Satisfied with himself and the decision he’d made, even though it was the first day after vacation, Johansson decided to leave early and work at home. His secretary thought this sounded excellent, not least considering the beautiful summer weather. She would gladly have done the same if she’d had the opportunity to choose or even express a wish in that direction.
“Sounds wise, boss,” she agreed. “Considering the weather, I mean. Is there anything else I need to know?”
“I’m to be reached only in an emergency. Plus the usual, you know,” said Johansson.
“That I should take care of myself,” said his secretary.
“Exactly. You have to promise to take care of yourself.”
“I promise,” she answered. “Although this evening I hadn’t planned any major adventures. Thought about watering the flower boxes on the balcony when I get home, if that’s all right?”
“Sounds like an excellent idea,” said her boss, whose thoughts already seemed to be elsewhere. “Just so you don’t fall over the railing.”
“I promise,” she said. What could happen to me? she thought as he vanished out the door. I’m fifty years old, single with no children, my only girlfriend on vacation with her new boyfriend, and I don’t even have a cat I can pet.
Johansson walked the whole way home along the city’s wharfs in the pleasant summer breeze that passed over the waters of Mälaren and cooled his Norrland body. An American in Paris, Johansson thought for some reason, and then he started wondering about himself along the same lines. A simple boy from the country, from Näsåker and red Ådalen in north Ångermanland, who had traveled to the royal capital forty years ago to start at the police academy in Solna. Who’d taken his fate in his own hands and borne it on strong arms, who’d done it well and patrolled his way to the top of the police pyramid. A simple boy from the country who was now approaching the end of the journey and would retire about the same time as the murder of the country’s prime minister would pass the statute of limitations. What would be a better finale than clearing up this case before he said goodbye?
In these and equally pleasant musings he walked the whole way along Norr Mälarstrand, Riddarholmen, and up on the heights of Söder. There he made a detour by way of the indoor market to shop for various delicacies for the summer dinner with which he intended to surprise his wife when she came home from her job at the bank. A few goodies, mostly fish, seafood, and vegetables, but still two well-filled bags that he carried home to the apartment on Wollmar Yxkullsgatan.
The rest of the afternoon he was diligently busy as a cook. Because the weather was right, he set the table on their new balcony facing the courtyard; it had been finished just before they went on vacation and could not be inaugurated until now. He made a salad of fresh salmon, avocado, and mild arugula, cut fresh tuna in nice thick slices, placed chopped herbs on top, and put everything back in the fridge until it was time.
Then he scrubbed carrots and potatoes, put them in separate saucepans, and poured in water. He checked the temperature of the dry German Riesling he planned to serve as the main wine. After a brief inner deliberation he also put a bottle of champagne on ice in a table-cooler. Both he and his wife preferred it really cold.
Then he did everything else from the fresh asparagus with whipped butter, to the cheese tray, to the concluding raspberries. Everything in the right order, of course, and while he was still at it he rewarded himself with a cold Czech pilsner. When his wife called and said she’d just left work and would be home in fifteen minutes, he put the saucepans on the stove and made a toast to himself.
Cheers, Lars, thought the head of the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation, Lars Martin Johansson, raising his glass. In all likelihood there’s not a soul on the planet who can say anything other than that you are one outstanding, well-stocked SOB.
“God,” Pia Johansson exclaimed as soon as she stepped into the hall and set her handbag down on the hall table. “I’m so hungry I could devour a boiled puppy. With the fur on.”
“That probably won’t be necessary,” Johansson answered. He bent forward, placed his right hand around her slender throat, his thumb against the hollow in her neck, letting his left hand rest lightly against her right cheek, breathing in her scent while he let his lips brush her hairline.
“What do you say we eat first?” asked Pia.
“Of course,” said Johansson. “Otherwise I would’ve wrestled you to the floor right away.”
“God, this is good.” Pia sighed two hours later when they had arrived at the raspberries and a more frostbitten Riesling that Johansson had up his sleeve for just this purpose. “If I were forty years younger I would have belched.”
