Let the right one in (60 page)

Micke sat down on the edge of the pool, smiled, and nodded at him. Oskar took a few strokes in the other direction, toward Mr. Avila.

"Orre!"

He saw the ball come flying in the corner of his eye, a moment too late. It landed in the water exactly in front of him and splashed chlorinated water into his eyes. They stung as if from tears. He rubbed his eyes and when he looked up he happened to see Mr. Avila looking at him with a ..

. pitying?... look on his face.

Or disdainful.

Perhaps it was only his imagination, but he hit away the ball floating in front of his face and sank. Let his head glide down under the surface of the water, his hair billowing out and tickling around his ears. He stretched his arms out from his body and floated with his face under the surface, bobbing with the water. Pretended he was dead.

That he could float here forever.

That he would never have to get up and meet the gazes of those who in the final analysis only wanted to hurt him. Or that when he finally lifted up his head the world would be gone. Just him and all this blue. But even with his ears under the water he could hear the distant sounds, banging sounds from the world above, and when he pulled his face out of the water it was there: echoing, noisy.

Micke had left his place at the edge of the pool and the others were engaged in some kind of volleyball. The white ball flew into the air, clearly defined against the darkness of the frosted windows. Oskar paddled into a corner of the deep end of the pool, stood there with only his nose above the water and watched.

Micke came walking rapidly from the shower room at the other end of the hall, shouted, "Teacher! The phone in your office is ringing!" Mr. Avila muttered something and stomped away along the edge of the pool. He nodded to Micke and disappeared up into the shower rooms. The last Oskar saw of him was a blurry contour behind the fogged-up glass.

Then he was gone.

+

As soon as Micke had left the changing rooms they had taken up their positions.

Jonny and Jimmy slipped into the exercise gym; Roger and Prebbe pressed up against the wall next to the door post. They heard Micke call out from inside the swim hall, prepared for action.

Soft barefooted footsteps that approached, passed through the gym, and a few seconds later Mr. Avila walked in through the doors to the changing rooms and over to his office. Prebbe had already wound the double tube socks filled with small change one time around his hand in order to get a better grip. As soon as the teacher reached the door and stood with his back to him, Prebbe stepped out and swung the weight at the back of his head.

Prebbe was not particularly coordinated and Mr. Avila must have heard something. Halfway into the swing he turned his head to the side and the blow caught him right above the ear. The effect was nonetheless the desired one. The teacher was thrown forward and to one side, hit his head on the doorpost, and fell to the floor.

Prebbe sat on his chest and tucked the heavy ball of coins into his palm so that he would be able to deliver a more controlled blow if needed. Didn't seem like it. The teacher's arms were trembling slightly, but he didn't put up the slightest resistance. Prebbe didn't think he was dead. Didn't look like it, was all.

Roger came over, leaned over the prone body as if he had never seen anything like it.

"Is he Turkish or what?"

"Damned if I know. Get the keys."

While Roger was fumbling for the keys in the teacher's shorts he saw how Jonny and Jimmy walked out of the gym and toward the pool hall. He got out the keys, tried one after another in the office door, shot a look at the teacher.

"As hairy as an ape. He's got to be a Turk."

"Oh, come on."

Roger sighed, kept trying the keys.

"I'm only saying it for your sake. Probably feels a little better if..."

"Fuck it. And come on."

Roger found the right key and unlocked the door. Before he walked in he pointed to the teacher and said:

"You probably shouldn't be sitting like that. Probably can't breathe if you do."

Prebbe slid off his chest, sat down next to the body with his weight at the ready in case Avila tried something.

Roger searched through the pocket of the coat he found inside the office, pulled out a wallet with three hundred kronor. In a desk drawer that, after a short search, he found the key in, there were also ten unstamped subway cards. He took them as well.

Not much in the way of bounty. But that wasn't what this was about. Pure payback.

+

Oskar was still in the corner of the pool blowing bubbles in the water when Jonny and Jimmy walked in. His first reaction wasn't fear, but annoyance. They were wearing their outdoor clothes.

