'A lot of people in my country would sell their own mother for American dollars.'
'You must tell him you know some people who have lots of American dollars.'
'He'll ask where it all comes from.'
Wallander thought for a moment, and remembered something that had happened recendy in Sweden.
'You must phone Mikelis and tell him you know two Latvians who have robbed a bank in Stockholm and acquired a large amount of foreign currency, mainly American dollars. They raided an exchange bureau at the central station in Stockholm, and the Swedish police never managed to solve the crime. The two robbers are back here in Latvia now, and they have all the foreign currency with them. That's what you must say.'
'He'll ask who I am and how I know about it.'
'Give him the impression you've been the girlfriend of one of the men, but that he's jilted you. You want revenge, but you're afraid of them and don't dare to give your name.'
'I'm so bad at lying.'
He was suddenly angry.
'Then you'd better learn. Right now. This Mikelis is our only hope of getting into the archives. I have a plan, and it might just work. If you can't think of any suggestions, then I have to.'
He got up from the bed. 'We're going back to Riga now, I'll tell you all about it in the car.'
'Do you mean Mikelis is going to look for Karlis's papers?'
'No, not Mikelis,' he replied solemnly. 'I'll do that. But Mikelis has to let me into the police headquarters.'
They had returned to Riga and Baiba had telephoned from a post office, and managed to lie successfully. Then they'd gone to the indoor market. Baiba had told him to wait in the big hangar-like hall where they sold fish. He watched her disappear into the throng, and he knew he might never see her again. She returned however, having met Mikelis in the meat section. They had wandered from stall to stall, examining the meat and talking. She told him there were no bank robbers in fact, and no American dollars. During the drive back to Riga Wallander had told her not to hesitate but to jump in with both feet and tell him the whole story. There was no other option. It was all or nothing.
'He'll either arrest you,' he'd told her, 'or he'll play along with us. If you start hesitating, he might suspect it's a plot against him, maybe something being tried on by one of his superiors who is testing his loyalty. You must be able to prove that you are Karlis's widow if he doesn't recognise your face. You must say and do exacdy what I've told you.'
A good hour later Baiba returned to where Wallander was waiting. He could see straight away that she had pulled it off. Her face radiated happiness. He was reminded again how beautiful she was.
She reported in a low voice that Mikelis had been very scared. His whole career as a police officer was on the line. He might even be risking his life. Nevertheless, she suspected he was also feeling relief.
'He's one of us,' she said. 'Karlis was not mistaken.'
There were still some hours to go before Wallander could put his plan into operation, and to fill in the time they wandered through the city, fixed two alternative meeting places, and then continued to the university where she worked. In a deserted biology lecture room smelling of ether, Wallander fell asleep with his head resting on a showcase containing the skeleton of a seagull. Baiba curled up on a broad window ledge, contemplating the park outside. There was nothing to do but wait, silent and exhausted.
Shortly before 8 p.m. they parted outside the biology theatre. A caretaker was doing his rounds, checking that lights were switched off' and doors locked, and Baiba talked him into switching off the light above one of the back doors for a moment.
When the light went out, Wallander slipped out the door, ran through the grounds in the direction Baiba had indicated, and when he paused to catch his breath he was sure the pack was still gathered round the university building.
The moment the clock in the church tower behind the police headquarters struck 9 p.m., Wallander walked in through the well-lit doors and into the section of the fortress that was accessible to the public. Baiba had described in detail what Mikelis looked like, and the only thing that surprised Wallander when he found him was how young he was. Mikelis was waiting behind a desk, and Wallander wondered how on earth he had explained away his presence there. In a loud, shrill voice he protested in English about having been mugged in the street. The bastards had not only taken his money, but they'd also stolen his holy of holies, his passport.
For one desperate moment it struck him that he might have made a fatal error. He'd forgotten to tell Baiba to find out if Mikelis spoke English. What if he only spoke Latvian? He could hardly avoid bringing in somebody who did speak English, and then Wallander would really be on the spot.
To his relief Mikelis did speak a litde English, better than the major in fact, and when one of the other duty officers came over to the desk to see if he could take this troublesome Englishman off Mikelis's hands, he was sent packing. Mikelis ushered Wallander into an adjacent room. The other officers displayed some curious interest, but hardly of the kind that suggested that they were suspicious and about to sound the alarm.
The interrogation room was bare and cold. Wallander sat down on a chair, and Mikelis observed him unsmilingly.
'At 10 p.m. the night shift will take over,' said Mikelis. 'By then I ought to have filled in a report form on the assault. I'll send out a car to search for some suspects whose appearance we can invent. We have exactly one hour.'
As Wallander had expected, Mikelis told him that the archives were huge. He would have no chance of going through even a tiny portion of all the shelves in the caverns built into the rock under the police headquarters. If Baiba was wrong and Karlis hadn't in fact hidden his testimony close to the file bearing her own name, they were lost.
Mikelis drew a map for Wallander, who would have to negotiate three locked doors on his way to the archives. Mikelis would give him the keys. On the bottom floor, the basement archive, there would be a guard posted on the final door. Mikelis would lure him away with a telephone call at precisely 10.30 p.m. One hour later, at 11.30 p.m., Mikelis would go to the basement and take the guard away with him in order to help him with some task he would invent. That was when Wallander would have to leave the archive. After that, he was on his own. If he should come up against any duty officer in the corridors who became suspicious, Wallander would have to sort things out for himself.
Could he rely on Mikelis? Wallander asked himself that question, and decided the answer was irrelevant. He had no choice but to trust him. There was no alternative. He knew what he'd instructed Baiba to say to the young sergeant, but he had no idea what else she'd told him, he only knew it was then that Mikelis had been convinced he should help Wallander get into the archives. No matter what he did, he would have no control over what was happening round about him.
After half an hour Mikelis left the interrogation room to arrange for a patrol car to be sent out with instructions to look out for any persons answering the description of the muggers who had attacked Mr Stevens, the English tourist. Mikelis had written out some descriptions that could well have applied to most of the citizens of Riga, and Wallander noticed that one of the descriptions could easily have been of Mikelis himself. The attack was assumed to have taken place near the Esplanade, but Mr Stevens was still too upset to be able to go with the car and point out the exact spot. When Mikelis returned they went over the map of the route to the archives once again. Wallander noticed he would have to pass by the corridor where the colonels had their offices, and where he himself had also had a room. The very thought made him shudder. Even if one of them is in his office, he thought, I can't know whether he was the one who ordered Sergeant Zids to butcher Inese and her friends. Was it Putnis, or Murniers? Which of them has sent out his dogs to hunt down the people who are searching for the major's testimony?
When it was time for the night shift to take over, Wallander noticed that all the tension had affected his stomach. He badly needed to go to the lavatory, but knew there was no time for that. Mikelis opened the door into the corridor, then gave Wallander the order to go. He had memorised the map and knew he couldn't afford to get lost – if he did, he would never reach the last door in time for Mikelis's call that would distract the guard.
The building was deserted. He hastened along the lengthy corridors as quiedy as he could, afraid that any moment a door would be flung open and a gun pointed at him. He counted the staircases as he passed them, heard the sound of footsteps echoing down a distant corridor, and had the feeling of being in the middle of a labyrinth
