Dark Pines Read online

  ‘Let’s cut through here,’ Frida says, turning left towards a rocky outcrop covered in brown ferns.

  ‘Is that the only way?’ I ask. ‘We can’t stay on this track to get there?’

  ‘We could,’ she says. ‘But it’d add a good couple of hours, and I need to get back to fix Hannes his dinner before his poker game. Come on, this is a shortcut, it’s fine, I’ve done it a million times.’

  But it’s not fine, it’s darker. The strip of light grey above is muddied by a criss-cross of spruce branches. Can’t Hannes fix his own fucking dinner? I see things that aren’t there, eyes and antlers and snakes hanging in trees. We get to a boulder field and scramble over the slippery rocks, Frida helping me, my boots losing purchase on damp moss and wet granite.

  Then I see lights. They’re not clear, just sporadic splinters of white light, broken by branches and trunks, and I want to walk faster. I’m happy to see something ahead so I speed up. I hold on to Frida’s hand and walk towards the lights and I hear voices now, men’s voices, and the depth and calm of their tone is reassuring. I’m smiling even though I know I’m heading towards an eyeless corpse.

  We wade through brambles. They scratch my legs and tear my trousers before I get through to the clearing on the other side. I have to fight to free myself. We skirt around marshy land, reeds and tall grasses swooshing about our faces, and then we reach the men. They’ve placed torches and lanterns in the trees to try to light up the space. There’s no tape and Thord isn’t turning people away. It’s just five men standing around a dead body in a hollow. I can see the victim’s hair sticking out from under a tarp sheet. Damp. Grey. Medium-length.

  ‘Who’s there?’ A voice booms out.

  ‘Frida Carlsson. I’ve got Tuva Moodyson with me.’

  I hear grunts of reluctant acceptance and see Thord walking towards us.

  ‘You shouldn’t be all the way out here,’ he says, looking cold and tired in the harsh white light of the lanterns.

  ‘I don’t want to be,’ I say. ‘Let me ask you a couple of questions and take a few photos then I’ll be out of your hair.’

  ‘No questions,’ a man from behind Thord says. He has the beginning of a beard, and I can see a Bluetooth earpiece hooked onto his ear even though there’s no reception out here. It’s flashing. ‘Karlstad homicide are in charge of this crime scene.’

  ‘I’m from the local newspaper,’ I say.

  ‘Good for you,’ he says, turning and walking back to the body.

  ‘Is it a man or a woman?’ I ask.

  The Karlstad cop with the Bluetooth thing in his ear walks back over and stands next to Thord. The air is all leaf mould and spores.

  ‘Didn’t you hear me? Get back to wherever you came from and let us do our job.’

  ‘Is it a man?’ I ask.

  I see Thord nod ever so slightly as the Karlstad Bluetooth guy tells me that’s my last warning.

  ‘Have the victim’s eyes been removed?’

  Karlstad Bluetooth guy crosses his arms. ‘You got one minute to leave the crime scene before I arrest you for obstructing police business.’

  But Thord nods.

  I shiver.

  ‘Last question, then I go home, officer.’ I need to know if Holmqvist was locked up when this murder took place. ‘Was the victim killed in the last twenty-four hours?’

  Karlstad Bluetooth guy unclips the handcuffs from his belt and Thord shakes his head.

  ‘Okay, I’m leaving,’ I say, turning and grabbing Frida’s hand as I go.

  We retreat a few steps and I take out the camera from my backpack. Then I turn and point it and take a flurry of photos. The flash reflects off the damp trees around me like sheet lightning. I see the police, at least three of them, turn and walk fast in my direction.

  I grab Frida again and we run back to the boulders.

  My heart’s racing.

  ‘You shouldn’t mess with the police force like that,’ Frida says. ‘They’re only doing they’re job.’

  ‘I know,’ I say. ‘So am I.’

  21

  My pillow alarm vibrates. I get up and stretch and climb into the shower and notice the scratches and cuts on my legs from last night’s hike through Utgard. I pull out a barb from my thigh and a spot of red appears in its place. So, brambles can draw blood through thick denim jeans, who knew? Think about that next time you eat a blackberry.

