‘What was it you wanted to tell me?’
There wasn’t much time. For anything. For nothing.
Alex had sent the digger back to Midsommarkransen to open up the grave so that the dogs would be able to pick up the scent of a body.
‘Let’s pray that you’re wrong,’ he had said to Fredrika.
She felt so powerless that she wanted to scream.
And Valter Lund, or Johan Aldrin, was waiting in another interview room.
Malena Bremberg sipped her tea as she struggled to find the right words.
‘I’m not sure what all this is about,’ she said eventually. ‘But I think I know something you ought to know too. Something about Rebecca Trolle.’
She took a deep breath and drank some more tea. Fredrika waited. Waited and listened.
‘Two years ago I had a brief relationship with an older man I met in a bar. Morgan Axberger.’
Fredrika was astonished.
‘But you’re so much younger than him!’
Malena blushed.
‘That was the point. The fact that he was forty years older than me. I know he looks boring, but he can be incredibly charming.’
Fredrika had no comment to make on that point; she had never met Morgan Axberger.
‘What did he want from you?’ she asked.
Malena’s face lost all trace of colour.
‘He wanted to know whether Thea Aldrin ever had visitors. At first I thought he was interested in me because… I thought he wanted a relationship with me. But that wasn’t what he wanted at all. He wanted a spy inside Mångården.’
‘He was just using you.’
‘When I realised what he was doing, I tried to break off our relationship. I refused to co-operate. But everything went wrong.’
It was too much for Malena. Huge tears rolled down her cheeks.
‘Which of Thea’s visitors was he interested in?’ Fredrika asked.
‘All of them. But she didn’t have many. There was a police officer, Torbjörn Ross, who’d been coming for years, plus the odd journalist now and again. Then suddenly Rebecca Trolle turned up. She said she wanted to speak to Thea because she was writing a dissertation about her.’
Malena blew her nose.
‘Did you tell Morgan Axberger that Rebecca had been there?’
‘Yes. I happened to be on duty that day.’
Fredrika swallowed hard. Morgan Axberger appeared to have good reason to stay away from the police. In addition, he was old enough to have murdered all the victims found in Midsommarkransen.
‘You said things went badly when you tried to break off your arrangement with Axberger?’ Fredrika said.
Malena’s tone was resigned.
‘He picked me up one morning when I was on my way to a lecture. By that time, I had realised he was dangerous, and I’d kept out of his way. But it was no good. He kept me prisoner for twenty-four hours.’
‘What did he do?’
Fresh tears. Then a whisper.
‘He showed me a film.’
Fredrika felt uncomfortable with the direction the conversation was taking, but she had to know.
‘What kind of film?’
‘A film from hell. One of those silent films that only lasts a few minutes.’
Fredrika held her breath.
‘At first I didn’t understand what I was watching. The film had been shot in a room where all the walls were covered with sheets. A young girl came in, then a man wearing a mask…’
Fredrika knew. Alex had told her about the film; she had decided against watching it herself.
Malena was sobbing.
‘He attacked her with an axe. Then a knife. I thought it was a sick joke. Until it was all over. Then the man bent over the girl, who was lying on the floor, and looked into the camera, at the person who was holding it. He was laughing when he took off the mask; it was just horrible. It was a really old film, but I could see the man’s face clearly. He was evil personified.’
Fredrika’s mouth went dry.
‘Hang on, are you telling me that after the girl was dead, the man who’d killed her took off his mask?’
Time stood still in the interview room.
Malena nodded.
‘I have no idea who he was. He grinned at the man who was holding the camera; he seemed really pleased with himself. When the film ended Morgan went out into the hallway, and when he came back he had an axe in his hand. I don’t think I’ve ever screamed so loudly in my entire life.’
She shuddered, her face chalk-white.
‘I ran, and he hunted me down like an animal. I tried to get out onto the balcony, but he was faster than me. He forced me down and swung the axe. It hit the floor several times, just a few centimetres from my head. I was convinced he was going to kill me. When he raised the axe for the last time, he suddenly stopped and leaned over me. Asked me whether I wanted to live or die. If I wanted to live, I had to keep my mouth shut and carry on working at the care home for as long as Thea Aldrin was alive. If I ever defied him again, he would come back. With the axe.’
Malena ran her hands through her tousled hair, and Fredrika thought that there must have been several copies of the snuff movie, including one that had been shortened in order to avoid revealing the identity of the perpetrator, and that could be shown to other people. Perhaps even sold.
‘You didn’t feel you could go to the police?’ Fredrika said.
‘Not under any circumstances. He made it very clear that the police would never be able to touch someone like him. Nobody would believe me if I said that Morgan Axberger had been in my apartment with an axe, threatening to kill me.’
True. Regrettable, but true.
Fredrika sensed that Malena had more to tell her.
‘He was filming me,’ Malena whispered.
‘Sorry?’
‘He showed me afterwards. He filmed me while I was watching the film, and when I tried to run away. How sick is that?’
Fredrika thought for a moment, giving Malena time to recover.
‘You’re going to have to testify against him, Malena.’
‘I know.’
‘One more thing.’ Fredrika glanced at her notes. ‘You said the killer smiled at the man behind the camera. Did you see him? The man who was holding the camera, I mean?’
‘No, I didn’t.’
‘But you’re sure it was a man?’
Malena nodded, and when she whispered her answer, Fredrika went cold.
‘Morgan told me. When he raised the axe for the last time, he leaned forward and said: “Now do you realise that I was the one holding the camera?”’
61
Peder Rydh left Jimmy’s room the same way as he assumed his brother had left: through the patio door. Leaving the care worker and Micke behind, he strode across the lawn to Thea Aldrin’s room. Thea didn’t have time to realise that he was coming to see her, otherwise she would probably have tried to lock him out.
She gave a start as he stepped inside.
‘You shouldn’t sit here with the door wide open, Thea.’
His voice sounded completely different from the one he normally used.
Thea was staring at him; she lowered the book she had been reading.
‘There are a few things you forgot to mention to me and my colleagues. If you can’t speak like a normal person, then you’re going to have to write. Because I’m not leaving here until you tell me what happened to my brother Jimmy. The boy who lived across the way; he came over to your window yesterday.’
When Thea still didn’t speak, Peder felt a spurt of white-hot rage. He grabbed the old woman by the shoulders and hauled her to her feet.
‘You. Will. Tell. Me.’
Thea made a feeble attempt to free herself, but she knew it was futile.
‘Tell me.’
Her silence decided the matter. He looked at her for a long time, then whispered:
‘We know who sends you flowers.’
The words had an immediate effect. Thea shook her head and tried once more to pull away.
But Peder held on tight.
‘Oh, yes, we know. We know that Valter Lund is your missing son, Johan. The only thing we don’t know, you old bitch, is what the fucker thinks he has to thank you for. Every bloody Saturday.’