Firewall

by Henning Mankell

  "I've never been to Ystad. Isn't that odd?"

  Wallander wanted to ask if he could call her. He didn't really know what he was feeling, but she seemed not to have found too many faults in him yet. For now that was plenty.

  "I have a car" she said. "I could even take the train. Do you have any time?"

  "I'm up to my neck in a difficult homicide case right now," he said. "But even policemen need time off occasionally."

  She lived in a Malmö suburb, towards Jägersro. Wallander offered to give her a lift, but she said she wanted to walk for a while and then would take a taxi.

  "I take as many long walks as I can," she said. "I hate jogging."

  "Me too," Wallander said.

  But he had said nothing about his diabetes, the reason he was now an avid walker.

  They shook hands and said good night.

  "It was nice to meet you," she said.

  "Yes," Wallander said, "same here."

  He watched her until she had rounded the corner of the hotel. Then he drove back to Ystad. He put on a cassette of arias by the tenor Jussi Björling. Music filled the car. As he passed the turning to Stjärnsund where Widén's ranch was he reckoned that his recent sting of jealousy was not as strong any more.

  It was almost 1 a.m. by the time he parked the car. He walked up to his flat and sat down on the sofa. It had been a long time since he had felt as happy as he did this evening. The last time must have been when he had begun to sense that Baiba reciprocated his feelings. He went to bed without even thinking about the case.

  Wallander arrived at the station on Friday morning with explosive energy. The first thing he did was to cancel the surveillance on Falk's flat on Apelbergsgatan. He did, however, want the surveillance at Runnerströms Torg to continue. Then he walked over to Martinsson's office. It was empty. Hansson was not in yet either. But he bumped into Höglund in the corridor. She looked unusually tired and grumpy. He ought to say something encouraging, but he could not find the words.

  "Hökberg's address book still hasn't turned up," she said. "The one she carried in her bag."

  "Have we established that she had one?"

  "Persson has corroborated Hökberg's mother's claim. It was a small, dark blue book with a rubber band around the middle."

  "Then we're assuming that whoever killed her and threw away the handbag had first pinched the book?"

  "It seems plausible."

  "The question is: what phone numbers were in there? And what names?"

  Höglund shrugged. Wallander looked more closely at her.

  "How are things with you anyway?"

  "Things are as they are," she said. "But they sure as hell could be better."

  She went into her office and closed the door. Wallander hesitated but then knocked at her door. When he heard her voice, he went in.

  "We have one or two other things to discuss," he said.

  "I know. I'm sorry."

  "Don't be."

  He sat down. As usual her office was perfectly tidy.

  "We have to sort out this business of the rape," he said. "I haven't spoken to Hökberg's mother yet. I have a meeting with Viktorsson at 8.30 a.m., but then I'm going to their house. I take it she's back from her sister's?"

  "They're planning the funeral. It's very hard on them."

  Wallander got up. "What's going to happen to Persson?" he asked.

  "I don't know."

  "Even if she manages to lay the blame on Hökberg, her life has been destroyed."

  Höglund made a face. "I don't know if I would go that far. Persson seems like one of those people who can let everything run over her and not let it get to her. How you get like that, I can't imagine."

  Wallander thought about what she had said. Perhaps he would understand it better later.

  "Have you seen Martinsson?" he said, as he was leaving.

  "I saw him come in."

  "He wasn't in his office."

  "I saw him go into Lisa's office."

  "I didn't think she was ever in this early?"

  "They had a meeting."

  Something in her voice made him stop. She saw his hesitation and seemed to make a decision. Then she gestured for him to come back and close the door.

  "A meeting about what?"

  "Sometimes you really surprise me," she said. "You see and hear everything. You're a great policeman and you know how to keep your investigative team motivated. But at the same time it's as if you see nothing that's going on around you."

  Wallander felt something cramp up in his gut, but he said nothing, just waited for her to go on.

  "You always speak well of Martinsson, and he always follows where you lead. You work well together."

