The Swedish Girl Page 7

  ‘Better?’

  Colin nodded and stifled a sigh. Glancing up, he looked at the detective properly for the first time. Detective Inspector Grant was quite a pretty woman, her dark hair cut short in a way that suited her elfin face. She had little make-up on that he could see and the tiny silver earrings shaped into knots were her only adornment. Colin’s gaze fell onto her fingers. No rings. Not married, then, he thought, trying to sum her up as best he could. Her rust-coloured shirt and dark brown suit were smart but not intimidating and he had noticed her high-heeled shoes tapping a beat along the corridor before him. A stylish lady, he would say were he asked, but not the sort of woman he fancied.

  Her grey eyes were looking into his face as he regarded her and Colin blushed, suddenly aware that he was staring.

  ‘Okay, well, thanks for coming in today, Mr Young. We know it’s been a pretty traumatic time for you all these last couple of days so we do appreciate your being here.’

  Colin looked up over her shoulder, seeing a uniformed officer for the first time standing by the door. Of course there had to be a second person there, hadn’t Kirsty told him that? They needed to corroborate any witness statement, didn’t they? Or was it in case one of the people being interviewed turned nasty?

  ‘… want you to tell me about the party,’ DI Grant was saying, her words cutting in on Colin’s thoughts.

  ‘Party?’ He gave his head a little shake as though to clear it. ‘Oh, right. What can I tell you?’ he asked, his hands clenched together under the table where he hoped she could not see them.

  ‘What can you remember of Eva’s movements that night?’ the detective asked.

  They were dancing together, Eva’s hand clasped in his when he pulled her closer, smelling the sweet scent of her hair, feeling her body mould itself to his. Did she notice his hardness? She’d smiled up at him as though it were the most natural thing in the world; a cat’s smile of satisfaction, he remembered. Then his arms were around her and they were kissing, moving into a darker corner where he swayed to the music, wanting her, wanting her…

  ‘She was dancing quite a lot,’ Colin began, swallowing hard and avoiding eye contact with the woman opposite.

  ‘With anyone in particular?’ Grant asked, her tone sharp, reminding him that this was an official enquiry.

  Colin shook his head, not trusting his voice to add to all the years of lies that smothered the air in this room.

  ‘Can you remember when she left the party, perhaps?’

  Sleep must have overtaken him afterwards, for when he eventually did awaken, she was gone, leaving him shivering and alone. Had he imagined that too? Had that longing translated itself into a dream or reality? Wandering back into the main room his eyes had peered through the gloom, trying to catch a glimpse of her in that pretty frock, hoping that she wasn’t one of the couples necking in a corner. And then, when he was sure she had gone, stumbling down the front steps and walking all the way back to the flat. He had walked for the best part of an hour, in a daze, holding onto the magic of the night like a fragile balloon that might blow away at the first tug of a freakish wind.

  ‘Mr Young?’

  ‘Sorry, think I was out of it,’ Colin shrugged. Would she take his diffidence for embarrassment that he had been too drunk to know what had been going on?

  The DI laid down her pen and clasped her hands together, resting her chin upon them. ‘Can you tell me what she was like, Colin?’ she asked, startling him by the use of his first name.

  ‘She was beautiful,’ he blurted out before he could stop himself.

  Then, to his horror, Colin Young began to cry.

  CHAPTER 13

  T

  he plane flew through a bank of pale grey clouds blotting out the dull green landscape that had been visible moments before. Henrik Magnusson sat by the window, staring out, too afraid to catch the eye of any person on this flight lest his weeping begin once more. Even the kindly smile from the purser as he had entered the cabin had made him bite his lip to control his emotions, though he wasn’t to know that the woman had given each and every passenger the same friendly greeting.

