The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared (19 page)

By now, the prosecutor would surely have whispered in some reporter’s ear, and the next day the pack of journalists would be out in force again. Prosecutor Ranelid was
probably
right in assuming that there would be lots of tipoffs about the whereabouts of the yellow bus with the smashed front. While he was waiting for them, Aronsson might as well stay where he was. He had nothing else to do: no family, no close friends, not even a sensible hobby. When this strange chase was over, he was definitely going to have his life
overhauled
.

Chief Inspector Aronsson ended the evening with a gin and tonic, and while he drank, he sat there feeling sorry for himself and fantasized about pulling out his service pistol and shooting the pianist in the bar. If he had managed to stay sober and
carefully
thought through what he already knew, the story would most certainly have developed differently.

That same evening in the editorial offices of
The Express
they had a short semantic discussion before deciding on the billboards for the next day. In the end, the head of the news desk decided that one dead person could be murder, two dead people could be double murder, but three dead people could not be called mass murder as some of his colleagues wanted to. But he managed a nice headline in the end:

They had a late evening at Bellringer Farm with one and all in very good spirits. Amusing stories were trotted out one after the other. Bosse was a hit when he pulled out the Bible and said that now he would tell them the story of how he, quite involuntarily, came to read the whole book from beginning to end. Allan wondered what devilish method of torture Bosse had suffered, but that wasn’t what lay behind it. No outsider had forced Bosse to do anything, no, Bosse’s own curiosity was responsible.

‘I’m sure I’ll never be that curious,’ said Allan.

Julius asked whether Allan could stop interrupting Bosse for once so that they could hear the story, and Allan said that he could. Bosse went on:

One day some months earlier he had received a phone call from an acquaintance at the recycling centre outside Skövde. The two of them had got to know each other at the racetrack. This acquaintance had learned that Bosse’s conscience was flexible and that Bosse was always interested in opportunities that might provide new sources of income.

The recycling centre had just received a pallet with half a ton of books that were to be pulped, because they had been
classified
as waste and not as literature, presumably because of some defect. Bosse’s acquaintance had become curious as to what sort of literature it was, and he had opened the packaging only to find a bible (his acquaintance had been hoping for something of a totally different kind).

‘But this wasn’t just your standard bible,’ said Bosse, and passed a specimen around so they could see for themselves. ‘We are talking ultra thin in genuine leather with golden lettering
and stuff… And just look at this: a list of characters, maps in colour, index…’

His acquaintance had been just as impressed as his friends now were, and instead of pulping the goodies, had phoned Bosse and offered to smuggle the books out of the recycling centre in exchange for… say a thousand crowns.

Bosse jumped at the chance, and that very same afternoon he found himself with half a ton of fancy bibles in his barn. But try as he might, he couldn’t find anything wrong with the books. It was driving him crazy. So one evening he sat down in front of the fire in the living room and started to read, from ‘In the beginning…’ onwards. To be on the safe side, he had his old confirmation bible for reference. There must be a misprint somewhere, otherwise why would they throw out something so beautiful and… holy?

Bosse read and read, evening after evening, the Old Testament followed by the New Testament, and still he read on, comparing it with his old confirmation bible – without finding anything wrong.

Then one evening he reached the last chapter, and then the last page, the last verse.

And there it was! That unforgivable and unfathomable misprint that had caused the owner of the books to order them to be pulped.

Now Bosse handed a copy to each of them sitting round the table, and they thumbed through to the very last verse, and one by one burst out laughing.

Bosse was happy enough to find the misprint. He had no interest in finding out how it got there. He had satisfied his curiosity, and in the process had read his first book since his schooldays, and even got a bit religious while he was at it. Not that Bosse allowed God to have any opinion about Bellringer Farm’s business enterprise, nor did he allow the Lord to be
present when he filed his tax return, but – in other respects – Bosse now placed his life in the hands of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. And surely none of them would worry about the fact that he set up his stall at markets on Saturdays and sold bibles with a tiny misprint in them? (‘Only ninety-nine crowns each! Jesus! What a bargain!’)

But if Bosse had cared, and if, against all odds, he had managed to get to the bottom of it, then after what he had told his friends, he would have continued:

A typesetter in a Rotterdam suburb had been through a personal crisis. Several years earlier, he had been recruited by Jehovah’s Witnesses but they had thrown him out when he discovered, and questioned rather too loudly, the fact that the congregation had predicted the return of Jesus on no less than fourteen occasions between 1799 and 1980 – and sensationally managed to get it wrong all fourteen times.

