Firewall

by Henning Mankell

  "Who later called Persson and told her Hökberg was dead?"

  "It's possible."

  "That would mean that Persson knows who killed Hökberg. Assuming it was a murder."

  "Could it have been anything else?"

  "I doubt it, but we have to wait for the result of the autopsy."

  "I tried to get a preliminary report, but I suppose it takes time to work with badly burned bodies."

  "I hope they realise it's urgent."

  "Isn't it always?"

  She looked down at her watch and got up.

  "I have to get home to the kids."

  Wallander thought he should say something to her. He knew what a hellish experience it was to end a marriage.

  "How are things going with the divorce proceedings?"

  "You've been through it yourself. You know what it's like."

  Wallander walked her to the door.

  "You should have a whisky," she said, "you need it."

  "I already have," Wallander said.

  At 7 p.m., Wallander heard a car horn below. From his kitchen window he could see Widén's rusty old van. Wallander tucked the whisky bottle in a plastic bag and went down.

  They drove out to the farm. As usual Wallander asked to see the stables first. Many of the stalls were empty. A girl of about 17 was hanging up a saddle when they came in. When she had mucked out they were left alone. Wallander sat on a bale of hay. Widén leaned against a wall.

  "I'm leaving," he said. "The stud has been put up for sale."

  "Who do you think will buy it?"

  "Someone crazy enough to think he'll make money on it."

  "Can you get a decent price?"

  "No, but it will probably be enough. If I live cheaply I can probably survive on the interest."

  Wallander was curious to know how much money was involved, but couldn't think of the right way to ask.

  "Have you decided where to go?" he said, instead.

  "First I have to sell. Then I'll decide where to go."

  Wallander got out the whisky.

  "You'll never be able to live without your horses," he said. "What will you do?"

  "I don't know."

  "You'll drink yourself to death."

  "Or else it'll be just the opposite. Maybe that's when I'll be able to kick the habit for good."

  They left the stables and walked across the yard to the house. It was a chilly evening. Wallander felt his usual pang of envy. Widén was on his way to an unknown but surely very different future. He, on the other hand, was splashed across the front pages of the paper for assaulting a 14-year-old girl.

  Sweden has become a place people try to escape from, he thought. The ones who can afford to. And those who can't afford it join the hordes who scavenge for enough money to leave. How had that happened? What had changed?

  They settled down in the untidy living room that also served as an office. Widén poured himself a glass of cognac.

  "I've been thinking about becoming a stage technician."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Exactly what I say. I could go to La Scala in Milan and operate the curtain."

  "You don't really think that that's done by hand any more, do you?"

  "Well, I'm sure the occasional prop is still moved by hand. Just think about being able to be backstage every night and hear that singing without paying a single cent for it. I would even work for free."

  "Is that what you're going to do?"

  "No. I have a lot of ideas. Sometimes I even think about heading up to northern Sweden and burying myself in some cold and unpleasant snowdrift. I just don't know. The only thing I know is that the stud is going to be sold and I'll have to go somewhere. What about you?"

  Wallander shrugged without answering. He'd had too much to drink. His head was starting to feel heavy.

  "Are you still chasing booze smugglers?"

  Widén had a teasing tone in his voice. Wallander felt himself get angry.

  "Murderers," Wallander said, "people who kill other people by smashing their heads with a hammer. I take it you heard about that taxi driver?"

  "No."

  "Two girls hit and stabbed a taxi driver to death the other day. They are the kind of people I chase. Not smugglers."

  "I don't understand how you can keep at it."

  "Neither do I. But someone has to do it, and I probably do it as well as anybody else."

  Widén looked smilingly at him. "You don't have to get so defensive. Of course I think you're an excellent policeman. I've always thought so. I just wonder if you're going to make time for anything else in your life."

  "I'm not a quitter."

  "Like me?"

