The Demon of Dakar (20 page)

Lindell was worried. She had
allowed herself to engage in a ridiculous war of words with Slobodan Andersson. It was amateurish and stupid. It worried her because it revealed the extent of her desperation. Armas did not want to take shape. He slid behind a curtain that consisted of an unknown background and such a strict and unimaginative life as to appear almost indecipherable.

To understand the victim was many times the prerequisite for understanding the perpetrator. No one had known Armas fully, she was convinced of this, not even Slobodan.

Who knows me? she thought as she took the walking path along the railway. The intense heat of the past few days had been replaced with large clouds that threatened from all sides. Will there be thunder? No one knows my fear of lightning, she thought, no one except Edvard.

The telephone call from Haver that had prompted her to leave Slobodan Andersson was about the forensic investigation. Some fifty meters from the clearing that they believed to be the scene of the crime, the technicians had found tire marks from a car. The ground was dry and therefore the tracks were unclear, but it was apparent that someone had opened the barbed-wire gate, after following a old path down to the river, and had subsequently parked. The car had been hidden behind a thicket of alders and underbrush.

Lindell went straight to Ola Haver’s office. He had barricaded himself behind piles of papers, his hair on end as it always was when Haver sat lost in deep thought.

“The hardworking Constable Ola Haver,” Lindell said lightly, relieved to escape her own thoughts after the meeting with the restaurant owner.

Haver grinned. Their relationship had only continued to improve after a romantic snag a few years ago. Nothing remained of their earlier attraction. Both of them realized now that it had never been a real infatuation,
that what they had felt was simply a result of Lindell’s disappointment over her and Edvard’s relationship and Haver’s frustration with a marriage that appeared to be idling.

“That Morgansson is a sharp bastard,” Haver said, “but you must already know that. I missed the marks but he’s a real pathfinder, quiet as the devil but tracks like an Indian.”

“What do they look like?”

Haver took out several photographs, but they did not say much to Lindell: the faint impression of what could possibly be traces of a car tire.

“That isn’t much,” she said, disappointed.

“Don’t say that,” Haver replied. “We’ll be able to match it to a tire brand, determine how wide the vehicle is, and from there perhaps even identify a specific make and model. It’s already clear that this is a small, narrow car.”

“Why does someone camp?” she started, unsure of where the discussion would lead. “Well, if one is a guest in town and doesn’t want to be visible at a hotel. How do you get to Uppsala? In your own car?”

“Doubtful,” Haver inserted, aware of where she wanted to go. “Why risk being seen in your own car?”

“A rental,” Lindell said.

“A person who camps is probably no Richie Rich,” Haver said. “I mean—”

“If this was an isolated task, to kill Armas, then why the need to camp? He could have gone into town, done the deed, and disappeared.”

“Maybe he had to spy him out first,” Haver said, “and needed a few days. Or the mission is more complicated than that.”

The back-and-forth between Haver and Lindell led to the topic of motive and there they had nothing, even if they could speculate.

“Slobodan became noticeably upset when I brought up the homosexual angle,” Lindell said after a while. “Maybe we should pursue that.”

“A triangle drama, you mean?”

“I don’t know,” Lindell said and shrugged.

They stopped talking, well aware of the fact that it was rarely useful to spin on for too long. Over the years they had developed this style of conducting brief discussions that could later be revisited in more detail.

“Let’s see what the technicians uncover,” Lindell concluded. “Have you heard anything from Berglund?”

“Not a word. Are you worried?”

“Not really,” Lindell said. “But we need him.”

Haver moved the computer mouse and the computer switched to another humming sound before it turned off.

“There was one more thing,” Haver said as Lindell was getting ready to leave.

“Oh?” Lindell said, pausing at the door.

“It was Fälth, the technician, who discovered it.”

“What?” Lindell said, tired of his evasiveness but also irritated at herself for her impatience.

“He noticed part of a branch on the ground, it was close to the tent, and he thought it looked a bit strange. It had been torn off a larger branch at a height of three meters above the ground.”

“How do you tear down a branch that high?” Lindell asked, and watched Haver revel in smugness.

“A bullet,” he said. “And we were damned lucky to find it in a tree trunk.”

“You mean a bullet was fired at the campground?”

Haver nodded.

“Nine millimeters. Fälth dug it out.”

Lindell stared at her colleague.

“I think Armas was armed, fired a shot, missed, and got his throat cut as punishment,” Haver said.

“Only now? Shouldn’t they have spotted this branch before?”

“One might have thought so,” Haver said laconically.

“That makes this a completely different investigation,” Lindell said. “But it could equally well have been the perp who fired the shot?”

“Morgansson doesn’t think so. Look at this and you’ll see,” Haver said and reached for a notepad.

