Knock Knock Read online

  She swept a hand over what was about to turn him into someone else.

  “One for the right eye, one for the left, one for the nose. And one for the chin and cheeks and neck. Only four pieces. It’s easier to deal with in case they start to peel.”

  She began with the closest tray, carefully lifted up the skin-like piece that lay on top of it.

  “I prefer working in gelatin, you know that, Piet, but right now—the weather’s just too hot. I have no clue what you’re planning to do, where you’re headed, but I do know you’re usually physically active and gelatin in this heat would just melt off.”

  He was aware that knowing the usage of a mask was usually the starting point for her designs. And so she was doing her best to infer the information she needed but would never receive.

  He smiled.

  “You’re not married to a cop, are you?”

  She smiled back.

  “No, my husband lives in the fantasy version of what seems to be your real life.”

  “Fantasy—how do you mean?”

  “He considers himself a playwright. That was how we met. You know, work.”

  “Well, in that case—yes. This disguise is going to be subjected to a lot . . . physically.”

  She held a shapeless mass in front of his right eye, as if taking aim, checking the distances, then pressed down against his skin. In the past Piet Hoffmann had stayed for the entire process and knew how skillfully her hands had shaped new features for a new personality. He knew what it looked like when she built the tiny walls along the edges of the first cast, walls meant to hold the mixture she poured over it—plaster and a splash of regular dishwashing soap and something else he couldn’t remember the name of. A filling that solidified, and when she finally tore off the walls, she had her next cast, on which she built the pieces of the mask.

  “Since I couldn’t use gelatin, which worked so well before, I went for silicone. Not perfect, I know, but the best I could do under the circumstances. The upside is that it can withstand heat much better, the downside is that it’s more likely to harden. So I experimented a little—mixed in a few other components. Now it should be more elastic and skin-like. We’ll just have to cross our fingers, Piet, and hope your skin takes to it.”

  She asked him to close his eyes while she glued a tired-looking eyelid over his right eye. She poked at it, pulled at it—it stayed put, firmly. Then a hanging eyelid over his left eye, then the enlarged wings of his nose, and finally the much larger piece that stretched from the two bloated cheeks to an equally bloated chin.

  “I knew your skin tone already, so I was able to do the color matching in the silicone itself. And now . . .”

  She looked happy and relieved.

  “. . . it’s perfect. The seams are barely visible, Piet! Whatever remains I can easily cover up.”

  He reached for a hand mirror lying on the lower shelf of her cart.

  She slapped his hand away, shook her head. He wasn’t supposed to see, yet.

  “I know you don’t like dress shirts. But I managed to make it to H&M before they closed, and I picked up one for you. It’s an extra large, so there will be plenty of room for the stomach that matches that face.”

  There was a plastic bag sitting on the floor, out of which she produced his new belly, which she hung around his neck and stabilized with a belt at his waist, a pair of gray dress pants, and a light-blue, summery, thin dress shirt with long sleeves.

  “Sort of like a banker—your new look fits better with that outfit than your usual T-shirt, hunter’s vest, and worn jeans. Also, no matter how carefully I place the big piece, there will be seams visible on the back of your neck. And I don’t want you to have to think about that while you’re running around—that won’t work. But a shirt collar, Piet, that will protect you if it comes loose, hide it.”

  She sat down one last time in front of him, a mustache fashioned from real human hair in her hand, the same shade as the newly dyed hair on his head. She adjusted his head slightly backwards, asked him to hold it just like that, and spread glue between his upper lip and nose and then on the back of the mustache. She pressed it down, walked her fingertips over it until she was sure it stuck.

  “And the seam is as usual in the nasolabial fold. It’s less visible there, hidden by your natural fold.”

  Now. It was time.

  She coaxed a full-length mirror out from behind the coat rack in the corner, carried it over toward his chair, and held it in front of him.

  It was time to meet himself.

  “You have to promise me to keep as close an eye on it as you can. In this heat—a single wrong move and a seam might come loose. Around the eyes. Or around your mouth. That’s what I’m most worried about. I’m sending some glue with you, just dab it on as needed, works for the mustache too, which might loosen at the corner of your mouth.”

  Piet Hoffmann looked at the person in the mirror.

  The person stared back at him.

  Him.

  And yet not.

  Dark hair. Dark mustache. Brown eyes. Skin sagging on his face. A person who seemed broken and old.

  He put out his hand, as if in a greeting, and the mirror image did the same.

  “A couple of days, Piet. Then you have to come back. If you want to be sure it won’t show. I have the casts and I’ll make a couple extra sets and have them here waiting for you. When you come back, I have a really effective removal agent, then we’ll do a re-glue. It’ll be just as quick as today.”

  She looked at him. Really looked at him.

  Checked every seam.

  Pulled a couple of badly dyed strands of hair out of his eyebrows.

  Asked him to spin around again, then nodded. He was ready.

  She smiled her lovely smile and wished him good luck, and it occurred to him how nice it would feel to just stay here. Become another person with another face living another life. But he was in a hurry. He had to keep moving toward those who threatened him. And now he could—in a new shape. Get closer, close enough to take back Paula.

