Before the Frost

by Henning Mankell

  “We’ll talk about this later.”

  “Thanks.”

  “What were you doing in Copenhagen?”

  “I’ve already told you.”

  Wallander shook his head.

  “Can you explain why a man has been arrested for trying to rob you?”

  “No. But I also can’t explain why you refuse to believe me.”

  He leaned over.

  “Do you understand what I went through when they called me? When they told me you had been admitted to a hospital in Copenhagen after an assault—do you know what that felt like?”

  “I’m sorry that you had to worry about me.”

  “Worry? I was scared out of my mind—more frightened than I’ve been in years.”

  Maybe you haven’t been so scared since I tried to kill myself, she thought. She knew his greatest fear was that something should happen to her.

  “I’m sorry, Dad.”

  “I wonder what it will be like when you start working, of course,” he continued. “If that will turn me into a worried old man who can’t sleep when you’re working the night shift.”

  She tried to tell her story again, slowly, with painstaking care, but he still didn’t seem to believe her.

  She had just finished when Stefan Lindman walked into the room. He had a paper bag with sandwiches. He nodded happily at her when he saw she was awake.

  “How are you doing?”

  “Fine.”

  Lindman handed the paper bag to Wallander, who immediately started to eat.

  “What kind of car do you have? I’m going to get it for you,” Lindman said.

  “A red VW Golf. It’s parked across the street from the apartment building on Nedergade. I think it’s in front of a smoke shop.”

  He held up the key.

  “I took this out of your coat pocket. You were lucky, you know. Desperate drug addicts are about the worst thing you can run into.”

  “He wasn’t a drug addict.”

  “Tell Lindman what you told me,” her father said in between bites.

  She proceeded through her account again, calmly and methodically, just as she had been taught.

  “This doesn’t exactly jibe with what our Danish colleagues reported,” Lindman said when she was done. “Nor with what the thug said either.”

  “But I’m telling you what really happened.”

  Wallander carefully wiped his hands with a paper napkin.

  “Let me put this a different way,” he said. “It’s unusual for people to confess to crimes they haven’t committed. It does happen, admittedly, but not very often, and least of all by convicted drug offenders, since what they fear most is incarceration and the possibility that they will be cut off from their lifeline of drugs. Do you see what I’m saying?”

  Linda didn’t answer. A physician walked into the room and asked her how she felt.

  “You can go home,” he said. “But take it easy for a few days, and call a doctor if the headache doesn’t subside.”

  Linda sat up. Something had just occurred to her.

  “What does Ulrik Larsen look like?”

  Neither Lindman nor her father had seen him.

  “I’m not leaving until I know what he looks like.”

  Her father lost his temper.

  “Haven’t you caused enough trouble? We are going home—now.”

  “Surely it can’t be hard to get a description of him. Can’t you ask one of these Danish colleagues you keep talking about?”

  Linda realized she was shouting. A nurse popped her head in and gave them a stern look.

  “We need this room for another patient,” she said.

  There was a bleeding woman lying on a stretcher in the corridor, banging her fist against the wall. A waiting room was empty and they walked in.

  “The man who hit me was about one hundred and eighty centimeters tall. I couldn’t see his face since he was wearing a sweatshirt with the hood pulled up. The sweatshirt was either black or dark blue. He had dark pants and brown shoes. He was thin. He spoke Danish and had a high-pitched voice. He also smelled of cinnamon.”

  “Cinnamon?” Lindman said.

  “Maybe he had been eating a cinnamon bun, how should I know? Anyway, call your colleagues and find out if the man they have in custody matches this description. If I can just find that out, I’ll keep my mouth shut for the time being.”

  “No,” Wallander said. “We’re going home.”

  Linda looked at Lindman. He nodded carefully after Wallander had already turned his back.

  The doorbell rang. Linda sat up in a daze and looked at the alarm clock. It was a quarter past eleven. She climbed out of bed and put on her robe. Her head was sore, but the throbbing pain was gone. She opened the front door. It was Lindman.

  “I’m sorry if I woke you up.”

  She let him in.

  “Wait in the living room. I’ll be right back.”

  She ran into the bathroom, splashed water on her face, brushed her teeth, and combed her hair. When she returned he was standing in front of the balcony door. It was open.

  “How are you feeling today?”

  “I feel OK. Would you like some coffee?”

  “I don’t have time. I just wanted to tell you about a phone call I made about an hour ago.”

  Linda waited. He must have believed what she told him back at the hospital.

  “What did they say?”

  “It took a little while to get to the right officer. I had to wake somebody called Ole Hedtoft who had worked all night. He was one of the patrol officers who found you, and who arrested the guy who did it.”

  Lindman took out a piece of paper from the pocket of his leather jacket and looked at her.

  “Give me Ulrik Larsen’s description again.”

  “I don’t know if his name really is Ulrik Larsen, but the man who attacked me was one hundred and eighty centimeters, thin, with a black or navy blue hooded sweatshirt, dark pants, and brown shoes.”

