The Fire Witness: A Novel Read online

  “That night?”

  “No, earlier…” Elin falls silent and Daniel holds her shoulders and tries to catch her eyes.

  “What is it?”

  “Vicky and Miranda played some game, where they held their hands over their face,” Elin says. “I don’t want to tell the police because that would add to their evidence.”

  “But Elin—”

  “Perhaps it doesn’t mean anything,” Elin says quickly. “I’m going to ask Vicky when I have a chance. She should be able to explain what they were doing.”

  “What if she can’t?”

  He falls silent as the waiter returns with the bottle of wine. Elin dries her tears and Daniel returns to his seat. He places his napkin on his knee and then tastes the wine. His hand shakes.

  “Good,” he says, a little too quickly.

  They are silent while the wine is poured. They thank the waiter and look carefully at each other when they’re left alone.

  “I want to foster Vicky again,” Elin says in a serious tone.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Do you think I’m not up to it?” She smiles.

  “It’s not that, Elin,” he says. “Vicky is suicidal. She’s gotten better but she still has a great deal of self-destructive behavior.”

  “Does she cut herself?”

  “She cuts herself and she overdoses. In my opinion, she’ll need twenty-four-hour care.”

  “So you wouldn’t recommend me?”

  “She needs professional help,” Daniel says. “I mean, I don’t think she got enough care at Birgittagården, actually. We didn’t have the money for it, but—”

  “What does she need?”

  “People to care for her around the clock.”

  “And therapy?”

  “I only had one hour a week with each student, sometimes two. It was much too little if you—”

  Elin’s cell phone rings and she excuses herself as she looks at the display. It’s Johannes Grünewald, so she answers right away.

  “What’s going on?” she asks.

  “I’ve looked into the matter and the prosecutor has decided that the girl will be arraigned without further interrogation,” the lawyer replies. “I’m going to talk to the court about the time for arraignment, but we’ll need a few more hours.”

  “Will Vicky accept help from us?”

  “I talked to her and she’s hired me as her lawyer.”

  “Did you mention me?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “Did she say anything?”

  “Well, she said … They’ve medicated her and—”

  “What did she say about me?”

  “Nothing at all.”

  Daniel can see a wave of pain pass over Elin’s beautiful face.

  “Meet me at the hospital,” she says. “It’s just as well to talk to her directly before we go much further.”

  “Good.”

  “How soon can you get there?”

  “Twenty minutes at the earliest, it should—”

  “Good, I’ll see you there,” she says, and ends the call. She looks at Daniel, who has a questioning look.

  “Okay then,” she says. “Vicky has taken Johannes on as her lawyer. I have to go now.”

  “Now? But we haven’t eaten yet!”

  “I know … I’m sorry.” She gets up. “Maybe we can meet for dessert later on.”

  “Of course,” he says with a weak smile.

  “Would you like to come with me to Söder Hospital?”

  “I don’t think I’m up to it,” he replies.

  “I don’t mean that you should see her,” she says swiftly. “I was thinking of myself. I would feel calmer if I knew you were waiting outside.”

  “Elin, it’s just … I haven’t come so far that I can think about Vicky … I need more time. Elisabet is dead and even if Vicky didn’t do it—”

  “I understand,” Elin says. “It wouldn’t be good for you to see her.”

  “Or maybe it would,” he says. “Maybe it would help me start to remember. I just have no idea how I would react.”

  146

  Vicky turns her face away when Saga enters the room. White straps around her ankles and wrists and a belt across her chest tie the girl to the bed.

  “Take away the straps,” Saga says.

  “I can’t do that,” the nurse says.

  “It’s a good thing that they’re scared of me,” Vicky says.

  “Have you been kept like this all night?” asks Saga as she sits down on the chair beside the bed.

  “Yeah.”

  Vicky is lying with her face turned away.

