The Locked Room

The post-mortem report was signed by a person Martin Beck had never heard of, presumably a temp. The text was exceedingly scientific and abstruse. This, perhaps, was why the matter had been treated rather dozily. As far as he could see, the documents had not even reached Einar Rönn at the Murder Squad until a week later. Only there had it aroused the attention to which it was entitled.

Martin Beck pulled the telephone towards him to make his first duty call in a long time. He picked up the receiver, laid his right hand on the dial, and then just went on sitting. He'd forgotten the number of the State Institute for Forensic Medicine and had to look it up.

The pathologist seemed surprised. ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘Of course I remember. That report was sent in two weeks ago.’

‘I know.’

‘Is something unclear?’

He thought she sounded slightly hurt.

‘Just a few things I don't understand. According to your report, the person in question committed suicide.’

‘Of course.’

‘How?’

‘Have I really expressed myself so badly?’

‘Oh no, not at all.’

‘What is it you don't understand, then?’

‘Quite a bit, to be honest; but that, of course, is due to my own ignorance.’

‘You mean of terminology?’

‘Among other things.’

‘If one lacks medical knowledge,’ she said consolingly, ‘one always has to expect certain difficulties of that type.’ Her voice was light and clear. On the young side, certainly.

For a while Martin Beck sat silent. At this point he ought to have said: ‘My dear young lady, this report isn't meant for pathologists but for quite another kind of person. Since it's been requested by the Metropolitan Police it ought to be written in terms that even a police sergeant, for example, could understand.’ But he didn't. Why?

His thoughts were interrupted by the doctor, who said: ‘Hello, are you there?’

‘Yes, I'm here.’

‘Is there something particular you want to ask about?’

‘Yes. Firstly I'd like to know your grounds for assuming suicide.’

When she answered her voice had changed, had acquired an undertone of surprise. ‘My dear Commissioner, we got this corpse from the police. Before carrying out a post-mortem I was personally in telephone contact with the police officer I assumed was responsible for the investigation. He said it was a routine job. There was only one question he wanted answered.’

‘What was that?’

‘Whether the person concerned had committed suicide.’

Irritated, Martin Beck rubbed his knuckles against his chest. The spot where the bullet had gone through him still hurt at times. He'd been told it was psychosomatic, that it would pass as soon as his unconscious had relinquished its grip on the past. Just now, it was the present that, in high degree, was irritating him. And that was something in which his unconscious could hardly have any interest.

An elementary mistake had been made. Naturally, the postmortem ought to have been done without any hints from the police. To present the forensic experts with the suspected cause of death was little short of breach of duty, especially if, as in this case, the pathologist was young and inexperienced.

‘Do you know the officer's name?’

‘Detective Sergeant Aldor Gustavsson. I got the impression he was in charge of the case. He seemed to be experienced and to know what he was about.’

Martin Beck knew nothing about Detective Sergeant Aldor Gustavsson or his possible qualifications. He said: ‘So the police gave you certain instructions?’

‘One could put it like that, yes! In any case the police made it quite clear that it was a question of suspected suicide.’

‘I see.’

‘Suicide means, as you perhaps know, that someone has killed himself.’

Beck did not reply to this. Instead he said: ‘Was the autopsy difficult?’

‘Not really. Apart from the extensive organic changes. That always puts a somewhat different complexion on our work.’

He wondered how many autopsies she had carried out, but he refrained from comment. ‘Did it take long?’

‘Not at all. Since it was a question of suicide or acute illness I began by opening up the thorax.’

‘Why?’

‘The deceased was an elderly man.’

‘Why did you assume death to have been sudden?’

‘This police officer gave me to understand it was.’

‘In what way?’

‘By going straight to the point, I seem to remember.’

‘What did he say?’

‘“Either the old boy's taken his own life or else had a heart attack.” Something along those lines.’

Another false conclusion crying aloud to heaven! There was nothing to suggest that Svärd, before dying, might not have lain there paralysed or helpless for several days.

‘So you opened his chest.’

‘Yes, and the question was answered almost immediately. No doubt which alternative was correct.’

‘Suicide?’

‘Of course.’

‘By?’