The Strangler's Honeymoon by Håkan Nesser Page A

free like this – a highly illusory freedom, of course – simply so that he could sit in peace and quiet at a convenient distance and observe its death throes. What was the point when the fate of the bird was already sealed? What forces lay behind this wicked game? Why did he do it? The beast of prey and its victim.
    Were they biological or culinary? Perhaps it didn’t matter, although he recalled that human beings prefer to eat meat that has been killed in conditions as unstressful as possible. He had read somewhere that pork and ham tasted best if the slaughterer was able to lull the pig into a false sense of security before its death. A shot through the back of the head while it was asleep, perhaps?
    Did cats – cat-like creatures in general – prefer meat that was filled with the bitter fluids caused by the fear of death? Could that be the explanation?
    Yes, probably. So infernally banal. And from the point of view of the victim, what pointless cruelty! A long-drawn-out death struggle simply to please the executioner’s taste-buds?
    My God, he thought. You must be a wicked devil.
    He shook his head at all these questionable speculations, raised the carpet-beater and hammered away at the bookcase. Stravinsky picked the swallow up again in his mouth and jumped down. Dashed out into the hall with Van Veeteren on his heels, then paused for a moment in front of the shoe shelf. He seemed to be wondering where next to retreat to, in order to escape being hounded by this madman with the carpet-beater – he had been living with him for quite a while now, and he’d seemed to be a reasonable and balanced person. Well, not all that barmy: but you could never tell with humans.
    Van Veeteren made use of the brief pause for thought to open the door out onto the landing, and Stravinsky took advantage of this opportunity to escape. He raced down the stairs like a flash, with the swallow – now no doubt as dead as a doornail – looking like a bushy but well-trimmed moustache.
    Van Veeteren had no doubt that the confounded little beast must go out into the courtyard, and chased after him – stark naked, hoping that none of the neighbours were up and about at this unholy hour (especially old fru Grambowska: a naked confrontation on the stairs would have ruined their good relationship once and for all, that was obvious, and she had looked after both Stravinsky and the potted plants while he and Ulrike were away in Rome). With a little difficulty he eventually managed to shoo the cat out through the back door, and left it ajar with the aid of the sweeping brush that was usually kept there. When he went back to the flat he felt as wide awake as if he had just taken a plunge into eight-degree seawater and survived.
    He checked the clock in the kitchen: seventeen minutes to six in the morning. He pinched his arm. It hurt, so he hadn’t been dreaming.
    Expecting some kind of tiredness to kick in after his surreal morning exertions, he went first to check if Ulrike had really managed to sleep through all the hullabaloo.
    She certainly had. She lay there on her side, sniffling peacefully, the obligatory pillow between her knees and a faint, slightly mysterious smile on her lips. He stood by the bed for a few moments, watching her. It had been an exceptional morning, but even now he simply couldn’t understand what benevolent higher power had brought her into contact with him. Or him with her. If there was anything for which he had to thank the God in whom he didn’t believe, it was Ulrike Fremdli. No doubt at all about that.
    Which had not just brought them into contact with each other, but had guided her here. To share his home and his bed and his life. Nothing – he was quite certain of it – nothing he had achieved during his erratic journey on this earth had made him worthy of her; but he had slowly begun to accept it as a fact, and just as slowly to adopt a sort of humility, which no doubt did not always reveal itself in his