The Dogs of Riga: A Kurt Wallendar Mystery

by Henning Mankell

  “But surely the tanks must be regarded as the cause of the disorder?”

  Putnis carefully stubbed out his cigarette before replying. “You and I are both police officers,” he said. “We have the same elevated goal: to combat crime and ensure that people feel safe. But we work in different circumstances, and that affects the way in which we go about our business.”

  “You said there are different ways of looking at things. I suppose there are different views inside the police force as well?”

  “I know that in the West, the police are regarded as apolitical civil servants. The police force has to be neutral towards whatever government happens to be in power. In principle the same applies in our country as well.”

  “But there is only one party here, isn’t there?”

  “Not anymore. Certain new political organizations have emerged in recent years.”

  Wallander could see that Putnis was skillfully avoiding answering any of his questions. He decided to take the bull by the horns.

  “What do you think yourself?” he asked.

  “What about?”

  “About independence. Breaking free.”

  “A colonel in the Latvian police force has no business commenting on that question. Certainly not to a stranger.”

  “I hardly think there are any hidden microphones in here,” Wallander insisted. “Your reply will go no further. Besides, I’ll be back in Sweden shortly. I’m hardly going to get on a soap box in the town square and announce what you’ve told me in strict confidence.”

  Putnis eyed him up and down for some time before replying.

  “I trust you, Inspector Wallander, of course. Allow me to say that I sympathize with what is happening in this country—and in our neighboring countries, and the Soviet Union; but I’m afraid not all of my colleagues share that view.”

  Colonel Murniers, for instance, Wallander thought. But he won’t admit as much, of course.

  Colonel Putnis got to his feet. “That was a thought-provoking conversation,” he said. “But now I have to confront an unpleasant person in an interrogation room. The reason I stopped by was to say that my wife Ausma wonders if it will be convenient for you to have dinner with us tomorrow evening. I had forgotten that we had a previous engagement tonight.”

  “That would be splendid,” Wallander said.

  “Colonel Murniers would like you to be in touch with him this morning. He thought you and he could discuss the areas the investigation should be concentrating on. Obviously, I’ll let you know if my interrogation achieves a breakthrough.”

  Putnis left the room. Wallander read through the notes he’d made the night before, when he’d gotten back from the hunting lodge in the forest. We suspect Colonel Murniers, Upitis had said. We think Major Liepa was betrayed. There’s no other explanation.

  He stood at the window, gazing out over the rooftops. He’d never been involved in an investigation quite like this one. People leading lives he had absolutely no conception of occupied the territory he found himself in. How should he proceed? Perhaps he might just as well go home? And yet, he couldn’t deny that he was curious. He wanted to know why the short-sighted little major had been murdered. Where were the connections? He went back to the desk and started going through his notes one more time. The telephone rang, and he lifted the receiver, expecting to hear Murniers’s voice. All he could hear at first was a deafening crackle, and then he realized it was Björk trying to make himself understood in his poor English.

  “It’s me!” he yelled into the mouthpiece. “Wallander. I can hear you.”

  “Kurt!” Björk shouted. “Is that you? I can hardly hear you. I’m only on the other side of the Baltic—why is the line so awful? Can you hear me?”

  “I can hear you. You don’t need to shout.”

  “What did you say?”

  “Stop shouting! And don’t speak so fast!”

  “How’s it going?”

  “Slowly. I don’t even know if we’re getting anywhere.”

  “Hello?”

  “I said it’s going slowly. Can you hear me?”

  “Only just. Don’t speak so fast. Stop shouting. Are you okay?”

  All of a sudden the connection was crystal clear—Björk might have been in the neighboring room.

  “That’s better. I didn’t hear what you said.”

  “It’s going slowly, and I don’t know if we’re getting anywhere. A colonel by the name of Putnis has been questioning a suspect since yesterday, but I’ve no idea where that will lead.”

  “Do you think you can be of use?”