  * * *

  • • •

  He’d changed cars again, now back to the one he’d started the day with, and then settled down at a café that stayed open late and put the phone down on the table in front of him. Three cups of coffee and biscottis later. Until the text finally arrived at half past ten.

  Latitude 59.279751. Longitude 18.229393.

  Northeastern edge of Knipträsket lake.

  Between the stone and two anthills.

  Dig one half meter down.

  Collect it before midnight.

  Piet Hoffmann looked up the coordinates on his phone. It showed a spot about twenty kilometers south of Stockholm, not far from Saltsjöbaden and Fisksätra. A short walk into the large natural reserve. That’s where they buried it.

  He’d play their game. But just a little longer. He had to make them think he was doing what they wanted, so he could get close enough to stab them in the back.

  It took twenty minutes by car. From the artificial light of the city to the dense darkness and absolute stillness of the forest.

  He held a GPS and a flashlight in one hand and pulled a small cart behind him with the other, zigzagging between thick branches and mossy stones down a narrow forest path. He stumbled a few times over a stray root, but never fell, always forward, forward, he had to keep moving.

  Buried in the forest.

  That’s how a lot of the criminals in Stockholm stored their weapons—within a twenty-kilometer radius of the city there were hundreds of private stockpiles buried beneath the ground. Criminals in the underworld hoarded and guarded their weapons like gold—many groups had shared custody of a stockpile, maybe a couple of Walther P99s, a Kalashnikov, which they dug up as needed.

  He stopped, checked his GPS. He was almost to the small lake called K
nipträsket. The northeast side, with his flashlight it was easy enough to find a large clearing where a big stone shared space with a couple of huge anthills. He was soon standing in front of a newly cleared piece of ground, and checked again to make sure the hood of his jacket covered his face before unfolding his spade.

  He assumed they had him under surveillance here, and they didn’t need to see his new face yet.

  Powerful thrusts.

  Aimed toward a weapon worth one hundred thousand kronor a piece. Much more expensive than anything else circulating in this city.

  A Glock, brand new and still in the box, could be had for ten, twelve thousand kronor. An AK-47, which cost about two hundred euros at the beginning of the supply chain in the Balkans, went for twenty-five thousand kronor by the time it reached Stockholm. Maybe some idiot might agree to pay thirty thousand, supply and demand, the more desperate you are, the more expensive it will be. But these were bargains in comparison to what he was about to dig out of the ground.

  So many more weapons in circulation now than when he was in the game—and so many more shootings. Still, bystanders rarely ended up with a bullet in their brains; criminals shot at each other, robbed each other, drug dealers trying to take over each other’s territories. While the politicians just kept talking about getting tougher on crime. But long sentences didn’t make a difference. People got a hold of weapons because they needed them. A matter of life or death. And life in prison was still better than no life at all.

  Now.

  The tip of the spade hit plastic wrapped around wood.

  Piet Hoffmann got down on his knees, cleared the last of the dirt with his hands, and lifted out the box. Oblong, heavy. His gloves still on, he pulled off the lid, looking for the FN BRG-15, a weapon that didn’t exist.

  Dear God.

  There it was. It was real.

  The most powerful machine gun ever made and some faceless arms dealer was trying to use Piet Hoffmann to corner the Swedish weapons market with it.

  Start a war. Change the balance of terror. Force every gang, every mafia, to arm themselves in the same way as their enemies.

  He loaded the wooden box onto his cart and then cleared away the dirt and gravel that covered the next box, the tripod, and then the ammunition. He was just starting to head back down the narrow forest path when the phone rang. So they were watching him, even out here.

  “You found it.”

  That distorted voice. It almost sounded pleased.

  “I want you to get started. Immediately. Our agreement is a go. We’re near your family to make sure . . . well, nothing happens to them. Until you do what we ask. When you’ve taken out a criminal organization with the weapon you just dug up, when you’ve launched our ad campaign, then we’ll leave your family alone and hand over the original documents, which describe your years as a snitch. And you’ll never hear from us again.”

  He had to answer. He had to buy time. Without revealing his new voice.

  “Bad connection. Call in fifteen minutes.”

  Abrupt. Almost whispering. Then he hung up. They called again. And again. Only when he was back up on the highway did he stop, pull over to the side of the road, and get out of the car, where his new voice would be watered down by the ambient sounds.

  “What’s going on?”

  “My phone. I didn’t have good reception—now it’s working better. But I need time. I can’t just go take out anyone. I have to choose the appropriate organization for the job. In the most vulnerable situation. With the most enemies. Most . . .”

  “How long?”

  “Forty-eight hours.”

  “Twenty-four.”

  “I need . . .”

  “Twenty-four hours is what you get. It’s not negotiable. Act—and you’ll get your papers and your family back. Don’t act—and we send the documents to every organization you ever snitched on, and we start shooting—youngest first. Luiza, that’s her name, right?”