Upon which, the typesetter had joined the Pentecostal Church; he liked their teachings about the Last Judgment, he could embrace the idea of God’s final victory over evil, the return of Jesus (without their actually naming a date) and how most of the people from the typesetter’s childhood including his own father, would burn in hell.

But this new congregation sent him packing too. A whole month’s collections had gone astray while in the care of the
typesetter
. He had sworn by all that was holy that the disappearance had nothing to do with him. Besides, shouldn’t Christians
forgive
? And what choice did he have when his car broke down and he needed a new one to keep his job?

As bitter as bile, the typesetter started the layout for that day’s jobs, which ironically happened to consist of printing two
thousand
bibles! And besides, it was an order from Sweden where as far as the typesetter knew, his father still lived after having abandoned his family when the typesetter was six years old.

With tears in his eyes, the typesetter set the text of chapter upon chapter. When he came to the very last chapter – the Book of Revelation – he just lost it. How could Jesus ever want to come back to Earth? Here where Evil had once and for all conquered Good, so what was the point of anything? And the Bible… It was just a joke!

So it came about that the typesetter with the shattered nerves made a little addition to the very last verse in the very last chapter in the Swedish bible that was just about to be printed. The typesetter didn’t remember much of his father’s tongue, but he could at least recall a nursery rhyme that was well suited in the context. Thus the bible’s last two verses plus the
typesetter
’s extra verse were printed as:

The late evening became night at Bellringer Farm. Vodka as well as brotherly love had flowed freely and would probably have continued to do so if it wasn’t for the fact that teetotaller Benny realised how late it was. He informed those present that it was high time that everyone went to bed. There were a lot of things that needed to be sorted out the following day, and it would be best for one and all to be rested.

‘If I was of a more curious disposition, I’d be eager to see what sort of mood the man with his face in his food is going to be in when he wakes up,’ said Allan.

The man on the park bench had just said ‘Good afternoon, Mr Karlsson,’ in English, and from that Allan drew two conclusions. First, that the man was not Swedish, otherwise he would
probably
have tried speaking his own language. Second, that he knew who Allan was, because he had just called him by his name.

The man was smartly dressed, in a grey hat with a black rim, a grey overcoat and black shoes. He could very well be a
businessman
. He looked friendly and definitely had something in mind. So Allan said, in English:

‘Is my life, by any chance, about to take a new turn?’

The man answered that such a change could not be ruled out, but added in a friendly tone that it depended on Mr Karlsson himself. The fact was, the man’s employer wanted to meet Mr Karlsson to offer him a job.

Allan answered that at the moment he was doing quite well, but, of course, he could not remain sitting on a park bench for the rest of his life. Was it too much to ask for the name of his employer? Allan found it easier to say yes or no to something if he knew what he was saying yes or no to. Didn’t the man agree?

The man agreed completely, but his employer was a bit special and would probably prefer to introduce himself in person.

‘But I am prepared to accompany you to the employer in
question
without the slightest delay, if that would suit you?’

Why not, Allan said, it might suit him. The man added that it was some distance away. If Mr Karlsson would like to collect his belongings from the hotel room, the man promised to wait in the lobby. In fact, the man could give Mr Karlsson a lift back to the hotel, because the man’s car with chauffeur was right beside them.

A stylish car it was too, a red Ford sedan of the latest model. And a private
chauffeur
! He was a quiet type. Didn’t seem nearly as friendly as the friendly man.

‘I think we can skip the hotel room,’ Allan said. ‘I am used to travelling light.’

‘No problem,’ said the friendly man and tapped his chauffeur on the back in a way that meant ‘drive off’.

The journey took them out to Dalarö, just over an hour south of the capital on winding roads. Allan and the friendly man conversed about this and that. The friendly man explained the endless magnificence of opera, while Allan told him how you cross the Himalayas without freezing to death.

The sun had given up for the day when the red coupé rolled into the little village on the coast that was so popular with archipelago tourists in the summers, but as dark and silent as can be in the winters.

‘So this is where he lives, your employer,’ said Allan.

‘No, not exactly,’ said the friendly man.

The friendly man’s chauffeur – who was not nearly as friendly – said nothing. He just dropped Allan and the friendly man off by the harbour and left. Before that, the friendly man had managed to get out a fur coat from the boot of the Ford, and he put it around Allan’s shoulders in a friendly gesture while apologizing for the fact that they would now have to walk a short way in the winter cold.

Allan was not one to pin his hopes (or, for that matter, his fears) on what might happen in the immediate future. What happened happened. There was no point
second-guessing
it.

Nevertheless, Allan was surprised when the friendly man led him away from the centre of Dalarö and instead set off across the ice into the jet-black archipelago evening.