Lindell took a couple of steps closer, increasingly agitated by her colleague’s attitude.

“This is what we think happened. Armas was standing here, facing
the tree where they found the bullet, he fired, had his throat slashed, and fell backward. The bloodstains corroborate this.”

“There was no trace of gunpowder on his hands,” Lindell said.

“He was found in the water,” Haver replied.

His smug expression had waned and he looked at Lindell with his former look of mutual understanding.

“Armas had no gun license,” Lindell said.

“How many gangsters do?”

“We have nothing on him.”

“He was a shady character, I am certain of it. This was an armed conflict with the owner of the tent.”

“Slobodan Andersson,” Lindell said thoughtfully, registering the fact that Haver was smiling almost imperceptibly.

“Should we put him under surveillance?”

“No sense,” Lindell said. “If he is involved in any funny business, he’ll be lying low right now. Armas was going to Spain, packed, exchanged money, was ready to leave, and the question is, was the meeting down by the river planned all along, or was it something that just happened?”

“Do we believe it really was a vacation trip, with a few Spanish restaurants planned in on the side, as Slobodan claimed?”

“That’s impossible to verify,” Lindell said.

She walked toward the door, but then turned again.

“Have you ever worked with Barbro Liljendahl?”

“Not really, we worked together a little before I started at violent crimes,” Haver said. “At the time she was a bit, what should I say, fussy. Why do you ask?”

“She’s in charge of a case of a stabbing in Sävja and had some idea that there was a connection to Armas since both crimes were knife-related. Do you happen to know anything about Konrad Rosenberg?”

Haver shook his head, closed a folder, and pushed the papers on his desk together.

“I don’t either. We need a Berglund for that,” Lindell said and went to her office, logged onto her computer, and looked up Konrad Rosenberg.

It was as if she and Haver were involved in two different investigations
. Maybe his surprise song-and-dance number was a kind of protest at her way of leading the investigation?

She smiled to herself as Rosenberg’s history slowly printed out. A bullet in a tree was indisputably progress. Before she turned to Rosenberg, she dialed Fälth’s number and felt incredibly generous as she praised the technician for his fine work.

“One needs a Smålander for detail work,” she said. Smålanders were known for their attention to detail, and Lindell wondered if he picked up the compliment.

A well-functioning restaurant kitchen
is a strange creature, as sensitive as a mollusk, it reacts in self-defense with lightning rapidity at the smallest external interruption. Anyone who disturbs this vulnerable and sophisticated organism experiences this.

“We don’t have time for this shit,” Donald snarled.

Gunnar Björk pulled back quickly in order not to be in the way.

“This is a workplace, not a social club,” the chef continued.

Feo smiled, blinked at the union representative, and sat down on a stool with deliberation.

“And on top of everything this is the worst possible time,” Donald went on, unusually expressive, though without explaining why.

“What do you say, Eva?” Feo asked.

“I belong to a different union,” she said tentatively, uncertain of the atmosphere in the kitchen.

Gunnar Björk summoned up his nerve, encouraged by her words.

“Then we’ll arrange a transfer for you to Hotel and Restaurant,” he said and immediately started to dig in his briefcase.

“I will never join,” Donald said.

“Why not?”

Donald stopped short, turned to Feo, and bored his eyes into him.

“I hate all organizations, all collective pressure where everyone has to sing the same damn song in the same damn choir.”

“You can sing whatever you like,” the union rep said.

“You know what, if you want to agitate, then go do it in your spare time and not here!”

“But you agitate on the job,” Feo objected, and tried to catch Johnny’s gaze. He was standing right in the line of fire with a bunch of leeks in his hand.

Donald twirled around and gave Feo a hard look.

“Stop it! Get back to work.”

Johnny started to cut the leeks. The sound of the knife against the cutting board softened the effect of Donald’s wrath somewhat.

“I’ll come back at a different time,” Gunnar Björk said in a conciliatory tone.

Donald returned to preparing the meat.

“This land is free, isn’t it?” Feo said.

Donald shook his head and sighed heavily.

Johnny put the cut leeks into a bowl. Eva was standing in the doorway to the dining room.

“I’ll go help Tessie,” she said.

Feo stared at Donald for a minute before he also left.

Johnny took out more leeks. He loved leek rings and could go on chopping them forever.

“Lovely,” he muttered to himself. For the first time since coming to Dakar he experienced something of what he had been looking for: the joy of working a sharp knife on a chopping block. He was rested and sober. Two meters away, Donald started to whistle, as if his earlier irritation was already forgotten. The aroma of raw beef mingled with the pungent smell of onion. The fish broth was already starting to bubble and hiss and Donald reached out to turn down the gas flame.

“Ten leeks are enough, don’t you think?”

“That’s fine for now,” Donald said.