“Impossible,” said Johansson. “Only small children belch. And Chinese,” he added. “It’s supposed to be a tradition they have in China to say thanks for the food.”
“You’re lucky I’m the only one listening. Okay then, if I were forty-five years younger, then I would have belched.”
“Children belch; men snore, fart in secret, even let out real juicy ones if they’re alone or feel comfortable with who they’re with. Women do nothing of the sort.”
“Why do you suppose that is?”
“I don’t have the faintest idea.” Johansson shook his head. “What do you think about a cup of coffee, by the way?”
“Of course,” Pia agreed. “Though first I meant to say thanks for this princely meal.”
“Just a simple banquet,” said Johansson modestly. “Necessary nourishment for our solitary earthly wandering.”
“I’m almost getting a little nervous,” she continued. “You’re not up to something, are you?”
“Not really,” said Johansson. “I simply wanted to ingratiate myself in general terms with the woman in my life.”
“You don’t need to borrow money?”
“Borrow money,” Johansson snorted. “A free man doesn’t borrow money.”
“Okay then,” said Pia. “Then I’ll take a double espresso with hot milk.”
“Good choice,” Johansson agreed. “Personally I was thinking about having a small cognac to help my digestion.”
“Not for me,” said Pia. “Considering tomorrow. There’s a lot to do after vacation.” But mostly because I’m a woman, she thought.
“Personally I was thinking about taking it very easy tomorrow,” said Johansson. I am the boss after all, he thought.
Tomorrow can wait, thought Johansson as he loaded up the espresso machine and poured a short one to help his digestion. I’m a fortunate man, and some days are better than others.
After dinner was over they sat on the couch in Johansson’s study. Johansson turned on the TV and looked at the late news. But everything was quiet, and given that his red cell phone had been silent the whole evening, his concluding message at the meeting had evidently done the trick. Not a peep about a prime minister assassinated long ago. In the midst of all this Pia fell asleep on the couch with her head on his lap. Without making a sound and while he stroked her forehead. You sleep like a child in any event, he thought. Motionless, soundless, now and then just a light trembling of the eyelids. Change of plans, and just as well considering all the food and wine, and what do I do now?
His wife solved the problem for him. Suddenly she sat up with a jerk, looked at the clock, and shook her head.
“Good Lord,” said Pia. “Already eleven. Now I’m going to bed. Don’t stay up too late. Tomorrow’s a work day.”
“I promise,” said Johansson. Tomorrow can wait, he thought, reaching for the TV guide.
First he sat surfing between the twelve or more movie channels to which he now had access. Most of the films he’d seen before, and the ones he hadn’t didn’t seem worth the trouble. Mostly a lot of nonsense about serial killers who had the good taste to stay away from his desk anyway, and in the midst of this he suddenly had an idea.
In the Palme room were binders, folders, and boxes that covered all the existing wall space and a good share of the floor. In Johansson’s large study there were books from floor to ceiling. Books about everything under the sun, assuming it was something that interested him. What didn’t interest him he would take up to the attic or give away. True, the Palme room was twice the size of Johansson’s study, but the difference in letters and words was less than that. Books, books, books…videocassettes, DVDs and CDs plus numerous good old-fashioned LPs. But mostly books, almost all books. Books he’d read and appreciated and could imagine reading again. Books he needed to learn about things and to be able to think better. Books he loved literally because their physical existence showed that for a long time he had become the master of his own life and that he had made the most of himself. All these books he’d missed so deeply while growing up on the farm outside Näsåker that the absence sometimes gnawed at his chest. But never a mountain he was forced to climb.
In Johansson’s childhood home there had been few books. The life they lived left little room for reading. In the parlor there was a bookcase with old Bibles, hymnbooks, farming guides, and the devotional tracts that were a natural part of the region’s cultural heritage and considered remarkable enough to have bound. But not much else.
