It turned out to be Marcus Tosscander. We had a terrible fight. Then Erik said that he felt like half a person sometimes. He was missing something when he was together with me. It was . . . terrible.”
“How did you react?”
“I left him. I moved out. But I couldn’t function without Erik. Before Johannes was born I moved back. Erik made a solemn vow to try and resist his . . . other desire. I know that it didn’t always work. But his relationships never hurt us. He was an amazingly good father and husband.”
“Did you notice anything recently that could point to Erik’s having had a new man?”
“No. Sometimes—”
She stopped herself and bit her lip. With a defiant gesture she threw her hair back, lifted her chin, and looked Irene straight in the eye.
“Sometimes he would work late. And he often worked far from home. I couldn’t check what he was doing every second. I had to trust him.”
Irene thought about the old saying You see what you want to see. She decided to change tacks and put her hand in her jacket pocket. Her fingertips touched the envelope holding the photos of Tom Tanaka’s two pictures. She placed the pictures on top of the coffee table. Sara Bolin leaned forward and inspected both photographs. When she examined the picture of Marcus more closely, she recoiled. She realized that they had noticed her reaction and she said in a shaky voice, “The picture of Marcus didn’t look like that. The one that Erik had at the exhibition.”
“What do you mean? Is it the wrong picture?” Hannu asked innocently.
“No, not the wrong picture . . . but it didn’t look like . . . this!”
With a shaking index finger, Sara pointed at Marcus’s magnificent erection. In the exhibition picture, Marcus’s hanging hand had nonchalantly concealed his sex. But Irene understood Sara’s distress. The picture on the table radiated lust and desire: Marcus seen through his lover’s eye.
Sara stared as though entranced at the picture, and finally she whispered, “He swore that it was over. He swore!”
Irene saw how close she was to bursting into tears. In order to distract her, Irene threw the picture of Manpower on top of the photo of Marcus.
“Do you recognize this man?” she asked.
For a second, Sara Bolin looked confused. Hesitantly, she picked up the picture of Basta and examined it. Then she lowered it and looked at Irene again.
“Of course I recognize the picture itself. It was part of the exhibition and it looked like this. But I have no idea who the man is.”
“Erik never said anything about this man or mentioned his name?”
“No.”
Irene saw that several nice pictures were hanging on the walls. A thought struck her. She pointed at the photos on the table and said, “I see you are displaying many of Erik’s photographs on the walls. Is it possible that the enlargement of one of these two photos is hanging somewhere in the house?”
Sara’s voice was harsh when she replied, “No. I decide what is going to hang on the walls!”
She was interrupted by a child’s cry. She rose and said apologetically, “Kristian is awake. He’s crying for me to come and change his diaper. It’s always so wet when he’s been sleeping and . . .”
The last part of the sentence faded away as she entered the hall. Irene turned to Hannu and said teasingly, “The parents of small children have such interesting conversational topics.”
Hannu raised his eyebrows a fraction of a millimeter and said, “Really.”
She was close to saying, “Just wait and see when it’s your turn,” but she stopped herself. Hannu would never sit and discuss his child’s diaper status with anyone.
They got up at the same time and started toward the glass doors. Sara Bolin came out of a door a little farther down the corridor. In her arms she was carrying a baby, still warm with sleep, who had thrown his chubby arms around her neck and burrowed his dark head under her chin.
“Thanks for letting us stop by,” said Irene.
Sara Bolin tried to smile bravely. “Naturally, I’m interested in seeing my husband’s murder solved. Of course, I’ll help any way I can.”
The little one in her arms became conscious of the strangers in the house. He turned and looked at Irene. Her throat tightened when she looked into Erik Bolin’s amber eyes.
HANNU CALLED Birgitta on the cell phone and they decided on a time to meet outside the station house. Fifteen minutes