elation. And note that the murderer didn’t stop, but went on and on long after the victim was dead. That often indicates mental derangement.”
“Obviously, we’ll check whether any of the mental hospitals have released any loonies lately,” Mella said.
Oh, shit! She could have bitten her tongue off. Shit, shit, shit! Why was her mouth always quicker than her brain? Martinsson had been sent to a mental hospital – she had been in such a state that they had to give her electric shock treatment. She had been hallucinating and screaming. That was after Gunnar Vinsa had shot himself and his son. Mella had never spoken to Martinsson about that. It had been beyond her comprehension. She had not even known that they still gave electric shock treatment. She thought that was what happened in prehistoric times. As in “One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest”.
“That’s enough of that,” Pohjanen growled.
At that very moment Mella’s mobile rang. She answered, relieved to have been given an escape route. It was Stålnacke.
He didn’t beat about the bush. “I thought we were going to have a press conference tomorrow morning,” he said.
“That’s right,” said Mella.
“Really? Then why is von Post chatting with a gang of journalists in the conference room at this very minute?”
Mella refrained from exclaiming, “What the hell are you on about?”
“I’ll be there right away,” she said instead, and hung up.
“You’re not going to like this,” she said to Martinsson.
We meet again, thought District Prosecutor Carl von Post when he saw Inspector Anna-Maria Mella and Rebecka Martinsson getting out of their cars. You bloody idiots.
It was several years now since Martinsson had arrived in Kiruna to poke her nose into his investigation concerning the murder of Viktor Strandgård. The moment she stepped off the plane, she thought she was somebody. A successful lawyer with Meijer & Ditzinger. As if that was of any significance. Her boyfriend was a partner. He, von Post, had no difficulty in understanding how she had got the job – but the media, all those damned journalists, had worshipped her. Once the murder had been cleared up, you could read about her everywhere. He had been presented as the idiot who had arrested the wrong person. He had thought he would have been rid of her after that – but oh, no. She had floated up to the surface again and started work as a prosecutor. She and that dwarf of a police inspector Mella had somehow blundered their way through the investigation into the murder of Wilma Persson and Simon Kyrö. It was a miracle that the murderer was caught, but the press – these bloody journalists again – had described her as a Modesty Blaise.
For years he had been spending his time on cases involving drunkenness, thefts of snow scooters and assaults. On the whole. One murder, though. A bloke from Harads who killed his brother of a Saturday evening.
Carl von Post was stuck as a prosecutor working on minor casesup in Lapland. And it was all their fault. Modesty Bloody Blaise and that policewoman she had on a leash. He did not have a snowball’s chance in hell of landing a job in a decent-sized law firm in Stockholm. But he had made up his mind. Things were going to change. It was his turn now to come into the spotlight, be written about. A spectacular murder like this one was just what the doctor ordered. She did not need it. And now he had made sure it was going to be his case. That pair were not going to get it back again, and he was about to make that clear to them.
Carl von Post turned to face the assembled journalists. They were all keeping an eye on their iPhones, and scanning Twitter and Flashback in search of something extra. Microphones had been switched on. The national evening papers
Expressen
and
Aftonbladet
had sent their usual freelancers. Reporters from local papers
N.S.D.
and
Norbottens-Kuriren
were hovering in the corridor a little further away, in the hope of
“Obviously, we’ll check whether any of the mental hospitals have released any loonies lately,” Mella said.
Oh, shit! She could have bitten her tongue off. Shit, shit, shit! Why was her mouth always quicker than her brain? Martinsson had been sent to a mental hospital – she had been in such a state that they had to give her electric shock treatment. She had been hallucinating and screaming. That was after Gunnar Vinsa had shot himself and his son. Mella had never spoken to Martinsson about that. It had been beyond her comprehension. She had not even known that they still gave electric shock treatment. She thought that was what happened in prehistoric times. As in “One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest”.
“That’s enough of that,” Pohjanen growled.
At that very moment Mella’s mobile rang. She answered, relieved to have been given an escape route. It was Stålnacke.
He didn’t beat about the bush. “I thought we were going to have a press conference tomorrow morning,” he said.
“That’s right,” said Mella.
“Really? Then why is von Post chatting with a gang of journalists in the conference room at this very minute?”
Mella refrained from exclaiming, “What the hell are you on about?”
“I’ll be there right away,” she said instead, and hung up.
“You’re not going to like this,” she said to Martinsson.
We meet again, thought District Prosecutor Carl von Post when he saw Inspector Anna-Maria Mella and Rebecka Martinsson getting out of their cars. You bloody idiots.
It was several years now since Martinsson had arrived in Kiruna to poke her nose into his investigation concerning the murder of Viktor Strandgård. The moment she stepped off the plane, she thought she was somebody. A successful lawyer with Meijer & Ditzinger. As if that was of any significance. Her boyfriend was a partner. He, von Post, had no difficulty in understanding how she had got the job – but the media, all those damned journalists, had worshipped her. Once the murder had been cleared up, you could read about her everywhere. He had been presented as the idiot who had arrested the wrong person. He had thought he would have been rid of her after that – but oh, no. She had floated up to the surface again and started work as a prosecutor. She and that dwarf of a police inspector Mella had somehow blundered their way through the investigation into the murder of Wilma Persson and Simon Kyrö. It was a miracle that the murderer was caught, but the press – these bloody journalists again – had described her as a Modesty Blaise.
For years he had been spending his time on cases involving drunkenness, thefts of snow scooters and assaults. On the whole. One murder, though. A bloke from Harads who killed his brother of a Saturday evening.
Carl von Post was stuck as a prosecutor working on minor casesup in Lapland. And it was all their fault. Modesty Bloody Blaise and that policewoman she had on a leash. He did not have a snowball’s chance in hell of landing a job in a decent-sized law firm in Stockholm. But he had made up his mind. Things were going to change. It was his turn now to come into the spotlight, be written about. A spectacular murder like this one was just what the doctor ordered. She did not need it. And now he had made sure it was going to be his case. That pair were not going to get it back again, and he was about to make that clear to them.
Carl von Post turned to face the assembled journalists. They were all keeping an eye on their iPhones, and scanning Twitter and Flashback in search of something extra. Microphones had been switched on. The national evening papers
Expressen
and
Aftonbladet
had sent their usual freelancers. Reporters from local papers
N.S.D.
and
Norbottens-Kuriren
were hovering in the corridor a little further away, in the hope of
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