The Cruel Stars of the Night - Kjell Eriksson [125]
Lindell heard how hollow her words sounded but it was the only thing she could think of to get Laura thinking in a different direction.
“You must think I’m stupid.”
Lindell shook her head.
“On the contrary,” she said. “I think you’re a smart woman.”
Laura snorted.
“Tell me about your mother. Even if you don’t think so maybe I’ll understand. We are both single women. I have been thinking about you so much.”
The silence made Lindell sweat. This was the moment of judgment. Either Laura would slam the door shut or she would start to talk. She kept her hand on the door handle. Lindell thought the strip of light on the basement floor grew thinner.
“Laura,” she said and tried to keep her voice steady, “where does your rage come from?”
“I’ve grown up with the black death,” she said and Lindell didn’t know what she was talking about but hoped she would keep talking.
“Petrus Blomgren killed my mother, you know?”
“Indirectly, you mean?”
“He broke into her life. A farmer who thought he was some kind of Casanova. Do you realize how much pain he caused? He inserted a wedge in our lives, lured her away to Mallorca of all places, and then dumped her. He deserved to die, it’s that simple.”
“Jan-Elis Andersson, did he also deserve to die?”
“Did you find the chess piece?”
“We did,” Lindell said and felt as if the air in the basement was running out. “Why a chess piece?”
“My father and I used to play chess in the cottage. That was when he taught me everything I know about chess.”
“Which cottage?”
Laura told her about the only happy summer with Ulrik, when he was like a real father, and how Jan-Elis Andersson turned them out and put an end to the idyll.
“Why did you have to move?”
Ann was trying to keep Laura talking.
“He said he had to prepare the house for a relative but I know why he threw us out. He tried to feel me up. The second time I said I would tell Ulrik. That scared the old bastard.”
“But why the chess piece?”
“When I was throwing out Ulrik’s old things I found the chessboard and the box, and then when I drove out to Alsike I took a pawn with me. Like a reminder. A detail that was important to me. Did it confuse you?”
“Yes. We only found it today.”
“How careless you are.”
Lindell was prepared to agree. She thought of the photo at Blomgren’s house. If Fredriksson had found it the first time they would perhaps have had a chance of stopping the murders of Andersson and Palmblad.
“So there was no larger scheme involving chess?” she asked.
“Why would there be?”
Lindell couldn’t help feeling a certain measure of satisfaction. The chess theory had been plucked out of thin air. The threat against Queen Silvia was nonexistent.
“One of my colleagues had an idea,” Lindell said.
Could she make it up the steps before Laura had time to close and lock the door?
“So Laura,” she said and climbed a step at the same time, “why Palmblad?”
“Oh yes, ‘The Horse.’ Not that he looks like a horse anymore. It’s strange what the years can do. I hardly recognized him, but he recognized me.”
“Why was he an enemy?”
Lindell took another step.
“There are eleven steps left. You’ll never make it,” Laura said. Lindell saw that she was smiling.
“You can think about it down there. You have plenty of time. Have a little wine. Acquaint yourself with Ulrik. He’s better dead.” “There are rats down here.”
“That’s good company for Ulrik. He loved to kill mice.” Laura pushed the door shut and turned the lock.
Forty-one
It’s strange how quickly one’s values can change, Stig Franklin thought, fastening the last straps on the tarpaulin that covered the boat. Only a few weeks ago this boat had been his all. During difficult moments at work the thought of the cruising yacht had been his comfort. It was his escape from melancholy. After he and Jessica quarreled he would turn his mind to contemplating the elegant lines of the boat, the beauty of the mahogany, or something he wanted to get for it.
He was still very fond ofEvita.
“You’re doing that at the last minute,” a man observed as he walked by.
Stig, who