Authors: Helene Tursten
“Did you hear what she was singing?”
Bengtsson looked surprised. “No. I kept my distance.”
“Did she see you?”
“No. She went to Hotel Eggers and sat down right by the entrance. Then she opened the bags and began to crumble up loaves of bread and scatter oats until she was covered with pigeons. Disgusting.”
The woman’s curious stink had an explanation, Irene thought. “When did you last see her?”
“Well … she’s not easy to spot. I only saw her that one time in Drottning Square. She comes to the shed late at night and leaves in the early morning. Last Monday night I hung a bag of sandwiches for her, and they were gone Tuesday morning.”
So Mama Bird was definitely nearby on the night of the murder. It was urgent that they find her.
“What does Mama Bird look like? How is she dressed?”
Bengtsson took some time to think before he answered. “Well, it’s hard to tell how old she is. Perhaps a bit younger than me. Short and thin. Though it’s hard to see what she really looks like. She wears a large man’s coat. She wears a knitted cap—I believe it’s pink. She keeps it pulled over her ears and nearly over her eyes. You don’t see much of her face.” “What color is her coat?”
“Don’t know. Brown. Gray. She wears it with a rope tied around her waist. She has big gym shoes on her feet, and she stuffs them with newspaper.”
“Anything else?”
“No. Yes. She has hardly any teeth.”
Tommy and Irene thanked him for the coffee and got up to leave. As they walked through the hallway, Irene stopped by the door marked central electricity.
“Have the techs searched the entire basement?” she asked.
“Yes, but they didn’t find anything outside of this room,” Tommy answered. “They also made a sweep of the elevator. Malm believes that she was killed in the ICU. She must have opened the door for the killer, since the lock can only be turned from the inside. Looks like she knew the murderer.”
“Unless the murderer had a key.”
“It’s possible. But the techs couldn’t figure out where in the room she was killed. During the outage Dr. Löwander and the old nurse were fumbling around and knocking stuff over. By the next morning the young ICU nurse had already cleaned it all up. Anna-Karin. She knew Marianne and was Linda’s friend.”
Again Irene had the feeling that Anna-Karin knew more than she was letting on. Still, it was only a feeling, and she couldn’t press the nurse further just on a hunch. She turned to Tommy and said, “I’m going up to the care ward. Nurse Ellen promised to take a look at my cat scratches.”
“All right. I’ll ask around and see if I can get anything more on Mama Bird.”
• • •
IRENE CLIMBED THE
stairs up to the ward. At the nurses’ station, she found her boss in happy conversation with Nurse Ellen Karlsson. They were laughing heartily together at a good joke. Irene tried to remember when she had last heard him laugh like that. When he saw her, he stopped abruptly, and his face turned red.
He had the look of a kid with his hand in the cookie jar
, Irene thought. But there should have been nothing for him to blush about.
Nurse Ellen followed Andersson’s glance and spun around in her chair. “Well, hello. How are you feeling? Your scratches giving you any trouble?”
“Thanks, I’m fine. As long as I don’t laugh.”
“Let me take a look. Let’s go to the exam room.”
Nurse Ellen got up from her chair, and Irene followed her. As they left, Irene shot a glance back at her boss, who looked very ill-tempered. Maybe he was up to something after all.
The nurse began to pick out the supplies she’d need. Sterile saline, new bandages, skin-friendly adhesive, and tweezers. She chatted as she assembled everything on a trolley.
“Things are quiet today. Dr. Bünzler has gone to his cabin in Sälen with his children and grandchildren. Konrad Henriksson, our anesthesiologist, has also gone on winter break. So it’s just Sverker Löwander in surgery, and he’s only doing minor operations using local anesthesia in the polyclinic. So there’s not a lot going on.” Nurse Ellen stopped in the middle of the flow of words. Her voice filled with worry. “Is there any news about Linda?”
“No. Sorry. No trace yet.”
“The whole thing is unbelievable. First Marianne is murdered, and then Linda disappears.”
“It’s strange, all right. Did you read yesterday’s newspaper? The woman who claimed to see Nurse Tekla?”
Nurse Ellen began to carefully remove the bandages from Irene’s face. It still hurt. “Yes. Who would say a thing like that?”
“There seems to be a homeless woman hanging around. Do you know anything about a homeless woman on the property?”
