‘No, there’s no registered activity after eight in the morning,’ Peder said, thinking it over.
‘Okay, doesn’t matter,’ said Fredrika. ‘We know that at ten he was in Kalmar, ringing his mother, at any rate. We can assume that by then the whole thing was over and he was on his way home.’
She looked at Peder.
‘In that case, he can’t have taken Lilian from the train,’ she said, summing up what they had just pieced together. ‘Not unless he was in a car on his way to Kalmar at the same time.’
Peder squirmed.
‘Or,’ he said, ‘it could have been that he decided to arrive at the “event” late and took Lilian with him.’
Fredrika shook her head.
‘Well,’ she said, ‘it could have been. But wouldn’t that make it a very muddled story? First he has to take Lilian and get her into the car. Then he drives down to Kalmar and… goes to some sort of sick club, or whatever you want to call it. Then he drives back home with Lilian, scalps her, sends the hair to her mum, murders her and gets someone to drive up and dump her at the entrance to Umeå Hospital? The records from Tele2 say the phone wasn’t active north of Stockholm during the period in question, don’t they?’
Peder drew himself up. Fredrika could see that the new information was stressing him out.
‘Correct,’ he acknowledged, ‘and it certainly does sound a bit too much when you put it like that.’
He thought for a moment and then thumped his fist on Fredrika’s desk.
‘Fuck it,’ he said, ‘everything’s happening too fast in this goddamned mess! How the heck did he manage it all? It just doesn’t fit! Maybe he gave his phone to someone else?’
Fredrika put her head on one side and looked briefly into the distance over Peder’s shoulder. She thought she could hear Alex out in the corridor.
‘Or,’ she said slowly, ‘it could be that these two stories have nothing to do with each other.’
Alex Recht left Umeå just after four. Lilian Sebastiansson’s body was to be flown air freight down to Stockholm later that evening.
‘Let’s hope you find that evil person before he murders any more children,’ Hugo Paulsson said darkly as he took his leave of Alex.
‘Murders more children?’ repeated Alex.
‘Yes, why should he stop now? If he sees that he can get away with it, I mean,’ said his colleague.
That little conversation hardly did anything to dispel Alex’s sense of disquiet.
He landed in Stockholm an hour or so later and went straight back to HQ.
Fredrika, Peder, Ellen, the National Crime Squad analyst and two people Alex had never seen before, but assumed to be the new backup staff, were waiting for him in the Den.
‘Well, my friends,’ began Alex as he sat down. ‘Where shall we start?’
It was late. He wanted a short, efficient meeting. Then he wanted to go home and think the case through, undisturbed.
‘What do we know? Let’s start there.’
Most of the information that had come to light that day had already been shared among the team members by telephone. Alex had not, however, heard the latest details about Gabriel Sebastiansson’s email and telephone activities. He saw Peder and Fredrika exchange a few quick looks when he asked someone – anyone, as long as they were quick – to update him on that point. Then he would run through what little he had not already told them about what had happened in Umeå.
Peder gathered his thoughts for a moment and then told them. He handed out copies of the email correspondence between Gabriel and ‘Daddy-Long-Legs’ to all those present. Then, to Alex’s genuine amazement, he showed them an overhead transparency showing two timelines.
Alex glanced at Fredrika.
This must have been her idea, he thought.
To judge by the look of satisfaction on her face, he had guessed correctly.
It wasn’t a bad idea, just a bit different. Sometimes it was good to have something different, Alex admitted to himself.
‘So,’ said Peder, indicating the timelines. ‘We, well, that is, Fredrika and I, have come up with two possible theories on the basis of what we now know.’
He ran rapidly through his own theory. Then he handed over to Fredrika, who spoke without leaving her seat.
‘The alternative to the theory that Gabriel drove to Kalmar and back with Lilian, which is fully possible if a bit tight time-wise, is that we’re dealing with two completely different stories here, two completely unconnected crimes.’
Alex frowned.
‘All right, let me clarify,’ Fredrika said quickly. ‘We know Gabriel has abused Sara, we know he looks at child porn at work, and I think we can assume from this email traffic that he’s an active paedophile. He’s part of a paedophile network we know nothing about, and he’s been meeting up with them regularly since the start of the year. Then an extra event is suddenly announced, in Kalmar. He applies for some leave straight away and – understandably enough – decides to lie about it to his mother and tell her he’s going on a business trip on the days in question. He promises to be back in time for dinner with Lilian when Sara and Lilian get back to Stockholm from Gothenburg.’
Fredrika paused for a moment to assure herself everyone had followed so far. Nobody sitting at the table looked confused.
‘So,’ she said, aware of being so worked up that she was blushing. ‘So, he drives to Kalmar some time on Tuesday morning. Just after two, Lilian goes missing. An hour or so later, people start ringing to ask him about it. His mobile is turned off. Gabriel happens to be unavailable just then, and stays unavailable until ten that evening, when he switches his phone back on.’
Fredrika paused for added effect.
‘The man’s just been committing the most disgusting crime our society can conceive of when his daughter goes missing and he’s wanted by the police in connection with that. He probably knows we’ve already found the records of his reported abuse of his wife, and imagines we’ll also have had contradictory statements from his mother and his company about where he is. It’s late and he’s hours from home. Maybe it’s panic, pure and simple. He doesn’t want to drive home and he doesn’t want to talk to the police. He knows he didn’t take Lilian, but he really doesn’t want to say where he was when she disappeared.’
Fredrika took a deep breath before going on.
‘But he’s wedged himself into a really tight corner, because his old mum who usually conjures up alibis for him finds it tricky this time, because he lied about where he was going to be. Naturally it’s still her he rings; there’s nobody else who’ll offer him such unconditional help. It’s hard to say exactly what plan they cook up between them, and exactly how much he tells his mother, but presumably they decide to assume Lilian will soon be found and they’ll lie low until then.’
‘And when Lilian’s safely back, the police won’t be interested in where he’s been?’ Alex added.
‘Just so,’ said Fredrika, taking a drink of water after her long exposition.
The room fell silent.
Alex looked through the emails Peder had handed out, reading a passage here and there.
‘Christ almighty,’ he said, putting the papers aside.
He leant forward across the table.
‘Has anyone come up with information of any kind to make Fredrika’s version seem unfeasible?’ he asked softly.
Nobody said anything.
‘In that case,’ Alex said slowly, ‘I’m inclined to believe that our friend Gabriel, who we’ve been hunting so frantically, most probably isn’t the one who took Lilian.’
He looked at Peder, who was now sitting beside Fredrika.
‘I agree it’s not impossible for Gabriel to take Lilian and pay his visit to Kalmar all on the same day, but as Fredrika pointed out: it would be a terrifically tight schedule.’
Alex shook his head.
‘But in that case,’ Peder said, ‘what about Ingrid Strand’s evidence? The woman who was sitting by Sara and Lilian on the train. I mean, she saw Lilian being carried off…’