The Long Shadow Read Online Free

thanks but no thanks.’
    Annika glanced at her computer screen. Schyman had offered her the more senior position. ‘I’m looking into a fatal gassing in Spain,’ she said. ‘A whole family was killed in a break-in on the Costa del Sol.’
    Berit switched on her computer and went to the coffee machine. ‘Give Rickard Marmén a call,’ she said, over her shoulder. ‘I don’t know his number, but if there’s anything going on in Spain that’s worth knowing, he’ll know about it.’
    Annika picked up the phone and dialled Directory Enquiries.
    Engaged.
    She went back into Google, thought for a moment, then typed
buscar numero telefono españa
. Was that the right spelling? Search telephone numbers Spain?
    The first result was for something called
Paginas Blancas
.
    Bingo!
    She narrowed the search to Málaga and typed in ‘Rickard Marmén’, then pressed
encontrar
.
    Who’d have thought it?
    He lived on the Avenida Ricardo Soriano in Marbella; his landline and mobile numbers were listed.
    Berit sat down with her coffee.
    ‘So who’s Rickard, then?’ Annika said, with the receiver in her hand.
    ‘An old friend of my brother-in-law. He’s lived down there for twenty years now, has tried his hand at pretty much everything you can think of and failed at all of it. He’s rented out sunbeds and bred stud horses and run a guesthouse, and once he had a share in a company selling log cabins.’
    ‘On the Costa del Sol?’ Annika said dubiously.
    ‘As I said, he always fails.’
    ‘What’s the dialling code for Spain?’
    ‘Thirty-four.’ Berit pulled a face as she tasted the coffee.
    Annika tried the landline first. After five rings an electronic voice said something unintelligible in Spanish and she hung up. She tried the mobile number, and two seconds later a male voice said loudly: ‘
Sí, dígame!
’
    ‘Rickard Marmén?’
    ‘
Hablando!
’
    ‘Er, my name’s Annika Bengtzon, I’m calling from the
Evening Post
in Stockholm. You do speak Swedish, don’t you?’
    ‘Course I do. What can I do for you?’
    He had a strong Gothenburg accent.
    ‘I’m calling because I’ve been told you know about everything that happens on the Costa del Sol,’ she said, glancing at Berit. ‘I was wondering if you knew anything about gas being used in a break-in somewhere down there?’
    ‘Gas? In
a
break-in? Listen, love, we don’t have any other sort of break-in here these days. Every break-in uses gas. Gas-detectors are more common than fire-alarms in the villas of Nueva Andalucía. Anything else you want to know?’
    There was a lot of noise in the background. It sounded like he was standing beside a motorway.
    ‘Er, okay,’ Annika said. ‘So, what exactly is a break-in involving gas?’
    ‘The thieves pump some sort of knock-out gas through the windows or air-conditioning. Then, while the occupants are asleep, they can go through the whole house. They usually take their time, have something to eat in the kitchen, open a bottle of wine.’
    ‘And this is the most common type of break-in, you say?’ Annika asked.
    ‘It’s an epidemic. It started five, six years ago, although gas was sometimes used before that.’
    ‘Why is it so common down there?’
    ‘There’s a lot of money here, darling. Thick bundles of cash under mattresses all round Puerto Banús. And there’s a significant criminal element, of course, and plenty of poor bastards who’ll do anything for a bit of cash. They caught a gang of Romanians last autumn. They’d cleaned out more than a hundred villas right along the coast, from Gibraltar up to Nerja.’
    ‘The news agency’s just let us know that a whole family’s been killed by gas in a break-in,’ Annika said. ‘You don’t happen to know anything about that?’
    ‘When? Last night? Where?’
    ‘Don’t know,’ Annika said. ‘Just that everyone died, including two kids and a dog.’
    Rickard Marmén didn’t answer. If it hadn’t been for the traffic in the background she