The Glass Devil (5 page)

“And was it a complete coincidence that you found out about it?”

“Yes.”

There was a short silence while Irene reflected. Finally, she decided to move on to something else and let go of the Satanic angle for a while.

“What kind of a person was Sten Schyttelius?” she asked.

The deaconess’s sorrowful expression vanished. Her face lit up. “Deeply pious, good-hearted. He hadn’t had an easy time through the years with Elsa’s illness, but he never complained. He took care of the kids and did his job. They’ve always had help with the cleaning, but otherwise he did most things himself. He enjoyed mealtimes and was a good cook and a wine connoisseur. He was an avid hunter as well. Each year, he took a break from work for the moose hunt.”

“And Jacob was like his father?”

“Yes. Except maybe not quite as good at cooking, but he was also a hunter. Very nice and friendly. The last few years, both of them became heavily involved with Sweden’s Ecumenical Children’s Villages. Mostly it was Sten, but last fall Jacob also started working actively.”

“What would they do?”

A blush suffused Rut Börjesson’s pale cheeks as she described the absorbing work of father and son Schyttelius. “They traveled with aid groups to war- and catastrophe- stricken countries in Africa to help needy children. Various Christian organizations in Sweden have set up several villages for orphaned children, about ten in all. For the most part, all work is done by volunteers, and both Sten and Jacob helped wholeheartedly. The expense of the trip and room and board was paid by the parishes, but otherwise they weren’t compensated.”

“Did Rebecka also help?”

“No. She has lived in London for the last two years, where she works as a computer consultant, or whatever it’s called. I don’t think she’s active in the church.”

“Was Elsa Schyttelius involved in the children’s villages?”

“No. Elsa had more than enough to occupy her with her illness.”

Irene saw that Rut was exhausted and decided to end the questioning. She followed her to the door and asked the cleaning woman, Rosa Marqués, to come in.

ROSA WAS short and rather plump. Her dark hair was gathered in a thick braid hanging down her back. Her face was pretty, dominated by a wide mouth which looked like it broke into a smile readily. Right now, neither her mouth nor her dark brown eyes were smiling; rather, they mirrored grave sorrow.

She seated herself on the edge of the chair with her hands folded in her lap. Irene started with personal information. It turned out that Rosa was thirty-eight years old, married, and had four children. She had not had close contact with the Schytteliuses during the four years she had cleaned their house once a week. She had never met their children, because they were both adults and had moved away from home before she started working at the rectory. She spontaneously mentioned Elsa Schyttelius’s periods of illness, during which Mrs. Schyttelius had locked herself in the bedroom and Rosa wasn’t allowed to clean in there.

“Do you clean the whole house every week?” Irene asked.

“No. I only clean the large fancy rooms on the first floor every week. When it’s needed, I do some of the rooms upstairs.”

“How do you know when it’s needed?”

“The rector tells me.”

“Have you ever cleaned the office upstairs?”

Rosa raised her dark eyebrows in surprise. “The office is on the first floor.”

“Sten Schyttelius has a smaller room with a computer on the second floor. It’s located behind the billiard room.”

Now Rosa frowned. Finally, she shook her head decidedly and said, “No. I’ve never cleaned in that room. The door is always locked.”

Over a period of four years, Rosa Marqués had never cleaned the computer room. Irene recalled that there was a gun cabinet in the room. It would be interesting to know what kind of weapons had been kept there. Is that why the room had always been locked? But if the cabinet had been kept locked, according to law, then locking the door to the room itself would have been unnecessary.

“Do you remember if anything was hanging on the wall in the bedroom?”

“The crucifix. The beautiful cross,” Rosa said.

“There was a cross hanging on the wall?”

“Yes. I always look at it when I’m cleaning the room. It’s so beautiful. Mrs. Schyttelius says that it’s very old. From Italy.”

“How big is it?” Irene asked, mostly out of curiosity.

“About like this,” said Rosa, indicating about a foot and a half in height and a few inches less in width. “And Jesus Christ is in silver,” she added.

This was the antique crucifix from Italy that had been turned upside down during or after the murders. Was this completely irrelevant, or was it important? Irene was unsure. But maybe that was the murderer’s intention.

THE FIRST of the Måårdhs whom Irene interviewed was Louise, the church accountant. She sat down in the armchair across from Irene and smiled faintly. “I can hardly remember ever sitting in this chair.”

“It doesn’t matter to me which chair I sit in. Do you want to trade?” Irene asked.

“No, no! I just meant that sometimes you become a little blind to your own surroundings. This chair is actually really comfortable.”

Louise Måårdh leaned back and crossed one slender leg over the other. Irene observed her. Her expression was serious and her gaze sorrowful, but she wasn’t nearly as distraught as the deaconess had been. Her black pinstriped suit, worn with a white silk blouse, was formal and appropriate. A necklace of large pearls shimmered at her throat.

She was actually quite attractive. And she had become the wife of a pastor in a country parish. Amazing.

Here, too, Irene commenced with general personal questions. Louise and Bengt Måårdh had two sons, twenty-five and twenty years old. The family had lived in Kullahult for almost ten years and Bengt had been the assistant rector in Ledkulla parish the entire time.

“And have you worked as the church accountant the whole time?” Irene asked.

“Yes. Earlier, I had handled the finances at a small company in the town where we used to live. But when we came here, this position was open and Sten asked if I was interested. I thought that I could always try it out and, well, I’m still here.”

“A thought just struck me. If your oldest son is twenty-five, then maybe he knows Rebecka Schyttelius?”

“Of course. They were classmates in high school.”

“Did they spend a lot of time together?”

