The Fifth Woman

by Henning Mankell

  On that particular morning, Thursday, 20 October, the fog was thick. It had come in from the sea and now lay motionless over the landscape. They had agreed to meet at 6.30 a.m., but they were all late because visibility was practically nil. Wallander was the last to arrive. When he got out of his car it occurred to him that it looked like a hunting club had gathered. The only thing missing was their guns. He was dreading the task that awaited them. Somewhere on Eriksson’s property a murdered woman might lie buried. Whatever they found – if they found anything at all – would be skeletal remains. Nothing else, 27 years was a long time.

  Shivering, they greeted each other. Hansson had brought a surveyor’s map of the farm and the adjacent fields. Wallander wondered fleetingly what the Cultural Association of Lund would think if they really did find the remains of a body. It would probably increase the number of visitors to the farm, he thought gloomily. There were few tourist attractions that could compete with the scene of a crime.

  They spread the map out on the bonnet of Nyberg’s car and gathered around it.

  “In 1967 the fields were laid out differently,” Hansson said, pointing. “Eriksson didn’t buy all the fields to the south until the mid-1970s.”

  This reduced the relevant area of land by a third, but what remained was still large. They would never be able to dig up the whole area.

  “The fog is making things harder for us,” Wallander said. “I thought we could try to get an overview of the terrain. It seems to me that it should be possible to eliminate certain areas. I assume that a person would choose the spot carefully for burying someone he killed.”

  “You’d probably pick the spot where you thought it least likely anyone would look,” Nyberg said. “A study was done on it. In the US, of course. But it sounds reasonable.”

  “It’s a big area,” Hansson said.

  “That’s why we have to make it smaller,” Wallander said. “Nyberg is right. He wouldn’t bury her just anywhere. I imagine, for instance, that you wouldn’t want a body lying in the ground right outside your front door. Unless you’re completely insane, and there’s nothing to indicate that Eriksson was.”

  “Besides, there are cobblestones there,” Hansson said. “I think we can eliminate the courtyard.”

  They went up to the farmhouse. Wallander wondered whether they should return to Ystad and come back when the fog was gone. Since there was no wind, it could last all day. In the end he decided that they should spend a while trying to gain an overview.

  They walked over to the large garden that lay behind the house. The soft ground was covered with fallen, rotten apples. A magpie fluttered up from a tree. They stopped and looked around. Not here either, Wallander thought. A man who murders someone in the city and has only his garden might bury the body there, but not a man who lives out in the country.

  He told the others what he was thinking. No-one had any objections.

  They started walking out to the fields. The fog was still thick. Hares popped up against all the whiteness and then vanished. They headed towards the northern border of the property.

  “A dog wouldn’t be able to find anything, I guess?” Hamrén asked.

  “Not after 27 years,” Nyberg replied.

  The mud was sticking to their gumboots. They tried to balance their way along the narrow ridges of mown grass that formed the boundary of Eriksson’s property. A rusty hoe stood mired in the earth. It wasn’t just their task that bothered Wallander. The fog and the damp grey earth also oppressed him. He was fond of the landscape of Skåne, where he had been born and raised, but he could do without the autumn. At least on days like this.

  They reached a pond that lay in a hollow. Hansson pointed on the map to where they were. They looked at the pond. It was about 100 metres wide.

  “This is full of water all year round,” Nyberg said. “At the middle it’s probably between two and three metres deep.”

  “It’s a possibility, of course,” Wallander said. “He could have sunk the body with weights.”

  “Or a sack,” Hansson said.

  Wallander nodded. There was the mirror image again. But he wasn’t sure.

  “A body can float to the surface. Would Eriksson choose to sink a corpse in a pond when he has thousands of square metres of land to dig a grave in?”

  “Who actually worked all this land?” Hansson asked. “Surely not Eriksson. He didn’t have it leased out. But this land is well tended.” Hansson had grown up on a farm outside of Ystad and knew what he was talking about.

