The Fire Witness
also by lars kepler
The Hypnotist
The Nightmare
Copyright © 2011 by Lars Kepler
Translation copyright © 2013 by Laura A. Wideburg
All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher – or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency – is an infringement of the copyright law.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Kepler, Lars
The fire witness / Lars Kepler ; translated from the Swedish by Laura A. Wideburg.
Translation of: Eldvittnet.
eISBN: 978-0-7710-9591-7
I. Wideburg, Laura A. II. Title.
PT9877.21.E65E4413 2013 839.73’8 C2012-908293-7
Originally published in 2011 by Albert Bonniers Förlag, Sweden, as Eldivittnet.
Published in the English language with Bonnier Group Agency, Stockholm, Sweden.
McClelland & Stewart,
a division of Random House of Canada Limited
One Toronto Street
Suite 300
Toronto, Ontario
M5C 2V6
www.mcclelland.com
v3.1
Contents
Cover
Other Books by This Author
Title Page
Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
Chapter 68
Chapter 69
Chapter 70
Chapter 71
Chapter 72
Chapter 73
Chapter 74
Chapter 75
Chapter 76
Chapter 77
Chapter 78
Chapter 79
Chapter 80
Chapter 81
Chapter 82
Chapter 83
Chapter 84
Chapter 85
Chapter 86
Chapter 87
Chapter 88
Chapter 89
Chapter 90
Chapter 91
Chapter 92
Chapter 93
Chapter 94
Chapter 95
Chapter 96
Chapter 97
Chapter 98
Chapter 99
Chapter 100
Chapter 101
Chapter 102
Chapter 103
Chapter 104
Chapter 105
Chapter 106
Chapter 107
Chapter 108
Chapter 109
Chapter 110
Chapter 111
Chapter 112
Chapter 113
Chapter 114
Chapter 115
Chapter 116
Chapter 117
Chapter 118
Chapter 119
Chapter 120
Chapter 121
Chapter 122
Chapter 123
Chapter 124
Chapter 125
Chapter 126
Chapter 127
Chapter 128
Chapter 129
Chapter 130
Chapter 131
Chapter 132
Chapter 133
Chapter 134
Chapter 135
Chapter 136
Chapter 137
Chapter 138
Chapter 139
Chapter 140
Chapter 141
Chapter 142
Chapter 143
Chapter 144
Chapter 145
Chapter 146
Chapter 147
Chapter 148
Chapter 149
Chapter 150
Chapter 151
Chapter 152
Chapter 153
Chapter 154
Chapter 155
Chapter 156
Chapter 157
Chapter 158
Chapter 159
Chapter 160
Chapter 161
Chapter 162
Chapter 163
Chapter 164
Chapter 165
Chapter 166
Chapter 167
Chapter 168
Chapter 169
Chapter 170
Chapter 171
Chapter 172
Chapter 173
Chapter 174
Chapter 175
Chapter 176
Chapter 177
Chapter 178
Chapter 179
Chapter 180
Chapter 181
Chapter 182
Chapter 183
Chapter 184
Chapter 185
Chapter 186
Chapter 187
Chapter 188
Chapter 189
Chapter 190
Chapter 191
Chapter 192
Chapter 193
Chapter 194
Chapter 195
A Note About the Author
All liars shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone …
—REVELATION 21:8
A medium is someone who claims to have paranormal talent: the ability to interpret circumstances that lie beyond the limits of science.
Some mediums act as intermediaries to the dead at séances, while others offer guidance based on, for example, the reading of tarot cards.
Humans have tried to contact the dead through mediums since the beginning of history. One thousand years before the birth of Christ, King Saul of Israel sought advice from the spirit of the recently deceased prophet Samuel.
All over the world, the police accept the help of psychics and mediums when they are baffled by a case. This happens several times a year, even though there is not a single documented instance where a medium has actually solved a crime.
1
Elisabet Grim is fifty
-three years old. Her hair is streaked with gray, but her eyes are bright and happy, and when she smiles, one of her front teeth juts out impishly.
She is a nurse at Birgittagården, a state-approved home for especially troubled girls north of Sundsvall. It’s a small, privately owned residence. Rarely are there more than eight girls there at a time. They range from twelve to seventeen in age. Many are drug addicts when they arrive. Almost all have a history of self-injury—eating disorders, for instance. Some can be violent. For these girls, there is no alternative to Birgittagården, with its alarms and double-locked doors. The next step would be prison or forced confinement in a psychiatric unit. This home, by comparison, is a hopeful place, with the expectation that the girls can make it back someday to open care.
