The Dogs of Riga: A Kurt Wallendar Mystery

by Henning Mankell

  The man pointing his pistol at him was still shouting questions. Wallander was growing more and more terrified, realizing he was going to be shot here in the corridor, and could think of nothing better than to reply in English.

  “It is a mistake,” he said in a shrill voice. “It is a mistake. I am a police officer, too.”

  But it wasn’t a mistake, of course. The officer ordered him to stand up with his hands over his head, then told him to start moving. He kept jabbing Wallander in the back with the barrel of his pistol.

  It was when they came to an elevator that the opportunity presented itself. Wallander had given up hope, convinced he was well and truly caught. There was no point in resisting. The man wouldn’t hesitate to shoot him. However, while they were waiting for the elevator his captor turned away slightly to light a cigarette, and in a split second Wallander realized that this was his only opportunity of getting away. He threw down the blue file at the man’s feet, and simultaneously hit him in the back of the neck as hard as he could. He felt his knuckles crunching, and the pain was agonizing, but his captor fell headlong to the floor, the pistol sliding away over the stone flags. Wallander didn’t know if the man was dead or just unconscious, but his hand was stiff with pain. He picked up the file, stuffed the pistol into his pocket, and decided the stupidest thing for him to do would be to use the elevator. He tried to work out where he was by looking out of a window facing the courtyard, and after a few seconds realized he must be on the opposite side from the colonels’ corridor. The man on the floor started groaning, and Wallander knew he wouldn’t be able to knock him out a second time. He hurried down the corridor to the left leading away from the elevator, and hoped he would come to an exit.

  He was lucky. The corridor led to one of the canteens, and he managed to open a carelessly bolted door in the kitchen that was obviously a service entrance. He came out into the street. His hand was hurting badly and had started to swell.

  The first rendezvous that he had agreed on with Baiba was at 12:30 a.m. Wallander stood in the shadows by the old church in Esplanade Park that had been turned into a planetarium. All around him were tall, bare, motionless lime trees. There was no sign of her. The pain in his hand was now almost unbearable. When it reached 1:15 a.m., he was forced to accept that something must have happened. She wasn’t going to come. He was extremely worried. Inese’s blood-covered face hovered in his mind’s eye, and he tried to work out what might have gone wrong. Had the dogs and their handlers realized that Wallander had managed to slip out of the university building unseen, despite their best efforts? In which case, what would they have done with Baiba? He did not dare to even think about that. He left the park, not knowing where to go next. What made him keep walking along the dark, deserted streets was really the pain in his hand. A military jeep with sirens blaring forced him to leap headfirst into a dark entrance, and not long afterwards a police car came racing down the street he was walking along, forcing him once more to withdraw into the shadows. He had put the file containing the major’s testimony down the front of his shirt, and the edges were scratching against his ribs. He wondered where he was going to spend the night. The temperature had dropped, and he was trembling with cold. The alternative rendezvous he and Baiba had agreed on was the fourth floor of the central department store, but that wasn’t until 11 a.m. the next morning, so he had nine hours to fill and couldn’t possibly spend them walking the streets. He was convinced he had broken his hand, and knew he should go to a doctor, but he didn’t dare go to an emergency room. Not now that he had the testimony with him. He wondered whether he ought to try and find shelter for the night at the Swedish embassy, assuming there was one, but he didn’t like that option either. What if the law said that a Swedish police officer who had entered the country illegally should be sent home immediately under guard? He didn’t dare take the risk.

  Uneasily, he decided to go to the car that had served him well for two whole days now, but when he got to where he’d left it, it had gone. He thought for a moment that he was so disoriented by the pain in his hand that he had remembered wrongly. Was this really the place where he’d parked the car? Yes, it definitely was—no doubt the car had been dismantled and quartered like a farm animal by now. Whichever one of the colonels was pursuing him had doubtless made certain the major’s testimony wasn’t hidden somewhere in the car.

