Mission in Malmö: The ninth Inspector Anita Sundström Mystery

By Torquil MacLeod

2006. Anita Sundström has only been with Chief Inspector Erik Moberg’s Criminal Investigation Squad for a year when they have to tackle the aftermath of an armed robbery at a cash handling facility in Malmö. The raid has left one security guard dead and there is no sign of the stolen millions. Though the team make early progress, they soon become frustrated as the investigation stalls. Then a murder with a possible connection to the audacious heist only raises more questions than answers.
In the present day, Anita is just finding her feet as chief inspector. Her first big case is an old couple’s apparent suicide pact, but if it is murder as she suspects, there seems to be no motive or suspects. Complicating her life further is the arrival of an FBI agent whose mission is to track down a Swede accused of a murder in Chicago. As Anita Sundström’s ninth mystery unfolds, the past comes back to haunt her.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Torquil MacLeod Books Ltd
• Release date: Nov 24, 2022
• ISBN: 9781916288911

Book preview

PROLOGUE

Six months ago.

‘I want the Swede found!’

Salvatore Baresi gave the Boss a warning look.

Some solemn heads had turned to look at the imposing, silver-haired man in the expensive dark coat and the gleaming handmade shoes. He was standing, straight and taut, next to Baresi, who thought that the dark glasses were an affectation too far; the Boss was scary enough without them. There were nervous glances from the other mourners. The beefy, unsmiling pallbearers slowly lowered the coffin into the ground as the priest muttered the expected religious platitudes on death.

The weak, wintry sun bathed the scene in a ghostly pale light as a woman began to moan loudly. Baresi knew it was the Boss’s daughter, Antonella. It was her fool of a husband who was heading towards the Pearly Gates. If St. Peter had any sense, he wouldn’t open them. Matteo was no great loss, but the Boss had taken his death personally. He was kin; for Italians like him, that counted for a lot. But the strong bond of the familial unit had been stretched to the limit in Matteo’s case; the guy was a handicap.

The widow slumped against a supportive shoulder as her ten-year-old son threw some dirt into the hole. It rattled as it dispersed over the top of the wooden coffin. Then she was steered through the same manoeuvre. This only produced more wailing. Baresi could sense the Boss’s teeth gnashing, and his eyes were glinting. The man might be nearly eighty, but you could see he looked after himself, unlike many of his contemporaries who hadn’t made old bones. He was lean – just like his operation. After cutting his teeth on the blood and brutality of the archetypal Chicago gangland scene, he had adapted to the modern realities of their business. He didn’t suffer fools gladly – unless they married into the family, and even then, they had to work hard to gain his trust. Yet the Swede had won him over. Even Baresi, by his own highly sceptical standards, had been taken in.

And then it had all gone wrong. The Swede had fooled them all. But how had the FBI found out? And why the fuck had he wasted cocky, dumbass Matteo?

The gathering parted as the Boss went to the graveside and added his earthy contribution. He gave his daughter a valedictory nod and returned to Baresi.

‘Enough.’

He began to walk briskly along the wide path through the Mount Carmel Catholic Cemetery, and Baresi followed.

‘Any word?’

‘We’ve had the boys out in Andersonville. Plenty of fucking Swedes, but no sign of ours.’

They were surrounded by two hundred acres of aging tombstones and gaudy family mausolea. Beneath all this petrified ostentation lay generations of holy men and hoodlums – cardinals and archbishops rubbing skeletal shoulders with the likes of Al Capone, the Genna brothers and Sam Giancana. The place was deserted: the only disturbance coming from the traffic sliding down Roosevelt Road. Many of the gravestones sported photographs of the dead. Baresi had always found the practice creepy. When he was a kid, his mother used to take him to his grandfather’s grave every Saturday. He’d always been rather frightened of his grandfather. He’d had a lazy eye that the tombstone photograph only emphasized.

‘I’ve got to get the money back. And my credibility.’

‘We’ll get it back.’

‘It was Matteo that brought him in?’

‘Yeah.’

Baresi knew that the Boss was conflicted about Matteo – furious that one of his own had been gunned down, yet annoyed that he’d had to waste space in the family plot for such a ‘stronzo’.

They stopped by a mawkish marble Madonna, and the Boss fixed Baresi with an icy stare.

‘When you find him, get him to talk. Then stop him talking ever again.’