As Elisabet often says, “It’s the nice girls who end up here.”
Right now, Elisabet is savoring the last bite of a bittersweet bar of chocolate. She can feel her shoulders begin to relax.
The day started well but the evening was hard. There were classes in the morning, and in the afternoon, the girls spent time at the lake. After the evening meal, the housemother went home, leaving Elisabet in charge on her own. The night staff was recently let go when the company changed hands. Elisabet had sat in the nurse’s office, catching up with reports, while the girls watched television, which they were allowed to do until ten.
And then she’d heard the yelling. It was loud, very loud. She’d hurried to the television room, where Miranda was beating up tiny Tuula. Miranda was screaming that Tuula was a slut and a whore. She’d yanked the little girl off the sofa and was kicking her in the back.
It was not unusual for Miranda to explode violently. Elisabet was used to her outbursts. She pulled her away from Tuula, and Miranda slapped Elisabet in the face. Elisabet was used to that, too. Without further discussion she led Miranda down the hall to the isolation room. Elisabet wished Miranda a good night, but Miranda didn’t answer. She just sat on the bed and studied the floor with a secretive smile as the nurse shut and locked the door behind her.
Elisabet was scheduled to have a private talk with the new girl, Vicky Bennet, but after the conflict, she found she was exhausted and couldn’t face it. When Vicky came by and timidly mentioned that it was her turn for a chat, Elisabet put her off. This made Vicky so unhappy, she broke a teacup and slashed her stomach and wrists with the sharpest piece.
When Elisabet checked on her a while later, Vicky was sitting in her room with her hands in front of her face and blood running down her arms.
The wounds were superficial. Elisabet washed the blood off, wrapped gauze around the girl’s wrists, and put a Band-Aid on her stomach. And Elisabet comforted her, soothing her with sweet names, telling her not to worry, coaxing her until a tiny smile crossed the troubled girl’s face. For the third night in a row, Elisabet gave the girl ten milligrams of Sonata so she could sleep.
2
All the girls are finally asleep and Birgittagården is quiet. Outside the office window, the September darkness has settled on the forest, but Himmelsjö Lake’s smooth surface shines like mother-of-pearl. Elisabet sits in front of her computer entering the evening’s events into the log.
It’s almost midnight and she realizes she hasn’t taken her sleeping pill yet. My own little drug, she calls it. Difficult days followed by nights on call are interfering with her sleep. She needs a few hours of rest; ten milligrams of Stilnoct by ten and she’s asleep by eleven. She pulls her shawl tight and thinks that a glass of red wine would hit the spot right now. She longs for her own bed, where she can curl up with a book, or with her husband, Daniel. But not tonight; she’s on call and has to stay here.
In the yard outside, Buster begins to bark. Insistently, stridently.
It’s very late. She’s usually asleep by now. She takes her pill, shuts down her computer. She grows aware of the sounds she’s making: the hiss of her chair’s hydraulic lift as she stands; the creak of the tiles beneath her feet as she moves to the window. She tries to look out, but all she can see is the reflection of her face. And of the door gliding open behind her.
Must be the draft, she thinks. The tile stove in the dining room draws such a great deal of air.
She shakes off the disquiet she feels and switches off the lamp before she turns around.
Now the door is wide open. She shudders faintly, and steps through it. The lights are on in the hallway between the dining room and the girls’ bedrooms. I should check the tile stove, she thinks; make sure the lids are shut. But there is whispering coming from one of the bedrooms.
3
At first all Elisabet hears is a delicate hiss. The whisper is hardly perceptible. Then she hears words.
“It’s your turn to close your eyes,” someone murmurs.
Elisabet keeps still, staring so hard down the hall her eyes are frozen open. It must be one of the girls talking in her sleep, she thinks. Then there’s a noise, like an overripe peach dropping on the floor. Then another, heavy and wet. A table leg scrapes the floor and there’s the sound of two more peaches falling.
Out of the corner of her eye, Elisabet catches a movement, a shadow gliding past. She turns around and sees the door to the dining room slowly close.
“Wait!” she calls out, even while trying to convince herself it’s nothing; it must be the draft.
She grabs the doorknob to the dining room, but something stops the door from opening and she has to yank it before it finally gives way. Stepping inside, she can see herself in the dull reflection from the scratched dining-room table, and again in the brass fire doors of the tile stove. She checks it: the lids are all shut. The stove suddenly knocks, and Elisabet takes a quick step back, tilting over a chair. It’s nothing. Just the slipping of a log.