  Where was he going to spend the night? He suddenly felt totally helpless, deep inside enemy territory, at the mercy of a pack of dogs managed by somebody who wouldn’t hesitate to butcher him and sling him into the frozen harbor or bury him in a remote wood. His homesickness was primitive but tangible. The reason why he was now stranded in Latvia in the middle of the night—a life raft containing two dead men, washed up on the Swedish coast—seemed vague and distant, like it had never really happened.

  For want of an alternative he made his way back through the empty streets to the hotel where he had earlier spent the night, but the door was locked and no lights went on upstairs when he rang the night bell. The pain in his hand was making him confused, and he was beginning to worry about whether he would lose his ability to think rationally altogether if he didn’t get indoors soon and thaw out. He went on to the next hotel, but once again he was unable to get any response when he rang the night bell. At the third hotel, though, which was even more decrepit and unappealing than the others, the outer door was not locked and he went in to find a man asleep behind the reception desk, his head resting on a table, a half-empty bottle of vodka at his feet. Wallander shook the man to wake him up, flourished the passport he’d been given by Preuss, and was handed a room key. He pointed at the vodka bottle, put a Swedish hundred-krona note on the desk, and took it with him.

  The room was small, with an acrid smell of musty furniture and nicotine-stained wallpaper. He flopped down on the edge of the bed, took a couple of long swigs from the bottle, and could feel his body warmth slowly starting to return. Then he took off his jacket, filled the sink with cold water, and immersed his swollen, throbbing hand. The pain began to ease, and he reconciled himself to having to sit like this all night. Occasionally he took another swig from the bottle, and wondered anxiously what could have happened to Baiba.

  He took the blue file from inside his shirt and opened it with his free hand. It contained about 50 typewritten pages, plus some blurred photocopies, but no photographs, which was what he had hoped for. The major’s text was in Latvian, and Wallander couldn’t understand a word. He noted that from page nine onwards the names Murniers and Putnis kept recurring at regular intervals: sometimes they were together in the same sentence. He couldn’t work out what that meant, whether both colonels were being accused or whether the major’s accusing finger had been pointed at just one of them. He gave up the attempt to decipher the secret document, put the file down on the floor, refilled the sink with water, and leaned his head back against the edge of the table. It was 4 a.m., and he dozed off. When he woke up with a start, he found he’d been asleep for ten minutes. His hand had started hurting again, and the cold water was no longer easing the pain. He finished off what was left in the vodka bottle, wrapped a damp towel around his hand, and lay down on the bed.

  Wallander had no idea what to do if Baiba failed to keep their rendezvous at the department store. He was beginning to have the feeling he had been defeated. He lay awake until dawn.

  CHAPTER 18

  He sensed danger the moment he woke. It was nearly 7 a.m. He lay quite still in the darkness, listening. Eventually, he realized the danger was not a threat outside the door or somewhere in the room, but inside himself. It was a warning that he still hadn’t turned over every stone to discover what was lying underneath it.

  The pain in his hand seemed to have eased a little. Carefully, he tried to move his fingers, although he still couldn’t bear to look at his hand. The pain returned immediately. He wouldn’t be able to last many hours more before seeing a doctor.

  Wallander was exhausted. Before he’d doze
d off, some hours earlier, he had felt defeated. The colonels’ power was too great, and his own ability to handle the situation had been continually curtailed. Now, he could see that he was also being defeated by exhaustion. He didn’t trust his own judgment, and he knew this was due to a lack of sleep over a long period.

  He tried to analyze the nagging feeling he had experienced on waking. What had he overlooked? Where, in all his thoughts and his constant efforts to establish connections, had he drawn the wrong conclusions, or perhaps not thought things through properly? What had he still not managed to see? He couldn’t ignore his instinct. Just now, in his dazed condition, it was his only chance of getting his bearings.

