Two laps around crumb-covered tables where travelers later in the day could picnic, and hot, smelly trash cans that should have been emptied long ago.

Finally his phone rang.

“Sven here, again. Alone. With the door closed.”

“Good.”

“And?”

“I need your help.”

“With what?”

“With Hermansson.”

“With Hermansson?”

“Yes. She . . . something’s not right, Sven. She’s hiding something. And it’s making me worried. I want you to check it out. Maybe follow her.”

“What are you talking about? Hermansson? Am I supposed to start following her? Investigating her?”

“That’s exactly what I need you to do.”

“You know I’m not one to argue. But if you want me to—this is Hermansson, Ewert, Hermansson we’re talking about—if you want me to investigate her you’re going to have to tell me why.”

“I can’t do that.”

“If you want my help, you have no choice.”

Sven was right. Grens knew it. Detective Inspector Sundkvist was not one to argue, quite the opposite—he was almost conflict averse.

“Some documents have disappeared from Wilson’s office. Extremely classified. How it happened I don’t know. However, not many have spent much time in the vicinity of that safe. I asked Hermansson to help me investigate it. And got the wrong answer. Wrong feeling. And I don’t like those kinds of feelings.”

“I don’t understand—do you think Hermansson stole the documents?”

“All I know for certain is that we have a corrupt colleague somewhere among us. Someone we trust. Whose actions risk destroying people outside the police station. I know her. I understand her. And I know that something’s off right now. Follow her. If nothing else, so that we can rule out her involvement in all this.”

They spent the last half hour of the drive in silence. Grens made it clear he didn’t want to talk anymore, and Lucas had finally realized that sometimes the best thing you can do in a situation is nothing at all.

Söderköping was a perfect summer town, a little more inviting, a little more charming than other places on this warm June day. People moved more slowly here, the water in the Göta Canal seemed to shine more brightly, and even the shade seemed to offer another kind of cool. The building on Gamla Skol Street was equally attractive—a wooden house from the early twentieth century, two stories and smack-dab in the middle of town. The detective superintendent hadn’t called ahead. He had tried that at dawn without success. Now he parked in front of the entrance, went up the stairs with two cadets at his heels, and rang the doorbell.

“Yes?”

The woman who opened the door was a couple years older than Grens himself. That fit. According to his contact at the Tax Agency, it hadn’t been that long since Charlotte M. Andersen had retired.