The Fire Witness. Ларс Кеплер

is breathing far too fast as she looks into Caroline’s eyes. She has to make her understand, but at the same time is surprised by her own voice, and the fact that she’s dared to shout in the middle of the night.

      ‘There’s blood everywhere!’

      ‘Be quiet,’ Caroline hisses, and gets out of bed.

      Nina’s cries have woken the others; she can already hear voices from the other rooms.

      ‘Come and look!’ Nina says, scratching her arms anxiously. ‘Miranda looks funny, you have to come and look at her, you …’

      ‘Can you just calm down? I’ll come and look, but I’m sure …’

      They hear a scream from the corridor. It’s little Tuula. Caroline hurries out. Tuula is staring into the isolation room, her eyes open wide. Indie comes out into the corridor, scratching one armpit.

      Caroline pulls Tuula away, but still has time to see the blood on the walls and Miranda’s white body. Her heart is beating fast. She stands in Indie’s way, thinking that none of them need to see any more suicides.

      ‘There’s been an accident,’ she explains quickly. ‘Can you take everyone to the dining room, Indie?’

      ‘Has something happened to Miranda?’ Indie asks.

      ‘Yes, we need to wake Elisabet.’

      Lu Chu and Almira come out from the same room. Lu Chu is only wearing a pair of pyjama trousers, and Almira is wrapped in the duvet.

      ‘Go to the dining room,’ Indie says.

      ‘Can I wash my face first?’ Lu Chu asks.

      ‘Take Tuula with you.’

      ‘What the hell is going on?’ Almira asks.

      ‘We don’t know,’ Caroline replies curtly.

      While Indie tries to get everyone into the dining room, Caroline hurries along the corridor to the staff’s overnight room. She knows Elisabet takes sleeping pills and never hears when any of the girls are running about at night.

      Caroline bangs on the door as hard as she can.

      ‘Elisabet, you have to wake up,’ she cries.

      No response. Not a sound.

      Caroline carries on, past the registration room to the nurses’ office. The door is open, so she goes in, picks up the phone and calls Daniel, the first person she thinks of.

      The line crackles.

      Indie and Nina come into the office. Nina’s lips are white, she’s moving weirdly, and her body’s shaking.

      ‘Wait in the dining room,’ Caroline snaps.

      ‘What about the blood? Did you see the blood?’ Nina screams, drawing blood as she scratches her right arm.

      ‘Daniel Grim,’ a tired voice says over the phone.

      ‘It’s me, Caroline – there’s been an accident here, and Elisabet won’t wake up, I can’t wake her, so I called you, I don’t know what to do.’

      ‘I’ve got blood on my feet,’ Nina yells. ‘I’ve got blood on my feet …’

      ‘Calm down,’ Indie shouts, and tries to take Nina out of the room.

      ‘What’s going on?’ Daniel asks in a voice that’s suddenly very awake, and very focused.

      ‘Miranda’s in the cell, it’s full of blood,’ Caroline replies, then swallows hard. ‘I don’t know what we …’

      ‘Is she badly hurt?’ he asks.

      ‘Yes, I think … well, I …’

      ‘Caroline,’ Daniel interrupts. ‘I’m going to call an ambulance, then …’

      ‘But what should I do? What should …’

      ‘See if Miranda needs help, and try to wake Elisabet,’ Daniel replies.

       7

      The emergency call centre in Sundsvall is located in a three-storey brick building on Björneborgsgatan, next to Bäckparken. Jasmin doesn’t usually have any trouble with the night-shift, but she’s feeling unusually tired now. It’s four o’clock in the morning, and the worst part of the night has passed. She’s sitting in front of the computer with her headset on, and blows on the mug of black coffee. In the staffroom they’re still laughing and joking. The day before, the tabloids ran a story about one of the police’s emergency operators earning a bit extra on the side, from telephone sex. It turned out that she just had an administrative job with a company that ran sex chat-lines, but the tabloids made it sound like she was dealing with both types of call in the emergency call centre.

      Jasmin looks past the screen and out through the window. It hasn’t started to get light yet. An articulated lorry rumbles past. There’s a streetlamp further along the road. Its weak light illuminates a tree, a grey electricity box, and a stretch of empty pavement.

      Jasmin puts her coffee cup down and takes an incoming call.

      ‘SOS 112 … What’s the nature of the emergency?’

      ‘My name is Daniel Grim, I’m a counsellor at the Birgitta Home. One of the residents has just called me. It sounded extremely serious, you have to get out there.’

      ‘Can you tell me what’s happened?’ Jasmin asks as she searches for the Birgitta Home on the computer.

      ‘I don’t know, one of the girls called. I didn’t really understand what she was saying, there was a lot of shouting in the background, and she was crying and saying there was blood all over the room.’

      Jasmin gestures to her colleague Ingrid Sandén that they need more operators.

      ‘And are you at the scene yourself?’ Jasmin says through the headset.

      ‘No, I’m at home, I was asleep, but one of the girls called …’

      ‘You’re talking about the Birgitta Home, north of Sunnås?’ Jasmin asks calmly.

      ‘Please, hurry up,’ he says in a shaky voice.

      ‘We’re sending police and an ambulance to the Birgitta Home, north of Sunnås,’ Jasmin repeats, just to be sure.

      She transfers the call to Ingrid, who goes on talking to Daniel while Jasmin alerts the police and paramedics.

      ‘The Birgitta Home is a children’s home, isn’t it?’

      ‘Yes, a secure children’s home,’ he replies.

      ‘Shouldn’t there be some staff there?’

      ‘Yes, my wife Elisabet is on duty, I’m about to call her … I don’t know what’s happened, I don’t know anything.’

      ‘The police are on their way,’ Ingrid says calmly, and from the corner of her eye sees the flashing blue lights of the first emergency vehicle sweep across the deserted street.

       8

      The narrow turning off Highway 86 leads straight into the dark forest, toward Himmelsjön and the Birgitta Home.

      The grit crunches beneath the tyres of the police car. The headlights play across the tall trunks of the pines.

      ‘You said you’d been out here before?’ Rolf Wikner asks, changing up to fourth gear.

      ‘Yes … a couple of years ago one of the girls tried to set light to one of the buildings,’