She paused to think about what Irene had said. “A homeless woman? There can’t be too many of those. No, I haven’t heard anything. What does she look like?”
“Short and thin. Wearing a pink knit cap and a man’s coat.”
“She could be the one I saw at Burnsite.”
“Burnsite?”
“That’s what we call it around here. Kind of a joke. There used to be a huge doctor’s mansion close to the hospital. It burned down eleven years ago, and the grounds were made into a parking lot for the employees.”
“I see. No one wanted to rebuild instead?”
Nurse Ellen stopped cleaning Irene’s face for a moment and bit her lower lip. For the first time in their conversation, Irene had the feeling that Nurse Ellen was deciding whether or not to tell the truth. Finally she said, “Mrs. Löwander went nuts and said that Carina had set the place on fire.”
“Isn’t Carina Mrs. Löwander?”
“She’s Mrs. Löwander Number Two. Barbro was Sverker’s first wife. He and Barbro moved into the mansion one year after old Dr. Löwander died. They were barely settled in the place when Dr. Löwander filed for a divorce. Barbro was totally devastated.”
“Do they have any children?”
“Yes, John and Julia. John lives in the States, and Julia’s there this year as an exchange student.”
“So Barbro stayed in the mansion by herself?”
“No, she left, and Sverker lived there alone.”
“Why would Carina set fire to the place if she planned to live there with Sverker?”
“That’s just it. She didn’t want to live in an old mansion. According to Barbro.”
“So she decided to burn the place down? That sounds far-fetched.”
“Yes, everyone else thought so, too. Barbro was unbalanced at the time, so nobody paid much attention to what she said.”
“So the house burned to the ground?”
“Yes. Oh, people managed to save a few things, but Carina refused to have them in the new place, so Sverker put them in the attic here.”
“Are they still here?”
“Most likely. I saw the suitcases they were in when I went to get the Advent lights last year. That part of the old attic was never renovated. It’s just used for storage.”
“Was that where Nurse Tekla hanged herself?”
“Yes.”
Irene decided to change the subject and go back to Mama Bird.
“You said that you might have seen the homeless woman near Burnsite?”
Ellen Karlsson relaxed again. “Yes, about two weeks ago. It was around six in the morning. I’d gotten here extra early. I still had things to finish from the night before. I just caught a glimpse of her underneath a streetlight. Then she disappeared into the park.”
“You never saw her again?”
“No.” The nurse cocked her head and inspected Irene’s cleaned wounds. “It’s healing nicely. You will still need one bandage, but the rest can be covered with surgical tape. You’re keeping up with your penicillin, I trust?”
Irene nodded obediently. “Did you know Dr. Löwander’s first wife, Barbro?”
“Oh, yes. She was a medical secretary here at the hospital. After the divorce, though, she took a new job at Sahlgren Hospital to avoid Carina. You see, Carina also had a job here.”
“What did she do?”
“Physical therapist. Sverker and Carina met here.”
“But Carina doesn’t work here anymore either, right?”
“No, she started to work in wellness care instead. She’s leading the fitness program for Corporate Health Services. I’m sure it suits her perfectly. She can hang out with people she likes.”
There was a sharp tone in that last comment, but just as Irene was about to follow up on it, someone knocked on the door. Ellen Karlsson didn’t have time to speak before the door flew open and Anna-Karin stuck in her head.
“Hi, I just got a call. The other night nurse has the flu, and Siv Persson is still out. So what do we do now?”
Nurse Ellen’s soft, friendly face suddenly sagged. Her exhaustion was audible in her voice. “Oh, dear Lord. I have no idea. I’m almost at my limit. I’ve already covered Linda’s shift twice.”
Anna-Karin thought quickly. “I’ll call Källberg Hospital and see if they have anyone in the pool that can be sent over.”
The image of a swimming pool filled with nurses flashed through Irene’s mind. Along the edge a desperate group of personnel administrators and exhausted hospital employees were trying to fish for people. Nurse Ellen’s stern voice snapped Irene back to reality.
“Please excuse me, Irene, I have to run. You can take the tape off on Sunday. Bye, now.”
