Malin laughs.
The masts of the yachts in the lock are sticking up above the stone edge like poles, swaying back and forth and giving the illusion of a dying wind, only there is no wind. In the background Malin can see the yellow wooden façade of the lock-keeper’s cottage, and opposite her, in the shade of the parasol outside the canalside café bar in Vreta Kloster, sits Viktoria Solhage, smiling, a warm smile that softens her thin face framed by her long blonde hair.
The morning meeting hadn’t taken long.
She told them about her meeting with Nathalie Falck.
Otherwise there was nothing to report, nothing new from Karin and Forensics. Their colleagues in Mjölby had checked up on their sex offender, Fredrik Jonasson. His mother could give him an alibi.
They agreed that Malin should talk to Viktoria Solhage alone. Woman to woman.
The phone call to Viktoria Solhage. She hadn’t sounded at all put out.
‘Let’s meet at the canal café bar by the lock at a quarter past ten. I get Sundays off. I live out in Ljungsbro, and it’s a nice bike ride along the towpath. But I haven’t got long. I have to head up to the forest fire later, we’ve all been called in.’
Now the former football star is sitting in front of Malin and talking about the end of one part of her career and the start of the next. Viktoria Solhage was the first female firefighter in the city. Her appointment was controversial, and Malin remembers what Janne said at the time: ‘OK. She passed the tests. But how do I know if she’ll be able to carry me if I pass out in a sudden burst of smoke?’
She’s probably stronger than ninety per cent of the men in the service, Malin thinks as she looks at Viktoria Solhage’s bulging muscles.
‘Pull, for God’s sake, can’t you see that we’re going to hit the edge?’
‘I am fucking pulling!’
Voices from one of the boats in the lock.
Coffee and ice cream in the shade of a parasol, it would have been lovely if the temperature wasn’t already thirty-five degrees in the shade.
‘Janne called, like I said. I was annoyed at first, but what the hell, the important thing here is that no more young girls get raped, isn’t it?’
Viktoria Solhage screws up her nose, then her face becomes expressionless as she waits for Malin’s questions.
‘What do you think,’ Malin says. ‘Is there anyone in the city’s lesbian community who seems particularly aggressive?’
‘I daresay we can all be a bit aggressive, but that much . . .’ Viktoria Solhage shakes her head. ‘Dyke is synonymous with aggression to you lot, isn’t it?’
Malin feels herself blushing. Wants to put her sunglasses on and look away.
‘No, but you know how it is,’ Malin says.
‘How is it? Tell me.’
Malin gives Viktoria Solhage a beseeching look before going on: ‘There’s no one with particularly problematic baggage? Any childhood traumas that you know about? Anyone who was raped?’
‘No, most people keep that sort of thing to themselves, don’t they?’
‘But?’
‘Well, sometimes things can get a bit rough in bed, like they can for anyone. If only you knew. And sure, some girls fight with each other when they’re drunk, competing to see who can be toughest.’
‘Does anything ever get reported?’
‘No, we mostly keep things to ourselves. Maybe if someone went way over the line, but even then most of us would keep quiet. But everyone’s like that, aren’t they? No one calls the pigs . . . sorry, the police, unless they have to.’
‘Why do you think that is?’
‘As far as we’re concerned, I know why. The police don’t give a damn about what a few dykes do to each other, Malin Fors. There’s a deep mistrust of the police, you ought to know that.’
‘But you can’t think of anyone who’s been in a bad way, anyone who’s been unusually violent?’
Viktoria Solhage looks down into her coffee cup.
Takes a deep breath.
You want to say something, Malin thinks. But Viktoria Solhage hesitates, turns to look at the canal and the lock, and the gates that are slowly closing again.
‘Can you imagine being stuck in a little ditch like that all summer?’
‘You were about to say something, weren’t you?’
‘Okay.’
Viktoria Solhage turns to face Malin.
‘There is one girl,’ she says. ‘She seems to be dragging a lot of shit around, and there’s gossip about her being particularly violent. There’s a hell of a lot of rumours about what she went through as a child. If I were you, I’d probably take a look at her.’
‘What’s her name?’
Viktoria Solhage looks down at her cup again. Then she pulls out a pen and paper from her handbag, writes down a name, address and phone number.
‘Look,’ she says, pointing at the canal. ‘There they go.’
Malin turns around.
Sees the yachts in the next section of the canal, heading for the lock that leads to the little lake halfway down towards Lake Roxen.
‘Once they’re out in the Roxen,’ Malin says as she turns around again, ‘they’ll be free of the ditch. Good for them, eh?’
Viktoria Solhage smiles.
‘The canal isn’t called the divorce ditch without reason.’
Malin puts the piece of paper in the front pocket of her trousers.
‘Thank you,’ she says. ‘One last thing. Does the name Nathalie Falck mean anything to you?’
Viktoria Solhage shakes her head and says: ‘Promise me one thing, Malin. Don’t let this business turn into something that reinforces the image of lesbians as macho idiots.’
‘I promise,’ Malin says.
‘In Stockholm, at any rate in the centre of the city, people are very tolerant about the way other people want to live, but out here in the country it’s different. Most people have never even met anyone that they know is homosexual. You can imagine how much fun it would be if the city got the idea you were hunting a lesbian killer.’
‘I’ve got something we should follow up.’
Zeke’s voice hoarse over the mobile.
Malin has just waved goodbye to Viktoria Solhage, who disappeared along the towpath up towards Ljungsbro, and is now cursing her stupidity. The place where she left the car is no longer in shadow, and the sun is now baking its dark-blue frame.
It must be at least a hundred degrees in there.
And the damn light is cutting right through her sunglasses and seems to have made giving her a headache its only goal.
‘What did you say?’
As she says the words a dust-cloud drifts past, making her cough.
‘I’ve got something we should look into.’
‘What?’
No answer, instead: ‘Did you get anything from Solhage?’
‘A name. We’ll have to check her out. And you?’
‘I got a text message from an anonymous sender.’
‘We get those every day.’
‘Don’t try to be funny, Malin.’
Then Zeke reads aloud from his mobile.
‘Check Paul Anderlöv. A very unfortunate man.’
Silence.
So Hasse did it: ignored the law on confidentiality.
She hadn’t thought that he would.
‘Who do you think sent it?’ Malin asks.
Zeke snorts.
‘That’s something neither you nor I want to know. But I’m not stupid, Malin.’
‘So you know what it’s about?’
‘Yes. Like I said, I’m not stupid.’
The Volvo is hotter than a sauna.
A very unfortunate man.
Bloody hell, Malin thinks. Is this right? Shouldn’t he be left in peace?