The Terrorists

Martin Beck continued to say nothing.

‘Not one,’ said Rhea. ‘And what you said turned the whole case. I could tell right away.’ She studied her feet and said, ‘Pretty sandals, but they rub like hell. It's nice to get them off.’

‘Take everything else off if you like it,’ said Martin Beck. He had known this woman long enough to know exactly how the situation might develop. Either she would immediately fling off all her clothes, or she would start talking about something completely different.

Rhea glanced at him. Sometimes her eyes looked luminous, he thought. She opened her mouth to say something and at once closed it again. Instead she flung off her shirt and jeans, and before Martin Beck had time to unbutton his jacket, her clothes were lying on the floor and she herself lay naked on the bed.

‘God, how slowly you undress,’ she said, with a snort. Her mood had suddenly changed. This showed too in that she lay flat on her back almost throughout, her legs wide apart and straight up, the way she thought was the most fun, which was not to say that she always or even usually thought it was the best way.

They came simultaneously and that had to be that for the day.

Rhea rummaged in the wardrobe and extracted a long lilac woollen jumper, which was clearly her favourite piece of clothing and which she had found as difficult to leave behind at Tulegatan as her personal integrity. Before she had even put it on, she began to talk about food.

‘A hot sandwich or maybe three, or five, how does that sound? I've bought all sorts of goodies, ham and pâté, the best Jarlsberg cheese you've ever tasted.’

‘I believe you,’ said Martin Beck. He was standing over by the window, listening to the wolf howls of police cars, which could be heard very clearly, although in fact he lived in a very secluded spot.

‘It'll be ready in five minutes,’ said Rhea.

It was the same every time they slept together. She at once became extremely hungry. Sometimes it was so urgent that she rushed stark-naked out to the kitchen to start cooking. Her preference for hot food didn't make things easier.

Martin Beck had no such problems – on the contrary. True, his stomach trouble seemed to have left him as soon as he left his wife. Whether the trouble had been due to her erratic cooking or whether it had had psychosomatic origins was not easy to say. But he could still easily satisfy his caloric needs – especially when on duty or when Rhea was not within reach – with a couple of cheese sandwiches and a glass or two of milk.

But Rhea's hot open sandwiches were very difficult to resist. Martin Beck ate three of them and drank two bottles of Hof. Rhea devoured seven, drank half a bottle of red wine and was still hungry enough fifteen minutes later to go foraging in the refrigerator for more.

‘Are you staying over?’ Martin Beck asked.

‘Yes, please,’ she said. ‘It seems to be that sort of day.’

‘What sort of day?’

‘The sort of day that suits us, of course.’

‘Oh, that sort of day.’

‘We could celebrate Swedish Flag Day, for instance. And the King's name day. We'll have to think up something original when we wake up.’

‘Oh, I expect that can be arranged.’

Rhea curled up in the armchair. Most people would probably have thought she looked comical in her strange position and that mysterious long jumper. But Martin Beck did not think so. After a while it looked as if she had fallen asleep, but at that moment she said, ‘Now I remember what it was I was going to say just as you raped me.’

‘Yes? What was it?’

‘That girl, Rebecka Lind, what'll happen to her?’

‘Nothing. They released her.’

‘Sometimes you really do say stupid things. I know they released her. The question is what might happen to her psychologically. Can she look after herself?’

‘Oh, I think so. She isn't as apathetic and passive as a lot of her contemporaries. And as far as the trial –’

‘Yes, the trial. What did she learn from it? Presumably that it's possible to be arrested and maybe sent to prison without ever having done anything.’ Rhea frowned. ‘I'm worried about that girl. It's difficult to manage on your own in a society you don't understand at all, when the system is alien to you.’

‘From what I could gather that American boy is okay and really does want to take care of her.’

‘Maybe he just can't,’ said Rhea, shaking her head.

