pants and a short-sleeved, scoop-necked angora sweater the same color as her fantastic eyes.
With a courteous gesture that displayed a certain lack of enthusiasm, Charlotte invited them into the living room. It was clearly marked by Henrik’s life and passions. Paintings and antiques were everywhere in the normal-sized room. They walked between urns and curved chairs over to a cream-colored silk sofa, which proved to be astonishingly comfortable. Charlotte draped herself gracefully in an overstuffed velvet easy chair with dark mahogany armrests. She crossed her legs demurely and gave the two detectives an unexpectedly calm look. Sparse daylight seeped in through the heavy drawn curtains and fell on her face. She had been in a hurry, because the foundation under her right eye had not been properly applied; there was a little brown smear on her cheek.
Irene decided on the tough approach and began, in a friendly tone of voice, “Charlotte, we’ve discovered a number of new details during the course of the investigation. We would be grateful if you could help us go over them.”
Without the least quaver in her voice, Charlotte replied, “I’ll try.”
“First, a question that I’m asking now so I won’t forget it at the end. When does your husband come home?”
“On Saturday night.”
“Late?”
“Yes, around ten. Presumably, he’s going straight to Marstrand. I’ll be at a birthday party for a friend who’s turning thirty.”
“Henrik’s not going?”
She hesitated before answering. “No, he’s not so wild about big parties. Lots of people and all that,” she said evasively.
“But you enjoy that sort of thing.”
She looked surprised at Irene’s statement. “Yes, of course I do.”
“Do you often go out alone?”
Now her gaze wavered. “Usually. Henrik never wants to go. What does this have to do with the investigation of Richard’s death?”
“Well, we know that you were often seen with Bobo Torsson. That you were good friends and that you worked together. We also know that you were the one who talked to your father-in-law and arranged for Bobo to rent the apartments on Berzeliigatan.”
“That’s correct. But Bobo has an aunt who owned the tobacco shop across the street. She gave Bobo a tip that Richard was renovating the apartments in his building. Then he asked me to ask Richard whether there was any chance he could rent one of them.”
“Do you know that Bobo is dead?”
Now Charlotte’s eyes glistened and she swallowed hard before replying. “I heard it on the news. How horrible!”
“Do you know if Bobo was involved in anything that might have made someone want to kill him?”
Something flared up behind the turquoise blue. Unease and wariness.
“No. Absolutely not!”
She crossed her legs harder and started to massage her bare forearms as if she were cold.
“Did Bobo sell drugs to you?”
Just like Lot’s wife, Charlotte was turned into a pillar of salt. It took a long while before she replied apologetically, yet still aggressively, “Everybody uses a little smack nowadays. Everybody does it. There’s nothing unusual about that. It’s like using alcohol!”
“I see. But it falls under different legislation. Did he sell a lot?”
Now she was prepared and made a brave attempt to sound haughty. “Not at all! He was a prominent photographer. The little he sold was only to friends and at private parties.”
She was almost successful, but not quite. Since Irene had a lot of other sensitive questions to ask, she changed the subject. “Do you know a man named Lasse ‘Shorty’ Johannesson?”
Charlotte was startled, but not scared. She pursed her lips and said, “That’s Bobo’s cousin. But I’ve never met him.”
“So you don’t know him at all?”
“No.”
Clearly Irene wasn’t going to get any farther with Shorty. Time to switch tacks. She continued calmly, “We also have information that you received a spare-key ring from Richard von Knecht this summer. Why did he give it to you?”
Her astonishment was not feigned. Or else she was a better actress than Irene thought.
“Spare keys? I never got any spare keys from Richard.”
“Your father-in-law never gave you any keys?”
“No.”
“Was it Henrik who got them?”
Now her gaze flickered before she answered, “I don’t think so.”
“You don’t know if Henrik was given the spare keys by his father?”
“No.”
“But you did know that there was a key ring with spare keys on it, didn’t you?”
“No, I tell you! No!”
A new scent broke through the heavy Cartier perfume. Terror.
“Then we’ll have to ask Henrik when he comes home,” said Irene.
She pretended to look at something in her blank notebook. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Charlotte relax and sink a