“They are far too different. My Per is an outgoing boy who always had a large group of friends. Rebecka is more reserved. Even in high school, she preferred to spend time with her computers.”

Suddenly she stood. “Wait. I’ll show you. . . .”

She walked around the desk and pulled out a drawer. Two thick colorful envelopes were lying on top.

“Pictures from two Christmases ago. I dropped off the film, picked up the pictures and brought them here, and they’re still here.” She started flipping through the photos. At regular intervals, she would place one on the desk. When she had gone through both piles, ten pictures were lying on the desk.

“Rebecka wasn’t home this Christmas. She had apparently come down with the flu. But she was here the Christmas before. Our tradition is that all the pastors’ families eat breakfast together after Christmas Day services here in the Fellowship Hall. Of course, the rest of the staff is also welcome to join us, if they want. Both of my boys were home, so I brought the camera with me to the Christmas breakfast.”

As she was speaking, she laid out the pictures in a particular order. When she was satisfied, she said, “In the first pictures you have the Schyttelius family. And there is our family. And in the later ones you can see the rest of the staff.”

For the first time, Irene saw what the Schyttelius family had looked like when they were all intact and alive. Sten Schyttelius was smiling in three of the four pictures. In the fourth, he was laughing as he raised a schnapps glass to Bengt Måårdh in a toast.

“Is the early service the only thing a pastor does on Christmas Day?” Irene asked.

“No. Then there is High Mass and Evening Service. Why?”

“Sten Schyttelius and your husband are drinking schnapps in the morning.”

“Just a small one, to go with the herring. Don’t worry, it would have worn off before High Mass. The service is divided among the pastors and the churches. It would be too much otherwise.”

Sten Schyttelius had been a tall, impressive man. His large hand which grasped the foot of the schnapps glass looked more as if it belonged to a day laborer than a clergyman. His face was powerful, dominated by a large, meaty nose. His hairline had receded, but his steel gray hair was thick, worn
en brosse.
His smile in the pictures seemed warm and heartfelt. His eyes almost disappeared in laugh lines in the photos where he was beaming at the camera.

Next to the rector was his wife. She looked plain next to her sparkling husband. A dark-blue suit jacket and a high-necked gray blouse added to that impression. Her thinning gray hair was cut short and lay flat on her head. Irene thought that she looked a bit like Rut Börjesson, but the deaconess had at least some sense of life about her. Elsa Schyttelius had none. She was looking straight into the lens in one of the pictures. Her gaze was empty and her facial expression stiff. Had she been sick during that Christmas season?

A young woman was seated next to Elsa. It had to be Rebecka. She was also big, and the contrast made Elsa look even smaller and more colorless. The similarity to her father was apparent. Rebecka wasn’t heavy like him, but her large bone structure was like his. She wore a light-brown suit jacket, under which a yellow turtleneck could be seen. Her thick hair was dark and shoulder-length. Loose curls softly framed her face. Based on what Irene could make out, she wasn’t wearing makeup, but her own coloring was strong enough to accent her distinct features. When she saw Rebecka’s face, Irene thought of a Mediterranean movie star from the fifties. She didn’t fit the twenty-first century ideal of anorexic good looks, but she was a beautiful woman.

“She must be tall,” Irene said, looking up at Louise Måårdh.

“We are exactly the same height: One hundred seventy-eight centimeters,” Louise responded.

She smiled faintly when she saw Irene’s surprise at this exact reply.

“We started talking about it during breakfast. She had bought that nice brown jacket at a London shop. Long Tall Sally, I remember it was called. You, of course, will appreciate how difficult it can be to find clothes,” she said.

Irene nodded. She knew the problem well. The church accountant placed a long well-manicured index-finger nail on one of the photos and said, “Jacob is sitting there next to my Per. Jacob and Rebecka were the same height.”

Jacob Schyttelius smiled at the camera and looked happy and relaxed. He had light hair and a slender build. Irene couldn’t see the slightest resemblance to his father or sister, but it was possible to see some similarities with his mother. The only thing the siblings had in common were brown eyes and dark eyebrows.

In the last three photos, Irene saw the people she had met a little while ago in the hall, but also a number of others whom she hadn’t met.

“Who are these people?” she asked.

“The church association’s employees. The secretary of information, the parish hostess, parish assistants, childcare workers, activity director, youth director, and our three preschool teachers.” Louise pointed at each as she identified them.

“Childcare workers? Secretary of information? Are all of them employed by the church?” Irene asked.

“We have a Christian preschool and a good youth program. The church is a large employer here in the municipality. And I’m the one who tries to find the money to pay for it all. The churches themselves also need renovations, as well as the fellowship halls, the rectories, and other properties. I’m in charge of paying all the bills and salaries, and I do the bookkeeping as well.”

Irene had never thought of the church as an employer with a large economic impact, but that’s apparently exactly what it was. And Sten Schyttelius had been in charge of it all, the commander of the parish or association or whatever it was called. She said out loud, “So you’re financially responsible, but Rector Schyttelius was the boss. What was he like as an employer?”

For the first time, Louise thought before she answered. Then she said, hesitantly, “Sten was a pleasant person, but as a boss he had certain . . . bad sides. He was actually ready for retirement, so you can understand that he was relatively old-fashioned and authoritarian. He was difficult to deal with sometimes. He had a short fuse and could get very angry. He saw women as personal assistants, not as colleagues. We had some clashes. . . . The woman who held this position before me actually quit. There was a lot of talk about harassment, but it didn’t come to anything. Not to mention his controversies with the vestrymen! The new director and Sten never got along.”

While Louise was speaking, one of the envelopes slipped from her lap and fell on the floor. The photos fell out, and Irene bent to help pick them up. She stopped at the first photo.