Free Falling, As If in a Dream Read online

  “Forget about Christer Pettersson and all the other drunks,” Bäckström snorted. “Gooks, drunks, and common hoods. Why should they attack Palme? He was the type who supported them. What we’re talking about is a guy with first-class knowledge of the situation, primo sense of locale, handy with the rectifier, and a fucking lot of ice in his belly.”

  “You mean, for example, a police officer or military man or someone with that background?” asked Mattei.

  “Yes, or some old marksman or hunter. Or maybe that Gilljo even. Only author in this country who’s worth the name, if you ask me,” said Bäckström. “Besides, he’s actually there on the lists of conceivable suspects. We got a fucking lot of tips about him. So take a look at Johnny Gilljo if you don’t have anything better to do. I believe more in someone like him, or a military man, than in another police officer,” Bäckström summarized, nodding. “I mean, me and the other cops could always hope we would get the chance to arrest him when he was drunk,” he clarified. “Small consolation is still consolation, even when the general misery is at its greatest. As it was while Palme was alive.”

  “Arrest Palme for drunkenness?” Mattei asked, sneaking a glance at her tape recorder to be on the safe side.

  “The most common wet dream among our colleagues at that time.” Bäckström grinned, and for some reason looked at the clock. “Now you have to excuse me, Mattei, but I have a few things to do too.”

  “Of course,” said Mattei, getting up with all the desired speed. “I really must thank you for participating.”

  “A few more things,” said Bäckström. “For the sake of order. I see that this is a confidential conversation, and I assume that what I’ve said stays between us.”

  “As I said by way of introduction, all interview subjects are anonymous.”

  “Like I believe that,” said Bäckström with a sneer.

  “There was something else you wanted to say,” Mattei reminded him as she put away the tape recorder, paper, and pen in her bag and closed the zipper.

  “You don’t need to greet the surströmming eater from me,” said Bäckström.

  “I promise,” said Mattei. “You don’t need to worry.”

  “I never worry,” said Bäckström. “It’s not my thing.”

  Lisa Mattei’s little investigation had taken five days, and she had drawn her conclusions even before she started. The material in the Palme room was the result of these colleagues’ work, and with two exceptions they believed in what they’d done.

  The support for the police track was limited to Bäckström’s general musings, and the material collected was not particularly extensive.

  The great exception was the so-called Kurd track, for which the police investigations generated even more paper than for Christer Pettersson. In round numbers, two hundred man-years for a year, and it turned out an enormous number of binders. One investigator out of thirteen was left who believed in what was there, and surely the proportion wouldn’t vary much with all the hundreds she hadn’t contacted.

  In the evening after the final interview she stayed at work until late and wrote a short memo about what she had come up with. Two pages, in contrast to Jan Lewin’s twenty-five. Then she e-mailed it to Johansson. Only to Johansson, because she thought it was his business to decide whether anyone else should read it.

  What do I do now? thought Mattei as she shut off her computer. It needs to be something quite specific, and it’s time I had a talk with my dear mom, she decided.

  17

  As usual, Johansson arrived first at his office. The hour before his secretary showed up he would usually use to have an extra cup of coffee in peace and quiet, read his e-mail, and do all the other things he never had time for during the rest of the day.

  A model of brevity and well written, thought Johansson as he read the memo Mattei had e-mailed him. That little string bean is hardworking too, he thought. According to the date and time the memo had arrived in his mailbox shortly after eleven the night before.

  But the memo was hardly exciting, because he already knew everything that was in there, he thought. So all hopes were dashed from the start that any of the old owls would have a new, exciting, concrete lead to offer.

  Although you knew that too, thought Johansson and sighed. The remaining consolation was that at least one of the older colleagues seemed to be thinking along the same lines as he was. A minor conspiracy in the victim’s vicinity and a highly capable perpetrator who took care of the practical aspects.

  Must be Melander, he thought. Melander had been his and Jarnebring’s mentor when they started at the central detective squad in Stockholm more than thirty years ago. Wonder how the old geezer’s doing? he thought just as Anna Holt stepped in through his open door, knocked on the doorjamb, and showed her white teeth in a smile.

  “Knock, knock,” said Holt. “Isn’t that what you always say when you barge into someone’s office?”

  “Sit down, Anna,” said Johansson, nodding toward his couch. “What are you doing at work this time of day?” She’s actually a really nice-looking lady, he thought. On the thin side, perhaps, and a little tedious sometimes, but…

  “Have to hurry along,” said Holt, shaking her head. “Just a quick question.”

  “Shoot,” said Johansson.

  “If you’d shot Palme, run down Tunnelgatan and up the stairs to Malmskillnadsgatan, which way would you have gone after that?”

  Mercy, thought Johansson.

  “I have three options,” he answered. “I can go left on Malmskillnadsgatan toward the park by St. Johannes Church, I can cross the street and go straight ahead, as it is alleged that the perpetrator did, continue straight across Brunkebergsåsen that is. Or I can turn right on Malmskillnadsgatan in the direction of Kungsgatan.”

  “So which way would you have gone?”

