“It was the needle that became a bowl of silver,” Fredriksson injected, referring to the old folk tale.
Mikael nodded and continued. Fredriksson leaned over and checked to make sure the miniature tape recorder on his desk was still going.
“Nineteen kronor. I didn’t want any of it, I was too scared, so Lennart and John divvied it up between them. Lennart was always fair with his brother. That was the problem for John-having a big brother who always shared. Did it start then? I don’t know.”
“Lennart and John were close?”
Mikael nodded.
“Did Lennart drag John into something?”
“It sounds plausible, of course, but I don’t think so. Lennart always protected his brother.”
“Maybe he involved him in something without being aware of it.”
Mikael looked doubtful.
“What could it have been, though? Lennart was a small-time guy.”
“Maybe he was on to something big this time,” Fredriksson said. “But okay, let’s leave it. I also wanted to ask you what you thought of John and Berit’s relationship. Were they happy together?”
Mikael snorted.
“Happiness?” he said. “That’s quite a word, but all right, I guess it applies to them.”
“No hanky-panky on the side?”
“Not in John’s case, I wouldn’t think. You know, they met when they were sixteen. I was actually there the first time they met; it was at a pool hall in Sivia. We hung out there almost all the time. One day Berit came by with a girlfriend. She fell for him immediately. He wasn’t like the rest of us, loud and all that. John was quiet, thoughtful. He could throw anyone off their stride, he was so quiet.”
“So you’re saying John and Berit have been faithful to each other for over twenty years.”
“When you put it like that it sounds crazy, but that’s how I saw it. I never heard him talk about other broads, and we talked about most things.”
There was a careful knock at the door and it opened. Riis looked in.
“I have a note for you, Allan,” he said, while looking the visitor up and down.
Fredriksson leaned over the desk and took the folded note, opened it, and read the short message from his colleague.
“I see,” he said and looked at Mikael. “You said that John and Berit hadn’t been in such good shape financially.”
“The last little while, yes.”
“Was that why you deposited ten thousand kronor into his account on the third of October?”
Mikael flushed a deep red again. He cleared his throat and Fredriksson again glimpsed an expression of fear in his eyes. Perhaps not fear exactly, more like anxiety. He knew it didn’t mean anything. Most people, especially those sitting in front of a desk at the police station, reacted that way on the subject of money. They could talk calmly about any number of unpleasant things, but invariably they grew nervous at the mention of money.
“No, not really. Things weren’t so good for me back in September. John stepped in with the ten thousand and I was paying him back.”
“Tell me what happened.”
“Like I said, I was short on cash and John offered to help out.”
“‘Help out.’ Ten thousand is pretty good for a man who’s unemployed.”
“I know, but he said it was no problem.”
“May I ask why you were short on cash? Were you in the habit of borrowing money from John?”
“It’s happened before, but not very often.”
“Why, then?”
“I’d been gambling. Roulette. That’s all.”
“And lost?”
“That’s how it goes, isn’t it?”
“Where was this?”
“A place called Baren Baren, if you know where that is.”
Fredriksson nodded.
“But then you got some money?”
“I was paid my salary. That was enough to take care of the loan. And then I lived cheap for the rest of October.”
“It was not the case, then, that you had borrowed more and the ten thousand was a first installment?”
“No, it wasn’t anything like that,” Mikael assured him.
“Did John say anything about how he was able to produce so much money without blinking an eye?”
“No.”
“It was not the case that you were supposed to perform a service for the money, but that you changed your mind and returned the cash?”
“No. What would that have been?”
“I don’t know,” Fredriksson said and carefully refolded the note. “When were you at Baren Baren?”
“I was there a lot.”
“John too?”
“Sometimes.”
“Did he gamble?”
“Yes, but never large amounts.”
“You wouldn’t call him a gambler?”
“No, not really. He was pretty careful.”
Fredriksson was silent for a moment.
“I know how it sounds, but I swear I’m telling you the truth.”
“It’s pretty normal for a friend to help out a friend,” Fredriksson said quietly, “but as you can understand, the picture changes when one of the two is murdered.”
With that, he ended the session.
Mikael tried to look relaxed but the air of openness at the beginning of the conversation had dissipated. He followed Fredriksson out without saying a word, and when they reached the last door, which the police officer held open for him, Mikael again assured him that it had all happened exactly as he’d said.
Fredriksson believed him, or rather, wanted to.
Fourteen
At three thirty Vincent Hahn stepped out onto the street, an extra two hundred kronor in his pocket. As always, it was like stepping out into a new world. People were new. The street that ran from the railway station down to the river had changed its character during the few hours he had spent inside the bingo hall. It looked more dignified, like a stately boulevard in a foreign country. The people around him seemed different from the ones he had left for the bingo hall’s warm retreat.
The feeling stayed with him for a minute or two, then the hostile voices returned, the shoves, and the looks. The linden trees no longer lined the street like leafy pillars but terrifying statues, black and cold, suggestive of funerals and death. He knew where this feeling came from, but did everything to suppress it, to avoid images of the graveyard where his parents lay buried.
Vincent Hahn was a bad man, and he knew it. If his mother and father could be brought back to life they would be horrified to see that their youngest child had become a misanthrope, a person who was suspicious of everyone and everything and who-and this was the worst-saw it as his task to revenge himself on those around him for their wrongdoings.
There could not be punishment enough for them. Hadn’t he suffered? But who cared? Everything simply kept going as if he didn’t exist. I’m here! he wanted to shout out to everyone on Bangårdsgatan, but he didn’t, and no one even so much as slowed down to pass him as they hurried on their way.
Air, he thought, I’m nothing but air to you. But this air will poison you, my breath will annihilate you, envelop you in death. He had made his decision. Now there was no fear, no hesitation.
He laughed out loud, checked his watch, and knew that he would begin this very evening. It was wonderful to finally have a plan, a meaning. A couple of retirees emerged from the bingo hall. Vincent nodded to them. To him they symbolized defeat. He didn’t want to stay with this thought because it led to both his source of strength and his weakness. The thoughts, memories. Until now they had held him down as an insignificant creature. He nodded to the old couple, loyal companions from the solitary community of the bingo hall, victims like himself. In some way he was sure they would understand. Living, but dead.
His bingo win made him strong, almost overconfident. He decided to go to a café. It would have to be the Güntherska. He could maintain his sense of control from the sofa in the corner.