“I’m not sure.”

“Here’s a photo of him.” Macdonald leaned over a desk. Vikingsson smiled unassumingly at the camera. He had short, straight, blond hair. “Wh-i-ite.”

Winter went and stood next to him.

“How can a flight attendant afford an apartment in Notting Hill?” Macdonald asked.

“I don’t know what Scandinavian Airlines pays.”

“I couldn’t live here on my salary.”

“That’s because you fly too close to the ground.”

“That doesn’t seem to be a problem for you, judging by your clothes.”

“No.”

“So you’re independently wealthy?”

“You might say that.”

“Damn, I knew it.”

“It’s a mix of old and new money.”

“You’re like a British officer,” Macdonald said. “Their salaries pay the bill at the mess hall and that’s about it.”

“We’ll have to do a little checking into Vikingsson’s finances. Remember, he’s got that place in Gothenburg too.”

They opened all the closets. The clothes were impeccably stacked.

“Perfectionist,” Macdonald said.

“What were you expecting? Another garbage bag of bloody clothes?”

“Once doesn’t count.”

“We’ll come back.”

“You’ll be gone by then.”

“I’ll be with you in spirit.”

“What time is your flight?”

“Seven o’clock.”

“Will Vikingsson still be there when you land?”

“Just barely. Unless we get a detention order.”

“Somebody has to convince the D.A.”

“Everybody’s nervous now. We can take advantage of that.”

“Or else Vikingsson will be cleared by the time you get home.”

“That would also be a step in the right direction.”

“The process of elimination. That’s our stock-in-trade.”

They came out on Stanley Gardens and walked over to the intersection. Macdonald nodded at someone in a Vauxhall that was parked across the street.

Winter called Gothenburg.

“Ringmar here.”

“It’s Erik. How’s it going?”

“No disagreements about the weather forecast, anyway.”

“What’s he like?”

“Cool.”

“Too cool?”

“Not exactly. But he’s obviously hiding something.”

“Good to hear.”

“It may or may not be important.”

“My plane lands at ten o’clock.”

“That’s too late.”

“So we’re still not close to having probable cause?”

“We haven’t got a thing.”

“This is moving fast, but that’s the way I like it. Make sure you’ve got something on him by the time I arrive. I’m counting on results.”

Winter hung up. It was late afternoon and more people were out, on their way to the markets. He heard cheerful Scandinavian voices. “Vikingsson isn’t talking.”

“That’s hardly surprising,” Macdonald said.

“It’ll happen. We just need a little more time.”

“They’re waiting for us at the studio.”

“I’d forgotten all about that.”

“They haven’t forgotten about us.”

Winter played the part of Macdonald’s advisor. It was a small studio. The lights were bright but Macdonald wasn’t the least bit sweaty.

This might do some good, Winter thought. You never know.

They didn’t mention the interrogations in Gothenburg. If it had been just three days from now, or five, Winter thought, we would have had a photo to hold up, a head of short, straight blond hair.

They held up other photos. People could call in during the program. The crew recorded all the calls. But when Macdonald listened to the tapes afterward, he didn’t hear anything that merited immediate attention.

Winter thought about Vikingsson. The events in Gothenburg were a welcome distraction.

After the show, they sat in Macdonald’s car outside the studio, then rode to a pub for lunch. As soon as they were through the revolving door, Winter was assaulted by the smell of beer, fried liver and cigarette smoke. They ordered their meal.

“We’re going to hear from some witnesses this time,” Macdonald said.

“About Christian?” Winter lit a cigarillo.

“Yes.”

“Because of the color of his skin?”

“Yep. The victim was a black person from another country. People aren’t so afraid. And considering that the murderer was white…”

“That’s an assumption on our part.”

“We have no reason to believe otherwise.”

“Here comes the beer.”

“And your quiche.”

“Now I won’t get a chance to meet your family,” Winter said.

“That makes two of us.”

“Do your kids remember what you look like?”

“Just as long as I don’t get a haircut.”

“Do you have a picture of them?”

Macdonald put his glass down and took his wallet out of his inside pocket. His holster strap stretched tightly across his chest like a big leather bandage. The metal revolver gleamed under his arm.

He pulled out a photo, a side view of a dark-haired woman sitting between two teenage girls. All three of them had ponytails.

“That’s the way they wanted it.” Macdonald smiled.

“Where’s the other half of the mug shot?”

“They’re a wild bunch.”

“Twins?”

“Uh-huh. Here’s another shot of them.”

“They look like your right side.”

“It’s the hairstyle.”

They ate in silence. Macdonald ordered coffee for both of them. He drove Winter back to the hotel. The traffic was hardly moving on Cromwell Road.

“ London is a hellhole,” Macdonald said. “At least to drive in.”

“I always end up back here. It’s one of the few truly civilized cities there is.”

“You just can’t resist our cigars.”

“The diversity is what most appeals to me.”

“Right, real diverse-murderers and rapists and pimps and junkies.”

“And soccer teams and restaurants and jazz clubs and people from all over the world.”

“It’s true. The eternal empire, although we call it the Commonwealth these days.”

“Could you imagine living anywhere else?”

“Somewhere other than London? I don’t live in London. I live in Kent.”

“You know what I mean.”

“No.”

“No what?”

“No, I can’t imagine living anywhere else.”

“Not to mention that you can sunbathe when it’s still winter in Sweden.”

Winter picked up his bags from the hotel. Macdonald coaxed the car back onto A4 and drove through the borough of Hammersmith onto M4 south of Gunnersbury Park. Winter looked out at the urban landscape. Children were playing soccer in Osterley Park, the wind ruffling their hair. Nothing ever changed. Middle-aged men strolled past, golf carts in tow. Three horses trotted by below him. He couldn’t tell whether the riders were women or men. He saw the last horse leave a trail of manure without breaking its elegant stride.

Winter felt the cold air as soon as he was out of the terminal. Spring was dawdling over the North Sea.

Ringmar was waiting in the car. “We had to let him go,” he said.

Winter waited.

“But he doesn’t have any alibis.”

“That’s good.”

“He can’t prove where he was during any of the murders.”

“Fine.”

“We’ve contacted the airlines, and he wasn’t on duty when they were committed.”

“Hmm.”

Out on the expressway, they drove through the town of Landvetter at eighty miles an hour. The lights of Gothenburg glimmered ten miles away.

“He was in London when it happened there and in Gothenburg when it happened here,” Ringmar said.

“What does he claim he was up to?”

“This and that. Laundry, cooking, going to a movie.”

Ringmar tapped his fingers on the wheel, as if to make the car go faster.

“No holes in his story?” Winter asked.

“Nope.”

“Have you checked whether he was working on the days that the victims were en route?”

“Yes.”

“And?”

“He was on all the flights.”