The Rabbit Hunter Page 18

  ‘He doesn’t have as much hair now,’ Joona says.

  ‘No, he looks older,’ she sighs.

  ‘Unlike you.’

  ‘Do you think?’

  ‘Who’s that?’ Joona asks, pointing at the other man in a white suit.

  ‘That’s Absalon, Salim’s brother. He cut off all contact with Salim after Salim got caught up in drugs …’

  They fall silent.

  ‘This is Salim’s team, FOC Farsta,’ she says after a pause, pointing at a picture of a football team, young men lined up in dark-red tracksuits.

  ‘Were they any good?’

  ‘No,’ she laughs.

  A shadow flits past the window in the front door.

  ‘I’ve got more photographs in the basement,’ she says, and takes a deep, nervous breath. ‘You wait on the sofa, I’ll be right back.’

  She turns away, leaning against the wall with one hand, then opens a narrow door and starts to go down a steep flight of steps.

  ‘Why don’t I come with you instead,’ he says, and follows her.

  Joona finds himself in a cramped utility room, with a washing machine and a pile of laundry on the tiled floor. There’s an old-fashioned hand-wringer in one corner.

  ‘The storeroom’s through there,’ Parisa says in a tense voice, pulling on a pair of shoes. ‘You can wait here.’

  She walks down a narrow passageway, past shelves of winter shoes and boxes, to a metal door.

  If Parisa is hiding anyone in the house, it will be in the basement, Joona thinks as he follows her.

  As she unlocks the door he slips his hand under his jacket, loosens the strap and takes hold of the pistol. The hairs at the back of his neck stand up as she pulls the heavy steel door open and turns the lights on.

  A tunnel several hundred metres long flickers in the light before the fluorescent tubes settle down.

  ‘Do all the houses share this storage space?’ Joona asks, even though he doubts that any signal from his microphone can still be picked up.

  He follows her along the cool passage, passing a couple of dozen closed metal doors before they turn left and find themselves in an even longer tunnel.

  Parisa is walking as fast as she can, holding her hijab in place with her right hand.

  They pass the closed armour-plated doors of an underground bomb-shelter, and ventilation drums clad in silvery foil.

  Eventually Parisa opens another sturdy cellar door and together they climb up some stairs, go through a communal bin room and emerge into an entrance hall.

  They walk out through the door.

  The long tunnel has led them under the main road to an area full of blocks of flats.

  Over by the edge of the forest are a small slide and some swings with broken chains. Wild roses shake in the gusty breeze and rubbish blows around.

  Parisa goes over to a dirty Opel parked among a number of other cars. She unlocks it and Joona gets into the passenger seat beside her.

  ‘You know … I was only being polite when I said I wanted to see more photographs,’ Joona jokes, but doesn’t get even the slightest hint of a smile in response.

  44

  Parisa Ratjen slows down before pulling out onto highway 229. Without speaking, they drive past low industrial units and scrappy patches of woodland.

  Her face is pale, her mouth tense. She’s sitting bolt upright, clutching the wheel with both hands.

  Joona has given up asking where they’re going. They’re way beyond the range of his microphone now.

  All he can do is try to keep his cover for as long as he possibly can. Maybe Parisa’s role is to take him to the terrorists’ hiding place.

  She brakes behind a truck with a yellow tarp over its trailer. There’s a sharp crack as a stone hits the windshield.

  ‘I don’t know what side you’re on, but Salim wouldn’t ask you to give me a message if it wasn’t important,’ she suddenly says, changing lane. ‘Can you tell me why you haven’t passed on the real message?’

  ‘You didn’t offer me any bread.’

  ‘Good,’ she whispers.

  They’re alongside the truck now, the steel railings on their left flicker past, as the trailer sways in a gust of wind.

  ‘Salim gave me a phone number,’ Joona says. ‘You need to phone 040 6893040 and ask for Amira.’

  The car swerves as Parisa’s grip slips at the sound of the name. The front wheel of the truck looms large in Joona’s passenger window and the roar of its engine fills the car.

