The White Lioness (23 page)

Getting old, he thought to himself. I'm only 44 and I'm already feeling worn out.

His train of thought suddenly angered him. It was up to him and nobody else to decide if he was getting old before his time. He could not blame his work, nor his divorce - that was already five years ago. The only question was: how would he be able to change things?

He came to the square and wondered where he should eat. In a moment of extravagance, he decided on the Continental. He paused on Hamngatan to look at the display in the lamp shop, then continued to the hotel. He nodded to the girl at the front desk, recalling that she had been in the same class as his daughter.

The dining room was almost empty, and he nearly changed his mind. Sitting all by himself in a deserted dining room seemed like too much solitude. But he sat down anyway. He couldn't be bothered to start looking for somewhere to eat now.

I'll turn over a new leaf tomorrow, he thought, grimacing. He always put off the most important matters affecting his own life. When he was at work, on the other hand, he insisted on precisely the opposite approach. Always do the most important things first. He had a split personality.

He was studying the menu when a young waiter came over to his table and asked what he would like to drink. Wallander had an idea he recognised the boy, but he could not quite place him.

"Whisky," he said. "No ice. But a glass of water as well."

He emptied the glass at once, and immediately ordered another. He did not often drink to get drunk. But tonight he was not going to hold back.

When he got his third whisky, he remembered who the waiter was. A few years earlier Wallander had questioned him about a series of robberies and car thefts. He was later arrested and convicted.

So things have turned out all right for him, at least, he thought. And I'm not going to say anything. Maybe you could say things have gone better for him than they have for me?

He could feel the effects of the spirits already.

He drank a bottle of wine with his dinner, and two brandies with his coffee.

It was 10.30 p.m. when he left the restaurant. He was pretty drunk by then, but he had no intention of going home to lie down.

He crossed over to the taxi stand opposite the bus station and took a taxi to the only dance club in town. It was surprisingly full, and he had some difficulty finding a table near the bar. He ordered a whisky and went out on the dance floor. He was not a bad dancer, and always performed with a certain measure of self-confidence. Music from the Swedish hit parade made him maudlin. He generally fell in love with every woman he danced with. He always planned to take them back to his apartment afterwards. But the prospect was scuppered on this occasion when he began to feel queasy, barely managing to get outside before throwing up. He did not go back in, but staggered homewards instead. When he got back to his apartment, he stripped and stood naked in front of the hall mirror.

"Kurt Wallander," he said aloud. "This is your life."

Then he decided to call Baiba Liepa in Riga. It was 2 a.m. He dialled a wrong number first, and though he knew he shouldn't, he tried again and let it ring until eventually she answered.

And then he had no idea what to say. He could not find the English words he needed. He had obviously woken her up, and she had been frightened by the telephone ringing in the middle of the night.

He told her he loved her. She did not know what he meant at first. Once it had dawned on her, she also realised he was drunk, and Wallander knew the whole thing was a terrible mistake. He apologised for disturbing her and went straight into the kitchen and took a half bottle of vodka from the refrigerator. He still felt sick, but he forced the drink down.

He woke at dawn on the sofa in the living room. He had a king-size hangover. What he regretted most was the call to Baiba Liepa. He groaned at the thought of it, staggered into the bedroom, and sank into his bed. He forced his mind to go blank. It was late in the afternoon before he got up and made coffee. He sat in front of the television and watched one programme after another. He did not bother to call his father, nor did he try again to contact his daughter. At about 7 p.m. he heated up some fish
au gratin
, which was all he had in the freezer. Then he returned to the television. He tried to avoid thinking about last night's telephone call.

At 11 p.m. he took a sleeping pill and pulled the covers over his head. Everything will be better tomorrow, he thought. I'll call her again and explain everything. Or maybe I'll write a letter. Or something.

Monday, May 4, turned out to be very different from the day Wallander had anticipated. Everything seemed to happen all at once. He had just arrived at his office shortly after 7.30 p.m. when the telephone rang. It was Loven in Stockholm.

"There's a word going around town," he said. "Talk of a contract on an African. He can be recognised first and foremost by the bandage he has on his left hand."

It was a second before it dawned on Wallander what kind of a contract Loven was talking about.

"Oh, shit," he said.

"I thought that's what you would say," Loven said. "If you can tell me when you'll arrive, we can drive out and pick you up."

"I don't know yet," Wallander said. "But it won't be before this afternoon. Bjork, if you remember who that is, has gallstones. I have to sort things out here first. But I'll call as soon as I get things straightened out."

"We'll be waiting," Loven said.

Wallander had just replaced the receiver when the telephone rang again. At the same time, Martinsson marched into the room waving a sheet of paper in his excitement. Wallander pointed to a chair, and answered the phone.

It was Hogberg, the pathologist in Malmo, who had completed the preliminary autopsy on Louise Akerblom's body. Wallander had dealt with him before, and knew the man was thorough. He pulled a notepad towards him and gestured to Martinsson to give him a pen.

"There is no apparent trace of rape," Hogberg said. "Unless the attacker used a condom, and it all took place in peaceful fashion. Nor does she have any injuries to suggest there was any other kind of violence. Just the abrasions she must have suffered in the well. I couldn't find any sign of her having had handcuffs either on her wrists or on her ankles. All that happened to her is that she was shot."

"I need the bullet as soon as possible," Wallander said.

"You'll get it this morning, but it will be some time before you get the comprehensive report, you understand."

"Thank you for your efforts," Wallander said.

He hung up and turned to Martinsson. "Louise Akerblom was not raped. So no sexual motives."

