Once she had escorted Nowak out, Brundin returned along the corridors and knocked on the door of Nyman’s office. She hoped he wasn’t dissatisfied with her efforts.
‘Come in!’ Nyman called through the door.
He still had his eyes glued to the screen showing the room where Brundin and Nowak had just been. He was leaning forward with his hands clasped together.
Brundin knew that her colleagues regarded her boss as a paper pusher. In their eyes, Quintus Nyman was a lawyer rather than a proper law enforcement official – having served out a career as a bureaucrat, unlike most people in the building who had spent the best parts of their working lives doing fieldwork. Had it been possible to rhyme anything with Quintus, she was sure there would have been many sobriquets applied to him.
A bald crown, grey-speckled beard, a ring of silver hair around his skull and a narrow, pointy nose that propped up a pair of steel-rimmed spectacles. He could have worn plain clothes, but he always wore a uniform to work – despite the fact that, or perhaps because, he had not been a police officer from the beginning. And true to form, he had a meticulously tidy desk and perfectly arranged folders in the bookcase behind him. No passwords on Post-its stuck to the keyboard here, no dirty coffee mugs, umbrella and wellies standing by, in case it should rain at home time.
Nyman looked up from the computer screen and only then did Brundin settle down into one of the armchairs provided for visitors.
‘Where on earth did she get those names from?’ said Quintus Nyman.
‘Hedin, I should think.’
Damned Hedin was what she wanted to say. But Nyman didn’t swear. So Brundin didn’t either.
‘Otto Rau,’ said Nyman, mostly to himself, as he looked up at the ceiling. Then he fixed his gaze on Brundin again. ‘She won’t give in, will she?’
Brundin shook her head.
‘Do you think she can find them?’
Reluctantly, Brundin realised she was proud that Nyman was consulting her for advice. It showed that he trusted her and appreciated her expertise. But that ought to be a matter of course after thirty-five years in the Security Service, rather than something that she reacted to like a schoolgirl. Pull yourself together, she urged herself.
‘She found Geiger,’ she said. ‘And unmasked Abu Rasil.’
Nyman took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose, closing his eyes.
‘And she was close to ruining the whole set-up with the Germans,’ he said. Then he put his glasses back on again, took a deep breath and exhaled audibly.
‘Should we take her into custody?’ said Brundin.
Nyman nodded thoughtfully. Then he shook his head slowly, mostly for his own sake, it seemed.
‘No,’ he said at last. ‘She’ll keep.’
That wasn’t the answer Brundin had been hoping for, but she trusted that Nyman knew what he was doing.
‘I’ll notify our German friends,’ said Nyman.
‘Should we stand by for the time being?’
‘No,’ said Nyman. ‘Definitely not. Stick to her. I want to know everything she does. All of it. She might actually find them. Keep me in the loop at all times. OK?’
‘OK,’ said Brundin, standing up. ‘Should I note the case as being linked to her, or those terrorists?’
Nyman checked himself.
‘Neither. There is no case. This is strictly off the books. Don’t leave a trace anywhere. Got it?’
That answer surprised Brundin, but she trusted Nyman.
‘Absolutely.’