She puts on a pair of disposable gloves and takes a pen out of her pocket. She uses it to fish out the item. Just as she suspected, it turns out to be a pair of badly damaged glasses. The frame is bent and one lens is missing. She holds them up to the light. The remaining lens is tinted. She stiffens, looks up at the body. It is hanging face down, the features battered and contorted; one eye socket is empty. However, she immediately recognises the dead man. It is the bearded stranger from the party.

She replaces the glasses and slowly retraces her footsteps. She takes off the gloves without looking at Morell, then calls over the officer who rang her.

‘Olsson, get these vehicles out of here then cordon off an area of at least fifty square metres around the tree. No one sets foot there until the CSIs have arrived.’

Olsson looks confused. ‘But he’s a jumper,’ he says a little too loudly, glancing over Anna’s shoulder. She doesn’t need to turn around to understand that he’s seeking guidance from Morell.

‘We are treating this incident as a suspicious death until we have evidence to the contrary, so get the vehicles out of here and set up a cordon. Is that clear?’ No stammering, no hesitation. Good!

Olsson hesitates, looks over at Morell again.

‘Is that clear?’ she repeats in a tone that brooks no argument.

‘Yes,’ he mutters, heading reluctantly for his car.

Morell has crept up on her; he obviously heard the whole thing.

‘So, Anna . . .’ He bounces up and down on his heels. ‘As I said, it’s your district now, and your budget. But is this really the best use of resources, in view of—’

‘I’m afraid I have to ask you to leave, Henry,’ she interrupts him, trying to sound pleasant but firm. She takes a deep breath before delivering her final sentence. ‘Right now, please.’

Chapter 31

31

Autumn 2017

Anna’s first murder investigation was relatively straightforward. A standard Swedish murder involving two alcoholics partying in a seedy flat. At the beginning of the evening they were best friends and brothers, eating hot dogs and drinking Explorer Vodka with grape tonic. At some point just before midnight, things went wrong. They’d run out of booze earlier than planned, and one guy stuck a bread knife in the other’s chest before crashing out next to his victim on the sofa. Fingerprints, DNA, the suspect discovered half a metre from the victim. An open-and-shut case, as they say on TV.

However, she did learn something important: that the motive for the most serious crimes can be that you make your own drink a little stronger than someone else thinks is reasonable. Over the years that knowledge has served her well. No motive, however petty it might seem, can be ignored.