The Laughing Policeman. Джонатан Франзен

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      ‘So that whoever was up there couldn't escape,’ said Kristiansson, trying to make things better.

      ‘But Jesus Christ there wasn't anyone up there! All you managed to do was to ruin every single footprint there was in the whole damn bus! To say nothing of outside! And why did you go tramping about among the bodies? Was it to make even more of a gory mess inside there?’

      ‘To see if anyone was still alive,’ Kristiansson said.

      He turned pale and swallowed.

      ‘Now don't start throwing up again, Kalle,’ Kvant said reprovingly.

      The door opened and Martin Beck came in. Kristiansson stood up at once, and after a moment Kvant followed his example.

      Martin Beck nodded to them and looked inquiringly at Gunvald Larsson.

      ‘Are you the one who is shouting? It doesn't help much, bawling out these boys.’

      ‘Yes it does,’ Gunvald Larsson retorted. ‘It's constructive.’

      ‘Constructive?’

      ‘Exactly. These two idiots …’

      He broke off and reconsidered his vocabulary.

      ‘These two colleagues are the only witnesses we have. Listen now, you two! What time did you arrive on the scene?’

      ‘Thirteen minutes past eleven,’ Kvant said. ‘I took the time on my chronograph.’

      ‘And I sat in exactly the same spot where I'm sitting now,’ Gunvald Larsson said. ‘I received the call at eighteen minutes past eleven. If we allow a wide margin and say that you fumbled with the radio for half a minute and that it took fifteen seconds for the Radio Central to contact me, that still leaves more than four minutes. What were you doing during that time?’

      ‘Well …’ said Kvant.

      ‘You ran about like poisoned rats, trampling in blood and brains and moving bodies and doing God knows what. For four minutes.’

      ‘I really can't see what's constructive –’ Martin Beck began, but Gunvald Larsson cut him off.

      ‘Wait a minute. Apart from the fact that these nitwits spent four minutes ruining the scene of the crime, they did get there at thirteen minutes past eleven. And they didn't go of their own accord but were told by the man who first discovered the bus. Is that right?’

      ‘Yes,’ said Kvant.

      ‘The old boy with the dog,’ said Kristiansson.

      ‘Exactly. They were notifed by a person whose name they didn't even bother to find out and whom we probably would never have identified if he hadn't been nice enough to come here today. When did you first catch sight of this man with the dog?’

      ‘Well …’ said Kvant.

      ‘About two minutes before we got to the bus,’ said Kristiansson, looking down at his boots.

      ‘Exactly. Because according to his statement they wasted at least a minute sitting in the car and shouting at him rudely. About dogs and things. Am I right?’

      ‘Yes,’ mumbled Kristiansson.

      ‘When you received the information the time was therefore approximately ten or eleven minutes past. How far from the bus was this man when he stopped you?’

      ‘About three hundred yards,’ said Kvant.

      ‘That's a fact, that's a fact,’ said Gunvald Larsson. ‘And since this man was seventy years old and also had a sick dachshund to drag along …’

      ‘Sick?’ said Kvant in surprise.

      ‘Exactly,’ Gunvald Larsson replied. ‘The damn dog had a slipped disc and was almost lame in the hind legs.’

      ‘I'm at last beginning to see what you mean,’ said Martin Beck.

      ‘Mm-m. I had the man do a trial run on the same stretch today. Dog and all. Made him do it three times, then the dog gave up.’

      ‘But that's cruelty to animals,’ Kvant said indignantly.

      Martin Beck cast a surprised and interested glance at him.

      ‘At any rate the pair of them couldn't cover the distance in under three minutes, however hard they tried. Which means that the man must have caught sight of the stationary bus at seven minutes past eleven at the latest. And we know almost for sure that the massacre took place between three and four minutes earlier.’

      ‘How do you know that?’ Kristiansson and Kvant said in chorus.

      ‘None of your business,’ Gunvald Larsson retorted.

      ‘Inspector Strenström's watch,’ said Martin Beck. ‘One of the bullets passed straight through his chest and landed up in his right wrist. It broke off the stem of his wrist watch, an Omega Speedmaster, which according to the expert made the watch stop at the same instant. The hands showed three minutes and thirty-seven seconds past eleven.’

      Gunvald Larsson glowered at him.

      ‘We knew Inspector Stenström, and he was meticulous about time,’ Martin Beck said sadly. ‘He was what watchmakers sometimes call a second hunter. That is, his watch always showed the exact time. Go on, Gunvald.’

      ‘This man with the dog came walking along Norrbackagatan from the direction of Karlbergsvägen. He was in fact overtaken by the bus just where the street begins. It took him about five minutes to trudge down Norrbackagatan. The bus did the same stretch in about forty-five seconds. He met nobody on the way. When he got to the corner he saw the bus standing on the other side of the street.’

      ‘So what,’ said Kvant.

      ‘Shut up,’ said Gunvald Larsson.

      Kvant made a violent movement and opened his mouth, but glanced at Martin Beck and shut it again.

      ‘He did not see that the windows had been shattered, which, by the way, these two wonderboys didn't notice either when they eventually managed to crawl along. But he did see that the front door was open. He thought there had been an accident and hurried to get help. Calculating, quite correctly, that it would be quicker for him to reach the last bus stop than to go back up the hill along Norrbackagatan, he started off along Norra Stationsgatan in a south-westerly direction.’

      ‘Why?’ said Martin Beck.

      ‘Because he thought there'd be another bus waiting at the end of the line. As it happened, there wasn't. Instead, unfortunately, he met a police patrol car.’

      Gunvald Larsson cast an annihilating china-blue glance at Kristiansson and Kvant.

      ‘A patrol car from Solna that came creeping out of its district like something that comes out when you lift up a rock. Well, how long had you been skulking with the engine idling and the front wheels on the СКАЧАТЬ