PART ONE

2006

CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION SQUAD – 2006

Erik Moberg, Chief Inspector

Henrik Nordlund, Inspector

Karl Westermark, Inspector

Anita Sundström, Inspector

Klara Wallen, Inspector

CHAPTER 1

‘Did you see Liverpool on the TV last night?’ Willi Hirdwall groaned as he threw his peaked cap down on the table and took his seat opposite Kasper Jensen. ‘God, I wish The Blues played football like that.’

Måns Wallström laughed as Hirdwall slipped off his jacket and rubbed his hands together. It was bitterly cold outside and it was only the first of his rounds of this nightshift.

‘Kasper doesn’t give a stuff about Malmö. He’s Danish.’

Jensen silently pushed a mug of steaming coffee across the table. Hirdwall nodded and cupped the mug, which sported the logo of Malmö FF, to thaw out his fingers. ‘That’s better,’ he said as he sipped the strong black liquid.

Måns Wallström, a man with the leathery features of someone in his early sixties, glanced at the notice board in the guards’ office and pointed towards the colourful holiday planner. ‘I’m off next week, by the way. But the shipment goes out first thing Monday, so there’ll be extra security lads in. Then you can all relax.’

‘Going anywhere nice?’ asked Hirdwall, swinging his legs onto the table and leaning back in his chair. He was over twenty-five years younger than Wallström. His nut-brown hair was slicked back in the style of an early Elvis Presley quiff. He was the joker in the group of security personnel at the Q Guard cash-handling facility on the edge of a dull, functional industrial estate on the outskirts of Malmö. Unlike Wallström and Jensen, Hirdwall was lean and wiry, but Wallström was sure that if push came to shove, Hirdwall could handle himself. However, that assumption hadn’t yet been tested.

‘Tenerife. The wife has set her sights on retiring there.’

‘Oh, I heard you were taking early retirement.’

‘Yeah. Offer too good to refuse, and what with all these cut-backs, I thought I might as well just go.’

‘How will you cope with all that sunshine?’ Hirdwall laughed. ‘You’ll miss all the wind and the rain and the snow.’

‘I will, but Alice won’t. And I’ve learned that for an easy life, it’s best just to agree.’ Wallström’s attention reverted to the bank of monitors that, via a number of strategically situated cameras, kept a digital eye on various parts of the depot. Nearly every shadowy corner, alcove and doorway of the squat, drab, brick building was covered, as well as the spiked, metal perimeter fence and entrance gates.

Jensen pushed his chair back.

‘I’m off to do my rounds,’ he muttered as he got up to leave the comfortingly stuffy office.

Hirdwall watched his colleague plonk his cap on his head, do up his jacket and pick up his torch which, like everything else in the depot, was emblazoned with the company logo. When he was gone, Hirdwall pursed his lips.

‘What’s up with Kasper?’

On one of the screens, Wallström could see Jensen heading towards the main building from their office by the gate.

‘Been like that for a few days.’

‘He seems quite jumpy,’ Hirdwall observed, his chair dangerously close to tipping over.

‘Maybe something’s up at home.’

‘He’s never been a bundle of laughs, but I’ve always put that down to his being Danish.’

‘I’m sure it’ll pass.’

‘I’ve heard a rumour he’s got money worries,’ said Hirdwall as he languidly raised his legs off the table and righted his chair.

‘Haven’t we all?’

‘Right enough,’ Hirdwall agreed. ‘But he won’t solve them working for this lot. All that money in there,’ he said, tilting his head towards the screens, ‘and how much of it do we see? Bugger all.’

‘Pension’s good, though. I’ll be picking mine up next year.’

Hirdwall raised his mug in a mock toast.

‘Here’s to Tenerife, then.’

The empty wine glass sat disconsolately on the table, asking to be refilled. Anita Sundström thought she’d better oblige.

‘Same again?’

‘Yes please,’ replied a weary Klara Wallen.

Anita took their glasses to the bar and waited to be served. The Lilla Torg hostelry was already full of people kicking off their weekend straight after work. This evening, the place was particularly noisy, possibly because Christmas was only three weeks away. Festive decorations twirled and twinkled around the walls, and a large spruce, dripping with silver stars and golden baubles – and a few cheeky Nordic gnomes – sparkled in one corner, waiting to ambush unsuspecting passing drinkers.

