One Step Behind

by Henning Mankell

  He considered checking into a hotel under a false name, but dismissed the possibility when he had a sudden flash of inspiration. There was one place he could go where no one would disturb him. And there was always the back door if someone turned up unexpectedly. He started the engine and turned on the headlights. It was almost time for the sun to rise. He needed to sleep, to rest in preparation for the coming day.

  He turned on to the main road and drove back to Ystad.

  It was close to 5 a.m. when Wallander started to realise how best to describe the kind of person Åke Larstam was. He was someone who left no trace of himself. They had nearly finished their search of the flat and hadn't managed to find even one object that revealed anything about the person who lived there. There was no post, not even a piece of paper with Åke Larstam's name on it.

  "I've never seen anything like it," Wallander said. "Åke Larstam doesn't seem to exist. We can't find a single document that verifies his existence, even though we know he's real."

  "Maybe he keeps another flat somewhere," Martinsson said.

  "Maybe he has ten other flats," Wallander answered. "He might have all kinds of villas and summer houses, but if so we have nothing here that will lead us to them."

  "Perhaps he took everything with him when he fled," Hansson said. "He may have known we were closing in on him."

  "The state of this flat doesn't suggest that," Wallander said. "I think he lived like this. The man has a professionally soundproofed room. But you may be right. I hope you are; then perhaps we'll find something after all."

  The piece of paper lay on the table in front of them.

  "Are we misinterpreting it?" Höglund asked.

  "It says what it says. Nyberg claims it was written recently. He can tell that from the consistency of the graphite, or something like that."

  "Why do you think he wrote it?"

  Martinsson was the one who asked the last question, and Wallander knew it was an important one.

  "You're right," he said. "It stands out as the only personal item we've found. What does it mean? I'm assuming that he was here when Nyberg and I were at the door. The unlocked back door seems to imply a hasty departure."

  "Then this was something he left behind inadvertently?" Martinsson asked.

  "That's the most plausible explanation. Or rather the most obvious. But is it the right one?"

  "What would the alternative be?"

  "That he wanted us to find it."

  No one seemed to grasp what Wallander was getting at. He knew it was a flimsy theory.

  "What do we know about Åke Larstam? We know he's good at getting the information he needs. He ferrets out other people's secrets. I'm not saying he has access to our investigation, but I think the information he does have is aided by a fair amount of foresight. He must have considered the possibility that we would find him. The fact that I turned up at that bar in Copenhagen, if nothing else, would have forced him to think about this. What does he do? He prepares to flee, but first he prepares a greeting for us. He knows we'll find it, since there's nothing much else here to find."

  "But that still doesn't tell us why," Martinsson said.

  "He's teasing us. That's not so unusual. Lunatics like this often enjoy taunting the police. He must have exulted over his triumph in Copenhagen. There he was, parading around as Louise just after the Danish papers had run her picture, and he still managed to get away."

  "It still strikes me as strange that we would find this piece of paper on the very day he's planning to kill again."

  "He couldn't have known when we would get here."

  But the words sounded unconvincing even to his ears. Wallander let it drop.

  "We have to take his threats seriously," he said. "We have to assume he intends to strike again."

  "Do we have any leads whatsoever?" The question came from Thurnberg, who had appeared in the doorway.

  "No," Wallander said. "We have nothing. We might as well be honest about that."

  No one said anything. Wallander knew he had to counteract the sense of hopelessness that was spreading through the team. It was 5.20 a.m. Wallander suggested that they report back at 8 a.m. That would give everyone an opportunity to rest for an hour or so. They would station a couple of officers outside the block of flats, and they would also start questioning the neighbours about Larstam.

  Nyberg waited until everyone except Wallander had left the room.

  "He keeps a clean house," he said. "But we have fingerprints."

  "Anything else?"

  "Not really."

  "Any weapons?"

  "No, I would have already told you about something like that."

  Wallander nodded. Nyberg's face was ashen with exhaustion.

  "I think you were right about the killer and happy people."

  "Will we find him?"

  "Sooner or later. But I dread what may happen today."

  "Couldn't we make some kind of announcement?"

  "Saying what exactly? That people should avoid laughing today? He's already chosen his victim. It's probably someone who isn't giving a thought to the idea of being followed."

  "I guess we might have a better chance of locating his hideout if we keep quiet."

  "That's my thought, too. I just don't know how much time we have."

  "Shouldn't we also consider the possibility that he may not have an extra flat or summer house to run to? What then? Where would he go?"

  Nyberg was right. Wallander hadn't considered this possibility. The fatigue had wrung his brain dry. "What do you think?" he asked.

  Nyberg shrugged. "We know he has a car. Maybe he's curled up in the back seat. It's still warm enough to sleep outside. That's another possibility. Or he may have a boat. There are a number of options."

  "Too many," Wallander said. "We have no time to look for him."

  "I understand the hell you're in right now," Nyberg said. "Don't think I don't."

  It was rare for Nyberg to express anything remotely close to emotion. Wallander sensed his support, and for once felt somewhat less alone.

