Frozen Moment (64 page)

    Not
that the police work he had been involved in so far bore much resemblance to
the investigations in books or on TV. During what felt like an endless period
on patrol he had escorted drunks to the cells to sober up, intervened in
hundreds of domestic disputes, caught speeding drivers, arrested dozens of
petty thieves, worked his way through tons of paperwork and filled in reports
on stolen cars. But eventually, one day, he was given the chance to tackle
something big.

    In
his mind's eye he had excitedly seen his name printed on his office door, and
on his card: MICHAEL GONZALES -
homicide.
But he continued to work his way through piles of paper.
Carried
on writing reports about domestic disputes - the difference being that now they
usually ended with one of the drunks being dead.

    There
was a shortage of car
chases,
he would say when the
little boys in the square asked him about his job. The kids who had not learned
to hate the police were still impressed, but those with elder brothers in gangs
were not exactly overwhelmed.

    'It's
smaller than Slavko's,' was the response from one of the younger boys when
Gonzales showed them his service pistol. This embarrassingly unprofessional
moment had cost Gonzales sleepless nights before he decided not to report the
boy's older cousin for the illegal possession of a weapon. Applying a logic
that was anything but legal, he concluded that the fact that he had been told
about the gun somehow took away his right to judge. Easy come, easy go, sort
of. Or maybe he was just scared that his colleagues would find out he'd been
using his pistol to impress little boys.

    Now
he took a call that had been misdirected by the exchange, then sat there, doing
nothing. The endorphins that had coursed through his system when he heard that
Sven Molin had been murdered were starting to dissipate.

    
Go
through everything was
the phrase Tell had used. Get to know the person.
Gather information, draw together the loose threads. Think around the situation.

    
Easy for him to say.

    Gonzales
was no novice when it came to murder enquiries; he was familiar with the
structure and approach, which in many ways were exactly the same irrespective
of who had killed or been killed. He had worked on a number of such cases
during his time with the team.

    In
the Jeep enquiry he had been given more of a free rein. Though no one had told
him so explicitly, he had been trusted to draw his own conclusions and organise
the investigative work as he saw fit. And now he was sitting there without any
kind of guidance while people assumed he could think for himself.

    He
had contacted Borås and asked for the case file from the 1995 investigation,
which had been called off due to lack of evidence. Nobody interviewed at the
time had been able to come up with names of potential attackers, and there was
no proof that Maya Granith hadn't left the track of her own accord and simply
tripped.

    He
found a notepad among the piles of paper on his desk, opened it at a clean page
and wrote
MAYA
in a circle in the centre.

    Start
with the year of the crime and work backwards, Tell had said. Gonzales closed
his eyes and tried to think about what was relevant in a young person's life,
what had been important in his own life.
Where you live.
What you do. He wrote
job/studies
in the margin.
If
you're with anyone - a boyfriend?
Boys/mates.

    Apparently
she had lived at an address in Borås with her mother.

    For
the last two years of her life she had also had a different address in another
part of Sweden - Stensjö. It sounded like the back of beyond. There was some
kind of foundation registered there, the Arnold Jansson Foundation for the
General Education and Training in Craftsmanship of the Working Class. Since
1999 the foundation had run a training centre for 'the development of local
craft', but before that the buildings had housed a folk high school and
boarding facilities. On the same web page he discovered that Stensjö lay to the
north and inland.

    Gonzales
raised his eyebrows. If Maya had both lived and studied in some backwater for
the last two years of her life, it wasn't impossible that the solution was
somehow linked to the school or the surrounding area. Sticking a load of people
from different backgrounds with different reasons to run away from home into
some kind of barracks in the forest - well, that was worse than
Survivor.
Anything could happen.

    But
what could have happened that was relevant to his investigation? Nobody had
been murdered in Stensjö, after all. And the three men who might indirectly
have cost Maya her life already had names and faces. He was looking for someone
who had been close to Maya and was capable of murdering in order to honour her
memory, or possibly to protect her brother.

    The
telephone interrupted his thoughts once more.

    'Michael?'

    'I
haven't got time at the moment, Mum. I'm working.'

    He
put the phone down gently but firmly. She'd have something to say about that
this evening. He got up and started pacing between the door and the desk.

    There
were only two alternatives, he decided. If three thirty-some- thing men were
desperate enough to rob someone, they would hardly choose a teenager, who by
definition was likely to be broke - particularly a teenager on her way home
from
a party. No, it was more likely that it had been their drunken
intention to rape Maya, otherwise why would they have chased her into the
forest? They had planned to hurt her, even if events had taken a different turn
and they had left her to freeze to death, unconscious in the snow.

    He
tried to weave the strands together.

    Someone
had reacted on Maya's behalf. Who would do that? The family, of course;
Sebastian Granith's confession was in the process of being transcribed. An
enraged father was Gonzales' next thought, but the official register informed
him that her father was unknown. Although he might have been out there, waiting
to take vengeance on his daughter's attackers, and possibly on her mother and
those around her who had refused to recognise him as the father of his child.
The mother, Solveig Granith.
Tell's opinion after meeting
her was that she was mentally far too fragile to carry out a murder. That was a
contradiction in itself, of course, since a normal person doesn't go and kill
someone, irrespective of what they have done to his or her family. Or do they?