As she waited, Anita’s gaze rested on Wallen, who was delving in her handbag. She felt sorry for the woman; that’s why she’d invited her out. It wasn’t surprising that Wallen looked shell-shocked. Anita got the impression that she’d thought her transfer to the Skåne County Police headquarters in Malmö from the relative anonymity of Kristianstad would improve her career prospects. But after only her first week in the Criminal Investigation Squad under the less-than-benign leadership of Chief Inspector Erik Moberg, it seemed she was beginning to regret the decision. She might need more than this second drink. And it was Friday night after all; neither of them would be working over the weekend.

Anita unceremoniously plonked the glasses on the table, and Wallen attacked her wine with gusto.

‘Thanks,’ she said, coming up for air.

‘Don’t worry. You’ll get used to the team.’

‘How do you put up with him?’ By ‘him’, Anita assumed she was referring to Chief Inspector Moberg.

‘I admit it’s not easy. I’ve been with him a year now and I haven’t been able to figure him out. He’s like a bear with a sore head half the time.’

‘He’s been barking at me all week and he snapped at me for no reason today. And his size doesn’t help: he’s so overbearing,’ Wallen added, grimacing.

‘I know. Wouldn’t surprise me if he has a heart attack one day.’

Anita was starting to regret her choice of wine. She shouldn’t have ordered the cheaper stuff. But money was tight, as her ex-husband, Björn, was once again being slow with the maintenance payments for her sixteen-year-old son, Lasse. She looked at her new colleague and tried to sound encouraging: ‘Moberg is difficult. But he’s not a bad cop. He just doesn’t know how to handle women despite the fact he’s on his third wife. Maybe that’s why he’s on his third wife. He’s highly combustible, which can be intimidating. And he hates incompetence, so any little slip...’ Anita realized too late that she wasn’t helping when Wallen retreated into her drink with a concerned expression. She quickly reeled in her negativity. ‘But I must say I’m really glad to have you here. As the only woman on the team, it’s been like fighting a war without any troops to back you up. That’s the trouble: unless you look like a battleaxe, they don’t take you seriously. Particularly someone like Karl Westermark.’

Wallen brightened at the young detective’s name.

‘He seems nice.’

‘Don’t be fooled. Anything in a skirt is a potential notch on his bedpost.’ Wallen gave her a quizzical look. ‘And, no, I’m not one of them, but it doesn’t stop him trying. Last Christmas, his hand wandered where it shouldn’t. The red mark on his face took a day to disappear.’ She smirked at the memory. ‘It bugs me sometimes; it’s hard to do your job working closely with a guy you know is mentally undressing you all the time. So be warned.’

‘He wouldn’t hit on me, surely?’

‘Don’t bet on it. It’ll happen.’

‘But I’ve got a boyfriend! Rolf.’

Anita looked at her with sympathy. She was pleasant-enough looking in a mousy sort of way, but she didn’t strike Anita as the most confident of people.

‘Is Rolf from Kristianstad?’

‘No. Ystad. But he’s going to move to Malmö soon. I think he’s worried the big city will corrupt me.’ She gave a girlish giggle. ‘He’s been great, though. Just what I needed after my divorce.’

‘Snap. Divorce, I mean. But I haven’t managed to find a just what I needed yet.’

‘Someone as attractive as you shouldn’t find it hard.’

Anita was flattered, but she’d realized long ago that her looks could also be a curse, especially in the male-dominated polishus. The fact that she wore spectacles, kept her blonde hair tied back and didn’t overdo the make-up didn’t seem to put off the unwanted attention and stream of inappropriate comments from some of her colleagues.

‘Harder than you think. It’s amazing how often guys lose interest when it comes up in conversation that you’re a cop – except the pervs who are turned on by uniforms!’

Wallen looked uncomfortable.

‘I’m only joking. Well, sort of.’

Anita was clearly straying into an area that made Wallen uneasy, which made her wonder about Rolf’s particular tastes. She swiftly changed the subject.

‘Henrik Nordlund’s lovely.’

‘Haven’t met him yet.’

‘He’s been at a conference in Gothenburg this week. Back tonight. Very experienced. I’ve known him for years. I worked my first murder case with him. I don’t know if you remember that student who was killed at Knäbäckshusen? About ten years ago?’

‘Yeah, I do actually.’

