The Man Who Smiled (1994)

existed. How could he ever have dreamed that he would one day come across a landmine buried in a garden in the middle of Ystad?

When Martinsson arrived at Mrs Duner's house with Hoglund, Wallander still had difficulty in believing it was a mine that had exploded. Martinsson, however, had greater faith in what Wallander had said on the telephone, and on the way out from the police station he had already sent a message to Nyberg, their technical expert. He arrived at the pink house only a few minutes after Martinsson and Hoglund had stood transfixed before the crater in the lawn. As they couldn't be sure there weren't any more mines hidden in the grass, they all stayed close to the house wall. Off her own bat Hoglund then went to the kitchen with Mrs Duner, who was a little calmer by now, to question her.

'What's going on?' Martinsson said, indignantly.

'Are you asking me?' Wallander replied. 'I have no idea.'

No more was said. They continued contemplating the hole in the ground. Shortly afterwards the forensic team arrived, led by the skilful but irritable Sven Nyberg. He stopped in his tracks when he caught sight of Wallander.

'What are you doing here?' he said, making Wallander feel that he had committed an indecent act by returning to duty.

'Working,' he said, going on the defensive.

'I thought you were packing it in?'

'So did I. But then I realised you couldn't manage without me.'

Nyberg was about to say something, but Wallander raised a hand to stop him.

'More important is this hole in the lawn,' he said, remembering that Nyberg had served several times with Swedish troops for the UN. 'From your years of duty in Cyprus and the Middle East you can verify if this was in fact a mine. But first can you tell us if there are any more of them?'

'I'm not a dog,' Nyberg said, squatting by the house wall. Wallander told him about the spike he had found with his fingers, and then the telephone book that had triggered the explosion.

Nyberg nodded. 'There are very few explosive substances or compounds that are detonated on impact - apart from mines. That's the whole point of them. People or vehicles are supposed to be blown up if they put a foot or a wheel on a landmine. For an anti-personnel mine a pressure of just a few kilos can be enough - a kiddie's foot or a telephone directory will do. If the target's a vehicle, 200 kilos would be the pressure required.' He stood up and looked questioningly at Wallander and Martinsson. 'But what the hell kind of person lays a mine in somebody's garden? They had better be caught in very short order.'

'You're quite certain it was a mine?' Wallander said.

'I'm never certain of anything,' Nyberg said, 'but I'll send for a mine detector from the regiment. Until it gets here nobody should set foot in this garden.'

While they were waiting for the mine detector Martinsson made a few calls. Wallander sat on the sofa, trying to come to terms with what had happened. From the kitchen he could hear Hoglund patiently asking Mrs Duner questions that Mrs Duner answered even more slowly.

Two dead lawyers, Wallander thought. Then somebody lays a mine in their secretary's garden. Even if everything else is still obscure, we can be sure of one thing: the solution must lie somewhere in the activities of the firm of solicitors. It's hardly credible any more that the private or social lives of these three individuals is relevant.

Wallander was interrupted in his train of thought by Martinsson finishing his calls.

'Bjork asked me if I'd taken leave of my senses,' he said, pulling a face. 'I must admit that I wasn't quite sure at first how I should answer that. He says it's inconceivable that it could be a landmine. Even so, he wants one of us to update him as soon as possible.'

'When we've got something to say,' Wallander said. 'Where's Nyberg disappeared to?'

'He's gone to the barracks himself to fetch a mine detector,' Martinsson said.

Wallander looked at the time. 10.15. He thought about his visit to Farnholm Castle, but didn't really know what conclusion to draw.

Martinsson was standing in the doorway, studying the hole in the lawn. 'There was an incident about 20 years ago in Soderhamn,' he said. 'In the municipal law courts. Do you remember?''

'Vaguely,' Wallander said.

'There was an old farmer who'd spent countless years bringing just as countless a series of lawsuits against his neighbours, his relatives, anybody and everybody. It ended up by becoming a clinical obsession that nobody diagnosed as such soon enough. He thought he was being persecuted by all his imagined opponents, not least by the judge and his own solicitor. In the end he snapped. He drew a revolver in the middle of a case and shot both the judge and his solicitor. When the police tried to get into his house afterwards, it turned out he'd booby-trapped all the doors and windows. It was sheer luck that nobody was injured once the fireworks started.'

Wallander remembered the incident.

'A prosecutor in Stockholm has his house blown up,' Martinsson went on. 'Lawyers are threatened and attacked. Not to mention police officers.'

Wallander nodded without replying. Hoglund emerged from the kitchen, notebook in hand. Somewhat to his surprise, Wallander noticed that she was an attractive woman. It had not occurred to him before. She sat on a chair opposite him.

'Nothing,' she said. 'She hadn't heard a thing during the night, but she is certain the lawn hadn't been messed with by nightfall. She's an early riser and as soon as it got light she saw that somebody had been in her garden. She says she has no idea why anybody would want to kill her. Or at the very least blow her legs off.'

'Is she telling the truth?' Martinsson said.

'It's not easy to tell if a person in shock is telling the truth,' Hoglund said, 'but I am positive she thinks the mine was put in her lawn during last night. And that she doesn't have a clue why.'

'Something about it worries me,' Wallander said. 'I'm not sure if I can get a handle on it.'

'Try,' Martinsson said.

'She looks out of the window this morning and sees that somebody has been digging up her lawn. So what does she do?'

'What doesn't she do?' Hoglund said.

'Precisely,' Wallander said. 'The natural thing for her to do would have been to open the French windows and go out and investigate. But what does she do instead?'

'She phones the police,' Martinsson said.

'As if she'd suspected there was something dangerous out there,' said Hoglund.

'Or known,' Wallander said.

'An anti-personnel mine, for instance,' Martinsson said. 'She was in quite a state when she phoned the police station.'

'She was in a state when I got here,' Wallander said. 'In fact, I've had the impression that she was nervous every time I've spoken to her. Which could be explained by all that's happened over the last week or two, of course, but I'm not convinced.'

The front doorbell rang and in marched Nyberg ahead of two men in uniform carrying an implement that reminded Wallander of a vacuum cleaner. It took the soldiers a quarter of an hour to go over the little garden with the mine detector. The police officers stood at the window watching intently as the men worked. Then they announced that it was all clear, and prepared to leave. Wallander accompanied them out into the street where their car was waiting for them.

'What can you say about the mine?' he asked them. 'Size, explosive power? Can you guess where it might have been made? Anything at all could be of use to us.'

LUNDQVIST, CAPTAIN, it said on the identity disc attached to the tunic of the older of the two soldiers. He was also the one who replied to Wallander's question.

'Not a particularly powerful mine,' he said. 'A few hundred grams of explosive at most. Enough to kill a man, though. We usually call this kind of mine a Four.'

'Meaning what?' Wallander said.

'Somebody treads on a mine,' Captain Lundqvist said. 'You need three men to carry him out of battle. Four people removed from active duty.'