The Troubled Man (2011)

by Henning Mankell

  Wallander nodded, and walked to his car. He was just about to leave Limhamn when he decided to make one more visit. He had often thought about investigating whether a mark he had made nearly fifty years ago was still there. He parked outside the churchyard, made his way to the western corner of the surrounding wall and bent down. Had he been ten or eleven at the time? He couldn’t remember, but he’d been old enough to have discovered one of life’s great secrets: that he was who he was, a person with an identity all his own. That discovery had sparked a temptation inside him. He would make his mark in a place where it would never disappear. The low churchyard wall topped by iron railings was the sacred place he had chosen. He had sneaked out one autumn evening, with a strong nail and a hammer hidden under his jacket. Limhamn was deserted. He had selected the spot earlier: the stones in the section of wall close to the western corner were unusually smooth. Cold rain had started to fall as he carved his initials, KW, into the churchyard wall.

  Wallander found those initials without difficulty. The letters had faded and were not as clear now, after all those years. But he had dug deep into the stone, and his mark was still there. I’ll bring Klara here sometime, he thought. I’ll tell her about the day when I decided to change the world. Even if it was only by carving my initials into a stone wall.

  He went into the churchyard and sat down on a bench in the shade of a tree. He closed his eyes and thought he could hear his own childhood voice echoing inside his head, sounding like it did when it was cracking and he was troubled by everything the adult world stood for. Maybe this is where I should be buried when the time comes, he thought. Return to the beginning, be laid to rest in this same soil. I’ve already carved my epitaph into the wall.

  He left the churchyard and went back to his car. Before starting the engine he thought about his meeting with Asta Hagberg. What had it accomplished?

  The answer was simple. He had not progressed a single step forward. Louise was just as big a mystery as she had been before. The wife of an officer, not present in any photographs.

  But the unease he had felt ever since meeting Hakan von Enke on his island was still there.

  I can’t see it, he thought. Whatever it is that I should have discovered by now.

  34

  Wallander drove home. He could cope with the fact that his visit to Asta Hagberg had not produced results, but his sorrow following the death of Baiba weighed heavily on him. It came in waves, the memory of her sudden visit and then her equally sudden departure. But there was nothing he could do about it; in her death he also envisaged his own.

  When he had parked the car, released Jussi and allowed him to run off, he poured himself a large glass of vodka and drank it in one swig, standing by the kitchen table. He filled his glass again and took it with him into the bedroom. He pulled down the blinds on the two windows, undressed and lay down naked on top of the bed. He balanced the glass on his wobbly stomach. I can take one more step, he thought. If that doesn’t lead me anywhere, I’ll drop the whole thing. I’ll inform Hakan that I’m going to tell Linda and Hans where he is. If that means he chooses to remain missing and find himself a new hideout, that’s up to him. I’ll talk to Ytterberg, Nordlander and Atkins. Then it’s no longer my business - not that it ever was. Summer is almost over, my holiday has been ruined, and I’ll find myself wondering yet again where all the time has gone.

  He emptied the glass and felt the warmth and the sensation of being pleasantly drunk kick in. One more step, he thought again. But what would it be? He put the glass on the bedside table and soon fell asleep. When he woke up an hour later, he knew what he was going to do. While he was asleep, his brain had formulated an answer. He could see it clearly, the only thing that was important now. Who other than Hans could provide him with information? He was an intelligent young man, if not especially sensitive. But people always know more than they think they know, observations they’ve made in their subconscious.

  He gathered his dirty laundry and started the washing machine. Then he went out and shouted for Jussi. There was a sound of barking from far away, in one of the neighbours’ newly mown fields. Jussi eventually came bounding up. He had been rolling in something that smelled foul. Wallander shut him in his kennel, got the garden hose and washed him off. Jussi stood there with his tail between his legs, looking pleadingly at Wallander.

  ‘You smell like shit,’ Wallander told him. ‘I’m not having a stinky dog in my house.’

  Wallander went into the kitchen and sat at the table. He wrote down the most important questions he could think of, then looked up Hans’s phone number at work in Copenhagen. When he was told that Hans was busy for the rest of the day with important meetings, he became impatient. He told the girl on the switchboard to inform Hans that he should call Detective Chief Inspector Wallander in Ystad within the next hour. Wallander had just opened the washing machine and realised that he’d forgotten to put in any detergent when the phone rang. He made no attempt to conceal his irritation.

  ‘What are you doing tomorrow?’

  ‘I’m working. Why do you sound so angry?’

  ‘It’s nothing. When do you have time to see me?’

  ‘It’ll have to be in the evening. I have meetings and appointments all day.’

  ‘Reschedule them. I’ll be arriving in Copenhagen at two o’clock. I need an hour. No more, but no less.’

  ‘Did something happen?’

  ‘Something’s happening all the time. If it was important, I’d have told you already. I just want answers to a few questions. Some new ones, a few old ones.’

  ‘I’d be grateful if it could wait until the evening. The financial markets are in turmoil.’

  ‘I’ll be there at two,’ said Wallander.

  He replaced the receiver and restarted the washing machine after putting in far too much detergent, though he knew it was childish to punish the washing machine for his own forgetfulness.

