The Cruel Stars of the Night - Kjell Eriksson [38]
“It’s too expensive,” she said.
Rosander twirled around.
“Well, look who we have here,” he said. “The fuzz.”
Lindell disliked the expression, but nodded and smiled.
“How’s tricks?” Rosander asked.
Lindell’s smile disappeared. She looked at him. He was the same as always. Tousled, you could say to sum him up, but still with a mocking expression on his somewhat puffy face. She nodded, tried to think of something to say, but only put her hand on his shoulder and then left. Rosander stayed behind, staring foolishly.
Ann Lindell broke into a half-run. To bump into Rosander was to confront memories that cut like a knife. She had met Rosander in the same time period that she had first met Edvard. They came from the same village. Edvard, the man she had loved and let slip away.
Maybe Rosander was still in touch with Edvard. What else would they talk about except people they knew in common? Lindell didn’t want to know anything, to hear news about Edvard.
She turned around for a look. Rosander was still there. Lindell slowed down. It started to rain and after a while she became aware of the damp seeping in. The October haze that plunged Sala Street into a gray hell, an enduring dark that found its grip and held on.
She bumped into Ola Haver in the entrance to the police station.
“Have you talked to the neighbor?”
“I haven’t had any time,” Lindell snarled.
Haver stared at her. She wanted to tell him to go to hell. “I’m on my way over there now. How about you?”
“I’m just back from the autopsy,” Haver said shortly.
“And?”
He shrugged. “Nothing much. A blow to the head, but we knew that.”
Lindell stepped into the elevator.
“Are you coming along?”
Haver shook his head, but just before the elevator doors closed Haver put out one leg so the doors slid open again.
“Is there anything in particular?”
“No, I met an old acquaintance. You remember Rosander, from the Enrico investigation? He had won some money in the lottery and was going to buy a new bed.”
“He buys lottery tickets? You mean the insect researcher?”
“Two million,” Lindell said. “He was going to buy a bed for fifty thousand. He felt fine. He sends his greetings and I guess that means you too.”
“I’ll be damned,” Haver said.
“I know.”
Haver backed away and Lindell went up, studying herself in the mirror. That was fine she thought and smiled in a grimace. That should shut him up. Ola Haver hated the lottery. He thought it was deeply unjust for some people to win money by chance. And anyway, Ola was the one who knew her the best and he probably sensed how much Edvard still meant to her. She begrudged him the pleasure of knowing that the meeting with Rosander had knocked the wind out of her. Unfair and ridiculous, yes, and above all deeply fictitious—an invented lottery win—but the lie made her feel better.
When she walked into her office it was with a sense of calm and confidence that was light years from the agitation she had felt on the street. She threw herself into the investigation and pulled her notepad toward her.
At that moment the phone rang. It was Fälth. Ann knew that meant trouble. As soon as she heard his voice she turned to a fresh page and reached for a pen.
“We have something new,” he said in his drawling, slightly laconic way, “as if this weren’t enough. It’s always like this—”
“I know,” Lindell interrupted him. His preambles always had a tendency of becoming long-winded.
“Another farmer,” Fälth said.
Eleven
An apple fell, and then another. Muted, slightly squishy thuds as they hit the moss-infested lawn. The inside of the apple appeared green-yellow through places where the peel had split open. The consistency was mealy and the fruit was falling apart. Laura poked one with her foot. The apple broke entirely, revealing a mushy interior and