Alex: Through Peder’s work, we were able to link him to the film club. At that stage, we began to sense how everything hung together, but…
(Silence.)
Alex:… we were a long way from the truth.
Roger: And Fredrika Bergman?
Alex: Yes?
Roger: What happened with her partner, Spencer Lagergren?
Alex: We decided we needed to question him, but by that time the Uppsala police had already picked him up.
Urban: And how did you deal with the fact that she had withheld important information from the rest of the team?
Alex: I discussed the matter with her and concluded that her actions had had no impact on the investigation.
Urban: No impact? How the hell do you work that out? She withheld crucial information!
Alex: That information was insignificant. We were able to eliminate Lagergren from our inquiries.
Roger: But you couldn’t possibly have known that from the beginning, could you? And what about Peder’s brother? Had he been reported missing at that stage?
Alex: It all happened at the same time. There was absolute bloody chaos. Jimmy had called Peder earlier and told him that he’d seen someone peering in through the window of the building opposite.
Roger: And how did Peder react to that?
Alex: He didn’t. Jimmy is… I mean, he was just the way he was. He had certain difficulties. When he said someone was standing in the flowerbed spying on one of the neighbours, Peder didn’t take it seriously.
Urban: Until you realised who the neighbour was.
(Silence.)
Roger: Was Peder still adopting a balanced approach at this stage?
Alex: He remained calm and professional throughout the entire investigation.
Urban: Except at the end. I mean, that’s why we’re sitting here now.
Alex: Like hell we are. We’re sitting here because you haven’t got enough to do, so you go after decent coppers.
WEDNESDAY
49
In the world of fairy tales, the bond between brothers was sacred. Peder Rydh’s mother had never let him forget that. His childhood was enveloped in warm memories of Peder and Jimmy sitting on her knee while she read them story after story about young boys battling everything from dragons to illness. Only when Peder was older did he realise that her words of wisdom were meant for him. It was Peder, not Jimmy, who would grow up and become the stronger one. The one who protected, took responsibility.
The evening when Peder heard that his brother was missing, everything came crashing down. Not during the first few hours, but later. As time passed, as darkness fell over the city, as it became clear that Jimmy hadn’t just gone off on one of his usual tours of the complex and happened to end up in the wrong block. When everyone realised that Jimmy was actually missing, the ground beneath Peder’s feet opened up and he plunged into an abyss he hadn’t even known existed.
He didn’t realise what had happened to him until later, when it was all over and nothing could be undone. Ylva saw it right from the start, and did everything in her power to save him. Without success. She had never been more powerless in her entire life.
After the initial call from the assisted-living complex, Ylva rang her mother and asked her to come and look after the boys. She and Peder went over to the complex and searched the area, along with the staff and Peder’s parents. They called Jimmy’s name over and over again. Peder felt as if their shouts were embedded in his brain, a recurring echo that just wouldn’t go away. Then he called the police and reported his brother missing.
Peder knew all too well how this worked. Police resources were not unlimited; it was always a question of priorities. When someone rang and said that his brother, an adult with learning difficulties, was missing from a gated complex on the outskirts of town, other cases would be regarded as more urgent. That was how he would have reacted, and that was how his colleagues reacted.
‘We’ll find him before the night is over,’ said the officer who was first on the scene.
How could he have known right from the start? Peder asked himself later. How come his heart had been screaming with fear all the time, even though Jimmy had gone missing before, and always turned up safe and sound?
‘Is he in the habit of going off on his own?’ his colleague asked.
Not often. It did happen, but it was rare. On one particularly harrowing occasion, Jimmy had managed to catch a bus into the city centre, and had been found on Sergels torg, where he was happily smoking a cigarette that a group of junkies had given him.
Peder had nearly blown it that time; the anxiety that had been building up during the hours while Jimmy was missing had culminated in a blind rage, and he had beaten up one of the junkies. He would never have survived an investigation by internal affairs if the guy had reported him. But he hadn’t, and after a few months the memory of the incident began to fade.
When morning came, Jimmy was still missing. The sunlight hurt Peder’s eyes. In the darkness, he had felt protected, but now there was nothing but pure fear.
‘We need to go home and sleep for a few hours,’ Ylva said as they drove back into the car park at the Mångården complex after driving around, up and down one street after another, searching for Jimmy. Their eyes had scanned the area like laser beams, desperate for Jimmy to appear.
She stroked Peder’s back, but he pulled away.
‘I’m not going anywhere.’
‘We’re no use right now,’ she said. ‘We’re both completely exhausted. It’s better to let the police keep looking.’
‘I am the police, in case you’ve forgotten.’
Ylva didn’t say anything.
‘We’ll find him, you know. It’s only a question of time before he turns up.’
But other images filled Peder’s head. Some people disappeared and never came back. Rebecca Trolle. Elias Hjort. The unknown woman who had lain in the ground for forty years. He felt as if his chest would explode with panic. The mere thought of life without Jimmy was unbearable.
Please God, give me a grave to visit.
Ylva shifted by his side.
‘I have to go home. Get some sleep. I’ll call work and tell them I won’t be in today.’
Peder looked out of the car window.
‘I think it would be best if you stayed at home,’ he said. ‘Jimmy might decide to go round to our place, and there has to be someone there that he knows.’
They both knew it was impossible for Jimmy to get to their apartment under his own steam. But hope is the last thing we give up, so Ylva raised no objections to Peder’s suggestion.
‘Will you be back later?’
‘I’ll call you.’
His tone was brusque, his gaze fixed on some distant point. She gently caressed his cheek. Peder hardly felt it. Nothing existed but the search for his brother.
The bed had never felt as big as it did now. Fredrika woke with the feeling that she hadn’t slept a wink. Her body felt heavy and weary. She rolled over, stroking the empty space where Spencer ought to be. The hot tears were unstoppable. She suddenly thought back to her encounter with Tova Eriksson, and pulled the covers up over her head. Had she irrevocably destroyed something by going to see the girl who was literally responsible for having Spencer locked up? She remembered Alex’s words and warnings; she knew she had been wrong to ignore them.
She raised her head from the pillow and wiped away the tears. There was no room for a mental collapse right now. She had to keep going, for the sake of Saga and Spencer if nothing else.
It was six o’clock. The day lay before her like a deserted motorway. Should she go to work? Or – to put it more accurately – could she bear to stay at home? The answer to that question was no. She had to go back to work, keep an eye on the efforts that were being made to ascertain whether Spencer had a part to play in a murder investigation. And she had to do her best to get the Uppsala police to release him.