The previous night, after successfully abducting the cop’s daughter, Konovalenko had ordered Tania and Sikosi Tsiki out of the kitchen. He had a great need to be alone, and the kitchen suited him best just now. The house, the last one Rykoff had rented in his life, was planned so that the kitchen was the biggest room. It was arranged in old-fashioned style, with exposed beams, a deep baking oven, and open china cupboards. Copper pots were hanging along one wall. Konovalenko was reminded of his own childhood in Kiev, the big kitchen in the kolkhoz where his father had been a political superintendent.
He realized to his surprise that he missed Rykoff. It was not just a feeling of now having to shoulder an increased practical workload. There was also a feeling that could hardly be called melancholy or sorrow, but which nevertheless made him occasionally feel depressed. During his many years as a KGB officer, the value of life, for everybody but himself and his two children, had gradually been reduced to calculable resources or, at the opposite pole, to expendable persons. He was always surrounded by sudden death, and all emotional reactions gradually disappeared more or less completely. But Rykoff’s death had affected him, and it made him hate even more this cop who was always getting in his way. Now he had his daughter under his feet, and he knew she would be the bait that would entice him out into the open. But the thought of revenge could not liberate him entirely from his depression. He sat in the kitchen drinking vodka, being careful not to get too drunk, and occasionally looking at his face in a mirror hanging on the wall. It suddenly occurred to him that his face was ugly. Was he starting to get old? Had the collapse of the Soviet empire resulted in some of his own hardness and ruthlessness softening?
At two in the morning, when Tania was asleep or at least pretending to be, and Sikosi Tsiki had shut himself away in his room, he went out into the kitchen where the telephone was, and called Jan Kleyn. He had thought carefully about what he was going to say. He decided there was no reason to conceal the fact that one of his assistants was dead. It would do no harm for Jan Kleyn to be aware that Konovalenko’s work was not without its risks. Then he decided to lie to him one more time. He would say that damned nuisance of a cop had been liquidated. He was so sure he would get him, now that he had his daughter locked up in the cellar, that he dared to declare Wallander dead in advance.
Jan Kleyn listened and made no special comment. Konovalenko knew Jan Kleyn’s silence was the best approval he could get for his efforts. Then Jan Kleyn had mentioned that Sikosi Tsiki ought to return to South Africa soon. He asked Konovalenko if there was any doubt about his suitability, if he had displayed any signs of weakness, as Victor Mabasha had done. Konovalenko replied in the negative. That was also a claim made in advance. He had been able to devote very little time to Sikosi Tsiki so far. The main impression he had was of a man completely devoid of emotion. He hardly ever laughed at all, and was just as controlled as he was impeccably dressed. He thought that once Wallander and his daughter were out of the way he would spend a few intensive days teaching the African all he needed to know. But he said Sikosi Tsiki would not let them down. Jan Kleyn seemed satisfied. He concluded their conversation by asking Konovalenko to call again in three days. Then he would receive precise instructions for Sikosi Tsiki’s return to South Africa.
The conversation with Jan Kleyn restored some of the energy he thought he had lost thanks to his depression after Rykoff’s death. He sat at the kitchen table and concluded that the abduction of Wallander’s daughter had been almost embarrassingly easy. It had only taken him a few hours to locate her grandfather’s house, once Tania had been to the Ystad police station. He made the call himself and a housekeeper answered the phone. He introduced himself as a representative of the telephone company and inquired whether there was likely to be any change of address before the next edition of the telephone directory went to press. Tania bought a large-scale map of Skane from the local bookstore, and then they drove out to the house and kept it under observation from a distance. The housekeeper went home late in the afternoon, and a few hours later a single police car parked on the road. When he was certain there were no further guards posted, he rapidly planned a diversion. He drove back to the house in Tomelilla, prepared an oil drum he found lying around in a shed, and told Tania what she had to do. They rented a car from a nearby gas station, then drove back to the house in two cars, found the copse, decided on a time and set to work. Tania made the fire blaze up as intended and then, as planned, left the scene before the cops showed up to investigate the fire. Konovalenko realized he did not have much time, but that was just an extra challenge for him. He flung open the outside door, tied up and silenced the old man in his bed, then chloroformed the daughter and carried her out to the waiting car. The whole operation took less than ten minutes, and he made his escape before the police car got back. Tania had bought some clothes for the girl during the day, and dressed her while she was still unconscious. Then he dragged her down into the cellar and secured her legs with a padlock and chain. It was all so easy, and he wondered whether things would continue to be equally uncomplicated. He had noticed her necklace and thought her father would be able to identify her by it. But he also wanted to give Wallander a different picture of the circumstances, something threatening that would leave no doubt about what he was fully prepared to do. That was when he resolved to cut off her hair and send it to him along with the necklace. Cropped female hair smells of death and ruin, he thought. He’s a cop, he’ll get the picture.
