“It resulted in heated discussions between these two doctors and some of their colleagues, who thought it was sheer nonsense.
“It eventually led to some of the workers receiving industrial injury compensation, including Benny here, which proved too much for the company in the financial climate as it was then.” Leo looked at Benny with undisguised skepticism. The discussion about whether he had been exposed to poisoning or not would apparently never end. “Arne Knudsen was already dead by then, of course, but before that he had repeatedly claimed that he had also been affected. And he managed to convince everyone. In hindsight, it was employees like Arne and—pardon my saying so—also you, Benny, who ultimately brought the company down.”
Benny Andersson put his cigar down in the ashtray. “That’s not true, Leo. You’re twisting everything.”
“Well, pardon me if I do. But things certainly went from bad to worse with Arne and the manganese case, and that was when Rose was still at the plant. Every time there was a discussion about it and we gave him a piece of our minds, knowing that he never came near the manganese dust, he went back to Rose and took it out on her. He did try to make an ally out of Benny, but Benny couldn’t stand the man.”
He turned toward Benny. “Would you agree with that?”
“Hell yes. I hated that prick. He was an asshole, and he hadn’t been poisoned. He was just a malicious bastard intent on ruining it for the rest of us who really were ill.”
“And Rose was having a really bad time because of her dad’s psychological abuse. We could all see it, so there were many reasons why we all wanted to get rid of Arne Knudsen. Get him the hell out of our lives.”
“Did you also want to get rid of him, Benny?”
“Are you recording this?” he asked.
Carl shook his head. “No. But we have two things we’d like to show you before we carry on. I’ve already shown them to Leo.” He slammed a photo on the table of Arne Knudsen’s body lying on a steel autopsy table.
“Good God,” said Benny at the sight of the man with his lower body completely crushed. No one would have been able to guess what they were looking at if they hadn’t been told in advance.
“And then there’s this photo. I received it half an hour ago.” He showed him the photo of Rose on his phone.
Benny Andersson reached for his box of cigars while his eyes lingered on the tormented face. It really got to him. “Is it Rose?” he asked, visibly shaken.
“Yes. The time between the two photos has been one long nightmare for her, as you can tell. Every day for seventeen years she has lived with the image of her mangled dad and taken the entire blame for his death. But the situation now is that her condition is extremely bad. And if you two don’t help us today, she will die inside. Do you believe me when you see this face?”
—
Benny and Leo had been gone for five minutes, and when they finally returned, neither of them looked comfortable with the situation.
It was Leo who spoke first.
“We are agreed that we don’t regret the part we played in what we’re about to tell you, and I’m convinced that the others feel the same. Just to set the record straight, Arne Knudsen was a real shit, and the world is a better place without him.”
Carl nodded. They were a couple of vigilantes and murderers who had ruined Rose’s life. Nothing could justify their heinous crime, but it wouldn’t benefit Rose if the truth became public.
“Don’t expect me to condone what you’ve done, but a promise is a promise.”
“It’s a harsh thing to say, but Rose was our useful idiot. Even though it sounds worse than intended.”
“That’s one of the reasons why I was against it at first, because I had a more personal relationship to Rose than the others,” said Benny. “But I gave in when Arne started to make life hell for everyone. You can’t imagine how intolerable he could be.”
Carl wasn’t so sure. “Out with it, and don’t beat around the bush. We don’t have all day. Assad and I have an appointment in town we can’t be late for,” said Carl.
“Okay. Well, Rose was the only one who could really get her dad so agitated that he didn’t notice what was going on around him. He simply loved those situations. It was almost as if they gave him an orgasm,” said Leo Andresen.
“There were five of us who devised the plan,” interjected Benny Andersson. “Leo wasn’t at work that day but ‘coincidentally’ turned up shortly after the accident,” he said, sketching apostrophes in the air when he said “coincidentally.”
“I made sure no one saw me at security and disappeared afterward just as quickly as I had arrived,” added Leo. “My mission was to delete all the data regarding the power cut, which one of our colleagues had been instructed to cause at the exact moment he received a signal on his pager. Our problem wasn’t the power cut but getting the timing right.”
“We agreed that immediately before the incident was due to take place, one of our foremen, who unfortunately isn’t with us anymore, should lie to Rose’s dad that she’d been slagging him off in the worst possible way, which of course she would never have dared,” said Benny. “So her dad was already fuming when the man who was controlling the overhead crane in the old hall gave the signal that he was ready. Then Benny walked over to Rose and explained to her that they wanted to teach him a lesson he wouldn’t forget, and that she just had to make sure that she was standing on a specific spot in hall W15, just by the conveyor belt to the pusher furnace, when her dad began to have a go at her. She had been told that when her pager vibrated it would be time for her to take up her position. That was all she knew. She had no idea about what was in store for him. The rest of us called it an accident and said that we hadn’t meant it to end like that, but it completely crushed Rose,” Leo ended.
“So there were five of you behind this?”
“Yes, five plus Rose.”
Assad didn’t look pleased with the explanation. “I don’t understand, Leo. Last time we spoke, you said you thought it wasn’t an accident, but that it was deliberate and calculated. Why didn’t you just keep silent about it? You must have known that we wouldn’t be able to leave it at that.”