Faceless Killers (8 page)

The farm seemed oddly deserted. A stable door flapped in the wind. For a moment he wondered whether he had taken the wrong road after all.

What desolation, he thought. The Scanian winter with its screeching flocks of crows. The clay that sticks to the soles of your shoes.

A young, fair-haired girl emerged from one of the stables. How like Linda she looked, he thought. She had the same blond hair, the same thin body, the same ungainly movements as she walked. He watched her closely.

The girl started tugging at a ladder that led to the stable loft. When she caught sight of him she let go of the ladder and wiped her hands on her grey breeches.

"Hello," said Wallander. "I'm looking for Sten Widén. Is this the right place?"

"Are you a policeman?" asked the girl.

"Yes," Wallander replied, surprised. "How could you tell?"

"I could hear it in your voice," said the girl, once more pulling at the ladder, which seemed to be stuck.

"Is he at home?" asked Wallander.

"Help me with the ladder," the girl said.

He saw that one of the rungs had caught on the cladding of the stable wall. He grabbed hold of the ladder and twisted it until the rung came free.

"Thanks," said the girl. "Sten is probably in his office" She pointed to a red brick building a short distance from the stable.

"Do you work here?" asked Wallander.

"Yes," said the girl, climbing quickly up the ladder. "Now I'd move away if I were you!"

With surprisingly strong arms she began heaving bales of hay through the loft doors. Wallander walked over towards the office. Just as he was about to knock on the heavy door, a man came walking around the end of the building.

It was more than ten years since Wallander had seen Sten Widén, but he didn't seem to have changed. The same tousled hair, the same thin face, the same red eczema near his lower lip.

"Well, this is a surprise," said the man with a nervous laugh. "I thought it was the blacksmith. But it's you. How long has it been, anyway?"

"Nearly eleven years," said Wallander. "Summer of '79."

"The summer all our dreams fell apart," said Sten Wid6n. "Would you like some coffee?"

They went into the red brick building. Wallander noticed the smell of oil emanating from the walls. A rusty combine harvester stood inside in the darkness. Widén opened another door. A cat ran out as Wallander entered a room that seemed to be a combination of office and living quarters. An unmade bed stood along one wall. There was a TV and a video, and a microwave on a table. An old armchair was piled high with clothes. Most of the rest of the space was taken up by a large desk. Widén poured coffee from a thermos next to a fax machine in one of the wide window recesses.

Wallander was thinking about Widén's lost dream of becoming an opera singer. About how in the late 1970s the two of them had imagined a future for themselves that neither of them could achieve. Wallander was supposed to become an impresario, and Widén's tenor would resound from the opera stages of the world.

Wallander had been a policeman back then. And he still was.

When Widén realised that his voice wasn't good enough, he had taken over his father's run-down racing stables. Their earlier friendship had not been able to withstand the shared disappointment. At one time they had seen each other every day, but now eleven years had passed since their last meeting. Even though they lived no more than 50 kilometres apart.

"You've put on weight," said Wid£n, moving a stack of newspapers from a wooden chair.

"And you haven't" said Wallander, conscious of his own irritation.

"Racehorse trainers seldom get fat," said Wid6n, laughing nervously again. "Skinny legs, skinny wallets. Except for the big time trainers, of course. Khan or Strasser. They can afford it."

"So how's it going?" asked Wallander, sitting down on the chair.

"So so," said Widén. "I get by. I've always got one horse in training that does well. I get in a few new colts and manage to keep the place going. But actually - " He broke off.

Then he stretched, opened a drawer in his desk, and pulled out a half-empty bottle of whisky.

"Want some?" he asked.

Wallander shook his head. "It wouldn't look good if a policeman got caught for being drunk in charge," he replied. "Though it happens once in a while."

"Well,
skal
,
anyway," said Widén, drinking from the bottle.

He extracted a cigarette from a crumpled pack and rummaged through the papers and form guides before he found a lighter.

"How's Mona doing?" he asked. "And Linda? And your dad? And your sister, what's her name, Kerstin?"

"Kristina."

"That's it. Kristina. I've never had a particularly good memory, you know that." "You never forgot the music." "I didn't?"

He drank from the bottle again, and Wallander could see that something was troubling him. Maybe he shouldn't have dropped by. Maybe Sten didn't want to be reminded of what once had been.

"Mona and I have split up," Wallander said, "and Linda's got her own place. Dad is the same as ever. He keeps painting that picture of his. But I think he's becoming a little senile. I don't really know what to do with him."

"Did you know that I got married?" said Widén.

Wallander wondered whether he'd heard a word he'd said. "I didn't know that."

"I took over these damned stables, after all. When Dad finally realised that he was too old to take care of the horses, he started doing some serious drinking. Before, he always had control over how much he put away. I realised that I couldn't handle him and his drinking mates. So I married one of the girls who worked here, mainly because she was so good with Dad. She treated him like an old horse. Didn't try to change his habits, but set limits for him. Took the hose and rinsed him off when he got too filthy. But when Dad died, it seemed to me as if she started to smell like him. So I got a divorce."

He took a swig from the bottle, and Wallander could see that he was beginning to get drunk.

"Every day I think about selling this place," he said. "I own the farm itself. I could probably get a million for the whole thing. After the mortgage is paid off, I might have 400,000 kronor left over. Then I'll buy a camper and hit the road."

"Where to?"

"That's just it. I don't know. There's nowhere I want to go"

Wallander felt uncomfortable listening to this. Even though Widén was outwardly no different, on the inside he had gone through some big changes. It was the voice of a ghost talking to him, cracked and despairing. Ten years ago Sten Widén had been happy and high-spirited, the first to invite you to a party. Now his love of life seemed gone.

The girl who had asked if Wallander was a policeman rode past the window.