‘Henrik led that investigation. Really frustrating. We knew who’d done it, but we were never able to find enough evidence to arrest the killer. He’s still out there,’ she said wistfully. ‘Anyway, Henrik’s a really genuine guy. He’s the main reason I’ve been able to stick it out with Moberg. And he’s the one person that Moberg defers to. He’s a good, old-fashioned cop. You’ll meet him on Monday.’

An awkward silence followed. Anita had run out of things to say: she’d used up most of her small-talk subjects during the week, and Wallen wasn’t volunteering any more questions. This time, Wallen noticed that Anita’s glass was empty again.

‘Can I buy you one?’

Anita thought about it for a moment before declining. Making conversation with someone she didn’t know that well for another half hour didn’t appeal. She’d done her bit.

‘No, sorry, must away. Lasse is going up to see his father tomorrow. Better make sure he’s got everything ready.’ It was a lie. It was true that Lasse was going to stay with Björn in Lund for a couple of nights, but he was far more organized than Anita could ever be. He would have packed already, and he’d probably have to wake her up in the morning, after giving himself breakfast, to say goodbye.

Anita rose from her seat, slipped into her thick, fur-lined coat and wrapped a bulky woollen scarf round her neck. It was freezing outside, though the snow was stubbornly refusing to fall.

As Wallen made to follow... ‘Have a good weekend. See you Monday,’ she called breezily.

It was just after one in the morning, and Willi Hirdwall was finishing his rounds. It was quiet except for his own footsteps and the sporadic hum of traffic coming from the E65 on nearby Ystadvägen. He’d walked the entire perimeter fence: there were no vehicles on the main drag into the estate and no sign of life on the small, rarely used track which bore off to the right just outside the gates. Now he was starting to feel the bitter, bone-numbing cold. The tarmac gleamed and glittered beneath his feet and he trod carefully so as not to slip. The beam from his powerful torch illuminated the building he was circling. It also picked out a couple of the security cameras. He flashed the light on and off twice at one of the cameras, which was his jokey signal to the watching Måns that he’d be back in a few minutes and that the coffee should be switched on. Facing the road that ran through the estate was a small sign sporting the discreet company logo – a red Q with the word Guard in black letters inside the Q’s circle. With all that money sitting in the depot, the company didn’t exactly want to over-advertise themselves. Willi knew that the stash of crisp krona notes was particularly large this week. With Christmas on the horizon, Skåne’s ATMs would be under siege from shoppers and party goers. He knew there were euros and dollars in the depository, too. Many Swedes liked to get away over Christmas and New Year. He walked past a neat line of armoured security vans that would be wheeling out on Monday morning to restock the banks after the weekend.

Hirdwall tested the big armoured door that the vans would drive through to collect the cash from the loading bay. As always, it was firmly in place. It could only be electronically operated from the inside. A few paces beyond, he yanked at the handle of the door that was used by the employees who came in and out of the distribution and storage areas. This was also specifically constructed of reinforced steel, and a code was needed to gain access to the loading bay and the vault beyond. Satisfied that everywhere was secure, Willi headed back to the warm sanctuary of the security office.

It was around ten past two that Willi Hirdwall decided to slip off to the toilet for a quick cigarette. Officially, the guards weren’t allowed to smoke, but none of the bosses ever inspected the bathroom at the back of the office. And the smell would have gone by the time the morning shift came on. He entered the small room, only just large enough for a toilet cubicle, a sink and a hand dryer. He opened the cubicle door, unbuckled his trousers, slid them down around his ankles and sat down. Comfortable, he fished out a half-empty packet of cigarettes. He flicked on his plastic lighter and torched the end of one of them. It glowed happily, and he drew on it contentedly. He’d been dreaming about this moment throughout his rounds. Now it was Kasper who was braving the temperatures that had plummeted as the night wore on. He yawned and stretched his legs. He closed his eyes momentarily. It was always around this time that he felt most tired when on nights. Still with his eyes closed, he took another drag.

As Willi Hirdwall enjoyed his cigarette, Måns Wallström was scanning the screens next door. Checking for any anomalies was automatic, and Måns’s thoughts, though alert, also kept straying to that beach in Tenerife. Then, suddenly, something didn’t seem quite right... where the hell was Kasper? He should have appeared by now. What was up with him? Willi was right – he had been on edge lately. It was as though his mind wasn’t on the job. Måns hoped he would be more on the ball while he was off on holiday. He was about to call him on his walkie-talkie when the camera by the loading-bay door picked him up. Jensen was staring around, looking anxious. He checked his watch. He was now by the staff entrance to the distribution area. What the hell was he doing?

