Vanished (22 page)

Maria hesitated, then nodded.

‘I’ve had several different names and I had a new personal ID number for a while; I went from a Virgo to an Aries!’

They both laughed.

‘What else does Rebecka do?’

Maria Eriksson became serious again.

‘What does she say she does?’

Annika took a sip of her tea. She had to decide: either she trusted this woman, or she would show her the door. She went for the first alternative.

‘She claims to have assisted sixty cases in three years,’ she said. ‘Two entire families relocated abroad; a full-time staff of five with a salary of fourteen thousand kronor a month each; all contacts take place by proxy, through Paradise, using a system of reference numbers; there’s an around-the-clock hotline; rerouted phone lines; safe houses all over Sweden; they claim to have the capacity to arrange government jobs in other countries; complete medical coverage; legal assistance; care from A to Z.’

Maria sighed and nodded.

‘More or less the usual tale. I’m surprised that she mentioned the business about relocation abroad – she usually plays that card close to the chest.’

‘She did, for the longest time.’

‘All right,’ Maria said. ‘The staff includes herself, her brother, her sister and her parents. I presume they’re on the payroll, but they don’t actually do anything. No real work takes place at Paradise at all. Her mother answers the phones at times, but that’s it.’

Silence.

‘What about the safe houses?’

Maria chuckled.

‘They have a run-down house in Järfälla, that’s where we’re staying. That’s where the telephone is connected. It rings periodically whenever Rebecka has a new case. Some poor desperate soul keeps calling, but no one answers . . .’

Annika shook her head.

‘So it’s all a pack of lies, then, every last word of it?’

Maria Eriksson blinked, tears in her eyes.

‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what happens to the others.’

‘The others?’

The woman leaned closer and said in a whisper: ‘The other people who come to Paradise – I don’t know what happens to them. They come, they pass through the system and they disappear.’

‘Don’t they stay at the house?’

Maria Eriksson laughed mirthlessly.

‘No, just us, we rent a room that we pay for under the table. She thinks she’s going to make a bundle out of us since our case is so clear-cut, that’s why we get to live there. But I’ve figured her out. If the Social Services office in our district makes that payment, she’ll take the money and run. We wouldn’t get a penny.’

Maria hid her face in her hands.

‘And I believed her! I ended up going from the frying pan into the fire!’

Annika suddenly thought about the civil servant from Vaxholm, the guy she’d met yesterday, Thomas.

‘You’ve got to get in touch with your district,’ she said.

The woman picked up another tissue.

‘I know. We’ve got to find somewhere else to stay, my husband is trying to arrange a cottage he’s heard about. As soon as that’s taken care of, we’ll slip away from Paradise and then I’ll contact my district. I can’t do anything as long as we’re staying at the foundation’s house.’

‘How long do you figure it will take?’

‘A few more days, this weekend by the latest.’

Annika reflected on this and asked: ‘The threat Rebecka has referred to, have you heard about it?’

Maria sighed.

‘Rebecka claims that the Mafia is after her, though I have no idea why. It sounds kind of far-fetched to me. What could she possibly have done to them?’

Annika shrugged.

‘Do you know what happens to the money?’

Maria shook her head.

‘I can’t get into the office. She keeps her records in one of the rooms on the ground floor, the door is always locked. But she does pay herself a high salary –I found a pay slip in the trash at the end of last week.’

Annika sat up straight. Pay slips, that would mean bank-account numbers, personal ID numbers, loads of information.

‘Did you bring it?’

‘Yes, I think I did . . .’

Maria rooted through her handbag and located a wrinkled slip of paper stained by coffee grounds.

‘It’s kind of messy,’ she apologized as she handed it to Annika.

Everything was listed: a bank account, a personal ID number, an address, the tax rate – everything but a corporate ID number for Paradise. A hefty salary, too: fifty-five thousand kronor a month.

‘It’s a Föreningssparbanken account,’ Maria said, ‘the address is the same as for the Paradise Foundation, a post office box in Järfälla.’

‘What’s the street address?’ Annika wondered.

Maria told her.

