Before the Frost (17 page)

“I want Ann-Britt to be here,” he said. “I'm so tired I'm not sure I can trust my own judgment any more. Are you sure you've told me all the relevant facts?”

“I think so.”

Wallander shook his head.

“It seems too much of a coincidence.”

“A few days ago you said one always has to be prepared for the unexpected.”

“I say a lot of crap,” he said thoughtfully. “Is there any coffee in the house?”

The water had just boiled when Höglund honked her horn down on the street.

“She drives too fast,” Wallander said. “She has two young children—what is she thinking? Throw her the keys, will you?”

Höglund caught the keys in one hand and walked briskly up the stairs. Linda noted she had a hole in her sock but her face was
made up—heavily made up. When did she have time to do that? Did she sleep with her makeup on?

“Would you like some coffee?”

“Please.”

Linda thought her father would be the one to talk, but when she came in with the coffee cup and put it on the table in front of Höglund, Wallander nodded at her to begin.

“It's better for her to hear it from the horse's mouth,” he said. “Don't leave out any details, you can count on Inspector Höglund to be a good listener.”

Linda picked up her story with both hands and unfolded it as carefully as she was able, all in the right order. Then she showed Höglund the journal with the page that mentioned Birgitta Medberg. Wallander only broke in when she started talking about the butterfly. Then he took over, changing her story to something that would perhaps form the basis of an investigative narrative. He got up off the sofa and tapped the wall where the butterfly had been hanging.

“This is where the lines intersect,” he said. “Two points, or perhaps three. Birgitta Medberg's name is in Anna's journal and they exchange at least one letter, although we haven't found it. Butterflies figure in both of their lives, although we don't know yet what the significance of this is. And then there is the most important similarity: they're both missing.”

Someone outside started shouting in Polish or Russian, most likely a drunk.

“It's certainly a strange coincidence,” Höglund said. “Who knows Anna best?”

“I don't know.”

“Does she have a boyfriend?”

“Not right now.”

“But she's had one?”

“Doesn't everyone? I think probably her mother knows her best.”

Höglund yawned and ruffled her hair.

“What about all this business with her father? Why did he disappear? Had he done something?”

“Anna's mother seems to think he was running away.”

“From what?”

“Responsibility.”

“And now he's back and Anna disappears. And Medberg is murdered.”

“No,” Wallander broke in. “‘Murdered' isn't an adequate description of it. She was slaughtered, butchered. Hands clasped as in prayer, head severed, torso and limbs missing. Martinsson has tracked down the Tademans, by the way. Mr. Tademan was extremely intoxicated, according to Martinsson, which is interesting. Anita Tademan—whom Linda and I met—seems to have been much easier to talk to. They haven't seen any unusual persons in the area, no one knew about the hideout in the forest. She called someone she knows who often hunts around there, but he hadn't seen any hut or even the ravine, strangely enough. Whoever used the place knew how to keep a low profile while remaining in relatively close proximity to people. I sense this is an important point, that he was invisible but close by.”

“Close to what, or whom?”

“We don't know.”

“We'll have to start with the mother,” Höglund said. “Should we call her right now or wait until morning?”

“Wait until morning,” Wallander said after hesitating. “We have our hands full right now as it is.”

Linda felt her face flush.

“What if something happens to Anna in the meantime?”

“What if her mother forgets to tell us something important because we got her out of bed in the middle of the night? We'll scare her half to death.”

He walked to the door.

“That's how it's going to be. Go home and get some sleep. But you'll be coming with us to see Anna's mother tomorrow morning.”

 

Höglund and Wallander put on their boots and rain gear and left. Linda watched them from the window. The wind was blowing harder, coming in strong gusts from the east and south. She washed the cups and thought about the fact that she needed to sleep. But how was she supposed to do that? Anna was gone, Henrietta had
lied, Birgitta Medberg's name was inscribed in the journal. Linda started to look through the apartment again. Why couldn't she find Medberg's letter?

She searched more energetically this time, pulling bookshelves from the wall and backings from paintings to make sure nothing was hidden inside them. She continued with this until the doorbell rang. Linda stopped. It was after one o'clock in the morning. Who rang a doorbell in the middle of the night? She opened the door and found a man outside in thick glasses, a brown robe, and worn pink slippers on his feet. He said his name was August Brogren.

“There's a great deal of noise coming from this apartment,” he said angrily. “Would you be so kind as to keep it down, Miss Westin?”

“I'm sorry,” Linda said. “I'll be quiet from now on.”

August Brogren took a step closer.

“You don't sound like Miss Westin,” he said. “You aren't Miss Westin at all, in fact. Who are you?”

“A friend.”

“When one has bad eyesight one learns to differentiate people's voices,” Brogren explained sternly. “Miss Westin has a gentle voice, but yours is hard and rasping. It is like the difference between soft white bread and hardtack.”

Brogren fumbled his way back to the handrail of the staircase and started walking back down. Linda thought about Anna's voice and understood Brogren's description. She closed the door and got ready to leave. Suddenly she was close to tears.
Anna is dead,
she thought. But then she shook her head. She didn't want to believe that, didn't want to imagine a world without Anna. She put the car keys on the kitchen table, locked the door, and walked home through the deserted streets. When she got home she wrapped herself up in a blanket and curled up on her bed.

 

Linda woke up with a start. The hands on the alarm clock glowed in the dark and showed a quarter to three. She had hardly been asleep for more than an hour. What had caused her to wake up? She had dreamed something, sensed a danger approaching from afar like an invisible bird diving soundlessly toward her
head. A bird with a beak as sharp as a razor. The bird had woken her up.