Konovalenko poured himself another glass of vodka and gazed out the window. Dawn was already rising. There was warmth in the air, and he thought about how he would soon be living in constant sunshine, far away from this climate where you never knew from one day to the next what the weather would be like.
He went to bed for a few hours. When he woke up he looked at his wristwatch. A quarter past nine, Monday, May 18. By this stage Wallander must know that his daughter has been abducted. Now he would be waiting for Konovalenko to contact him.
He can wait a little bit longer, Konovalenko thought. The silence will grow increasingly unbearable with every hour that passes, and his worry greater than his ability to control it.
The hatch leading down to the cellar where Wallander’s daughter was imprisoned was just behind his chair. Occasionally he listened for any noises, but everything was silent.
Konovalenko sat there a bit longer, gazing thoughtfully out of the window. Then he got up, got an envelope and put the cropped hair and necklace into it.
Soon he would be in touch with Wallander.
The news of Linda’s abduction hit Wallander like an attack of vertigo.
It made him desperate and furious. Sten Widen happened to be in the kitchen when the telephone rang, answered it, and looked on in astonishment as Wallander tore the instrument from the wall and hurled it through the open door into Sten Widen’s office. But then he saw how scared Wallander was. His fear was completely bare, naked. Widen realized something awful must have happened. Sympathy often aroused ambivalent reactions in him, but not this time. Wallander’s agony over what had happened to his daughter and the fact that nothing could be done about it had hit him hard. He squatted down beside him and patted him on the shoulder.
Meanwhile Svedberg had worked up a frenzy of energy. Once he had made sure Wallander’s father was uninjured and did not seem to be especially shocked, he called Peters at home. His wife answered, and said her husband was in bed asleep after his night shift. Svedberg’s bellowing left no doubt in her mind that he should be woken immediately. When Peters came to the phone, Svedberg gave him half an hour to get hold of Noren and then come to the house they were supposed to have been guarding. Peters knew Svedberg well and realized he would not have woken him up unless something serious had happened. He asked no questions but promised to hurry. He called Noren, and when they arrived at the grandfather’s house, Svedberg confronted them with the brutal truth about what had happened.
“All we can do is tell you the truth,” said Noren, who had been vaguely worried the previous evening that there was something odd about the burning oil drum.
Svedberg listened to what Noren had to say. The night before it was Peters who insisted they should go and investigate the fire, but he said nothing. Noren did not pin the blame on him, however. In his report he stated the decision was a joint one.
“I hope nothing happens to Wallander’s daughter, for your sake,” said Svedberg afterwards.
“Abducted?” asked Noren. “By whom? And why?”
Svedberg gave them a long, serious look before answering.
“I’m going to make you promise me something,” he said. “If you keep that promise, I’ll try and forget that you acted in complete disregard of clearly expressed orders last night. If the girl comes out of this unharmed, nobody will get to know a thing. Is that clear?”
They both nodded.
“You heard nothing, and you saw nothing last night,” he said. “And most important of all, Wallander’s daughter has not been abducted. In other words, nothing has happened.”
Peters and Noren stared at him, nonplused.
