'Beck's on a case,' said Malm, pulling himself together. 'He is in fact subordinate to me in my division.'

'Oh, so the Murder Squad is working on a case?' said the Commissioner. 'Well, I'm sure he'll find the time. In any event, the Murder Squad may soon work itself right out of existence.'

'I'm on eleven cases myself,' said Gunvald Larsson.

'But you're not in my division' said Stig Malm.

'No, thank the good Lord in heaven. Or some such.'

They all arrived at the prescribed time, except Moller. Stig Malm and Gunvald Larsson greeted each other and the Commissioner, not especially warmly, but then it was not the first time they had met on this rather dreary July day. Martin Beck was there, wearing a denim jacket and baggy trousers, and the Stockholm City Police chief was sporting the usual white silk tie. But Moller was missing.

They were already seated around the conference table when the National Commissioner noticed the fact and remarked cleverly, 'Where's Moller? We simply can't start without him. You know what a fuss there is whenever Security's involved.'

Eric Moller was head of the State Security Police, better known as Sapo, but it was questionable whether even he himself really knew what he was in charge of. The actual Security Police was nothing special. It employed about eight hundred people who supposedly spent their time on two things: first, exposing and catching foreign spies; and second, counteracting organizations and groups considered dangerous to the security of the state. Over the years, however, its role had become more and more confusing, since everyone knew that Sapo's only task was to register, persecute and in general make life a misery for people with left-wing views.

When Sapo finally reached the point where they were keeping dossiers on members of the ruling Social Democratic party, the supposedly socialist government began to find it more and more difficult to control its embarra.s.sment Eric Moller arrived at the conference room thirty-three minutes late. His face was perspiring and he was puffing and blowing.

Even if Moller were a spy or a counterspy or whatever, it would have been extraordinarily difficult for him to appear in disguise. Though roughly the same age as the others, he was much more overweight and had a wreath of foxy-red hair around a bald head and large ears that stuck out at a striking angle. None of the others knew him very well, as he kept to himself, perhaps because of his profession.

The only person present who genuinely loathed Moller was Gunvald Larsson, who said: 'How're things with your Croatian terrorist friends? Do you still have tea parties in the garden on Sat.u.r.day afternoons?'

The chief of the Security Police, however, was too out of breath to reply.

The National Commissioner then opened the meeting, gave an account of the somewhat unpopular senator's coming visit on Thursday the twenty-first of November and said that Gunvald Larsson had brought back some interesting and useful material from his study trip. He spoke of the difficulty of the task and its enormous importance for the prestige of the police. Then he went on to the various special missions each of those present could expect to be a.s.signed.

Pity I didn't bring that head back with me and put it in a jar of Formalin, thought Gunvald Larsson. Now that would really be interesting and useful material.

The news of his very first a.s.signment as chief of operations reached Martin Beck in the middle of a yawn. He suppressed it as best he could and said, 'Just a minute, please. Are you talking about me?'

'Precisely, Martin,' said the Commissioner heartily. 'What is this if not a preventive murder investigation? You'll be given all the resources you need, you can choose whom you like and use your staff as you think best.'

Martin Beck at first thought of shaking his head, and then he thought, good G.o.d, the fact is he can order me to do it. Then he noticed that Gunvald Larsson was nudging him in the side and turned to him.

Gunvald Larsson murmured, 'Tell him you'll organize the whole protective apparatus, preliminary investigation, long-range security and everything.'

'How?'

'With staff from the Murder Squad and the Violent Crimes Squad. But only if someone else takes charge of short-range security, to see to it that no one pops up and bashes the senator's head in with a brick or something.'

'Gentlemen, would you stop mumbling and speak up, please,' said the Commissioner.

Glancing swiftly at Martin Beck, Gunvald Larsson said, 'Beck and I reckon that with personnel mainly from Murder and Violent Crimes, we can undertake to coordinate all long-range activity - preventive measures and everything. But we'd rather not have to deal with the close-range protection. That a.s.signment seems made for Moller and his gang.'