  It was so different from last summer in Glasgow when he and Eva had been doing up the flat during the summer vacation. A year ago they had still been together, spending the Christmas holiday skiing at Klosters, he remembered, seeing once again that flag of blond hair streaming behind her as Eva had swished down the slopes beside him. Even then he’d had such plans for her! After university she would return to live in the family house in Stockholm and he would begin to introduce her to the ins and outs of the Magnusson Corporation. She was destined for great things, Henrik had said proudly to anyone who would listen, never tiring of telling people how much she had meant to him. But now there was a different story that the world would tell about the fate of Eva Magnusson.

  As the plane banked, Henrik gripped the armrest, steeling himself not for the landing but for what awaited him beyond the confines of the approaching airport.

  Dr Rosie Fergusson picked up her briefcase and pulled her coat from the peg on the back of her office door. It was another lousy day, dark and foreboding as only days in the depth of a Scottish winter could be. Then, remembering the man she was about to meet, the pathologist gave a rueful grin. Bet they have gloomier days than we do, all the way up into the northern climes, she thought. No wonder the suicide rate was so high in places like Sweden if you had to wait months and months for a glimpse of sunshine.

  Outside, the rain had stopped and a weak band of light was showing in the east, but the dark clouds above surely held more bad weather, maybe even the first snows, Rosie told herself, pulling the coat collar around her neck as she slipped into the front of the Saab. It was a short ride across town to Glasgow City Mortuary where Rosie kept her other office and where Eva Magnusson’s body lay stored in the wall of refrigerators. The Swede had intimated that he wanted to come straight there from the airport and Rosie remembered the terse email letting her know when he expected to arrive.

  God! How she hated this part of her job, meeting the relatives of the dead. For some reason it had become worse since Abby’s birth, something that Solly had tried to explain to her in terms of psychology. Before her pregnancy Rosie had been well able to keep all of her emotions in check, always the consummate professional when dealing with her work. But now it was as if some fairy creature had stolen away her old reserves of… what? Stoicism? Objectivity? Or had she just been a hardened bitch back then? Nowadays the pathologist’s head was filled far more with thoughts about the relatives of the deceased and she seemed to have developed a keen empathy with the bereaved to the extent that she found it difficult sometimes to keep her own tears in check.

  As she entered the small parking place at the back of the mortuary, Rosie noticed the familiar blue van, its back doors opened wide and empty indicating that some other fatality would be awaiting her attention this Monday morning. A recent accident, perhaps? A sudden death, more than likely, but not one that had necessitated calling her out in the middle of the night, so probably not murder.

  She smiled at the undertakers as the empty trolley passed her. They had a job to do and so had she, and if that job was all about the dead, then so be it. They were owed as much care by the pathologist and her colleagues as any sick patients in hospital, yet a different sort of caring, since it was too late for them to speak of whatever had brought them to this place.

  And what had happened to the Swedish girl whose body would shortly be taken to the viewing room? That she had been strangled was quite evident. The death had probably been quick enough, but even those last suffocating seconds must have been terrifying. Whoever had committed this crime must have been strong enough to overcome the girl. Small and slight as she was, she had had youth and vigour on her side, not to mention the adrenalin rush that would have caused her to try to fight back. And the traces of semen… now had that come from the perpetrator? The victim had had sex with someone shortly before her death, a
fact that was already written in the pathologist’s report. Oh, dear Lord, Rosie sighed, knowing that this was something else she was dreading having to tell the father.

  The taxi stopped at the lights, letting Henrik see a different part of Glasgow from the business district with which he was familiar. Everything here looked dark, cold and dreary and, as if to underline his impressions, scraps of litter rose in a gust of wind then fell into gutters already lined with detritus. He wrinkled his nose in disgust. If he had known that parts of the city were like this… he dashed a gloved hand across his eyes. Of course he had known exactly what Glasgow was like, had even argued a little with Eva when she had made her choice to go to Strathclyde. Buying her that flat in Anniesland was meant to have protected her…

  The lights changed and the taxi turned into a side street where, facing them, he saw for the first time the High Court of Judiciary in all its glory. Then the cab turned once more and drew up outside a small grey Victorian building. Taking a deep breath, Henrik Magnusson stepped out into the cold of a Scottish December and made his way to the front door of Glasgow City Mortuary.