"Who's she?" he asked. "She could tell I was police."

"Her name is Louise," said Widén. "She could probably smell it. She's been in and out of institutions since she was 12. I'm her guardian. She's good with the horses. But she hates policemen. She claims that she was raped by one once."

He took another swig and gestured towards the unmade bed.

"She sleeps with me sometimes," he said. "That's how it feels at any rate. That she's taking me to bed, not the other way around. I suppose that's against the law, right?"

"Why should it be? She isn't a minor, is she?"

"She's 19. But are guardians allowed to sleep with their wards?"

Wallander thought he caught a hint of aggression in Widén's voice. He was sorry he had come. Even though he did have a reason for the visit that was connected with the investigation, he now wasn't sure whether it had been more than an excuse. Had he come to see Widén to talk about Mona? To seek out some sort of consolation? He no longer knew.

"I came here to ask you about horses," he said. "Maybe you saw in the paper that there was a double murder in Lunnarp?"

"I don't read newspapers," said Widén. "I read form guides and starting price lists. That's all. I don't give a damn about what's happening in the world."

"An old couple have been killed," Wallander continued. "And they had a horse."

"Was it killed too?"

"No. But I think the killers gave it some hay before they left. And that's what I wanted to talk to you about. How fast does a horse eat an arm load of hay?"

Widén emptied the bottle and lit another cigarette.

"Are you kidding?" he asked. "You came all the way out here to ask me how long it takes a horse to eat an arm load of hay?"

"As it happens, I was thinking about asking you to come with me and take a look at the horse," said Wallander, making a quick decision. He could feel himself starting to get angry.

"I don't have time," said Widén. "The blacksmith is coming today. I've got 16 horses that need vitamin jabs." "Tomorrow, then?"

Widén gave him a glazed look. "Is there money involved?" "You'll be paid."

Widén wrote his telephone number on a dirty scrap of paper.

"Maybe," he said. "Call me in the morning." When they stepped outside, Wallander noticed that the wind had picked up. The girl came riding up on her horse. "Nice horse," he said.

"Masquerade Queen," said Widén. "She'll never win a race in her life. The rich widow of a Trelleborg contractor owns her. I was actually honest enough to suggest that she sell the horse to a riding school. But she thinks it can win. And I get my training fee. But there's no way in hell this horse will ever win a race."

They said goodbye at the car.

"You know how my dad died?" asked Widén suddenly.

"No."

"He wandered off to the castle ruin one autumn night. He used to sit up there and drink. He stumbled into the moat and drowned. The algae are so thick there that you can't see a thing. But his cap floated to the surface. 'Live Life' the legend said on the cap. It was an ad for a travel bureau that sells sex holidays in Bangkok."

"It was nice to see you," said Wallander. "I'll call you tomorrow."

"Whatever," said Widénand went off towards the stable.

Wallander drove away. In the rear-view mirror he could see Widén talking to the girl on the horse.

Why did I come here? he thought again. Once, a long time ago, we were friends. We shared an impossible dream. When the dream evaporated like a phantom there was nothing left. It may be true that we both loved opera. But perhaps that was just a fantasy too.

He drove fast, as if he were letting his agitation dictate the pressure he put on the accelerator. Just as he braked for the stop sign at the main road, his car phone rang. The connection was so bad he could hardly make out that it was Hansson.

"You'd better come in," the voice yelled. "Can you hear what I'm saying?"

"What happened?" Wallander yelled back.

"There's a farmer from Hagestad here who says he knows who killed them," Hansson shouted.

Wallander felt his heart beating quicker.

"Who?" he shouted. "Who?"

The connection abruptly died. The receiver hissed and squawked.

"Damn," he said out loud.

He drove back into Ystad. Much too fast, he thought. If Norén and Peters had been on traffic duty today, I'd have been in real trouble.

Just as he was going down the hill into the centre of town, the engine started coughing. He had run out of petrol. The warning light was obviously on the blink.

He managed to make it to the petrol station across from the hospital before the engine died completely. Getting out to put some money in the pump, he discovered that he didn't have any cash on him. He went next door to the locksmith in the same building and borrowed 20 kronor from the owner, who recognised him from an investigation of a break-in a few years back.

He parked and hurried into the station. Ebba tried to tell him something, but he dismissed her with a wave.

The door to Hansson's office was ajar, and Wallander went in without knocking. It was empty. In the corridor he found Martinsson, who was holding a handful of print-outs.

"Just the man I'm looking for," said Martinsson. "I dug up some stuff that might be interesting. I'll be damned if some Finns might not be behind this."

"When we don't have a lead, we usually say it's Finns," said Wallander. "I haven't time now. You know where Hansson is?"

"He never leaves his office, you know that."

"Then we'll have to put out an APB on him, because he's not there now."

He poked his head into the canteen, but there was only an office clerk there making an omelette. Where the hell is that Hansson? he thought, flinging open the door to his own office. Nobody there either. He called Ebba at the switchboard.

"Where's Hansson?" he asked.

"If you hadn't been in such a rush, I could have told

you when you came in," said Ebba. "He told me he had to go down to the Union Bank."

"What was he going there for? Was anyone with him?"

"Yes. But I don't know who it was."

Wallander slammed down the phone. What the hell was he up to? He picked up the phone again.

"Can you get Hansson on the phone for me?" he asked Ebba.

"At the Union Bank?" "If that's where he is."

He very rarely asked Ebba for help tracking people down. If he needed something done, he did it himself. In the past he'd put it down to his upbringing. Only rich, arrogant people sent others out to do their footwork. Not being able to look up a number in the phone book and pick up a receiver was indefensible laziness.

The telephone rang, interrupting his thoughts. It was Hansson calling from the Union Bank.

"I thought I'd get back before you did," said Hansson. "You're probably wondering what I'm doing here."