The Fifth Woman

by Henning Mankell

  “One of Blomberg’s colleagues is on his way to identify the body. They’ll let us know by phone.”

  “And the widow?”

  “Not yet informed. We thought that was a little premature.”

  “That’s going to make the interview more difficult,” Wallander said. “She’ll be shocked, of course.”

  “I don’t think that we can do anything about that.”

  Birch pointed to a café across the street. “We can wait there,” he said. “Besides, I’m hungry.”

  Wallander hadn’t eaten lunch either. They went into the café and had sandwiches and coffee. Wallander gave Birch a summary of the case to date.

  “It reminds me of what you were dealing with this summer,” he said when Wallander had finished.

  “Only because the murderer has killed more than one person,” Wallander said. “The method here is quite different.”

  “What’s so different about taking scalps and drowning somebody alive?”

  “I might not be able to put it into words,” Wallander said hesitantly. “But there’s still a big difference.”

  Birch let the question drop. “We sure as hell never thought about things like this when we joined the force,” he said instead.

  “I hardly remember what I imagined any more,” Wallander said.

  “I remember an old commissioner,” Birch said. “He’s been dead a long time now. Karl-Oscar Fredrick Wilhelm Sunesson. He’s practically a legend. At least here in Lund. He saw all of this coming. I remember that he used to talk to us younger detectives and warn us that everything was going to get a lot tougher. The violence would get more widespread and more brutal. He said that this was because Sweden’s prosperity was a well-camouflaged quagmire. The decay was underneath it all. He even took the time to put together demographic analyses and explain the connections between various types of crime. He was that rare sort of man who never spoke ill of anyone. He could be critical about politicians, and he could use his arguments to crush suggested changes to the police force. But he never doubted that there were good, albeit confused, intentions behind them. He used to say that good intentions that are not clothed in reason lead to greater disasters than actions built on ill will. I didn’t understand it back then. But I do now.”

  Birch could have been talking about Rydberg.

  “That still doesn’t explain what we were really thinking when we decided to join the force,” he said.

  But what Birch had in mind, Wallander never found out. The phone rang. Birch listened without saying anything.

  “It’s Eugen Blomberg. There’s absolutely no doubt about it.”

  “So let’s go in,” Wallander said.

  “If you want, you can wait until we inform his wife,” said Birch. “It’s usually rather painful.”

  “I’ll go with you,” Wallander said. “It’s better than sitting here doing nothing. Besides, it might give me an idea what kind of relationship she had with her husband.”

  They encountered a woman who was unexpectedly composed. She seemed to understand why they were standing on her doorstep at once. Wallander kept in the background as Birch told her of her husband’s death. She sat down on the edge of a chair, as if to bear the brunt of it with her feet, and nodded silently. Wallander assumed that she was about the same age as her husband, but she seemed older, as if she had aged prematurely. She was thin, her skin stretched taut across her cheekbones. Wallander studied her furtively. He didn’t think she was going to fall apart. At least not yet.

  Birch nodded to Wallander to step forward. Birch had merely said that they had found her husband dead in Krageholm Lake. Nothing about what had happened. This was Wallander’s job.

  “Krageholm Lake comes under the jurisdiction of the Ystad police,” said Birch. “Which is why one of my colleagues from there is with me. This is Kurt Wallander.”

  Kristina Blomberg looked up. She reminded Wallander of someone, but he couldn’t think who it was.

  “I recognise your face,” she said. “I’ve seen you in the papers.”

  “That’s quite possible,” Wallander said, sitting down on a chair across from her. Birch had taken over Wallander’s position in the background. The house was very quiet. Tastefully furnished. But quiet. It occurred to Wallander that he didn’t yet know whether they had children.

  That was his first question.

  “No,” she replied. “We don’t have any children.”

  “None from earlier marriages?”

  Wallander immediately noticed her uncertainty. She paused before answering; it was barely noticeable but he saw it.

  “No,” she said. “Not that I know of.”

  Wallander exchanged a glance with Birch before slowly pressing on.

  “When did you last see your husband?”

  “He went for a walk last night as he usually did.”

  “Do you know which way he went?”

  She shook her head. “He was often gone for more than an hour. Where he went, I have no idea.”

  “Was everything normal last night?”

  “Yes.”

  Wallander again sensed a shadow of uncertainty in her answer. He continued cautiously.

  “So he didn’t come back? What did you do then?”

  “At 2 a.m. I called the police.”

  “But didn’t you think he might have gone to see some friends?”

  “He didn’t have many friends. I called them before I contacted the police. He wasn’t with them.”

  She looked at him. Still composed. Wallander realised that he couldn’t wait any longer.

  “Your husband was found dead in Krageholm Lake. We have determined that he was murdered. I regret this very much, but I have to tell you the truth.”

  Wallander studied her face. She’s not surprised, he thought. About him being dead, or that he was murdered.

  “Of course it’s important that we catch the person or persons who did this. Did your husband have any enemies?”

