The Sandman. Ларс Кеплер

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       23

      Joona stared at the motionless figure between the tree trunks. He could feel the weight of his semi-automatic pistol and the chill of the night air on his fingers. He could hear Samuel’s breathing beside him.

      The situation was beginning to seem slightly absurd when, without warning, the man took a step forward.

      They could see he was holding a bag in one hand.

      Afterwards it was hard to know what it was that convinced them both that they had found the man they were looking for.

      The man just smiled up at the window of Roseanna’s bedroom, then vanished into the bushes.

      The snow covering the grass crunched faintly beneath their feet as they crept after him. They followed the fresh footprints through the dormant forest until they eventually reached an old railway line.

      Far off to the right they could see the figure on the track. He passed below an electricity pylon, crossing the tangle of shadows thrown by its frame.

      The railway was still used for goods traffic, and ran from Värta Harbour right through Lill-Jan’s Forest.

      Joona and Samuel followed, sticking to the deep snow beside the tracks to avoid being seen.

      The railway line carried on beneath a viaduct and into the expanse of forest. Suddenly everything got much quieter and darker again.

      The black trees stood close together with their snow-covered branches.

      Joona and Samuel silently speeded up so as not to lose sight of him.

      When they emerged from the curve around Uggleviken marsh they could see that the railway line stretching out ahead of them was empty.

      The man had left the track somewhere and gone into the forest.

      They climbed up onto the rails and looked out into the white forest, then started to walk back. It had been snowing over recent days and the snow was largely untouched.

      Then they found a set of footprints they had missed earlier. The skinny man had left the rails and headed off into the forest. The ground beneath the snow was wet and the prints left by his shoes had darkened. Ten minutes before they had been white and impossible to see in the weak light, but now they were dark as lead.

      They followed the tracks into the forest, towards the large reservoir. It was almost pitch-black among the trees.

      The murderer’s footprints were crossed three times by the lighter tracks of a hare.

      At one point it was so dark that they lost his trail again. They stopped, then spotted the tracks again and hurried on.

      Suddenly they could hear high-pitched whimpering sounds. It was like an animal crying, like nothing Joona and Samuel had ever heard before. They followed the footprints and drew closer to the source of the sounds.

      What they saw between the tree trunks was like something out of some grotesque medieval story. The man they had followed was standing in front of a shallow grave. The ground around him was covered with freshly dug earth. An emaciated, filthy woman was trying to get out of the coffin, crying and struggling to clamber up over the edge. But each time she was on her way up, the man pushed her down again.

      For a couple of seconds Joona and Samuel could only stand there, staring, before taking the safety catches off their weapons and rushing in.

      The man wasn’t armed, and Joona knew he ought to aim at the man’s legs, but he couldn’t help aiming at his heart.

      They ran over the dirty snow, forced the man onto his stomach and cuffed both his wrists and feet.

      Samuel stood panting, pointing his pistol at the man as he called emergency control.

      Joona could hear the sob in his voice.

      They had caught a previously unknown serial killer.

      His name was Jurek Walter.

      Joona carefully helped the woman up out of the coffin, and tried to calm her down. She just lay on the ground gasping. When Joona explained that help was on the way, he caught a glimpse of movement through the trees. Something large was running away, a branch snapped, fir trees swayed and snow fell softly like cloth.

      Perhaps it was a deer.

      Joona realised later that it must have been Jurek Walter’s accomplice, but right then all they could think about was saving the woman and getting the man into custody in Kronoberg.

      It turned out that the woman had been in the coffin for almost two years. Jurek Walter had regularly supplied her with food and water, then covered the grave over again.

      The woman had gone blind, and was severely undernourished, her muscles had atrophied and compression sores had left her deformed, and her hands and feet had suffered frostbite.

      At first it was assumed that she was merely traumatised, but as time passed it became clear that she had incurred severe brain damage.