Johnny felt his coworker’s gaze like a radiator in his back.

“Do you know a chef called Per-Olof, nicknamed ‘Perro’?”

“The one who left for the States?” Donald asked.

Johnny nodded.

“Sure, we worked together at Gondolen for a year.”

“He’s good,” Johnny said. “He trained me at Muskot in Helsingborg.”

“Then you know Sigge Lång?”

“That was before my time,” Johnny said, “but I know who he is. He went to Copenhagen.”

“Didn’t he become head chef at some fish restaurant?”

The conversation went back and forth, about restaurants and cooks, owners and head chefs, while Donald prepared duck breast, veal, and lamb and Johnny laid out ingredients for the garnish, took out the butter, kept an eye on bread in the oven, and tidied up.

Dakar’s kitchen had been hit hard by Armas’s murder, and both of the cooks felt the need for casual chatter. Not because Armas had been particularly well-liked but because of the turbulence his death had caused. The police had questioned everyone, asked Donald to check the kitchen knives and make sure that none were missing. Donald tried to explain that every chef owned their own knives, and that it would never occur to them to contaminate them with human blood.

“And the rest are so worthless that we basically never touch them,” he explained further and refused to entertain the idea that anyone at Dakar was a murderer.

Feo returned to the kitchen.

“The cops are coming here again,” he said. “They are going to talk to Tessie and Eva.”

“Damn it, we have a job to do!” Donald exclaimed.

“As do they,” Johnny said calmly.

The police had searched every corner and taken a bag of papers from the small desk squeezed in behind the counter. The desk was Donald’s territory and it had upset him, though he had not said anything. He knew they would pay no attention to his objections anyway. Instead, the chef’s wrath had gone out over the rest of them and above all Johnny. It was as if Donald connected the murder with the arrival of the new cook.

Donald hated change and irritating elements that disturbed the balance of the kitchen. He did not grieve for Armas as such but for the work peace that had been lost.

Naturally there had been wild speculation about the motive of the murder. Feo had launched a theory that it was Slobodan who had taken out his companion. His coworkers listened in fascination as he embroidered a story that contained almost everything: black money, trade in prostitutes from the Baltic states, and Armas’s and Slobodan’s murky past.

“The past caught up with Armas,” he said and waved the fillet knife in illustration.

The one to whom the police had shown the most attention was Gonzo, but nothing spoke for the fact that he had been involved, even if the alibi that he presented for the day of the murder was flimsy. It was his day off, he had slept until eleven and gone into town at around two o’clock. He could prove that he had been to the Saluhallen markets by way of a receipt from the cheese vendor that had 14:33 printed on it. In addition, the sales clerk could remember Gonzo’s purchase. He had bought some Stilton.

It was after this that his account became less substantial. He had wandered around downtown, ducking briefly into Bergström’s clock store in order to look at a watch, but no one there could recall seeing him. Then he had gone to Alhambra and talked to Slobodan, returned home at around four o’clock, and then stayed in until shortly before nine when he had a beer at Svensson’s.

He stubbornly claimed that he had resigned, even though everyone knew that he had been fired by Armas. But Gonzo’s version of the events could of course be worth as much as Armas’s.

Eva returned to the kitchen
after the police had left. She had been off for two days and wanted to know what had happened. Tessie was not particularly communicative and only gave monosyllabic answers to Eva’s questions.

“Tessie is still in shock,” Feo said. “I think she was the only one who liked Armas. In a way they were similar to each other, though Armas was more ruthless. Tessie has a heart.”

“What do the police say?”

“To us? Nothing. And Slobban has hardly shown his face. He came
down once and then he went on about how everything would go on as normal. He is holed up at Alhambra.”

“He’s scared,” Donald said, unexpectedly.

“How do you know that? Has he said anything?”

“No, but you can tell. Armas meant more to him than you realize.”

Donald expressed himself as if he knew more than the others but did not find it worth his while to try to explain it.

When it came to the kitchen and the food he was number one and no one questioned it, but Donald often adopted his superior attitude in other areas. When they discussed politics he mostly gave jabs at Feo.

Feo was eager to re-create a good feeling in the kitchen and therefore he overlooked the arrogant tone.

“It must have been a quick one to slit the throat of someone like Armas,” he said. “Armas was no one you toyed with.”

“Maybe it happened in bed,” Donald said.

“What?”

“You didn’t know, did you? Armas was a fag.”

“I don’t believe it,” Feo said.

“Talk with Nicko at the local video store,” Donald said nonchalantly. “Once Armas came in and checked out twenty homo-films at one time. That’s serious business.”

“No, I don’t believe it,” Pirjo exclaimed.

Everyone looked at the kitchen assistant, who immediately became beet red.

“I see,” Feo said, grinning, “you don’t believe it. Maybe he came on to you?”