  “I’m going to meet your new lawyer,” Saga says. “There’s going to be an arraignment later today and he needs the transcript of the interrogation.”

  “I just get so angry sometimes.”

  “The interrogation is over, Vicky.”

  “Can’t I talk?” She turns her head to look at Saga.

  “It would be best if you asked your lawyer for his advice first before you—”

  “But if I want to,” she says.

  “You can talk, but it won’t be recorded,” Saga says calmly.

  “It’s like a strong wind,” Vicky tells her. “Everything just … It thunders in my ears and I go along so I don’t fall over.”

  Saga looks at the girl’s bitten fingernails and then repeats in a calm, almost indifferent voice, “Like a strong wind.”

  “I can’t explain. It’s like one time … They hurt Simon really bad. He was a little boy. We were in the same foster home,” Vicky says. Her mouth is trembling. “The big boy in the family, he was their real son, he was mean to Simon. He’d torture him. Everybody knew. I even talked to the social worker about it, but nobody cared.”

  “What happened?”

  “I came into the kitchen. The big boy had forced Simon’s hands into a pot of boiling water and the mom was there and she wasn’t doing anything. She looked totally afraid. I was seeing all of it and I got really strange and suddenly I found myself hitting them and cutting them up with a piece of glass.”

  Vicky pulls at the straps. Her body is tense, but she calms down when there’s a knock at the door.

  A gray-haired man wearing a dark blue suit enters the room.

  “I’m Johannes Grünewald,” he says as he shakes hands with Saga.

  “Here’s the latest transcript,” Saga says, and hands him a folder.

  “Thanks,” Johannes says. “I don’t have to read it right away. I managed to get the arraignment moved to tomorrow morning.”

  “I don’t want to wait,” says Vicky.

  “I understand, but I still have some work to do on your case,” he says, smiling. “And there’s someone I want you to meet before we start going through all sorts of questions.”

  Vicky looks up and her eyes grow wide as she sees the woman who heads straight for her without stopping to greet the police officers. Elin Frank’s eyes are shimmering and nervous. Her lips tremble as she realizes the girl is strapped to the bed.

  “Hello,” Elin says.

  Vicky looks away as Elin gently unfastens the straps.

  “May I sit down?” she asks. Her voice is thick with emotion.

  Vicky’s gaze becomes hard and she does not say anything.

  “Do you remember me?” asks Elin.

  Elin’s throat hurts from the words she can’t force out and the sobs she can barely control.

  A church bell starts ringing somewhere in the city.

  Vicky touches Elin’s wrist and then withdraws her finger.

  “We have the same bandages.” Elin smiles. “You and me.”

  Vicky turns her face away.

  “I don’t know whether you remember me,” Elin says. “You stayed with me when you were a little girl. I was just a temporary foster mother, but I’ve never stopped thinking about you.”

  She takes a deep breath. Then her voice breaks: “I know I betrayed you, Vicky. I wasn’t up to taking care of you.”r />
  Elin is studying the girl in the bed: her messy hair, her worried forehead, the dark rings around her eyes, the wounds on her face.

  “I know that to you I’m nothing. Just another person in a long line of people who’ve let you down.” Elin has to stop speaking and swallow hard before she can continue.

  “The prosecutor wants you in jail, but I don’t think that jail is the right place for you. It’s not good for anyone to be locked up.”

  Vicky shakes her head. The gesture is barely noticeable, but Elin sees it and her voice is intense as she says, “It’s really important that you listen to what Johannes and I have to tell you.”

  147

  There’s an arraignment room on the ground floor of the National Police building. It’s a simple conference room with chairs, a desk, and a table of lacquered fir. About twenty journalists have already collected in the glass-enclosed foyer and TV vans are parked on Polhemsgatan.

  The hard rain of the previous night has streaked the triple-paned windows of the arraignment room, and wet leaves are stuck to the white window frames. A uniformed policeman is standing by the wall next to the door, and the judge, an older man with bushy eyebrows, sits behind the desk.

