‘Moonif didn’t want to take the glass recycling. But everyone has to help, I told him. All Swedish people recycle and we should too. So he took them even though he didn’t want to.’

‘And this Samira, where does she live?’

‘House across the street, first floor.’ The boy’s mother pointed.

‘Did Moonif’s teacher say whether she was in school or not?’

‘I don’t know. I was so very worried and didn’t know to ask.’

Lilja nodded and put a comforting hand on the boy’s mother’s arm just as their neighbour returned with a school picture in which the neatly combed boy was dressed up in a nice white shirt, waistcoat and bow tie.

‘He told me he picked out the clothes himself and dressed up so Samira would like him,’ the woman confided quietly while the boy’s mother lit incense sticks and started shuffling the tarot cards. ‘I do think they’re a bit infatuated.’

*

Lilja hurried down the stairs. She needed to get out and get some fresh air. Something about incense made her feel sick and when the boy’s mother had started asking the cards about how she should proceed with the investigation, she’d decided to wrap things up.

All statistics suggested the boy would turn up of his own accord in the near future and that there would be an innocuous explanation for his disappearance. But she had promised to contact the school and Samira and her parents, and if that didn’t turn up anything, she was going to contact the local Bjuv police and ask them to put out a missing person alert.

It was the sign that changed her mind. Instead of stepping outside and filling her lungs with fresh air, she opened the metal door that was standing ajar next to the stairs to the basement.

Recycling Room.

According to the boy’s mother, Moonif had taken the glass recycling down there, so there might be some clue as to where he’d got to.

A fluorescent ceiling light turned on automatically when she stepped into the room and looked around. Apart from a number of big bins on wheels lined up against the grimy concrete wall, the room was as empty as it was silent. There was no one there. Even so, she decided to open the bins one by one and root around the cardboard, newspapers and sticky plastic containers.

But she could see no sign of a missing boy. Not until she turned on the flashlight on her phone and peered in under one of the bins. In that moment, it became clear she had made a grave error and that the boy’s mother and her tarot cards had been right all along.