  He mowed the lawn, raked the gravel paths, lay down in the garden hammock and read a book about Verdi that he’d bought for himself as a Christmas present. When he emptied the washing machine he discovered that a red handkerchief had been lying unnoticed among the white items, and the colour had run, turning everything pink. He started the machine yet again. Then he sat down on the edge of the bed, pricked a fingertip and measured his blood sugar. That was another thing he kept forgetting. But the result was just about acceptable at 146.

  While the washing machine was doing its job for the third time, he lay down on the sofa and listened to a newly bought recording of Rigoletto. He thought about Baiba; his eyes filled with tears and he imagined her restored to life. But she was gone, and would never return. When the music had finished he heated a fish stew he had taken out of the freezer and washed it down with a glass of water. He eyed a bottle of wine standing on the worktop but didn’t open it. The vodka he had drunk earlier was enough. He spent the evening watching Some Like It Hot, a favourite of his and Mona’s, on television. He had seen the film many times before, but it still made him laugh.

  He slept well that night, to his surprise.

  Linda called the next morning as he was having breakfast. The window was wide open; it was a lovely warm day. Wallander was sitting naked on his kitchen chair.

  ‘What did Ytterberg have to say about Hakan getting in touch?’

  ‘I haven’t spoken to him yet.’

  She was shocked.

  ‘Why not? If anybody should know that Hakan isn’t dead, surely it’s him.’

  ‘Hakan asked me not to say anything.’

  ‘You didn’t tell me that yesterday.’

  ‘I must have forgotten.’

  She realised immediately that his reply was both hesitant and evasive.

  ‘Is there anything else you haven’t told me?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then I think you should call Ytterberg the moment we finish this conversation.’

  Wallander could hear the anger in her voice.

  ‘If
I ask you a straightforward, honest question, will you give me a straightforward, honest answer?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What’s behind all this? If I know you, you have an opinion.’

  ‘Not in this case I don’t. I’m just as bewildered as you are.’

  ‘But the suggestion that Louise was a spy is just ridiculous.’

  ‘Whether it’s plausible or not is not something I can judge. The police found those items in her handbag.’

  ‘Somebody must have planted them there. That’s the only possible explanation. She certainly wasn’t a spy,’ Linda asserted once more.

  She paused. Perhaps she was waiting for him to agree. He heard Klara screaming in the background.

  ‘What’s she doing?’

  ‘She’s in bed. But she doesn’t want to stay there. Incidentally, that’s something I’ve been wondering: what was I like at her age? Did I cry a lot? Have I asked you that before?’

  ‘All babies cry a lot.’

  ‘I was just wondering. I think you see yourself in your children. Anyway, you’re going to call Ytterberg today, I hope?’

  ‘Tomorrow. But you were a well-behaved child.’

  ‘Things got worse later, when I was a teenager.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ Wallander said. ‘Much worse.’

  When they hung up, Wallander remained seated. That was one of his worst memories, something he rarely allowed to bubble up to the surface. When she was fifteen, Linda had tried to take her own life. It probably wasn’t all that serious, more of a classic cry for help, a desire to attract attention. But it could have ended very badly if Wallander hadn’t forgotten his wallet and returned home. He had found her, slurring her words, with an empty jar of pills by her side. The panic he felt at that moment was something he had never experienced again. It was also the biggest failure of his life - not having realised how bad she felt as a vulnerable teenager.

  He shook off the painful memory. He was convinced that if she had died, he would have taken his own life as well.

  He thought back to their conversation. Her absolute certainty that Louise couldn’t have been a spy made him think. It wasn’t a matter of proof, but of conviction. But if she’s right, Wallander thought, what is the explanation? Despite everything, was it possible that Louise and Hakan were somehow working together? Or was Hakan von Enke such a cold-blooded liar that he talked about his great love for Louise in order to ensure that nobody would think what he said wasn’t true? Was he behind her death and now trying to send investigators in the wrong direction?

  Wallander scribbled a sentence in his notebook: Linda is convinced that Louise is innocent. But deep down he didn’t believe it. Louise was responsible for her own death. That had to be the case.

  Shortly before two Wallander rang the bell outside the glass front door of the exclusive offices at Rundetarn in Copenhagen. A busty young lady let him in through the whispering doors. She called for Hans, who appeared in reception without delay. He looked pale and tired. They passed by a conference room where an argument was taking place between a middle-aged man speaking English and two fair-haired young men speaking Icelandic. Their interpreter was a woman dressed entirely in black.

  ‘Hard words,’ Wallander said as they passed by. ‘I thought finance people had pretty discreet conversations?’

  ‘We sometimes say that we work in the slaughterhouse industry,’ Hans said. ‘It sounds worse than it is. But when you work with money, your hands get covered in blood - symbolically speaking, of course.’

  ‘Why are they arguing so vehemently?’

  Hans shook his head.

  ‘Business. I can’t say what exactly, not even to you.’