  ‘That was all,’ Joona says quietly.

  She grips the wheel tightly, accelerates and pushes past the huge vehicle.

  ‘Say the number again,’ she says, swallowing hard.

  ‘040 6893040.’

  Parisa pulls into the right-hand lane again and turns off the main road so sharply that a road atlas on the back seat falls to the floor.

  They drive past a large, pale yellow industrial building and onto a large tarmacked area between a petrol station and a McDonald’s. She turns the car around, reverses back against the grass and stops.

  The headlights shine dully over the asphalt towards the petrol pumps.

  Off to the left a family emerges from the fast-food restaurant.

  Parisa leaves the car in neutral and winds down the windows on both sides. Without saying a word she opens her door and gets out. She feels under the seat, pulls out a Glock, and points it at him through the open window.

  ‘Get out of the car very slowly,’ she says.

  ‘I’m not involved, I’m just passing on—’

  ‘Put your hands up,’ she snaps. ‘I know you’re armed.’

  ‘It’s just for protection.’

  The pistol is shaking in her hands, but her finger is on the trigger and she would probably still hit him if she were to fire now.

  ‘I have no idea what this is all about,’ she says. ‘But I grew up in Afghanistan. I saw the sniper in the window on the other side of the street.’

  ‘I don’t know what you think you saw, but—’

  ‘Out of the car, or I’ll shoot,’ she says, raising her voice. ‘I don’t want to, but I’ll shoot you if I have to.’

  ‘OK, I’m coming,’ Joona says, and slowly opens the car door.

  ‘Keep your hands where I can see them,’ she says, licking her lips.

  ‘Who’s Amira?’ he asks as he puts his right foot on the ground.

  ‘Walk away from the car without turning around.’

  Joona straightens up with his back to her. He notes that there are three cars parked outside the McDonald’s. The wind is tugging at the flags flying outside.

  ‘Further away,’ she says as she steps closer to the car, keeping the gun trained on him.

  Joona starts to walk towards the parked cars.

  Parisa gets back in the driver’s seat, still pointing the pistol at him.

  ‘I might be able to help you,’ he says, and stops walking.

  ‘Keep walking,’ she calls out behind him.

  He takes another couple of steps, and sees a large man come out from McDonald’s carrying a bag of food. He gets into the front seat of his car, puts the key in the ignition and starts to eat his hamburger.

  ‘Just so you know,’ she says, with a trace of hysteria in her voice: ‘If you try to use me to put pressure on Salim, it won’t work, because I’ve already filed for divorce. He won’t care what happens to me.’

  ‘I’m not involved,’ Joona repeats, and hears her put the pistol down on the passenger seat.

  ‘Keep walking. I swear, I’ll shoot if you stop again.’

  The moment he hears her put the car in gear and accelerate he starts to run. He vaults the low hedge surrounding the car park, opens the door of the car in which the large man is eating a hamburger. He yanks him out onto the ground. His big cup of Coke falls to the ground, scattering its ice-cubes.

  Joona sees Parisa almost lose control of her car as she drives past the yellow industrial building.

  He quickl
y puts the car in gear, slams his foot down and drives straight through the neatly trimmed hedge.

  The golf clubs on the back seat rattle when the rear wheels hit the road on the other side.

  The heavyset man gets to his feet and stands there surrounded by the remains of his hamburger as his car heads straight up the steep grass bank beside the road.

  Joona drives across the grass divider, makes a sharp right and thuds down onto the main road. The Volvo lurches across the three lanes. The back end of the car is still sliding sideways as he slams his foot down on the accelerator pedal.

  The left rear wheel hits the central guard rail with a thump.

  The hubcap flashes in the rear-view mirror as it bounces onto the other side of the highway.

  Joona sees Parisa turn onto Huddingevägen. A warning light appears on the dashboard.

  He passes a white van, hitting one hundred and forty kilometres an hour, then brakes when he sees her dirty Opel a couple of hundred metres ahead.