The Commissioner cleared his throat and said, 'What do you think, Eric?'

'Fine,' said Moller. 'We'll take that on.'

He was still having difficulty with his breathing.

'That particular job is really embarra.s.singly simple,' said Gunvald Larsson, 'I could do it with the twenty thickest cops in the city. And Moller, after all, has several hundred nincomp.o.o.ps out there in the bushes in disguise. I heard one of them photographed the Prime Minister as he was giving his May Day speech and reported that he appeared to be a dangerous communist.'

'Cut it out, Larsson,' said the Commissioner. 'That's enough. So you'll take the job, Beck?'

Martin Beck sighed, but nodded his agreement. He saw the a.s.signment ahead of him with all of its wretched complications - endless meetings, officious politicians and military people meddling in everything. Still, he could not in fact refuse to carry out a direct order, and Gunvald Larsson seemed to have some sort of idea of how the whole thing could be handled. He had already succeeded in getting rid of the Security Police, and that was a very good thing.

'Before I go on, I'd like to know one thing,' said the Commissioner. 'Something our friend Moller should be able to answer.'

'Oh , yes,' said the security man stoically, opening his briefcase.

'Well, this organization called UGH or whatever it's called, what do we know about it?'

'It isn't called UGH,' said Malm, stroking his hair.

'But it ought to be,' said Gunvald Larsson.

The Commissioner burst out laughing. Everyone except Gunvald Larsson looked at him in surprise.

'It's called ULAG,' said Malm.

"That's it,' said the Commissioner. 'What do we know about it?'

Moller took a single piece of paper out of his file and said laconically, 'Practically nothing. That is, we know it has carried out several a.s.sa.s.sinations. The first time was in March last year, when the president of Costa Rica was shot as he stepped out of a plane in Tegucigalpa. An a.s.sa.s.sination attempt was unexpected and the security measures do not appear to have been very satisfactory. If ULAG itself had not taken responsibility, the a.s.sumption would have been that the a.s.sa.s.sin was some individual psychopath.'

'Shot?' asked Martin Beck.

'Yes, apparently by a long-range sniper who lay hidden in a van. The police did not succeed in tracing him.' 'And the next time?'

'In Malawi, where two African prime ministers were meeting to discuss a border dispute. The whole building suddenly exploded and more than forty people were killed. That was in September. The security measures were extremely comprehensive.'

Moller wiped the sweat from his forehead. Gunvald Larsson reflected with satisfaction that his own physical condition was not all that bad by comparison.

"Then the organization carried out two a.s.sa.s.sinations in January. First, a North Vietnamese minister, a general and three members of his staff were all killed when their car was. .h.i.t by mortar fire. They were on their way to a conference with some senior South Vietnamese, and the convoy had a military escort.

'Only a week later, the organization struck again in one of the northern states of India. When the president of the state visited a railway station, at least five men threw hand grenades at both the train and the station building. Then the terrorists fired several salvoes with machine pistols. It was their bloodiest attack to date. Several hundred schoolchildren had gathered to cheer the president and about fifty of them were killed. All the police and security men on the spot were also killed or severely injured and the president himself was blown to bits. This was also the only time anyone saw the criminals. They were masked and wearing some kind of commando uniform. They drove away in several different cars and could not be traced.

'Then there was one more case in j.a.pan in March, where a well-known and controversial politician visited a school. In this case, too, the building was blown up and the politician killed along with a good many other people.'

'Is that all you know about ULAG?' asked Martin Beck.

'Yes.'

'Did you prepare that summary yourself?' 'No.'

'When did you get it?' 'About two weeks ago.'

'May I ask who supplied you with it?' said Gunvald Larsson.

'Yes, you may, but I don't have to give you an answer.'

They all knew, anyway. Moller said with a resigned expression, 'The CIA. It's no secret that we exchange information with the USA.'

