The Locked Room (19 page)

All his adult life Svärd had been a warehouseman, and his last job had been with a freight forwarding agency. He'd had a bad back, a common enough thing in his profession, and at the age of fifty-six had been declared medically unfit.

Since then he had dragged out his days on his pension. In other words he belonged to that category for whom the super¬market chains maintain overstocked counters of dog and cat food.

A half-empty can of cat food, with the label 'Miaow' had been the only apparently edible constituent of his larder.

Some data, certainly without significance: Svärd had been born in Stockholm; his parents had died in the forties; and he had never married or had to support anyone. He had not turned to the welfare authorities. At the firm where he had had his last job there was no one who remembered him.

The doctor who had certified him as unfit for work fished out a few notes, in which it was said that the patient was not up to physical work and too old to be retrained. Further, Svärd had said he had no wish to work any more, since it seemed 'senseless'.

Perhaps it was also senseless to try to find out who might possibly have killed him, and if so, why. Since the manner of his killing seemed incomprehensible, the simplest procedure seemed to be to try and find the murderer first, and then ask him how he'd done it

So now it was Thursday, and almost evening. Hardly an hour after his visit to the men with the evil-smelling van, Martin Beck made a fresh attempt on the house on Tulegatan. His working day was really over, but he didn't feel like going home. So again he climbed the two frights of stairs and then waited a minute to get his breath back. As he did so he looked at the oval enamel doorplate with green letters on a white background: 'Rhea Nielsen'.

There was no doorbell. Only a bell rope. He pulled it and waited. A bell tinkled. Otherwise nothing happened.

The tenement was an old one, and through the door's panes of frosted glass he-saw a light shining in the vestibule. This indi¬cated that someone was at home. At his previous visit all the lights had been out

After a suitable interval he again pulled the bell rope; the tinkle was repeated, swift, shuffling footsteps were heard, and he glimpsed someone behind the opaque glass.

Martin Beck was used to the routine of swiftly summing up the people he met in the course of his duties, a kind of 'prelim¬inary description', to use the official term.

The woman who opened the door seemed at most to be thirty-five, but something told him she was actually a few years older. She was not very tall, only five foot two or so, he guessed. Though of compact build, she gave the impression of being lithe and shapely rather than plump or clumsy. Her features were strong, somewhat irregular. The eyes were blue and uncompromising, the gaze steady, and she looked him straight in the eyes as if she were accustomed to coming to grips with things, whatever they might be.

Her hair was straight, blonde, cut short, though just then wet and tousled. She gave off a clean smell, very likely of herbal shampoo, and wore a short-sleeved knitted cardigan and faded blue jeans, suggestive of innumerable washings. The cardigan had not been on her more than a few seconds; large wet splashes were spreading over her shoulders and bosom. She was rela¬tively broad across the shoulders, slender around the hips, with a short neck and dense, fine down on her sunburned arms. She had rather stubby bare feet with straight toes - as if accustomed to walking in sandals or clogs and as often as possible in nothing at all.

Aware that he was examining her feet with the same profes¬sional meticulousness that he was accustomed to devoting to bloodstains and marks on corpses, he raised his eyes to her face.

Now the eyes were searching and the brow slightly ruffled. 'I was just washing my hair,' she said. Her voice was hoarse; perhaps she had a cold, or was a chain smoker, or just naturally spoke like that.

He nodded.

'I shouted "Come in" twice. The door's not locked. I don't usually lock it when I'm at home. Not unless I want peace and quiet, that is. Didn't you hear me call out?'

'No. Are you Rhea Nielsen?'

'Sure. And you're a policeman, eh?'

Though Martin Beck's powers of observation functioned unusu¬ally swiftly, for once he had an immediate sense of having met someone who in this respect was his superior. In a few seconds she had pigeonholed him correctly; and further, the look in her eyes suggested that she had already summed him up. Though that remained to be seen.

The explanation of her quick assessment of him might, of course, be that she was expecting a visit from the police, though he didn't think so. As he took out his wallet to show his identity card, she said: 'It's quite enough if you tell me your name. Dammit, man, come in! There's something you want, I expect, and neither of us likes standing talking out here on the stairs.'