As usual, the eleven o’clock meeting was too focused on the future and not concerned enough with yesterday. The visions that the news editors had of the newspaper of tomorrow were generally reminiscent of soufflés: gonzo takes presuming that people would spill their guts, confess or deny scandals, share the tragedy, pain, rage, wrongdoing or injustice that had been visited upon them. Disasters were made out to be worse than they actually were, the lives and loves of celebrities were exaggerated out of all proportion. The consequences of new political proposals were oversimplified and the general public was invariably described as being a winner or a loser.

Anders Schyman sighed: that’s what the business was like, after all. Overly enthusiastic news editors weren’t exclusive to
Kvällspressen.
The same phenomenon was present at the national public-service broadcasting company where he had worked for many years, only with a slightly different twist. The starting point for whoever was in charge of planning was the necessity to make the greatest possible impact. For
Kvällspressen
this might mean concentrating on a TV celebrity who broke an ankle during a game show, while a television debate forum would hit the jackpot if an authority figure got rattled on air and made a fool of himself. At this moment Ingvar Johansson was reporting to the group his take on the follow-up of the handicapped boy who had taken his local government to court and won. A cake and flowers, no champagne, a photo spread with the whole family gathered around the kid, giving him a hug. He pictured a centre spread; the header declaring ‘Kvällspressen made a difference!’ had already been set up.

‘Do we know if the family will do the picture?’ Schyman asked.

‘No,’ Ingvar Johansson replied, but the reporter will take care of that. It’s Carl Wennergren, so we’re home free.’

They all nodded appreciatively.

‘The free-port homicide story has developments,’ Sjölander informed them. ‘This man who competes in the old-boy class in orienteering found the missing truckload of cigarettes yesterday. It was completely gutted by fire and had been hidden in some kind of a ravine at the vicinity where the three provinces Östergtland, Södermanland and Närke meet.’

‘Maybe someone was dying for a smoke,’ Picture Pelle said, getting a few laughs.

‘Two dead bodies were found in the cab,’ Sjölander said unsmilingly. ‘The coroner’s office hasn’t completed their post-mortem yet, but the police are pretty worked up. The victims appear to have been tortured. Every last joint in their bodies was smashed. The officer I spoke to had never seen anything so God-awful in his life.’

The room grew silent. The air-conditioning whooshed.

‘What can the police go public with?’ Schyman asked.

Sjölander flipped through his notes.

‘The spot where the bodies were recovered is located in very rugged woodlands to the north of Havla, in the greater Finnspång region. There is an extremely poor road through the woods that follows the fault line where the truck was found. Some interesting clues have been discovered. There are some tyre tracks from a vehicle other than the truck, and they’re pretty distinctive. Some type of winter tyre without studs. Broad, American, used by only a few brands of cars. We’re talking about a big four-wheel drive, like a Range Rover or the biggest Toyota Land Cruiser models. The police have already towed away the wreckage, which apparently wasn’t an easy thing to do, and they would like us to write that anyone who’s seen something should to get in touch with them.’

‘How did they get the truck down the ravine?’ Ingvar Johansson wondered.

Sjölander sighed.

‘They drove it there, obviously; picked a day when the ground was frozen. The owner of the property isn’t too pleased – they’ve totaled hundreds of saplings along the road.’

‘Who did it?’ Schyman wondered.

‘The Yugo Mafia,’ Sjölander replied. ‘That’s crystal clear. And we haven’t seen the end of this, either. The guys in the car couldn’t have told them anything, or they would have had one or two unbroken joints. Whoever owns the cigarettes is going to keep on killing people until they find the shipment. Anyone who knows anything about it is in deep shit.’

‘What more do we know about the Yugo Mafia?’ Schyman asked. ‘Stuff we can’t go public with, I mean.’

‘They figure the Serbian government is behind it all,’ Sjölander said, ‘but no one has ever been able to prove it. Since the resources used in these operations are so extensive, it’s a good guess that some state has indeed sanctioned them. That’s why there aren’t any snitches who would have a full insight into the set-up, who would know the whole picture. The people in the know are either a part of the government in Belgrade or are connected to it – like police commissioners, top military brass.’

‘Would it be dangerous to dig deeper?’ Schyman asked.