'So the Security Police knew nothing about ULAG before that?' said Martin Beck.

'No,' said Moller. 'No more than what was in the newspapers. It doesn't seem to be a communist group.'

'Nor Arab,' said Gunvald Larsson.

'Now let's hear what Larsson has to say,' said the Commissioner. 'What more do you know about this ULAG or whatever it's called?'

'I know just as much about ULAG as Moller has down on that piece of paper, plus a little more. I was in on most of the investigation after the a.s.sa.s.sination on the fifth of June, and I'll merely point out that there are countries whose security men do more than subscribe to mimeographed material from the CIA.'

'Don't be so long-winded, Gunvald,' said Martin Beck.

'If we look at these a.s.sa.s.sinations, certain conclusions can easily be drawn,' Larsson said. 'For instance, they have all been directed at prominent politicians, but those politicians have nothing else in common. Costa Rica's president was more or less a social democrat and the two Africans were nationalists. The Vietnamese, in contrast to what Moller said, were not North Vietnamese but connected to the PRG - that is, the provisional government in South Vietnam - and were communists. The state president in India was a liberal socialist, and the j.a.panese an ultraconservative. The president whose demise I witnessed was a fascist and ran a dictatorship of many years' standing. However you twist and turn it, there is no clear political pattern. Neither I nor anyone else I know of is in a position to offer even a possible explanation.'

'Perhaps they do the jobs to order,' said Martin Beck.

'I've thought of that, but it doesn't seem likely. It just doesn't fit somehow. Another thing that strikes me is that all the a.s.sa.s.sinations were so well planned and carried out. They have used a whole series of different methods and all of them have functioned perfectly. These people know their job and are extremely dangerous. They are evidently well trained and educated, and they seem to have considerable resources at their command. They must also have some kind of base.'

'Where?' asked Martin Beck.

'I don't know. I could make a guess, but I'd rather not. But regardless of what their ultimate aims may be, I find it hard to imagine anything more unpleasant than a terrorist group that always succeeds in its a.s.sa.s.sination attempts.'

'Tell us what happened out there,' said the Commissioner.

'It took me a while to work it out,' said Gunyald Larsson. 'The explosion was extremely powerful. Twenty-six people were killed in addition to the president and the governor - most of them police and security men, but also the drivers of several taxis and horse-drawn cabs parked nearby. There was even one person walking along another street who was killed when what was left of the car landed on his head. What made the explosion so powerful was that the bomb had been placed in one of the city's gas mains, so it must have been detonated by radio by someone who was quite some distance away.'

'And what do you think the police did wrong?' asked Martin Beck.

"There was nothing much wrong with the actual security plan,' said Gunvald Larsson. 'It was roughly the same one the United States Secret Service worked out after the a.s.sa.s.sination of President Kennedy. But since this guest was obviously unpopular, they shouldn't have published the route of the motorcade beforehand.'

'But then people don't get a chance to cheer and wave flags,' said the Stockholm City chief.

'And it's h.e.l.l to keep changing the route,' said Moller. 'I remember what a to-do there was when Khrushchev was here.'

'I seem to remember when he left he said he'd never seen so many policemen's backs before anywhere in the world,' said Martin Beck.

'That was his own fault,' said Moller. 'He didn't even have enough sense to be scared.'

'Another mistake they made was in starting their preventive measures too late,' Gunvald Larsson went on. 'They set up controls at the ports and airports only two days before the state visit But people like these boys in ULAG come weeks ahead.'

'That's sheer guesswork,' said Mdller.

'Not so. The police over there produced quite a lot of interesting information. And the information from that a.s.sa.s.sination in India wasn't as meagre as you made out. A policeman who was badly injured and later died said that the terrorists weren't really masked, they were just wearing some kind of helmet, like the ones construction workers wear. He also said he was sure that, of the three he saw, two were j.a.panese and the third was European, a tall man of about thirty. When this man jumped into the car, his helmet fell off and the wounded policeman saw that he had blond hair and sideburns. Naturally the Indian police were checking everyone who left the country, especially foreigners, and among them was a man who fit that description. He had a Rhodesian pa.s.sport and they took his name. But the policeman in the hospital didn't give his description until the next day, and by that time the man was long gone. The authorities in Rhodesia said the name wasn't known to them:'

'But at least it's something,' said Martin Beck.