  Joona pulls into the right-hand lane, leaving two cars between them, then draws out his phone and calls Janus Mickelsen, and gives him all the information about Parisa’s car and their current position and direction.

  ‘OK, I’ve got it,’ Janus says. ‘Keep us informed. I’ll get the go-ahead to redirect our operation.’

  ‘I don’t know what this is about or where we’re going,’ Joona says. ‘But I’ve only got enough petrol for another fifty kilometres, so I’ll need backup before then.’

  When the warning light first comes on, there are eight litres of fuel left. That would give fifty-four kilometres of normal driving, but because he’s driving unusually fast it could be considerably less.

  He has no idea where Parisa is going, and he can’t see any other option but to follow her for as long as he can.

  They’re heading north, just west of Stockholm. He thinks about her peculiar nervousness, and her efforts to make conversation before she spotted one of the snipers and decided to make a run for it.

  Thirty minutes later Joona is driving down a long hill beside a golf course. The wind is blowing hard, tugging sideways at the car.

  He sees a petrol station and a row of rental cars. But if he stops he might lose sight of Parisa.

  And then she’d be gone.

  He has to gamble and keep driving, even though the petrol is going to run out in about four kilometres.

  Joona calls Janus and gives him a concise update, telling him that they’ve passed Åkersberga and are heading out along Roslagsvägen. As he drives, the forests and meadows are swallowed up by dusk.

  Parisa’s red rear lights are visible far ahead of him. Sometimes they vanish briefly, only to reappear when he emerges from a bend in the road.

  The road leads through a dark patch of forest. The tree-trunks look like a stage-set in the glow of the headlights.

  Joona thinks about the look on Parisa’s face when he passed on Salim’s message. The emotions he saw were fear and surprise.

  He’s just passed an isolated side-road blocked by a rusty barrier when there’s a whirring sound.

  The engine sounds like it’s racing, then it goes completely quiet. Joona pulls over to the hard shoulder, stops and switches on the hazard lights.

  Far in the distance he sees the lights of Parisa’s car flicker and then disappear.

  Grabbing his phone, Joona gets out of the car and starts running along the road after her.

  The sound of her engine has already vanished.

  Even on a winding road like this one Parisa can drive something like three times as fast as he can run. With every minute the distance between them is growing exponentially.

  There’s dense forest on either side of the road.

  He passes a deserted bus-stop and runs down a slope. The forest opens up, revealing misty meadows in the darkness.

  He’s running fast, and he knows he can keep this pace up for more than ten kilometres.

  Far off in one of the fields, two deer raise their heads as he runs past.

  45

  Even though there’s still some light left in the sky, the surrounding forest is completely dark. Parisa brakes as she heads down a long hill. She slowly steers right, then starts to drive down a gravel track beside an overgrown patch of land with a wrecked car at the far end.

  She thinks about the tall man who came to her home with a message from da gawand halak. He said Salim had just been transferred to his unit at Kumla, but that he didn’t really know him. Presumably Salim had felt obliged to send a message with the first person granted leave.

  Salim gave him a code which meant that he was someone whose loyalty couldn’t be guaranteed, but that she should still listen to what he had to say.

  She had seen that the blond messenger was armed, but didn’t actually start to panic until she saw the sniper from the kitchen.

  On the upper floor of the house across the street.

  A window ajar, a black ring and a glowing circle: barrel and sights.

  It was impossible to tell if he knew the sniper, if they were working together.

  Maybe the messenger was the sniper’s target?

  Thoughts are buzzing through her head. She can’t figure out how everything fits together, but right now her sister is the only thing that matters.

  Once she’d forced the man out of the car she called the number he’d given her, and the call was forwarded automatically. There was a second ringtone, then after a long wait a man answered in a Slavic language. She asked if he spoke English, and he said of course he did.

  The gravel crunches beneath the tyres, and the trees around the car quiver in the darkness. The headlights illuminate a small stream through the trees on the left.

