The Demon of Dakar - Kjell Eriksson [71]
“That the camper may have been our man.”
Lindell hurried to her office and dialed Haver’s number.
He sounded pleased, almost excited, and he had good reason to be. They had most likely located the scene of the crime, a small clearing perhaps some twenty square meters concealed behind a thicket and a large mound of rubble, not visible from the road, perhaps four hundred meters north of the place the body was found, and some one hundred meters from the river.
The technicians had almost immediately isolated samples from the ground of what they believed to be blood, and also traces of what most likely was urine.
Apparently one or more persons had occupied the site for several days. A rectangle of flattened grass suggested the presence of a tent. The surrounding area was trampled, there were broken twigs and the remains of a fire. A veritable feast for the forensic team.
Valdemar Husman, who had alerted the police, had nothing to say about the person or persons who might have been camping. He had only noticed something peeking out of the vegetation, and had assumed it was a tent. He explained that he had not approached it further so as not to appear curious, and not to get “dragged into anything.”
“What did he mean by that?” Lindell asked.
“I don’t know,” Haver answered. “He didn’t say.”
“I mean, did he have a suspicion that something illegal was going on? Did he hear or see anything that appeared suspicious?”
“Neither. He simply didn’t want to get involved.”
“A little more curiosity wouldn’t hurt,” Lindell said. “Will you be there for a while?”
“I don’t know, I don’t have much to do here. Morgansson and the rest are the ones who are busy. They’re thinking of erecting a tarp over the site in case it rains.”
“Okay, but can we hope for a little DNA?”
“Looks like it.”
“Then the question is, what was Armas doing there? Did he go willingly or was he forced?”
“I’ll let you figure that one out,” Haver said.
After she hung up, Ann Lindell sat absolutely still and stared into space.
“Who camps out?” she muttered.
Tourists or young people seemed most likely.
The site was private and probably chosen with care.
“Okay, you come to this city for murky business,” she said out loud. “You are careful not to be seen in a hotel or even at a public campsite. Instead, you camp in the forest, but you are so clumsy you leave a corpse and numerous traces behind.”
She shook her head. Something didn’t make sense.
She went over to Ottosson and recounted what Haver had told her, and added her own thoughts.
“Maybe the perp couldn’t afford to stay in a hotel,” Ottosson said.
“What kind of murderer is that?” Lindell exclaimed.
“Most people don’t stay in hotels,” Ottosson said with a grin.
The rest of the day was spent reviewing the material that had been collected. This had to be done, but above all Lindell felt a need to be alone. More and more she suffered an almost claustrophobic feeling in her dealings with people, whether at work, in meetings at Erik’s day care, or in situations where the room was small and the number of people large.
There were reports from questionings, an initial overview of Slobodan Andersson’s business dealings, and the autopsy report.
Armas’s personal history was still missing. Slobodan Andersson had contributed a part, but much of his early life was still unknown.
Lindell heard Ola Haver return, and could hear him and Fredriksson chatting in the corridor. Her thoughts went to Berglund. She decided to wait until the following day. If he didn’t come in to work she would call him at home.
Twenty-Eight
The call was received at two twenty-two in the afternoon. The fire-fighting unit at the Viktoria fire station, just east of the city, arrived on the scene seven minutes later, but at that point there was not much more to do other than keeping the fire from spreading into the adjacent areas.
The closest neighbor, who had discovered the fire when he returned from a mushroom-picking trip in the forest, had hauled his garden hose over, which did not reach more than