  Piet Hoffmann lingered for a while in the darkness next to the highway, watching cars rush by. Everyone was on their way somewhere. Just like him—on his way to where the ones who threatened him didn’t want to see him. And they wouldn’t.

  What do you do when a distorted voice thinks they know what you look like?

  You mask yourself.

  What do you do if that voice thinks you’re working for him?

  You go your own way.

  And—what do you do when that motherfucking voice is convinced that he’s kept you at a distance?

  You get close. You go all the way in.

  * * *

  • • •

  He’d done his final car exchange of the day—jumped into a small Japanese rental car he’d picked up at a gas station in Västertorp, where his own car stood along with the phone back in the passenger seat—and now he was parked on a backstreet not far from the house that meant everything to him. Close enough to be able to see, far enough away not to be seen. Listening to the blackbird’s melodic song. Wondering if it was the same bird as before. He decided it was, it must live in their tree.

  His whole body ached.

  He wanted to be with them, checking Hugo’s and Rasmus’s homework, bathing Luiza in her little tub, holding Zofia in his arms.

  Later.

  When this was over.

  A neighbor passed by with her dog on a leash, a shiny red Irish setter bouncing along happily, and they nodded to each other. She showed no signs of knowing the person she was greeting. A little later a couple with a daughter in Hugo’s class parked next to him on this dead-end street, glanced through his windshield as they passed by, but they too didn’t seem to recognize him.

  When the lights were turned off on the bottom floor of his home, the living room, the hall, and finally the kitchen, he grabbed a bag out of the back seat and took out two finger prostheses. Once they went up, it usually took a half hour until Zofia had the kids in bed and the lights in the upstairs’ bathroom and in the boys’ bedrooms went dark like the night.

  He didn’t like using these. They felt clumsy and awkward, because he’d learned to live with just three fingers on his left hand. But he had to hide the most noticeable characteristic he had. His final transformation. He greased the stumps of his fingers with gel until the thin sleeve of the prostheses slid on easily.

  And suddenly Piet Hoffmann was there again. In a hotel in central Germany some years ago.

  He’d infiltrated the Polish mafia from behind the walls of a Swedish maximum-security prison. Been unmasked, sentenced to death, forced to flee. He’d hidden in a ventilation shaft, and when it was time to go, he left two of his fingertips behind on a metal edge. His bones had been visible. It was in a hotel room in Frankfurt where they’d agreed to meet that Zofia peeled back the skin and flesh, wrapped his fingers in sterilized compresses, gave him a high dose of antibiotics, and waited until she was sure the infection was gone. Then she’d used a regular pair of pruning shears to clip the bone off a bit further in, folded the excess skin over it, and glued it all together.

  Medical silicone. That’s what the finger prostheses were made of. At the moment he was covered from head to toe in materials he’d only ever used to caulk joints. He waved the prostheses, and they stayed firmly attached to the stumps, then wiggled his healthy fingers without bumping into the shells—his ability to move was intact.

  A half hour later and night had rocked the whole neighborhood to sleep. He climbed out of his car. Started walking. Strolling. That’s what it should look like—a man out for a nighttime stroll, maybe on his way home, maybe just trying to get a good night’s sleep.

  According to Juan and Nic, the first vehicle that didn’t seem to belong in the area was parked just twenty meters from the Hoffmann’s mailbox. It had a clear view of the front of the house. A Toyota, not brand new, mid-price range. Exactly the sort of thing he would hav
e chosen to not attract attention. He memorized the license plate number and walked on.

  There was a man sitting in the driver’s seat.

  Piet Hoffmann knocked on the side window and waited for the window to roll down.

  “Got a light?”

  Hoffmann recognized the man. He’d even worked with him a couple of times—hired him when he needed extra personnel. But they’d never really gelled. That this guy and his friends were his opponents, sent here on behalf of an anonymous organization, made this all the more difficult.

  “Excuse me?”

  “A light? The wife won’t let me smoke at home anymore.”

  Hoffmann waved the pack of cigarettes he’d bought on his way here. The man in the car was competent. Trigger-happy and fearless. Employed by a security company known for not being picky about who was paying or why, as long as the money was good. Everything inside Piet Hoffmann was screaming now. He wanted to grab onto the motherfucker watching his house, drag him out of his car, force him to say who was paying him and whom he was reporting to. But he couldn’t. Not yet. Once Zofia and his kids were safe, then he could unleash himself.

  “And, like an idiot, I left the house with no lighter.”

  “Go away.”

  “You got a light or . . . ?”

  “Are you deaf? Get the fuck outta here.”

  Now he’d tried his mask and voice on someone he’d met before. It worked. He’d gotten close. In a way Piet Hoffmann never could have.

  Not far away there was another car with a lone man in the front seat, his eyes on the back of Piet’s house. And when Hoffmann checked the license plate, it was registered to the same security firm.

  They were—just like him—guarding his family. While he was supposed to be somewhere else, preparing for the mission they’d given him.

  Instead, he continued strolling through the neighborhood he knew so well.

  Made a wide circle until he felt completely sure that the two men could no longer see him.

  Then he turned back.