The next moment Irene was left alone in the tiny examination room. She got up from the table she’d been sitting on and walked over to the window, which looked out on the park. Right beneath her was the lilac arbor and the garden shed. Although the leaves were gone, it was still hard to see its tarpapered roof. Mama Bird’s nest was well hidden. Irene looked past the park to the heavily visited cluster of evergreen trees. Beyond them she could see a three-story apartment building. She could see a car or two passing by on the road below. The traffic crossed the stream via a narrow bridge, on the other side of which she could make out a streetcar stop. This was probably the route Mama Bird used to get here in the evenings. She came by streetcar from town, got off at the stop, made her way over the bridge and through the park to her nest.
Maybe they ought to keep watch by the shed and try to wait for her? If they couldn’t find her today, this would be a last resort. Still, it would cost time and resources, and it looked as if the woman had other hideouts as well. What if she didn’t show up several nights in a row? They’d have to check in with the superintendent if they couldn’t find her.
IRENE FOUND TOMMY PERSSON
in a secretary’s room by the reception desk. He was talking on the telephone, the notebook page in front of him scribbled full.
“By lot? And then how do they find out about it?” He listened to the voice on the other end of the line, rolling his eyes when he spotted Irene. “I see. And what if they have no address? … You can’t? You can’t do anything about it? … I see. Thanks so much.”
Tommy slammed down the receiver and sighed dejectedly. “This is crazy. There are human beings in our society who officially do not exist. They’ve been administrated out of existence.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve been calling around to our welfare offices and asking them if they know Mama Bird. They’re helpful at first, but then they want her real name, her personal number and address. Since I can’t answer a single one of those questions, they can’t help me. When I mention that she’s homeless, they turn frosty. Homeless? Can’t help you there. Then they say a polite phrase or two and hang up. I decided to press this last person for more details, like their routines for homeless people. Do you know what they do with them?”
“No, what?”
“They pick a part of the city to place them in. By lot.”
“By lot?”
“Yep. Mama Bird could have been assigned the social-welfare office in Torslanda, and they would be in charge of her welfare. But how is she supposed to know that? There’s no address to send her the information. Her true address is the garden shed in Löwander Hospital Park. It’s a great system. They raffle responsibility to someone who has never met the homeless person in question. This person is now the homeless person’s caseworker on paper. Society has done its duty and made sure that the homeless person has his or her own caseworker. And the two never meet.”
Tommy looked at the telephone bitterly, as if it represented the social-welfare offices.
“I assume there’s no need to bother with the welfare office.”
Tommy nodded and shrugged. “So it seems. We’ll have to search all the city districts. But I don’t think that’ll lead anywhere.”
“What should we do, then?”
“Let’s go try the Salvation Army or the City Mission.”
“How about lunch?”
“Okay, lunch first.”
IT WAS THREE
in the afternoon by the time Tommy and Irene got out of the car at the police station. Tommy was to continue calling to find out about Mama Bird. He borrowed Birgitta and Fredrik’s office, since Irene would be hosting her interviews in the office he shared with her. Irene decided to put her report together before Andreas Svärd showed up.
At exactly 4:00
P.M
., Andreas Svärd knocked on Irene’s door. He was dressed as elegantly as he’d been the previous evening. His pale color was underscored by the dark blue overcoat, black pants, and black shoes he wore. As he took off his coat, Irene saw he was wearing a black jacket, a dark blue tie, and a white shirt. Obviously Andreas was dressed in mourning, and his face reflected his sorrow. His eyes were still bloodshot. Irene wondered if he’d had a fight with Niklas about his lunch outings with his ex-wife.
“Have you learned anything new?” Andreas asked directly.
“No, but we have a possible witness.”
“The one mentioned in the paper?”
“Yes, among others.”
Irene was purposely vague. It was obvious that Andreas Svärd was affected by the murder, but he could also be afraid of what the police would find. She decided to feel him out.
“How did you and Niklas start your relationship?”
“Is this of any importance?”
“Absolutely. It seems to be what motivated Marianne to leave Östra Hospital for Löwander.”
Andreas sighed, resigned. “We had an open-house party, Marianne and I. We’d bought a house in Hovås, and she was so … happy.” His voice turned raspy. “We’d never had many people over, and we certainly didn’t have large parties. But now we had the space, and Marianne thought that for once we should have a really huge party. We invited all our friends and co-workers. Of course, Marianne invited Niklas. So that’s how we … got to meet.”