She heads to her room, pausing outside the girls’ bedrooms. She detects a sour, slightly metallic aroma. She searches for movement in the hallway, but all is still. To the right are the bathrooms and the alcove leading to the isolation room. Miranda should be fast asleep in there. The peephole in the door glimmers weakly.
Now, again, there’s that light voice, whispering.
“It’s time to be quiet,” Elisabet calls out.
A series of quick thuds. It’s hard to locate the noise, but it sounds as if Miranda is lying in bed and kicking her bare feet against the wall. Elisabet decides to check on her through the peephole. It is then that she sees a shadowy figure in the alcove. With a gasp, she backs away. She knows how dangerous the situation is, but fear makes her slow; her body feels as if it’s moving in the heavy water of a dream. But the creaking of the floor startles her awake, and she whirls around and starts to run.
A soft voice behind her urges her to stop, but she knows she mustn’t.
Elisabet makes it to the front door. Throwing the lock, she races out into the cool air of the night. She slips on the front steps, smacking her hip and twisting a leg beneath her. Her ankle hurts so badly she cries out, and she crawls for a stretch, losing her slippers. Then she forces herself to her feet.
4
The dog is barking at her. He runs circles around her as she limps away across the gravel driveway. She knows there is no escape in the forest, and it’s several hours’ walk to the closest farm, so she drags herself behind the drying shed, toward the former brewery. Hands shaking, she opens the door, slips inside, and pulls the door tight.
“Oh God! Oh God!”
She searches her pockets for her cell, but her hands jerk so badly she drops the phone. The back bursts off and the battery flies out. She scrambles to pick up the pieces as she listens to the footsteps crunch the gravel.
She crawls to the low window and peers out. Buster, who has followed her, scratches frantically at the door. Elisabet creeps over to the masonry fireplace and crouches behind the woodpile, where with uncooperative hands she tries to shove the battery back into place.
The door flies open. There’s nowhere to go.
She can see the boots, the twisted face, the r
aised hammer, its heft and shine. She listens to the voice, nods, and then covers her face with her hands.
The shadowy figure pauses a moment before knocking her flat on the ground, holding her down, and smashing her hard. Along the hairline, her forehead burns. Her sight is gone, and she’s in agony, but the warm blood running over her ears and down the sides of her throat feels like a caress.
The next blow lands in the same spot. Her head is knocked askew and now the only thing she knows is how to breathe. She thinks how wonderfully sweet oxygen is.
She cannot feel her body jerk from the next round of blows. She cannot tell when the keys to the office and the isolation room are taken from her pocket. She cannot see her body lying on the floor or the dog sneaking in and tentatively lapping the blood leaking from her crushed head. She cannot sense her life ebb away.
5
Someone has left a large red apple on the table. It gleams and looks wonderfully tasty. Perhaps she’ll just eat the whole thing and then pretend she knows nothing about it. She’ll sit there looking glum, ignore the harangues, and refuse to answer their questions.
She reaches for the apple, but her fingers sink into cold, mushy flesh. It’s completely rotten.
Nina Molander wakes up as she jerks her hand away. It’s the middle of the night. She’s lying in her bed. The only thing she hears is the dog barking in the yard. This new drug makes her wake at night. She has to get up and go to the bathroom. She needs to take the drug, even though it makes her feet and calves swell. Without it, dark thoughts consume her to the point where she no longer cares about anything and can’t get out of bed. She knows she needs something to look forward to instead of thoughts about death.
Nina throws off her blanket and sets her feet on the warm wooden floor. She’s fifteen years old, with straight blond hair, wide hips, and large breasts. Her white flannel nightgown is tight around her belly.
In the hallway, the only light on is the green emergency exit sign. She hears whispers behind one of the doors. Nina thinks the other girls are having a party and didn’t invite her. As if I’d ever want to go.
She can smell cinders, an old fire that has gone out. The dog starts barking again. Nina doesn’t worry about whether she’s quiet or not. She feels like slamming the door over and over. She doesn’t give a damn that Almira will get angry and throw things at her.
The floor is colder out in the hall. The old tiles creak. She heads toward the bathroom, but stops when she steps in a wet patch. A dark pool is spreading from beneath the door of the isolation room where Miranda is sleeping. Nina doesn’t know what to do at first, but then she sees that the key to the room has been left in the lock.