  Wallander hesitated, then replied confidently. “Yes,” he said. “I think it’s good for me to be here—if you can spare me for a bit longer.”

  “There’s been nothing special here. It’s pretty quiet. You can concentrate on what you’re doing.”

  “Any leads on the life raft?”

  “Not a thing.”

  “Is there anything else I ought to know? Have you got Martinsson there?”

  “Martinsson’s in bed with flu. We’ve dropped the preliminary investigation now that Latvia’s taken over. We’ve got nothing new to contribute.”

  “Have you had any snow?”

  Wallander didn’t hear Björk’s reply. The telephone link was cut off, as if somebody had taken a pair of scissors to it. Wallander replaced the receiver, and it occurred to him that he ought to phone his father. He still hadn’t sent the postcards he’d written. Maybe he ought to buy some souvenirs of Riga? What on earth could one take home from Latvia? He pushed away a vague feeling of homesickness, drank the remains of his cold coffee and went back to his notes. After half an hour he leaned back in his creaking desk chair and stretched. At last he was beginning to feel less tired. The first thing I must do is talk to Baiba Liepa, he thought. Until I do that, everything is based on guesswork. She must have information of crucial significance. I have to know why Upitis arranged the meeting last night, what he wanted me to tell him or feared I might know.

  He wrote her name on a piece of paper and drew a ring round it. He put an exclamation mark after her name. Then he wrote Murniers’s name and put a question mark after it. He gathered his papers together, stood up and went out into the corridor. When he knocked on Murniers’s door, he heard a grunting noise and on entering found Murniers on the phone. The colonel pointed to one of the uncomfortable visitors’ chairs, and Wallander sat down and waited. He listened to what Murniers was saying. It seemed to be a heated conversation, and occasionally the colonel’s voice rose to a bellow. Wallander realized there was considerable strength confined within that swollen, neglected body. He couldn’t understand a word of what was being said, but it suddenly dawned on him that Murniers was not speaking Latvian—the intonation was different. It was a while before it occurred to him that Murniers must be speaking Russian. The conversation ended with Murniers firing off a salvo that sounded like a string of peremptory orders, then slamming down the receiver.

  “Idiots,” he muttered, wiping his face with his handkerchief. He turned to Wallander, cool and collected once more, and smiled. “It’s always difficult when one’s subordinates don’t do what they’re supposed to do. Do you have the same problem in Sweden?”

  “Often,” Wallander replied politely.

  He watched the man sitting opposite. Could he have murdered Major Liepa? Of course he could! The experience he’d gained during his years in the police force had given him this unambiguous answer: there are no murderers. Only ordinary people who commit murder.

  “I thought perhaps we could go through all the material one more time,” Murniers said. “I’m convinced the man Colonel Putnis is interrogating is involved in some way or other, but while the questioning is going on perhaps we might be able to find some new angles?”

  Wallander decided to take the bull by the horns.

  “I feel that the investigation of the crime scene is inadequate,” he said.

  Murniers raised an eyebrow.

 
“In what way?”

  “Sergeant Zids translated the report for me, and several details didn’t ring true. To start with, nobody seems to have bothered to search the quay itself.”

  “What might have been found there?”

  “Tire marks. Major Liepa would hardly have walked out to the harbor that night.”

  Wallander waited for Murniers to comment, but as the colonel said nothing, he continued.

  “Nobody seems to have looked for a murder weapon either. My overall impression is that the murder couldn’t have been committed where the body was found. The reports that Sergeant Zids translated for me state that the scene of the crime and the place where the body was found are identical, but they provide no evidence to support this. What strikes me as oddest of all, though, is that no witnesses have been questioned.”

  “There were no witnesses,” Murniers said.

  “How do you know?”

  “We’ve spoken to the security officers at the harbor. Nobody saw anything. Besides, Riga is a city that sleeps at night.”

  “I was thinking rather about the district where Major Liepa lived. It was late at night when he left the house. Somebody might have heard a door closing and checked to see who was going out so late. A car might have stopped. There’s nearly always somebody who saw or heard something, if only you dig deep enough.”

