Three Seconds

his way up to the fourth floor, stopping briefly in front of the door with a name plate with the Finnish name that Wilson had tried to push him to discuss this morning, then continued on to the flat that was still being guarded by contracted security men in green uniforms. He looked at the big blood stain and the markers on the walls, but this time it was the kitchen that interested him and a spot near the fridge where Krantz was one hundred per cent certain that the man had been standing when he called and raised the alarm.
You sound calm despite the fact that you’re frightened.
He put the headphones on and pressed the two buttons that had worked the last time.
You are precise, systematic, purposeful
. The voice again.
You can cut yourself off and carry on functioning, despite that fact that you’re in the midst of chaos.
Grens walked between the sink and the worktop, listening to someone who had been in exactly the same place and had whispered a message about a dead man while the people on the other side of the door stood next to the body that was still bleeding heavily.
You’re involved in the murder but chose to raise the alarm and then disappear.
    ‘This thing is bloody marvellous.’
    He had rung Nils Krantz as he walked down the stairs.
    ‘What are you talking about?’
    ‘The machine that you lent me. Jesus, I can listen to it when I want, as many times as I want.’
    ‘That’s good, Ewert. Great. Speak to you again soon.’
    The car was double-parked outside the front door, waiting, the policeman ready behind the wheel, with his safety belt still on.
    Grens clambered into the back seat.
    ‘Arlanda.’
    ‘Excuse me?’
    ‘I want to go to Arlanda.’
    ‘This is not a taxi, you know. I knock off in quarter of an hour.’
    ‘Then I think you should stick on the blue light. It’s quicker.’
    Ewert Grens leant back in the seat when the car approached Norrtull and the northbound E4.
Who are you?
He had the headphones on, so he would be able to listen to it several times before they stopped outside Terminal 5.
What were you doing there?
He was on his way to see someone who knew more about at least one of the people who had been in the flat when a lead and titanium bullet had penetrated one man’s head, and he would not return until he knew more himself.
Where are you now?
    __________
    He held the plastic bag in his hand, swinging slowly back and forth between the steering wheel and the door.
     
    Piet Hoffmann had left number five at half past eleven that morning, an empty flat that could be accessed from two addresses. He had felt stressed, the shooting at Västmannagatan, the breakthrough with Wojtek, trust or potential death sentence, stay or run. When he closed the gate to the communal gardens, his phone had rung. Someone from the nursery, who mentioned fever and two little boys with burning cheeks lying on a sofa, who needed to be picked up so they could go home. He had gone straight to Hagtornsgården in Enskededalen, collected the two hot, sleepy children and then headed towards the house in Enskede.
    He looked at the plastic bag, at the shirt that was in it, grey and white checks that were now covered in blood and tissue from a person.
    He had put the boys to bed, where they had each fallen asleep clutching an unread comic. He had phoned Zofia, promised to stay at home with them, and she had kissed the receiver twice – always an even number.
    He looked out of the car window at a clock above a shop door. Six more minutes. He turned around. They sat there silently, with shiny eyes and floppy bodies. Rasmus was almost flat out on the back seat.
    He had wandered around in the watchful house, every now and then giving a sleeping, feverish cheek a worried caress, and had realised that he didn’t have any choice. There was a bottle of Calpol in the door of the fridge and after much protest that it tasted horrible and they would rather be ill, both had eventually swalloweda double dose, served to them in a dessert spoon. He had carried them out to the car, driven the short distance to Slussen and Södermalm and parked a couple of hundred metres from the entrance on Hökens Gata.
    Rasmus was now actually lying on the back seat. Hugo was half on top of him. Their flaming cheeks were slightly less red for a while as the Calpol worked its magic.
    Piet Hoffmann felt something in his chest that was possibly shame.
    I’m so sorry. You shouldn’t be here
.
    Right from the start, when he had been