WINTER HAD COME TO DJURSHOLM. A SOFT WHITE COVERING of snow now lay on the ground in the gardens and parks, hiding lawns and asphalt. The snow glistened in the light of the street lamps. Martha looked out through the tower room window and followed the white snowflakes that slowly fluttered down to the ground. The oak trees were covered with a thin pearl-white layer and the high grass had been bent and lay buried beneath a white covering.
How many days had it snowed, and how many days had she sat here and looked out through the window? Martha had lost track, she only knew that she wasn’t feeling right. After the Christmas holidays she had been struck down with a heavy bout of influenza that had been difficult to shake off, and it had been followed by a very troublesome asthma attack. And on top of it all, her heart was acting up. She ought, of course, to have gone to the doctor, but she couldn’t stand the idea of sitting there at the walk-in clinic waiting for hours; no way was she going to do that. She didn’t have the patience. Besides, you could catch something nasty in the waiting room! She had heard all about people who had acquired nosocomial infections, which was the fancy word for catching something nasty in a hospital. You might be admitted for something trivial but you could then die from the acquired infection! Perhaps simply because the hospital management had cut down on cleaning staff to save money. No, she wasn’t going to take unnecessary risks; she would treat her influenza and her fibrillation all by herself. Besides, it was modern to take responsibility for your own health and not take too many pills. She had read about that in a book called The Self-Healing Human. And that suited her just fine, sitting there on the sofa with her knitting and lacking the energy to go anywhere. She had hardly set her foot in the restaurant since that evening when she had sent the Weasel and Kenta packing. She had deliberately tried to let the others take responsibility and she thought that she had got better and better at delegating. Besides, it was to her advantage. While the others worked, she had time to ponder future plans and work out new crimes, but at the same time she could secretly try to cure herself.
So, just sort of in passing, she had asked Christina about various health tips, advice that she had tried out bit by bit. Sooner or later she would stumble across something that worked. And having heart fibrillation was perhaps only logical considering how much pressure she had been under. Above all, there was the problem with Brains. They behaved in a nice and friendly manner toward each other, but he was brooding about something, she could sense that very strongly. She looked at her engagement ring. They hadn’t broken off the engagement, even though he had grunted about that on one occasion, but since that evening when he had thrown the pillow at the wall they no longer talked about a wedding. Now all he talked about, day in and day out, was that Betty woman. Betty this and Betty that, and he didn’t seem to notice it himself. But most serious of all was that he looked so happy when he came up from the restaurant kitchen but his bright eyes faded as soon as he left the barge. That damned pinup girl had completely turned his head. Couldn’t he see how pathetic his behavior was? He was an old man and would win any competition for the person with the most wrinkles! But if this was how he wanted things, well, so be it. Martha snorted—but so forcefully that her heart did a double beat. She calmed down. That fibrillation was slightly worrying. But she also had a past as a gymnastics teacher, so it was embarrassing to worry about such troubles. No, she wasn’t sick. She remembered that Christina had said something about magnesium helping . . . yes, she had claimed that it prevented fibrillation and problems with your legs too.
Martha fetched her computer, dragged the chaise lounge out onto the terrace and started to google the word “magnesium.” She scrolled down the list of sites and nodded. Christina had evidently been right, that metal was good for lots of things. Martha decided to ask her friend for some powders and say it was for a cramp in her legs. Then she wouldn’t need to let on about her heart condition. Pleased with herself, she put her computer to one side, filled a small jug with cloudberry liqueur and put that on a tray together with some eucalyptus pills. Then she went to fetch Christina’s health bible, The Self-Healing Human, and two soft cushions. She made herself comfortable on her Bruno Mathsson armchair. Now she could relax with a good book and at the same time look out across Bielke’s garden.
She noticed that somebody had moved the garden furniture and she wondered whether Bielke had returned. Unless, of course, it was somebody from the council or a new gardener. But why would Bielke suddenly come home now when he hadn’t even been home at Christmas? Now, when it was nice and warm on the Cayman Islands and, later, he could sail his yacht around the Mediterranean. His luxury motor yachts, yes. Martha tried to recall what Christina had said. That’s right, his luxury monstrosities were worth far more than five hundred million kronor each and were registered in the Cayman Islands—where you didn’t need to pay tax. Martha’s brain started to process the information: five hundred to six hundred million, that was a lot of money. In fact, that would be a very nice amount to have! The City Mission hadn’t received many millions and the bonus that the League of Pensioners had given to health staff didn’t add up to much more than a pathetic thousand-kronor note for each one. Business super bosses and the other bonus sharks would laugh themselves to death. No, the League of Pensioners ought to donate a great deal more. And one of those yachts—well, if they could steal just one, then they wouldn’t need to commit any more crimes for a long time. They would be able to give away more money as well as getting a bit of peace and quiet for quite a while. And that would be good for her heart too, no doubt. Wouldn’t it be a delightful crime to plan now that she had delegated most of the work to the others? She was bored and had become restless. And that couldn’t be good for your heart either.
The Silver Punk project had been fun to carry out, but the restaurant didn’t make much of a profit and the new cafe and movie theater she’d thought about had not yet become a reality since the barge was in poor condition and would have to go into dry dock for repairs. Such a project would not generate much money either. Martha took a lemon wafer and poured a thimbleful of cloudberry liqueur into her tea. Why not ask Anders and Emma to take over the restaurant activities, then the friends could go off to Saint-Tropez (far away from Betty) and start the next project? A major project. And it would be really something to steal a huge motorboat that only royalty, oil sheikhs and billionaires could afford; one with a helicopter platform, a swimming pool, luxury rooms and expensive art on the walls. Yes, she had read that people were prepared to pay ten thousand euros a week just to rent one of those seagoing palaces. The very idea cheered her up and she took another lemon wafer.
It was good to stop and think sometimes, not just rush on in life. Perhaps there was meaning when you became ill? Your body’s own way of telling you that you must take it easy, she thought. She got up, fetched her notepad and pen and immediately felt much perkier. Anna-Greta had also thought along the same lines, on that occasion when they had eaten pea soup with a lot of thyme in it. Brains might not be too eager to commit crimes again, but, on the other hand, she wasn’t dependent on what he thought. There were three others in the gang and she ought to be able to get them to agree. Anyway, she might even manage to persuade Brains too; he liked having things to do and there wasn’t enough work at Silver Punk. Besides, it would be good to go away with him so that he would have something else to think about other than Betty and the ladies at the dating table. But how do you steal a motor yacht worth more than five hundred million? It would be difficult, but what a wonderful challenge!