Faceless Killers: A Mystery

by Henning Mankell

  “Who?”

  “He wouldn’t say.”

  Wallander thought about this for a moment.

  “We’ll go to Kristianstad anyway,” he said. “Our colleagues up there will have to help us. Then I’m going to take on Lars Herdin myself.”

  They took one of the squad cars. Wallander crawled into the back seat and let Naslund drive. When they were outside of town, Wallander noticed that Naslund was driving much too fast.

  “This isn’t an emergency,” said Wallander. “Drive slower. I have to read these papers and think.”

  Naslund slowed down.

  The landscape was gray and foggy. Wallander stared out at the dreary desolation. Although he felt at home in the Scanian spring and summer, he felt alienated by the barren silence of fall and winter.

  He leaned back and closed his eyes. His body ached and his arm burned. He also noticed that he was having palpitations.

  Divorced men have heart attacks, he thought. We put on weight eating too much and feel tormented about being abandoned. Or else we throw ourselves into new relationships, and finally our hearts just give out.

  The thought of Mona made him both furious and sad.

  He opened his eyes and looked out at the landscape of Skane again.

  Then he read through the transcripts of the interviews the police had conducted with Lövgren’s two daughters.

  There was nothing to give them a lead. No enemies, no pent-up hostilities.

  And no money either.

  Johannes Lövgren had kept even his own daughters in the dark about his vast financial assets.

  Wallander tried to imagine this man. How had he operated? What had driven him? What did he think would happen to all the money after he was gone?

  He was startled by his own thought.

  Somewhere there ought to be a will.

  But if it wasn’t in one of the safe-deposit boxes, then where was it? Did the murdered man have another safe-deposit box somewhere else?

  “How many banks are there in Ystad?” he asked Naslund.

  Naslund knew everything about the town. “Around ten.”

  “Tomorrow I want you to investigate the ones we haven’t visited so far. Did Johannes Lövgren have more safe-deposit boxes? I also want to know how he got back and forth from Lenarp. Taxi, bus, whatever.”

  Naslund nodded. “He might have taken the school bus.”

  “Someone must have seen him.”

  They took the route past Tomelilla. They crossed the main road to Malmö and continued north.

  “What did the inside of Lars Herdin’s house look like?” Wallander asked.

  “Old-fashioned. But clean and tidy. Strangely enough, he uses a microwave oven to do his cooking. He offered me homemade rolls. He has a big parrot in a cage. The farm is well cared for. The whole place looks neat. No tumbledown fences.”

  “What kind of car does he have?”

  “A red Mercedes.”

  “A Mercedes?”

  “Yes, a Mercedes.”

  “I thought he told us it was hard making ends meet.”

  “That Mercedes of his cost over three hundred thousand.”

  Wallander thought for a moment. “We need to know more about Lars Herdin. Even if he has no idea who killed them, he might actually know something without realizing it himself.”

  “What’s that got to do with the Mercedes?”

  “Nothing. I’ve just got a hunch that Lars Herdin is more important to us than he realizes. Then we might wonder how a farmer today can afford to buy a car for three hundred thousand kronor. Maybe he has a receipt that says he bought a tractor.”

  They drove into Kristianstad and parked outside the police station just as rain mixed with snow started to fall. Wallander noticed the first vague prickles in his throat, warning him that a cold was coming on.

  Damn, he thought. I can’t get sick now. I don’t want to meet Mona with a fever and sniffles.

  The Ystad police and the Kristianstad police had no special relationship with each other other than cooperating whenever the situation called for it. But Wallander knew several of the officers rather well from various conferences on the county level. He was hoping, above all, that Göran Boman would be on duty. He was the same age as Wallander, and they had met while sitting over a whiskey at Tylösand. They had both endured a tedious study day organized by the educational delegation of the National Police. The purpose was to inspire them to improve and make more effective the staff policies at their respective workplaces. In the evening they sat and shared half a bottle of whiskey and soon discovered that they had a lot in common. In particular, both their fathers had been extremely resistant when the sons had decided to go into police work.

  Wallander and Naslund stepped into the lobby. The young woman at the switchboard, who oddly enough spoke with a lilting Norrland accent, told them that Göran Boman was on duty.

  “He’s in an interrogation,” said the woman. “But it probably won’t last long.”

  Wallander went out to use the toilet. He gave a start when he caught sight of himself in the mirror. The bruises and abrasions were bright red. He splashed his face with cold water. At that moment he heard Boman’s voice out in the hall.

  The reunion was a hearty one. Wallander realized that he was overjoyed to see Boman again. They got some coffee and took it to his office. Wallander discovered that both of them had exactly the same kind of desk. But otherwise Boman’s office was better furnished. It made his office look better, the same way that Anette Brolin had transformed the sterile office she had taken over.

