To be honest, it’s mostly my fault, she thinks. If I’d acted more quickly and followed my gut instinct instead of being rational, we might have been able to save Ulrika Wendin’s life. It’s as simple as that, really.
Jeanette knows that right about now the girl’s grandmother will be hearing of her death from two police officers accompanied by a priest. There are some people who have a gift for that particular task, and Jeanette knows that she isn’t one of them. Truly loving someone can be terrifying, she thinks, and her thoughts go to Johan, who will soon be sitting in a plane on his way back from London. In a few hours she’ll see him again, and he’ll be happy after a successful weekend away with his dad. She understood that much from the text message she received just after they had found Ulrika Wendin’s body half covered with snow under a ragged pine tree. She had had a terrible death, and Jeanette will never be able to stop thinking about how frightened she must have been.
She brushes a few tears from her cheeks and looks at Hurtig. Has he got anyone to fear losing? His parents, of course. They seem to get along well, and have managed to come to terms with the loss of one member of the family. Someone who’ll never be coming back.
Perhaps Ulrika Wendin’s grandmother has no one she can share her grief with. Like Annette Lundstr?m, the only survivor among all the people caught up in this horrible mess.
She finds herself thinking about a family from Sierra Leone who have also lost someone, and will soon be getting confirmation from the police.
In addition to the Polaroids in Viggo Dürer’s cellar out at Hundudden, forensics found a video recording.
Samuel Bai, chained up and fighting for his life against a half-naked man whom both Jeanette and Hurtig recognised as the man they found dead in the cottage up in Lapland.
On the desk, next to the film of Samuel’s death, are dozens of files and a heap of folders, one of them containing copies of Viggo Dürer’s photographs of the bodies from Thorildsplan, Svartsj?landet, Danvikstull and Barn?ngen. It’s now almost incidental that Dürer spent several years being treated for cervical cancer, or that the car that scraped the tree where the body was found out in Svartsj?landet is the same one parked under a tarpaulin at Hundudden.
But the investigation isn’t over just because their four cases have been solved. There’s evidence of another forty bodies, and all the files will be passed on to Europol.
None of that really makes any difference, though, Jeanette thinks, since everybody concerned is dead. Including the murderer.
The bodies that ended up cremated on Viggo Dürer’s boat were, in all likelihood, Henrietta Dürer and Anders Wikstr?m.
And Dürer has been found dead in a park in Kiev, shot in the back of the head. A murder that Iwan Lowynsky will have to deal with until Europol takes on the case.
It’s over, she thinks. But I’m still not happy.
There’s something that isn’t right, something that can’t be properly understood, leaving unanswered questions. All investigations include some degree of anticlimax, but she’s found it impossible to get used to that and accept it. Like the fact that she never managed to find Madeleine Silfverberg. When it comes down to it, maybe she was just a phantom anyway. Maybe the murders of the former Sigtuna pupils really were Hannah and Jessica’s work. She’s never going to know, and that’s just one part of everything she’s going to have to live with.
What would I do if I didn’t have Johan? she thinks. Resign and just take off somewhere? No, I probably wouldn’t dare. Maybe apply for a leave of absence and do something else. Mind you, I’d probably return to work after a week, since police work is all I can do. Or would I?
She doesn’t know, and is reminded of the fact that her personal life is as full of unanswered questions as her investigations. Does she even have a personal life? A relationship?
‘What are you thinking about?’ Hurtig suddenly asks.
They’ve been silent for so long that Jeanette had almost forgotten that he’s sitting on the other side of the desk.
In relationships with other people you only see a fraction of each other, she thinks. Most of your real life takes place inside your head, and can’t be translated easily into verbal communication.
‘Nothing,’ she says. ‘I’m not thinking about anything at all.’
Hurtig gives her a weary smile. ‘Me neither. And it feels very nice, actually.’
Jeanette nods, then hears footsteps out in the corridor followed by a light knock on the door. It’s Billing, who gives them a concerned look as he shuts the door behind him. ‘How’s it going?’ he asks quietly.
Jeanette gestures towards the piles on her desk. ‘We’re done, we just need von Kwist to come and get what we’ve put together.’
‘Good, good …’ the commissioner mutters. ‘But, if I’ve understood correctly, as soon as this is made public it’s going to cause … problems?’
Billing looks troubled, and Jeanette suddenly realises why he’s there.
‘Yes, that’s probably unavoidable,’ she says. ‘It’s not really possible to remove Berglind from the case.’
‘This is the last thing we need right now.’ Billing sighs. ‘The press are going to crucify us.’ He shakes his head and leaves the door open when he leaves.
The press? Jeanette thinks. So the worst thing about all this is what the papers are going to say about us?
She glances at the stacks of evidence on the desk, in which the fact that Billing’s predecessor, the former police commissioner Gert Berglind, was involved in financing child pornography is revealed in macabre detail. Crucifixion probably isn’t the right word for how the press is going to react.
More like slaughter.
The phone rings once Hurtig has left her office.
A call that, if it doesn’t turn her entire life upside down, certainly changes the future forever.
Miracles rarely happen. That’s in the nature of things.
But occasionally they do.
The call is from her bank. An impersonal call in every way, were it not for its highly personal import.
Someone has paid off the outstanding balance of her and ?ke’s mortgage.
Two million, four hundred and fifty-three thousand kronor.
‘What did you say?’ is all Jeanette can manage.
‘It’s quite true,’ the voice at the other end says, making it sound like some sort of punishment. ‘The individual in question has also transferred another two million into your personal account.’
Jeanette feels dizzy.
The coffee machine out in the kitchen rattles. Ice crystals have started to form on the window. The rain will soon turn to snow.
‘There must be some mistake –’
‘No, there isn’t. I spoke to the person who conducted the transactions myself, and she was very clear.’
‘She?’
‘The donor wished to remain anonymous, but she asked me to let you know that Victoria Bergman is alive and well. Is that someone you know?’