Red Wolf_ A Novel Part 47

She folded down the sides of the bag and looked openmouthed at its contents. Nothing but bundles of euros, dozens of them. She pressed the bag, trying to work out how many layers there were inside. A lot. An absurd number.

Then she felt sick.

The executioner's death-tainted bequest to his children.

Without reflecting any more about it she picked up the bag and threw the money into the boot of the car.

49.

The gla.s.s internal doors of the City Hotel slid open with a swis.h.i.+ng sound. Annika walked into the chandelier-lit s.p.a.ce, blinking against the light.

'I think she's just walked in,' the receptionist said into a telephone behind the counter. 'Annika Bengtzon?'

Annika looked at the young woman.

'It is you, isn't it? From the Evening Post Evening Post? We spoke when you were here two weeks ago. I've got your boss on the phone.'

'Which one?'

The woman listened.

'Anders Schyman,' she called across the lobby.

Annika hoisted her bag onto her shoulder and walked over to the desk.

'Tell him I'll call him in five minutes, I just need to check in.'

Ten seconds of silence.

'He says he wants to talk to you now.'

Annika reached for the receiver.

'What do you want?'

The editor-in-chief sounded muted and clenched when he spoke.

'The newspaper's telegram agency has just sent out a newsflash that the police in Lulea have cracked a thirty-year-old terrorist cell. That the attack on a Draken plane at F21 has been cleared up, that an international hitman has been found dead, and that a suspected terrorist is still at large.'

Annika glanced at the receptionist's inquisitive ears, turned round and stretched the lead as far as she could.

'Goodness,' she said.

'It says you were there when the hitman died. That you were locked up with some of the terrorists. That Minister of Culture Karina Bjornlund was one of the members. That you alerted the police so that they could be arrested.'

Annika s.h.i.+fted her weight from one foot to the other.

'Oops,' she said 'What are you planning for tomorrow?'

She glanced at the receptionist over her shoulder, who was trying hard to look as though she wasn't listening.

'Nothing, of course,' she said. 'I'm not allowed to write about terrorism, that was a direct order. I obey my orders.'

'Yes, yes,' Schyman said. 'But what are you writing? We've torn up everything we've got, all the way to the centrefold.'

She clenched her jaw.

'Not one single line. Not in the Evening Post Evening Post. I've got a h.e.l.l of a lot of material, but because you've forbidden me to gather it then of course I won't be using it.'

There was a short, astonished silence.

'Now you're being silly,' he eventually said. 'That would be a very bad miscalculation on your part.'

'Sorry,' she said, 'but who's responsible for the miscalculations on this story?'

Silence echoed along the line. She knew the editor-in-chief was fighting against a justifiable instinct to tell her to go to h.e.l.l and slam the phone down, but with an entirely empty news section he couldn't afford to.

'I'm on my way to bed,' she said. 'Was there anything else you wanted?'

Anders Schyman started to say something, but changed his mind. She could hear him breathing down the line.

'I've had some good news today,' he said, trying to sound conciliatory.

She swallowed her derision. 'Oh?'

'I'm going to be the new chair of the Newspaper Publishers' a.s.sociation.'

'Congratulations.'

'I knew you'd be pleased,' he said. 'Why aren't you answering your mobile, by the way?'

'There's no coverage up here. Goodnight.'

She handed the phone back to the receptionist.

'Can I check in now, please?'

The door of the lift was heavy and Annika had to strain to push it open. She stumbled out onto the fourth floor, the thick carpet swallowing her steps.

Home, she thought, home at last home at last.

Her business-cla.s.s room was off to the left. The hotel corridor was tilting slightly from side to side, and she had to put her hand out to steady herself against the wall twice.

She found her room, pushed the card in, waited for the little bleep and the green light.

She was greeted by a gentle hum, and narrow slivers of light creeping round the closed curtains, her safe haven on earth. She shut the door behind her; it closed with a well-oiled click. She let her bag slide to the floor and switched on the main lamp.

Hans Blomberg was sitting on her bed.

50.

She froze to ice, her body utterly rigid. She couldn't breathe.

'Good evening, young lady,' the archivist said, pointing a pistol at her.

She stared at the man, his grey cardigan and friendly face, trying to get her brain to work.

'What a long time you've been. I've been waiting for several hours.'

Annika roused her legs and took a step back, fumbling behind her for the door handle.

Hans Blomberg stood up.

'Don't even think about it, my dear,' he said. 'My trigger finger is terribly itchy tonight.'

Annika stopped and let her arm drop.

'I can believe that,' she said, her voice high and very thin. 'You haven't hesitated so far.'

He chuckled. 'How true,' he said. 'Where's the money?'

She leaned against the wall for support.

'What?'

'The money? The Dragon's bequest?'

Her brain rattled into action, her thoughts rus.h.i.+ng in a torrent, the day ran past in images and emotions and conclusions.

'Why do you think there's money, and why would I know where it is?'

'Little Annika the Amateur Detective who creeps around the bushes. If anyone knows, it's you.'

The man approached her with an ingratiating smile. She stared up at his face.

'Why?' she said. 'Why did you kill those people?'

He paused, and leaned his head to one side.

'But this is war,' he said. 'You're a journalist, haven't you noticed? The war on terror? That must mean armed struggle on both sides, don't you think?' He chuckled contentedly.

'It wasn't my idea,' he went on, 'but suddenly it was legitimate to eliminate dictators and false authorities, and there are lots of those around the world, they're everywhere.'

He looked at her and smiled.

'As a journalist, Annika,' he said, 'you'll be familiar with the old adage, "dig where you stand". There are stories everywhere, why cross the river to fetch water? The same thing applies to false authorities, why look further than you have to?'

'And Benny Ekland was one of them?'

Hans Blomberg took a few steps back and sat down on the bed again, waving with the pistol to indicate that she should sit at the desk. She obeyed, moving through air as thick as cement, and dropped her polar jacket beside the chair.

'You haven't quite understood,' the archivist said. 'Hans Blomberg is just my alias. I'm really the Black Panther; I've never been anything else.'

He nodded to emphasize his words, as Annika searched feverishly for a loose thread, something that could make him unravel.

'That isn't strictly true,' she said. 'You've tried to fit in as Hans Blomberg as well, haven't you? All those articles about the county council that were always published at the bottom of page twenty-two, was that it?'

A flash of anger crossed his face.

'A way of maintaining my facade until the Dragon came back. He promised, and his return was the signal.'

Then he smiled again.

'Benny made sure I ended up in the archive. Not that I'm bitter, because of course I won in the end.'

Annika forced back a feeling of nausea.

'But why the boy?'

Hans Blomberg shook his head sorrowfully. 'It was a shame that he had to go, but war claims many civilian casualties.'

'Because he recognized you? You used to see the family socially, didn't you?'

Hans Blomberg didn't reply, merely smiled gently.

'Kurt Sandstrom?' Annika said, fear pounding in her stomach, putting pressure on her bladder.

'False authority,' he said. 'A traitor.'

'How did you know him?'

'From Nyland,' Hans Blomberg said. 'The big lad on the next farm, he was one year older than me. We were at Uppsala together, and joined the movement at the same time. But Kurt's faith was weak, and he drifted over to the side of capitalism and exploitation, to the farmers' movement. I gave him a chance to change his mind, but he chose his own fate.'

She was holding on to the desk.

'And Margit Axelsson?'