They hadn't even taken their shoes off, and Mr. Avila who was so concerned about... When Jimmy stopped at the edge of the pool and started looking out over the pool, the fear came. He had met Jimmy a few times, briefly, and thought he seemed horrible even then. Now there was also something about his eyes ... the way he was moving his head ...

Like Tommy and those guys when they have.. .

Jimmy's gaze found Oskar's and he realized with a shiver that he was... naked. Jimmy had clothes on, armor. Oskar was in the cold water and every centimeter of his body was exposed. Jimmy nodded to
Jonny,
made a semicircular movement with his hand and, one on either side of the pool, they started to walk toward Oskar. While he walked Jimmy screamed to the others:

"Get out of here! Everyone! Out of the water!" The others were standing still or treading water, indecisive. Jimmy placed himself at the edge of the pool, took a stiletto out of his jacket pocket, unfolded it, and held it like an arrow directed at a group of boys. Thrust it in the direction of the other end of the pool.

Oskar was pressed up into the corner, watching shivering while the other boys quickly swam or waded their way to the other end and left him alone in the pool.

Mr. Avila... where is Mr. Avila ...

A hand gripped him by the hair, fingers taking hold so firmly that his scalp stung and his head was
forced
back all the way into the corner. Above him he heard Jonny's voice. "That's my brother, you fucker." Oskar's head was banged backward a couple of times against the tile ledge and water splashed up into his ears while Jimmy walked over to the corner of the pool and crouched down with the stiletto in his hand.

"Hi there Oskar."

Oskar took in a mouthful of water and started to cough. Every shaking motion of his head that the cough induced made his scalp, which Jonny had grasped even more firmly, burn more. When his coughing spell was over Jimmy clinked the blade against the tiled edge.

"You know what? I was thinking like this. That we should have a little competition. Now don't move ..."

The stiletto passed right above Oskar's forehead as Jimmy handed it over to Jonny, taking over the grip on Oskar's head. Oskar didn't dare do anything. He had looked into Jimmy's eyes for a few seconds and they looked completely crazed. So filled with hate he couldn't look at them. Oskar's head was pressed into the corner of the pool. His arms were helplessly fumbling in the water. Nothing to grip. He looked for the other boys. They were standing at the shallow end of the pool. Micke was in front, still smiling, in anticipation. The others looked mostly scared.

No one was going to help him.

"So here's the deal... it's pretty easy, see. Easy rules. You stay under the water for... five minutes. If you can do that we'll just put a little scratch in your cheek or something. A keepsake. If you can't do it... well, then when you come up I'll take out one of your eyes. OK? Understand the rules?"

Oskar got his mouth above the surface. Water was spurting out of his mouth as he said, shivering:

"... can't do it..."

Jimmy shook his head.

"That's your problem. You see that clock. We'll start in twenty seconds. Five minutes. Or your eye. Better take a breath now. Ten ... nine ... eight... seven ..."

Oskar tried to push away with his legs, but he had to stand on tiptoe to even get his whole head above the water and Jimmy's hand was holding him by his hair, making all movement impossible.

If I pull my hair away. .. five minutes...

When he had tried it on his own he had managed three at most. Almost.

"Six ... five ... four ... three ..."

Mr. Avila. Mr. Avila will come back before...

"Two ... one ... zero!"

Oskar only managed to take half a breath before his head was pushed down under the water. He lost his foothold and the lower half of his body slowly floated up until he lay with his head bent toward his chest a few decimeters under the surface, his scalp burning like fire as the chlorinated water came into contact with the rips and tears in the skin. No more than a minute could have gone by before the panic came. He opened his eyes wide and only saw light blue ... veils of pink that swirled from his head past his eyes when he tried to take hold with his body, although it was impossible, since there was nothing to hold onto. His legs were kicking up at the surface rippling the pale blue in front of his eyes, refracted in light waves.

