Frozen Moment (69 page)

    He
slipped on a pair of wooden clogs and went out through the veranda door.

    Ann-Christine
smiled gently. 'He just wants to leave us in peace.'

    'That's
impressive, making a violin,' Tell replied.

    She
nodded. 'It's always been his dream. And now he's retired - he took his pension
a couple of years early so that he could be at home with me - he suddenly has
the time to do it.'

    They
were both silent for a while. A magpie landed on the decking outside the
window.

    'We
miss you at work,' said Tell eventually.

    'Thank
you. Actually, I'm not missing the job very much. Not as much as I thought I
would, anyway. Everything's relative, after all. I suppose I didn't think I'd
be able to cope if I didn't have the job to hang on to. In some peculiar way I
thought as long as I was working, I'd stay alive. If I went home it would be
like giving up, giving in to the cancer. Waiting for death, I suppose. I
couldn't bear that thought. It just got bigger and bigger. You know how it is.
You have your work, and that means you know who you are. At work I might not
have been the best in the world, but I was competent. At home I'm nothing
special. I don't do anything special.
Although I have started
reading again.'

    She
brightened up.

    'When
I was younger I used to read all the time.
Nothing deep -
crime novels, biographies.
You know. I've just finished reading a
biography of Frida Kahlo, the artist.
Fascinating woman.
Fascinating life.'

    'They've
made a film about her,' said Tell.
'With Penelope Cruz.
She's a fascinating woman as well. And she doesn't look too bad either.'

    Ostergren
laughed. The smile still lingered around the corners of her mouth as she said,
'And how are things going otherwise?'

    'Well,
what can I say?
Same old, same old.
Bärneflod's wife
got it into her head that she should invite the team round for dinner, which
Bengt isn't all that thrilled about. He's going round saying it clearly isn't
enough, putting up with us from Monday to Friday; now he's expected to have us
in his house on a Saturday night and supply us with drink.'

    Ostergren
laughed again and shook her head. Tell thought he hadn't seen her looking this
happy for a long time. He took a biscuit and continued his update.

    'Gonzales
brought in a lad for that rape in Vasa Park, the one where the girl died. The
semen matched. And three other girls who've reported rapes over the past year
have identified him as their attacker. Once it was clear that we'd got him, he
told us that his cousin had been involved as well.'

    'Horrible.'

    'Yes,
but at least both of them are out of action now. Beckman and Karlberg went off
on that course last Monday, the one they should have gone on at Christmas if
the Jeep case hadn't got in the way.'

    Ostergren
took a bite from a cinnamon bun. She brushed the crumbs off her turquoise
jumper carefully. The movement made Tell realise that was another departure;
she always used to wear black.

    'And
that's all sorted now, by the way,' he went on, despite a vague feeling that
she was only half-listening. 'The knife that was found inside the door panel of
Selander's car had been wiped, but forensics found traces of Molin's blood on
the handle. She confessed when she realised the game was up. Evidently
Sebastian Granith and Caroline Selander didn't exactly plan the murders
together, not in so many words, but they egged each other on in their mutual
desire for revenge: the mother, the brother and the lover. They seem to have had
some kind of insane three-way pact. Solveig Granith hasn't been in a fit state
to be interviewed so far; she's still in Lillhagen.'

    'The
question is
,
why did they wait twelve years to murder
someone?'

    Tell
shrugged his shoulders. 'There's
a
awful lot that
doesn't add up. I'm no expert, but I've actually been giving some thought to
that very question.'

    'And
what did you come up with?'

    'I
think that separately, however disturbed they were, they weren't capable of
murder. Well, Selander has a long history of violence, including the attempted
murder of her father. But I think that somehow these three individuals found
each other - through their mutual loss - and came to be dependent on each other
in different ways. They lived together year after year, getting in deeper and
deeper, and that triggered something in each other. Like a secret club of hate,
a pact where the dead girl became a symbol for what was missing in their lives.
At the end of his interrogation Sebastian Granith said that he had assuaged his
guilt. He was satisfied. It seemed as though he had assumed some kind of
responsibility for what had happened to Maya - don't ask me how or why - but
that the murders were some form of penance.
A way of
impressing the other two, or perhaps being accepted by them.
Over the
years he had been driven to a point where murder seemed the only possible
course of action.' The furrow between his eyebrows disappeared, and he added
with a hint of embarrassment, 'I don't really know what I'm talking about; Beckman
is better at this psychology stuff. I suppose we might never know the answer to
some things.'

    Ostergren
protested and said it was interesting, which he took as an indication that she
wanted him to go on.

    Anyway,
when she realised we had proof that she was the one who killed
Molin,
Caroline Selander confessed that Sebastian Granith
had sent her a text just after we arrested him.
"Two
down - one to go," something along those lines.
He must have
pre-programmed his mobile in case he got caught, because he was never left
unsupervised. We found the mobile later, after she'd confessed. It had been
trodden into the ground where we were standing. It was a bit embarrassing,
actually.'

    
'Oh dear.'

