The Living and the Dead

The Living and the Dead

1

She believed in the truth, possibly the truth at any price.

It was this belief that guided her toward a career in law enforcement, and that, in turn, had brought her to Skavböke. This seemed like the best way to look at it. Some things in life are just that simple.

Others can be considerably more complex.

Perhaps it’s telling: on that cold morning in December 1999, when it all began, she was almost lost. Although she had caught a glimpse of the house through the trees just a little while before, it was hard to find her way to it. Skavböke was intricate, its paths far too thorny, its woods too deep. No vast open fields to navigate by, just myriad small farms and terrain, damp forest and dim clearings.

But then it appeared before her, the Eriksson family home: two stories built on a small open patch surrounded by thick old oaks and birches.

The son of the house opened the door, his hair damp, wearing sweatpants and a T-shirt. Eighteen years old and thin, almost sinewy, he stood with one hand on the doorframe and an intelligent gleam in his alert eyes.

“Hello,” she said. “My name is Siri Bengtsson. I’m with the police. May I come in?”

“My parents aren’t home.”

“You’re actually the one I want to talk to. Sander, right?”

“What is this all about?”

If he knew, he hid it well.

“I’d like to sit down and talk about it.”

As he showed her into the kitchen, she saw scratches on his forearms.

The house felt smaller than it was. The ceiling was low, and heavy furniture lined the walls. Advent candelabras shone in the windows, and shiny red Christmas ornaments hung gleaming in front of the curtains. When Siri sat down on the creaky kitchen bench, she felt a cold draft from the window.

Across the table from her, Sander kept his hands in his lap as though he’d been sent to the principal’s office for a talking-to. His gaze was open and full of genuine curiosity. But the rest of his face suggested hesitation, and she knew the type: over the years, Sander Eriksson’s face would become harder before softening again.

She took a notepad from her pocket and clicked a pen. “To start, may I have your name and personal identity number?”

He told her, and waited as she jotted it down.

“And who lives here, besides you?”

“My parents.”

“No siblings?”

He shook his head tentatively.

“We’re investigating an incident that occurred near here last night. Perhaps you’ve already heard about it?”

“No, what happened?”

“A young person has been found dead. And so I need to ask you a few questions about your whereabouts yesterday.”

Sander’s eyes grew large.

“Dead? Here? Who is it?”

“I’ll try to answer your questions as best I can if you’ll answer mine first. Does that sound okay?”

He nodded, likely realizing that he didn’t have much choice.

“So,” Siri said. “Yesterday.”

“It was a normal Friday, I guess.”

“And what does that entail?”

“School during the day. Party at night. That’s about it. I also went to a friend’s house, in between.”

“And who’s that friend?”

“Killian, is his name. With a K—Killian Persson.”

Siri took this down.

“Thanks. And Mikael Söderström,” she said, more slowly. “Is that a name you’re familiar with?”

When Sander finally spoke, it was as though he were standing on a frozen lake, scared he might fall through the ice.

“Is he the one who died?”

“Do you know each other?”

“We’re in the same class, and he lives pretty close by. I’ve known Mikael forever . . . not super well, I guess, but since we’re both from here, you know . . . We went to the same school, had the same friends, we played soccer together when we were little.”

“In Oskarström?”

“No, Sennan. You don’t play in Oskarström if you come from Skavböke.”

“He’s your same age, eighteen?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Who would you say Mikael’s friends are?”

He thought for a moment, or appeared to be thinking.

“I mean, like, everyone. I don’t know.”

“Who does he spend a lot of time with?”

“Oh, some of the guys who were at the party, of course. So, Jakob Lindell. Pierre too. Pierre Bäck. The party was at his house.”

“Pierre’s house?”

Sander nodded.

“And you saw Mikael there last night?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Did you go there together?”

“I went with Killian. Mikael was already there when we arrived, I think. Yeah, he was, because I saw his coat in the hall when we came in. Filip too. Filip is Mikael’s little brother.”

“How old is Filip?”

“Sixteen. Um, so is Mikael dead?”

The question sounded childish, and he must have heard it too, because he blushed. Siri held off on telling him. She was trying to get a sense of who this person sitting across from her was. Impossible to say, at this point. Maybe he was just a worried friend and classmate. Most people were no more than that.

“I know this is difficult, but we have to get through my questions first. How long were you all there, at the party?”

“Until around one. Killian got a little too drunk, I guess, and so did I, so we decided to walk home.”

“Do you remember what order people left in?”

Sander squinted, as if to see his memories more clearly.

“Mikael’s brother, Filip, left early, with a girl. They were almost the first. A little while later, Mikael left. Jakob too. And then me and Killian.”

“And that was at one o’clock?”

“There’s a clock on the wall in the front hall at Pierre’s. It said it was one when we left.”

“Which way did you go?”

Siri wished she had a map as Sander explained.

“And your friend?” she asked when he was finally finished. “Killian?”

“What about him?”

“Which way did he go?”

“Didn’t you talk to him?”

“We’re going to interview basically everyone around here, but right now I’d like to focus on what you have to say.”

“Okay, well, we left together. And when we said goodbye he kept going. So I guess it would have taken him a while after that to get home. He lives a little farther on.”

“But you’re sure he went home?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. How?”

“How what?”

“I’m sorry, I’m not being clear.” Siri shifted in her seat. She was getting too warm in her uniform. “What I meant was, how can you be sure he went home?”

“Well, because he said so. Where else would he have gone? He was super drunk.”

“You sounded so certain, as though you walked him all the way there. But you’re saying that’s not the case?”

“Killian is my best friend,” Sander said, as though he needed to defend himself. “If he was going to do something else, he would have said so. But obviously something could have happened along the way, like he ran into someone and decided to spend the night somewhere else. But it was the middle of the night, so who would he have run into?”

Siri waited, as if she found the question more intriguing than rhetorical.

“Do you two typically walk home?”

“Depends on where we’ve been. But there’s no bus up here, so you have to get home from Oskarström on your own. Either on foot, or by bike, or on a moped, you know? Or by car.”

“And what did you do when you arrived home?”

“Nothing. I fell asleep and then I woke up about an hour ago.”

“How much did you have to drink at the party?”

“I had some beers. Six or seven, maybe.”

“I was wondering, this route you say you took home from the party.” She tapped her pen on the notepad. “It doesn’t sound like you went through the forest. Am I understanding that correctly?”

“No, we didn’t, really. We mostly followed the road and the trails.”

“So you might have walked through the forest as well?”

“Huh?”

“You said you mostly followed the trails.”

“Oh, no. No, we didn’t go through the forest. What happened to Mikael?” Sander asked again.

This time, Siri saw no reason not to tell him.

“He’s in a car about two kilometers from here, beaten to death.”

Sander didn’t move a muscle; his eyes were perfectly blank.