Page 114 of The Living and the Dead

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Vidar spent the day alone with only the investigation material for company. He read it all from the start, every last bit, reports and logs and interviews; he studied photographs from the scene of the crime and the party, he read documentation concerning the landslide, the accident that had taken Killian Persson’s life, the few advances in the case that had been made on this side of the millennium. At last heturned to the whiteboard and uncapped a marker.

Skavböke, December 1999

A car, its back gate open in the dawn light. A big, blond eighteen-year-old holding secrets in his heart. A third pair of footprints; a witness who never came forward. Why not? An abyss. Over twenty years later, a dead younger brother. Once a little brother, always a little brother, even if you’re the only one still alive. Siri’s notes from that first, crucial interview:lyingfor Sander Eriksson.hiding somethingfor Killian Persson.

Vidar drew it all out. House by house, the community spread across the whiteboard. Söderströms’, Ljunggrens’, Östholms’; there were the Lindells’ and Grenbergs’ places, Erikssons’, Perssons’.

He made a redXwhere Mikael Söderström had been found in Madeleine Grenberg’s Volvo, and another for the detonation of Söderström’s dynamite, ground zero for the great landslide. Hehesitated for a moment but then added one lastXto mark the spot where Filip Söderström was killed.

There were some parts way back in the investigation he couldn’t make sense of. “Miscellaneous investigation material” was a hodgepodge of dead ends and sidetracks, the final measures taken before the case seemed to fade away for good. He knew Gerd Pettersson and Siri Bengtsson had needed to move on, deal with other cases. But even so, something chafed at him. Here were new details, names that weren’t linked to the rest of the material. He thought of Siri Bengtsson and wondered what she had been working on in her final days on the force, before she quit.

He doggedly kept at it, just like a jigsaw puzzle he couldn’t tear himself away from. Now and then, someone from the investigation team would drop off a report or an interview transcript. To a man they described Vidar as absent-minded and worn out and thought he ought to go home and get some sleep. These days, police work was all about conserving energy for the long haul—didn’t the old-timers know that?

After a while, Adrian al-Hadid turned up holding a bag.

“One shirt, just for you,” he said. “Jakob Lindell was happy to hand it over.”

Vidar shot a quick glance at it. “He was?”

“Not exactly.”

“Send it for testing, please. How are things going with Rasmusgården?”

“They’re supposed to get back to me.”

“Head over there if you don’t hear from them today.”

Adrian nodded.

“Right,” he said. “One other thing. Jakob Lindell. He wanted you to call him.”

“What for?”

“He didn’t say.”

Vidar went back to the whiteboard and observed it, hands on his hips. Adrian did the same.

“What do you think?” he said.

Vidar turned his head wearily. “That I think better when I’m alone.”

Adrian trudged off with blazing cheeks. After a while, he came back, his footsteps even more hesitant.

“Yes?” Vidar said coolly, before Adrian could speak. “What is it now?”

“I’m sorry to bother you, but, uh, there’s someone downstairs who wants to talk to you.”

“To me?” Vidar reached for his coffee. “Who is it?”

He followed Adrian down. The heat dissipated. “How the hell can it be cooler down here than up in our offices?”

“Something about the AC up on your floor, I think.” They arrived in the lobby and Adrian glanced uncertainly from Vidar to the visitor. “Is this okay, or…?”

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“Is he any good, that one?” Siri asked, watching the young man as he walked off.