The White Lioness (30 page)

He stopped abruptly, as if the words he had just spoken had given him such terrible insight he had trouble absorbing it.

"I grew up in a family that was split from the start." After a long pause he said, "The whites knew they could break down resistance by splitting up our families. I watched my brothers and sisters behaving more and more like blind rabbits. They ran around in circles, no longer knowing where they came from or where they were going. I chose a different route. I learned to hate. I drank of the dark waters that arouse the desire for revenge. And I realised that despite their belief that their supremacy was God-given, the whites also had their weak points. They were frightened.

"They talked about making South Africa a perfect work of art, a white palace in Paradise. They could not see how impossible that dream was, and those who did refused to admit it. So the foundation on which everything was built became a lie; fear came to them in the night. They filled their houses with weapons. But fear found its way inside even so. Violence became a part of the everyday programme of fear. I could see all that, and I resolved to keep my friends close by me, but my enemies even closer. I would play the role of the black man who knew what white men wanted. I would feed my contempt by running errands for them. I would work in their kitchens, and spit in the soup before carrying it to their tables. I would go on being a nobody who in secret had become a somebody."

How much had Wallander really understood? How could it help him to understand what had brought Mabasha to Sweden?

"I have to know more," he said. "You haven't said who's behind all this, who sent you to Sweden?"

"Those ruthless people are mere shadows," Mabasha said. "Their ancestors abandoned them long ago. They meet in secret to plan the downfall of our country."

"And you run their errands?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Why not?"

"You kill people."

"Sooner or later others will kill me."

"What do you mean by that?"

"I know it will happen."

"But you didn't kill the woman at the farmhouse?"

"No."

"A man called Konovalenko did that?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Only he can tell you that."

"You come here from South Africa and another man comes from Russia. You meet at a farmhouse in Skane. There is a radio transmitter there, and weapons. Why?"

"That's how it was arranged."

"By whom?"

"By the ones who asked us to make the journey."

We're going around in circles, Wallander thought. I'm not getting any answers.

But he forced himself to make one more effort.

"I've gathered this was some kind of preparation," he said, "for some crime or other that was going to take place back home where you come from. A crime you were to be responsible for. A murder? But who was going to be killed? Why?"

"I've tried to explain what my country's like."

"I'm asking you straight questions, and I want straight answers."

"Maybe the answers have to be what they are."

"I don't understand you," Wallander said. "You're a man who kills to order, if I understand you rightly. Yet you seem a sensitive person who's suffering as a result of circumstances in your country. I can't make it all add up."

"Nothing adds up for a black man living in South Africa."

Then Mabasha went on to explain how things were in his battered and bruised homeland. Wallander had difficulty believing his ears. When Mabasha was finished, it seemed to Wallander that he had been on a long journey. His guide had shown him places he never knew existed.

I live in a country where we've been taught to believe that all truths are simple, he thought. And also that the truth is clear and unassailable. Our legal system is based on that principle. Now I'm starting to realise that the truth is complicated, multi-faceted, contradictory. That lies are both black and white. If one's view of humans, of human life, is disrespectful and contemptuous, then truth takes on another aspect than if life is regarded as inviolable.

He contemplated Mabasha, who was looking him straight in the eye.

"Did you kill the woman at the farmhouse?" Wallander said, getting the impression that this was the last time he would ask. "Or the storekeeper."

"No," Mabasha said. "And I lost one of my fingers for the sake of the woman's soul. I didn't touch the man in the store."

"You still don't want to tell me what you're supposed to do when you get back?" Before Mabasha replied Wallander felt that something had changed. Something in the black man's face was different. Thinking about it later, he thought maybe it was that the expressionless mask suddenly started to melt away.

"I still can't say what," Mabasha said. "But it won't happen."

"I don't think I understand," Wallander said slowly.

"Death will not come from my hands," Mabasha said. "But I can't stop it coming from somebody else's."

"An assassination?"

"That was my job to carry out. But now I'm going to drop it and walk away."

"You're talking in riddles," Wallander said. "What are you going to drop? I want to know who was going to be assassinated."

But Mabasha did not answer. He shook his head, and Wallander accepted, reluctantly, that he would get no further. Afterwards he would also realise he still had a long way to go before he could recognise the truth in circumstances outside his normal range of experience. It was only later that it dawned on him that the last admission, when Mabasha allowed his mask to drop, was utterly false. He did not have the slightest intention of walking away from his assignment. But the lie was necessary if he were to receive the help he needed to get out of the country. To be believed, he had to lie - and to do so skilfully enough to deceive the Swedish policeman.

Wallander had no more questions then. He was tired, but he seemed to have achieved what he wanted to achieve. The assassination was foiled, at least Mabasha's involvement - if he was telling the truth. That would give his opposite numbers in South Africa more time to sort things out. I'll contact them via Interpol and tell them all I know. The only missing element is our friend Konovalenko. If I try to get Akeson to have Mabasha arrested, there's a serious risk that everything could become even more confused. The chance of Konovalenko fleeing the country would only increase. I don't need to know any more. Now I can carry out my last illegal action as far as Mabasha is concerned.

Help him to get out of here.