  “That’s an important question,” Wallander said. “We have to find out.”

  “It might also give us the answer to another question,” Hamrén said. “Whether any changes have occurred on the land. If you dig in one place, a mound appears somewhere else. I’m not thinking about a grave. But a ditch, for example. Or something else.”

  “We’re talking about something that happened almost 30 years ago,” Nyberg said. “Who would remember that far back?”

  “It happens,” Wallander said. “But of course we’ll have to look into it. So who worked Holger Eriksson’s land?”

  “There could well have been more than one person,” Hansson said.

  “Then we’ll talk to all of them,” Wallander replied. “If we can find them. If they’re still alive.”

  They moved on. Wallander remembered that he had seen several old aerial photographs of the farm inside the house. He asked Hansson to call the Cultural Association in Lund and get someone to bring the keys out.

  “It’s unlikely anyone would be there this early in the morning.”

  “Call Höglund,” Wallander said. “Ask her to contact the lawyer who was the executor of Eriksson’s will. He might still have a set of keys.”

  “Lawyers might be morning people,” Hansson said doubtfully as he dialled the number.

  “I want to see those aerial shots,” Wallander said. “As soon as possible.”

  They kept walking while Hansson talked to Höglund. The field now sloped downwards. The fog was still just as thick. In the distance they heard a tractor engine dying away. Hansson’s phone rang. Höglund had spoken to the lawyer. He had turned in his keys. She was trying to get hold of someone in Lund who could help. She would get back to them.

  It took them almost 20 minutes to reach the next boundary marker. Hansson pointed to the map. They were now at the southwest corner. The property stretched another 500 metres, but Eriksson hadn’t bought this section until 1976. They walked east, now approaching the ditch and the hill with the bird tower. Wallander felt his uneasiness growing. He thought he could sense the same silent reaction from the others.

  It was turning into an image of his life, he thought. My life as a policeman during the last part of the 20th century in Sweden. An early morning, dawn. Autumn, fog, a damp chill. Four men slogging around in the mud. They approach a ditch where a man was trapped, impaled on bamboo stakes. At the same time they’re searching for the burial site of a Polish woman who disappeared 27 years ago.

  I’m going to end up trudging around in this mud until I collapse. Out there in the fog people are huddled around their kitchen tables, organising vigilante militias. Anyone who takes a wrong turn in the fog runs the risk of being beaten to death.

  He was carrying on a conversation with Rydberg as he walked along. He saw Rydberg sitting on his balcony towards the end of his illness. The balcony hovered before Wallander’s eyes like an airship in the fog. Rydberg didn’t speak, but listened to Wallander with a wry smile, his face already heavily marked by illness.

  They reached the pungee pit. A torn remnant of crimescene tape was caught under one of the collapsed planks. We didn’t clean up very well, Wallander thought. The bamboo stakes were gone. He wondered where they were. In the basement of the police station? At the forensic laboratory in Linköping? The tower was on their right, barely visible in the fog.

  Wallander took a few steps to the side and nearly slipped in the mud. Nyberg stood staring into the ditch
. Hamrén and Hansson were discussing a detail on the map in low voices.

  Someone keeps an eye on Holger Eriksson and his farm, thought Wallander, an idea developing slowly in his mind. This person knows what happened to Krista Haberman, a woman, missing for 27 years, declared dead – a woman who is buried here somewhere. Eriksson’s time is being measured out. A grave with sharpened stakes is prepared. Another grave in the mud.

  He went over to Hamrén and Hansson. He told them what he’d just been thinking. Nyberg had disappeared in the fog.

  “Let’s assume that the killer knew where Krista Haberman was buried. On several occasions we’ve talked about the murderer having a language – that he or she is trying to tell us something. We’ve only had partial success in breaking the code. Eriksson was killed with what can only be described as deliberate brutality. His body was intended to be found. It’s also possible that this place was chosen for another reason, as a challenge to us to keep searching right here. And if we do, we’ll also find Krista Haberman.”