Though Martin Beck felt he had only slightly been thrown off his guard, it was a feeling he very rarely had occasion to feel.

Turning abruptly, she led the way into her flat. At first its size and layout were beyond him. But the rooms were pleasantly furnished with old odds and ends of furniture. Some children's drawings, stuck up with drawing pins, indicated she had some kind of a family. Otherwise the decorations on the walls were mixed. There were oil paintings, and drawings, and old photos in oval frames, but also newspaper clippings and posters - among them portraits of Lenin and Mao, though these, as far as he could see, were mostly without political implications. There were also a lot of books, on bookshelves or piled up here and there, as well as a respectable collection of records, a stereo set, a couple of old and apparently much-used typewriters, and above all papers, most of them carbon copies and clipped together, which almost looked like police reports. He concluded that they were notes of one sort or another and that she was busy with some kind of studies.

He followed her in, past what could only be a nursery. But the beds were so tidily made up that the room's usual occupants could hardly be in the vicinity. Well, it was summer of course, and the children of all parents who could afford it were in the country, out of reach of the city's polluted air and absurd living conditions.

She threw him a glance over her shoulder, not a particularly appreciative one, and said: 'Do you mind if we sit here in the kitchen? If you do, just say so.' The tone of voice, not exactly friendly, was not exactly hostile either.

'This'll do fine.'

'Take a seat, then.'

They had come into the kitchen, and he sat down at a large round table. There were six chairs of various kinds, painted in gay colours, with room for more.

'Wait a second,' she said.

She seemed nervous and restless, but behaved as if it were her normal condition. In front of the stove was a pair of clogs. She climbed into them and tramped off out of sight. He heard her busy herself with something, and at the same moment as an electric motor started up she said: 'You didn't tell me your name.'

'Beck. Martin Beck.'

'And you're a policeman?'

'Yes.'

'What kind?'

'National Criminal Police.'

'Salary scale twenty-five?'

'Twenty-seven."

'See there! Not so bad.'

'Not too bad, no.'

'And how do I address you?'

'Detective chief inspector.'

The motor hummed. The sound was familiar from his past, and he realized almost immediately what she was doing: quickly drying her hair with the aid of a vacuum cleaner.

'Rhea,' she said. 'That's me. Though of course I don't have to say so. The name's on the door.'

The kitchen was a big one, as it so often is in older buildings, and despite the table and its many chairs there was not only a gas stove and a dishwasher but also a refrigerator, a freezer, and plenty of room left over. On a shelf above the sink were pots and kettles, and on nails beneath them hung various natural prod¬ucts: for instance, twigs of wormwood and thyme, bunches of mountain ash berries, ribbons with dried mushrooms, and three long twists of garlic - objects which, though they create an atmosphere and give off an aromatic scent, are not altogether indispensable in a household. Wormwood and mountain ash berries are good spices to add to brandy, and thyme can be put into pea soup - though Beck, in the days when his stomach had been equal to that Swedish delicacy, had preferred sweet marjoram. Mushrooms are always good to have about the place if one knows how to use them. But the garlic could only be regarded as a deco¬ration since the quantity would have been enough to last any normal consumer a lifetime.

She came back into the kitchen, combed her hair, saw instantly what he was looking at, and said: 'To keep away the vampires.'

'The garlic?'

'Sure. Don't you ever go to the movies? Peter Cushing knows everything about vampires.'

She had swapped the wet knitted cardigan for a sleeveless turquoise garment, in all essentials reminiscent of a slip. He noticed she had blonde hair under her arms, little breasts, and no need of a bra. Nor was she wearing one, and her nipples were clearly visible under the cloth.

'Police,' she said. 'Detective chief inspector.' She looked at him with that straight look of hers and furrowed her brow: 'I didn't think that officers on salary scale twenty-seven made visits.'

'Not usually, no,' he said.

She sat down at the table but immediately got up again, biting on her knuckles.

Martin Beck realized the moment had come for some kind of initiative. He said: 'If I understand you correctly, you're not espe¬cially positive in your attitude to the police.'

