The Cruel Stars of the Night - Kjell Eriksson [140]
He flipped through the folder again. The daughter’s name was Laura Hindersten. She was most likely unmarried since she had the same last name and address as her father. The street where they lived he couldn’t place exactly but he knew it was in Kåbo.
Ulrik Hindersten was retired but had been an associate professor in Italian literature. Sammy re-read the sentence.
“Italian literature,” he muttered, got up, took out his cell phone, and called Berglund.
“Hi, where are you?”
“In the bathroom,” Berglund answered drily. “Do you want to hear me flush?”
Sammy heard flushing water in the background.
“Hey, Berglund, didn’t you say something about Jan-Elis Andersson being a farmer with a flair for languages? What did you mean by that?”
“I saw an inscription on the side building,” Berglund said, and now his voice was serious. “If you remember, there was a smaller cottage a little ways off.”
“In what language?”
“I think it was Italian, why?”
“Then I was right! Do you have any idea what it said?”
“Not in the least,” Berglund said and Sammy realized he had left the bathroom because now there was no echo in the phone.
“Can you come to Ann’s office?”
Berglund arrived after half a minute.
“Why were you asking?” he said as soon as he came in.
“I had a vague memory of you talking about something Italian,” Sammy Nilsson started, and then summed up the case of the professor who specialized in Italian.
“The connection is tenuous but . . .” Berglund said.
“But . . .”
“. . . but interesting,” the old criminal investigator went on. “You think there may be a connection between the professor and the farmer in Al-sike?”
Sammy Nilsson nodded and told him about the file he had found on Lindell’s desk.
Berglund eyed the first page.
“Kåbo,” he said.
“Do we know anyone who speaks Italian?” Sammy Nilsson asked.
Berglund shook his head.
“But that can be arranged,” he said. “Should I call Örjan Bäck? He knows these things.”
Sammy Nilsson nodded. In his thoughts he was already in Alsike to check the inscription, which according to Berglund appeared on the wall of a farm building some thirty meters from the murdered Andersson’s living quarters.
“Another idea would be to call Andersson’s relative in Umeå,” Berglund said. “What was her name? She may know if there were any ties between the professor and her uncle.”
“Lovisa Sundberg,” Sammy Nilsson said. “Let’s do that. Damn that I didn’t think of it.”
“We’re all exhausted,” Berglund said.
“Do you think Ann has called her?” Sammy Nilsson asked. “No, she hasn’t been in contact with any of Andersson’s or Palmblad’s family I’ve checked.”
Ottosson called home to see how things were going with Erik. As he expected there was no problem. The boy had eaten and was right now playing with one of Ottosson’s grandchildren, a girl about Erik’s age. Asta had nothing but praise for his calm and social skills.
“You can tell he has learned from day care how to be around people,” she said, which surprised Ottosson somewhat. Asta was not the one who usually had anything good to say about the communal childcare services and he couldn’t help pointing it out.
“You don’t understand all that,” Asta determined calmly, “but I will try to explain it to you one day when you aren’t so stressed.”
They finished the conversation and Ottosson really did feel stressed. The worst thing was not being able to do anything, not even pretend to look for Lindell. What would that even look like? Should he walk around on streets and squares and call out her name? Suddenly he understood the frustrations of relatives of missing people. They could be a complete pain during an investigation, call all the time and nag, suggest various approaches, and sometimes threaten to file a complaint with the Parliamentary Ombudsmen or go to the papers and say how passive the police were being.
There was a knock on the door. Sammy Nilsson came in. Ottosson thought he looked as eager