Bubbles rose from his mouth and he threw his arms out, floating on his back, and his eyes were pulled to the white, to the swaying halogen tubes' glow in the ceiling. His heart was throbbing like a hand against a glass pane, and when he happened to draw water in through his nose a kind of calm started to spread in his body. But his heart was beating harder, more persistently, wanted to live, and again he thrashed desperately, tried to get a grip where there was no grip to be had. And his head was pushed down further. And strangely enough he thought:

Better this. Than an eye.

+

After two minutes Micke started to feel really uncomfortable. It seemed like ... like they really wanted to ... He looked around at the other boys, but no one seemed prepared to do anything, and he himself only said a half-muffled: "Jonny... what the hell..." But Jonny didn't seem to hear him. He was absolutely still on his knees
next to
the pool with the tip
of
the
stiletto
directed into the water, at the refracted white shape moving down there.

Micke looked up at the shower rooms. Why the hell wasn't the teacher back yet? Patrik had run up to get him; why wasn't he coming? Micke pulled further up into the corner, next to the dark glass door that looked out onto the night, folded his arms across his chest.

In the corner of his eye he thought he saw something fall down from the roof outside. Something banged on the glass door so hard it rattled in its frame.

He stood on tiptoe, peeked out of the window of regular glass at the very top, and saw a little girl. She lifted her face up to his. "Say'Come in!'"

"W ... what?"

Micke looked back at what was happening in the pool. Oskar's body had stopped moving but Jimmy was still leaned over the edge, holding his head down. Micke's throat hurt when he swallowed.
Whatever happens.
Just make it stop.

A banging on the glass door, harder this time. He looked out into the darkness. When the girl opened her mouth and shouted at him he could see .. . that her teeth ... that there was something hanging from her arms.

"Say that I can come in!"

Whatever happens.

Micke nodded, said almost inaudibly:

"You can come in."

The girl pulled back from the door, disappeared into the darkness. The stuff that was hanging from her arms shimmered for a moment, and then she was gone. Micke turned back to the pool. Jimmy had pulled Os-kar's head out of the water and taken the stiletto back from Jonny, moving it down to Oskar's face, aiming.

A speck of light was visible in the dark middle window and a split second later it shattered. The reinforced glass didn't shatter like regular glass. It exploded into thousands of tiny rounded fragments that landed with a rustle at the edge of the pool, after flying out into the hall, over the water, glittering like myriad white stars.

FRIDAY 13 NOVEMBER

Friday the thirteenth .. .

Gunnar Holmberg was sitting in the empty principal's office, trying to get his notes in order.

He had spent the whole day at the Blackeberg school, studying the scene of the crime, talking with students. Two technicians from downtown and a bloodstain analyst from the National Laboratory of Forensic Science were still securing evidence down by the pool.

Two youths had been killed there last night. A third ... had disappeared. He had even talked to Marie-Louise, the class teacher. Had realized that the missing boy, Oskar Eriksson, was the same one who had raised his hand and answered his question about heroin three weeks ago. Holmberg remembered him.

I've read a lot and stuff.

Also recalled that he had thought the boy would be the first to come out to the police car. He would have taken him for a spin in it, maybe. If possible, bolstered his self-confidence a little. But the boy had not shown up.

And now he was gone.

Gunnar scanned his notes from his conversations with the boys who had been at the pool last night. Their accounts basically matched up, and one word had turned up frequently: angel.

Oskar Eriksson had been rescued by an angel.

The same angel who, according to the witnesses, had ripped Jonny and Jimmy Forsberg's heads off and left them in the bottom of the pool. When Gunnar told the crime scene photographer, who had used his underwater camera to eternalize the image of the two heads in the place where they had been found, about this angel he had said: "Hardly one from heaven, in that case."

No...

He looked out the window, tried to think of a reasonable explanation. In the schoolyard the flag was at half-mast.

Two psychologists had been present for the boys' questioning, since several of them were showing worrying signs of talking too lightheartedly about what they had witnessed, as if it were a film, something that had not happened in reality. And that was what one would most like to believe.