Page 59 of We Chase Shadows

‘We know he’s been active since about 2001,’ says Amy.

Sara looks at the photograph again. ‘But this man must be seventy? So even in 2001 he would be in his forties?’

Steve had been thinking about this. Criminals tend to appear suddenly in their teens or early twenties. Not their forties. Not many people enjoy a twenty-year career in chartered accountancy and then decide to pivot into fraud and murder. Although, in the end, the guy dumping severed limbs in supermarket toilets had been a quantity surveyor from Carshalton.

‘Well, there it is,’ says Sara. ‘He is not Jakob Eriksson. He has just chosen the name from somewhere, a child’s gravestone perhaps? Or a morgue. What was your book, Rosie, that was set in a morgue?’

‘When the Dead Scream,’ says Rosie.

‘That’s it,’ says Sara, smiling and shaking her head. ‘I honestly don’t know where you get your jokes from.’

‘Well …’ says Rosie.

‘You’re saying you don’t think Jakob Eriksson is his real name?’ says Amy.

‘I’m saying I know every Swedish criminal,’ says Sara. ‘But I’ve never seen this man, and I’ve never heard of this man. You want to find him?’

Rosie nods. ‘We’re investigating a murder. He’s our chief suspect.’

‘What sort of murder?’ Sara asks.

‘A bodyguard shot in the back of the head,’ says Steve.

Sara thinks about this. ‘A bit slapstick for my tastes. Why do you think this man Eriksson committed this murder?’

‘He’s a rival of our client,’ says Rosie. ‘And he left a note.’

Sara shrugs. ‘Listen, maybe he is successful, maybe he is Swedish, maybe he killed a bodyguard. Maybe many things. But I know everyone, and I don’t know him. I doubt it very much that he is called Jakob Eriksson. He is not young, so he must have been someone else in 2001.’

This would make some sense of the man’s elusiveness.

‘You don’t need to find out who Jakob Eriksson is,’ says Sara. ‘You need to find out who he was.’

‘Where he suddenly came from?’ says Steve.

‘No one appears from nowhere,’ says Sara. ‘He must have been someone before he was Jakob Eriksson.’

Steve nods. What do they really know about Jakob Eriksson? What he looks like, sure, but what else? Even Vern has told them very little. But surely if he and Eriksson are friends, then he would have more information than he has given them thus far?

The closer they get to Jakob Eriksson, the further away he seems to drift.

Perhaps Palm Springs will bring better luck?

Sara Lindstrat starts laughing. Steve, Rosie and Amy look at each other. Her shoulders are now heaving, and she is dabbing at her eyes with a black handkerchief.

‘Are you okay?’ Amy asks.

‘I’m so sorry, Rosie,’ Sara manages to get out. ‘I’m just thinking of when you made that detective jump out of a third-storey window and he landed on a spike.’

Sara is composing herself now.

‘I don’t think that was one of mine,’ says Rosie.

Sara has a think about this, then raises a hand to her forehead. ‘You’re right, of course. That was one of mine. Will you stay for lunch?’

‘We probably need to get going,’ says Rosie, already getting to her feet. ‘Long flight.’

So that was Sweden.