  “I don’t know,” she replied. “I didn’t know my husband very well.”

  Wallander paused to think before he continued. Her answer made him uneasy.

  “I don’t know how to interpret your answer.”

  “Is it really so difficult? I didn’t know my husband very well. Once upon a time, a long time ago, I thought I did. But that was back then.”

  “What happened? What changed things?”

  She shook her head. Wallander saw something he interpreted as bitterness in her expression. He waited.

  “Nothing happened,” she said. “We grew apart. We live in the same house, but we have separate bedrooms. He has his own life, and I have mine.”

  Then she corrected herself. “He had his own life. And I have mine.”

  “And he was a researcher at the university?”

  “Yes.”

  “Milk allergies? Is that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you work there too?”

  “I’m a teacher.”

  Wallander nodded. “So you wouldn’t know whether your husband had any enemies?”

  “No.”

  “And few friends?”

  “That’s right.”

  “And you can’t imagine anyone who would want to kill him? Or why?”

  Her face was strained. Wallander felt as if she were looking right through him.

  “No-one except me,” she replied. “But I didn’t kill him.”

  Wallander looked at her for a long time, without saying anything. Birch had stepped forward to stand next to him.

  “Why would you want to kill him?” Wallander asked.

  She stood up and tore off her blouse with such force that it ripped. It happened so fast that Wallander and Birch didn’t understand what was going on. Then she held out her arms. They were covered with scars.

  “He did this to me,” she said. “And a lot of other things that I won’t even talk about.”

  She left the room with the torn blouse in her hand. Wallander an
d Birch looked at each other.

  “He abused her,” Birch said. “Do you think she was the one who did it?”

  “No,” Wallander answered. “It wasn’t her.”

  They waited in silence. After a few minutes she came back wearing a new shirt.

  “I’m not going to grieve for him,” she said. “I don’t know who did it. I don’t think I want to know, either. But I realise that you have to catch him.”

  “Yes,” Wallander said. “We do. And we need all the help we can get.”

  She looked at him, and all of a sudden her expression was completely helpless.

  “I didn’t know anything about him,” she said. “I can’t help you.”

  It was quite likely that she was telling the truth. But she had already helped them. When Wallander saw her arms, he lost his last shred of doubt.

  He knew that they were looking for a woman.

  CHAPTER 26

  It was raining when they left the house on Siriusgatan. They stopped at Wallander’s car. He felt restless.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever met a widow who took the loss of her husband so lightly,” Birch said, his voice grim with distaste.

  “And yet it’s something we have to bear in mind,” Wallander replied.

  He didn’t take the trouble to explain his answer. Instead he tried to think ahead through the next few hours. His feeling of urgency was intense.

  “We have to go through his belongings both at home and at the university. That’s your job, of course. But I’d like someone from Ystad to be here too. We don’t know what we’re looking for, but this way we might discover something of interest more quickly.”

  Birch nodded. “You’re not staying yourself?”

  “No. I’ll ask Martinsson and Svedberg to come over. I’ll have them leave right away.”

  Wallander dialled the number of the Ystad police, and asked for Martinsson, telling him quickly what had happened. Martinsson said that they would leave immediately. Wallander told him to meet Birch at the police station in Lund. He had to spell the name for Martinsson. Birch smiled.

  “I would have stayed,” Wallander said, “but I have to start working backwards through the investigation. I’ve got a hunch that the solution to Blomberg’s murder is in there somewhere, though we haven’t seen it yet. The solution to all three murders is there in a complex system of caverns.”

  “It would be good if we could prevent any more deaths,” Birch said. “Enough have died as it is.”

  They said goodbye. Wallander drove back towards Ystad. Rain showers came and went. When he passed Sturup Airport there was a plane coming in to land. As he drove he went over the case again. He didn’t know how many times he had done it so far.

  He arrived back at 5.45 p.m. In reception he stopped and asked Ebba if Höglund was in.

  “She and Hansson came back an hour ago.”

  Wallander hurried on. He found Höglund in her office. She was on the phone. Wallander signalled to her and then waited out in the hall. As soon as he heard her hang up, he went back in.

  “I think we should go to my office,” he said. “We need to do a thorough overview.”

  “Shall I bring anything?” She pointed at the papers and folders strewn across her desk.

  “No. If we need anything you can come back and get it.”

  She followed him to his office. Wallander told the switchboard to hold his calls.

  “You remember that I asked you to go through everything that’s happened and look for female characteristics,” he said.

  “I’ve done that,” she replied.

  “We have to go over all the material again,” he went on. “I’m convinced that there’s a point where we can make a breakthrough. It’s just that we haven’t seen it yet. We’ve walked right past it. We’ve gone back and forth, and it’s been there the whole time, but we just haven’t been looking in the right direction. And now I’m certain that a woman must be involved.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  He told her about his conversation with Kristina Blomberg and about how she had ripped off her blouse and showed them her scars.

