In the end, it was Wallander who broke the silence.
“One thing’s for sure at least,” he said. “This isn’t one of Louise Akerblom’s fingers.”
Chapter Five
They gathered at five o’clock in one of the conference rooms at the police station. Wallander could not remember a more silent meeting.
In the middle of the table, on a plastic cloth, was the black finger.
He could see that Bjork had angled his chair so he couldn’t see it.
Everyone else stared at the finger. Nobody said a word.
After a while, an ambulance arrived from the hospital and removed the severed remnant. Once it was gone, Svedberg went to get a tray of coffee cups, and Bjork commenced proceedings.
“Just for once, I’m speechless,” was his opening gambit. “Can any of you suggest a plausible explanation?”
Nobody responded. It was a pointless question.
“Wallander,” said Bjork, trying another angle, “could you perhaps give us a summary of where we’ve gotten so far?”
“It won’t be easy,” said Wallander, “but I’ll give it a shot. The rest of you can fill in the gaps.”
He opened his notebook and leafed through.
“Louise Akerblom went missing almost exactly four days ago,” he began. “To be more precise, ninety-eight hours ago. Nobody’s seen her since, as far as we know. While we were looking for her, and not least for her car, a house exploded just where we think she might be found. We now know the occupant is deceased, and the house was up for sale. The representative of the estate is a lawyer who lives in Varnamo. He’s at a loss to explain what has happened. The house has been empty for more than a year. The beneficiaries have not yet been able to decide whether to sell or to keep it in the family, and rent it. It’s not impossible that some of the heirs might buy out the rest. The lawyer’s name is Holmgren, and we’ve asked our colleagues in Varnamo to discuss the matter with him. At the very least, we want the names and addresses of the rest of the beneficiaries.”
He took a slurp of coffee before proceeding.
“The fire broke out at nine o’clock,” he said. “The evidence suggests some form of powerful explosive was used, with a timing device. There is absolutely no reason to suppose the fire was started by any other, natural causes. Holmgren was quite certain there were no propane canisters in the house, for instance. The whole house was rewired just last year. While the fire was being fought, one of our police dogs sniffed out a human finger some twenty-five meters from the blaze. It’s an index finger or middle finger from a left hand. In all probability, it belonged to a man. A black man. Our technical guys have run a fine-tooth comb over whatever parts of the heart of the fire and the surrounding area are accessible, but they’ve found nothing more. We’ve run an intensive line search over the whole area, and found nothing at all. No sign of the car, no sign of Louise Akerblom. A house has blown up, and we’ve found a finger belonging to a black man. That’s about it.”
Bjork made a face.
“What do the medics have to say?” he asked.
“Maria Lestadius from the hospital was here,” said Svedberg. “She says we should get onto the forensic lab right away. She claims she’s not competent to read fingers.”
Bjork squirmed on his chair.
“Say that again,” he said. “‘Read fingers’?”
“That’s the way she put it.” Svedberg seemed resigned. It was a well-known peculiarity of Bjork’s, picking on inessentials.
Bjork thumped the table almost absentmindedly.
“This is awful,” he said. “To put it bluntly, we don’t know anything at all. Hasn’t Robert Akerblom been able to give us any pointers?”
Wallander made up his mind on the spot to say nothing about the handcuffs, not for now. He was afraid that might take them in directions that were of less than immediate significance. Besides, he was not convinced the handcuffs had any direct connection with her disappearance.
“Nothing at all,” he said. “I think the Akerbloms were the happiest family in the whole of Sweden.”
“Might she have gone over the top, from a religious point of view?” asked Bjork. “We’re always reading about those crazy sects.”
“You can hardly call the Methodists a ‘crazy sect’,” said Wallander. “It’s one of our oldest free churches. I have to admit I’m not sure just what they stand for.”
“We’ll have to look into that,” said Bjork. “What do you think we should do now?”
“Let’s hope for what tomorrow might bring,” said Martinson. “We might get some calls.”
“I’ve already got personnel to man the telephones,” said Bjork. “Anything else we should be doing?”
“Let’s face it,” said Wallander, “we have nothing to go on. We have a finger. That means that somewhere or other, there’s a black man missing a finger on his left hand. That means in turn he needs help from a doctor or a hospital. If he hasn’t shown up already, he will do sooner or later. We can’t exclude the possibility that he might contact the police. Nobody cuts his own fingers off. Well, not very often. In other words, somebody has subjected him to torture. Needless to say, it’s possible he might have fled the country already.”
“Fingerprints,” said Svedberg. “I don’t know how many Africans there are in this country, legally or illegally, but there’s a chance we might be able to trace a print in our files. We can send out a request to Interpol as well. To my knowledge a lot of African states have been building up advanced criminal files these last few years. There was an article about it in Swedish Policeman magazine a month or two ago. I agree with Kurt. Even if we can’t see any connection between Louise Akerblom and this finger, we have to assume there might be one.”
“Shall we give this to the newspapers?” Bjork wondered. “The cops are looking for the owner of a finger. That should get a headline or two, anyway.”
“Why not?” said Wallander. “We’ve got nothing to lose.”
“I’ll think about it,” said Bjork. “Let’s wait a bit. I agree every hospital in the country should be alerted, though. Surely the medics have a duty to inform the police if they suspect an injury has been caused by a criminal action?”
“They’re also bound by confidentiality,” said Svedberg. “But of course the hospitals should be contacted. Health centers, too. Does anybody know how many medical practitioners we have in this country?”
Nobody knew.
“Ask Ebba to find out,” said Wallander.
It took her ten minutes to call the secretary of the Swedish Medical Association.
“There are just over twenty-five thousand doctors in Sweden,” said Wallander, when she had reported to the conference room.
They gaped in astonishment.
Twenty-five thousand doctors.
“Where are they all when we need ’em?” wondered Martinson.
Bjork was starting to get impatient.
“Is this getting us anywhere?” he asked. “If not, we’ve all got plenty to do. We’ll have another meeting tomorrow morning at eight.”
“I’ll see to the hospital business,” said Martinson.
They had just collected their papers and got to their feet when the telephone rang. Martinson and Wallander were already out in the corridor when Bjork called them back.
“Breakthrough!” he said, his face flushed. “They think they’ve found the car. It was Noren on the phone. Some farmer showed up at the fire and asked the police if they were interested in something he’d found in a pond a few kilometers away. Out towards Sjobo, I think he said. Noren drove to the spot and saw a radio antenna sticking out of the mud. The farmer, whose name is Antonson, was sure the car wasn’t there a week ago.”
“Right, let’s get the hell out of here,” said Wallander. “We’ve got to get that car up tonight. We can’t wait until tomorrow. We’ll have to find searchlights and a crane.”