  “Personally I would go right,” he said, nodding in emphasis, “take the stairs down to Kungsgatan, melt in among all the others walking there, and then disappear down into the subway.”

  “Why?” said Holt.

  “Because it’s best,” said Johansson.

  “Thanks,” said Holt. She nodded, smiled, turned on her heel and left.

  Wonder what she’s after? thought Johansson, and though it was said he could see around corners, he had no idea that Holt too had shared his speculations for almost a day now. Wonder if little Mattei has shown up yet? he thought suddenly, looking at his clock. Worth a try, he thought, entering her number.

  “Sit down, Lisa,” said Johansson, indicating the chair on the other side of the desk.

  “Thanks, boss,” said Mattei, doing as she was told. Be on the alert, Lisa, she thought.

  “Thanks for the e-mail,” said Johansson. “A model of brevity. And well written,” he added.

  “Thanks,” said Mattei. “Although I’m afraid there weren’t any new ideas.”

  “No,” said Johansson. “But neither of us thought there would be. Speaking of new ideas, by the way, I’d hoped maybe you would have some.”

  Sink or swim, thought Mattei, and if it were to sink and go completely down the toilet it would still be a point in her favor if Johansson knew about it in advance.

  “I actually have an idea,” said Mattei. “I don’t know, but—”

  “Go on,” said Johansson, nodding encouragingly.

  “I was thinking about what you said at our last meeting. About the Palmes going to the movies. I share your understanding, boss. I think he might very well have talked about it before, and that his plans might have been known among his co-workers, and that the people at SePo might also have heard talk of it.”

  “So now you’re thinking about having your mother invite you and a now retired head of personal security to dinner and let all the good food and drink take care of the rest,” Johansson observed. That girl can go as far as I have, he thought.

  “Roughly like that,” said Mattei. He can see around corners, though I already knew that, she thought.

 
“How long has she been at SePo now? Your mother, that is,” Johansson clarified.

  “Since I was in preschool,” said Mattei. “Almost thirty years. Now she has a position as director of constitutional protection. She’s retiring next year.” My mom will be a retiree, she thought.

  “Although you can’t really say that kind of thing,” said Johansson, who had been operational head of the secret police himself before he wound up at the national bureau. “I have the idea that she was with personal security too?”

  “In the eighties, actually. She was there for several years, including when Palme was assassinated. She was responsible for the queen and the children in the royal family,” said Mattei. “If I dare say that.” What else would a woman be doing at that place? she thought.

  “To me you can say anything whatsoever,” said Johansson with an authoritative expression. “It stays in this room, as you know.”

  “So she knows Chief Inspector Söderberg well. He was the one who took care of the government and Palme, as I’m sure you recall. He’s always had an eye for my mother.” Who didn’t at that time? she thought.

  “Of course,” said Johansson. “Who hasn’t? She’s an elegant woman, your mother. Though Söderberg has never really been himself since the murder of Palme,” he added. I guess it would be strange otherwise, he thought.

  “He seems to have taken it extremely hard in the beginning,” said Mattei. “Although the last time I saw him, at my mom’s sixtieth birthday dinner by the way, he was lively and happy. So what happened when Palme was murdered he certainly remembers in detail.”

  “Sounds good,” said Johansson. “That’s what we’ll do,” he said, nodding. “Say the word if there’s anything practical I can help you with.

  “Oh, and there’s one more thing,” said Johansson, who was suddenly struck by a thought. “Which one of the old Palme investigators was it, by the way, who had the same good idea as I did?”

  “I really can’t say that,” said Mattei, shaking her blond head unusually firmly. Good Lord, she thought.

  “I’m still listening,” Johansson repeated.

  “Not even to the boss,” Mattei persisted. “I’ve promised all of them anonymity. You can get a list of the ones I’ve interviewed, but I can’t go into what this one or that one said.”

  “I understand,” said Johansson. “How’s Melander doing, by the way?” he added with an innocent expression. “We worked together at the bureau ages and ages ago.”

  “Good,” said Mattei. “He said to say hello, by the way.” You didn’t manage that corner, she thought.

  “I can imagine that,” said Johansson contentedly.

  18

  What does he really mean? thought Holt, when she had returned to her office the day before and started reading the papers Lewin had given her.

  There was a total of ten pages, and at the top was a tip form that had been filled out on Saturday the first of March 1986, the day after the murder. That day a young woman succeeded in getting past the Stockholm police department’s seriously overloaded switchboard and evidently made such a strong impression on the officer who took the call that he asked her to come down to Kungsholmen so they could hold an interview with her.

  The interview with the young woman, Madeleine Nilsson, born in 1964, took place at the duty desk on Kungsholmen late on Saturday evening. The interview was transcribed in summary and took up no more than one letter-size page. It had been done by an officer unknown to Holt, someone by the name of Andersson, who sent it on to the homicide squad for any follow-up and other actions.

  “Nilsson states the following in summary. She spent Friday evening at a pub down on Vasagatan where she saw acquaintances with whom she had a beer. Nilsson does not remember the name of the place, but states that it is diagonally across from the Central Station in the direction of Kungsgatan.