  Nyberg reappeared out of the fog. Wallander repeated what he’d said. They made their way over the ditch and up to the tower. The woods below were shrouded in fog.

  “Too many roots,” Nyberg said. “I don’t think it’s that grove of trees.”

  They turned around and continued eastwards until they were back where they had started. It was close to 8 a.m., and the fog was just as thick. Höglund called to say that the keys were on the way. Everyone was cold and wet. Wallander didn’t want to keep them there unnecessarily. Hansson would devote the next few hours trying to find out who had worked the land.

  “An unexpected change 27 years ago,” Wallander emphasised. “That’s what we want to know about. But don’t mention that we think there’s a body buried here. Then there’ll be an invasion.”

  Hansson nodded. He understood.

  “We’ll go over this again sometime when there’s no fog,” Wallander continued. “But I think it’s useful to have been out here already.”

  They all left. Wallander remained behind. He got into his car and turned on the heater. It didn’t seem to be working. The repairs had cost an incredible amount of money, but apparently didn’t cover the heating system. He wondered when he’d have the time and money to trade it in for another car. When was this one going to fall apart again?

  He waited, thinking about the women. Krista Haberman, Eva Runfeldt, and Katarina Taxell. Plus the fourth one who didn’t have a name. What was the common point of contact? He had a feeling it was so close that he was looking at it without seeing it.

  He went back over his thoughts. Abused, maybe murdered women. A vast stretch of time arched like a vault over the whole thing.

  As he sat in his car he realised that there was one other possible conclusion. They hadn’t seen everything. The events they were trying to understand were part of something bigger. It was important for them to find the connection between the women, but they also had to consider the possibility that the connection was coincidental. Someone was making choices. But what were the choices based on? Circumstances? Coincidences? Available opportunities? Eriksson lived alone on a farm. Didn’t socialise, watched birds at night. He was someone it was possible to get near. Runfeldt was leaving on an orchid safari for two weeks. That provided an opportunity. He also lived alone. Eugen Blomberg took walks by himself in the evening.

  Wallander shook his head at his own thoughts. He couldn’t make any progress. Was he thinking in the right direction or not? He didn’t know.

  It was cold in the car. He got out to move around. The keys should be arriving soon. He walked across the courtyard, remembering the first time he had come here, the flock of rooks in the ditch. He looked at his hands. His tan was gone. Even the memory of the sun in the garden of the Villa Borghese was gone. And so was his father.

  He let his gaze wander over the courtyard. The house was well cared for. Once a man named Holger Eriksson sat here and composed poems about birds. One day he got into a dark blue Chevrolet and drove all the way to Jämtland. Was he driven by passion? Or something else? Krista Haberman was a beautiful woman. Did she go with him willingly? She must have.

  They drive back to Skåne. Then she disappears. Eriksson lives alone. He digs a grave. She’s gone. The investigation never catches up with him. Until now, when Hansson finds a connection.

  Wallander was standing and looking at the deserted kennel. At first he wasn’t aware of what he was thinking. The image of Krista Haberman slowly slipped away. He frowned. Why wasn’t there a dog? No-one had asked that question before. He hadn’t either. When had the dog disappeared? Did that have any significance at all? These were questions he wanted to have answered.

  A car braked outside the house. A moment later a boy who couldn’t be more than 20 came into the courtyard. He walked over to Wallander.

  “Are you the policeman that needs the key?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  The boy regarded him doubtfully.

  “How can I be sure? You could be anybody.”

  Wallander felt annoyed, but he realised that the boy’s doubts were justified. He had mud all over his trousers. He took out his identification. The boy nodded and gave him the set of keys.

  “I’ll see to it that they get back to Lund,” Wallander said.

  The boy nodded. Wallander heard the car roar off as he looked through the keys for the one to the front door. He thought fleetingly about what Jonas Hader had said about the red Golf outside Katarina Taxell’s building. Don’t women gun their engines? Mona drives faster than I do. Baiba always stamps on the accelerator. But maybe they don’t gun their engines.

