by Unknown
He had not been sitting in the television studio, in the booth with headphones on. He had been sitting in this very same armchair. He too had known all the answers, and not once did he even need extra time to think. But he didn’t win 10,000 kronor. Nobody knew of his vast knowledge of birds. He just went on writing his poems.
A noise woke him with a start from his daydream. He listened in the darkened room. Was there someone in the courtyard? He pushed away the thought. It was his imagination. Getting old meant suffering from anxiety. He had good locks on his doors. He kept a shotgun in his bedroom upstairs, and he had a revolver close at hand in a kitchen drawer. If any intruders came to this isolated farmhouse just north of Ystad, he could defend himself. And he wouldn’t hesitate to do so.
He got up from his chair. There was another sharp twinge in his back. The pain came and went in waves. He set his coffee cup on the kitchen bench and looked at his watch. Almost 11 p.m. It was time to go. He squinted at the thermometer outside the kitchen window and saw it was 7°C. The barometer was rising. A slight breeze from the southwest was passing over Skåne. The conditions were ideal, he thought. Tonight the flight would be to the south. The migrating birds would pass overhead in their thousands, borne on invisible wings. He wouldn’t be able to see them, but he’d feel them out there in the dark, high above. For more than 50 years he had spent countless autumn nights out in the fields, experiencing the sensation of the birds passing. Often it had seemed as though the whole sky was on the move.
Whole orchestras of silent songbirds would be leaving before the approaching winter, heading for warmer climes. The urge to move on was innate, and their ability to navigate by the stars and the earth’s gravity kept them on course. They sought out the favourable winds, they had fattened themselves up over the summer, and they could stay aloft for hour after hour. A whole night sky, vibrating with wings, was beginning its annual pilgrimage towards Mecca.
What was a lonely, earthbound old man compared to a night flyer? He had often thought of this as the performance of a sacred act. His own autumnal high mass, as he stood there in the dark, sensing the departure of the migratory birds. And then, when spring came, he was there to welcome them back. Their migration was his religion.
He went out into the hall and stood with one hand on the coat hooks. Then he went back to the living room and pulled on the jumper lying on a stool by the desk. Along with all the other vexations, getting old meant that he got cold more quickly.
Once more he looked at the poem lying there finished on the desk. Maybe he would live long enough to put together enough poems for a tenth and final collection. He had already decided on the title: High Mass in the Night.
He went back to the hall, put on his jacket, and pulled a cap over his head. He opened the front door. Outside, the autumn air was redolent with the smell of wet clay. He closed the door behind him and let his eyes grow accustomed to the dark. The garden seemed desolate. In the distance he could see the glow of the lights of Ystad. He lived so far from his other neighbours that this was the only source of light. The sky was almost clear, and filled with stars. A few clouds were visible on the horizon. Tonight the migration was bound to pass over his property.
He set off. His farmhouse was old, with three wings. The fourth had burned down early in the century. He spent a lot of money renovating the building, although the work was still not completed. He would leave it all to the Cultural Association in Lund. He had never been married, never had any children. He sold cars and got rich. He had dogs. And then birds.
I have no regrets, he thought, as he followed the path down to the tower he had built himself. I regret nothing, since it is meaningless to regret.
It was a beautiful September night. Still, something was making him uneasy. He stopped on the path and listened, but all he could hear was the soft sighing of the wind. He kept walking. Could it be the pain that was worrying him, those sudden sharp pains in his back? The worry was prompted by something inside him.
He stopped again and turned around. Nothing there. He was alone. The path sloped downwards, leading to a slight rise. Just before the rise there was a broad ditch over which he had placed a bridge. At the top of the rise stood his tower. He wondered how many times he had walked this path. He knew every bend, every hollow. And yet he walked slowly and cautiously. He didn’t want to risk falling and breaking his leg. Old people’s bones grew brittle, he knew that. If he wound up in the hospital with a broken hip he would die, unable to endure lying idle in a hospital bed. He would start worrying about his life. And then nothing could save him.
An owl hooted. Somewhere close by, a twig snapped. The sound had come from the grove just past the hillock on which his tower stood. He stood motionless, all his senses alert. The owl hooted again. Then all was silent once more. He grumbled under his breath, and continued.
Old and scared, he muttered. Afraid of ghosts and afraid of the dark. Now he could see the tower. A black silhouette against the night sky. In 20 metres he would be at the bridge crossing the deep ditch. He kept walking. The owl was gone. A tawny owl, he thought. No doubt about it, it was a tawny owl.
Suddenly he came to a halt. He had reached the bridge that led over the ditch.
There was something about the tower on the hill. Something was different. He squinted, trying to see the details in the dark. He couldn’t make out what it was. But something had changed.
I’m imagining things, he thought. Everything’s the same as always. The tower I built ten years ago hasn’t changed. It’s just my eyesight getting blurry, that’s all. He took another step, out onto the bridge, and felt the planks beneath his feet. He kept staring at the tower.
There’s something wrong, he thought. I’d swear it was a metre higher than it was last night. Or else it’s all a dream, and I’m looking at myself standing up there in the tower.