  What had he still not managed to see? He sat up in bed carefully, still not having answered the question. He looked in disgust at his swollen hand for the first time, and filled the sink with cold water. He first dipped his face into it, then his injured hand. After a few minutes he went over to the window and opened the blind. There was a very strong smell of coal. Misty dawn was just breaking over the church towers of the city. He stayed at the window and watched all the people hurrying along the sidewalk, but he was still unable to answer his own question: what had he failed to see?

  Then he left the room, paid, and allowed himself to be swallowed up by the city. It was as he walked through one of the city’s many parks—he couldn’t remember what it was called—that he noticed how many dogs there were in Riga. It wasn’t just the invisible pack that was pursuing him. There were lots of other dogs, real ones, the kind people play with and take for walks. He paused to watch a pair of dogs involved in a violent fight. One was an Alsatian, the other a mutt. The two owners were shouting at their dogs as they tried to separate them, and then began to shout at each other as well. The owner of the Alsatian was an elderly man, but the mutt belonged to a woman in her 30s. Wallander had the feeling that what he was witnessing was symbolic of the opposing forces in Latvia. The dogs were fighting and the people as well, and there were no outcomes that could be predicted in advance.

  He arrived at the central department store just as they were opening at 10 a.m. The blue folder was burning hot inside his shirt: his instinct told him he ought to get rid of it, to find a temporary hiding place.

  While he’d been wandering around the streets that morning, he had monitored every movement behind and in front of him, and he was now certain that the colonels had encircled him again. There were more shadows than ever now, and the grim thought that a storm was brewing struck him. He stopped just inside the entrance and pretended to read an information board, but in fact he was observing a coat check where customers could leave bags and parcels. The counter was L-shaped. He had remembered it all correctly. He went over to the bureau de change, handed over a Swedish note and received a bundle of Latvian notes in exchange. Then he went up to the floor where they sold records. He picked out two LPs of Verdi, and noted that the records were just about the same size as the file. When he paid and had the records put in a shopping bag, he saw the closest of the shadows pretending to study a shelf with jazz records. He then went back to the coat check and waited for a few seconds until there were several people waiting to be served. He walked quickly to the farthest corner of the counter, pulled out the file and placed it between the records. He acted quickly, even though he could only use one hand properly. He handed in the shopping bag, was given a tag with a number, and walked away. The various shadows were dotted around near the entrance doors, but even so he felt pretty sure they hadn’t noticed him putting the file into the bag. Of course, there was a risk that they would search the bag, but he thought it was unlikely since they had watched him buy the two records.

  He looked at his watch: only ten minutes to go until Baiba was due at their meeting place. He was still uneasy, but he felt more secure now for having gotten rid of the file. He went upstairs to the furniture department. Although it was still early, there were lots of customers gazing dreamily or in resignation at suites and bedroom furniture. Wallander strolled slowly towards the area displaying kitchen equipment. He didn’t want to arrive too soon, but wanted to get to the meeting place at the exact time they had planned, and so he filled the time by wandering around and looking at various light fixtures. They had agreed to meet among the ovens and refrigerators, all of which were made in the Soviet Union.

  He saw her right away. She was examining a stove, and he noticed that it only had three hotplates. He could tell immediately that something was wrong. Something had happened to Baiba, something he had suspected the moment he woke up that morning. His uneasiness bristled and sharpened all his senses.

  She noticed him at the same moment. She smiled, but he could see the fear in her eyes. Wallander walked towards her, not bothering to establish what positions the shadows had taken up. Just for the moment his whole attention was concentrated on finding out what had happened. He stood beside her, and they both stared at a dazzling white refrigerator.

  “What’s happened?” he asked. “Just tell me the important parts, we haven’t much time.”

  “Nothing’s happened,” she said. “It was just that I couldn’t leave the university since they had it under observation.”

  Why is she lying, he wondered frantically. Why is she trying to lie so convincingly that I won’t notice?

  “Did you get the file?” she asked.

  He hesitated over whether he ought to tell the truth, but then he decided he was fed up with all the lies.

