“Doris Peterzén. Nils is my husband.” Only a slight tremble in her voice betrayed her feelings.
Irene observed this self-possessed woman. She and Doris were about the same height, slightly less than six feet, unusually tall. She was around fifty and was dressed very fashionably. She was definitely beautiful even with no makeup and after much crying. Her hair was a discreet platinum, probably the work of a skillful stylist, and it surrounded a perfectly formed face without a wrinkle or blemish. She had grayish blue eyes and dark lashes. Irene vaguely recognized her face but couldn’t place it. She wore a blue coat with a black fur collar and a matching fur hat.
“Your husband was put on a respirator yesterday after his operation,” Irene began.
“I know. Dr. Löwander called and told me himself. Nils was aware that might happen. He’d quit smoking ten years ago, but after the fifty years before.… His lungs.… We.… Dr. Löwander believed that he’d survive the operation. It was absolutely necessary, because the arterial hernia was large.”
“How old was your husband?”
“Eighty-three.”
Doris Peterzén returned to the foot of the bed where her husband lay. She bowed her head and began to weep softly again.
At that moment the door burst open and a young nurse, her face flushed red with hurry, rushed in. A shock of short blond hair stood up on her head.
“Have they come yet?” she asked Nurse Ellen in an agitated voice.
A frown appeared on the older nurse’s brow. “No,” she answered severely.
Irene wondered who “they” might be, but her unasked question was answered immediately as two men in matching black suits came through the doorway right behind the blond nurse. They pushed a gurney between them, a dark gray bag with a zipper draped over the top.
Nurse Ellen said softly to Doris Peterzén, “The men from the funeral home are here.”
When Doris caught sight of the men, her weeping intensified. Nurse Ellen put an arm around her and led her out through the double doors. She was probably taking the recent widow into her office, Irene thought, but she stayed put to talk further with the young ICU nurse.
Nils Peterzén’s body was lifted onto the bag spread over the rolling table and zipped into it, and the men disappeared again through the doors as quickly as they’d come.
Irene walked over to one of the two windows in the ICU unit overlooking the large park and parking lot. She rested her forehead on the cool windowpane and watched as the gurney was rolled out through the back entrance toward the funeral home’s dark gray station wagon. The entire process took less than a blink of the eye, a journey no one would have noticed.
Irene decided to look through the same door the undertakers had just used. The red exit box over it was brightly lit. The door itself was heavy and steel-coated, with automatic door openers on each side. Irene could see that this area was part of a later addition to the hospital. Here there were no fancy art nouveau embellishments. The stairs were wide and made from common stone. An ordinary iron handrail was fastened to one of the cream-colored walls. The stairway curved around an elevator shaft whose gray metal door was marked bed elevator in black letters.
Irene closed the door again. Nurse Anna-Karin, whose flushed cheeks had had no time to fade, was frenetically stripping the bed Nils Peterzén’s body had occupied only three minutes earlier. She started to stuff the bedclothes into a laundry bag.
Irene cleared her throat. “Anna-Karin, do you have a moment?” she asked. “I need to talk to you. My name is Irene Huss. I’m a criminal inspector, and this is about the murder of your colleague, Marianne Svärd.”
The nurse stiffened and whirled around to face Irene. “I don’t have time. The first polys are coming soon.”
“Polys? What’s that?”
“Oh, the patients from the polyclinic who’ve just had their operations. Today two colons and one gastro. And later today a rhino. It’s crazy to do a rhino on a day like this.”
Irene puzzled through the jargon. The young nurse was stressed and scattered. Not so strange considering that her colleague had been murdered the night before. Probably a bit of shock as well. Irene went to the nurse and put a hand on her shoulder.
“I still have to talk to you for a moment. For Marianne’s sake,” she said calmly.
Nurse Anna-Karin stood still, and her shoulders dropped. She nodded in resignation. “All right. Let’s go sit down at the registration desk.”
At the desk Anna-Karin gestured for Irene to take the chair while she herself sat on the stainless-steel stool.
Irene began, “I know that your first name is Anna-Karin. Could you please tell me your last name and your age?”
“My whole name is Anna-Karin Arvidsson. I’m twenty-five.”
“How long have you worked at Löwander Hospital?”
“About a year and a half.”
“So you’re about as old as Marianne and you’ve been here about the same length of time. Did you hang out together after work?”
Anna-Karin looked surprised. “Not at all.”
“Never?”
“No. Well, once we went out dancing. Marianne, Linda, and me.”
“When was this?”
“About a year ago.”
“And you never were out together with her again?”
“No, except for the holiday party. The entire staff is invited to a Christmas smorgasbord right before we close for the holidays.”
“Did you know Marianne well?”
“No.”
“What did you think of her?”
“Nice. A little shy.”
“Do you know anything about her personal life?”
The nurse needed a moment to think. “Not much. I knew she was divorced. They separated right before she started working here.”
“Do you know anything about her ex-husband?”
“No. Except he’s a lawyer.”
“Did she have children?”
“No.”
“Where did she work before she came to Löwander Hospital?”
“Östra Hospital. Also in their ICU.”
“Do you know why she changed jobs after her divorce?”
Anna-Karin thought about this. She dragged her fingers through her blond stubble a number of times. “She never said, but I got the feeling she was trying to stay away from some guy.”
“Who?”
“No idea. But that one time when we all went out dancing, we met at my place first for a bite to eat and a little wine. I asked Marianne why she’d quit her job at Östra, and she said, ‘I couldn’t stand meeting him every day and pretending there was nothing wrong.’ But she didn’t want to talk about it any longer.”
“Did Marianne spend more time with Linda?”
“No. Linda and I hang out together all the time.”
“Does Linda also work ICU?”
“No, she’s in the care ward.”
“But not right now.”
“No, Ellen works here for the morning shift.”
“Do you know when Linda will be coming in to work?”
“She starts the evening shift, at two o’clock.”
They were interrupted when the steel-plated door opened and a rolling bed with a still-slightly-groggy patient was wheeled in. An operating-room nurse wearing a green uniform, a paper cap, and a mask said mechanically, “First colon. The gastro will be here soon.”
Nurse Anna-Karin flew from the stool. Both nurses flipped busily through the paperwork, mumbling to each other over the drowsy patient.
Irene decided it was time to find Nurse Ellen and Doris Peterzén.
IRENE FOUND THE recent widow in the empty nurses’ office. Doris Peterzén sat ramrod straight, her fingers laced in her lap. She’d taken off her hat and placed it on the desk but kept on her elegant coat. Irene paused in the doorway for a moment, considering whether she should question Doris Peterzén now or wait awhile. Perhaps it was too soon. On the other hand, Irene felt that Doris had the right to know about the events of the night before.