  Susanne Öst appears pale and tense, and Vicki looks small and exhausted. She sits between Elin Frank and her lawyer, bent over as if her stomach hurts.

  “Where’s Joona?” she whispers.

  “We don’t know if he can come,” Johannes says.

  Susanne stands up. “If it please, Your Honor, I would like to request that Vicky Bennet be jailed on suspicion of the murders of Elisabet Grim and Miranda Eriksdotter, as well as on suspicion of kidnapping Dante Abrahamsson.”

  The judge writes something down and Susanne hands him a Cerlox-bound collection of documents before she begins to relate the conclusions reached during the preliminary investigation.

  “All the technical evidence points to Vicky Bennet and no one but Vicky Bennet.”

  Susanne pauses for a moment before she begins to go through the reports from the crime scene investigation. Barely restraining her eagerness, she puts special emphasis on the biological evidence and the fingerprints.

  “The boots found in Vicky Bennet’s closet have been matched to footprints from both crime scenes. Blood from both victims have been found in her room and on her clothing. Vicky Bennet’s bloody handprint was found on the windowsill.”

  “Why do they have to talk about all of this?” Vicky whispers.

  “I don’t know,” Elin replies.

  “If Your Honor would look at the appendices to the National Forensic Laboratory’s expert opinion.” Susanne waits for the judge to find the right document. “On page 9 the murder weapon can be seen. Vicky Bennet’s fingerprints have been lifted from the handle. See pages 113 and 114 for photos of them. The comparative analysis has concluded that Vicky Bennet has used the murder weapon.”

  The judge looks through the material. Then Susanne begins to relate the conclusions from the expanded forensic autopsy report: “Miranda Eriksdotter died from blunt trauma to the head. This is beyond a doubt. She had compression fractures on her temporal bone and—”

  “Susanne,” the judge says in a friendly manner, “we are only discussing whether the suspect should be kept in jail until trial or not. We’re not at the main trial.”

  “I know.” The prosecutor nods. “However, considering the young age of the suspect, I thought it would be important to demonstrate the reasons why she should be in jail.”

  “As long as you don’t take up too much time,” the judge says.

  “Thank you,” Susanne says. She then describes all the injuries on both victims, including Elisabet Grim’s serious defensive wounds, and how long the victims had been dead before they were discovered, based on the lividity.

  “Where is Joona?” Vicky asks again.

  Johannes places a hand on Vicky’s arm and whispers that if Joona hasn’t appeared by the break, he’ll give him a call.

  148

  When they return to the room after the break to resume the hearing, Joona still hasn’t shown up. Johannes shakes his head at Vicky’s questioning face. Vicky is pale and again sits bent over and silent.

  Susanne reports the results of the crime scene investigation by the Västernorrland police department: how Vicky pursued Elisabet Grim to the brewery house and how she took her life so that she could get her hands on the keys to the isolation room.

  Vicky has lowered her face and tears are running down her cheeks.

  The prosecutor describes the second murder, the flight through the forest, the theft of the automobile, the impulse kidnapping, and finally the suspect’s capture in Stockholm. She then details the girl’s violence during the interrogation and the need for her to be strapped to the bed.

  For kidnapping, the sentence can vary anywhere from four years to life. For murder, the sentence is a minimum of ten years.

  Susanne Öst concludes by saying that although Vicky Bennet is extremely violent and dangerous, she is not a monster. In order to be ahead of the defense team, she takes pains to point out the suspect’s positive attributes. She has presented her side competently and ends her speech by quoting the interrogation synopsis.

  “During the third interrogation, the suspect confessed to both murders. I quote: ‘I killed Miranda’ and later, in response to whether Elisabet Grim wanted to lend her the keys, the suspect replied, ‘I smashed her skull in.’”