  He opened the door and went inside. It smelled musty. He sat down on a bench and pulled off his muddy gumboots. When he went into the main room he noticed to his surprise that the poem about the woodpecker was still on the desk. The night of 21 September. Tomorrow it would be a month since then. Were they really any closer to a solution? They had two more murders to solve. And the mystery of woman who had disappeared, who might be buried out in Eriksson’s fields.

  He stood motionless in the silence. The fog outside the windows was still dense. He felt uneasy. The objects in the room were watching him. He walked over to the wall where the two aerial photographs hung in their frames. He searched his pockets for his glasses, put them on and leaned forwards. One of the photographs was black-and-white, the other a faded colour shot. The black-and-white picture was taken in 1949, two years before Holger Eriksson had bought the farm. The colour photograph was from 1965.

  Wallander opened a curtain to let in more light, and saw a lone deer grazing among the trees in the garden. He stood quite still. The deer raised its head and looked at him. Then it calmly went on grazing. Wallander stayed where he was. He had a feeling that he would never forget that deer. How long he stood there and watched it, he didn’t know. Finally a sound that he himself didn’t notice caught the deer’s attention. It vanished. Wallander kept on looking out the window for a time and then went back to the two photographs. The plane carrying the camera had come in from due south. All the details were clear. In 1965 Eriksson hadn’t yet built his tower, but the hill was there and so was the ditch. He couldn’t make out a bridge. He followed the contours of the fields. The picture was taken early in the spring. The fields had been ploughed, but nothing was growing yet. The pond was quite clear in the photograph. A grove of trees stood next to a narrow tractor path separating two of the fields. He frowned. He couldn’t remember those trees. This morning he wouldn’t have seen them because of the fog, but he didn’t remember them from his previous visits. The trees looked tall. He studied the house, which was in the centre of the picture. An outbuilding that might have been used as a pigsty had been torn down. The approach road was wider. But otherwise everything was much the same. He took off his glasses and sat down in a leather armchair. Silence surrounded him.

  A Chevrolet goes to Svenstavik. A woman comes back to Skåne. Then she vanishes and 27 years later the man
who may have gone to Svenstavik to get her is murdered. Now they were looking for no less than three different women. Krista Haberman, Katarina Taxell, and one without a name. One who drives a red Golf, smokes handrolled cigarettes and might wear false nails.

  He wondered whether two of the women could be in fact be one and the same, whether Krista Haberman, in spite of everything, was still alive. If so, she would be 65 years old by now, and the woman who knocked down Ylva Brink was a lot younger.

  It didn’t add up. Nothing did.

  He looked at his watch. It was 8.45 a.m. He stood up and left the house. The fog was still just as thick. He thought about the deserted kennel. Then he locked up and drove away.

  At 10 a.m. Wallander called the investigative team together for a meeting. Martinsson was still away, but he had promised to come in that afternoon after he had been at Terese’s school. Höglund said that he’d called her late the night before. She thought he sounded drunk, which was out of the ordinary. Wallander felt vaguely jealous. Why had Martinsson called her and not him? It was the two of them who had worked together all these years.

  “He still seems determined to quit,” she said. “But I got the feeling that he also wished I would talk him out of it.”

  “I’ll talk to him,” Wallander said.

  They closed the door to the conference room. Per Åkeson and Chief Holgersson were the last ones to arrive. Wallander had a feeling that they had just completed their own meeting. Lisa Holgersson took the floor as soon as the room was quiet.

  “The whole country is talking about the citizen militia,” she said. “From now on Lödinge is firmly on the map. We’ve had a request for Kurt to participate in a discussion programme on TV tonight, to be broadcast from Göteborg.”

  “Not on your life,” Wallander replied, horrified. “What would I say?”

  “I’ve turned them down on your behalf already,” she replied with a smile. “But I’m thinking of asking for a favour in return later on.”

  Wallander realised that she was referring to the lectures at the police academy.