The voice belongs to a man of about thirty-five with a shaved head, seated at the far end of the long conference table. He has crossed his muscular arms and is leaning back with his legs stretched out in front of him. Someone chuckles, but a look from Byle quickly turns the mirth into a cough. Karen sighs and has to briefly search her memory for his name. Police Constable Robert Röse, Byle had said.

‘No, we’re not, but as I’m sure you know, in reality these things are rarely as straightforward as TV makes them out to be. That being said, we do have enough to classify Fredrik Stuub’s death as suspicious and continue our investigation.’

Karen outlines Kneought Brodal’s preliminary conclusions based on the victim’s facial injuries, the drag wounds on his feet and the bruises in the armpits. She passes around a stack of photographs, some from the crime scene and some from the autopsy table.

‘The crime scene investigation also supports the theory that Stuub was murdered,’ she continues. ‘We probably won’t have any lab results until after New Year’s, but the technicians were able to identify drag marks that closely match the injuries on Stuub’s body. Officially, this is only a suspected crime, but in practice there can be no doubt this is murder, or at the very least, manslaughter.’

‘Were there any footprints or tyre tracks?’

This time, the question comes from a man who could be Röse’s younger brother. The same shaved head and oversized arm muscles. There is none of his colleague’s arrogance in his voice, however. Once again, Karen struggles to remember the name Byle gave her. It might have been Andersson. Röse is the arsehole, Andersson seems fine, and what was the name of the quiet woman with the ponytail? Ella . . . Svanberg? No, Svanemark. Well, she seems conscientious, at any rate, Karen muses, glancing at the woman’s comprehensive notes.

‘According to Larsen we shouldn’t get our hopes up about the forensic evidence,’ she replies, turning to Andersson. ‘In addition to a large number of paw prints from Fredrik Stuub’s dog, several sets of shoe prints were secured. Some of them are likely to belong to Gertrud Stuub and as soon as we know the size and type of the others, we can start looking for matches. I’m hopeful those results will come back sooner rather than later. Unfortunately, as far as tyre tracks go, there are far too many of them down by the turning area – from locals dumping rubbish – for there to be any point analysing them. And aside from all the ones that were there already, now there are obviously tracks from the first responders, which is to say emergency services, the doctor . . .’