She threw him a quick glance and said: 'No. I can't say I've ever had any use for them. Nor do I know anyone else who has. On the other hand I know a lot of people to whom they've caused suffering and unpleasantness.'

'In that case I'll do my best to trouble you as little as possible, Mrs Nielsen.'

'Rhea,' she said. 'Everyone calls me Rhea.' 'If I understand things correctly, you are the owner of this building?'

'Yes. I inherited it a few years ago. But there's nothing here to interest the police. No drug sessions, no gambling dens, not even any prostitutes or thieves.' She paused briefly. 'Perhaps a little subversive activity goes on here from time to time. Mental crimes. But you aren't on the political side.'

'How can you be so sure?'

She laughed, suddenly and heartily. A gay infectious laugh. 'I'm not all that dumb,' she said.

No, certainly not, thought Martin Beck. Aloud he said: 'You're right. I'm only concerned with crimes of violence. Murder and manslaughter.'

'We've had neither the one nor the other here. Not even a fight for the last three years. Though last winter it's true someone broke into the attic and pinched a lot of rubbish. I had to report it to the police, since the insurance people insist on it. No policemen turned up, they hadn't time for it; but the insurance company paid up. All that about reporting it to the police was obviously only a formality.' She scratched her neck, and said: 'Well, and what do you want?'

'To talk about one of your tenants'

She raised her eyebrows. 'One of mine?' she asked, laying heavy emphasis on the word 'mine', as if worried and aston¬ished.

'Not one of those you've got now,' he said. 'Only one has moved out during the last year.' 'Svärd.'

'Right. A man called Svärd used to live here. He moved out last spring. What's up with him?' 'He's dead.'

'Did someone do him in?' 'Shot him.'

'Who?'

It's possible he committed suicide. But we're not sure of it' 'Can't we talk a little more relaxed?'

'By all means. But what do you mean, relaxed? Call each other by our Christian names?'

The woman shook her head. Then she said: 'Formal talk is hopeless. I loathe it. Though I can behave in the most correct manner if I have to. And I can play the flirt, and dress myself up, and use eye shadow and lipstick'

Martin Beck felt strangely unsure of himself.

Suddenly she said: 'Like a cup of tea? Tea's good.'

Though he would dearly have liked a cup of tea, he said: 'Please don't bother for my sake. I don't need anything.'

'Nonsense,' she said. 'Hot air. Wait a minute, and I'll fix you something to eat, too. A grilled sandwich would do us both good.'

Immediately he felt he wanted one too. And before he could say he didn't she was chattering on.

'It won't take more than ten minutes at most. I can serve up food in two shakes of a cat's tail. No bother at all. And it's good. One must try to make the best of everything. Even if every¬thing looks as if it's going to the devil, one can always cook something nice. Tea and a sandwich under the grill, then we can talk.'

To refuse seemed impossible. He became aware of something new about her. An obstinate trait, a strong-willed streak, which could be hard to resist

'Yes, thanks,' he said lamely.

But before he'd even had time to say the words she was already busy. Banging about a lot, but also astonishingly quick and efficient. As a matter of fact he'd never seen anything like it, at least not in Sweden.

During the seven minutes it took her to get the food ready she didn't say a word. Six hot sandwiches with slices of tomato and grated cheese and a big pot of tea. He watched her making her improvised meal, wondered how old she was.

At the same moment, as she sat down in front of him, she said: "Thirty-seven. Though most people think I'm younger.'

He was too astonished to hide his amazement.

'That was what you were thinking, wasn't it? Eat up.'

It tasted fine.

'I'm always hungry,' she said. 'I eat ten to twelve times a day.'

People who eat ten or twelve times a day usually find it hard to keep their weight down.

'And it doesn't make me the least bit fatter,' she said. 'Makes no difference anyway. A few pounds one way or the other don't change a human being. I'm always myself. Though I go nuts if I don't get my food.'

She gulped down three sandwiches. Martin Beck ate one, and after some hesitation a second. 'I see you've certain opinions about Svärd,' he said.