Martin Beck: The Locked Room Part 26

The answers gradually began coming in, and he noted them on his list: compensation paid; incident closed; the insured died before the debt could be setded.

Martin Beck went on phoning and making notes. By now the margins of the ledgers had begun to look really full, though of course he didn't get answers to everything.

During his eighth conversation a thought struck him. He said: 'What becomes of the damaged merchandise after the company has paid out the insurance?'

'Naturally, we inspect it If the merchandise can still be used we sell it to our employees at a discount'

Yes, yes. And that, too, meant a small profit. Naturally.

Suddenly he remembered his own experiences in this field. Almost twenty years ago, right after he got married, he'd been very hard up. Before Inga - the cause of the marriage - was born, his wife had been working for an insurance company. There she had been able to buy at a discount a great number of cans of unusually foul-tasting consomme1 damaged in transit. They'd lived on them for months. Since then he'd never really liked consomme. Maybe the loathsome liquid had already been tasted by Kalle Svard or some other expert and found unsuitable for human consumption.

Martin Beck never got as far as dialling his ninth call. The phone squawked. Somebody wanted something of him. Surely it couldn't be...

'Yes, Beck here.'

'Mmmm, Hjelm here.' 'Hi, nice of you to call.'

'It certainly is. But you seem to have behaved decently out here, and anyway I was thinking of doing you one last service.'

'A last service?'

'Before you're promoted to commissioner. I see you've found that cartridge.'

'Have you looked at it?'

Why else do you think I'm phoning?' Hjelm said irritably. 'We've no time here for unnecessary phone calls.'

He must have something up his sleeve, Martin Beck thought If Hjelm called, it was always to triumph in one way or another. Ordinarily you heard from him in writing. Aloud he said: "That's d.a.m.n decent of you.'

'One might say that,' Hjelm agreed. 'Well, that cartridge of yours is in pretty bad shape. Very hard to get anything out of it at all.'

'I understand.'

'I doubt it. I suppose you want to know whether it matches that suicide bullet, eh?' 'Yes.' Silence.

'Yes,' Martin Beck said. 'That's just what I'd like to know.' 'It matches,' said Hjelm. 'For certain?'

'Haven't I told you, once and for all, that we don't deal in guesswork here?' 'Sorry.'

'I don't suppose you've got the gun too?' 'No. I don't know where it is.'

'But it so happens I do,' said Hjelm dryly. 'At this moment it's lying right here on my desk.'

In the special squad's lair on Kungsholmsgatan there was nothing that could be said to indicate optimism.

Bulldozer Olsson had rushed off to the National Police Board for consultations. The National Police Chief had told them nothing must be allowed to come out, and just now Olsson was urgently trying to find out what it was that mustn't come out.

Kollberg, Ronn, and Gunvald Larsson were sitting silent in postures reminiscent of parodies of Rodin's The Thinker.

There was a knock at the door, and at virtually the same moment Martin Beck was standing in the room. 'Hi,' he said.

'Hi,' said Kollberg.

Ronn nodded, and Gunvald Larsson didn't even bother. 'You guys don't seem too happy.'

Kollberg stared at his old friend and said: 'We have our reasons. And what brings you here? No one ever comes here of his own free will.'

'I did. Unless I'm wrongly informed, you've got a joker here by the name of Mauritzon.'

'Sure,' said Ronn. 'The Hornsgatan murderer.' 'What do you want him for?' said Kollberg, suspicious. 'Just to meet him.' 'How so?'

'I'd like to have a httle talk with him - a.s.suming he knows how to talk.'

'Not much point in that,' Kollberg said. 'He's a chatterbox, but not in the right way' 'Won't he confess?'

'You can be d.a.m.n certain he won't But the circ.u.mstantial evidence'll be too much for him. We've found his disguise in the house where he lives. Plus the murder weapon. And we've tied him to it'

'How?'

'The serial number on the gun had been filed off. And the marks on the metal come from a grinding machine that is demonstrably his and that was found in his bedside table. The grinding pattern agrees with the microscopic image. It's airtight. And yet he goes on denying it.'

'Right And he's been identified by witnesses,' said Ronn.

'Well...' Kollberg began. But he immediately broke off, pressed some b.u.t.tons on his phone, and barked some orders into the mouthpiece.

They're bringing him down.'

'Where can we talk?'

'Take my room,' Ronn said.

'Take good care of that idiot,' said Gunvald Larsson. 'He's all we've got'

Within five minutes Mauritzon appeared, handcuffed to a guard.

'That seems superfluous,' Martin Beck said. We're just going to have a little talk. Unlock him and wait outside.'

The warder fiddled with the handcuffs. Mauritzon irritably rubbed his right wrist.

'Please sit down,' said Martin Beck.

They sat down opposite each other at the desk.

Martin Beck had never seen Mauritzon before and noticed, though it did not astonish him, that the man seemed to be emotionally disturbed and exceedingly nervous - on the verge of collapse.

Perhaps they'd beaten him up. But probably not. It was all too common for murderers to have an unstable disposition and lose their heads as soon as they were caught.