  He was a huge bear of a man, thought Rosie, ushering the Swede down the corridor to the viewing room where Eva Magnusson’s body lay. Apart from his immense height – maybe even taller than Lorimer – she noticed he was a handsome man, his blond hair cut into a smart style, his lambskin coat hugging a body that was strong and muscular. His eyes startled her they were such a vivid shade, making her remember the moment when she had drawn the dead girl’s eyelids down over their unseeing blue. That the Swedish girl’s father had the same eyes should not have unsettled her like this, but somehow it did.

  Magnusson had remembered the ordinary courtesies, even at a time like this, removing his heavy leather gloves to shake hands with this woman who had performed the post-mortem examination on his beloved daughter.

  She had taken his outstretched hand, told him how sorry she was for his loss, and now that these preliminaries were over they were standing side by side at the window that looked down on the body lying on top of the trolley. A sudden intake of breath and the sense that the man by her side had stiffened was all the reaction that Rosie noticed, though she stole a sideways glance at the bereaved father just to see if he wanted to speak. But there was only silence as he stood there, staring at his daughter; silence and a sense of sheer disbelief. Rosie’s eyes strayed to Magnusson’s fingers as he fiddled with his cuffs, straightening the solid cufflinks as though it was an unconscious habit. It’s stress, she thought. He needs to control even the tiniest things around him right now.

  Then, ‘Did she suffer?’ he asked quietly.

  ‘The post-mortem results suggest a quick death,’ Rosie replied briskly. Her answer had been ready and came perhaps a little too easily to her lips. ‘She would have lost consciousness in seconds,’ she added a little more gently.

  He nodded at that, still staring as though unable to take it all in, needing perhaps to see in order to believe.

  Then, as though some unspoken decision had been made, Magnusson turned away from the window and began walking back towards Rosie’s office.

  ‘When can I have her back?’ he asked gruffly and Rosie glanced at him again, noticing him swallowing hard, trying no doubt to refrain from showing any unmanly emotion. It took some men like that, she knew, the ones who didn’t want a stranger to see their grief, while other men simply broke down and wept, sometimes on her shoulder.

  ‘We’ll let you know, sir, but until the Procurator Fiscal decides that it may be released your daughter’s body will stay here with us,’ she said. ‘There may be a need for further examinations and so we have to keep Eva here in the mortuary.’

  ‘And now, Dr Fergusson, you will do me the courtesy of telling me exactly what you know about my daughter’s death.’

  Henrik Magnusson had stopped right outside Rosie’s office, his blue eyes bearing down upon her and a look on his face that brooked no refusal.

  He was a strong man, Rosie thought suddenly, probably ruthless in his business dealings and maybe he considered himself strong enough to hear the plain unvarnished truth that the pathologist was writing in her full report.

  ‘Come in,’ she said, pulling the door back and indicating a seat on one side of her desk. She eased herself past him and sat behind the desk, a weak light filtering through from the glazed window behind her. Eva Magnusson’s notes were in a file right in front of her, but the pathologist preferred to look this man in the eye as she told him what she had found, not hide behind the safety of an already prepared document.

  ‘We know a fair bit about what happened,’ Rosie began, ‘but as yet the police have not identified the perpetrator. Nor,’ she added, ‘do we know why anyone might have done this to your daughter.’

  For a moment the Swede’s expression was so bleak that Rosie almost put out her hands to clasp his across the desk. But the long habit of professionalism stopped her.

  ‘Eva suffered manual strangulation from a person unknown,’ she continued. ‘Someone who was wearing gloves.’ She looked at his eyebrows, noticing that they were raised as she spoke.

  ‘It was a very cold night, so the wearing of gloves might or might not suggest a premeditated attack,’ she added. ‘There was nothing on Eva’s body to suggest that she had managed to resist the attack and, as I told you earlier, she would have lost consciousness very quickly.’

  Magnusson nodded, his face still a mask of despair, his fingers twisting and turning the solid gold cufflink at his wrist.