Martin Beck looked silently at her for a while, then said, ‘I'd like to disagree with you, but the fact is I was worried myself when I saw that girl. Another fact is that unfortunately we can't do much to help her. Of course we could help her privately, with money, but I don't think she'd accept that kind of help and anyway I don't have any money to give away.’

Rhea scratched the back of her neck for a while. ‘You're right,’ she said. ‘I think she's the type who wouldn't accept charity. She'll never even go willingly to the welfare office. Perhaps she'll try to get herself a job, but she'll never find one.’ She yawned. ‘I haven't the energy to think any more,’ she said. ‘But one thing seems clear. Rebecka Lind will never become a noted citizen in the land.’

She was wrong there, and soon afterwards fell asleep.

Martin Beck went out to the kitchen, did the dishes and put things away. He was still there when Rhea woke up and he heard her switch on the TV. She had decided not to have a set of her own, presumably for the sake of the children, but she occasionally liked to watch his. He heard her call something, put down what he was doing and went into the room.

‘There's a special news bulletin,’ she said.

He had missed the actual beginning, but there was no doubt about the subject matter. The newscaster's voice sounded dignified and serious.

‘… the assassination occurred before the arrival at the palace. An explosive charge of very great force was detonated beneath the street just as the motorcade was passing. The President and the others in the bulletproof car were killed immediately and their bodies badly mutilated. The car itself was thrown over a nearby building. A number of other people were killed by the explosion, among them several security men and civilians in the area. The chief of the city police announced that sixteen people had definitely been killed, but the final number may be considerably higher. He also emphasized that security measures for the state visit had been the most comprehensive ever undertaken in the history of the country. In a broadcast from France immediately after the assassination, it was said that an international terrorist group called ULAG had accepted responsibility for the act.’

The newsreader lifted his telephone receiver and listened for a few seconds, then said, ‘We now have a film transmitted by satellite and made by an American television company covering this state visit that has come to such a tragic end.’

The broadcast was of poor quality, but nevertheless so revolting that it should never have been shown.

At first there were a few pictures of the arrival of the President's plane and the noble gentleman himself, rather foolishly waving at the reception committee. Then he unenthusiastically inspected the honour guard and greeted his hosts with a smile plastered on his face. There followed a few pictures of the motorcade. The security measures seemed singularly reassuring.

Then came the climax of the broadcast. The television company appeared to have had a cameraman very strategically, or perhaps fortunately, placed. If the man had been fifty yards nearer, he would probably no longer be alive. If on the other hand he had been fifty yards further away, he would probably not have had any pictures to show. Everything happened very quickly; first an enormous pillar of smoke, cars, animals and people all thrown high into the air, bodies torn apart, swallowed up in a cloud of smoke that looked almost like the mushroom cloud from an atomic bomb. Then the cameraman panned around the surroundings, which were very beautiful; a fountain playing, a wide palm-lined street. And then came the terrible paroxysms beside a heap of metal that might once have been a car, and something which a short time before had probably been a living human being.

Throughout the film the reporter kept up a ceaseless commentary in that eager, exalted tone that only American news reporters seem to achieve. It was as if he had – with enormous pleasure – just witnessed the end of the world.

‘Oh, God,’ said Rhea, burying her face in the chair cushion. ‘What a damned awful world we live in.’

But for Martin Beck it was going to be slightly more difficult.

The Swedish newsreader reappeared and said, ‘We have just learned that the Swedish police had a special observer at the site of the assassination, Inspector Gunvald Larsson, from the Violent Crimes Squad in Stockholm.’

The screen was filled with a still picture of Gunvald Larsson looking mentally deficient, his name, as usual, misspelled.

‘Unfortunately there is no news at the moment of what has happened to Inspector Larsson. The next newscast will be the regularly scheduled news on the radio.’

‘Dammit,’ said Martin Beck. ‘Dammit to hell.’

‘What's the matter?’ asked Rhea.

‘Gunvald. He's always right there when the shit hits the fan.’

‘I thought you didn't like him.’