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Back Bad Apples Save as PDF
Chapters (65)
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  65. Acknowledgements

‘Forensics? Ballistics? Physical evidence? Fibres? Anything you can share?’

‘Early days, Tuvs,’ says Thord, sipping his coffee. ‘And don’t go grilling Noora neither, she’s under strict orders from the Chief to keep things to herself. He told her there needs to be a Chinese wall between the two of you when it comes to police business.’

‘Why do you think I’m here talking with you?’

He grins and winks and wags his finger at me.

‘Gun?’ I say.

‘Not recovered yet. A 6.5x55mm, or so I’m told, which is pretty standard this time of year. Shot from roughly twenty metres away in thick fog. Which suggests Arne Persson was dead for a while before he was discovered. Considerable blood loss. The…’ he whispers, ‘the head has still not been located.’

‘His ex-wife told me he would have been out exercising in the forest.’

‘Not always good for your health,’ says Thord.

I widen my eyes at the gallows humour.

‘I’m sorry.’ He rubs his chin. ‘Tough week. Listen, no fingerprints so it’s possible the shooter never touched the victim. Or could be he was wearing gloves.’

I think back to Wimmer’s latex watchmaker finger covers.

‘Bootprints are a complete disaster. Too many, a muddy mess this time of year. Churned and then destroyed by the never-ending rain. Victim’s wedding ring was taken, which suggests to me this could have been personal in some way. Not much value in that ring. We got the boys from Karlstad homicide assisting. Any major developments I’ll give you the nod, if I can. Best guess, in those conditions – thick fog, elk hunt in full swing, that far away from any other town or city – I’d say it’s most likely a local resident’s responsible. Some kind of bad blood.’

Thord gets called away on his radio so I walk over to Tammy’s food van on the far side of the ICA-Maxi parking lot.

The rear of her van now has CCTV installed. The end door has been reinforced and locks from inside. Two bolts not one. I reach the serving hatch and look in.

She’s in there on her stool watching something on her iPad.

‘This is a hold-up,’ I say, a McFlurry ice cream in each hand.

She springs up and sticks her head out the hatch and kisses me on the cheek. ‘Dessert of the gods,’ she says, taking a Daim McFlurry. ‘Processed-dairy full-fat goodness from pudding McHeaven.’

14

Tam switches things off and shutters up her food van. 5:10pm. Her prep is done. Twenty-minute break until she opens for dinner.