  “After her companions went their separate ways about 11:00 p.m. she made her way on foot in the direction of her residence at Döbelnsgatan 31. She took Kungsgatan in an easterly direction, crossed Sveavägen, and then took the stairs on the left side of Kungsgatan up to Malmskillnadsgatan. Then she continued on Malmskillnadsgatan and Döbelnsgatan north home to her residence where she arrived at about 11:30 p.m.

  “About halfway up the stairs from Kungsgatan to Malmskillnadsgatan she encountered a solitary man walking at a rapid pace down the stairs toward Kungsgatan. Nilsson is uncertain about the time but thinks it was about 11:20.

  “The man was about six feet tall, broad-shouldered, neither heavy nor thin. He gave the impression of being in good condition and did not seem intoxicated in any way. He had short dark hair, and Nilsson estimates his age at about 35–40. The man had no head covering, was dressed in a half-length dark coat or longer jacket with turned-up collar, plus dark pants (but not jeans). Information about his footwear is lacking. Nilsson cannot talk about his appearance in more detail as the man held his hand in front of his face, as if to blow his nose, as he passed her. At the same time she has a general impression that he was good-looking with regular features, dark eyes, and short dark hair.

  “During the walk between the intersection of Sveavägen and Kungsgatan and her residence on Döbelnsgatan, she has not made any further observations of interest. She states in conclusion that according to her definite understanding it was calm in the city. She saw only a few people during the walk on Döbelnsgatan, and none of them acted strange in any way. When she was walking on Döbelnsgatan she encountered a police bus that drove in the direction of Malmskillnadsgatan. The bus was driving at a moderate speed and without flashing lights or sirens. She remembers this because they blinked the headlights at her.”

  I see then, thought Holt. So far everything seemed well and good, apart from the fact that the investigation’s chain of witnesses had suddenly broken already at the second link. If this does add up, she thought.

  Wednesday the fifth of March, the week after the murder, another interview had been held with Madeleine Nilsson at the homicide squad in Stockholm. A dialogue interview that was seven pages in transcript. The interview leader was also named Andersson, unknown to Holt, but judging by the first name a different Andersson than the one the witness had met at the duty desk a few days earlier, and with a completely different attitude toward her.

  First she had to repeat the same story she had told a few days earlier. Then she was asked whether she could provide the name of the individuals she had been with at the pub on Vasagatan. She didn’t want to do that, and she didn’t want to talk about why either.

  The subsequent questions were straight to the point and left no room for any doubt whatsoever as to what direction the interview had taken.

  What had she really been up to down in City on Friday evening the twenty-eighth of February?

  She’d been doing what she already said. Nothing more, nothing less.

  Had she in reality been in the block around Malmskillnadsgatan to “pick up a john”?

  Or to “buy a few downers”? Or maybe even a few “uppers”?

  She did not even want to comment on this. She had been doing what she said. Nothing more, nothing less. She had called the police because she wanted to help them. If it was going to be like this, she didn’t want to cooperate anymore.

  After a few more questions on the same theme, the interview was concluded. The handwritten notes that her interview leader made on the interview transcript also meant the end of witness Madeleine Nilsson.

  “Witness Nilsson is not credible. Appears in the police record under five different sections (theft, fraud, shoplifting, narcotics offenses, etc.). Is a known addict and prostitute.”

  The chief inspector at the homicide squad who reviewed the various witness statements specifically related to observations of the perpetrator drew the same conclusion about the value of her testimony. According to the photocopy of his decision to withdraw the witness’s statement from the file, the story lacked “relevance.” “It is most likely that the witness passed the scen
e before the murder of OP.”

  His signature was completely legible, and Holt knew very well who he was. When she first starting working with the detective squad in Stockholm, a few years after the assassination of Palme, she had run into him on numerous occasions. One of the old legends at the homicide squad, Chief Inspector Fylking. Nowadays both retired and deceased.

  What does he really mean? thought Holt, and the person she had in mind was her colleague Jan Lewin who had prepared the final paper in the thin bundle. Typewritten, neat, like everything that came from Lewin, it had been prepared on Friday the twenty-eighth of March 1986, exactly four weeks after the murder. Astonishingly brief considering it came from him. Only six points on a normal letter-size sheet. Signed by then criminal inspector Jan Lewin with the homicide squad in Stockholm, and in all essentials he seems to have been the same man then as he was now.

  In principle what was there was as unimpeachable as it could ever be, considering the circumstances. Even the quintessence of what the police actually knew about what had happened. The problem was Lewin’s exactitude. All these places where the actors found themselves, preferably stated to the nearest yard. All these points in time when they were at a certain place, if possible noted to the second. All movements and everything else humanly possible that the perpetrator and the witnesses were doing in between. Obviously calculated in yards and seconds. The pedagogical value was zero, the reading pleasure nonexistent, and it took Holt more than fifteen minutes before she managed to force her way through the Lewinian thicket of words and finally understand what was there.

  The first point in his memo was comprehensible enough. The next four were harder to read, but his opening said most of what needed to be said: “(1) Sweden’s prime minister Olof Palme was murdered at the intersection of Sveavägen and Tunnelgatan on Friday the twenty-eighth of February 1986, at approx. 23:21:30.”