The friendly man and Allan walked on and on. Sometimes the friendly man turned his flashlight on and flashed it a bit in the winter darkness before using it to get the right bearing on his compass. He didn’t talk to Allan during the entire walk, but instead just counted his steps aloud – in a language that Allan hadn’t heard before.

After a fifteen minute walk at quite a good pace out into the void, the friendly man said that they had now arrived. It was dark around them, except for a flickering light on an island far away. The ground (or rather, the ice) under the two men’s feet suddenly broke up.

The friendly man had possibly counted incorrectly. Or the captain of the submarine hadn’t been exactly in the place he should have been. Whatever the cause, the 97-metre-long vessel now broke through the ice far too close to Allan and the friendly man. They both fell backwards and almost ended up in the icy water. But soon Allan was helped to climb down into the warmth.

‘Well, now you can see how sensible it is not to start your day by guessing what might happen,’ said Allan. ‘After all, how long would I have had to go on guessing before I guessed this?’

At this point, the friendly man thought that he didn’t have to be so secretive any longer. He told Allan that his name was Yury Borisovich Popov and that he worked for the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, that he was a physicist, not a politician or a military man, and that he had been sent to Stockholm to persuade Mr Karlsson to follow him to Moscow. Yury Borisovich was chosen for this mission because of Mr Karlsson’s possible reluctance which could perhaps be
overcome
by Yury Borisovitch’s background as a physicist, meaning that Mr Karlsson and Yury Borisovich both spoke the same language, so to speak.

‘But I am not a physicist,’ Allan said.

‘That may be the case, but my sources tell me that you know something that I would like to know.’

‘I do? Whatever could that be?’

‘The bomb, Mr Karlsson. The bomb.’

Yury Borisovich and Allan Emmanuel immediately took a liking to each other. To agree to follow him without knowing where he was going or why – that impressed Yury Borisovich and indicated that there was something devil-may-care about Allan that Yury himself lacked. And as for Allan, well, he appreciated the fact that for once he could talk with somebody who didn’t try to fill him with politics or religion.

Besides, it soon transpired that both Yury Borisovich and Allan Emmanuel shared a boundless enthusiasm for vodka. The previous evening Yury Borisovich had had the opportunity to taste the Swedish variety while he had been keeping an eye on Allan Emmanuel in the dining room at the Grand Hotel. At first, Yury Borisovich thought that it was too dry, without the Russian sweetness, but after a couple of glasses he got used to it. And another two glasses later, he let a ‘not bad at all!’ pass his lips.

‘But this is of course better,’ said Yury Borisovich and held up a whole litre of Stolichnaya. He and Allan Emmanuel sat and had the officers’ mess to themselves. ‘And now we shall each take a glass!’

‘Sounds good,’ said Allan. ‘The sea air tires you out.’

After the very first glass, Allan insisted on a change in the way the two men addressed each other. To say Yury Borisovich to Yury Borisovich every time he needed to attract Yury Borisovich’s attention just wasn’t practical in the long term. And he didn’t want to be called Allan Emmanuel, because he hadn’t used his middle name since he was baptised by the priest in Yxhult.

‘So from now on, you are Yury and I am Allan,’ said Allan. ‘Otherwise I’m getting off this boat now.’

‘Don’t do that, dear Allan, we are at a depth of two hundred metres,’ said Yury. ‘Fill your glass again instead.’

Yury Borisovich Popov was a passionate socialist and wanted nothing more than to keep working in the name of Soviet socialism. Comrade Stalin was a stern man but Yury knew that if you served the system loyally and well then you had nothing to fear. Allan said that he didn’t have any plans to serve any system, but that of course he could give Yury one or two tips if they had got stuck in working out the atom bomb problem. But first of all Allan wanted to taste another glass of the vodka whose name was unpronounceable even when you were sober. And another thing: Yury would have to promise that he would continue not to talk politics.

Yury thanked Allan heartily for his promise to help, and said straight off that Marshal Beria, Yury’s boss, intended to give the Swedish expert a one-off payment of 100,000 American dollars, on condition that Allan’s help led to the production of a bomb.

‘We’ll figure it out,’ said Allan.

The contents of the bottle shrank steadily while Allan and Yury talked about everything on heaven and earth (except politics and religion). They also touched upon the atom bomb
problems
and although the topic really belonged to the days to come, Allan decided to give him a couple of simple tips and then a couple more.

‘Hmmm,’ said senior physicist Yury Borisovich Popov. ‘I think I understand…’

‘Well, I don’t,’ said Allan. ‘Explain the thing with opera again. Isn’t it just a lot of shouting?’

Yury smiled, took a large gulp of vodka, stood up – and started to sing. In his drunkenness he didn’t just choose any old folk song, but instead the aria ‘Nessun Dorma’ from Puccini’s
Turandot
.