Wallström strode to the door and was outside the security office in a matter of seconds. He was instantly hit by the cold air, and it nearly took his breath away.

‘Hey, Kasper! What are you doing?’

Jensen spun round guiltily. All of a sudden, Wallström heard the noise of an engine behind him. He swung round. Through the horizontal bars of the gate, he could make out a huge shape moving at speed along the road which led directly to the depot. As it came within range of the building’s security lights, Måns could see what it was. An earth mover with a massive bucket on the front was heading straight towards him.

‘Get out of the way!’ Jensen shouted

The earth mover was clearly not going to stop. Wallström instinctively drew his gun and fired through the bars of the gate at the advancing machine. Two bullets pinged harmlessly off the giant bucket. Then, with a deafening reverberation of clanks and clangs, the gate crumpled and died before the relentless onslaught. The earth mover careered through the opening as Wallström tried desperately to get out of the way, but, in his panic, he lost his footing on the icy surface. As he fell to the ground, his gun spun out of his hand. The metallic battering ram kept going, and as Wallström was sucked under the massive rubber tyres, his piercing cry was lost in the thunderous noise of the pitiless machine.

CHAPTER 2

As Anita turned off Ystadvägen, an ambulance with flashing lights and wailing siren shot past her in the other direction. She wound her way onto the industrial estate of shadowy, anonymous, box-like buildings. She had to peer carefully through the windscreen, as her glasses were starting to fog up; the Volvo’s excuse for a heater was only just beginning to work. It had taken her ten minutes to get her aging vehicle to start; it had an aversion to the cold. During her desperate attempts to coax the car into life, she’d even contemplated getting a taxi, but that wouldn’t have gone down well and would have given Moberg and Westermark a hefty round of ammunition.

Ahead, she saw a uniformed officer directing her to the left-hand side of the road. She passed two abandoned police cars. Both had flat tyres. She stifled a yawn. The car clock showed 4.17. Her sleep had been rudely interrupted by a call from the polishus: Chief Inspector Moberg wanted her to attend a ‘serious incident’ on the E65 Industrial Estate, just beyond the Jägersro trotting track. No details were given. She’d lurched out of bed, quickly washed her face and hurriedly scribbled a note for Lasse, explaining that she’d been called out and that she probably wouldn’t be back before he left. She deliberately didn’t put anything about sending her love to Björn. Her relaxing Saturday had gone out of the window.

While most of the industrial units and warehouses she passed were modestly illuminated, the building at the far end of the road was a blaze of lights. And under the lights, there was a huge amount of activity. She parked the car next to a large metal piece of telecommunications street furniture, which was as near as she could get to the centre of it all. She spotted Karl Westermark talking to a couple of uniformed officers. He had that square-jawed Aryan look that Hitler would have approved of, and Anita suspected that his politics lay in that direction, if, that is, his mind ever wandered further than his next shag. When he saw her, he peeled away.

‘Hope we didn’t interrupt a night of unbridled nooky.’

‘Piss off, Karl.’

They walked together through the twisted metal gate of the low, square, functional depot. It was clear that there had been some kind of break-in. Immediately in front of them was an incident tent. Beyond the tent loomed a massive yellow earth mover. The machine was nestled up against, almost caressing, a steel loading-bay door, several metres in width. The door was seriously indented and the left-hand corner was badly damaged. Part of the surrounding brickwork had also crumbled, leaving a small gap.

‘What is this place?’

‘Q Guard. It’s a cash-handling facility.’

‘Did they get what they wanted?’

‘Oh, yes. Big haul. Don’t bother trying to get money out of an ATM this week; there won’t be any.’

A white-suited forensic technician emerged from the incident tent into the glare of the arc lights. Anita had expected to see old, cantankerous Petersson, but it was a strawberry-blonde woman instead. She grimaced ruefully at them.

‘Better not go in there. The poor fellow was crushed under that thing,’ she said, nodding in the direction of the brooding earth mover, whose shadow in the lights was double the size of the machine and resembled a menacing prehistoric creature. ‘Not a pretty sight.’