In his father’s study—the farm office—there were thick catalogs for everything under the sun having to do with work. From manufacturers of tractors, farm and forest machinery, to sellers of guns and ammunition, fishing tackle, screws, nails, tar, paint and varnish, bolts and lumber, motor saws, tools, seed, breeding animals and other lighter goods that were part of life on the farm, and could be shipped through the postal service, paid for COD with the deal concluded by a handshake with the mail carrier.
In his older brothers’ room were numerous worn-out volumes of Rekord magazine, Se and Lektyr, carelessly stacked on their one rickety bookshelf. Besides very different publications in which a picture said more than a thousand words, and which they preferred to hide under their mattresses.
The latter publications were obviously lacking in his sister’s room. Instead there were Anne of Green Gables, Pollyanna, The Children from Frostmo Mountain, and everything else on the same theme that shaped little girls into conscientious young women and good mothers.
Not so for Johansson, who even as a little boy read as if he were possessed. Who somehow learned to read the year before he started grade school. Little Lars Martin, whose love of reading deeply worried his kindly father and was the reason that his older brothers teased him and gave him a licking whenever they caught him with a thick book without any pictures.
It started with crime. Ture Sventon, Agaton Sax, Master Detective Blomkvist, and Sherlock Holmes, the greatest of them all. He was forced to hide in toolsheds, carriage houses, and outhouses so he could harvest the fruits of such reading in peace. Not until he was big enough to defend himself could he visit his own room, his own reading lamp, and the relative lack of disturbance this calling required.
He continued with adventure in the most general terms, from another time and reality than his own, and for just that reason he could give his imagination free rein. All the adventures of Biggles, the solidarity of the three musketeers, and the solitude of Robinson Crusoe. Around the World in 80 Days and Gulliver’s Travels. He traveled in time and space, in free flight between reality and imagination, and as far away as the public library in Näsåker could issue the ticket. The happiest of all the journeys a person could undertake if anyone had thought to ask little Lars Martin.
When he was nine, his father put him in the car and took him on another journey, an eighteen-mile trip to the district doctor. High time, imminent danger, and his youngest son was wearing his eyes out reading books like a veritable madman. Because little Lars seemed completely normal in all other respects, his father couldn’t rule out that something in his head had gotten stuck. Like a gramophone record with a skip in it, if you were to ask a layman.
“So it’s not that he’s strange or anything,” his father, Evert, told the doctor, when he’d shut the door, leaving the little patient in the waiting room outside.
“No, it’s nothing like that if you ask me. He’s easy enough to deal with, likes fishing, and he’s a real crackerjack with the air rifle I gave him for Christmas. It’s this reading stuff. He’s in a conspiracy with the library lady down in the village and his teacher, and as soon as I take my eye off the kid he’s dragging home sacks of books that they pile on him. I’m worried his eyes are going straight to hell.”
The doctor investigated the matter. Shone a light in the eyes, ears, and nose of Lars Martin Johansson, nine years old. Squeezed him on the head and hit him on the knee with a little hammer, and so far all seemed well and good. Then the boy had to read the bottom line of letters on the chart on the wall. First with both eyes and then with his hand in front of first the left, then the right eye, and no big deal there.
“The kid’s as healthy as a jay,” the doctor summarized after his patient returned to the waiting room.
“But you don’t think he needs glasses? There must be some help,” Evert persisted.
“About as much as a hawk, if you ask me,” said the doctor.
“But what about all the reading? The boy seems possessed. You didn’t find anything wrong in his head?”
“I guess he likes to read. Some people do,” said the district medical officer, sighing for some reason. “The worst thing that can happen is that he’ll become a country doctor,” he observed and sighed again.
Then Evert and his youngest son drove home to the farm and never talked about the matter again. Ten years later Lars Martin went to Stockholm to become a cop and so that he would be able to read in peace. Mostly about crime as it turned out, mostly gathered from reality, less often from the world of imagination. A considerable detour it might seem, but not all journeys are simple, and there are often more routes than one that lead to the journey’s end.