Even though she had slept so briefly, she felt clearheaded. She thought about the investigators still out at the crime scene, people moving back and forth in the strong spotlights, insects swarming in the light beams and burning themselves on the bulbs. It seemed to her that she had woken up because she didn't have time to sleep. Was Anna calling out to her? She listened, but the voice was gone. Had it been there in her dreams? She looked at the time. It was now three minutes to three.
Anna called out to me,
she thought again. And she knew what she was going to do. She put on her shoes, took her coat, and ran down the stairs.

 

The car keys were still lying on Anna's kitchen table. When she drove out of town it was twenty minutes past three. She swung north and ended up parking on a small overgrown road that lay out of sight of Henrietta's house. Stepping out of the car, she listened for any noise, then gently closed the car door. It was chilly. She pulled her coat tightly around her body and chastised herself for not having brought a flashlight.

She started walking along the small road, taking care not to trip. She didn't know exactly what she was planning to do, but Anna had called out to her and she felt compelled to respond. She followed the dirt road until she came to the path leading to the back of Henrietta's house. Three windows were lit.
The living room,
she thought.
Henrietta is still up—although she could have gone to bed and left the lights on
.

Linda walked toward the light, giving a wide berth to a rusty harrow and getting closer to the garden. She stopped and listened. Was Henrietta in the middle of composing? She made it to the fence and climbed over it.
The dog,
she thought.
Henrietta's dog. What am I going to do if it starts barking? And what am I doing out here in the first place? Dad, Höglund, and I are coming back here in a couple of hours. What is it I think I can find out on my own now?
But it wasn't really about that. It was about waking up from a nightmare that seemed like a cry for help from a friend.

She approached the lighted windows, then stopped short. Voices.
At first she couldn't determine where they were coming from, but then she saw that one of the windows was pushed open. Anna's neighbor had said that her voice was gentle. But this wasn't Anna's voice, it was Henrietta's. Henrietta and a man. Linda listened, trying to will her ears to send out invisible antennae. She walked even closer and was now able to see through the glass. Henrietta sat in profile, the man was on the sofa with his back to the window. Linda couldn't hear what the man was saying. Henrietta was talking about a composition, something about twelve violins and a lone cello, something about a last communion and apostolic music. Linda didn't understand what she was talking about. She tried to be absolutely quiet. The dog was in there somewhere. She tried to figure out who Henrietta was talking to, and why they were talking in the middle of the night.

Suddenly, very slowly, Henrietta turned her head and looked straight at the window. Linda jumped. It seemed like Henrietta was looking directly into her eyes.
She can't have seen me,
Linda thought.
It's impossible
. But there was something about the woman's gaze that frightened her. She turned and ran, accidentally stepping on the edge of the water pump, causing a clang from within the pump structure. The dog started to bark.

Linda ran back the way she had come. She tripped and fell, got up and stumbled on. She heard a door open somewhere behind her as she threw herself over the fence and ran down the path, trying to make her way back to the car. At some point she took a wrong turn. She didn't know where she was. She stopped, gasping for air, and listened. Henrietta had not set the dog loose. It would have found her by now. She listened again. There was no one there, but she was still so scared she was shaking. After a while she cautiously started making her way back to the path, but she couldn't see where she was going because it was so dark. The darkness frightened her, making shadows into trees and trees into shadows. She stumbled and fell.

When she stood up she felt a searing pain in her left leg. She felt as if she had been stabbed with a knife. She screamed and tried to get away from the pain, but she couldn't move. It was as if an animal had sunk its teeth into her, except that this animal didn't
breathe or make any noise. Linda groped down her leg until her hand hit something cold and metallic connected to a chain. Then she understood. She was caught in a hunter's trap.

Her hand was wet with blood. She continued to cry out, but no one heard her, no one came.

19

Linda tried to free herself from the trap. She didn't like the idea of calling her father, but the trap was impossible to budge. She took out her cell phone and dialed his number. She explained where she was and that she needed help.

“What's happened?”

“I'm caught in a trap.”

“What on earth are you talking about?”

“I have a steel trap around my leg.”

“I'm on my way.”

Linda waited, shivering. It felt like an eternity before she saw the headlights from a car in the distance. Linda called out. The front door opened and the dog barked. She called and called. They walked over in the dark, a flashlight lighting their way. It was her father, Henrietta, and the dog. There was a third person with them but he hung back.

“You're caught in an old fox trap. Who is responsible for putting this here?”

“Not me,” said Henrietta. “It must be the man who owns the land around here.”

“We'll have a word with him.” Wallander forced the trap open.

“We'd better get you to the hospital,” he said.

Linda tried to put some weight on the foot. It hurt, but she was able to steady herself with it. The man in the shadows now came closer.

“This is a colleague you haven't met yet,” Wallander said. “Stefan Lindman. He started with us a couple of weeks ago.”

Linda looked at him. His face was partly lit by the flashlight and she liked what she saw.

“What are you doing here?” Henrietta asked.

“I can explain,” Lindman said.

He spoke with some kind of dialect. But which was it? She asked her father later when they were driving back to Ystad.

“He's from western Götaland,” Wallander said. “A strange language. They have trouble commanding respect, as do people from eastern Götaland and the island of Gotland. The ones who command the most respect are northerners, apparently. I don't know why.”

“How is he going to account for me being out there tonight?”

“He'll think of something. But maybe you can tell me what you thought you were doing.”

“I had a dream about Anna.”

“What sort of dream?”

“She called out to me. I woke up and drove out here. I didn't know what I was planning to do. I saw Henrietta inside talking to a man. Then she looked over in my direction and I ran and then I got caught in that trap.”