  Wallander didn't answer. He was suddenly aware of the distance between them and wondered how long it had been so without their knowing it. Once upon a time they had been very close. Then they had grown up and gone their separate ways. When they met up years later, they thought they could build on the friendship they had once had. They had never grasped that the continuation of that friendship was utterly different. Only now could Wallander see clearly. Widén had probably come to the same conclusion.

  "One of the girls who killed this taxi driver had a stepfather," Wallander said. "Erik Hökberg. Or Eriksson, as we know him."

  Widén looked at him with surprise. "Seriously?"

  "Seriously. It looks as if the girl has now been murdered herself. I don't have the time to take off, even if I wanted to."

  He put the whisky back in the plastic bag.

  "Could you call a taxi for me?"

  "Are you going already?"

  "I think I am."

  A wave of disappointment ran over Widén's face. Wallander felt the same. Their friendship had come to an end. Or rather: they had finally discovered that it had ended a long time ago.

  "I'll take you home."

  "No," Wallander said. "You've been drinking yourself."

  Widén didn't argue. He went over to the phone and called the taxi company.

  "It'll be here in ten minutes."

  They went out. It was a clear autumn evening with no wind.

  "What did we expect?" Widén said suddenly. "When we were young, I mean."

  "I've forgotten. But I'm not the kind to look back very often. I have enough on my plate with the present, and my worries for the future."

  In time the taxi arrived.

  "Make sure you write and tell me what happens," Wallander said.

  "Will do."

  Wallander climbed into the back seat. The car drove through the darkness of Ystad.

  Wallander had just stepped into his flat when the phone rang. It was Höglund.

  "Are you home now? I've tried to call you a million times. Why isn't your mobile turned on?"

  "What's happened?"

  "I tried the coroner's office in Lund again. I spoke to the pathologist. He didn't want to be held to this, but he's found something. Hökberg had a skull fracture in the back of the head."

  "Was she dead when she hit the power lines?"

  "Maybe not, but probably unconscious."

  "Could she have somehow hurt herself?"

  "He was pretty sure it could not have been self-inflicted."

  "That settles it," Wallander said. "She was murdered."

  "Haven't we known that all along?"

  "No," Wallander said. "We suspected it, but we haven't known it until now."

  Somewhere in the background a child started crying. Höglund was in a hurry to get off the phone. They arranged to meet at 8 a.m. the next day.

  Wallander sat at the kitchen table. He thought about Widén and Hökberg, but above all about Persson.

  She must know, he thought. She does know who killed Sonja Hökberg.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Wallander was catapulted from sleep at around 5 a.m. on Thursday. As soon as he opened his eyes in the dark he knew what had awakened him. It was something that had slipped his mind: his promise to Höglund. Today was the day he was supposed to give a t
alk at the Ystad women's literary society about life as a police officer.

  He lay paralysed in the darkness. How could he have forgotten about it so completely? He had nothing prepared, not even scribbled notes. He felt the anxiety settle in his stomach. The women he was going to address would almost certainly have seen the pictures of Eva Persson. And Höglund must have called them by now to tell them he was speaking in her place.

  I can't do it, he thought. All they are going to see is a brutal man who assaulted a little girl. Not the person I actually am. Whoever that is.

  As he lay in bed he tried to plot a way out of his dilemma, but he soon realised there was no escaping this time. He got up at 5.30 a.m. and sat down at the kitchen table with a pad of paper in front of him. He wrote the word Lecture at the top of the page. He asked himself what Rydberg would have told a group of women about his work. But in the back of his mind he suspected that Rydberg would never have allowed himself to be roped into something like this in the first place.

  By 6 a.m., he had still only written this one word. He was about to give up when he had a sudden thought. He could tell them about what they were involved in right now: the investigation of the taxi driver's death. He could even start by telling them about Stefan Fredman's funeral. A few days in a policeman's life – the way it really was, without any editing. He made a few notes. He wouldn't be able to avoid the incident with the photographer and so his speech could seem like a defence. But in a way of course it was. It was a chance for him to tell it the way it had happened.