His daughter had been present for the latter part of the conversation. She had woken up, and come into the kitchen. Wallander explained briefly who the man was.

"This is the man who hit you?"

"That's right. Goli, this is my daughter."

"And here he is drinking coffee with you?"

"Yes."

"Even you must think that's a little odd."

"A policeman's life
is
a little odd."

She asked no more questions. When she was dressed, she came back and sat quietly, listening. When they were finished, Wallander sent her to buy a bandage for the man's hand. He found penicillin in the bathroom and gave some to Mabasha, knowing that he ought to have called a doctor. Then, reluctantly, he cleaned up the wound and applied the clean bandage.

Next he called Loven and got him almost right away. He asked for the latest news on Konovalenko and the others who had disappeared from the apartment block in Hallunda. He said nothing about the fact that Mabasha was there with him in his kitchen.

"We know where they went when we raided their apartment," Loven said. "They moved two floors up in the same building. Cunning and convenient. They had an apartment there, in the wife's name. But they're gone from there too."

"Then we know something else as well," Wallander said. "They're still in this country. Presumably in Stockholm, where it's easiest to lose yourself."

"If need be I'll personally kick down the front door of every apartment in this town."

"Concentrate on Konovalenko. I think the African is less important."

"If only I could grasp the connection between them," Loven said.

"They were in the same place when Louise Akerblom was murdered," Wallander said. "Then Konovalenko did the bank job and killed an officer. The African wasn't with him then, and later Konovalenko tries to kill the African. One explanation is they started out friends but had a falling out."

"But where does your estate agent fit into this?"

"She isn't a part of it. I think she was there by sheer chance. Wrong place, wrong time. And Konovalenko is ruthless."

"All of which leaves us one single question," Loven said. "Why?"

"The only person who can answer that is Konovalenko."

"Or the African," Loven said. "You're forgetting him, Kurt."

After the call to Loven, Wallander made up his mind to get Mabasha out of the country.

"The best thing you can do is to stay here in the apartment," he told Mabasha. "I still have a lot of questions I want answered. You might just as well get used to that."

Apart from the drive on Sunday afternoon, they spent the weekend in the apartment. Mabasha was exhausted, and slept most of the time. Wallander was worried that his hand would turn septic. At the same time he regretted ever having let him into his apartment. Like so often before, he had followed his intuition rather than his reason. Now he could see no obvious way out of his dilemma.

On Sunday evening he drove Linda to see his father. He dropped her on the main road so he would not have to deal with his father's complaints about his not even having time for a cup of coffee.

Monday finally came, and he returned to the police station. Bjork welcomed him back. They got together with Martinsson and Svedberg in the conference room. Wallander reported selectively on what had happened in Stockholm. There were many questions, but nobody had much to say. The key to the whole business was finding Konovalenko.

"We just have to wait until he gets picked up," Bjork said. "That'll give us time to sort out the stacks of other matters waiting for our attention."

They agreed the priorities. Wallander was assigned to find out what happened to three trotting horses that had been rustled from stables near Skarby. To the astonishment of his colleagues, he burst out laughing.

"It's a bit absurd," he said, apologetically. "A missing woman. And now missing horses."

He hardly got back to his office before he received the visit he was expecting. He was not sure which of them would actually turn up to ask the question. It could have been any one of his colleagues. But it was Martinsson who knocked and entered.

"Have you got a minute?" he said.

Wallander nodded.

"There's something I need to ask you."

Wallander could see he was embarrassed. "I'm listening," he said.

"You were seen with an African yesterday," Martinsson said. "In your car. I just thought . . ."

"What did you think?"

"I don't know really."

"Linda is back with her Kenyan again."

"I thought that would be it."

"A moment ago you said you didn't know what you thought."

Martinsson threw his arms wide and made a face. Then he retreated in a hurry.

Wallander ignored the case of the missing horses and sat down to think. What were the questions he still had to ask Mabasha? And how would he check his answers?

In recent years Wallander had dealt with people from abroad, both as victims and criminals, in connection with various investigations. It had occurred to him that what he used to regard as absolute truth when it came to right and wrong, guilt and innocence, might no longer apply. And what was held to be a crime might vary according to the culture one grew up in. He often felt helpless in such situations. In the course of the year before his mentor Rydberg had died, they had spent a lot of time discussing the enormous changes that were taking place in their country, and indeed in the world at large. The police would face quite different demands. Rydberg had sipped his whisky and prophesied that within ten years Swedish policemen would have to cope with more fundamental changes. This time, though, it would not just be organisational reforms, but it would affect police work on the ground.

"This is something I'm not going to have to face," Rydberg had said one evening as they sat on his cramped little balcony. "Sometimes I feel sad that I won't be around to see what comes next. It's bound to be difficult. But stimulating. You'll be there, though. And you'll have to start thinking along completely different lines."

"I wonder if I'll manage," Wallander said. "I ask myself more and more often whether there's life beyond the police station."

"If you're thinking of sailing to the West Indies, make sure that you never come back," Rydberg said. "People who go off somewhere and then do come back are seldom better off for their adventure. They haven't come to terms with the old truth: you can never run away from yourself."