  I rub moisturiser into my face. Soon I’ll need to move to my heavy winter cream because my nose and my eyelids are getting dry.

  David Holmqvist is inside the cop shop two minutes from my apartment. Locals are gossiping, whispering in ICA that he’s killed two men. Others discuss the case at the bus stop and reckon he’s killed all five. There are only three cells in Toytown and it’s likely Thord is preparing one right now.

  But the town hasn’t changed one bit. I drive and I see people cycling down Storgatan with their lunchboxes in their baskets, and I see old ladies scurrying along thawed pavements with spikes strapped to their sturdy leather shoes. Everybody has something to do, just not very fast.

  When I get to work there are no copies of last week’s issue left on the counter and everyone’s waiting inside Lena’s office. I hang up my coat and kick off my boots and join them.

  ‘We haven’t started yet, Tuva, I’m just explaining what you told me last night.’

  I nod.

  ‘So I had a chat with Holmqvist’s lawyer this morning and he reminded me of our legal obligations, not that I needed any reminding. We report whatever the hell I decide we report, don’t worry I told him that in pretty basic language, but we can’t risk jeopardising any prosecutor’s case against Holmqvist if he ends up getting charged with the murders.’

  ‘What does that actually mean?’ asks Nils, an elastic band stretching between his fingers.

  ‘Not much for you, but Tuva, Lars, just be extra vigilant when it comes to fact-checking and sources.’

  I look at Lars and he’s staring up at the ceiling, his bald patch shining at me. He’s probably rolling his eyes from behind his oversize glasses.

  We split to our separate territories: Lars to the printer and Nils to the kitchen/office and me to the desk closest to the counter.

  ‘You see the body last night? Any idea who it is?’ Lars asks.

  ‘Didn’t see it,’ I say. ‘Well, I saw it but it was already covered with a sheet.’

  ‘This is a lot for a town like Gavrik to cope with,’ Lars says, like it might tip the place over a cliff. ‘This is the last thing we all need after that business in the ’90s. I wish it would all just go away. We just want a quiet life, not all this.’

  I call the police station and Thord picks up. He sounds more officious than usual and I guess he’s being watched by someone regional, someone of rank.

  ‘Thord, it’s me. Press conference today or tomorrow?’

  ‘Noon,’ he says, and puts down the phone. I look at the receiver like it’s his face and he just made an obscene joke.

  The first part of the morning’s spent collating photos and prioritising what writing I need to do. I have three full days and I almost hope nothing else happens because I can barely hold on to the stories as they are, never mind accommodate developments. Lena will give me as much space as I need for this, to explain the pattern in the victims, to lay out the facts as fairly and as impartially as I can. I need to visit the paper mill up north, as that’s where some of the ’90s victims worked. I write all morning with one eye on the clock and my aids switched low, but still on.

  At 11:45 I take my camera and leather jacket and pull on my boots and walk over to the police station. I invited Lars to come with me but he said he wasn’t in the mood.

  It’s like before, but worse. There are maybe twenty journalists, no BBC or CNN, it’s just Swedish press so far, but we’ve got representatives from Gothenburg and Malmö joining us now. I’m told there will be a third cop starting work here after Christmas and I reckon they need her now. It’s still Björ
n giving the statement but he has two good-looking guys behind him, one on each side, both wearing suits. I take my seat on the front row and check my Dictaphone and my camera and then I notice one of the suits staring at me. He’s the guy from last night with the beginner beard and the Bluetooth on his ear. He’s had a shave. Looks good. I nod to him but I don’t smile and he just ignores me.

  Björn starts. Same preamble as before. He speaks into a nest of brightly coloured microphones as flashbulbs light up his face.

  ‘Welcome all, thanks for coming. Yesterday, at 13:22, a call was placed to the Gavrik district police station by a member of the Utgard forest hunting group. Said member informed us that a body had been discovered close to the area commonly known as Badger Hollow. When officers arrived at the scene, they discovered a deceased male in his fifties or early sixties. His identity is unknown at this present time. I would like to appeal for information and request anyone with a missing friend or relative matching that description to come forward. This man was not an official member of the Utgard hunting team. He was found with a rifle and a leash, but no dog.’

