have done scores of times,’ says Olsson.
He looks at the streetlight before he lifts his stick and crushes both the lampshade and the bulb with a well-directed blow. Fine shards of glass rain over us. Berglund gives Olsson a look and brushes himself off.
‘Are you as careless as that with Dahlman’s stick?’ I venture.
‘Dahlman’s stick? Like hell,’ the large-hewn inspector calls out, before adding: ‘I only use it on Sundays.’ We stand in silence for a few moments.
‘I need to smoke,’ I holler through the bad weather and look around.
A few floors up in the house opposite, a bloke stands in a window looking up at the dark sky, but before long he turns back into his flat. Cold rainwater finds its way inside my collar and runs down my neck. The lice bites sting.
‘Your position,’ Berglund snorts with irritation, ‘is hardly one in which you can start making demands. Surely it’s in your own interest to clear your name?’
‘I also want to wash myself down and shave.’
‘We can take care of it,’ Olsson interjects. ‘That’s not too much to ask, is it, Alvar?’
Berglund removes his steamed-up spectacles, squints, and then puts the spectacles back on again.
‘As long as you run, so we can leave this place,’ he cries, getting out a pack of Carat from his inside coat pocket and handing it over.
I shake out a cigarette. Olsson offers me a light. I shudder as I smoke slowly, the cigarette held between my thumb and forefinger so that the glowing ember is shielded from the rain while I’m looking around. The drunk is still rifling through his wallet in the middle of the street. An open invitation to be robbed if I ever saw one.
The shards of glass from the streetlight crunch under my feet. They make me run four times before they’re satisfied. When I limp back panting after the last pass, I can finally see what I’ve been trying to understand since we came out of the front door: in the house opposite Zetterberg’s, a curtain moves in a dimly lit window.
‘So that’s where you are, you bastard.’
‘What the hell are you on about, Kvist?’
‘Nothing.’
Someone has seen the murderer leaving the crime scene. There’s a witness.
When I was pushed back against the ropes for the first time, my old trainer yelled at me that closing your eyes didn’t make it hurt less. I was a newcomer in the ring, but already sparring with heavier and tougher lads, and sometimes I tried to dig myself in by putting up my guard.
I only wake when the key is inserted into the lock. It’s a cold morning in the cell. I’ve draped my jacket over the blanket but I’m so cold that I’m shivering. The same screw as yesterday brings me similarly smooth porridge. I don’t look up but I take the bowl. I shiver so violently that it’s difficult to eat.
I think about the trainer’s words while I’m eating. He was right. In actual fact, it hurts even more when you close your eyes. That’s when the memories ambush you, run riot while you lie sleeping. Some things cannot be gotten rid of; they stay with you as stubbornly as ash in the pores of a stoker.
I swallow down the last spoonful of cold porridge. I am already missing Långholmen, missing the company and the work. There’s not such a difference between life at sea and life in prison: both places harbour a gang of blokes in similar clothes who do as they’re told. From time to time you find someone whose warmth you can bask in, and no one raises an eyebrow about it. As long as I managed to keep out of the metal cages of the isolation cells in the cellars, life was much better on the island than here.
‘Better tuck, lovely lads.’
I stretch and yawn. The key is re-inserted into the lock. The goon, roaring at me to follow him, doesn’t require me to put on handcuffs.
‘By no means have you been ruled out of the investigation,’ Olsson informs me without looking up as I enter the little interrogation chamber. He has three thick piles of
He looks at the streetlight before he lifts his stick and crushes both the lampshade and the bulb with a well-directed blow. Fine shards of glass rain over us. Berglund gives Olsson a look and brushes himself off.
‘Are you as careless as that with Dahlman’s stick?’ I venture.
‘Dahlman’s stick? Like hell,’ the large-hewn inspector calls out, before adding: ‘I only use it on Sundays.’ We stand in silence for a few moments.
‘I need to smoke,’ I holler through the bad weather and look around.
A few floors up in the house opposite, a bloke stands in a window looking up at the dark sky, but before long he turns back into his flat. Cold rainwater finds its way inside my collar and runs down my neck. The lice bites sting.
‘Your position,’ Berglund snorts with irritation, ‘is hardly one in which you can start making demands. Surely it’s in your own interest to clear your name?’
‘I also want to wash myself down and shave.’
‘We can take care of it,’ Olsson interjects. ‘That’s not too much to ask, is it, Alvar?’
Berglund removes his steamed-up spectacles, squints, and then puts the spectacles back on again.
‘As long as you run, so we can leave this place,’ he cries, getting out a pack of Carat from his inside coat pocket and handing it over.
I shake out a cigarette. Olsson offers me a light. I shudder as I smoke slowly, the cigarette held between my thumb and forefinger so that the glowing ember is shielded from the rain while I’m looking around. The drunk is still rifling through his wallet in the middle of the street. An open invitation to be robbed if I ever saw one.
The shards of glass from the streetlight crunch under my feet. They make me run four times before they’re satisfied. When I limp back panting after the last pass, I can finally see what I’ve been trying to understand since we came out of the front door: in the house opposite Zetterberg’s, a curtain moves in a dimly lit window.
‘So that’s where you are, you bastard.’
‘What the hell are you on about, Kvist?’
‘Nothing.’
Someone has seen the murderer leaving the crime scene. There’s a witness.
When I was pushed back against the ropes for the first time, my old trainer yelled at me that closing your eyes didn’t make it hurt less. I was a newcomer in the ring, but already sparring with heavier and tougher lads, and sometimes I tried to dig myself in by putting up my guard.
I only wake when the key is inserted into the lock. It’s a cold morning in the cell. I’ve draped my jacket over the blanket but I’m so cold that I’m shivering. The same screw as yesterday brings me similarly smooth porridge. I don’t look up but I take the bowl. I shiver so violently that it’s difficult to eat.
I think about the trainer’s words while I’m eating. He was right. In actual fact, it hurts even more when you close your eyes. That’s when the memories ambush you, run riot while you lie sleeping. Some things cannot be gotten rid of; they stay with you as stubbornly as ash in the pores of a stoker.
I swallow down the last spoonful of cold porridge. I am already missing Långholmen, missing the company and the work. There’s not such a difference between life at sea and life in prison: both places harbour a gang of blokes in similar clothes who do as they’re told. From time to time you find someone whose warmth you can bask in, and no one raises an eyebrow about it. As long as I managed to keep out of the metal cages of the isolation cells in the cellars, life was much better on the island than here.
‘Better tuck, lovely lads.’
I stretch and yawn. The key is re-inserted into the lock. The goon, roaring at me to follow him, doesn’t require me to put on handcuffs.
‘By no means have you been ruled out of the investigation,’ Olsson informs me without looking up as I enter the little interrogation chamber. He has three thick piles of
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