Free The Man from Beijing by Henning Mankell Page B

Roslin.”
    “Speaking.”
    “Ah. I’ve been informed who you are, but I’m not sure what you want. As you can probably understand, we’re under a lot of pressure right now. Am I right in thinking that you are a judge?”
    “Yes, I am. I don’t want to make too much of a fuss about this, but my mother—who died several years ago—was adopted by a family called Andrén. I’ve seen photographs that suggest she lived in one of the houses in Hesjövallen.”
    “Contacting the next of kin is not my responsibility. I suggest you speak to Erik Huddén.”
    “But am I right in thinking that some of the victims were in fact called Andrén?”
    “Since you ask I can tell you that the Andrén family was the largest one in the village.”
    “And are all of them dead?”
    “I can’t tell you that. Do you have the first names of your mother’s foster parents?”
    She had the file on the desk in front of her; she untied the ribbon and leafed through the papers.
    “I’m afraid I don’t have time to wait,” said Vivi Sundberg. “Call me when you’ve found the names.”
    “I have them here. Brita and August Andrén. They must be over ninety, possibly even ninety-five.”
    There was a pause before Sundberg responded. Roslin could hear the sound of papers rustling. Then Sundberg picked up the phone again.
    “They are on the list. I’m afraid they are both dead, and the oldest was ninety-six. Please don’t pass that information on to any newspaper.”
    “Why in God’s name would I want to do that?”
    “You’re a judge. I’m sure you know what can happen, and why I’m asking you to keep the details to yourself.”
    Birgitta Roslin knew exactly what was meant, although she had occasionally discussed with her colleagues how they were seldom if ever buttonholed by journalists—reporters hardly thought that judges would release information that ought to be kept secret.
    “I’m obviously interested in how the investigation is going.”
    “Neither I nor any of my colleagues has time to release specific information. We are besieged by the mass media here. I recommend that you talk to Erik Huddén if you phone Hudiksvall.”
    Vivi Sundberg sounded impatient and irritated.
    “Many thanks for calling. I won’t disturb you any longer.”
    Birgitta Roslin hung up and thought over what had been said. At least she was now quite certain that her mother’s foster parents were among the dead. Like everybody else, she would have to remain patient while the police went about their work.
    She considered phoning police HQ in Hudiksvall and talking to this Erik Huddén. But what would he be able to add? She decided not to. Instead, she started reading more carefully the papers inside the file devoted to her parents. It was many years since she had last opened it. She realized that, in fact, she had never read some of the documents before.
    She sorted the contents of the thick file into three piles. The first one comprised the life history of her father, whose body was lying on the seabed in Gävlebukten. The water in the Baltic Sea was so salty that skeletons did not corrode especially quickly. Somewhere in the silt were his bones and cranium. The second pile dealt with the shared life of her mother and father, and she featured in there herself, both before and aftershe was born. The third pile was the largest and contained papers relevant to Gerda Lööf, her mother, who became an Andrén. She read slowly through everything, especially when she came to the documents referring to the time when her mother had been fostered and adopted by the Andrén family. Many of them were faded and difficult to read, despite the fact that she used a magnifying glass.
    She slid over a notepad and wrote down names and ages. She herself had been born in the spring of 1949. Her mother was then seventeen, having been born in 1931. She also found the birth dates of August and Brita Andrén: she was born in August 1909, and he in December 1910. So