The moment the thought occurred to him, he knew it was true. There was someone up in the tower. A silhouette, motionless. A twinge of fear passed through him, like a lone gust of wind. Then anger. Somebody was trespassing on his property, climbing his tower without asking him for permission. It was probably a poacher hunting the deer that grazed around the grove on the other side of the hill. It couldn’t be another bird-watcher.
He called out to the figure in the tower. No reply, no movement. Again he grew uncertain. His eyes must be deceiving him; they were so blurry.
He called again. No answer. He started to walk across the bridge.
When the planks gave way he fell headlong. He pitched forwards and didn’t even have time to stretch out his arms to break his fall. The ditch was more than two metres deep.
He felt a hideous pain. It came out of nowhere and cut right through him, like red-hot spears piercing his body. The pain was so intense he couldn’t even scream. Just before he died he realised that he had never reached the bottom of the ditch. He remained suspended in his own pain.
His last thought was of the migrating birds, somewhere far above him. The sky moving towards the south.
One last time he tried to tear himself away from the pain. Then it was all over.
It was 11.20 p.m. on 21 September 1994. That night, huge flocks of thrushes and redwings were flying south.
They came from the north and set a southwest course over Falsterbo Point, heading for the warmth that awaited them, far away.
When all was quiet, she made her way carefully down the tower steps. She shone her torch into the ditch. Holger Eriksson was dead. She switched off the torch and stood still in the darkness. Then she walked quickly away.
CHAPTER 2
Just after 5 a.m. on Monday, 26 September, Kurt Wallander woke in his flat on Mariagatan in central Ystad.
The first thing he did when he opened his eyes was look at his hands. They were tanned. He leaned back on his pillow again and listened to the autumn rain drumming on the window. A feeling of satisfaction came over him at the memory of the trip that had ended two days earlier at Kastrup Airport in Copenha
gen. He had spent an entire week with his father in Rome. It had been hot there. In the afternoons, when the heat was most intense, they had sought out a bench in the gardens of the Villa Borghese where his father could sit in the shade, while Kurt took off his shirt and turned his face to the sun. That had been the only area of conflict during their holiday. His father couldn’t understand how he could be vain enough to waste time trying to get a tan.
That happy holiday, thought Wallander as he lay in bed. We took a trip to Rome, my father and I, and it went well. It went better than I could ever have hoped.
He looked at the clock. He had to go back on duty today. But he was in no hurry. He could stay in bed for a while yet. He reached for the stack of newspapers he had glanced through the night before, and started reading about the results of the parliamentary election. Because he had been in Rome on election day, he had sent in an absentee ballot. The Social Democrats had taken a good 45 per cent of the vote. But what did that mean? Would there be any changes?
He put the paper back on the floor, and thought again of Rome. They had stayed at an inexpensive hotel near the Campo dei Fiori. From the roof terrace directly above their two rooms they’d had a beautiful view over the city. There they drank their morning coffee and planned what they were going to do each day. Wallander’s father knew what he wanted to see. Wallander had worried that his father wanted to do too much, that he wouldn’t have the strength. He watched for signs that his father was confused or forgetful. Alzheimer’s disease, the illness with the strange name, was lurking there and they both knew it. But for that entire, happy week, his father had been in terrific form. Wallander felt a lump in his throat at the realisation that the whole trip belonged to the past, could only be a memory. They would never return to Rome together.
There had been moments of great closeness, for the first time in nearly 40 years. Wallander pondered the discovery he had made, that they were alike, more so than he had been willing to admit. They were both definitely morning people. When Wallander told his father that the hotel didn’t serve breakfast before 7 a.m., he had complained at once. He dragged Wallander down to the front desk and in a mixture of Skåne dialect, a few English words, and some German phrases, as well as a smattering of Italian words, he managed to explain that he wanted to have breakfast presto. Not tardi. Absolutely not tardi. For some reason he also said passaggio a livello several times as he was urging the hotel to start its breakfast service at least an hour earlier, or they would consider looking for another hotel. Passaggio a livello, said his father and the desk clerk had looked at him in shock but also with respect.
Naturally, they got their breakfast at 6 a.m. Later Wallander looked up passaggio a livello in his dictionary and found that it meant railway crossing. He assumed that his father had muddled it up with another phrase, but he was wise enough not to ask what that might be.
Wallander listened to the rain. Looking back, the trip to Rome, one brief week, seemed an endless and bewildering experience. When he took his morning coffee was not the only thing his father had fixed ideas about. He had guided his son through the city with complete confidence. Wallander could tell that his father had been planning this trip for a lifetime. It was a pilgrimage, which Wallander was allowed to share. He was a component in his father’s journey, an ever-present servant. There was a secret significance to the journey that he hadn’t quite understood. His father had travelled to Rome to see something he already seemed to have experienced within himself.
On the third day they had visited the Sistine Chapel. For almost an hour Wallander’s father had stood staring at Michelangelo’s ceiling. It was like watching a man send a wordless prayer to heaven. Wallander soon got a crick in his neck and had to give up. He knew that he was looking at something very beautiful, but his father saw much more. For a wicked moment, he’d wondered whether the old man was searching for a grouse or a sunset in the huge ceiling fresco. But he regretted this thought. There was no doubt that his father, commercial painter that he was, stood gazing at a master’s work with reverence and insight.