"So now we know," Martinsson said. "We also know the black finger is the index finger of a man's left hand. The man is probably about 30. It's all here in this fax from Stockholm. You wonder how can they be so precise."

"I've no idea," Wallander said. "But the more we know, the better. If Svedberg is around, I think we'd better have a meeting right away. I'm going to Stockholm this afternoon. I told Bjork I'd hold a press conference at 2 p.m. You and Svedberg had better take care of that."

"Svedberg will be pleased when he hears that," Martinsson said. "Are you sure you can't travel a little later?"

"Positive," Wallander said, getting to his feet.

"I hear our colleagues in Malmo have brought Morell in," Martinsson said when they were out in the corridor.

Wallander stared at him. "Who?" he said.

"Morell. The fence in Malmo. The one with the water pumps."

"Oh, him," Wallander said absentmindedly. "That one."

He went out into reception and asked Ebba to book him a flight at about 3 p.m. He also asked her to reserve a room at the Central Hotel on Vasagatan, which wasn't too expensive. Then he went back to his office and reached for the receiver, intending to call his father, but had second thoughts. He did not want to risk getting into a bad mood. He would need all his powers of concentration today. Then he had a brainwave. He would ask Martinsson to call Loderup later in the day, pass on messages to his father, and explain that he had been forced to go to Stockholm at short notice. That might persuade the old man that Wallander was up to his neck in important business.

The thought cheered him up. It could be a useful ploy for the future.

At 3.55 p.m. Wallander landed at Arlanda, where it was drizzling slightly. He passed through the hangar-like terminal and saw Loven waiting for him outside the revolving doors.

Wallander had a headache. It had been a very intense day. He had spent nearly two hours with the prosecutor. Akeson had many questions and querulous observations. Wallander wondered how to explain to a prosecutor that police officers were occasionally bound to rely on instinct when priorities had to be set. Akeson was critical of the reports he had received so far. By the end of the meeting the atmosphere was tense between them. Before Peters drove Wallander to Sturup Airport, he had managed to stop at his apartment and pack some clothes into a bag. That was when he finally managed to reach Linda on the telephone. She was pleased to hear he was coming, he could hear that. They agreed he would call her that night, no matter how late it was.

Only when the plane had taken off did he realise how hungry he was. The SAS sandwiches were the first food to pass his lips that day.

As they drove to the police station at Kungsholmen, Wallander learned what Loven could tell him about the hunt for Tengblad's killer. They obviously had no useful clues to follow up, and he could see the search was characterised by frustration. Loven also managed to give him a summary of what had happened at the discotheque. It seemed to be either a heavy-handed prank or an act of revenge. No definite clues here, either. Wallander asked about the contract. As far as he was concerned, this was something new and frightening. Something that had only surfaced in the last few years, and then only in the three largest cities in the country. But before long it would be happening in his own back yard. Contracts were made between a customer and a professional killer, with the aim of murdering people. Pure and simple, a business deal: the ultimate proof that the brutalisation of society had reached unfathomable depths.

"We have people out there trying to get a line on what's actually at the bottom of this," Loven said as they passed the northern cemetery on the way into Stockholm.

"I can't work it out," Wallander said. "It's like it was last year, when that raft came ashore. Nothing added up then, either."

"We'll have to hope our forensic people can come up with something," Loven said. "They might be able to make something of the bullets." Wallander tapped his jacket pocket. He had with him the bullet that had killed Louise Akerblom.

They drove into the underground garage and then took the lift straight up to headquarters, where the hunt for Tengblad's killer was being organised.

As Wallander entered the room, he was struck by the number of officers present. Fifteen or more were staring at him, and he thought about how different it was from Ystad.

Loven introduced him, and Wallander took the chorus of mumbles as a greeting. A short, balding man in his fifties introduced himself as Stenberg, the officer in charge of the investigation.

Wallander suddenly felt nervous and badly prepared. Perhaps they might not understand his Scanian dialect. Nevertheless, he sat at the table and very concisely talked them through his investigation. He had to field a lot of questions, and it was obvious he was dealing with experienced detectives who were very quick to get to the heart of a case, locate the weak points, and plan the way forward.

The meeting lasted for more than two hours. When everyone was obviously beginning to run out of steam and Wallander had to ask for some aspirin, Stenberg gave a summary.

"We need a rapid response regarding the results of the ammunition analysis," he said. "If we can establish a link between the weapons used, then, if nothing else, we've succeeded in muddying the waters a bit more." One or two of the officers managed a smile, but most of them just sat staring into space.

It was nearly 8 p.m. by the time Wallander left the Kungsholmen police station. Loven drove him to his hotel.

"Will you be OK?" Loven said, as he dropped Wallander off.

"I have a daughter here in town," Wallander replied. "By the way, what's the name of that disco where they threw the tear gas grenades?"

"Aurora," Loven said. "But I hardly think it's the sort of place for you."

"I'm sure it isn't," Wallander said.

Loven drove off. Wallander picked up his key and resisted the temptation to look for a bar close to the hotel. The memory of Saturday night in Ystad was still all too raw. He took the lift to his room, showered, and changed his shirt. After an hour's catnap, he looked up the address of the Aurora in the telephone book. He left the hotel at 8.45 p.m. He asked himself several times whether he should call Linda before going out. In the end, he decided that his excursion to the Aurora should not take too long. Besides, Linda was a night owl. He crossed over towards Central Station, found a taxi and gave an address in the Soder district. Wallander gazed thoughtfully at the city as they drove through it. Somewhere out there was his daughter Linda, and somewhere else his sister Kristina. Hidden among all those houses and people was presumably also an African missing the index finger of his left hand.