Sjölander hesitated.

‘Not really,’ he replied. ‘Covering the murders would be fairly harmless. They’re prepared for that. This is business, remember. It’s just another day at the office for these operators. Only, don’t try to trick them. Don’t steal their booty and don’t sit on any information about the people who did it.’

The meeting drifted on to other subjects, but Anders Schyman wasn’t really paying attention. They had hardly ever had a discussion quite like this one. Relief and satisfaction flooded his entire gut. Ever since that clash yesterday he had been worried, but now he knew.

He had won.

The end of October and beginning of November was always a hectic time. The board considered the budget in October and the council had its say in November. Well, to be perfectly honest, the process usually dragged on into the first week of December. Every single solitary nursery in the city had called and asked if it was really true that they only had three thousand kronor left, and Thomas Samuelsson had to deal with the last quarterly follow-up at the same time.

But still he couldn’t concentrate. He was seriously concerned about his outbursts. That journalist had asked him if he was a burn-out case, and he’d thought about her words several times. But there wasn’t any real reason for him to break down because of stress. He was doing what he had been doing for seven years now: living in the same house with the same wife and going to the same job.

It was something else. He didn’t want to put it into words because of the ramifications.

The truth of the matter was that Thomas wanted more out of life. That was it, there it was. He wanted to move on, he knew this job inside out by now. He wanted to move to the big city, he wanted to go to the movies and to the theatre without excessive planning, to walk home along streets lined with high-rise buildings and Indian restaurants and people he didn’t know.

Yesterday he had walked around Vaxholm for hours, street after street. He knew every cobblestone by name, and then some. He had whiled away some time at a grungy restaurant, drinking beer, but he had left when a bunch of noisy high-school kids had barrelled in. It had been past midnight by the time he got home. He had hoped that Eleonor would have waited up so that they could talk, but she was fast asleep with a copy of the business magazine
Moderna Tider
next to her on the nightstand.

The telephone rang again. Thomas resisted an impulse to yank its lead out of the socket and smash the device against the wall.

‘Hello,’ he roared.

‘Thomas Samuelsson? This is Annika Bengtzon, the reporter you met yesterday. I’ve uncovered certain details about the Paradise Foundation. Have you managed to find that corporate ID number?’

He groaned.

‘I’ve been busy, you know,’ he said.

‘I’m glad you’re doing your job,’ she said. “Then perhaps you’ve found out that Rebecka Björkstig used to call herself something else? That the foundation is based in a tumble-down house in Järfälla, that there’s no staff, and that they don’t do a thing except charge people for their services?’

He tried to think of something to say.

‘Is that on the level?’

On the other end, the reporter sighed.

‘Apparently. I’m not absolutely certain, but I’ve obtained Rebecka’s personal ID number and I’m going to check it with the debt-enforcement service over at Sollentuna. I’m taking the commuter train that leaves in fifteen minutes. Join me if you’re interested.’

Thomas looked at his watch. He’d have to cancel three meetings.

‘I’m not sure that I can make it,’ he said.

‘It’s your call,’ the reporter said. ‘If you do come, please bring the corporate ID number for Paradise.’

Annika Bengtzon hung up. Thomas closed the notebook on his desk and went over to see the social worker in charge of that Bosnian woman, Aida Begovic. She was with a client, a young man with a shaven head who kept picking at his pimples. Thomas walked in anyway.

‘I need the number for Paradise,’ he said, interrupting her.

The woman behind the desk struggled to keep her temper.

‘I’m busy,’ she said, clearly emphasizing each word. ‘Would you please leave us?’

‘No,’ Thomas said. ‘I need that number. Right now.’

The social worker’s face went red.

‘You really—’

‘Immediately,’ he roared.

Alarmed, she got up, pulled out a notebook and, opening it, handed it to him.

‘Upper right-hand corner,’ she said curtly.

‘Contact me as soon as you receive an invoice,’ Thomas said. ‘I apologize for the interruption.’

He picked up the notebook and left. Jotted down the number on a Post-It sticker, put it in his pocket, put on his coat and went out. He hadn’t brought his car today so he had to go home and get it.