    
'Exactly.
Anyway, when she got the message she realised he'd
murdered the first two. She then saw it as her duty to deal with the last one,
and she just went off and did it. She realised it was urgent, that the police
knew the background and it was only a matter of time before… Well, you get the
picture. So she just went out and stabbed him, wiped the knife and took off in
her van. They picked her up pretty quickly.'

    
'The police in Ystad?'

    'Yes.'

    'And
before that she'd attacked Seja Lundberg?'

    Tell
swallowed. 'Seja Lundberg suspected Caroline Selander because of a conversation
she'd had with a mutual acquaintance.'

    'So
she was making her own enquiries, then.'

    'She
was, yes. Selander panicked when she realised Seja was on her trail.'

    Ostergren
looked thoughtful once again.

    'I
read the piece she wrote. It was good.
Perceptive.'

    She
leaned over and placed her hand briefly on Tell's, as she reached for the milk.

    'But
when I asked how things were going, I was really talking about you. How are
you?'

    'What
do you mean?'

    She
shrugged impatiently. 'What do you think I mean? How are you feeling? Are
things going well for you? How's your girlfriend?'

    He
didn't know what to say. Didn't she know that it was all over between him and
Carina, or had someone at work got there before him and told her about Seja?

    She
sighed. 'Do you have to look so petrified? First of all, I'm more or less
retired and therefore no longer your boss, so you can forget about any
repercussions. And secondly, and much more importantly, I'm your friend. At
least I thought I was. Perhaps I haven't always been as open as I might have
been, but I've always felt that the two of us are pretty much alike.
That we understand one another.
I trusted you-'

    'Yes,
but-' he protested.

    She
raised a finger in the air. 'I trusted you to be able to make a judgement about
any risks you might be taking as a result of your behaviour. You're perfectly
capable of doing so even if you've been treading a very fine line in this case.
That's why I was quite hurt that you didn't feel you could talk to me. Instead
you avoided me. That was cowardly.'

    'Yes.'

    
'And childish.'

    He
didn't look up, but he sensed a smile playing around one corner of her mouth.
For some reason this made him feel even more vulnerable.

    
'Absolutely.
And since we're on the subject of my lack of
backbone,

    I'd
also like to apologise for the fact that I didn't want to see you, or be
reminded of you or your illness. It wasn't just this business with Seja. I was
just terrified at the thought…' He fell silent. A helpless gesture in
Ostergren's direction said what he couldn't bear to say out loud.

    'That
I'm going to die soon,' she said calmly. 'Apology accepted.' He could feel her
gaze burning into his forehead. 'Why are you so angry?' She had raised her
eyebrows so high that they had disappeared under her white curls. 'Why are you
so angry, when I'm not?'

    She
leaned forward and forced him to look her in the eye.

    'I'm
going to ask you the same question I've been asking Gustav over these last few
weeks. Why should you be angry, when I've stopped feeling that way? I've
accepted that I have a year. I have a year to read all those books I'd intended
to read when I retired.
To sleep late in the mornings.
I can use the sauna we built ten years ago and have hardly ever had time to
use. Or I can go back to all those exciting conversations I had with Gustav
when we were first married, the ones that got lost somewhere along the way as
my career took over. I say to him, "You should be pleased, Gustav. After
all, you're always complaining that I never see you.'"

    Tell,
who thought he was about to laugh, realised to his surprise that there were
tears prickling his eyelids.

    'And
you, Christian, you ought to be happy for yourself sometimes. Be happy, as I
am,
that you've found somebody nice who can put up with you,
and stop wallowing in those peculiar feelings of guilt. Stop letting fear
dictate what you do. Stop asking whether you deserve what you
get
- and just live instead. Live and be happy!'

    She
swept a pack of cards off the table as she waved her arms. They went
everywhere.

    And
when he thought about it, Tell realised he was happy. Happy that Seja might be
in his apartment when he got home from work in the evening. He didn't dare take
it for granted, but he thought she probably would be.

    'Things
are going well with Seja,' he said. He smiled as he bent down to pick up the
cards.

    'There
- you see - now you're laughing too,' she said, prodding him playfully in the
side.

    After
they had laughed together, a restful reflective silence settled over the room.
They watched Gustav Ostergren push a lawnmower around the side of the house and
park it in front of the cellar steps. The sound of screaming gulls rose as he
opened the veranda door. A chilly gust of wind hit their faces. Ann-Christine
shivered.

    'The
wind's getting up,' commented her husband, pouring himself a cup of coffee.
'Blowing inland.'

    Tell
could actually smell the sea now, through the exhaust fumes from the rush-hour
traffic. As a child he had always loved walking by the sea when it was windy.

    'And
how's the violin?' he asked.

    'Let
me just finish my coffee, and you can come and have a look.'

    Gustav
dunked a piece of cake in his coffee, popped it in his mouth and reached for a
blanket lying by the door. He passed it to his wife, and she spread it
gratefully over her knees.

    Tell
stood up.
'Another time, Gustav.
I need to make a
move.'

    He
took his leave of Ann-Christine Ostergren simply and without drama. His heart
felt lighter than it had when he had arrived just an hour ago.

    Outside
the wind was strong and the cypress trees were swaying violently. He decided to
take a walk by the sea. After all, he had the time