Missing

'Roger Larsson.'

His colleague pushed a red button on a tape-recorder and checked that it was recording. Then he nodded.

Interrogation of Sibylla Forsenström on the third of April 1999, starting at 8.45 a.m. Present in the room are the charged woman, Sergeant Mats Lundell and Inspector Roger Larsson.'

Larsson turned to her.

'You are Sibylla Forsenström?'

She nodded.

'I must insist that you answer every question loudly and clearly.' 'Yes, I am.'

'Tell us what you are doing in Vimmerby.'

She stared at the moving wheels in the tape-recorder, while they were observing her intently. Someone knocked briskly on the door and a woman came in carrying a sheet of paper, which she handed to Roger Larsson. He read it quickly and put it away on the desk, text-side down. Then he looked at her again.

I didn't do it.'

'Didn't do what?'

The question had been immediate. She was very tired and hungry. Her thoughts seemed to go all over the place. Now she had led them on to the right track.

It's the man called Ingmar who's the murderer.'

The two men exchanged knowing glances, almost smiling at each other.

'Do you mean Ingmar Eriksson? A hospital porter, resident here in Vimmerby. He was hospitalised last night, after turning up in casualty with his right hand crushed and a nail file stuck in one eye. Is that the Ingmar you've got in mind?'

By the end of all this, he sounded angry. She looked down at her hands. If she moved them to hide the chain between them, the cuffs looked like two silver bracelets. The man called Roger was putting an object on the table in front of her.

'Why did you carry this about in your jacket pocket?'

Inside a plastic bag was the crucifix. She found it hard to speak.

'He gave it to me. HE was going to murder me.' 'Why?'

'To make me take the blame.' 'Blame for what?' She sighed.

'Everything. He had a relationship with Rune Hedlund.' One corner of Roger Larsson's mouth was twitching.

'Who?'

'Rune Hedlund. He died in a car accident on the fifteenth of March last year.'

The men exchanged glances again. Neither said anything, but she realised what they were thinking. This woman was obviously deranged. Maybe they were right.

Moon or no moon, God had never been on her side.

'Phone Patrik. He knows that I didn't do it.'

'Who is Patrik?'

'Patrik… eh…'

She could not remember his surname. It had been on the door to their flat, but the memory had faded.

'His mother is in the police. They live on Sagar Street. South End.'

'South End in Stockholm – is that what you mean?'

Another knock on the door. The same woman came in with a new piece of paper. There were two curious faces peering in through the door behind her. Roger Larsson read what was on the paper, nodded and checked the time.

'Interrogation stopped at 9.03 a.m.'

Sibylla closed her eyes.

'We'll have a break now. Do you want to wait here or in a cell?'

She could barely keep her eyes open. Her whole being felt exhausted.

'Is there a bed in the cell?' 'Yes.'

'The cell, please.'

Hours passed without anything happening. The bunk was hard and she slept only in fits and starts. One longer period of sleep was more like a restless semi-conscious state, marred by obsessive dreaming about being chased and desperately trying to escape in slow motion from an invisible enemy.

They gave her food, but no one told her what they were all waiting for. She was too tired to ask. She was less troubled by the locked door than she had feared. It was actually quite nice just to lie there, freed from all responsibility. She had done her best, really done very well, if truth be told. But she had failed and all she could do now was accept her failure. They had won and she had lost.

That was all there was to it.

Later that afternoon, Roger Larsson came to see her. He told her that they were waiting to hear from the National Criminal Investigation Bureau in Stockholm. She had nothing to say to that. It seemed she must be thought such a hardened criminal that she was outside the remit of the sad little Vimmerby force. The elite team was coming to the rescue.

'You have the right to request a solicitor.'

'I haven't done anything wrong.'

He shrugged and went to the door.

'I think you'd better change your tune.'

Then he left her alone.

A little later, a man in his fifties came to see her. He seemed agitated, either terrified or under great stress. He dumped his briefcase on the table in the cell.

'My name is Kjell Bergstrom.'

She sat up, but her face contorted with pain. Her broken rib was announcing that it would rather she stayed horizontal.

'I'll be your legal advisor until further notice. They'll presumably move you to Stockholm soon, and find you someone else to help you there. Your father is dead, did you know that?'

She stiffened.

'What did you say?'

Kjell Bergstrom pulled a sheet of paper from his briefcase. 'This is a fax that's just come in from a colleague in Vetlanda. They heard the news that you had been captured.' She responded quickly. 'I didn't do it.'

He lost his bustling show of efficiency and looked at her for the first time.

'It was a heart attack. Two years ago.'

Heart attack. Sibylla tested what it felt like. It didn't seem to matter in the slightest to her that Henry Forsenström had been dead for two years. As far as she was concerned, he had been dead for a very long time.

'My contact Krister Ek, the executor and a very good man, tells me that your mother, Beatrice Forsenström, believed for years that you were dead. When your father died, she appealed to have you declared dead officially. It was just about to be passed when you got in the news as wanted by the police.'

Sibylla realised that she was smiling. The corners of her mouth were irresitibly pulled upwards, even though there was no real reason.

'She thought I was dead, did she? So that was why she kept sending me fifteen hundred kronor every month for the last fifteen years? To this dead person?'

It was Kjell Bergstrom's time to be surprised.

'Did she, indeed?'

'Until last week.'

'Remarkable. Quite… remarkable.' Yes, isn't it?

Bergstrom studied his fax again.

'As you surely know, your father had quite considerable assets. He left an inheritance that according to the law must be divided equally between his spouse and any direct descendants. On the face of it, it's hard to escape the conclusion that your mother has been attempting to deprive you of your share.'

Sibylla felt like laughing out loud. Something was breaking inside, pushed apart by feelings that wanted release. She tried to control herself, burying her face in her hands and letting soundless laughter shake her body.

'I understand this must be difficult for you.'

Sibylla peered at him between her fingers. So, he thought she was weeping. Poor man, he was standing there utterly nonplussed by the problem of dealing with a serial killer, who was crying because her father had died. It made her want to laugh again. Her rib was aching dreadfully, causing tears to come to her eyes. When she sensed that her eyes were overflowing, she pulled herself together sufficiently to risk taking her hands away from her face.

He felt he had better try to comfort her.

'You mustn't worry. The law is your side.'

This was too much. Her control cracked and new laughter welled up. She made snorting noises, holding her hands to her sides to dampen the pain.

The law was on her side!

She had just become a millionaire, but would go straight into prison to serve life for four brutal murders, which she had not committed.

Presumably God was pleased with His handiwork – if He was looking her way, that is. Now He and Ingmar could relax and live together happily ever after, just contemplating their successes from time to time.