  Lindman nodded and then rubbed the bridge of his nose with his thumb and index finger.

  “Ole Hedtoft described the same man. But you may have misunderstood the threat he made.”

  Linda shook her head.

  “That’s not possible. He talked about the man I was looking for, Torgeir Langaas.”

  “Well, somebody must have misunderstood something.”

  “Why do you keep going on about a misunderstanding? I know what happened, and I’m more afraid than ever that Anna is in danger.”

  “Report it then. Talk to her mother. Why doesn’t she come report her missing?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Shouldn’t she be worried?”

  “I can’t explain why she isn’t worried, but I do know Anna may be in danger.”

  Lindman started walking back to the front door.

  “Report it to the police and let us take care of it.”

  “You haven’t done much up to this point.”

  Lindman stopped dead. He was angry when he answered her.

  “We’re working around the clock,” he said. “We’re investigating something that has actually taken place: a homicide, and a repulsive, baffling one at that.”

  “Then we’re in the same situation,” she said calmly. “My friend Anna isn’t there when I call or knock on her door. And I’m baffled by that too.”

  She opened the door for him.

  “Thanks for at least believing part of what I told you.”

  “This is between the two of us. There’s no need to mention it to your dad.”

  Lindman ran down the stairs. Linda ate a hasty breakfast, put her clothes on, then called Zeba. She didn’t pick up. Linda drove over to Anna’s apartment, but this time there were no signs that the place had been disturbed in any way. Where are you? Linda called out silently. You’ll have a lot to explain when you get back.

  She opened a window, pulled up a chair, and opened Anna’s journal. There has to be a clue somewhere, she thought. So
mething that can explain what’s happened.

  Linda started reading, going back about a month into the past. Suddenly she stopped. There was a name scribbled in the margin, as if a reminder by Anna to herself. Linda frowned. She knew she had seen or heard it recently, but where? She put down the diary. There was a distant rumble of thunder. The heat was oppressive. A name that she had seen or heard, the question was where or from whom. She made herself some coffee and tried to distract herself enough to make her brain relax and shake out the name. Nothing happened.

  It was only later when she was about to give up that she finally remembered.

  She had seen it less than twenty-four hours ago. It was the name of one of the people living in the apartment building on Nedergade.

  29

  Vigsten. She knew she was right. She wasn’t sure if it was someone living on the street side or in the inner building over the courtyard, nor if there was a D or an O as a first initial, but she knew she was right about the surname. What do I do now? she thought. I’m working on something that is actually starting to hang together. But I’m the only one who takes it seriously; I haven’t managed to convince anyone else. Of course, I have no idea what is actually going on. Anna thought she saw her father and then she disappeared. Two disappearances that camouflage each other, cancel each other out, or complete each other? Linda felt a sudden need to talk to someone, and there was no one to turn to except Zeba. She ran down the stairs of Anna’s building and drove to Zeba’s place. Zeba was just on her way out with her son. Linda tagged along. They went to a nearby playground, where the boy ran off to the sandbox. There was a bench there, although it was littered with dirt and chewing gum.

  They sat on the edge of the sandbox while the boy threw sand around and let out whoops of joy. Linda looked at Zeba and felt the usual sting of envy: Zeba was extravagantly beautiful. There was something arrogant and inviting about her at the same time, the kind of woman Linda had once dreamed of becoming. But I became a policewoman, she thought. A policewoman who hopes she won’t turn out to be a scaredy-cat.

  “I’ve been trying to reach Anna,” Zeba said. “She hasn’t been home. Have you seen her?”

  This infuriated Linda.

  “Hello? Have you been listening to a single word I’ve said? About her being gone, that I’m worried about her, that I think something’s happened to her?”

  “But you know what she’s like, don’t you?”

  “Do I? Apparently not. What is she like?”

  Zeba frowned.

  “Why are you so worked up?”

  “I’m worried about her.”

  “What do you think has happened? And what is that bruise on your head, for heaven’s sake?”

  Linda decided to fill her in on the latest events. Zeba paid attention in silence. The boy played.

  “I could have told you that,” she said when Linda finished. “The part about Anna being religious.”

  Linda looked at her.

  “Religious?”

  “Yes.”

  “She never said anything to me.”

  “You only just met up again, after a long gap. And Anna is the kind of person who says different things to different people. She tells a lot of lies.”

  “Really?”

  “I had been meaning to warn you, but I thought it would be best if you discovered it for yourself. Anna is a compulsive liar. She can say just about anything.”

  “She didn’t used to be like that.”

  “People change, don’t they?” Zeba said in a mocking tone. “I’m friends with Anna because of her good qualities. She’s cheerful, nice to my son, helpful. But when she starts telling one of her stories, I don’t bother to listen. Do you know that she spent last Christmas with you?”

  “I was still in Stockholm last winter.”

  “She said she had been up to see you. Among the many things you did together, apparently, was a trip over to Helsinki on the ferry.”

  “That’s absurd.”

  “Of course it is. But that’s what Anna told me. I don’t know why she lies, perhaps it’s an illness or else she’s just bored.”

