He rested his head in his hands and felt the gaze of others in the room. He should start playing. John was close-by. A neutral picture, without expression or clarity.
“You died,” he mumbled. Soon it would be Janne’s turn, or someone else. Vincent could no longer remember the rankings of the list he had drawn up. The picture of John in his mind was replaced by his father’s. He had woken up too late! When the time came for revenge, his father had disappeared into illness, the worms eating away at him until he was just a skeleton. Vincent remembered the thin hand gripping the hospital bed railing. He had taken it and squeezed it as hard as he could. His father had cried out, looked at him with watery eyes, and understood. Then he had smiled his satanic smile, the smile that seduced the women around him, and charmed the world, but Vincent knew better.
The picture in the paper of his father smiled at him and he tried to hit it. One of the bingo hall employees came over to him.
“You’ll have to go,” he said. “You’re disturbing the others.”
The voice was not unkind.
“I’ll go,” Vincent said submissively. “But my head hurts so much.” He pulled off his cap and revealed the makeshift bandage over the wound.
“What did you do?”
“My daddy hit me.”
“Your father did this?”
Vincent nodded.
“And my brother too.”
He stood up.
“I have to go now.”
“You should see a doctor,” the employee said.
“My father was a doctor, or something like that. Mommy spoke mainly German. She was Jewish and he a Nazi. Or communist, maybe. No, that can’t be. They’re red and Daddy was black.”
“Your father was black?”
Vincent staggered out onto the street. Bangårdsgatan was like a wind tunnel where the snow was swept along with a howling sound. People steeled themselves against the wind, pulling shawls, scarves, and hats more tightly around them. The sounds of their footsteps were muffled by the snow. An ambulance drove by. Then a series of trucks obscured the view. He wanted to be able to see farther and made his way to the river.
Twenty-nine
Lennart Jonsson was exhausted. It was half past four and dark outside as well as in the apartment. He let the apartment remain in darkness while he took off his clothes and let them fall in a pile. He was covered in dried sweat but it was not an unpleasant feeling. He brushed his hand over his hairy chest, across his left shoulder and left forearm. Some of his old musculature remained. He scratched his crotch and felt a stirring sensation of lust.
His back ached but he was so used to it that he hardly noticed it. He had some pills for arthritis relief left and decided to take one. On his way to the bathroom he noticed an unfamiliar scent. He stopped and sniffed. Perfume, an unmistakable smell of perfume.
He looked around. Someone had been in his apartment. Was the person still here? He snatched his pants up and started walking to the kitchen with the idea of finding something to defend himself with. Was he mistaken? No, the smell was undeniably here. Was it the scent of a woman or a man? He remained alert for any sounds.
He tiptoed into the kitchen, carefully pulled out a drawer, and took out a bread knife.
“Put it down,” he heard a voice say, “or you’ll regret it.”
The voice came from somewhere in the kitchen and Lennart realized that someone was sitting at the kitchen table. He recognized the voice but couldn’t place it in his confused state. He judged the threat as serious and didn’t hesitate in throwing down the knife.
“Who the hell are you?”
“I think it’s time you turned on the light.”
Lennart quickly pulled on his pants, then turned and switched on the light. Mossa was sitting at the table, a pistol laid out in front of him.
“You? What the hell-”
“Sit down. We need to talk.”
Lennart did as he was told. He sensed what was coming.
“It wasn’t me,” he said, and the Iranian smiled mockingly.
“That’s what they always say,” he said and took up the gun. “Tell me instead who ran straight to the cops.”
“Not me, in any case,” Lennart said. “Do you think I’m stupid?”
“Yes,” Mossa said. “Stupid enough to try to win their favor. You thought the cops would help you. I think you are stupid enough for that. I trusted you. We talked about your brother. I liked your brother, but I don’t like you.”
“Someone else must have squealed. Someone who played that night.”
He didn’t want to say what he thought, that Micke had told the police what he knew. But could he have known the names of the players? John might have told him, but it wasn’t likely. He kept quiet about such things.
“Stop giving me lies. You don’t believe it yourself,” Mossa said. “You turned me in. I couldn’t care less about the others, but no one runs to the cops with my name, you understand?”
Lennart nodded.
“I get it, I do, but it really wasn’t me. I want to do this on my own, you know that. That’s why I looked for you.”
“In order to have something to barter with.”
“You have a brother, Mossa. You love him, you should get it. I’m doing everything I can to find the guy who killed John.”
“Don’t mix Ali in this.”
“He is a brother. John was a brother.”
Mossa sat quietly and seemed to weigh his words.
“I think you are a shit,” he said finally and stood up, the gun still in his hand. “Put on a shirt. I don’t want to shoot a man with a bare chest.”
“Kill me then, you dumb bastard. Do you think I give a fuck?” Lennart said belligerently and looked at Mossa with defiance.
Mossa smiled.
“You really are stupid, aren’t you?”
“Did you kill John?”
The Iranian shook his head and raised the gun so it pointed at Lennart’s knees.
“It wasn’t me,” Lennart said with sweat running down his face.
In a way he felt relieved. He had experienced this sensation before, one night when his drinking had led to an episode of heart palpitations. That time he had been prepared to die, had made peace with his shitty existence. He had gotten up, drunk some water and looked at himself in the mirror, and then gone back to bed with his heart jumping around in his chest.
Mossa raised the gun a few centimeters.
“You remind me of an Armenian I once knew,” Mossa said. “He also met his death with courage.”
Lennart sank to his knees.
“Plant the bullet in my skull,” he said and closed his eyes.
Mossa lowered his gun, kicked Lennart in the mouth, and leaned over him.
“If you want to play the detective, then go talk to his whore for a wife,” he hissed and left the apartment. Lennart, who had fallen down when he was kicked, lay still on the floor until he started shivering with cold.
Twenty minutes later, Lennart had managed to take a warm shower and wrap himself up in a sheet. The kick had busted his lip and he had to tape it up to stop the bleeding. He jumped when the front doorbell rang. He had forgotten all about Lindell stopping by.
He opened the door, prepared for anything, until he saw the stroller.
“What the fuck?” he said and backed up into the apartment.
They sat down in the living room.
“What happened to you?”
“I slipped at work,” Lennart said. “The shovel caught me right here.”
“You don’t have any Band-Aids?”
“Tape works fine.”
All the air had gone out of him. The early morning, the work in the snow, Mossa’s unexpected visit, and the warm shower had so drained him that he could hardly keep his eyes open. If Lindell hadn’t been sitting there he would have fallen asleep in a minute.
“You said something about a lead,” Lindell said. “Why didn’t you say anything to Sammy Nilsson?”
“Like I said, I don’t care for him. He’s too cocky, comes on too strong.”