    He
stopped himself. His sisters, full of life and joy, passed before his mind's
eye; a fraction of a second later they were lying in the snow - left to die
because some randy pissed-up bastards had been too scared, wanting to save
their own skins, to call for help.

    He
clenched his fists and erased the image. It wasn't his sister who had been
lying there in the snow. There was no reason to start speculating about what
was morally defensible or even human. That wasn't his job. He was there to find
a murderer. The law could make judgements. He wrote
Boyfriend?
on
his pad, then picked up his phone and keyed in the number
for the principal at Stensjö. To his surprise there was a person on the other
end, not an answering machine.

    'I'm
looking for information about a student who attended the folk high school
between 1993 and 1995.1 know it's a long time ago, but…'

    The
woman on the other end of the phone laughed. She had a pleasant voice.

    'It
certainly is a long time ago. I've only been principal here for eighteen
months, so I definitely can't help you. Berit Hjarpe was the principal before
me and was involved in setting up the centre, but this is a completely new
venture, even though it's backed by the same foundation. There used to be a
more traditional folk high school here.'

    Gonzales
thought for a moment.

    'Would
you be able to put me in touch with someone who was around in 1995?'

    'I
don't know…' She hesitated. 'If I can come back to you next
week,
that
will give me time to contact the board. They must have details of
the people who were working here at the same time. But I know that Margareta
Folkesson, the chairwoman, is on holiday at the moment and-'

    'I'm
afraid I can't wait until next week,' Gonzales interrupted her. 'This is a
murder enquiry, and it's of paramount importance that the information we're
looking for-'

    'OK,'
she interrupted gently, and Gonzales immediately regretted the formality of his
words. She was actually trying to help.

    'You
can't think of anyone else who might know more?' he asked in a conciliatory
tone.

    'I
can, in fact,' said the woman after a brief silence. 'You could try our
secretary, Greta Larsson. She's worked for the foundation for ever, and she had
a similar role at the school for many years. She might be able to help you.'

    'Could
you put me through to her?'

    'She's
not working today.'

    'Then
I need her home number.'

    There
was silence at the other end of the line.

    'As
I said, this is a murder enquiry, and I do have the right to-'

    'Yes,
OK.
Just a moment.'

    A
man who sounded at least a hundred years old answered just as Gonzales was
about to hang up. He said that Greta Larsson was out walking by the lake and
wasn't expected back for at least a couple of hours, but she had her mobile
with her. Did he want the number? He himself was in bed most of the time
because of heart problems.

    Gonzales
took down the number, eventually managed to interrupt the old man by thanking
him for his help, and called Greta Larsson's mobile. She answered almost
immediately with a shrill 'Hello?'

    When
he had introduced himself she sighed audibly and laughed.

    'Oh
my goodness, I was so scared. I got this phone because Gunnar, my husband, is
so ill, and he has to be able to get hold of me. There's a nurse who comes in
every day while I'm at work, but when I'm free I like to go walking.'

    She
disappeared in a torrent of sounds that forced Gonzales to hold the receiver
away from his ear so that his eardrum wouldn't burst.

    'Sorry,
I just had to take off my rucksack, and I was so worried when the phone rang.
Nobody else has the number, you see, so I thought-'

    'I
know what you thought, fru Larsson.' He was going to have to take the lead if
he was going to get a word in edgeways. 'I'm calling because I have a couple of
questions about a pupil who attended the folk high school in Stensjö twelve
years ago. I will understand perfectly if you can't answer my questions, but I
thought I'd give it a try. It would be a great help if you could remember
anything at all. Her name was-'

    'I
have an excellent memory, constable. If you just wait a moment, I'll sit down
on this rock…'

    She
disappeared again in a rush of noise, and Gonzales sighed.

    'Maya
Granith,' he said before Greta Larsson had time to open her mouth.

    'Hmm…
it sounds familiar somehow,' she murmured thoughtfully.

    This
is a waste of time.

    'What
did she look like? At the time, I mean. I have a good memory for faces. I had
all kinds of different roles in those days - study mentor, counsellor. You know
what young people are like: their confusion can make them fairly demanding.'

    'On
the photographs I've seen she had dyed black hair and a ring in her nose. I
could send you a couple of photos of-'

    'No,
I remember!' Greta Larsson exclaimed so loudly that Gonzales actually jumped.
'Granith, you said! I know exactly who you mean! It was a long time ago, but
the reason I remember her so well is that I had a lot of trouble with her, to
put it mildly.'

    'Trouble?'
asked Gonzales. He noticed he was clutching the phone in a vice-like grip.

    'Yes.
I was also in charge of the administration of the boarding side of the school,
you see. And she rented a room, stayed there for a while, moved out,
then
moved back in. I hardly had time to get the paperwork
done before she changed her mind again. That's why I remember her so well.'

    'You
mean she dropped out of school, then changed her mind, or…'