Kepler - Lazarus

Translated from the Swedish by Neil Smith

HarperCollinsPublishers

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2020

Copyright Lars Kepler 2018

Translation copyright Neil Smith 2020

All rights reserved

Originally published in 2018 by Albert Bonniers Frlag, Sweden, as Lazarus

Lars Kepler assert the moral right to be identified as the authors of this work

Cover layout design by Claire Ward HarperCollinsPublishers 2020

Cover photography Dirk Wustenhagen / Trevillion Images (wintery road);

Tim Robinson / Trevillion Images (man crossing road)

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

This is entirely a work of fiction. Any references to real people, living or dead, real events, businesses, organizations and localities are intended only to give the fiction a sense of reality and authenticity. All names, characters and incidents are either the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously, and their resemblance, if any, to real-life counterparts is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books

Source ISBN: 9780008205959

Ebook Edition MARCH 2020 ISBN: 9780008205973

Version: 2020-01-15

Contents

The light of the white sky reveals the world in all its naked cruelty, the way it must have appeared to Lazarus outside the tomb.

The ribbed metal floor is vibrating beneath the priests feet. He clings to the railing with one hand as he tries simultaneously to parry the rocking with his stick.

The grey sea is moving drowsily, like a billowing tent-canvas.

The ferry is being winched forward along the two steel cables stretched between the two islands. They rise dripping out of the water in front of the boat and sink back down behind it.

The ferryman brakes, foaming waves swell up and the gangplank is extended to the concrete jetty with a clatter.

The priest stumbles slightly as the prow hits the fenders and the jolt echoes through the hull.

Hes here to visit retired churchwarden Erland Lind, seeing as he isnt answering his phone and didnt show up for the Advent Service in Lnna Church like he usually does.

Erland lives in the wardens cottage behind Hgmars Chapel, it belongs to the parish. He suffers from dementia, but still gets paid to cut the grass and grit the paths when the weather turns icy.

The priest walks along the winding gravel track, his face turning numb in the cold air. Theres no one in sight, but just before he reaches the chapel he hears the shriek of a lathe from the dry dock down in the boatyard.

He can no longer remember the Bible quote he tweeted that morning, he had been thinking of repeating it to Erland.

Against the backdrop of flat farmland and the strip of forest, the white chapel looks almost as if its made of snow.

Because the place of worship is shut up in winter, the priest walks directly to the wardens cottage and knocks on the door with the crook of his stick, waits, then goes inside.

Erland?

Theres no one home. He stamps his shoes and looks around. The kitchen is a mess. The priest gets out the bag of cinnamon buns and puts it down on the table next to a foil tray containing the cracked remains of some mashed potato, dried-up sauce, and two grey meatballs.

The lathe down by the shore falls silent.

The priest goes outside, tries the door to the chapel, then looks in the unlocked garage.

Theres a muddy shovel on the floor, and a black plastic bucket full of rusting rat-traps.

He uses his stick to lift the plastic covering the snow-blower, but stops when he hears a distant moaning sound.

He goes back outside and walks over to the ruins of the old crematorium on the edge of the forest. The oven and the sooty stump of its chimney are sticking up from the tall weeds.

The priest walks round a stack of wooden pallets and cant help looking over his shoulder.

Hes had an ominous feeling ever since he stepped on board the ferry.

Theres nothing reassuring about the light today.

The odd sound rings out again, closer, like a calf trapped in a metal box.

He stops and stands still, not making a sound.

Everything is quiet as his breath steams from his mouth.

The ground is muddy and trampled down behind the compost heap. Theres a bag of potting compost leaning against one tree.

The priest starts to walk towards the compost but stops when he reaches a metal pipe sticking out of the ground, some half a metre long. Perhaps it marks the boundary.

Leaning on his stick, he looks up at the forest and sees a path covered with pine-needles and cones.

The wind is whistling through the treetops, and a solitary crow cries in the distance.

The priest turns back, hears the strange moaning sound behind him and starts to walk faster. He passes the crematorium and cottage, glances over his shoulder and thinks that all he wants right now is to get back to his vicarage and sit down in front of the fire with a thriller and a glass of whisky.

A dirty police car is driving away from the centre of Oslo on the outer ring road. The weeds growing beneath the barriers shiver in the wind, and a plastic bag is blowing along the ditch.

Karen Stange and Mats Lystad have responded to the call even though its late.

Its really time for them to knock off for the day, but instead theyre on their way to Tveita.

A number of residents in an apartment block have been complaining about a terrible smell. The maintenance company sent someone to check the bins, but they were all clean. The smell turned out to be coming from a flat on the eleventh floor. The sound of quiet singing could be heard inside, but the occupant, a Vidar Hovland, was refusing to answer the door.

The police car drives past an industrial estate.

Behind the barbed wire fence sit skips, trucks, and depots full of salt, ready for winter.

The blocks of flats on Nkkves vei look like a huge concrete staircase has fallen over and split into three parts.

A man in grey overalls is waving to them in front of a van with Mortens Lock Service Ltd emblazoned on the side. Their headlights sweep over him, and the shadow of his raised hand reaches several storeys up the building behind him.

Karen pulls over to the kerb and stops gently, pulls the handbrake on, switches the engine off and gets out of the car with Mats.

The sky is already closing up for the night. The air is cold, it feels like it might snow. The two police officers shake hands with the locksmith. Hes clean-shaven, but his cheeks are grey, his chest seems shrunken and he moves in a twitchy, nervous way.

Have you heard the one about the Swedish Police being called to a cemetery? Theyve already found almost three hundred buried bodies, he jokes almost breathlessly, and looks down at the ground as he laughs.

The thickset man from the building maintenance company is sitting in his pickup smoking.