'I'm the object of a diabolical conspiracy,' Mauritzon said in a shrill voice. 'The police or someone else has planted a lot of false evidence in my home. But when that bank was robbed I wasn't even in town, though even my own lawyer doesn't believe me. What the h.e.l.l am I to do?'

'Are you a Swedish-American?'

'No. Why?'

'You said "planted". That's not a Swedish term.'

'Well, what in G.o.d's name can you call it when the police come breaking into your home and put wigs, and sungla.s.ses, and pistols, and G.o.d knows what else there and then pretend to have found them? I swear I've never robbed a bank. But even my own lawyer says I haven't a chance. What do you want me to do? Confess to a murder I had absolutely nothing to do with? I'm going nuts here.'

Martin Beck put his hand under the desk and pressed a b.u.t.ton. Ronn's desk was a new one, cunningly equipped with a built-in tape recorder. 'The fact is,' said Martin Beck, 'I've nothing at all to do with all that.'

'Haven't you?'

'No. Nothing at all.'

'So what do you want?'

'To talk about something else.'

'And what could that be?'

'A story I imagine you are familiar with. It begins in March, 1966. With a crate of Spanish liqueur.' 'What?'

'The fact is, I've doc.u.mented almost everything. Quite legally, you imported a case of liqueur, declared it to the customs, and paid the duty. Above all the duty; but also the freight. Is that correct?'

Mauritzon didn't answer. Martin Beck looked up and saw the fellow was gaping at him, astounded.

'I've got all the papers,' Martin Beck repeated. 'So I a.s.sume it's correct.'

'Yes,' Mauritzon said, at length, 'that is correct'

'But you never received that consignment. If I understand the matter correctly, the crate was destroyed by accident while in transit.'

'Yes. Though I wouldn't exactly call it an accident'

'No, you're right enough on that point. I believe that a warehouseman, by the name of Svard, smashed it intentionally to get at the liqueur.'

'You believe b.l.o.o.d.y right. That was exactly what happened.'

'Mmmm,' Martin Beck said. 'I realize you're tired from all these other matters. Perhaps you'd prefer not to talk about this old story?'

After a very long while Mauritzon said: 'Okay. Why not? It's good for me to talk about something that really happened. Otherwise I'll go out of my mind.'

'As you wish,' Martin Beck said. 'Now, in my view those bottles didn't contain liqueur.'

'And you're still right.'

What they really did contain we can leave for the moment.'

'If you're interested, I can tell you. The bottles had been fixed in Spain. Though they looked perfecdy authentic they contained a morphine-based solution of phenedrine, a commodity much appreciated in those days. The consignment was quite valuable.'

'Yes. And as far as I know, this abortive piece of smuggling -for it was abortive - is highly criminal.'

'You're right there,' said Mauritzon, as if this were an angle he'd been overlooking.

'Furthermore, I have reason to a.s.sume that you were blackmailed by this guy Svard.'

Mauritzon didn't reply. Martin Beck shrugged and said: 'As I've already said, you needn't answer if you don't want to.'

Mauritzon still seemed as nervous as before. He kept altering his position and couldn't keep his hands still.

They must really have been putting psychological pressure on him, Martin Beck thought, faintiy astonished. He knew Kollberg's methods and knew they were almost always humane.

'I shall reply,' Mauritzon said. 'Don't stop. This brings me back to reality.'

'You paid Svard seven hundred and fifty a month.'

'He wanted a thousand. I offered five hundred: Seven hundred and fifty was a compromise.'

'Why don't you tell me all about it yourself,' Martin Beck said. 'If there's anything you don't understand we can reconstruct it together.'

You think so?' said Mauritzon. His face twitched. He mumbled: 'Is that possible?'

'Of course,' said Martin Beck.

'Do you think I'm insane, too?' Mauritzon asked suddenly. 'No. Why should I?'

'Everyone seems to think I'm mad. I've almost come to believe it myself.'

'Just tell me what happened,' Martin Beck said. 'There's certainly an explanation for everything. So - Svard squeezed you for money.'

'He was a bloodsucker,' Mauritzon said. When that happened I simply couldn't afford to be put away. I'd been inside before and been given a couple of suspended sentences and was under surveillance. Though of course you know all that'

Martin Beck said nothing. As yet he had not checked up too carefully on Mauritzon's criminal record.

'Well,' said Mauritzon. 'Seven hundred and fifty a month isn't the whole world. Nine thousand a year. That crate alone was worth a lot more.' He checked himself and added in consternation: 'I don't get it How can you know all this?'

'Most things in a society like ours are doc.u.mented,' Martin Beck said amiably.

'But those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds down at the docks must have been smashing up crates every d.a.m.n week,' Mauritzon said.

'Indeed. But you were the only one who didn't claim any insurance money.'

'That's true. I almost had to beg them not to get it for me. Otherwise we'd have had the insurance adjusters there, poking their noses into things. Svard was quite enough.'

'I understand. And you went on paying.'

'After a year or so I tried to cut him off, but I only needed to be a few days late for the old boy to start threatening me. And my affairs weren't of a kind that could withstand inspection.'