Wallander opened his eyes and looked out at the rain.
It was on the same evening that he’d had the feeling that his father was preparing something he wanted to keep secret. They had dined on the Via Veneto, which was far too expensive in Wallander’s view, but his father insisted that they could afford it. After all, they were on their first and last trip together to Rome. Then they had strolled slowly back through the city. The evening was warm, they were surrounded by throngs of people, and Wallander’s father had talked about the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. They lost their way twice before they finally found their hotel. Wallander’s father was treated with great respect after his initial outburst, and they had picked up their keys, received a polite bow from the desk clerk, and gone upstairs, said goodnight and gone to their rooms. Wallander lay listening to the sounds from the street. Maybe he thought about Baiba, maybe he was just falling asleep.
Suddenly he was wide awake again. Something had made him uneasy. He put on his dressing gown and went down to the lobby. Everything was quiet. The night clerk was sitting watching TV behind the front desk. Wallander bought a bottle of mineral water. The clerk was a young man. He’d told Wallander that he was working nights to finance his theological studies. He had dark, wavy hair and was born in Padua. His name was Mario and he spoke excellent English. Wallander stood there holding his bottle and found himself asking the clerk to wake him if his father appeared in the lobby during the night, or left the hotel. The young man looked at him. If he was surprised, he didn’t show it. He simply nodded and said, certainly, if the senior Signor Wallander went out during the night, he would knock on the door of Room 32 at once.
It was on the sixth night that it happened. That day they had strolled around the Forum, and paid a visit to the Galleria Doria Pamphili. In the evening they went through the dark underground passages that led to the Spanish Steps from the Villa Borghese, and ate in a restaurant. Wallander was shocked when the bill arrived, but it was their last night, and this holiday, which couldn’t be described as anything but happy, was coming to an end. Wallander’s father showed the same boundless energy and curiosity that he’d had on the whole trip. They walked back to the hotel, stopping at a café for a cup of coffee on the way, and toasting each other with a glass of grappa. At the hotel they picked up their keys. Wallander fell asleep as soon as he got into bed.
The knock at the door came at 1.30 a.m. At first he had no idea where he was. He jumped up, half awake, and opened the door. The night clerk was standing there, and explained that Signor Wallander’s father had just left the hotel. Wallander threw on his clothes. He caught up with his father easily, and followed him at a distance. His premonition had been right. When the streets began to narrow, he realised they were on their way to the Spanish Steps. Still he kept his distance. And then, in the warm Roman night, he watched his father climb the Spanish Steps to the church with two towers at the top and sit down, a black dot way up there. Wallander kept himself hidden in the shadows. His father stayed there for almost an hour. Then he stood and came slowly down the steps. Wallander continued to tail him – as if it were the strangest assignment he’d ever had to carry out – and soon they were at the Fontana di Trevi. His father did not toss a coin over his shoulder, but stood for a long time watching the water spraying out of the huge fountain. In the dim light Wallander could see the gleam in his eyes.
Eventually he followed his father back to the hotel.
The next day they flew back on an Alitalia plane to Copenhagen. Wallander’s father had the window seat, as on the way there. Wallander waited until they were on the ferry heading back to Limhamn to ask whether his father was pleased with the trip. He nodded, mumbled something unintelligible, and Wallander knew that he couldn’t demand more enthusiasm than that. Gertrud was waiting for them in Limhamn and drove them home. They’d dropped Wallander in Ystad, and later that night, when he called to ask if all was well, Gertrud told
him that his father was back in his studio painting his trademark motif, the sun setting over a becalmed landscape.
Wallander got out of bed and went to the kitchen, and made some coffee. Why had his father sat there on the Spanish Steps? What had he been thinking at the fountain? He had no answers. But he knew he’d had a glimpse into his father’s secret inner landscape. And he knew that he could never ask him about his solitary walk through Rome.
As the coffee was brewing, Wallander went into the bathroom. He noticed with pleasure that he looked healthy and energetic. The sun had bleached his hair. All that pasta must have added a few kilos, but he avoided the bathroom scales. He felt rested, that was the most important thing. He was glad they had made the journey.
The realisation that in just a few hours he would return to being a policeman again didn’t bother him. Often he’d had trouble going back to work after a holiday. In recent years he’d been very reluctant. There were times when he’d seriously thought of finding another job, maybe as a security guard. But in the end he was a policeman. This knowledge had matured slowly but irrevocably. He could never be anything else.
As he showered, he thought of the hot summer and Sweden’s triumph in the World Cup, recalling with anguish the desperate hunt for the serial killer who scalped his victims. During the week in Rome, he’d managed to banish it from his mind. Now the memories came flooding back. A week away had changed nothing.
He sat at his kitchen table until just after 7 a.m. The rain continued to lash the windows. The heat of Italy was already a distant memory. Autumn had come to Skåne.
At 7.30 a.m. he left his flat and drove to the police station. Martinsson arrived at the same time, parking next to him. They said a quick hello in the rain and hurried into the station.