  I raise my hand and the Chief points to me.

  ‘Was the victim found with his eyes intact, sir?’

  ‘I can’t comment on that yet.’

  ‘Do you know the cause of death?’ asks someone behind me with a thick Skåne accent.

  ‘A gunshot wound to the chest area.’

  ‘Is it the same weapon used in the murder of Fredrik Malmström?’ asks a woman with a clear radio voice.

  Björn sniffs. ‘I can’t say but it appears to be of a similar calibre.’

  Radio woman perks up again. ‘Was the same weapon used in the ’90s murders used for these new murders?’

  ‘We can’t say yet,’ says the Chief, ‘but the National Forensic Centre in Linköping are running ballistic tests.’

  A woman with a video camera on her shoulder, I think she works for a small outfit in Dalarna, asks, ‘Will hunting rights be cancelled for the rest of the season?’

  ‘No decision has been made at this time.’

  A man on my right with trousers too short for his legs asks, ‘Has David Holmqvist been charged with any crime?’

  ‘Nobody has been charged in connection with this incident.’

  A tabloid woman at the back with thick blonde hair I’d kill for, wrong choice of word, asks, ‘Was there was any sexual element to the crimes?’

  The Chief looks uncomfortable. ‘Not that we’re aware of.’

  More flashbulbs.

  ‘What will the police do to make sure nobody else dies in Utgard forest?’ I ask.

  ‘We’ve brought in specialists from the National Homicide Unit, and we will decide what to do about hunting rights at the earliest opportunity.’

  A woman with a chestnut-brown spaniel bursts through the doors to the conference room and everybody turns.

  ‘Ma’am, this is official press only.’

  ‘It’s my husband,’ she says. No tears, no sorrow, no emotion at all. She strokes her dog and rubs his long, soft ears. ‘We had an argument yesterday and then he took off with Jumbo.’ She looks down at the dog and then up at Björn. I recognise her face from somewhere but can’t place her. ‘He hasn’t come home and I know it’s him out there in the woods. He goes there sometimes.’ She looks down at the dog again. Her skin’s loose like she’s a smoker who’s been on too many holidays. She quietens her voice. ‘I can feel it. It’s Rikard.’

  Cameras pivot on their tripods and flashbulbs explode in her direction. The dog growls and she pulls it tight under her chin and backs out into the entrance foyer of the station. Thord follows her as Björn tells the press conference that questions are over can we leave in an orderly fashion, as if we’re Boy Scouts. When I get through to the counter, Thord and the woman have already slipped through the heavy door with the push-button code lock. The other reporters are right behind me and we exit in one lump.

  The sun’s out. Photographers are checking their cameras, hands shielding digital screens from the light. Two TV types walk over to their outside broadcast van and several others start making recordings, stiff smiles and microphones, good-looking people with their backs to the police station. The liquorice factory chimneys cast long shadows down Storgatan. I can see one guy preparing for live broadcast and the other newspaper reporters are chatting and sending tweets.

  I’m hungry for grease and I need some air so I walk towards McDonald’s and see a figure seated on a fold-up stool outside the pharmacy, with placards and leaflets and a small table with a clipboard. The wind picks up. There’s a biro attached to the clipboard with string. It’s Bengt Gustavsson, the Mossen hoarder.

  ‘Bengt, how are you?’

  ‘Oh, keeping out of trouble. Have you walked over here to sign my petition like a good Christian?’

  ‘Depends what it’s for,’ I say, smiling, the low sun warming my cheeks.

  His face drops. He stands up from his fold-up stool and I notice his cold sores again, and then his eyes narrow.

  ‘Are you okay?’ I ask.

  He talks through breaths, straining to get the words out. ‘You’re . . .’ he says, his nostrils flaring. ‘You’re all the same.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I say, backing off slightly, checking behind him in case anyone else is around.

  He grabs the lapel of my leather jacket.

  ‘What do you think this is actually made out of? You call this fashion? It’s barbarity is what it is.’ I pull back and he lets go of my lapel. Nobody’s coming to my rescue, nobody’s noticed.

  ‘Come on, Bengt.’