  Once Wallander was out on the street, he was no longer sure what to do. He knew he needed to go home, shower, and sleep for at least half an hour. But anxiety drove him to keep going. A squad car took him back to the station. He felt queasy and thought about trying to eat something, but instead he drank some more coffee and took his medication. He sat down at his desk and started working through the file again. He saw himself back at Svedberg's flat, with Martinsson close behind. Åke Larstam was the one who had been there and killed Svedberg. Wallander still couldn't see their relationship clearly, but the photo Svedberg had was of Larstam dressed as a woman. Now he knew why the flat had looked the way it did. Larstam's greatest fear was leaving traces of himself. After shooting Svedberg, he had turned the flat upside down looking for that photograph. But Svedberg had had a secret of his own.

  The team met promptly at 8 a.m. When Wallander saw the fatigue and anxiety on the faces around him, he worried that he had failed them. Not that he had led them down the wrong path, but that he hadn't led them down the right one. They were still fumbling around in a no-man's-land, not knowing which way to turn. He had one clear thought in his head.

  "From now on we work together," he said. "This room will be our headquarters and our meeting place."

  The others went to their offices to get the materials they needed. Only Martinsson lingered in the doorway.

  "Have you slept at all?" he asked.

  Wallander shook his head. "You have to," Martinsson said firmly. "We can't do this if you collapse."

  "I can keep going a while longer."

  "You've already crossed the line. I slept for an hour. It helped."

  "I'll take a walk soon," Wallander said. "I'll go home and change my shirt."

  Martinsson looked as if he was going to add something, but Wallander held his hand up to stop him. He didn't have the energy to listen. He didn't know if he was ever going to have the energy to get
up from his chair again. They all filed back into the room and closed the door. Thurnberg loosened his tie and actually looked tired. Holgersson sent a message saying that she was in her office dealing with the press.

  Everyone looked at Wallander.

  "We have to try to understand the way he thinks," he said. "And we have to figure out where can we look for answers. We're not only going to look back through our files on this investigation; some of us will have to examine this man's past. We need to know if he has any living relatives at all, if anyone remembers him from his time at Chalmers, or his old workplace. Where did he retrain to become a postal worker? Our biggest problem is time. We have to assume that the note we found was a message to us about his intentions. Somehow we have to decide what information to look for first."

  "We should find out about his parents," Höglund said. "We can only hope his mother is still alive. A mother knows her children; we've learned that lesson."

  "Why don't you look into that?" Wallander said.

  "One more thing," she said. "I think there's something strange about his career switch from engineer to postal worker. That needs to be explored."

  "I recently heard about a bishop who started driving a taxi," Hansson said.

  "This is different," she said. "I heard about that bishop, too. He was already 55 – maybe he wanted to try something completely different before he got too old. But Åke Larstam made his switch before he turned 40."

  Wallander sensed that this was important. "You mean that something happened?"

  "Yes, something significant had to have happened to make him change his life so completely."

  "He moved, too," Thurnberg said. "That suggests that Ann-Britt is right."

  "I'll look into this myself," Wallander said. "I'll call that engineering firm – what was it called?"

  Martinsson flipped through his papers. "Strand Consulting. He left in 1985, which means he was then 33 years old."

  "We'll start there," Wallander said. "The rest of you will keep looking through the material we already have. You're trying to find out where he might be, and who his next victim is."

  "What about bringing in Kjell Albinsson again?" Thurnberg asked. "He might think of something else, particularly if he participates in our discussion."

  "You're right," Wallander said. "We'll bring him back. Someone also has to run Larstam's name through the database."

  "His name isn't there," Martinsson said. "I've already checked."

  Wallander was surprised that he had found the time to do it, but then he realised that Martinsson must have lied when he said he had slept for an hour. He had been working as hard as Wallander, but had lied out of consideration. He didn't know if he should be touched or angry. He decided against both, and pushed on.

  "Get me the number of that firm."

  He dialled the number that was read out to him and reached a recording stating that the number had been changed. He dialled the new number, which was in Vaxholm, an island very close to Stockholm. This time someone answered.

  "Strand Consulting," a female voice said.

  "My name is Kurt Wallander. I'm a detective with the criminal division in Ystad. I need some information about a former employee at your company."

  "And who might that be?"

  "An engineer by the name of Åke Larstam."

  "There's no one here by that name."

  "I know. That's what I just said. He's a former employee. Please listen."

  "There's no need to take that tone with me. How do I know you're really from the police, anyway?"

  Wallander was about to pull the phone out of the wall but managed to calm himself.

  "Of course you have no way of knowing who I am," he said. "But all the same, I need information on Åke Larstam. He left the firm in 1985."

  "That was before my time. You'd better speak with Persson."

  "Why don't I give you my number? That way he can double-check that I'm calling from the Ystad police station."

  She wrote down the number.

  "This is an urgent matter. Is Persson available?"

  "He's meeting with a client right now, but I'll have him call you when he's done."

  "That's not soon enough," Wallander said. "He'll have to interrupt his meeting and call me back immediately."

