Henrik wrinkled his brow. Of course it had been dreadful to see such a little body on the pathologist’s table. Was it when she saw the letters on the boy’s neck that her face first turned a bit pale? Or had he imagined it? Why was he questioning her behavior?
He and Mia stepped into the conference room thirty seconds before the meeting was due to start, and Jana was already there with her usual focus. Next to her sat Anneli, all her concentration on the local paper. Ola and Gunnar sat with their heads close together, talking quietly.
Mia flopped down onto her usual chair and stretched out to reach the coffee thermos on the table. Henrik sat down next to Jana.
Gunnar got up from his chair and said, “Okay, everybody. It’s time to get to work. We’ll start straightaway with Henrik and Mia. You’ve been to forensics, can you tell us what you know about the boy’s injuries?”
Henrik nodded, clasped his hands on the table and leaned forward.
“Bj?rn has confirmed what we already know. The boy was shot from behind and it seems that he was brutally assaulted before, although not sexually, and that he was under the influence of drugs, heroin to be exact.”
“How old was he?” Gunnar asked.
“Around nine or ten, and apparently already an addict—he had sores and infections on his arms.”
“Pitiful.”
“Yes, it’s uncommon to find such a young addict,” said Gunnar.
“Once you start, you are hooked, regardless of age. Heroin is an extremely addictive drug,” said Ola.
“But it’s uncommon to find such a young addict,” said Gunnar.
“So we think he was at Hans Juhlén’s house possibly to steal money for his addiction?” said Mia.
“Well, that’s one theory,” said Gunnar. “We must get a better idea of who the boy was, whether he was a member of a gang, a dealer, an addict, who he bought the stuff from, sold to, and so on.”
“We need to reach out to all the heroin addicts and dealers we know.” Gunnar walked up to the window.
“Selling often takes place in deprived areas,” said Mia as she brushed the palm of her hand back and forth across the table.
“But drugs are a problem in all classes of society, aren’t they?” said Henrik.
Mia looked over at Jana and smiled.
“Only in rich areas it is better hidden,” said Mia.
“But what would make children sell drugs?” said Henrik.
“Money, of course,” said Mia quickly. “If there were summer jobs for all teenagers, they wouldn’t need to push drugs.”
“So you’re saying that they start selling drugs because the council doesn’t give them summer jobs?” said Jana. That was the first time she opened her mouth at the meeting. She leaned across the table and glared at Mia. “Allow me to smile at that. A job is something you find yourself, it’s not something you’re given.”
Mia clenched her teeth, and folded her arms over her chest.
That prosecutor could go to hell. “But we’re talking about a ten-year-old here, and ten-year-olds don’t have summer jobs,” said Henrik.
Mia gave him an irritated look.
“But why would a ten-year-old be involved in drugs? Could he have been forced into it?” said Ola.
“Forced to deal? That’s very likely,” said Henrik.
Gunnar pulled his chair out but didn’t sit down. “Let’s skip the speculation and concentrate on something else. The tire tracks next to the crime scene at Viddviken come from Goodyear. Marathon 8. We don’t know for certain whether the tracks are from the white van that the witness had seen. Incidentally, have we got any more on that?”
“Yes, I spoke to Gabriel and according to the witness it seems the vehicle was an Opel,” said Mia.
“Model?”
“He didn’t know.”
“Well how did he know that it was an Opel?”
“I suppose he recognized it.”
“But not the model?”
“No, not the model.”
“How big?”
“He described it as a little van.”
“And what is the witness’s name?”
“Erik Nordlund.”
“Where does he live?”
“Jansberg. He was doing some forestry work out there and saw the van driving at high speed outside his house. He lives close to Ark?sund Road just a couple of kilometers before the turning down to Viddviken.”
“Ask him to come down right away. He must surely know which type of van he saw. Print out pictures of all the Opel models and put them in front of him. We must find that van. Even if it isn’t connected with the murder, the driver might have seen something that’s important.”
Gunnar walked back and forth in front of the map on the wall, then picked up a red marker and wrote on the whiteboard: Opel.
They were still nowhere with this investigation, and it was extremely frustrating. He sat down and tried to pull himself together.
“You said the van was driving fast,” Henrik said to Mia.
“Yes, according to the witness, it was,” said Mia.
“Are there any speed cameras on Ark?sund Road?” said Henrik.
“Yep.”
“Perhaps it was caught by the camera?”
“Good point, Henrik. Check with the department of transportation up in Kiruna. They’ll be able to tell us if their cameras registered any car that violated the speed limit that evening,” said Gunnar.
Ola raised a finger. “I’ll do that,” he said. “But have you abandoned the theory about the boy coming by boat?”
“No, but nobody has seen or heard of a boat in the area at that time. So we’ll concentrate on the van first.”
Gunnar nodded to Ola. “Okay, over to you.”
“Right-o.”
Ola pressed a few keys on his keyboard and opened the document with the letters and numbers; he started the projector but the screen showed nothing.
“Now what’s wrong?” he said and got up from his chair. “Is it the light or what?”
Ola adjusted his cap and then climbed up onto the conference table to reach the apparatus hanging from the ceiling.
Jana glanced at him as she took short shallow breaths. Ever since she had left home she had been struggling to retain her composure. Her calm was only surface-deep, and she couldn’t really control her nerves. Several times she had to remind herself to focus. She stretched out to reach the coffee thermos, which was in front of Mia. Even though her insides felt like one big raw nerve, her movements didn’t betray that.
Mia glared at Jana as Jana pulled the thermos across the table.
Ola was still busy up by the ceiling and the rest of the group was silent, deep in their own thoughts.
Jana took a sip of coffee.
Ola broke the silence. “That’s it. It should work now.”
He climbed down from the table and woke the computer up from sleep mode. The screen showed the image of the strange combinations of letters and numbers.
Jana looked up at the enlarged image. Her eyes opened wide, as her heart beat rapidly. She could hear a rushing sound in her ears; the room was rocking. She immediately recognized the first line. She had seen it before. In her dream. The one that recurred time after time.
VPXO410009.
“Right, I found these combinations in Hans Juhlén’s computer. I’ve gone through every single folder and file and document on his hard drive and this document is the only one that looks weird. Hans Juhlén used these combinations for something several times and saved the document with the same name over and over. But I’ve no idea why. Nor do I know what the numbers and letters mean. Does anyone here have any ideas?”
They all shook their heads. Except Jana.
Ola went on: “I’ve searched online, but haven’t gotten anywhere.”
Ola scratched his head on the outside of his cap again.
“Perhaps his secretary knows? Or his wife?”
“Henrik, check with Lena. Mia, you can ask Kerstin. Also check whether Yusef knows anything. We’ll have to ask everybody. Right, Jana?” said Gunnar.
Jana was caught unawares.
“What?”
“What do you think?”
She forced herself to smile and answered:
“I agree. We’ll keep at it.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-ONE
THE STEEL WAS cold in her hand.
The girl swallowed and looked up at the man with the ugly scar standing in front of her.