He opened the door at the end of the hall and saw a sofa in the corner, a dirty mattress on the floor and a pool table in the middle of the room.

No one was there. The footsteps had disappeared.

He listened, then went into the room. He had the sudden feeling of being watched. He turned around, sweeping with his gun, and scratched the wall with its muzzle. He swung around again, holding his breath, but didn’t see anything other than the dimly lit basement hallway.

A blue light shone in through the barred windows, and Henrik knew that reinforcements had finally arrived.

* * *

Gravel scraped against the floor as Jana Berzelius opened the door and stepped out into the stairwell. Through the window she saw two police cars and a horde of officers converging on the street below.

They must have found something, she thought. But she didn’t want to be found. Not here.

She had to find another way out.

She quickly turned back into the storage space.

She knew she had to hurry, had to figure something out. She probably only had a few minutes before her escape route would be closed off.

* * *

The police officers immediately dispersed to all floors. Henrik Levin heard their loud footsteps on the floor above him. He was standing in the room with the billiard table and was just about to go out when he heard a sound. A metallic sound, like a steel pipe being dragged against stone.

It was coming from next door.

He went slowly out into the hallway with the pistol pointed in front of him and positioned himself with his back against the wall. He looked carefully through the doorway and suddenly saw Axel Lundin standing there, in the middle of the dark room, ready to attack. But it wasn’t a steel pipe—he was holding a crowbar in his hand and was only three long strides away from Henrik.

Axel’s eyes had a vacant, disturbing look, and his whole body swayed back and forth.

“Drop the crowbar!” Henrik shouted, showing himself.

Axel took a step forward. Henrik stumbled backward into the hallway. Axel advanced, swinging the crowbar at him, forcing him to take several steps backward.

“Drop the crowbar, for fuck’s sake!”

The command came from Mia Bolander, who had entered through a doorway behind the man and was now standing with her feet firmly planted and her pistol pointed at his head.

“Drop it, I said!”

* * *

Jana Berzelius stuffed the sketch of Danilo into her pocket, pulled the bench away from the wall and opened the only way out, a hatch in the ceiling.

With both hands, she heaved herself up into the crawl space above the ceiling, closing the hatch behind her without a sound. She wriggled forward, searching for an opening and finding a large ventilation shaft. She kicked the sheet metal forcefully. It gave immediately, exposing a hole to the roof.