the renovation.”
“I thought that far, too,” said Halders. “And guess what: the parents can’t find it either. They say that she had a Samsonite that was pretty new, black, but it’s not at the Neys’ house now.”
“Good, Fredrik.”
“God knows. I’ve been thinking here in this haunted apartment. It looks like one big fucking shrouded corpse in here. White, plastic, some kind of antiseptic smell from the paint and the thinner. It’s not fun to be here, Erik. It’s too white here.”
“I understand what you mean, Fredrik.”
Halders didn’t say anything. Winter could hear a rushing sound through the telephone. Perhaps Halders had opened the window in Paula’s white apartment; maybe it was the wind out there in the gray heights of Guldheden.
“You said that you’d been thinking?” Winter said after a moment.
“What? Well, I don’t know about thinking . . . but maybe all this is just a dead end. The suitcase, I mean. Maybe it doesn’t have anything to do with the murder. That someone took it. The murderer. She justhad a bad fucking stroke of luck on her way to Central Station. Met someone. And then it went to hell.”
“You think she was on her way to Central Station? In the evening, after having a glass of wine with her friend?”
They had tried to establish Paula’s final hours. Final hours of freedom, as Winter had thought of it. But so far they hadn’t spoken to anyone who had seen her, noticed her, recognized her. As usual, the big city was the place for the anonymous; it always gave shelter, for the worse, sometimes for the better, offered insecurity, security. There was a great and strangely obvious paradox built into the big city: the more people, the greater the loneliness. Out in the boonies, no one could keep to himself; everyone within a hundred kilometers of primeval forest heard everything, saw everything, noticed everything, recognized everything.
“Enough thinking,” Halders answered. “Now it’s time to find out.”
• • •
Halders hung up. He looked around, at the protective plastic, at the half-finished painting of the walls, as though everything was final and at the same time a continuation that had been stopped only temporarily. The apartment was a condo, nothing exclusive, not junk, even if none of that mattered anymore because all apartments were wildly expensive; this two-roomer up on the top of Guldheden would go for about half a million kronor, maybe more, not to mention the monthly fee. When had she bought it? Had anyone asked yet? In any case, Halders hadn’t found out yet. How many years had she lived here? Did the parents buy it? Someone else? I’ll have to keep reading, Halders thought. Keep asking.
Outside, the trees swayed in the wind; elms, lindens, maples, twenty-five-meter-high crowns, hundred-year-old giants that would still be standing here when he was gone, too, along with all the others who had sat around the coffee table this morning; the whole gang would be gone from this earthly paradise, some earlier, some later, and all that green halfway up in the sky would keep on swaying in thesweet summertime. He had started thinking about existence during the last few years, had become an existentialist because it was only a matter of time in this line of work. He worked in the middle of the end of existence, the premature end. It was hard work, delicate work, and he sometimes wondered why God and the minister of justice had given it to the police in particular.
He shook off his thoughts, or whatever they were, and went into the bedroom for the second time.
There was something he hadn’t seen when he was in there the first time. Something he had expected to find but without knowing what it was. It often happened that way—he knew that he was missing something, but not what. It might be in a room, on a person, at a discovery site, at a crime scene. What wasn’t there could be more interesting than what he could see or hold. The
“I thought that far, too,” said Halders. “And guess what: the parents can’t find it either. They say that she had a Samsonite that was pretty new, black, but it’s not at the Neys’ house now.”
“Good, Fredrik.”
“God knows. I’ve been thinking here in this haunted apartment. It looks like one big fucking shrouded corpse in here. White, plastic, some kind of antiseptic smell from the paint and the thinner. It’s not fun to be here, Erik. It’s too white here.”
“I understand what you mean, Fredrik.”
Halders didn’t say anything. Winter could hear a rushing sound through the telephone. Perhaps Halders had opened the window in Paula’s white apartment; maybe it was the wind out there in the gray heights of Guldheden.
“You said that you’d been thinking?” Winter said after a moment.
“What? Well, I don’t know about thinking . . . but maybe all this is just a dead end. The suitcase, I mean. Maybe it doesn’t have anything to do with the murder. That someone took it. The murderer. She justhad a bad fucking stroke of luck on her way to Central Station. Met someone. And then it went to hell.”
“You think she was on her way to Central Station? In the evening, after having a glass of wine with her friend?”
They had tried to establish Paula’s final hours. Final hours of freedom, as Winter had thought of it. But so far they hadn’t spoken to anyone who had seen her, noticed her, recognized her. As usual, the big city was the place for the anonymous; it always gave shelter, for the worse, sometimes for the better, offered insecurity, security. There was a great and strangely obvious paradox built into the big city: the more people, the greater the loneliness. Out in the boonies, no one could keep to himself; everyone within a hundred kilometers of primeval forest heard everything, saw everything, noticed everything, recognized everything.
“Enough thinking,” Halders answered. “Now it’s time to find out.”
• • •
Halders hung up. He looked around, at the protective plastic, at the half-finished painting of the walls, as though everything was final and at the same time a continuation that had been stopped only temporarily. The apartment was a condo, nothing exclusive, not junk, even if none of that mattered anymore because all apartments were wildly expensive; this two-roomer up on the top of Guldheden would go for about half a million kronor, maybe more, not to mention the monthly fee. When had she bought it? Had anyone asked yet? In any case, Halders hadn’t found out yet. How many years had she lived here? Did the parents buy it? Someone else? I’ll have to keep reading, Halders thought. Keep asking.
Outside, the trees swayed in the wind; elms, lindens, maples, twenty-five-meter-high crowns, hundred-year-old giants that would still be standing here when he was gone, too, along with all the others who had sat around the coffee table this morning; the whole gang would be gone from this earthly paradise, some earlier, some later, and all that green halfway up in the sky would keep on swaying in thesweet summertime. He had started thinking about existence during the last few years, had become an existentialist because it was only a matter of time in this line of work. He worked in the middle of the end of existence, the premature end. It was hard work, delicate work, and he sometimes wondered why God and the minister of justice had given it to the police in particular.
He shook off his thoughts, or whatever they were, and went into the bedroom for the second time.
There was something he hadn’t seen when he was in there the first time. Something he had expected to find but without knowing what it was. It often happened that way—he knew that he was missing something, but not what. It might be in a room, on a person, at a discovery site, at a crime scene. What wasn’t there could be more interesting than what he could see or hold. The
Similar Books
