Camilla Lackberg Crime Thrillers 1 and 2: The Ice Princess, The Preacher

Galleri Abstract was on the left, with big display windows facing the street. A bell over the door pinged as she entered, and she saw that the space was much bigger than it looked from outside. The walls, floor and ceiling were painted white so as not to distract from the works of art hanging on the walls.

At the far end of the gallery she saw a woman who looked unmistakably French. She exuded sheer elegance as she discussed a painting with a customer, gesturing eagerly as she talked.

‘I’ll be right there, please have a look around in the meantime.’ Her French accent sounded charming.

Erica took the woman at her word. With her hands clasped behind her back she walked slowly around the room as she looked at the artworks. As the gallery’s name indicated, all the paintings were done in the abstract style. Cubes, squares, circles and strange figures. Erica tilted her head and squinted, trying to see what the art aficionados saw. But it completely eluded her. Nope, still only cubes and squares like any five-year-old could produce, in her opinion. She would just have to accept that this was beyond her comprehension.

She was standing before a gigantic red painting with yellow, irregularly divided sections when she heard Francine come up behind her with heels clacking on the chequerboard floor.

‘That one is certainly wonderful,’ said Francine.

‘Yes, indeed. Exquisite. But to be honest, I’m not really at home in the world of art. I think Van Gogh’s sunflowers are great, but that’s about as far as my knowledge goes.’

Francine smiled. ‘You must be Erica. Henri just rang and told me you were on your way here.’

She held out a finely contoured hand. Erica hastily wiped off her own hand, still wet with rain, before she took Francine’s.

The woman facing her was small and slender, with an elegance that Frenchwomen seem to have patented. Erica was five foot nine in her stockinged feet, and she felt like a giant in comparison.

Francine’s hair was raven-black. It was pulled back smoothly from her forehead and gathered in a chignon at the nape of her neck. She wore a form-fitting black dress. The colour was no doubt chosen in view of the death of her friend and colleague; she seemed more the type to dress in dramatic red, or perhaps yellow. Her make-up was light and perfectly applied, but it could not conceal the telling red rims of her eyes. Erica hoped that her own mascara wasn’t running – no doubt a vain hope.

‘I thought we ought to sit down and talk over a cup of coffee. The weather is very mild today. Let’s go out back.’

She led Erica towards a small room behind the gallery that was fully equipped with a refrigerator, microwave oven, and coffeemaker. The table was small and had room for only two chairs. Erica sat down and was instantly served a cup of steaming hot coffee by Francine. Her stomach protested after all the cups she had drunk when she was visiting Henrik. But she knew from experience, from the innumerable interviews she had conducted to dig up background material for her books, that for some reason people talked more easily with a coffee cup in their hand.

‘From what I understood from Henri, Alex’s parents asked you to write a commemorative article about her life.’

‘Yes. I’ve only seen Alex on brief occasions in the last twenty-five years, so I need to find out more about what she was like as a person before I can start writing.’

‘Are you a journalist?’

‘No, I write biographies. I’m only doing this because Birgit and Karl-Erik asked me. And besides, I was the first one to find her, well, almost the first. And in some strange way I feel as though I need to do this to create another picture of Alex for myself, a living picture. Does that sound odd?’

‘No, not at all. I think it’s fabulous that you’re taking so much trouble on behalf of Alex’s parents – and Alex.’

Francine leaned across the table and placed a well-manicured hand over Erica’s.

Erica felt a warm blush spread across her cheeks and tried not to think of the draft of the book she’d been working on for large parts of the previous day.

Francine went on, ‘Henri also asked me to answer your questions with the utmost candour.’

She spoke excellent Swedish. She rolled her R’s softly, and Erica noticed that she used the French Henri rather than Henrik.

‘You and Alex met in Paris?’

‘Yes, we studied art history together. We ran into each other the very first day. She looked lost and I felt lost. The rest is history, as they say.’

‘How long have you known each other?’

‘Let’s see, Henri and Alex celebrated their fifteenth anniversary last fall so it would be … seventeen years. For fifteen of those years we’ve run this gallery together.’

She fell silent and to Erica’s astonishment lit a cigarette. For some reason she hadn’t pictured Francine as a smoker. The Frenchwoman’s hand shook a little as she lit the cigarette, and then she took a deep drag without taking her eyes off Erica.

‘Didn’t you wonder where she was?’ Erica asked. ‘She must have been lying there a week before we found her.’

It occurred to Erica that she hadn’t thought to ask Henrik the same question.

‘I know it sounds strange, but no, I didn’t. Alex …’ she hesitated. ‘Alex always did pretty much as she liked. It could be incredibly frustrating, but I suppose I got used to it over the years. This wasn’t the first time she was gone for a while. She usually popped up later as if nothing had happened. Besides, she did more than her share when she took care of the gallery all alone when I was on maternity leave. You know, in some way I still think the same thing is going to happen. That she’s going to come walking in the door. But this time I know she won’t.’ A tear threatened to spill from her eye.

‘No, she won’t.’ Erica looked down into her coffee cup to allow Francine to dry her eyes discreetly. ‘How did Henrik react whenever Alex simply vanished?’

‘You’ve met him. Alex could do no wrong in his eyes. Henri has spent the past fifteen years worshipping her. Poor Henri.’

‘Why poor Henri?’

‘Alex didn’t love him. Sooner or later he would have been forced to realize that.’

She stubbed out the first cigarette and lit another.

‘You must have known each other inside-out after so many years,’ said Erica.

‘I don’t think anyone really knew Alex. Although I probably knew her better than Henri did. He has always refused to take off his rose-tinted glasses.’

‘During our conversation Henrik hinted that in all the years of their marriage it felt as though Alex was hiding something from him. Do you know whether that’s true? And if so, what it could be?’

‘That was unusually perceptive of him. I may have underestimated Henri.’ She raised a finely shaped eyebrow. ‘To your first question I will answer yes: I’ve always known that she was carrying some sort of baggage. To the second question I must answer no: I don’t have the faintest idea what it could be. Despite our long friendship there was always a point at which Alex would signal, “so far, and no farther”. I accepted it, while Henri did not. Sooner or later it would have broken him. And it probably would have been sooner.’

‘Why is that?’

Francine hesitated. ‘They’re going to do an autopsy on Alex, aren’t they?’

The question took Erica by surprise.

‘Yes, that’s always done for a suicide. Why do you ask?’

‘Because then I know that what I’m about to tell you will come out anyway. My conscience feels lighter, at least.’

She stubbed out the cigarette carefully. Erica held her breath in tense expectation, but Francine took her time lighting a third cigarette. Her fingers didn’t have the characteristic yellow discolouration of a smoker, so Erica suspected that she didn’t usually chain-smoke like this.

‘You must know that Alex has been going to Fjällbacka much more often for the past six months or so?’

‘Yes, the grapevine works very well in small towns. According to the local gossip, she was in Fjällbacka more or less every weekend. Alone.’

‘Alone is not exactly the whole truth.’

Francine hesitated again. Erica had to check her impulse to lean across the table and shake the woman to make her spit out whatever she was holding back. Her interest was definitely aroused.

‘She had met someone there. A man. Well, it wasn’t the first time that Alex had an affair, but somehow I got the feeling that this was different. For the first time in all the years we’ve known each other, she seemed almost content. And I know that she couldn’t have taken her own life. Someone must have murdered her, I have no doubt about that.’