  Göran Boman knew, of course, about the double homicide in Lenarp, as well as the attack on the refugee camp and Kurt Wallander’s rescue attempt that had been so exaggerated in the papers. They talked for a while about refugees. Boman had the same impression as Wallander that people seeking asylum were dealt with in a chaotic and disorganized fashion. The police in Kristianstad also had numerous examples of deportation orders that could be carried out only with great difficulty. As recently as a few weeks before Christmas they had been advised that several Bulgarian citizens were supposed to be expelled. According to the Immigration Service, they were living at a camp in Kristianstad. Only after several days’ work did the police manage to find out that the Bulgarians were living at a camp in Arjeplog, over a thousand kilometers to the north.

  Then they switched to the real reason for their visit. Wallander gave Boman a detailed rundown.

  “And you want us to find her for you,” said Boman when he was done.

  “That wouldn’t be a bad idea.”

  Up until then Naslund had been sitting in silence.

  “I’ve got an idea,” he said. “If Johannes Lövgren had a child by this woman, and we assume that the child was born in this town, we should be able to look it up in the vital statistics records. Lövgren must have been listed as the child’s father, don’t you think?”

  Wallander nodded. “Besides, we know approximately when the child was born. We can concentrate on a ten-year period, from about 1947 to 1957, if Lars Herdin’s story is correct. And I think it is.”

  “How many children are born over a ten-year period in Kristianstad?” asked Boman. “It would have taken an awfully long time to check it out before we had computers.”

  “Of course it’s possible that Johannes Lövgren was listed as ‘father unknown,’ said Wallander. ”But then we just have to go through all of those cases with extra care.”

  “Why don’t you go ahead and put out a public appeal for the woman?” asked Boman. “Ask her to contact you.”

  “Because I’m quite sure that she wouldn’t do that,” said Wallander. “It’s just a feeling I have. It may not be particularly professional. But I think I’d rather try this route instead.”

  “We’ll find her,” said Boman. “We live in a society and an age when it’s almost impossible to disappear. Unless you commit suicide in such an ingenious fashion that your body is completely obliterated. We had a case
like that last summer. At least that’s what I assume happened. A man who was sick of it all. He was reported missing by his wife. His boat was gone. We never found him. And I don’t think we’re ever going to, either. I think he put out to sea, scuttled the boat, and drowned himself. But if this woman and her child exist, we’ll find them. I’ll put a man on it right away.”

  Wallander’s throat hurt.

  He noticed that he had started to sweat.

  Most of all he would have liked to stay sitting there, discussing the double homicide with Göran Boman in peace and quiet. He had the feeling that Boman was a talented cop. His opinion would be valuable. But Wallander suddenly felt too tired.

  They concluded their conversation. Boman followed them out to the car.

  “We’ll find her,” he repeated.

  “Let’s get together some evening,” said Wallander. “In peace and quiet. And have some whiskey.”

  Boman nodded.

  “Maybe on another meaningless study day,” he said.

  The wet snow was still coming down. Wallander felt the dampness seeping into his shoes. He crawled into the back seat and huddled up in the corner. Soon he fell asleep.

  He didn’t wake up until Naslund pulled up in front of the police station in Ystad. He was feeling feverish and miserable. The wet snow was still coming down, and he asked Ebba for a couple of aspirin. Even though he realized that he ought to go home to bed, he couldn’t resist getting an update on what had happened during the day. Besides, he wanted to hear what Rydberg had come up with regarding protection for the refugees.

  His desk was covered with phone messages. Anette Brolin was among the many people who had called. And his father. But not Linda. Or Sten Widen. He shuffled through the messages and then put them aside except for the ones from Anette Brolin and his father. Then he called Martinson on the phone.

  “Bingo,” said Martinson. “I think we’ve found the car. A vehicle that fits the description was rented last week by an Avis office in Göteborg. It hasn’t been returned. There’s just one thing that’s strange.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The car was rented by a woman.”

  “What’s so strange about that?”

  “I have a little trouble picturing a woman committing the double murder.”

  “Now you’re on the wrong track. We have to get hold of that car. And the driver. Even if it is a woman. Then we’ll see if they had anything to do with it. Eliminating someone from an investigation is just as important as getting a positive lead. But give the license number to the truck driver and see whether he recognizes it after all.”

  He hung up and went into Rydberg’s office.

  “How’s it going?” he asked.

  “This is certainly not much fun,” replied Rydberg gloomily.

  “Who ever said police work was supposed to be fun?”

  But Rydberg had made a thorough job of it, exactly as Wallander had known he would. The various camps were cordoned off, and Rydberg had drawn up a brief memo about each one. For the time being he suggested that as a precaution the night patrols should make regular rounds of the camps according to a cleverly devised timetable.

  “Good,” said Wallander. “Just make sure the patrols understand that it’s a serious matter.”

  He gave Rydberg a report of the results from his visit to Kristianstad. Then he stood up.

  “I’m going home now,” he said.

  “You’re looking a little bedraggled.”

  “I’m coming down with a cold. But everything seems to be moving along by itself right now.”

  He drove straight home, made some tea, and crawled into bed. When he woke up several hours later, the teacup was standing next to his bed untouched. It was quarter to seven. He was feeling a little better after getting some sleep. He threw out the cold tea and made coffee instead. Then he called his father.

  Wallander realized at once that his father had heard nothing about the fire in the night.