  "I'll tell him it's important, but that's all I can do."

  "Then tell him this: if he doesn't return my call in three minutes, a police helicopter will be dispatched from Stockholm to bring him in for questioning."

  Wallander hung up, aware that everyone was staring at him. He looked over at Thurnberg, who burst out laughing.

  "I'm sorry about that," Wallander said. "I had to say something."

  Thurnberg nodded. "I didn't hear you say anything."

  The phone rang in less than two minutes. The man on the other end said he was Hans Persson. Wallander told him what he needed to know, without saying that Åke Larstam was wanted for murder.

  "According to our information, he stopped working for you in 1985," Wallander said.

  "That's right. It was in November, if I recall."

  "You remember?"

  "Vividly."

  Wallander pushed the receiver closer to his ear.

  "Why was it so memorable? What happened?"

  "He was fired. He's the only engineer I've ever let go. I should explain at this point that I founded this company. There's never been a 'Strand' here, I just thought Strand sounded better than Persson."

  "So you fired Åke Larstam. Why?"

  "It's hard to explain, but he just didn't fit in here."

  "Why not?"

  "It will sound strange when I explain it."

  "I'm a policeman, I'm used to strange things."

  "He wasn't independent enough. He always agreed with everything, even when we knew he had a different opinion. It isn't possible to have constructive discussions with people who are only out to please others. You can't get anywhere with them."

  "That's how he was?"

  "Yes. It just wasn't working out. He never came up with any ideas of his own."

  "How were his technical abilities?"

  "Excellent. That was never the issue."

  "How did he react to his termination?"

  "He didn't show any emotion at all, as far as I could tell. I was expecting to keep him on for another half a year at least, but he left immediately. He walked out of my office, got his coat, and just left. He didn't even pick up the severance pay due to him. It was as if he vanished into thin air."

  "Did you have any contact with him after that?"

  "I tried to, but I never managed to speak with him in person."

  "Did you know he went to work for the post office?"

  "I heard about it. There was some paperwork that came through from the employment office."

  "Did he have any close friends that you were aware of?"

  "I knew nothing about his personal life. He wasn't particularly close to anyone at this office. Sometimes he looked after other people's flats when they were gone, but otherwise I think he simply kept to himself."

  "Do you know if his parents were still alive, or if he had any siblings?"

  "I have no idea. His life outside this office was a complete blank. That's a real problem at a small firm."

  "I understand. Thanks for your help."

  "You'll understand if my curiosity has been piqued," Persson said. "Can you tell me what this is about?"

  "You'll hear about it soon enough," Wallander said. "I can't tell you more than that right now."

  Wallander hung up abruptly. He was struck by something Persson had said, something about how Larstam looked after other people's flats when they were away on holiday. He hesitated, but decided it should be looked into.

  "Has anything been done with Svedberg's flat?" he asked.

  "Ylva Brink said at the funeral that she was going to empty it soon, but she hasn't started yet."

  Wallander thought about the keys that were still in his desk
drawer.

  "Hansson," he said. "You and someone else should go down to his flat and look around. See if you can tell if anyone's been there recently. The keys are in my top drawer."

  Hansson left with one of the officers from Malmö. It was just before 9 a.m. Höglund was trying to find Larstam's parents. Martinsson went back to double-check the database. Wallander went to the men's room, refusing to look at himself in the mirror. When he returned to the conference room, someone was passing around a plate of sandwiches, but he shook his head. Höglund appeared in the doorway.

  "Both of his parents are dead," she said.

  "Any siblings?"

  "Two older sisters."

  "Find them."

  She left, and Wallander thought about his own sister, Kristina. How would she describe him if the police came around asking questions?

  He heard someone shouting in the corridor. Wallander got up quickly as a policeman appeared in the door.

  "Gunfire," he shouted. "Down at the main square."

  Wallander knew what it meant. "It must be Svedberg's flat," he shouted back. "Anyone injured?"

  "I don't know. But the gunfire has been confirmed."

  Four cars with blaring sirens were on their way in less than a minute. Wallander sat in the back seat with his gun held tightly in his hand. Larstam was there, he thought. What had happened to Hansson and the colleague from Malmö? He feared the worst, but pushed the thought away. It was too unbearable.

  Wallander was out of the car before it came to a halt. A crowd had gathered at the door to the block of flats on Lilla Norregatan. Wallander dived through the crowd at full speed, bellowing, he was later told, like a charging bull. Then he saw both Hansson and the officer from Malmö. They were unhurt.

  "What happened?" Wallander yelled.

  Hansson was pale and shaking. The Malmö officer was sitting on the kerb.

  "He was there," Hansson said. "I had just unlocked the door and stepped inside. He appeared out of nowhere and fired his gun. Then he was gone. It was pure luck we weren't hit. We turned and ran. It was sheer luck."

  Wallander didn't say anything, but he knew luck had nothing to do with it. Larstam was an excellent marksman. He could have taken out both of them if he had wanted to. But he hadn't. Someone else was marked as his victim.