  Parisa had asked the man where her little sister Amira was. She explained that Amira was among the group from Sheberghan that was expected to arrive in Sweden on Wednesday.

  The man spoke to someone else nearby, then replied that the journey had been quicker than normal, and that they had arrived at the rendezvous five days early. Her little sister was already in Sweden. Amira had been waiting three days for her, and she hadn’t known.

  The forest opens up to reveal a brighter night sky and, a short distance away, the sea. Parisa crosses a junction and heads down towards a marina.

  A large corrugated-metal workshop rises up above more than a hundred beached boats: big yachts with huge keels and long, narrow motorboats that look like sleek arrowheads.

  There’s light coming from a low barrack-like building. It illuminates a sign on the wooden wall: ‘Nyboda Boatyard’.

  Parisa turns the car around, and reverses towards the wall.

  When she gets out the sea breeze cuts right through her knitted sweater. She’s only wearing that and her comfy tracksuit bottoms, and just has trainers on her feet.

  Tarps knock against hulls, plastic rustles and the line on the flagpole slaps rhythmically.

  She can see movement behind the dirty curtain of the barrack.

  A narrow path between the tall metal workshop and the densely packed rows of boats leads down to the water.

  Parisa hangs the bag with the pistol in it over her shoulder and goes up the steep flight of steps to the barracks. She knocks, waits a few seconds, then goes inside, into an office with a shabby desk and nautical charts stapled to the walls. A man who looks to be over seventy is sitting at the desk going through some receipts. In a wicker chair in the corner sits a woman of the same age, knitting.

  The man is dressed in a short-sleeved shirt, and his hairy lower arms are resting on the desk. He’s wearing a scratched gold watch around his wrist. The woman lowers her knitting to her lap and looks up quizzically at Parisa.

  ‘I’m here to pick up my sister,’ Parisa says calmly. ‘Her name is Amira.’

  The man runs one hand over his bald head and invites her to sit down in the visitor’s chair.

  Parisa sits down and hears a gentle clicking sound behind her back as the woman in the wicker chair resumes kni
tting.

  ‘We were starting to think no one was going to come and get the last one,’ the man says as he reaches for a folder.

  ‘She wasn’t supposed to get here until Wednesday,’ Parisa explains coolly.

  ‘Really? Well, this is going to cost quite a bit,’ the man goes on disinterestedly, then licks a finger and leafs through the shipping dockets in the file.

  ‘Everything’s already been paid for,’ Parisa says.

  ‘If you’d picked her up when she arrived,’ the man replies, giving her a quick glance.

  ‘Doesn’t she want to pay?’ the woman asks anxiously.

  ‘Oh, she’ll pay,’ the man says, pointing at a pink sheet of paper in the folder. ‘Three days’ room and board, cleaning charge, and administrative costs.’

  The woman starts knitting again behind Parisa as the man taps some numbers into a pocket calculator next to a dusty telephone.

  Parisa hears a sander in the workshop.

  The man licks his wrinkled lips and leans back in his chair.

  ‘Thirty-two thousand and three hundred kronor,’ he says, turning the calculator towards her.

  ‘Thirty-two thousand?’

  ‘We can’t afford charity. Sadly there’s no leeway,’ he explains.

  ‘Do you accept cards?’ Parisa asks, even though she knows she doesn’t have that much money in her account.

  ‘No,’ he smiles.

  ‘I don’t have that much cash.’

  ‘Then you’ll have to go to Åkersberga and take the money out, but do bear in mind that the debt will keep rising the longer she stays here.’

  ‘I need to speak to her first,’ Parisa says, standing up.

  ‘If we start making exceptions, then—’

  ‘She’s my sister,’ she explains, raising her voice. ‘Don’t you understand? She’s come all this way. She can’t speak a word of Swedish. I have to talk to her.’

  ‘We understand that you’re upset, but it isn’t our fault that you didn’t come and get her, and—’

  ‘Tell me where she is!’ Parisa interrupts, waits a few seconds, then walks past the woman and out through the door.