Joona had stood in the hallway outside the conference room listening on the phone to Johns slow recitation. His voice was filled with the tiredness that comes immediately after high stress. He described how hed just found the general director for the National Inspectorate of Strategic Products hanging from the ceiling in his home.
Suicide? asked Joona.
No.
Murder?
Cant you just come over? John asked. I cant decide what Im seeing. The body is hanging way too high above the floor, Joona.
Hed taken Nathan Pollock and Tommy Kofoed along. Joona had just explained that this was a suicide when the doorbell had rung at Palmcronas home. In the darkness of the landing, a woman was standing and holding two plastic grocery bags in her large hands.
So have you cut him down yet? she asked.
Cut him down?
Director Palmcrona, she replied matter-of-factly.
What do you mean by that?
Excuse me, Im just a housekeeper and I thought
Obviously she was troubled, and she turned away to start walking down the stairs. She was stopped in her tracks by the answer to her first question.
Hes still hanging there.
I see. She turned toward him with a blank face.
Joona asked, Did you see him earlier today?
No.
How did you come to ask whether wed taken him down, then? Did you see anything unusual?
A noose from the ceiling in the small salon, she answered.
So you saw the noose?
Yes, indeed.
But you werent afraid that he might use it?
Dyings not a nightmare. She was holding back a smile.
What did you just say?
The woman just shook her head.
How do you think he died, then?
I think he tightened the noose around his neck, she replied in a low voice.
How did he manage to get the noose around his neck?
I dont know maybe he needed help.
What kind of help?
Her eyes rolled toward the back of her head and for an instant, Joona thought she was going to faint. Instead, she steadied herself with a hand on the wall and then she met his gaze.
Softly, she said, There are always helpful people around.
8
The police stations swimming pool is large and blue, almost completely still. Lit from below, its light dances across the walls and ceiling of the natatorium, and all that breaks the stillness is the steady movement of Joona Linna swimming laps, one after the other.
While he swims, idle thoughts tumble over and over in his head: Disas face when she told him her teeth itched when she looks at him.
Joona touches the edge of the pool, turns underwater, and kicks off again. He doesnt realize hes picking up speed when the memory of Carl Palmcronas apartment on Grevgatan comes to him. Once again, he sees the hanging body, the pool of urine, and the flies on the bodys face. The dead man had been wearing his coat and shoes and yet had taken the time to turn on music.
Actions both impulsive and yet planned, not that unusual when it comes to suicide.
Joonas swimming even faster now, picking up more speed as he kicks off another lap. He sees himself walking back through Palmcronas hallway and opening the door after the unexpected ringing of the doorbell. The tall woman in the darkness of the landing. The impression of her large hands. The fact she was hiding behind the door.
Breathing heavily, Joona pulls up to the edge of the pool and steadies himself, resting his arms on the plastic grille over the gutter. His breathing slows but he can feel the heavy increase of lactic acid in his shoulder muscles. A group of policemen in bathing suits walk into the pool area carrying two rescue dummies: one a child and the other an overweight adult.
Dyings not a nightmare. The large woman had smiled when she said that.
Joona heaves himself out of the pool. Hes filled with nervous tension. The Carl Palmcrona case wont leave him alone. For some reason, the empty, light-filled room keeps coming back into his mind: the languid violin music and the slow buzzing of the flies.
Joona knows in his gut that it is a suicide and is not a case for the CID. Still, he feels the urge to run back to the apartment, to take another look and examine it minutely to make sure hes missed nothing.
Initially hed thought that shock had confused the housekeeper, fogged her mind, and made her suspicious, causing her to speak in that strange, disjointed way. Now Joona tries thinking in reverse. Maybe she wasnt confused at all. Maybe she wasnt shocked in the least but was answering his questions as clearly as she could. Edith Schwartz had hinted that Carl Palmcrona may have had help with the noose: that there were helpful hands, helpful people. In any case, shed insinuated he was not alone in meeting his death. He was not the only person responsible.
Something is not right.
But he cant put his finger on why he thinks that.
Joona walks through the door to the changing room and unlocks his locker. He picks up his cell phone and calls Nils Ahlen, The Needle.
Im not done yet, The Needle says instantly.
Its about Palmcrona. What was your first impression, even if-
Im not done yet.
Even if youre not done-
Come by on Monday.
Im coming over now.
At five oclock, me and the missus are going to check on a sofa at the furniture store.