  Murniers nodded. “That’s exactly what we’re doing just now,” he said. “A number of police officers are currently knocking on doors with a photo of Major Liepa.”

  “Don’t you think that’s a bit late? People soon forget. Or they mix up days and dates. Major Liepa used to go up and down those stairs to his apartment every day.”

  “Sometimes it can be advantageous to wait a little,” Murniers answered. “When the rumor that Major Liepa had been murdered started to spread, people claimed to have seen all kinds of things. Or they imagined they had. Waiting for a few days can be a way of getting people to reflect, to sort out the difference between what they imagined they might have seen, and accurate observations.”

  Wallander knew that Murniers had a point, but his own experience was that it could be helpful to conduct two door-to-door exercises, with a few days between visits.

  “Is there anything else that concerns you?” Murniers asked.

  “What did Major Liepa have on?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Was he in uniform, or in civilian clothes?”

  “In uniform. He’d told his wife he had to go on duty.”

  “What did they find in his pockets?”

  “Cigarettes and matches. Some small change. A pen. Nothing that had no business to be there. There was nothing missing, either. His identity card was in his breast pocket, and he’d left his wallet at home.”

  “Was he carrying his gun?”

  “Major Liepa preferred not to carry a gun unless there was a real risk that he might be forced to use it.”

  “How did he generally get to the police station?”

  “He had a car with a driver, of course, but often he chose to walk. God knows why.”

  “In the case notes it says that Baiba Liepa doesn’t recall having heard a car stop outside.”

  “Of course not. He wasn’t going on duty—he’d been tricked.”

  “He didn’t know that at the time, though. Since he didn’t go back inside, he must have assumed something had happened to the car. What did he do then?”

  “Presumably he started walking. We can’t be sure.”

  Wallander had no more questions, but was now certain that the investigation had been conducted badly. So badly that it gave the impression of having been set up. But in order to conceal what?

  “I’d like to spend some hours nosing around his home and the surrounding streets,” Wallander said. “Sergeant Zids can help me.”

  “You won’t find anything,” Murniers assured him, “but you’re welcome to. If anything crucial comes out of the interrogation, I’ll send for you.”

  He pressed the bell; Sergeant Zids appeared in the doorway. Wallander asked him to start by showing him the town. He felt he needed to give his brain an airing before getting to grips with the fate of Major Liepa.

  Sergeant Zids seemed to relish the task of showing off his city to the visitor. He described the streets and parks they passed at length, and Wallander could see how proud he was. They drove down Aspasias Boulevard, with the river on the left, and the sergeant pulled up by the curb to show Wallander the tall monument to freedom. Wallander tried to work out what the gigantic obelisk represented, and recalled Upitis saying that one could long for freedom, but also be scared of it. Some disreputable-looking men were squatting at the foot of the monument, shabbily dressed, shivering with cold. Wallander watched one of them pick up a cigarette end from the street. Riga is full of contrasts, he thought. Everything I see, and think I’m beginning to understand, is immediately followed by its opposite. Unpainted high-rise buildings soar above highly decorated but decrepit blocks of flats built before the war. Huge esplanades end up either as narrow alleys or as splendid squares—the Cold-War parade grounds of gray concrete and granite monuments.

  When the sergeant stopped at a red light Wallander watched the endless stream of people flowing down the pavements. Were they happy? Were they any different from people back home? He couldn’t judge.

  “Verman’s Park,” Sergeant Zids said. “There are a couple of cinemas over there, the Spartak and the Riga. That’s the Esplanade to the left. Now we’re turning into Valdemar Street. When we’ve crossed the bridge over the municipal canal, you’ll see the Dramatic Theater on your right. Now we’re turning left again, into November 11th Quay. Shall we keep going, Colonel Wallander?”

