The Unlucky Lottery

‘Diary!’ snorted Mauritz. ‘What the hell has that got to do with you? And why the hell are you poking your nose into all this? We’ve had enough of you snooping around, can’t you leave people in peace? Besides, I’m ill.’

‘I’ve noticed,’ said Rooth. ‘Did she keep a diary?’

For quite a while there was no sound other than Mauritz’s heavy breathing. Rooth realized he was wondering whether to hang up or not.

‘Listen here,’ he said in the end. ‘I’ve been in bed with flu for two days now. A thirty-nine degree temperature. I’ll be fucked if I want to talk to you any more. Both my father and mother are dead, I don’t understand why the police can’t find something better to do instead of pestering us.’

‘You’re taking penicillin, I assume?’ asked Rooth in a friendly tone, but the only answer he received was a clear and dismissive click.

Rooth hung up. Bastard, he thought. I hope you’re in bed for a few more weeks at least.

‘Do you really mean that?’ asked Heinemann. ‘That the police have been treating you improperly?’

‘What?’ said Ruben Engel.

‘That we’ve been bothering you unnecessarily. If so, you should make a complaint.’

‘Yes . . . er?’

‘There’s a special form you can fill in,’ Heinemann explained. ‘If you like I can arrange to have one sent to you.’

‘Eh? That’s not necessary,’ said Engel. ‘But for God’s sake hurry up and get this business sorted out, so that we can get some peace and quiet.’

‘It’s a bit tricky,’ said Heinemann, looking round the cluttered kitchen with his glasses perched on the end of his nose. ‘Murder investigations like this one are often more complicated than people in general can imagine. There’s an awful lot of aspects to take into account. An awful lot. What are you drinking?’

‘Eh?’ said Engel. ‘Oh, just a drop of wine toddy – to raise my body temperature a bit. It’s so damned draughty in this flat.’

‘I see. Anyway, I mustn’t disturb you any longer. Do you know if fröken Mathisen next door is at home?’

Engel looked at the clock.

‘She usually comes home about five,’ he said. ‘So with a bit of luck . . .’

‘We shall see,’ said Heinemann. ‘Anyway, sorry to have disturbed you.’

‘No problem,’ said Ruben Engel. ‘The screwing machines are moving out, by the way.’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘The couple downstairs. They must have found somewhere better. They’re moving out.’

‘Really?’ said Heinemann. ‘We didn’t know that. Thank you for telling us.’

‘You’re welcome.’

Marie-Louise Leverkuhn’s funeral took place in one of the side chapels in Keymerkyrkan. Apart from the vicar and the undertaker there were four people present, all of them women.

Closest to the coffin, a simple affair made of fibreboard and hardboard – but during the service covered by a green cloth that concealed the deficiencies – sat Ruth Leverkuhn in her capacity as next of kin. Behind her sat the other three: furthest to the left was Emmeline von Post; in the middle a pale woman of about the same age and, as far as Münster and Moreno could make out, identical with the Regine Svendsen who had supplied Heinemann with the information about the diaries; and on the right a quite tall, well-dressed woman about forty-five years of age – Münster and Moreno had no idea who she was.

They had placed themselves strategically in the nave: they were sitting in an austere, light-coloured pew, leafing furtively through their hymn books and keeping a discreet eye on the simple ritual taking place some fifteen metres away.

‘Who is the younger woman?’ whispered Münster.

Moreno shook her head.

‘I don’t know. Why isn’t the son here?’

‘He’s ill,’ said Münster. ‘Or says he is, in any case. Rooth spoke to him on the phone this morning.’

‘Hmm,’ said Moreno. ‘So you won’t be having a chat with him, then. Shall I try to grab that woman afterwards? She must have some sort of connection with the family.’

‘She could be one of those funeral hyenas, mind you,’ warned Münster. ‘It takes all sorts . . . But by all means, see what she has to say. I’ll try and have a word with the daughter.’

He noticed that he was enjoying sitting here, squeezed up close to Ewa Moreno in the cramped pew, whispering. Whispering so closely to her ear that he could feel her hair brushing against his skin.

Carry on talking, Mr Vicar, he thought. Make sure you spin the service out for as long as possible – it doesn’t matter if it takes all afternoon.

What the hell am I doing? he then thought. Despite the fact that he was sitting in church with a hymn book in his hand.

‘No problem,’ said the woman, whose name was Lene Bauer. ‘No problem at all – I intended to ring you several times, but never got round to it . . . But then, perhaps I don’t have all that much to tell you, when it comes to the nitty gritty.’