He went on wearily.
‘It had never occurred to me that there was money to be made from Jakob’s activities, from hiding refugees. But I came to realise it must be possible, since the people who came over had paid so much for the trip itself, and I thought they must surely have assets with them when they got here. So I put the idea to a good friend… and we started up.’
He turned his head away to cough.
‘We hid the refugees in remote holiday cottages that we could rent at a cheaper price than they paid us.’
‘Did it bring in a lot of money?’ asked Peder.
‘Yes, but still not enough,’ Sven said sadly.
‘Who were you in partnership with?’ asked Stefan.
Another bit of information Sven was reluctant to reveal. And when the answer finally came, it was one they should have expected, but Peder realised he was still shocked.
‘Ragnar Vinterman.’
Stefan and Peder sat dumbfounded and wide-eyed as Sven stumbled on through his story.
‘Ragnar wanted to expand the operation because he needed even more money. He’d lost a lot on bad investments and property speculation abroad. But I felt, well, I felt I couldn’t support his new idea. So I said I was pulling out. It wasn’t just that I felt it was morally wrong, it was a damn risky proposition calling for a lot more people to be involved. Smugglers, reliable interpreters, document forgers.’
Sven lapsed into silence.
Peder sensed they were nearing a point in the story at which it was going to be harder to get any more out of Sven.
‘And how did Ragnar react when you said you wanted out?’
‘He was livid.’
‘What was the expanded operation that he was suggesting and you didn’t want to be in on?’
Anxiety and stress were taking over Sven’s body.
‘Refugee smuggling,’ he said.
Peder held his breath.
‘In a new way.’
‘What does that mean, “a new way”?’ Stefan demanded, but Peder kept his cool.
Here it comes, he was hoping. The last bit of our jigsaw puzzle.
And now Sven had started to talk, it was as if he could not stop, though he did navigate very skilfully round all the points where he should have provided more detail. Names, for example.
‘Ragnar thought it cost an appalling amount for a refugee to get from, say, Iraq or Somalia to Sweden, and that one ought to be able to lure in selected individuals by offering them an easier way of getting to Sweden.’
‘And the aim of that would be what?’ asked Stefan, looking sceptical. ‘It all sounds remarkably generous.’
A joyless laugh from Sven echoed round the interview room.
‘Generous,’ he repeated, looking irate. ‘Believe me, for a man of the cloth Ragnar Vinterman shows exceptionally poor understanding of what that word means. No, Ragnar’s plan was to entice individual refugees over here, who would get in on false documents and then commit crimes to order. Special, hand-picked individuals with a background in the military forces. Then they’d be sent home again, and no one would ever be able to catch the perpetrators of the crimes or trace their link to us.’
‘The security van robberies that have been keeping us busy in recent months,’ began Stefan, and Sven nodded eagerly.
Peder was familiar with the robberies. Minutely planned, and accompanied by violence that was in an entirely different league from the kind generally used in robberies like that.
‘I refused to be part of that hateful business, but when I saw the news reports of the robberies I realised it was up and running anyway.’
A new line creased Stefan’s brow.
‘You said the plan was to send the refugees home again?’
Sven nodded.
‘So why, in at least two cases, have they been found dead in the Stockholm area?’
‘I’ve no idea,’ said Sven, looking scared stiff.
‘You must have had contact with Ragnar Vinterman about this since,’ Peder persisted.
Sven nodded again.
‘But only when Ragnar came round to make sure I was going to keep my mouth shut. And when Yusuf rang me. He got my number from someone in the network who thought I was still part of it. Ragnar saw to all that.’
Something must have gone horribly wrong, Peder thought to himself as he totted up the grand total, the crescendo of violence and death that Ragnar Vinterman’s business had generated in the past two weeks.
‘What about Jakob Ahlbin, then?’ he asked. ‘Did he know any of this was going on?’
Sven met his gaze with a pained expression.
‘No, we didn’t tell him what we were starting. But I think…’
They waited.
‘I’m afraid he sniffed out the truth even so. And that naïve good-for-nothing evidently went to Ragnar and said he’d heard rumours that a new smuggling network had established itself in Sweden.’
‘A network supposedly much more generous than the rest,’ said Peder.
‘Exactly,’ said Sven.
‘And that set everything in motion,’ Stefan summarised.
‘I think that must be what happened,’ said Sven. ‘But I don’t know anything definitely.’
Stefan waited a moment and then tried again.
‘Who the heck was it that took your car, Sven?’
‘Don’t know.’
‘There’s not a cat in hell’s chance Ragnar did the whole thing on his own. Who else was with him?’ asked Peder.
But Sven’s mouth was sealed now, and the two interviewers realised they were coming to the end of the road.
‘If anybody’s threatened you…’ Peder began.
Sven closed up like a clam.
Peder decided to try a new tack.
‘According to the police report that was made at the time you and Elsie found Jakob and Marja’s bodies, an officer called Viggo Tuvesson was first on the scene. Why didn’t you tell us he was your son?’
‘It didn’t seem necessary,’ said Sven.
‘According to information we’ve recently received, Viggo went to Marja and Jakob’s after a call that you and Elsie made direct to his mobile. Why didn’t you ring the usual emergency number?’
Sven sighed.
‘It was so much easier to ring Viggo direct.’
‘Is he part of Ragnar Vinterman’s network?’ Peder asked bluntly, and Sven turned pale again.
‘I can’t imagine he would be,’ Sven said quietly, but both Peder and Stefan could see he was prevaricating.
Peder decided to pile on the pressure with another question.
‘Johanna or Karolina Ahlbin, then? Were either of them part of it?’
Sven shrank even further and turned even paler.
‘Another question I can’t answer,’ he said in a muted voice.
‘And Marja,’ persisted Peder, as it dawned on him what a ghastly situation must have confronted Jakob in the last hours of his life. ‘Was she in on it, too?’
Sven merely shook his head.
‘Who was it then, Sven?’ Peder said exasperatedly. ‘Who was it that murdered Marja and Jakob, or had them murdered?’
Silence.
With some effort, Peder found a gentler way of expressing himself.
‘Are you scared, Sven?’
The older man nodded mutely.
Then he sat back in his chair, saying nothing.
There were ways of getting information even without the cooperation of Sven Ljung. Going back over the analysis of telephone data the police had been working on throughout the investigation, new contacts could be established now that more telephone numbers had been identified. Marja had rung Ragnar Vinterman a number of times, even quite late at night when it seemed unlikely they were discussing work-related matters. And when new lists of traffic to and from Ragnar Vinterman’s number finally came in after an urgent request to his phone company, it was possible to link Vinterman both to the man killed outside the university and to Muhammad in Skärholmen, victim of the Sunday evening shooting.
Two telephone numbers to unregistered pay-as-you-go accounts recurred in all the telephone lists and this, combined with the fact that neither Johanna nor Karolina Ahlbin featured among the contacts, was a source of frustration to the team.