‘That was quite something,’ said Allan when Yury had finished.

‘Nessun dorma
!’ said Yury solemnly. ‘Nobody is allowed to sleep!’

Regardless of whether anybody was allowed to sleep or not, they did both soon drop off in their berths beside the officers’ mess. When they woke up, the submarine was already docked in Leningrad harbour. There, a limousine was waiting to take them to the Kremlin for a meeting with Marshal Beria.

‘Saint Petersburg, Petrograd, Leningrad… Couldn’t you make up your mind?’ said Allan.

‘And a good morning to you too,’ said Yury.

Yury and Allan got into the back seat of a Humber Pullman limousine for a day-long journey from Leningrad to Moscow. A sliding window separated the driver’s seat from the luxurious compartment where Allan and his newfound friend were sitting. The compartment boasted a refrigerator with water, soft drinks and all the alcohol that these two passengers were not in need of at the moment. There was also a bowl of red gummy sweets and a whole tray of fancy chocolates. The car and its fittings would have been a brilliant example of Soviet socialist engineering if it hadn’t all been imported from England.

Yury told Allan about his background. He had studied under Nobel-prize laureate Ernest Rutherford, the legendary nuclear physicist from New Zealand, which was why Yury Borisovich spoke such good English. Allan, in turn, described (to an
increasingly
astounded Yury Borisovich) his adventures in Spain, America, China, the Himalayas and Iran.

‘And what happened to the Anglican priest?’ Yury wondered.

‘I don’t know,’ said Allan. ‘He has either Anglicanized all of Persia, or he’s dead. The least likely is probably something in between those two.’

‘That sounds a bit like challenging Stalin in the Soviet Union,’ said Yury candidly. ‘Setting aside the fact that it would be a crime against the revolution, the chance of survival is poor.’

On this particular day and in this particular company, Yury’s candidness seemed to know no bounds. He opened his heart about what he thought of Marshal Beria, the boss of the secret service who had suddenly become the head of the project to make an atom bomb. Beria had no sense of shame at all. He abused women and children sexually and as for undesirable people, well, he sent them to prison camps – if he hadn’t had them killed first.

‘Undesirable elements must of course be weeded out as soon as possible, but they must be undesirable on the correct,
revolutionary
grounds. Those who don’t further the aims of socialism must be got rid of! But not those who don’t further the aims of Marshal Beria. No! Allan, that is dreadful. Marshal Beria is no true representative of the revolution. But you can’t blame Comrade Stalin for that. I have never had the privilege of meeting him, but he has the responsibility for an entire country, almost an entire continent. And if amidst all that work, and in a hasty moment, he gave Marshal Beria more responsibility than he is capable of shouldering… well, Comrade Stalin has every right to do that! And now, my dear Allan, I shall tell you something really fantastic. You and I, this very afternoon, are going to be honoured with an audience not only with Marshal Beria, but also with Comrade Stalin in person! He has invited us to dinner!’

‘I look forward to that,’ said Allan. ‘But how are we going to manage until then? Are we supposed to survive on red gummy sweets?’

Yury saw to it that the limousine stopped in a little town on the way, to pick up a couple of sandwiches for Allan. Then their journey continued.

Between bites of his sandwich, Allan thought about this Marshal Beria character who, from Yury’s description, seemed to resemble the recently deceased boss of the secret service in Tehran.

Yury, for his part, sat there trying to figure out his Swedish colleague. The Swede would soon be eating dinner with Stalin, and he had said that he was looking forward to it. But Yury had to ask whether it was the dinner he meant, or the leader.

‘You have to eat to live,’ Allan said diplomatically and praised the quality of the Russian sandwiches. ‘But, dear Yury, would you allow me to ask a question or two?’

‘But of course, dear Allan. Ask away, I’ll do my best to answer.’

Allan said that to be honest he hadn’t really been
listening
while Yury had been spouting on about politics just now, because politics was not what interested Allan most in this world. Besides, he did distinctly recall from the previous evening that Yury had promised not to sail off in that direction.

But Allan had made a note of Yury’s description of Marshal Beria’s human failings. Allan believed that in his earlier life he had come across people of the same type. On the one hand, if Allan had understood correctly, Marshal Beria was ruthless. On the other hand, he had now seen to it that Allan was
extraordinarily
well cared for, with a limousine and everything.

‘But it does occur to me to wonder why he didn’t simply have me kidnapped and then make sure that you wring out of me what he wants to know,’ said Allan. ‘Then he wouldn’t have had to waste the red gummy sweets, the fancy chocolates, the hundred thousand dollars and a lot of other stuff.’