  “You’re talking about an abused woman,” she said. “Not about a woman who murders people.”

  “It might be the same thing,” Wallander said. “In any case, I have to find out if I’m right or wrong.”

  “Where do we start?”

  “From the beginning. Like with a story. And the first thing that happened was that someone prepared a pungee pit for Holger Eriksson in a ditch in Lödinge. Imagine that it was a woman. What do you see?”

  “It’s not impossible, of course. Nothing was too heavy or too large.”

  “Why did she choose this particular modus operandi?”

  “So it would look like it was done by a man.”

  “She wanted to throw us off the track?”

  “Not necessarily. She may have wanted to demonstrate how violence comes back, like a boomerang. Or, why not both reasons?”

  Wallander thought about that. Her explanation was certainly possible.

  “The motive,” he continued. “Who wanted to kill Holger Eriksson?”

  “With Gösta Runfeldt there are a number of candidates. But with Eriksson we still don’t know enough about him. It’s as if his life is a no trespassing zone.”

  He knew right away that she was saying something important.

  “How do you mean?”

  “Just what I said. We should know more about a man who’s 80 years old and has lived his whole life in Skåne. A well-known man. We know so little that it’s unnatural.”

  “What’s the explanation?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Are people scared to talk about him?”

  “No.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “We were searching for a mercenary,” she said. “We found a man who’s dead. We’ve learned that these men often use assumed names. It struck me that the same might apply to Holger Eriksson.”

  “That he could have been a mercenary?”

  “No, I don’t think so. But he could have used an assumed name. He mightn’t always have been Holger Eriksson. That might be one explanation as to why we know so little about his private life. Maybe sometimes he was someone else.”

  Wallander recalled some of Eriksson’s earliest poetry books. He had published them under a pseudonym, later using his real name.

  “I have a hard time accepting what you’re saying,” Wallander said. “Mostly because I don’t see any reasonable motive. Why does someone use an assumed name?”

  “So that he can do something in secret.”

  Wallander looked at her. “You mean that he might have used an alias because he was homosexual? In a time when it was best to keep it secret?”

  “That’s one possibility.”

  Wallander nodded, but he was still dubious. “We’ve got the gift to the church in Jämtland. That must mean something. Why did he do it? And the Polish woman who disappeared. There’s something that makes her special. Have you thought what it might be?”

  Höglund shook her head.

  “The fact that she’s the only woman who appears in the investigative material on Holger Eriksson,” he said.

  “Copies of the material on her were sent from Östersund. But I don’t think anyone has started going through it yet. Besides, she’s just on the periphery. We have no proof that she and Eriksson knew each other.”

  Wallander was suddenly determined.

  “That’s right. We have to do that as soon as possible. Find out whether there’s a connection.”

  “Who’s going to do it?”

  “Hansson. He reads faster than any of us. He usually goes right to the heart of the matter.”

  She made a note. Then they left the topic of Holger Eriksson for the moment.

  “Gösta Runfeldt was a brutal man,” Wallander said. “We know that for sure. On that point there’s a similarity with Eriksson. Now it turns out that it applies
to Eugen Blomberg too. Runfeldt abused his wife, just like Blomberg. Where does this lead us?”

  “To three men with violent tendencies, at least two of them who abused women.”

  “It might also be true of Eriksson. We don’t know yet.”

  “The Polish woman? Krista Haberman?”

  “For example. And it might also be true that Runfeldt killed his wife. Prepared a hole in the ice for her to fall into and drown.”

  They both knew that they were onto something. Wallander went back through the investigation again.

  “The pungee pit,” he said. “What was it?”

  “Prepared, well planned. A death trap.”

  “More than that. A way to kill someone slowly.”

  Wallander searched for a paper on his desk.

  “According to the pathologist in Lund, Eriksson may have hung there impaled on the bamboo stakes for several hours before he died.”

  He put down the paper in disgust.

  “Runfeldt,” he said. “Emaciated, strangled, hanging tied to a tree. What does that tell us?”

  “That he was held captive. He wasn’t hanging in a pungee pit.”

  Wallander raised his hand. She didn’t say a word. He was thinking, recalling the visit to Stång Lake, how they’d found her under the ice.

  “Drowning under ice,” he said. “I’ve always imagined that would be one of the most horrifying ways to die. To be beneath the ice and not be able to break through. Maybe even see the light through it.”

  “Held captive under the ice,” she said.

  “Precisely. That’s just what I was thinking.”

  “Do you mean that this killer has invented methods of killing that are linked to the event that’s being avenged?”

  “Something like that. It’s a possibility, anyway.”

  “In that case, what happened to Eugen Blomberg looks more like what happened to Runfeldt’s wife.”

  “I know,” Wallander said. “Maybe we can figure that out too if we keep at it a while longer.”

  They went on. They discussed the suitcase. Wallander mentioned the false nail that Nyberg had found out in the woods near Marsvinsholm. Then they started on Blomberg. The pattern was repeated.