The Human Flies - [32]

Sadly, she could not tell me much more about her parents. Her adoptive parents had been told only that they were a young Jewish couple, originally from Lithuania, with no other known children. Her parents were registered as dead in 1944, but no further details were recorded. She had been given the names Felix and Anna Marie Rozenthal, born in 1916 and 1918 respectively. Her own given name was Sara Rozenthal, and she had been born in 1943. But her adoptive parents had been given no other details, either about her parents’ disappearance or about how she ended up with a Swedish adoption agency in Gothenburg in 1944. She had wondered about it a lot in her youth. Following her twenty-first birthday, she had tried to find out more, with no success. She was told that there was no more information recorded anywhere, and as far as anybody knew, her parents had never been registered as domiciled in Sweden. She had gradually learned to accept the uncertainty surrounding her parents, tried to live her own life and regarded her kind adoptive parents as her only parents.

Her eyes slid over to the window as she spoke.

‘But as long as one does not know what happened or have a grave to go to, one can always daydream that they are still alive, somewhere,’ she added, in a quiet voice.

When I mentioned her bank account, she hesitated at first and then asked with a furrowed brow why I needed to see it. She responded swiftly to my reply that I could not answer that for reasons relating to the investigation. Rather reluctantly, she gave me a small Swedish bank book that showed a balance of 55,623 kroner. I allowed myself to comment that it was no mean sum for a student with no other income. She informed me then that she had first inherited some money from her adoptive grandfather and then received a whole year’s student grant in March, which together totalled 50,000. This did not sound improbable, and given that she had produced her bank book straightaway, I decided to accept the explanation for the time being.

‘However, we do, unfortunately, have to talk about your close relationship with one of your neighbours,’ I said in a sharper tone.

She paled and froze for a few seconds, and then asked how I had found out about it. I replied in all honesty that it was thanks to a wise analysis of known facts. I added that Kristian Lund had since been forced to admit the relationship, but that there was no reason for his wife to know about it – on the condition that she now gave me a complete and truthful account. Sara Sundqvist sighed with relief and regained some of her colour.

‘In many ways, it is a good thing that you found out. It has bothered me tremendously that I lied so much to you about it,’ she said, and moved fractionally closer to me on the sofa. She paused pensively for a couple of minutes. I let her take the time she needed without pressing. It was starting to dawn on me that she was a reflective young lady who did not like to make important decisions without thinking them through.

‘I hope you will be kind and not judge me too harshly. I have given considerable thought to his wife and son, and do feel bad for them,’ she admitted.

Then she was silent again.

‘But…’ I prompted, after a few moments.

‘But I can live with it. And in any case, she has almost everything: two parents, a child, lots of money and no worries about the past or the future. I deserve him more than she does. Kristian and I have both worked our way up from a difficult start in life. And she would probably be happy with any handsome and rich man, whereas I can only be happy with him.’

I resisted the momentary temptation to ask why she was so fond of Kristian Lund. She told me of her own accord: ‘It was not planned. It all started with a little social flirtation, of which I have had many without it leading to anything else. But this time it did. The flirtation spun out of control – in a wonderful way I have never experienced before. Suddenly, there we were one afternoon when his wife was away, without me quite realizing what was happening. But I have to take my fair share of the responsibility, as well as him. And I am ashamed to say that I do not regret it one bit, rather just hope that it will continue and that he will leave his wife. It is still a rollercoaster of highs and lows. I go to bed every evening with the hope that in the morning he will tell me that he is leaving his wife, and wake up every morning with the fear that today he will tell me that he is staying with her. Every time the doorbell or telephone rings, I jump and imagine that it is his wife and that all hell is about to break loose. I realize that it is not easy for him either, as his son is so young. But all is fair in love and war, and this is the one great love of my life. So I hope and believe still that he will choose me. In the meantime, I can scarcely think of anything else, day or night. Things cannot go on like this, I thought the day before the murder, and it has not got any easier since.’

I nodded in agreement. Whatever one’s view on the morality of it, it was very much in line with Kristian Lund’s account.