After some rooting in his shelves, Johansson at last found the book he was looking for. Volume seven, on the Gustavian period, of Carl Grimberg’s classic work on Swedish history: The Marvelous Destiny of the Swedish People. A beautiful little book that could be sensuously weighed in the hands, first edition, leather bound, gold tooling on the spine.
This is what the computer wizards have missed, despite all the networks and search engines, thought Johansson contentedly as he poured the last drops of wine from dinner into his glass, made himself comfortable on the couch, and started reading about the assassination of Gustav III and the times in which he lived. It was as close as he could get to his own murder victim and a comparable Swedish crime case, he thought.
The reading had taken an hour, most of it he already knew, and then he took out paper and pen to make notes while he thought.
The masked ball at the Royal Opera House in Stockholm on March 16, 1792. A circle of perpetrators in the victim’s vicinity who hated him and what he stood for. Aristocrats, courtiers, members of the king’s own guard. A circle of perpetrators whose opportunity was served up on a silver platter. With a personal invitation and far enough in advance to make the most of it. A circle of perpetrators who were expected to wear masks even before they set to work.
A circle of perpetrators who had access to firearms. Johansson smiled wryly as he made a note of this. One of them was motivated enough to approach the victim, draw his weapon, aim, and fire. Motive, opportunity, and means, Johansson summarized the same way his colleagues at that earlier time must have done.
A victim who was hated by many—aristocrats, military officers, rich citizens. Fine people, in brief, who held power in their swords, their moneybags, their history, and feared that an absolute monarch would take it away from them for good. A victim who was loved by many. By poets and artists, for the shimmer they maintained was a result of King Gustaf’s reign, and for them in particular on good economic grounds, thought Johansson.
The fact that large segments of the peasantry also seemed to have liked their king was not as easy to understand. Plagued as they were by constant wars that drove the finances of the realm to the bottom, and suffering all the everyday misery of crop failure, starvation, epidemics, and common diseases. People must not have known any better, thought the farmer’s son Johansson, sighing.
Hated by many, loved by many, but with no room for many feelings in between. What more can one ask of a so-called motive, Johansson summarized as he brushed his teeth in front of the bathroom mirror after a day of hard work, an excellent meal he’d made himself, and a little reading purely for the sake of enjoyment. At best I’ve learned something too, he thought.
Ten minutes later he was asleep. With a smile on his lips but otherwise exactly as usual. On his back with his hands clasped over his chest, with manly snoring, secure in his own body, free from dreams. Or in any case the kind of dreams he would remember, even vaguely, when he woke up the next morning.
Most often it was Lars Martin Johansson who fell asleep last and woke up first, but for once his wife had evidently gotten up before him. It was the faint aroma of coffee that alarmed his sensitive nose and woke him. Although it was only seven o’clock it was still a few hours late compared to his usual routine. His wife, Pia, had already had time to set out breakfast—“I’ve labored like a beast to start paying you back for dinner last night”—and in passing she alerted him to the morning paper with an innocent smile.
“You’re in the newspaper, by the way,” said Pia as she poured coffee for him. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
“About what?” asked Johansson as he splashed warm milk in his coffee cup.
“That you’ve appointed a new Palme investigation.”
What the hell are you saying, woman? thought Johansson, who would never dream of saying that out loud. Not to his beloved wife and after almost twenty years of marriage. The fact that all days hadn’t been good weighed easily against the fact that many had been good enough and several far better than anyone had the right to ask for, even from his wife.
“What is that you’re saying, dear?” said Johansson. What the hell is it she’s saying? he thought.
“Read it yourself,” said Pia, handing over the copy of Dagens Nyheter that for some reason she had chosen to set on the floor next to her own chair.
“Sweet Jesus,” Johansson moaned, glaring at the unflattering picture of himself on the front page of the country’s largest morning paper.
“High time if you ask me,” said his wife. “A new Palme investigation, I mean,” she clarified. “Though maybe you should make sure they get a better picture of you. You’ve actually lost quite a bit of weight since they took that one.”