  ‘There is something else, however,’ Rosie went on, drawing a deep breath before she continued. ‘There is evidence in the post-mortem that shows your daughter had sex some time before her death.’

  Magnusson’s eyes widened but although his lips parted slightly, he did not utter a word.

  ‘We are hopeful of obtaining a DNA match from this trace evidence, naturally,’ she said. ‘But that will not necessarily give us the identity of her assailant.’

  The man sat there staring at Rosie, then began to shake his head as though this extra piece of information must somehow be incorrect.

  ‘Are you trying to tell me my daughter was raped before she was murdered?’ he said thickly.

  ‘There was no bruising around the vaginal area or anything like her clothes being removed that would have indicated it had not been consensual sex,’ Rosie murmured. ‘Plus the toxicology tests have not given any signs of a drug that might have been administered to render Eva comatose.’

  Henrik Magnusson continued to stare at her, his brows drawing together as if he were trying to figure something out.

  ‘A date-rape drug, you mean?’

  Rosie nodded. ‘There was nothing like that in your daughter’s blood tests and only a minimal amount of alcohol,’ she said.

  There was silence for a long moment.

  ‘She did enjoy an occasional glass of champagne,’ Magnusson said at last, his eyes wandering past Rosie as if he could see his daughter once again. And, as his expression softened and the tears filled them, Rosie felt a pain in her chest that came from a desire to let herself weep for this big man’s loss.

  CHAPTER 14

  ‘

  I

  think we’ve got him,’ Jo Grant told the detective superintendent, her hands leaning upon Lorimer’s desk, her shining face a picture of anticipation.

  ‘Thank God for that,’ Lorimer replied, his breath exhaling in a long sigh as he sat back. For each and every one of the few days since Eva Magnusson’s death his DI’s case had been preying on his mind and now he experienced a certain sense of relief. ‘Anyone we know?’ he continued, motioning her to take a seat.

  Jo nodded and sat down. ‘DNA results came back this morning,’ she told him. ‘They match the sample we took from one of the students.’ She paused then went on, still regarding him carefully. ‘It’s Colin Young.’

  ‘Really?’ Lorimer’s eyebrows shot up in surprise as a sudden memory of the student’s trou
bled face came back. ‘He hadn’t impressed me as the violent type,’ he went on hastily as Jo’s brow wrinkled in a frown of annoyance.

  ‘There’s absolutely no getting away from these sorts of facts,’ she said. ‘He was definitely the one who had sex with the deceased and…’ She hesitated. ‘I had him weeping in the interview room after only a few questions. Total remorse, if you ask me,’ she added with that firm manner that Lorimer had come to respect.

  ‘Well, you know the procedure,’ Lorimer said. ‘A Section Fourteen. Bring him in and hope that he’ll confess. Makes it much easier all round than having to go through the entire trial-by-jury scenario.’

  He steepled his fingers under his chin, watching Detective Inspector Grant nod in agreement as he considered how so many cases ended up dragging out for months in the courts. They’d both seen it plenty of times, though a lot of hardened criminals were savvy enough to cough up and plead guilty if there was evidence stacked up against them. A guilty plea carried a lesser sentence and they all knew it. But what of a student like Colin Young who had no previous police record? If he had strangled Eva in a moment of rage would he be remorseful enough to get it all off his chest to the police? Or would fear make him try to spin a web of lies concerning the girl’s death? And there was the aspect of the gloves. Lorimer sighed. Did that suggest a premeditated act or had the lad simply worn his gloves on that freezing night?

  ‘Did you find any gloves among Young’s possessions?’

  ‘No.’ Jo shrugged. ‘But I bet he was forensically aware enough to ditch them somewhere. All these kids know the score nowadays. CSI syndrome,’ she added, rolling her eyes to heaven. The much-watched American cop show, Crime Scene Investigation, had made a huge impact on viewers and the interest in forensic medical science had rocketed.

  ‘Right, you better get a warrant for his arrest,’ Lorimer said, watching his detective inspector rising from her seat. ‘Good luck.’