  “Do you think she was lying when she said she had seen her father in Malmö?”

  “Of course. It’s so typical of her to invent an amazing reappearance like that, even though her father has probably been dead for a long time.”

  “So you don’t think anything has happened to Anna?”

  Zeba looked at her with an amused expression.

  “What could possibly have happened to her? She’s gone off like this many times before. She comes back when she’s done, and then she has a fantastic and completely fabricated story about where she’s been.”

  “And nothing of what she says is true?”

  “Compulsive liars are only successful if they weave in enough aspects that are true. Then we believe it, then the lie sails by, until we finally realize their whole world is built out of lies.”

  Linda shook her head in slight bewilderment.

  “The medical studies?”

  “I don’t believe a word of it.”

  “But where does she get her money? What does she do?”

  “I’ve wondered about that. Sometimes I think she might be a professional con artist, but I really don’t have a clue.”

  Zeba’s son called out to her and she joined him in the sandbox. Linda watched her as she walked over. A man walking by on the street also turned around to look at her. Linda thought about what Zeba had said. It doesn’t explain everything, she thought. It explains a part of it, and it reduces my anxiety and above all infuriates me, since I now know that Anna has been feeding me lies. I don’t like people claiming to have gone to Helsinki with me when it’s not true. It explains a lot, she thought. But not everything.

  When they had gone their separate ways, Linda walked down into the center of town and withdrew some money from an ATM. She was careful with money since she worried about finding herself without. I’m like my dad, she thought. We’re both thrifty to the point of being miserly.

  She walked home, cleaned the apartment, and then called the housing agency. After several tries she managed to reach the man in charge of her case. She asked if she could move into the apartment earlier than planned, but apparently that wasn’t possible. She lay on the bed in her room and thought more about the conversation with Zeba. Her concerns for Anna’s well-being had been replaced by a feeling of unease over the fact that she hadn’t seen through her lies. But what should she have noticed? How did one see through a person who did not concoct remarkable, fantastic stories but lied about everyday events?

  Linda got up and called Zeba.

  “I never finished talking to you about Anna’s religiosity.”

  “Why don’t you ask her about it when she comes back? Anna believes in God.”

  “Which one?”

  “The Christian one. She goes to church occasionally, or she says she does. But she does pray. I know because I’ve caught her in the act a couple of times. She gets down on her knees.”

  “Do you know if she belongs to a particular congregation or sect?”

  “No. Do you?”

  “I don’t know. Have the two of you ever talked about it?”

  “She’s tried to a couple of times but I’ve always put a stop to it. God and I never got along too well.”

  Linda heard a howl in the background.

  “Oops, he just hurt himself. Bye.”

  Linda walked back over to the bed and continued staring up at the ceiling. What do we really know about people? An image of Anna floated through her mind, but it was like looking at a stranger. Mona was also there, naked, with a bottle in her hand. Linda sat up. I’m surrounded by a bunch of crazy people, she thought. The only normal one is Dad.

  She walked out onto the balcony. It was still a warm day. I’m going to drop this thing here and now, she said to herself. I should concentrate on something important, like enjoying this weather for instance.

  Linda rea
d in the newspaper about the investigation into Birgitta Medberg’s murder. Her father was interviewed. She had read the same words many times before. No definitive leads, the investigation continues on many fronts, results may take time. She threw the paper down and thought about the name in Anna’s diary. Vigsten. The second person in her diary after Birgitta Medberg to have crossed Linda’s path.

  One more time, she thought. One more trip across the bridge, even though it’s expensive. But one day I’ll present Anna with a bill for all the needless worrying she’s caused.

  This time I’m not going to walk around on Nedergade in the dark, she thought as she drove across the bridge toward Denmark. I’m going to look up the man—I’m assuming it’s a man—whose name is Vigsten and ask him if he knows where Anna is. That’s all. Then I’m going to go home and cook dinner for my dad.

  Linda parked in the same spot as before and was hit by a sense of dread when she got out of the car. It was as if she hadn’t fully realized it before now: she had been attacked on this street the night before.

  She got back into her car and locked the doors. Take it easy, she thought. I’m just going to get out of the car; there’s no one who’s going to knock me down. I’ll walk into that building and find this Vigsten person. And that will be that.

  Linda kept telling herself to remain calm, but she ran across the street. A cyclist veered hard to get out of her way and almost fell over, yelling an obscenity after her. The front door opened when she pushed on it. She saw the name almost immediately. On the fourth floor, F. Vigsten. She hadn’t remembered the initial correctly. She started walking up the stairs. Fredrik Vigsten, she thought. It’ll be Fredrik if it’s a man, that’s typically Danish. Or Frederike for a woman. She stopped and caught her breath once she was on the fourth floor. Then she rang the doorbell, which played a short melody. She waited and counted slowly to ten. Then she rang again, and the door opened at about the same time. An older man with ruffled hair and glasses hanging from a cord around his neck gave her a stern look.

  “I can’t walk any faster,” he said. “Why can’t you young people have some patience?”