7

      Per Månsson was born and grew up in the working-class section around Möllevång Square in Malmö. He'd been a police officer for more than twenty-five years. Having lived with Malmö his whole life, he knew his city better than most – and liked it, too.

      However, there was one part of the city he'd never really got to know, and this section had always made him feel uneasy. That was Västra Förstaden, with areas like Fridhem, Västervång and Bellevue, where many rich families had always lived. He could remember the famine years of the twenties and thirties, when many times as a little lad he had trudged in his clogs through the blocks of mansions on the way to Limhamn, where somehow it might be possible to find herring for dinner. He recalled the expensive cars and the uniformed chauffeurs, maids in black dresses with aprons and starched white caps, and upper-class children in tulle dresses and sailor suits. He'd felt so utterly outside of all that; the whole environment had appeared incomprehensible, like a fairy tale to him. Somehow it still felt the same way, by and large, despite the fact that the chauffeurs and most of the servant girls were gone and that nowadays upper-class children didn't differ very much on the surface from any other children.

      After all, herring and potatoes was not a bad diet. Although fatherless and poor, he'd grown up to be a big strong man, taken the ‘hard road’ and eventually done quite well. At least he thought so himself.

      Viktor Palmgren had lived in this same area; and consequently his widow probably still lived there.

      So far he'd only seen pictures of the people around the fateful dinner table and didn't know very much about them. About Charlotte Palmgren, however, he knew that she was considered an exceptional beauty and had once been crowned Miss Something – was it only of Sweden or of the whole universe? Then she'd made herself famous as a model and after that become Mrs Palmgren, twenty-seven years old and at the height of her career. Now she was thirty-two and outwardly fairly unchanged, as only women can be who haven't had children, and who can afford to spend a lot of time and an unlimited amount of money on their appearance. Viktor Palmgren had been twenty-four years older than she, a fact which might give an indication of the mutual motives for the marriage. He'd probably wanted something good-looking to display to his business acquaintances and she, enough money so that she never again would need to do anything that might possibly be characterized as work. And that is the way it seemed to have worked out.

      Nevertheless, Charlotte Palmgren was a widow, and Månsson couldn't avoid a certain measure of propriety. Therefore, much to his distaste, he put on his dark suit, white shirt and tie before he went down and got into the car to drive the relatively short stretch from Regementsgatan to Bellevue.

      The Palmgren residence seemed to correspond with all of Månsson's childhood memories, which had perhaps become covered with a patina of slight exaggeration over the years. One could catch only a glimpse of the house from the street, a bit of the roof and a weather vane, for the hedges were not only well clipped and richly verdant, but also very high and thick. If he wasn't mistaken, there was likely to be a wrought-iron fence behind it. The plot seemed immense, and the lawn rather resembled formal gardens. The gate to the drive was just as impenetrable as the hedge; it was of copper, green with age, high, broad, and embellished with spiralling pinnacles. On one half of the door was a row of oversized brass letters, which formed the by now familiar name – Palmgren. On the other half was a letter box, the button for an electric doorbell and directly over it a square opening through which potential visitors could be scrutinized before being granted admission. Clearly it wasn't a matter of just walking in any old way. As he cautiously pressed down the handle, Månsson almost expected an alarm to start ringing somewhere inside. The door was locked, of course, and the opening hermetically sealed. Nothing could be seen through the letter slot – obviously it opened into a closed metal box.

      Månsson raised his hand to the doorbell, but changed his mind, let his arm sink back and looked around.

      Besides his own old Wartburg, two cars were parked by the kerb – a red Jaguar and a yellow MG. Did it seem plausible that Charlotte Palmgren would have two sports cars parked on the street? He stood still, listening, and thought for an instant that he discerned voices from within the park. Then the sounds died away, perhaps stifled by the heat and the stagnant, quivering air.