Red Wolf_ A Novel - Liza Marklund [3]
He stumbled down the steps, waving his arms frantically to keep his balance. At the bottom, he peered through the falling snow above the fence, and stopped still.
The whole sky was illuminated with blue flashing lights. They’re here now, he thought, feeling his throat tighten. This is for real.
He set off, but stopped next to a broken lawnmower that was barely visible under the snow, feeling his heart hammering, faster and faster, thud, thud, thud, thud. He screwed his eyes shut. He didn’t want to see, didn’t dare go up and look. He stood there, his hair-gel stiffening in the cold, hard snowflakes landing on his nose, his ears pricking. Every sound was wrapped in the cotton-wool of the snow, the sound of the ironworks barely audible.
Then he heard voices, a car engine, maybe two. He opened his eyes as wide as he could, looking over the fence towards the football pitch.
Police, he thought. Not dangerous.
He waited until he had calmed down before creeping towards the road and leaning carefully forward. Two police cars and an ambulance, people with confident postures and broad shoulders, with belts and uniforms.
Weapons, the boy thought. Pistols. Bang, bang, you’re dead.
They were standing there talking, walking about and pointing. One man had a roll of tape that he was unwinding; a woman closed the back doors of the ambulance before getting into the passenger seat. He waited for the sirens, but they didn’t come. No point rushing to the hospital.
Because he’s already dead, the boy thought. There’s nothing I could have done.
The sound of a bus accelerating down the road grew louder. He watched the number one go past, annoyed that he had missed it. His mum got so angry if he was late.
He ought to hurry, he ought to run, but his legs refused to move. He couldn’t go onto the road. There might be cars. Gold-coloured cars.
He sank to his knees, his hands shaking, and started to cry, thinking what a wimp he was, but he couldn’t stop.
‘Mum,’ he whispered, ‘I didn’t want to see anything.’
2
Anders Schyman, editor-in-chief, unfolded the graph of the circulation figures on the conference table in front of him. His hands were twitchy and slightly sweaty. He already knew what the columns showed, but the conclusions and analysis made him blush.
It was actually working. It was okay.
He took a deep breath, put his hands palm-down on the table, leaned forward and let the information sink in. The new direction the team had taken was making a clear difference, both to the circulation figures and to the finances. Here it was, in black and white. It was working; the bitterness from the latest round of cutbacks was dying down. The reorganization was complete; people were motivated, working towards a common goal, in spite of the cuts.
He walked round the shiny walnut table, his fingers stroking the wood. It was a beautiful piece of furniture. He deserved it. His high-handed treatment of the staff had turned out to be exactly the right thing to do.
I wonder if anyone else could have done it, he thought, even though he knew there was no one else. He had finally been able to prove himself.
The deal he had worked out with the printers had cut their print costs by eight per cent. That was saving the owners millions each year. And the recession meant that the cost of paper had gone down, which of course he couldn’t take any credit for, but it all added to the successful development of the business. The recruitment of a new sales manager had helped attract advertisers, and in the last three quarters they had taken market-share from both the morning papers and the broadcast media.
And who had fired the old fogey who was still selling advertising space like he was working on some small-town local rag?
Schyman smiled to himself.
But the most important thing was probably his continued development of sales on the front page and flyers. He wasn’t counting his chickens, but,