  149

  The judge, who is looking tired, turns to Vicky Bennet and Johannes Grünewald and asks them formally if they have any objections to the case presented by the prosecutor. Vicky stares at the judge with a frightened expression. She shakes her head. Johannes, however, holds back a smile as he says he would like to go through the confession again to make sure that the court has not missed anything.

  “I knew when I saw you that this wouldn’t be easy,” the judge says calmly.

  In his objections, Johannes does not raise any of the technical evidence or even question Vicky’s guilt. He lists Vicky’s positive qualities, which the prosecutor had just mentioned, and emphasizes the young age of the suspect.

  Then Johannes says, “Even if Vicky Bennet and her previous lawyer signed the interrogation, the prosecutor should not have done so.”

  “The prosecutor shouldn’t have?” The judge looks surprised.

  Johannes goes up to him and points out Vicky’s response in the transcript. The prosecutor has highlighted the words “I killed Miranda” in yellow.

  “Could you read her entire answer?” Johannes asks.

  “‘I killed Miranda,’” the judge reads.

  “Not just the highlighted words, please.”

  “‘I killed Miranda, didn’t I?’”

  “Would you consider that a confession?” asks Johannes.

  “No,” the judge says.

  Susanne Öst stands up. “But her next response,” she says. “Her next confession—”

  “Quiet,” says the judge.

  “Would Your Honor be so kind as to ask the prosecutor to read it aloud?” Johannes suggests.

  The judge nods. Susanne’s voice trembles as she says, “‘I smashed her skull in. That’s what you want to hear, isn’t it?’”

  “This sounds like a confession,” the judge says, turning to Johannes.

  “Please look carefully at the entire transcript, Your Honor,” Johannes says. He points.

  “‘This interrogation is concluded,’” the judge reads.

  “Who says that the interrogation is concluded?”

  The judge runs his hand down the page and looks at the prosecutor.

  “I did,” she says quietly.

  “And this means?” the judge asks.

  “That the interrogation was concluded,” Susanne says. “But I just wanted—”

  “You should be ashamed.” The judge stops her sharply.

  “To use this confession in an arrest consideration is against Swedish law, Article 40 of the U
nited Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the Council of Europe agreement,” Johannes says.

  150

  Susanne Öst sits down with a thump. She pours water into her glass and spills some on the table. She wipes the drops up with her sleeve and drinks. Her hand is shaking. When she hears Johannes call Daniel Grim as a witness, she understands how completely her hand has been undermined. She’ll have to lower the level of suspicion required if Vicky is going to be sent to jail at all.

  Elin tries to look at Vicky’s face, but the girl is keeping her head down.

  Using his warmest voice, Johannes introduces Daniel Grim, mentioning how long he has worked at Birgittagården and all the institutions where he’s worked previously. Vicky looks up for the first time. She tries to meet Daniel’s eyes, but he’s staring straight ahead, his lips pursed.

  “Daniel,” Johannes begins, “please tell us how well you know Vicky Bennet.”

  “Know,” Daniel repeats, thinking. “No, I…” He stops speaking.

  Vicky scratches one of the scabs on her wrist.

  “Is there any psychologist or counselor who knows her better than you do?”

  “No, there isn’t,” Daniel whispers.

  “Not one?”

  “No, well, it’s hard to judge. I don’t believe she had much therapy, if any, before she came to Birgittagården. So it’s my understanding she was in therapy longer with me than with anyone else.”

  “You had one hour of cognitive behavioral therapy with Vicky every week until she ran away, is that correct?” Johannes asks.

  “Yes. I also took part in her All Day Lifestyle training.”

  “That’s training to prepare patients for a normal life back in society,” Johannes explains to the judge.

  “It’s a big step,” Daniel tells the judge.

  Johannes contemplates Daniel for a while and his tone is serious when he says, “Now I have to ask you a difficult question.”

  “All right.”

  “There is a great deal of technical evidence that points to Vicky Bennet being involved in the murder of your wife.”