  "I'm forever worried that he's going to get fed up and leave."

  "He won't, believe me."

  "It's what he always tells me. And it would be a shame. He is a good police officer."

  She looked squarely at him. "I shouldn't be telling you this, but I will anyway. You trust him far too much."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean that he's going behind your back. What do you think is going on in Lisa's office right now? They may very well be talking about it being high time for some changes around here. Changes that would be to your detriment but not to Martinsson's."

  Wallander couldn't believe it. "How do you mean 'going behind my back'?"

  She threw her letter opener across her desk in annoyance.

  "It took me a while to see it," she said. "But Martinsson is smart. He's manipulative, and good at it. He complains to Lisa about the way you're handling this investigation."

  "He tells her I'm incompetent?"

  "I don't think he would express himself so bluntly. He rather implies certain deficiencies: weak leadership, strange priorities. He went straight to Lisa when you brought in Modin, for example."

  Wallander was amazed. "I can't believe this."

  "You should. But I hope you understand that I'm telling you this in confidence."

  Wallander nodded. His stomach was hurting now.

  "I just thought you should know. That's all."

  Wallander looked at her. "Do you agree with him?"

  "If I did I would tell you to your face. Not go behind your back."

  "What about Hansson? Nyberg?"

  "This is Martinsson's game. No-one else's. He's going after the throne."

  "But what about his endless complaints about work? He doesn't even know if he wants to stay in the force."

  "Aren't you the one who's always telling us to look past the surface to the very bottom? You always take Martinsson at face value. But I can tell you, I've seen what's underneath, and I don't like what I see."

  Wallander felt almost paralysed. The energy and joy he had felt when he woke this morning had evaporated. Inside him, anger was starting to bubble up.

  "I'm going to get him for this," he said. "I'm going to confront him right now and see what he has to say for himself."

  "That is not a good idea."

  "How am I supposed to keep working with someone like that?"

  "I can't tell you. But you have to wait for a better opportunity to confront him. If you say anything now, you'll just give him more reason to complain about you being unbalanced. He also thinks that the slap you gave Persson was no coincidence."

  "Maybe you know that Lisa is thinking of suspending me."

  "It wasn't Lisa's idea," Höglund said grimly. "It was Martinsson's."

  "How do you know all this?"

  "He has a weakness," she said. "He trusts me. He thinks I'm on his side, even though I've told him that he should stop going behind your back."

  Wallander got up from the chair.

  "Don't do anything rash," she said. "Try to think of this information as having one up on him. Save it for when the time comes."

  She was right. Wallander went back to his office. His anger was tainted with sadness. He could have believed it about almost anyone but Martinsson. Not Martinsson. He wa
s interrupted in his thoughts by the phone. It was Viktorsson, calling to see where he was since he hadn't turned up for the meeting. Wallander walked over to the prosecutors' department, nervous about running into Martinsson. But he had probably already left to be at Modin's side in Falk's office.

  The conversation with Viktorsson did not take long. Wallander forced himself to put all other thoughts aside and focus on the case. He told Viktorsson where they thought they were and what direction they were planning to take. Viktorsson asked a few questions, but he raised no objections.

  "What do you expect to find in Falk's computer?"

  "I don't know, but I believe it may help us unravel the motive."

  "Did Falk commit any kind of a crime?"

  "Not as far as we know."

  Viktorsson scratched his head. "Do you know enough about these things? Shouldn't specialists from the National Police be brought in?"

  "We have a local expert working with us. But we have decided to be in touch with Stockholm."

  "I would urge you to do that as soon as possible. They can be touchy about these kinds of things. Who is this local expert?"

  "His name is Robert Modin."

  "And he's very good?"

  "Better than most."

  Wallander realised he should tell Viktorsson the truth about Modin's criminal past, but before he had gathered himself to do so the moment was past. Wallander had in effect chosen to safeguard the investigation rather than himself. He had taken the first step on a path that could lead straight into personal disaster. Even if he escaped suspension for the business with Persson, this could settle it, and Martinsson would have more than enough grounds to crush him.