  “Yes, I got the file,” he said. “Mikelis was reliable.”

  She gave him a quick look.

  “Give it to me,” she said. “I know where we can hide it.”

  It was clear to Wallander that this was not Baiba speaking. It was her fear that was asking for the file, the threat she was exposed to.

  “What’s happened?” he asked again, this time more firmly, and perhaps with a note of anger.

  “Nothing,” she insisted.

  “Don’t lie,” he said, unable to prevent his voice from rising. “I’ll give you the file. What will happen if you don’t get it?”

  He could see she was at the end of her tether. Don’t collapse just yet, he thought in desperation. We’re still one step ahead of them as long as they are not sure whether or not I’ve got the major’s testimony.

  “Upitis will die,” she whispered.

  “Who has threatened you with that?”

  She shook her head dismissively.

  “I have to know,” he said. “It won’t have any effect on Upitis if you tell me.”

  She looked at him in horror. He took hold of her arm and shook her.

  “Who?” he said. “Who was it?”

  “Sergeant Zids.”

  He let her go. Her reply had made him furious. Would he never get to know which of the colonels was at the core of the conspiracy?

  He noticed the shadows closing in on them. They now seemed to have decided that he had the major’s testimony. Without pausing to think he grabbed hold of Baiba and dragged her with him in a race for the stairs. Upitis won’t be the first to die, he thought. It’ll be us, unless we can get away.

  Their sudden flight had confused the pack of dogs. Even though he doubted whether they could get away, he knew they would have to try. He pulled Baiba after him down the stairs, elbowed aside a man who hadn’t managed to get out of their way, and suddenly they found themselves in the clothing department. Sales assistants and customers stared at them in astonishment as they charged past. Wallander stumbled and fell into a rack of suits. As he pulled and grabbed at the suits, the rack overturned. When he fell, he’d landed on his injured hand and the pain shot through his arm like a knife. A security guard came running up and took hold of his arm, but Wallander had no inhibitions any longer. He punched the man in the face with his good hand, then pulled Baiba after him towards where he hoped there might be a back staircase or an emergency exit. The shadows were catching up, and making no attempt to conceal themselves now. Wallander was pushing and pulling
at doors that refused to budge, but eventually came to one standing ajar. They emerged onto a back staircase, but he could hear footsteps coming towards them from below: there was no choice but to head for the upper floor.

  He flung open a fire door and they came out onto a roof covered with gravel. He looked round for an escape route, but they were trapped. The only way down from the roof was the long leap into eternity. He noticed he was holding Baiba’s hand. There was nothing to do but wait. He knew that the colonel who would soon step out onto the roof would be the man who had murdered the major. The gray fire door would reveal the answer at last, and he realized bitterly that it no longer mattered whether he’d guessed right or not.

  When the door opened and Colonel Putnis stepped out accompanied by a group of armed men, however, he was surprised even so to see that he had been wrong. Despite everything, he had come to the conclusion that Murniers was the monster who had been lurking for so long in the shadows.

  Putnis came towards them with a very serious expression on his face. Wallander could feel Baiba’s nails digging into his hand. He can’t very well order his men to shoot us here, Wallander thought desperately. Or maybe he can? He recalled the execution of Inese and her friends, and suddenly he could feel himself trembling, overcome by fear.

  Then Putnis’s face broke into a smile, and Wallander realized to his bewilderment that it wasn’t an animal of prey standing before him and smiling, but a man displaying great friendliness.

  “You don’t need to look so perplexed, Mr. Wallander. You seem to think I’m the one behind this business. But I must say, you’re a very difficult person to protect.”

  For one brief moment Wallander’s mind stood still. Then he realized he’d been right after all, that it wasn’t Putnis but Murniers who was the devil’s henchman he’d been hunting for so long. He’d also been right in suspecting there was a third possibility, that the enemy also had an enemy. Everything fell into place. His judgment hadn’t let him down, and he stretched out his left hand in order to greet Putnis.