  “Weren’t we going to play cards?” snapped his father.

  “I’m sick,” said Wallander.

  “But you’re never sick.”

  “I’ve got a cold.”

  “I don’t call that being sick.”

  “Not everybody is as healthy as you are.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  Kurt Wallander sighed.

  If he didn’t come up with something, this conversation with his father was going to be unbearable.

  “I’ll come out to see you early in the morning,” he said. “Around eight o’clock. If you’re up by then.”

  “I never sleep past four thirty.”

  “But I do.”

  He ended the conversation and hung up the phone.

  At the same instant he regretted having made this appointment with his father. Starting off the day by driving out to visit him was equivalent to accepting a whole day filled with depression and guilt feelings.

  He looked around his apartment. There were thick layers of dust everywhere. Even though he frequently aired out the place, it still smelled musty. Lonely and musty.

  All of a sudden he started thinking about the black woman he had been dreaming about lately. The woman who willingly came to him, night after night. Where did she come from? Where had he seen her? Was it a picture in the newspaper, or did he catch a glimpse of her on TV?

  He wondered why it was that in his dreams he had an erotic obsession that differed completely from his experiences with Mona.

  The thought got him excited. Again he wondered whether he should call up Anette Brolin. But he couldn’t talk himself into it. Angrily he sat down on the floral-patterned sofa and switched on the TV. It was one minute to seven. He rolled through to one of the Danish channels, where the news broadcast was just about to start.

  The anchorman reviewed the top stories. Another catastrophic famine. Terror was on the rise in Romania. A huge quantity of drugs had been confiscated in Odense.

  Wallander grabbed the remote control and turned off the TV. Suddenly he couldn’t take any more news.

  He thought about Mona. But his thoughts took an unexpected turn. All of a sudden he was no longer sure that he really wanted her back. What guarantee was there that anything would be better? a

  None. He was just fooling himself.

  Feeling restless, he went out to the kitchen and drank a glass of juice. Then he sat down and wrote a detailed status report of the investigation. When he was done, he spread out all his notes on the table and looked at them as if they were pieces of a puzzle. He suddenly had a strong feeling that they might not be too far from finding a solution. Even though there were still a lot of loose ends, a number of details did fit together.

  It wasn’t possible to point to a particular person. There weren’t even any possible suspects. But he still had the feeling that the police were close. This made him feel both gratified and uneasy. Too many times he had headed up complicated criminal investigations that seemed promising at first but later petered out in dead ends which they never managed to get out of, and in the worst instances they had to drop these cases altogether.

  Patience, he thought. Patience.

  It was almost nine o’clock. Again he was tempted to call Anette Brolin. But he resisted. He had no idea what he would say to her. And maybe her husband would answer the phone.

  He sat down on the couch and switched on the TV again.

  To his immense surprise he found himself staring at his own face. In the background he heard the droning voice of a woman reporter. The story was about the fact that Wallander and the police in Ystad seemed to be showing a deplorable lack of interest in guaranteeing the safety of the various refugee camps.

  Wallander’s face disappeared and was replaced by a woman who was being interviewed outside a large office complex. When her name appeared on the screen, he realized that he should have recognized her. It was the head of the Immigration Service, whom he had talked to on the phone that very day.

  �
�It cannot be ruled out that there may be an element of racism behind the lack of interest shown by the police,” she stated.

  Bitter anger welled up inside him.

  That bitch, he thought. What you’re saying is a total lie. And why didn’t those damned reporters contact me? I could have showed them Rydberg’s protection plan.

  Racists? What was she talking about? His fury was mixed with shame at being unjustly accused.

  Then the phone rang. He considered not answering it. But then he went out to the hallway and grabbed the receiver.

  The voice was the same as last time. A little hoarse, muffled. Wallander guessed that the man was holding a handkerchief over the mouthpiece.

  “We’re waiting for results,” said the man.

  “Go to hell!” roared Wallander.

  “By Saturday at the latest,” continued the man.

  “Were you the bastards who set the fire last night?” he shouted into the phone.

  “By Saturday at the latest,” repeated the man, unmoved. “Saturday at the latest.”

  The line went dead.

  Wallander suddenly felt sick. He couldn’t rid himself of a sense of foreboding. It was like an ache in his body that was slowly spreading.

  Now you’re scared, he thought. Now Kurt Wallander is scared.

  He went back to the kitchen and stood at the window and looked out into the street.

  All of a sudden he realized that there was no wind. The street light was hanging motionless.

  Something was going to happen. He was positive of that.

  But what? And where?

  Chapter Eight

  In the morning he took out his best suit.

  Despondently he stared at a spot on one lapel.

  Ebba, he thought. This is a good project for her. When she hears that I’m going to meet Mona, she’ll put her heart into getting rid of this spot. Ebba is a woman who thinks that the number of divorces is a considerably greater threat to the future of our society than the increase in crime and violence.

  At quarter past seven he laid the suit on the back seat and drove off. A thick cloud cover hung over the town.

  Is it snow? he wondered. The snow that I really don’t want.