It was like being socked in the stomach.
Beck moved his lips to say, ‘How do you know?’ but he couldn’t even find the breath to say the first word.
She seemed to guess what he was asking.
“Simple logic. First, we found a number of smuggled children, in different places, all around the world, and we traced them back to where the smuggling first occurred, but it was always a different place, a different situation. So, we looked around for any common factors, apart from people wanting money — there was always that — and we noticed there was often some kind of medical organisation involved.” She paused.
“Different organisations, but we put them all together to see if there were people or one person in common who always stood out… and Henry Winslow came top of the list. But, that doesn’t prove anything, and until there is proof, he can’t be arrested and taken to court. To prove something, we have to catch him at it.”
“‘We’,” Jonas repeated in a highly sceptical tone that made Beck whip his head around in surprise. “That’s Tullverket, right?”
She looked at him with an expression so neutral it almost screamed.
“Yes, Tullverket, who I work for. I showed you my I.D.,” she said.
Jonas made a scornful noise.
“The Customs agency wouldn’t be tracing stolen children all around the world — that would be an international job. And I doubt they have expert trackers and marksmen, and they can’t order clean-up crews to dispose of dead bodies. You’re not Tullverket, you’re Säpo.”
“What’s…” Beck had found his breath and tried the word. “‘Serpo’?”
“Säkerhetspolisen — the Security Service, who don’t officially exist but everyone knows they do,” Jonas replied. He looked at Elin with reluctant admiration. “Wow! Säpo!”
Elin looked at him for a moment longer, then turned back to Beck as though Jonas hadn’t said anything at all.
“Do you know what makes me angry?” she said. “Really, really angry? Winslow specialises in selling children to crooked adoption agencies. Now, I’m adopted myself. I had a wonderful childhood with parents who loved me. When it’s done properly, which it is ninety-nine per cent of the time, adoption is wonderful. Here, you have children who want parents. There, you have parents who want children. So you bring them together and you create a new family. It should be so good, so right, and people like Winslow have corrupted it. That makes me mad.”
“So you are the good guys?” Beck asked quietly. “Like a female James Bond?”
“Of sorts. And this is why I’m after Winslow,” she finished.
Okay, he could breathe now. He wasn’t sure he could manage anything else. So much certainty had vanished that he wasn’t sure what to think. Did this all really add up? Could the doc really be bad?
And… if he moved his mouth, would sense come out of it?
“You…” Beck frowned. He had no reason to doubt her, but Winslow was Winslow. The man who had delivered him and Dian. He hadn’t realised he had hung so much on the image of that grumpy, balding man he had met at the lodge. He had to make one last effort to defend him. “But surely, you’ll need more than that in court.”
“And we have it. All kinds of backing evidence. For example, he is a man who likes to gamble — in fact he’s addicted to it, and he is not very good. He is always running up huge debts and then paying them off around the time a new child is taken — that’s what we think he uses the money for. But as you say, that’s not conclusive evidence.”
She changed tone abruptly.
“I need to get you two back to safety. We’re seven kilometres from the road — we can be there in a couple of hours and I can call for a lift.” She gave Beck a quick up-and-down look, taking in his bog-smeared clothing. “I’ll tell them to bring you a fresh change of clothes. But first…” She looked longingly at the cooking hare. “Is there enough for three?”
“Of course!” Beck smiled for the first time. “I’m sorry. There’s plenty here for you too. You must be as hungry as us?!”
“I am hungry.” She paused. “I had no idea teenagers were such hard work!”
They all smiled. Beck sliced the meat and handed it round. After some silence as they savoured the hot food, Beck then started up again. His mind still whirring.
“But do you know how long he’s been doing this? Stealing children?”
She thought.
“We can’t know every single case. He started paying off his debts … oh, fourteen, fifteen years ago, so that might be when it began. Why?” She peered at him more closely.
Beck then stopped eating, mid mouthful, and put the meat slowly down on the ground. His hand was shaking.
“You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
Beck paused.
“We still don’t know why he wanted to kill us,” he said slowly. “Or do we?” Beck paused.
“I recognised him as the man who delivered me. That means…” He paused again, as if he was somewhere far away.
Then Beck looked up at each of them in turn.
“I think I know exactly why he was afraid of me.”