'The security police down where I was had had no previous contact with the Indian police. But they did keep track of everyone leaving the country at the time, and it turned out later that one of them was a person with the same name and the same pa.s.sport. The pa.s.sport is almost a hundred per cent certain to be false, as well as the name.'

'What name did he use?' asked Martin Beck.

'Reinhardt Heydrich,' said Gunvald Larsson.

The chief cleared his throat 'This ULAG seems very unpleasant'

'How are we going to defend anyone against people who use radio-controlled bombs?' said Moller gloomily.

'We'll manage, I expect,' said Gunvald Larsson. 'As long as you take care of the close-range protection.'

'That's not so easy if we all go flying into the air all of a sudden,' said the security chief. 'How do we protect him then?'

'Don't worry about bombs. We'll take care of that'

'I was just thinking about one thing,' said Martin Beck. 'If long-range protection was really functioning down there, then whoever set off the bomb couldn't have been dose enough to see what was happening.'

'I'm sure he wasn't,' said Gunvald Larsson.

'Could he have had an accomplice nearby?'

'I don't think so.'

'Then how did he know when to set the thing off?'

'What I think is that he just listened to the regular radio broadcast or watched it on television. Radio and TV were both sending the whole state visit live. They usually do in most countries when anything special is going on. We know that ULAG always strikes at very well-known political figures. And always when the intended victim is doing something unusual or spectacular, like making an official state visit for example. This'll be just the kind of occasion when they might try something.'

'What do we do about prevention?' asked Moller. 'Shall I lock up all the crackpots?'

'No,' said Gunvald Larsson. 'Anyone who wants to can go out and demonstrate, of course.'

'You don't know what you're saying,' said the Stockholm chief. 'We'd have to bring in every policeman in the country. McNamara was supposed to go to Copenhagen a few years ago, and he simply had to cancel when he heard about the demonstrations they were expecting. And when Reagan was in Denmark to lunch on the royal yacht two years ago, it was hardly mentioned in the newspapers. He was there on a private visit and didn't want any publicity. He said so himself. Imagine: Reagan...'

'If I were free this particular day, I might well go out and demonstrate against this b.a.s.t.a.r.d myself,' said Gunvald Larsson. 'He's a lot worse than Reagan.'

They all looked distrustfully and gravely at Gunvald Larsson, all except Martin Beck, who appeared to be sunk in his own thoughts. They were thinking: Is this really the right man for the job?

Then the Commissioner decided it had probably been a joke.

'This has been very productive' he said. 'I think we're heading in the right direction. Thank you, all of you.'

Martin Beck had finished thinking. He turned to Eric Moller.

'I've been offered this a.s.signment and I've accepted it. That means you'll have to follow my directives. Directive number one is that there's to be no preventive detention of people whose political opinions are different from your own, unless there are really compelling reasons and unless we others, myself in particular, approve. You've been given an important a.s.signment, the close-range protection, and I want you to stick to that. You're to try to remember that people have the right to demonstrate, and I forbid you to use provocation and unnecessary force. Any demonstrations are to be handled properly and you're to work together with the chiefs for Stockholm and the regular police. All plans must be submitted to me.'

'But what about all the subversive elements in this country? Am I just supposed to ignore them?'

'As far as I can see, the subversive elements are a product of your imagination and your wishful thinking. Your primary job is the close-range protection of the senator. Demonstrations are inevitable, but they are not to be broken up by force. If the regular police get sensible directives, there won't be any complications. I want to be informed of all your plans. Of course you're free to deploy your eight hundred spies however you like, provided it's legal. Is that clear?'