fluttering
kites, dripping ice creams and bouncing balls. For a few black seconds while they were towelling themselves down after their dip, she felt a sudden rush of envy as she watched all these family
clusters. These extrovert, happy people, enjoying themselves in these simple, healthy and natural surroundings.
But it passed. She shook her head at the thought of such a naive, tuppenny-ha’penny analysis, and contemplated Mikael Bau, stretched out on his back in the sand.
If she really wanted to find herself in that kind of company, there was nothing to stop her, she thought. Nothing to prevent her from taking that step.
Superficially nothing, that is. Only herself. He had said that he loved her, after all. Several times. She lay down close to him. Closed her eyes and began thinking about her own family.
About her mother and father, to whom she spoke once a month on the telephone. And met once a year.
Her bisexual brother in Rome.
Her lost sister.
Maud. Lost in the backyards of Europe. In the red-light districts of large cities, and in the filthy hopelessness of junkie apartments. In pimps’ beds. Sliding further and further down a
long, sleazy spiral. She no longer knew where Maud was.
There were no more postcards. No address, no sign of life. Perhaps her sister was no longer in the land of the living?
A family? she thought. Can you really start living in a family when you’re over thirty and have never had one? Or did all families resemble her own, more or less, when you started to
investigate them more closely?
Good questions, as they say. She had asked them lots of times before.
Asked and asked, but always refrained from answering. It was so easy to blame everything on her parents as well. To polish the chip on her shoulder. Much too easy.
‘What did you say his name was?’
Mikael stroked his hand over her stomach.
‘Who?’
‘The scumbag.’
How clever of him to drag her back into the real world.
‘Lampe-Leermann. Franz Lampe-Leermann. Why do you ask?’
He began slowly filling her navel with sand. A thin trickle of warm, white sand tumbling down from his clenched fist.
‘I don’t really know. Jealousy, I suppose. You go to meet him every other day. Is that why he doesn’t come out with everything at one go? So that he has the opportunity of
spending more and more time with the most beautiful copper in Europe?’
Moreno thought that over.
‘Presumably,’ she said. ‘But there’ll only be one more meeting. I intend to explain to him that there’ll be no more, no matter what happens. I’ll try to be a
bit nicer to him as well, in compensation. Make him a few promises . . .’
‘Bloody hell!’ said Mikael. ‘Don’t say things like that. What’s he done, by the way?’
‘Practically everything,’ said Moreno. ‘He’s fifty-five years old, and has been in jail for at least twenty of them. But he has a reputation. Child pornography. Drug
barons. Weapons. Maybe even people-smuggling. It’s a bit of a tangled mess, but we should be able to sort out some of it at least . . . with Lampe-Leermann’s help. I have no choice but
to go through with this. It’s my job to open up this scumbag. But I’m only going to give up one more day to the task, I promise you that.’
Mikael blew away the grains of sand, and kissed her stomach instead.
‘Do you believe in what you’re doing?’
She raised her head and looked at him in surprise.
‘What do you mean?’
‘What I say, of course. I wonder if you think it really matters. The fact that you manage to achieve some results as a detective inspector. And that I manage to save somebody or something
as a result of my welfare work. Do you think any of that matters when we’re up against the bloody free market and all that bloody hypocrisy and all that bloody cynicism? Look after number
one, and the devil take the hindmost. Do you believe that what you do matters?’
‘I certainly do,’ said Moreno. ‘Of course that’s
kites, dripping ice creams and bouncing balls. For a few black seconds while they were towelling themselves down after their dip, she felt a sudden rush of envy as she watched all these family
clusters. These extrovert, happy people, enjoying themselves in these simple, healthy and natural surroundings.
But it passed. She shook her head at the thought of such a naive, tuppenny-ha’penny analysis, and contemplated Mikael Bau, stretched out on his back in the sand.
If she really wanted to find herself in that kind of company, there was nothing to stop her, she thought. Nothing to prevent her from taking that step.
Superficially nothing, that is. Only herself. He had said that he loved her, after all. Several times. She lay down close to him. Closed her eyes and began thinking about her own family.
About her mother and father, to whom she spoke once a month on the telephone. And met once a year.
Her bisexual brother in Rome.
Her lost sister.
Maud. Lost in the backyards of Europe. In the red-light districts of large cities, and in the filthy hopelessness of junkie apartments. In pimps’ beds. Sliding further and further down a
long, sleazy spiral. She no longer knew where Maud was.
There were no more postcards. No address, no sign of life. Perhaps her sister was no longer in the land of the living?
A family? she thought. Can you really start living in a family when you’re over thirty and have never had one? Or did all families resemble her own, more or less, when you started to
investigate them more closely?
Good questions, as they say. She had asked them lots of times before.
Asked and asked, but always refrained from answering. It was so easy to blame everything on her parents as well. To polish the chip on her shoulder. Much too easy.
‘What did you say his name was?’
Mikael stroked his hand over her stomach.
‘Who?’
‘The scumbag.’
How clever of him to drag her back into the real world.
‘Lampe-Leermann. Franz Lampe-Leermann. Why do you ask?’
He began slowly filling her navel with sand. A thin trickle of warm, white sand tumbling down from his clenched fist.
‘I don’t really know. Jealousy, I suppose. You go to meet him every other day. Is that why he doesn’t come out with everything at one go? So that he has the opportunity of
spending more and more time with the most beautiful copper in Europe?’
Moreno thought that over.
‘Presumably,’ she said. ‘But there’ll only be one more meeting. I intend to explain to him that there’ll be no more, no matter what happens. I’ll try to be a
bit nicer to him as well, in compensation. Make him a few promises . . .’
‘Bloody hell!’ said Mikael. ‘Don’t say things like that. What’s he done, by the way?’
‘Practically everything,’ said Moreno. ‘He’s fifty-five years old, and has been in jail for at least twenty of them. But he has a reputation. Child pornography. Drug
barons. Weapons. Maybe even people-smuggling. It’s a bit of a tangled mess, but we should be able to sort out some of it at least . . . with Lampe-Leermann’s help. I have no choice but
to go through with this. It’s my job to open up this scumbag. But I’m only going to give up one more day to the task, I promise you that.’
Mikael blew away the grains of sand, and kissed her stomach instead.
‘Do you believe in what you’re doing?’
She raised her head and looked at him in surprise.
‘What do you mean?’
‘What I say, of course. I wonder if you think it really matters. The fact that you manage to achieve some results as a detective inspector. And that I manage to save somebody or something
as a result of my welfare work. Do you think any of that matters when we’re up against the bloody free market and all that bloody hypocrisy and all that bloody cynicism? Look after number
one, and the devil take the hindmost. Do you believe that what you do matters?’
‘I certainly do,’ said Moreno. ‘Of course that’s
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