The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared

Ranelid.
    ‘Understood. Just take a deep breath, Conny, and I’ll ask. I’ll call you back in a few minutes.’
     
    Chief Inspector Aronsson turned to his companions and announced the happy news that Prosecutor Ranelid had just held a press conference where he had emphasized how innocent Allan Karlsson and his friends were. And then he passed on the prosecutor’s request to visit.
    The Beauty reacted with an animated lecture saying that no good would come of describing in detail the developments of the last few weeks for the prosecutor. Julius agreed. If you had been declared innocent, then you were innocent, and that was that.
    ‘And I’m not used to that. So it would be too bad if my innocence lasted less than twenty-four hours.’
    Allan said that he wished his friends would stop worrying about every little thing. The newspapers and TV would certainly not leave the group in peace until they had their story. So wouldn’t it be better to tell it to a solitary prosecutor, than to have journalists all over the place for the next few weeks?
    ‘Besides, we’ve got all evening to come up with a story,’ said Allan.
    Chief Inspector Aronsson would have preferred not to hear the last bit. He got up from his chair to emphasize his presence and stop them from saying any more. It was time to call it a day, he said. If Benny would be so kind as to drive him to his hotel, he would be most grateful. From the car, Aronsson intended to phone Prosecutor Ranelid and tell him that he would be welcome at about ten o’clock the following morning, if that was what the group agreed upon. In any case, Aronssonintended to come in a taxi, if only to collect his car. Incidentally, would it be possible to have another half-glass of that exquisite Bulgarian champagne before he left? What? It was Hungarian? Well, it didn’t really matter, to be honest.
    Chief Inspector Aronsson was served yet another glass, filled to the brim, which he downed in all haste before rubbing his nose and then getting into the passenger seat of his own car, already driven up to the door by Benny. And then, he declaimed some lines from the Swedish poet Carl Michael Bellman about good friends and Hungarian wine.
    Benny, an almost-expert on literature, nodded.
    ‘John 8:7, don’t forget that tomorrow morning, Chief Inspector,’ Bosse called out in a sudden burst of inspiration. ‘In the Bible, John 8:7.’

Chapter 25
    Friday, 27th May 2005
    It takes time to get from Eskilstuna to Falköping. Prosecutor Conny Ranelid needed to get up at dawn (and after sleeping badly all night too) to get to Bellringer Farm by ten o’clock. And the meeting couldn’t run longer than one hour or his plan would be ruined. The press conference was supposed to start at three.
    Conny Ranelid was close to tears as he drove down the road. The Great Victory of Justice , that was what his book would have been called. Hah! If there was any justice at all in this world, then lightning would strike that damned farm and everyone there would burn to death. Then Prosecutor Ranelid could say whatever he wanted to the journalists.
     
    Chief Inspector Aronsson slept late. He woke up at nine, with a bit of a bad conscience about the events of the previous day. He had drunk champagne with the potential delinquents, and he had clearly heard Karlsson say that they would make up a story for Prosecutor Ranelid. Was he about to become an accomplice — accomplice to what, in that case?
    When the chief inspector had reached his hotel the previous evening, he looked up John 8:7 in the Gideon Bible in his room. This had been followed by a couple of hours of bible reading in a corner of the hotel bar, in the company of a gin and tonic, followed by another gin and tonic followed by another gin and tonic.
    The chapter in question was about the woman who committed adultery and whom the Pharisees had taken before Jesus to place him in a dilemma. If according to Jesus the woman should not be stoned for her crime, then Jesus wasrejecting Moses (the Book of Leviticus). If, on the other hand, Jesus was on the same side as Moses, then he would be battling with the Romans who had the monopoly on the death sentence. Would Jesus go against Moses or the Romans? The Pharisees thought that they had the Master cornered. But Jesus was Jesus and after thinking it over he said:
    ‘Let he who is without sin cast the first stone!’
    Jesus had thus avoided arguing with Moses and with the Romans, or for that matter