  “No, that’ll be enough,” Wallander said, not feeling in the least like a colonel. “You can help me buy some souvenirs later on, but now I’d like you to stop somewhere near Major Liepa’s house.”

  “Skarnu Street,” Sergeant Zids told him, “in the heart of the oldest part of Riga.”

  He parked behind a truck that was belching out exhaust fumes while the driver unloaded some sacks of potatoes. Wallander hesitated for a moment over whether or not to take the sergeant along with him. Without him he wouldn’t be able to ask any questions, but even so, he felt a need to be alone with his observations and thoughts.

  “That’s Major Liepa’s house,” Sergeant Zids said, pointing at a building crammed between two tower blocks that appeared to be holding it up.

  “Did his apartment overlook the street?” asked Wallander.

  “Yes, on the second floor, those four windows to the left.”

  “Wait here,” Wallander told him.

  It was the middle of the day, but the street was quiet. Wallander walked slowly to the house Major Liepa had emerged from when he went out for that last, solitary walk. He remembered Rydberg saying that a police officer had to be an actor, to approach the unknown by trying to get inside it, under the skin of a criminal or a victim, imagining their thoughts and reactions. Wallander went up to the entrance door and opened it. It was dark on the staircase and there was an acrid smell of urine. He let go of the door and it closed with no more than a slight click.

  He could not trace where the insight came from, but as he stood peering up the dim stairs, something suddenly became clear to him. It was as if a little gleam of light had spread out and he could remember everything he’d seen flashing before his eyes. There was something beforehand, he thought. When Major Liepa came to Sweden a lot had already happened. The life raft Mrs. Forsell had come upon at Mossby Strand was only a small part of a chain of events that Major Liepa was tracking. That was what Upitis had wanted to know. Had Major Liepa revealed any of his suspicions, had he said anything about what he knew or suspected of a crime back in his homeland? Wallander could now see quite clearly that he’d missed a line of thought he ought to have caught onto sooner. If Upitis was right and Major Liepa had been betrayed by one of his colleagues, possibly Colonel Murniers, wasn�
�t it possible that others besides Upitis might be asking the same question? How much does this Swedish police officer actually know? Is it possible that Major Liepa has passed on to Wallander some of what he knows or suspects?

  It had occurred to him that the fear he had experienced several times since arriving in Riga had been a warning signal. Perhaps he ought to be more on his guard than he had hitherto realized? There was no doubt whoever was behind the murders of the men in the life raft and Major Liepa would have no hesitation in killing again.

  He crossed the street and looked up at the windows. Baiba Liepa must know, he thought. But why didn’t she go to the hunting lodge herself ? Is she being watched? Is that why I’ve become Mr. Eckers? Why did I agree to talk to Upitis? Who is Upitis? Who was it listening in the doorway beyond the dim light of that kerosene lamp?

  Getting under the skin, he thought—now Rydberg would have started his solitary role-playing game.

  Major Liepa returns from Sweden. He delivers his report to Colonel Putnis and Colonel Murniers, then goes home. Something he said while accounting for his activities in Sweden resulted in somebody pronouncing an immediate death sentence. He goes home, has dinner with his wife and shows her the book he’s been given by the Swedish police officer Inspector Wallander. He’s glad to be home again, and has no idea that this is the last evening of his life. Once he’s dead, his wife tries to establish contact with the Swedish police officer: she invents Mr. Eckers, and a man calling himself Upitis questions him in an attempt to find out what Wallander knows, or what he doesn’t know. The Swedish police officer is asked to help, although it is not at all clear how he can help. Nevertheless, it is obvious that the crime is connected with the political unrest in Latvia, and that at the heart of it is a dead major of the police force by the name of Liepa. In other words, there is an extra link to add to the chain already established: politics. Is that what the major discussed with his wife the final evening of his life? The phone rings just before 11 p.m. Nobody knows where the call came from, but Major Liepa appears to have no sense of it being connected with the carrying out of the death sentence. He says he’s been called in for night duty, and leaves his apartment. He never comes back.