  "I take it you have been informed about the internal investigation that is now under way?" Viktorsson said abruptly. "The girl's lawyer has filed a complaint with the Justice Department ombudsman on top of charging you with assault."

  "That picture tells a lie," Wallander said. "Whatever anyone says, I was simply protecting the mother."

  Viktorsson didn't answer. Is there anyone who believes me? Wallander thought. Anyone?

  Wallander left the station at 9 a.m. He drove to the Hökbergs' house. He had not called them to say he was coming. What mattered was to get away from the station for a while. He wouldn't now run into Martinsson, but it would happen sooner or later, and he didn't trust his ability to control himself.

  As he got out of his car his mobile rang. It was Siv Eriksson.

  "I'm sorry to have to bother you," she said.

  "No problem."

  "I'm calling because I need to talk to you."

  He suddenly heard that she was upset. He pressed the phone closer to his ear and tried to turn out of the wind.

  "Has anything happened?"

  "I don't want to talk about it over the phone. I'd be grateful if you could come as soon as possible."

  It must be urgent. He said he would drive over straight away. The conversation with Hökberg's mother would have to wait. He drove back to Ystad and parked in Lurendrejargränd. The sharp east wind was making it much colder in Skåne. Wallander pressed the bell to her flat. She buzzed him in and was on the landing to meet him. He could see that she was frightened. As they walked into the living room, she stopped to light a cigarette. Her hands were shaking.

  "What happened?" he asked.

  It took several tries to light her cigarette. She inhaled deeply, then stubbed it out.

  "I often go to see my mother," she said. "She lives in Simrishamn and I went there yesterday. It got late and I decided to spend the night. When I got back this morning I saw what had happened."

  She stopped and walked into her study. Wallander followed her. She pointed to her computer.

  "I had just sat down to work, but when I turned on the computer nothing happened. At first I thought the computer had been unplugged, but then I realised what had happened."

  She pointed to the screen.

  "I don't follow you," Wallander said.

  "Someone has deleted all my files" she said. "My hard drive is empty. But it gets worse."

  She walked over to a cabinet and opened the doors.

  "Every one of my back-up disks is gone. Nothing is left. Nothing. I even have a reserve hard drive. That's gone too."

  Wallander looked around. "So someone broke into your flat last night?"

  "But there are no signs of it. And how did they know I wasn't going to be here?"

  "Did you leave a window open? Were there any marks on the front door?"

  "No, I checked."

  "Does anyone else have the keys to your flat?"

  Her answer came slowly. "Yes and no," she said. "I gave Tynnes a spare key."

  "Why did you do that?"

  "So he would have access to my flat when I was away. In case anything happened. But he never used them, as far as I know."

  Wallander nodded. He understood why she was so upset. Someone had used her spare keys when she was away, and the only person who had had those keys was dead.

  "Do you know where he kept them?"

  "He said he was going to keep them in his flat on Apelbergsgatan."

  Wallander nodded. He thought about the man who had tried to shoot him. Perhaps he had finally been given the answer to what the man had been looking for. The keys to Siv Eriksson's flat.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  For the first time since the investigation began, Wallander felt that he had a clear picture. After checking the front door and all the windows of the flat he was sure that Eriksson was right. The person who had cleaned out her computer had used keys to get in. Furthermore, someone had been watching her and waiting for the right moment to strike.

  They returned to the living room. She was still upset and lit another cigarette which she also stubbed out straight away. Wallander decided to wait a while before calling in Nyberg. There was something else he wanted to clarify first. He sat down.

  "Do you have any idea who might have done this?"

  "No. It's utterly incomprehensible."

  "Your computer equipment must be pretty valuable, but the burglar didn't come for that. He wanted only what was inside."

  "Everything is gone," she said. "Everything. All my work."

  "You must have had a password."

  "Of course I did."

  "So the burglar knew what it was?"

  "Or was able to get around it somehow."