had missed, and these had led to breakthroughs. She also had a fresh, intellectual humour that Bublanski appreciated.
He was pleased to have Jerker Holmberg on his team. Holmberg was fifty-five and originally from Ångermanland. He was a stocky, plain individual, who had none of Modig's imagination, but he was, in Bublanski's view, perhaps the best crime scene investigator in the entire Swedish police force. They had worked on numerous investigations together over the years, and Bublanski was convinced that if there was something worth finding at a crime scene, Holmberg would find it. His immediate task would be to take command of the work in the apartment in Enskede.
Bublanski hardly knew Curt Andersson. He was a laconic and solidly built officer with such a short stubble of blond hair that at a distance he looked completely bald. Andersson was thirty-eight and had only recently come to the division from Huddinge, where he had spent years dealing with gang crime. He had a reputation for being hot-tempered and tough, which was perhaps a euphemism for the fact that he employed methods that were not quite by the book. Ten years back he had been accused of brutality, but an enquiry cleared him on all counts.
In October 1999 he had driven with a colleague to Alby to pick up a hooligan for interrogation. This man was well known to the police, and for some years had terrorized the neighbours in his apartment building. Now, as the result of a tip, he was to be taken in for questioning in connection with the robbery of a video store in Norsborg. When confronted by Andersson and his colleague, the hooligan pulled a knife instead of coming along quietly. The other officer collected several wounds to his hands, and then his left thumb was sliced off before the thug directed his attention to Andersson, who for the first time in his career was obliged to use his service weapon. He fired three shots. The first was a warning shot, the second was deliberately aimed but missed the man - no easy matter since the distance was less than ten feet - and the third shot hit him in the middle of his chest, severing the aorta. The man bled to death in a matter of minutes. The inevitable enquiry had ultimately cleared Andersson of any wrongdoing, but only solidified his reputation.
Bublanski had had doubts about Andersson at first, but after six months he had encountered nothing to provoke his criticism or wrath. On the contrary, Bublanski was beginning to have some respect for Andersson's taciturn skill.
The last member of the team, Hans Faste, was forty-seven, a veteran of fifteen years in violent crimes, and the chief reason for Bublanski's not being totally satisfied. Faste had a plus side and also a minus side. On the plus side, he had extensive experience - and of complicated investigations too. On the minus side, he was egocentric and had a loudmouth sense of humour that especially bothered Bublanski. But when he was kept on a short leash he was a competent detective. Besides, he had become something of a mentor for Andersson, who did not seem to object to his personality.
Inspector Nyberg of the criminal division had been invited to the meeting to report on her interview with the journalist Blomkvist during the night. Superintendent Mårtensson was also present to report on what had happened at the crime scene. Both of them were worn out and eager to go home to bed, but Nyberg had already managed to get photographs of the apartment, and these she passed around to the team.
After half an hour they had the sequence of events clear. Bublanski said: "Bearing in mind that the forensic examination of the crime scene is still in progress, this is what we think happened... An unknown person entered the apartment in Enskede without the neighbours or any other witness noticing and killed the couple, Dag Svensson and Mia Johansson."
"We don't know yet," Nyberg said, "whether the gun that was found is the murder weapon, but it's at the National Forensics Laboratory, and it's top priority there. We've found a fragment of a bullet - the one that went into Svensson - relatively intact in the bedroom wall. But the bullet that struck Johansson is so fragmented that I doubt it will help much."
"Thanks for that information. A Colt Magnum is a damned cowboy pistol that ought to be banned outright. Have we got a serial number?"
"Not yet,"