  Wallander asked no more questions. Hans took him to a small conference room made entirely of glass - even the floor - and apparently hanging on the outside wall of the office building. Wallander had the feeling of being in an aquarium. A woman, just as young as the receptionist, came in with a tray of coffee and Danish pastries. Wallander placed his notebook and pencil by the side of his cup as Hans served the coffee. Wallander noticed that his hands were shaking.

  ‘I thought the days of the notebook were past,’ said Hans when he had filled both cups. ‘Aren’t police nowadays only issued cassette recorders, or perhaps video cameras?’

  ‘Television series are not always a true reflection of our work. I do use a tape recorder sometimes, of course. But this isn’t an interrogation; it’s a conversation.’

  ‘Where do you want to start? I really do have just this one hour. It was extremely difficult to rearrange things.’

  ‘It’s about your mother,’ Wallander said firmly. ‘No work can be more important than finding out what happened to her. I take it you agree with me on that?’

  ‘That isn’t what I meant.’

  ‘OK, let’s discuss what this is all about. Not what you meant or didn’t mean.’

  Hans stared hard at Wallander.

  ‘Let me say from the start that my mother couldn’t possibly have been a spy. Even if she could act a bit secretive at times.’

  Wallander raised his eyebrows.

  ‘That’s something you never said before when we talked about her. That she could be secretive.’

  ‘I’ve been thinking since we last spoke. I do find her increasingly puzzling. Mainly because of Signe. Can you imagine a more outrageous deceit than concealing from a child that he has a sister? I sometimes regretted being an only child. Especially when I was very young, before I’d started school. But there was never anything evasive in her answers. Now it seems to me that she answered my childish longing with ice-cold indifference.’

  ‘And your father?’

  ‘He was never at home in those days. At least, I remember him as being mostly absent. Every time he came through the door, I knew he would soon be leaving again. He always brought me presents. But I didn’t dare enjoy being with him. When his uniform was taken out to be aired and brushed, I knew what was going to happen. The following morning he would leave.’

  ‘Can you tell me more about what you regard as secretive behaviour on your mother’s part?’

  ‘It’s hard to pinpoint. Sometimes she seemed preoccupied, sunk so deep in her own thoughts that she grew angry if I happened to disturb her. It was almost as if I’d caused her pain, as if I’d stuck a pin in her. I don’t know if that makes sense to you, but that’s how I remember it. Sometimes she would close her notebooks, or quickly slide something over the paper she was working on when I came into the room.’

  ‘Was there anything your mother did only when your father wasn’t at home? Any routines that suddenly changed?’

  ‘No. I don’t think so.’

  ‘You’re answering too quickly. Think about it.’

  Hans stood up and gazed out the windows. Through the floor Wallander could see a street musician down below strumming away at a guitar with a hat in front of him on the pavement. No sound of music penetrated the glass. Hans returned to his chair.

  ‘What I’m about to say now is nothing I could swear to,’ he said. ‘It could be my imagination, my memory playing tricks. But now that I think about it, when Hakan was away she often talked on the phone, always with the door closed. She didn’t do that when he was at home.’

  ‘Didn’t talk on the phone or didn’t close the door?’

  ‘Neither.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘There were often papers lying around that she worked on. I have the feeling that when Hakan came home the papers were no longer there - there were flowers on the tables instead.’

  ‘What kind of papers?’

  ‘I don’t know. But sometimes there were drawings as well.’

  Wallander gave a start.

  ‘Drawings of what?’

  ‘Divers. My mother was very good at drawing.’

  ‘Divers?’

  ‘Various dives, different phases of individual dives. “German leap with full twist” or whatever they say, that sort of thing.’

/>   ‘Can you remember any other kind of drawings?’

  ‘She sometimes drew me. I don’t know where those drawings are, but they were good.’

  Wallander broke a Danish pastry in two and dunked one half in his coffee. He looked at his watch. The musician under his feet was still playing his silent music.

  ‘I’m not quite finished yet,’ said Wallander. ‘Let’s talk about your mother’s views. Political, social, economic. What did she think about Sweden?’

  ‘Politics were not a topic of conversation in my home.’

  ‘Never?’

  ‘One of them might say, “The Swedish armed forces are no longer capable of defending our country,” or something of the sort. The other might reply to the effect that it was the fault of the Communists. And that would be it. Either of them could have said either of those things. They were conservative, of course - we’ve spoken about that already. There was no question of voting for any party other than the Moderates. Taxes were too high. Sweden was allowing in too many immigrants who went on to cause chaos in the streets. I think you could say they thought exactly as you would expect them to.’

  ‘There was never any exception to that, then?’

  ‘Never, not that I can recall.’

  Wallander nodded and ate the other half of the Danish.

  ‘Let’s talk about your parents’ relationship with each other,’ he said when he’d finished chewing. ‘What was that like?’

  ‘It was good.’

  ‘Did they ever argue?’

  ‘No. I think they really loved each other. That’s something I’ve thought about since - that as a child I never had the slightest fear that they would divorce. That thought never even occurred to me.’

  ‘But surely no couple ever lives together without the occasional conflict?’

  ‘They did. Unless they argued when I was asleep and I didn’t hear them. But I find that hard to believe.’

  Wallander had no more questions. But he wasn’t ready to give up.