  He put down his pen at 6.15 a.m. He was still anxious about the evening, but no longer felt quite so helpless. He called the garage and asked about his car. The conversation was depressing. Apparently they were considering taking the engine apart. The clerk promised to call him with a quote later in the day.

  The thermometer outside read 7°C. There was a soft wind and some clouds, but no rain. Wallander watched an old man walking slowly down the street. He stopped by a rubbish bin and leafed through its contents with one hand but, apparently, found nothing. Wallander thought back to his visit to Widén. All trace of envy was gone. It had been replaced by a vague melancholy. Widén was going to disappear from his life. Who was left who connected him to his earlier life? Soon there would be no-one.

  Wallander forced himself to halt this train of thought and left the flat. On his way to the station he thought about what he should say in his speech. A patrol car pulled up alongside him and the officer asked him if he wanted a lift. Wallander thanked him but declined the offer. He wanted to walk.

  A man was waiting for him in reception. When Wallander walked past the man turned to face him. Wallander recognised the face but could not place it.

  "Kurt Wallander," the man said, "do you have a minute?"

  "That depends. Who are you?"

  "Harald Törngren." Wallander shook his head. "I was the one who took the picture."

  Wallander remembered the man's face from the press conference.

  "You mean, you were the one skulking around the corridor."

  Törngren smiled. He was in his thirties, had a long face and short hair.

  "I was looking for the toilet and no-one stopped me."

  "What do you want?"

  "I thought you might like to comment on the picture. I'd like to interview you."

  "You'd never write what I say."

  "How do you know that?"

  Wallander thought about asking Törngren to leave. But he saw an opportunity and decided to take it. "I want a third party present," he said.

  Törngren kept smiling. "A witness to the interview?"

  "I've had bad experiences with reporters."

  "As far as I'm concerned, you're welcome to ten witnesses."

  Wallander looked at his watch. It was 7.25 a.m.

  "I'll give you half an hour."

  "When?"

  "Right now."

  Irene said that Martinsson was in already. Wallander told Törngren to wait. Martinsson was doing something on his computer. Wallander explained the situation.

  Martinsson seemed to hesitate. "As long as you don't flare up."

  "Do I usually say things I don't mean?" Wallander said.

  "It happens." Martinsson was right.

  "I'll keep it in mind. Come on."

  They sat down in one of the smaller conference rooms. Törngren put his tape recorder on the table. Martinsson kept himself in the background.

  "I spoke to Eva Persson's mother last night," Törngren said. "They have decided to press charges against you."

  "For what?"

  "For assault. Do you have a reaction to that?"

  "There was never any question of assault."

  "That's not what they say. And I have a picture of what happened."

  "Do you want to know what happened?"

  "I'd be glad to hear your version."

  "It's not a version. It's the truth."

  "It's their word against yours, you know."

  Wallander was starting to realise the impossibility of what he was trying to do and regretted agreeing to the interview, but it was too late now. He told him what happened: Persson had attacked her mother and Wallander had tried to separate them. The girl had been wild. He had slapped her.

  "Both the mother and the girl deny this."

  "Nonetheless, it's what happened."

  "Do you really expect me to believe that she started hitting her mother?"

  "The girl had just confessed to murder. It was a tense moment. At such times unexpected things can happen."

  "Eva Persson told me last night that she had been forced to confess."

  Wallander and Martinsson looked at each other. "Forced?"

  "That's what I said."

  "And who forced her to do this?"

  "The officers who interrogated her."

  Martinsson was upset. "That's the damnedest thing I ever heard," he said. "We most certainly do not coerce anyone during our interrogations."

  "I'm just repeating what she said. She now denies everything. She says she's innocent."

  Wallander looked hard at Martinsson who didn't say anything else. Wallander felt completely calm.

  "The pre-investigation is far from complete," he said. "Persson is tied to the crime and if she has decided to retract her confession that doesn't change anything at this point."