races at Jagersro on Sunday, and he was assigned the surveillance during the races.
'But I'm not authorising any bets,' said Bjork, in a halfhearted attempt at a joke.
'I propose that we all go in,' replied Hansson. 'There's good odds that this murder investigation could pay off.'
But it was a serious mood that prevailed in Bjork's office. There was a feeling that a decisive moment was approaching.
The question that aroused the longest discussion concerned whether Magnusson should be told that they were onto him. Both Rydberg and Bjork were sceptical. But Wallander thought that they had nothing to lose if Magnusson discovered that he was the object of police interest. The surveillance would be discreet, of course. But beyond that, no measures would be taken to hide the fact that he was the subject of an investigation.
'Let him get nervous,' said Wallander. 'If he has anything to be nervous about, then I hope we discover what it is.'
It took three hours to go through all the investigative material to look for threads that could be tied to Magnusson. They found nothing, but they also found nothing to contradict the possibility that it could have been Magnusson who was in Lunnarp that night, despite his fiancee's alibi.
Now and then Wallander felt vaguely uneasy; afraid that they were going down yet another blind alley. But it was mosdy Rydberg who showed signs of doubt. Time after time he asked himself whether a lone individual could have carried out the murders.
'There was something that hinted at teamwork in that slaughterhouse,' he said. 'I can't get the idea out of my mind.'
'There's nothing to say Magnusson didn't have an accomplice,' replied Wallander. 'We have to take one thing at a time.'
'If he committed the murder to pay a gambling debt, he wouldn't want an accomplice,' Rydberg objected.'I know,' said Wallander. 'But we have to keep at it.'
Thanks to some quick work by Martinsson, they obtained a photograph of Magnusson, which was dug up from the county council's archives. It was taken from a brochure in which the county council presented its activities to a populace that was clearly assumed to be ignorant. Bjork was of the opinion that all national and municipal government bodies needed public relations teams, which when necessary could highlight the colossal significance of that institution. He thought the brochure was excellent. In any case, there was Magnusson, standing next to his yellow fork-lift truck, dressed in dazzling white overalls. He was smiling.
The police officers looked at his face and compared it with some black-and-white photos of Johannes Lovgren. One of the pictures showed Lovgren standing next to a tractor in a newly-ploughed field.
Could they be father and son? The tractor driver and the fork-lift operator? Wallander had a hard time focusing on the pictures and making them blend together. The only thing he could see was the bloody face of an old man with his nose cut off.
By n p.m. on Friday they had completed their plan of attack. Bjork had left them to go to a dinner organised by the local country club.
Wallander and Rydberg were going to spend Saturday paying a visit to Ellen Magnusson in Kristianstad. Martinsson, Naslund, and Hansson would split up the surveillance of Erik Magnusson and also confront his fiancee with the alibi. Sunday would be devoted to surveillance and an additional run-through of all the investigative material. On Monday Martinsson, who had been appointed computer expert in spite of his lack of any real interest in the subject, would examine Erik Magnusson's records. Did he have other debts? Had he ever been mixed up in any kind of criminal activity before?
Wallander asked Rydberg to go over all of the material. He wanted Rydberg to do what they called a treasure hunt. He would try to match up events and individuals who appeared to have nothing in common. Were there points of contact that they had previously missed? That was what he would try to discover.
Rydberg and Wallander walked out of the station together. Wallander was suddenly aware of Rydberg's fatigue and remembered that he had been to the hospital.'How are you?' he asked.
Rydberg shrugged his shoulders and mumbled something unintelligible in reply.'How's your leg, I mean,' said Wallander.
'Same old thing,' replied Rydberg, obviously not wanting to talk about his ailments.
Wallander drove home and poured himself a glass of whisky. But he left it untouched on the coffee table and went into the bedroom to lie down. His exhaustion got the upper hand. He fell asleep at once and escaped the thoughts that were whirling around in his head.
That night he dreamed about Sten Wid?n. Together they were attending an opera in which the performers were singing in an unfamiliar language. Later, when he awoke, Wallander couldn't remember which opera it had been.
As soon as he woke up the next day he remembered something they had talked about the day before. Johannes Lovgren's will. The missing will. Rydberg had spoken with the estate administrator who had been engaged by the two surviving daughters, a lawyer who was often called on by the farmers' organisations in the area. No will existed. That meant that the two daughters would inherit all of Lovgren's hidden fortune.
Could Erik Magnusson have known that Lovgren had huge assets? Or had Lovgren kept this secret from everyone?
Wallander got out of bed intending not to let this day pass before he knew definitively whether Ellen Magnusson had given birth to Johannes Lovgren's son.
He ate a hasty breakfast and met Rydberg at the station just after 9 a.m. Martinsson, who had spent the night in a car outside Magnusson's flat in Rosengard was relieved by Naslund, and reported that absolutely nothing had happened during the night. Magnusson was in his flat. All had been quiet.
The January day was hazy. Hoarfrost covered the fields. Rydberg sat exhausted and uncommunicative in the front seat next to Wallander. They didn't say a word to each other until they were approaching Kristianstad.
At 10.30 a.m. they met Boman at the police station, and went through the transcript of the initial interview with Ellen Magnusson, which Boman had conducted himself.
'We've got nothing on her,' said Boman. 'We ran the vacuum cleaner over her and the people she knows. Not a thing. Her whole story fits on one sheet of paper. She has worked at the same chemist for 30 years. She belonged to a choral group for a few years but eventually quit. She takes a lot of books out of the library. She spends her holidays with a sister in Vemmenhog, never travels abroad, never buys new clothes. She's a person who, at least on the surface, lives a completely undramatic life. Her habits are regular almost to the point of pedantry. The most surprising thing is that she can stand to live this way.'
Wallander thanked him for his work. 'Now we'll take over,' he said.They drove to Ellen Magnusson's flat.
When she opened the door, Wallander thought that Eric looked a lot like his mother. He couldn't tell whether she had been expecting them. The look in her eyes was remote, as if she were somewhere else.
Wallander looked around the living room. She asked if they wanted a cup of coffee. Rydberg declined, but Wallander said yes.
Every time Wallander stepped into someone's home, he felt as though he were looking at the front cover of a book that he had just bought. The flat, the furniture, the pictures on the walls, and the smells were the title. Now he had to start reading. But Ellen Magnusson's flat was odourless, as if uninhabited. He breathed in the smell of hopelessness, resignation. Against a background of pale wallpaper hung coloured prints of abstract motifs. The furniture crammed into the room was heavy and old-fashioned. Doilies were decoratively arranged on several mahogany drop-leaf tables. On a little shelf stood a photograph of a child sitting in front of a rosebush. Wallander noticed that the only picture of her son on display was one from his childhood. The grown man was not present at all.
Next to the living room was a small dining room. Wallander nudged the half-open door with his foot. To his amazement, one of his father's paintings hung on the wall. It was the autumn landscape without the grouse. He stood looking at it until he heard the rattie of a tray behind him. It was as if he were looking at his father's painting for the first time.