Pirjo turned away.

“Don’t pay any attention to us,” Donald said.

It was not the first time he defended the shy Pirjo, who found it so difficult to express what she wanted or thought. But now she turned back again.

“You’re speaking ill of the dead,” she said vehemently. “When Armas was still alive you said nothing, least of all to his face. Am I right?”

Feo nodded. Donald looked at her with curiosity.

“You are right,” he said, “we are cowards. Everyone who works in a
kitchen is a coward, you should learn that. If someone has balls, he’ll take his knives and leave, that’s how it is. Such a chef is unhappy.”

“More unhappy than the coward?” Feo asked.

“Yes,” Donald said.

“Is that why you don’t want to join the union?” Johnny hazarded, though he regretted it as soon as he said it.

“As if that is any of your business. No, that isn’t why, and you should have been able to figure it out.”

Johnny got it. With Donald’s work ethic and with the quality of the dishes he presented, there was a negligible chance that he would be badly treated by his employer. Not even if he joined the union. He was too valuable.

Their hands did not rest while they gabbed. They prepared sauce bases, sliced meat, took some things out, wrapped others in plastic, and continued their preparations. Only Eva stood passively. She lingered in the kitchen. There was still a quarter of an hour to go before her shift officially began. She wanted to absorb as much as possible of the new world that was opening to her.

The atmosphere here was completely different from the post office. Perhaps it was the stress that created the raw tone that dominated. There was an urgency to her former job as well, but it was as if the warmth of the stoves, the clatter of china and silverware, the steam from pots and pans, the sudden sizzle of meat, and the waitstaff’s shouted orders … everything created a never-ending restlessness.

“Can you help me, Eva?”

Johnny was busy stocking the refrigerator.

“How are the boys?” he asked softly.

“They’re fine,” Eva said and looked up.

He held her gaze.

“Patrik has started to talk,” she went on, “but he is still grounded.”

She looked at her reflection in the mirror that the roll of aluminum foil attached to the wall provided and where her face appeared cracked in a thousand wrinkles, before she tore off a sheet and handed it to Johnny.

“What do the cops say?”

“Let’s talk later, okay?”

Johnny nodded.

“Thanks for the help,” he said and Eva sensed that the thirty seconds she had helped him were as important for Johnny as for herself.

“Let’s get a cup of coffee,” she said. “I mean some day before we start work.”

He nodded and glanced at the others.

“Then you can start your own chapter of the union,” said Donald, who had his back to them. He then turned his head and gave them a look of amusement.

“Only if you join us,” Eva said, and swept out of the kitchen.

It was ten o’clock when
Eva got home. Her legs were tired and her headache did not want to go away, but she felt satisfied and sent Tessie a mental note of gratitude. She had let Eva go home early. It was as if no one was being so precise anymore, and she had also been understanding when Eva withdrew to call home.

Patrik had answered every time, irritation in his voice, but he turned out to be sitting up waiting for her in the kitchen when she got home.

Hugo was in his room. She heard the sound effects from his computer game. She opened the door a little wider and said hello. His tense back and the concentration in his face testified to a crucial moment in one of these games he spent most of his time on.

She went to the bathroom and got herself some pain relievers.

“Hi, have you had anything to eat?”

Patrik nodded and Eva followed his gaze to the kitchen counter. They had even loaded their dishes in the dishwasher and wiped the counters.

She laughed and put her hand through his hair.

“Was it fun?”

“There were a lot of people,” Eva said. “But they let me go early. When the dinner guests start to get finished it’s mostly drinks and such, and I’m not so good at that yet. The bartender has promised to show me some things. I can’t even tell all the different kinds of beer apart yet.”

“What did they say about that guy who was murdered?”

“No one knows anything, there’s just a lot of talk.”
“Was he a good guy?”

Eva shrugged.

“I met him twice and he said all of five words. What about you, what have you been up to?”

“Nothing,” Patrik said.

“Do you want some tea?”

She started to get things out, while Patrik put water on to boil.

“I don’t think Hugo will want any,” he said.

When they sat down at the table, Patrik started to talk. Eva realized that he must have spent the evening thinking about it and even how to formulate his beginning.

“Zero is actually not stupid, you know? He is easy to deceive, that’s his biggest problem. He wants to be king but doesn’t know what to do.”

Eva figured out that by “king” Patrik meant “liked.”

“Has he been in touch with you?”

Patrik nodded and took a sip of his tea. Eva waited.

“What are you doing?” Hugo called out suddenly.

“None of your business,” Patrik yelled.

“Patrik!”

“He’s so annoying.”

“What did Zero say?”

“He’s hiding.”

Eva wondered where a fifteen-year-old boy could hide.

“He doesn’t dare go home. His brothers will beat him up.”