“I don’t trust Blomberg.”
“We have to, Adam.”
She was close to tears.
“What if she did it?” I said. “What if it was Stella?”
Ulrika turned her face away and I stepped close to her again.
“You got rid of her phone. And her top. Why did you do that? Do you think Stella killed that man?”
She placed both of her hands on my chest. Tears were streaming down her face.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
Ulrika shook her head.
“You’re crazy. You went to her house. Linda Lokind. You went into her apartment, Adam.”
“Well, the police aren’t doing anything. Someone has to do something!”
“I’m doing something too. Lots of people are doing things, Adam. But not like this. There are better ways.”
She dried her tears. I hadn’t seen her cry very many times, and guilt was tearing up my insides.
“Alexandra texted me yesterday,” she said. “Is it true that you waited for Amina outside the arena?”
I didn’t know what to say.
“Did you follow Amina and ask her a bunch of questions?”
“That’s not what happened.”
I couldn’t believe Amina had told her mother. At the end of the day this was good news, because now she would have to confess everything, whatever she was keeping from us. There was no way Alexandra would let her keep mum. It was obvious that Amina was sitting on information that could determine Stella’s future.
“You can’t keep on like this,” said Ulrika.
“What am I supposed to do? My daughter has been accused of murder!”
I thundered out to the entryway and tore my coat from the hook. I flung open the door and let it slam behind me.
36
I walked through town like a boiling cauldron. Staring at my shoes, my feet pounding the ground. I was starting to feel afraid of myself.
Late that afternoon, Ulrika called. I was standing on a gravel path in Lundag?rd Park with no idea of how I got there or where I was heading.
“I’m sorry, honey,” she said. “We can’t let this ruin things between us too. It’s hard enough as it is.”
She had made reservations at Spisen and wondered if we could meet for dinner.
My pulse calmed and I walked slowly past the cathedral. The park benches were full of students sipping Frappuccinos in the late summer sun. Japanese tourists with cameras around their necks and pigeons around their feet were pointing up in fascination at the spires straining toward the sky.
* * *
It was sheer coincidence that I ran into Jenny Jansdotter a bit later outside Market Hall. She would later claim that I had followed her somehow, but that was utter nonsense. In fact, I was on my way to Spisen when I caught sight of Jansdotter in front of me. Those twiggy, bowed legs; that springy walk, like she was bouncing forth on her high heels. She was so petite that if it weren’t for the heels, the blazer, and the expensive purse over her shoulder you might have mistaken her for a child.
Michael Blomberg’s words echoed through my head—Jenny Jansdotter was leading the preliminary investigation. She was the one who guided the actions of the police, who, according to Blomberg, had focused all the attention on Stella as the perpetrator. Why? Was she so absorbed in her work that she’d forgotten real people with real emotions would be affected by her decisions? How could she refuse us the opportunity to see our own child? What kind of person would do something like that? I was honestly curious, and when I saw her crossing Botulfsplatsen I couldn’t stop myself. I caught up to her just outside the west entrance to Market Hall.
“Excuse me. Excuse me!”
She whirled around. I think it took a second or two for her to realize who I was.
“This is highly inappropriate,” she said.
“I just wanted to ask you something.”
She didn’t even respond. She whipped back around so quickly that her purse was flung out from her body, and she headed once more for the glass doors of Market Hall.
“Why aren’t you investigating Linda Lokind?” I asked, starting after her. “Did you know Lokind has a pair of shoes just like the ones you’re looking for?”
She hurried into the building and I had to raise my voice.
“Why can’t we see our daughter?”
The prosecutor stopped short and eyed me, cold and impartial.
“You’re making yourself guilty of unlawful influence.”
“Not at all. I just want to understand why you’re doing this.”
Jenny Jansdotter shook her head and turned around. In the police report she subsequently filed, she claimed that at that moment I grabbed her arm and tried to stop her. Naturally, this is not true. In reality, I only reached out my hand in one last desperate attempt to make her listen. I did brush her arm, I won’t deny that, but I would never have dreamed of preventing her from leaving.