‘We’ll let you scrape him up, then,’ smirked Westermark, who was clearly taken by the fresh-faced forensic technician. He reckoned she must be in her early thirties, like himself, and, as she headed off back to the tent, he was already having lurid thoughts about her prowess in bed.

‘God, that’s awful!’ exclaimed Anita. ‘Who was that in the ambulance?’

‘One of the other security guards. Shot in the arm. He’ll live.’

‘Anybody else injured?’

‘There’s a third guard. Tied up by the gang. He’s in the office with the freaked-out depot manager. Well shaken up.’

Before Anita could ask any more questions, from behind the enormous earth mover emerged the equally bulky Chief Inspector Moberg, with a timid Klara Wallen in his wake. Damn! Even Wallen had got here before her; that would give the new detective a few brownie points.

Moberg greeted her with ‘Glad you could be bothered to turn up.’ Biting her lip, Anita took his sarcasm on the chin – there was no point trying to explain about the car. He had that distorted anger in his voice that comes from being forced out of a warm bed at an unearthly hour on a glacial night.

‘It must be clear what’s happened, even to you,’ Moberg said pointedly to Anita. ‘It appears they smashed through the main gate some time after two. Made that hole in the wall, got into the building and the loading bay, then along to the vault door, which they blew to smithereens, and made off with the dosh. Don’t know how much yet, but it’s a lot. They were well away by the time we were called to the scene. Presumably, they came with some sort of van or truck. We’ve put out an alert, but my guess is, they’ll have dumped the van, or whatever, and transferred the cash into something else by now.’

‘That’s if they’re bright enough,’ said Westermark.

‘They’re bright enough to get in and out of here,’ came Moberg’s surly reply as his cold breath billowed into the air. ‘We’re not dealing with the bloody Jönsson Gang.’ They all knew the reference to the popular comedy heist films of the 1980s.

‘Who raised the alarm?’ Anita asked.

‘Willi Hirdwall. He’s the guy who was shot. Though I’m surprised he managed to make the call – he seemed pretty out of it. Think he bashed his head or something. The third one is talking to Henrik, though I’m not sure he’ll get much sense out of him either. He’s in a bit of a state. Not surprising when one of your colleagues has been flattened like a pancake. But the strange thing is, the building’s alarm system should have been activated as soon as that thing hit that,’ he said, gesturing to the earth mover and the battered door. ‘It wasn’t.’ Moberg stamped his feet against the cold. ‘Right. Sundström and Wallen, I want you to check out the security office. Hopefully, they’ve got CCTV, which might give us something to go on. Have a good look round. The alarm not going off needs checking. Karl, I want you to coordinate the search for the getaway van.’ Anita noted, not for the first time, that it was surnames for women, first names for men. ‘As far as I can see, they must have made off along that track just outside the gate. Seems to go round the back of the estate. They certainly made sure we couldn’t get here in a hurry with those caltraps all over the main road.’ Hence the punctured patrol cars.

They stood there.

‘What are you fucking waiting for?’

Moberg stomped his way into the spacious, yet sparse, office of the depot manager. The manager was sitting behind a large desk strewn with trays, files and papers. In front of him was a computer and, with his eyes glued to the screen, he was talking rapidly on the phone, making grovelling excuses in English for what was, undoubtedly, a crippling business disaster. The robbery would seriously damage Q Guard’s reputation with its banking and other customers. Months of PR crisis management and expensive schmoozing would be needed to restore even a smidgeon of faith.

In another part of the room, Henrik Nordlund was talking to Kasper Jensen, whose hulk was huddled uncomfortably on an ergonomic office chair. On seeing Moberg enter, Nordlund came over to report.

‘I haven’t got much out of him. He seems shattered. More mental than physical, as he hasn’t anything in the way of injuries.’

‘Shall I have a word?’

‘No, no. Best not.’ Nordlund understood his boss well enough to know he’d probably frighten the witness to death, and it was important to glean as much information as possible, as soon as possible. ‘I’ll get a preliminary statement out of him and then we can question him properly later.’

‘OK. I’ll have a word with the rabbit,’ Moberg said, glancing over to the depot manager, who did look as though he’d been caught in the headlights.

The manager came off the phone. He was a middle-aged man of medium build, with thinning, unbrushed, reddish hair. He obviously hadn’t had time to dress for the office and had