  ‘Don’t,’ he says, still pointing at my jacket, stepping back. ‘Biggest mass-murder in the history of our planet. Do not be one of them. I’m dead serious.’ He raises his voice. ‘Meat, leather, hunting, sport, murder.’ He thrusts a leaflet at my face. ‘Meat, leather, hunting, sport, murder.’ I can see a froth of white spit at the corner of his mouth. ‘Why don’t you educate yourself, Tuva Moodyson. Before it’s too late.’

  22

  I spend the rest of the afternoon at my desk sorting my stories, drafting headlines and cleaning up quotes and making a string of appointments. I schedule meetings at the paper mill and the strip club, and one with the local hunting association chairman. There’s a scrolling newsfeed at the base of my computer screen in case anything new comes in. Three separate journos pop in to say hi and ask for local restaurant and hotel tips and they all have the same look on their face as they open the office door. The bell rings above their head and they see our bobble wallpaper and our beat-up pine desks and our PC monitors the size of microwaves. They look amused and nostalgic and then I answer their questions and they look disappointed. One asks for the route to the crime scene. He asks if he can drive all the way in or will he need to rent a quad bike to get there and I just laugh at him.

  I look up at the muted TV on the wall, subtitles blinking underneath faces, and I recognise the woman on screen.

  ‘Isn’t that the owner of the stationery store?’ I ask. ‘The dreary place that closed down?’

  Lars looks up and nods and goes back to his typing.

  I leave the office. I see Bengt in the distance with his placards and his bright white socks and his anger management issues, and then I turn the other way to my truck. I drive for about five minutes to Eriksgatan, the street I recognised on the TV, and park up next to the stationery store woman’s house. There’s a film crew outside and she’s talking from her front doorstep wearing a bright purple fleece and black leggings.

  I walk up to the journos and plant myself in between them, thrusting my Dictaphone under her chin.

  ‘Oh, say now, you’re a local girl, ain’t ya?’

  I nod and the other journalists scowl. At least one of them is broadcasting live and absolutely hating me right now.

  ‘I was just telling your friends here, I knew Davey from way back when. He was one of the best customers I had before that damn supermarket expanded down the road an
d began selling cheap pencils and bad quality paper and such. I’ll never shop in there, y’know, I drive all the way to the ICA in Munkfors these days on principle.’

  ‘Do you think David Holmqvist is capable of such a crime?’ asks a man wearing a woolly hat.

  She purses her lips and the skin around them wrinkles and puckers into deep ravines. Her lipstick has bled.

  ‘He was always a strange child,’ she says. ‘Used to come into my store, sometimes alone, sometimes with his little friend, and spend an age pottering around, I didn’t really mind much because he was a good customer, just like I told you. Even back then. He’d be specific, very specific about what paper and pens and notebooks and journals he wanted. I had to get it in special from the depot and if I got it just a little bit wrong, a one-hundred-and-twenty-page refill pad instead of an eighty-page, say, he’d not go near it. Like it was poison. He’d not even touch it, just leave the store without saying nothing, or reordering or nothing. I reckon he thought he was the boss of me somehow because he bought so many supplies, box files and printer cartridges and such. Davey bought almost as much as the liquorice factory bought, or as much as the Posten bought before they all started going to the damn supermarket, or ordering everything on the internet store.’

  The woman licks her index finger and pushes it through her eyebrow. She opens her eyes wide and adjusts her posture for the cameras.

  ‘Did you think he was dangerous back then?’ I ask.

  ‘Well now, let me see. It was a few years ago now, but yes, I do remember thinking, well that boy won’t be babysitting my grand-kiddies anytime soon, and that’s a fact. He had cold eyes, you know what I mean, like them ones you see on the news. There wasn’t any ‘good morning Irene’ or ‘how’s business Irene’ about him. He’d walk in wearing them pull-on shoe covers. I told him he didn’t need to, and he’d pass me a great list of bits and bobs for me to get hold of, all in this tiny, girly handwriting he had, I needed a magnifier glass in the end just to read it. He never did me any harm, but yes, I’d say he most likely had it in him to slaughter young Freddy Malmström, no doubt about it.’