They continued through the town. The streets were deserted, and the traffic lights seemed very reluctant to change. Once they had left Lund behind them and Wallander increased speed along the motorway heading north, they started to check the traffic behind them once again. But the Mercedes had gone, and it didn't reappear. When they took the exit for Helsingborg south, Wallander slowed down. A dirty lorry overtook them, then a dark red Volvo. Wallander pulled up at the side of the road, released his safety belt and got out. He walked round to the back of the car and crouched down, as if he were inspecting one of the back wheels. He knew she would keep an eye on every car that passed. He counted four cars overtaking them, and a bus which had a fault in one of its cylinders, to judge by the sound of its engine. He got back into the car and turned to her.
'No Mercedes?'
'A white Audi,' she said. 'Two men in front, maybe another in the back.'
'Why pick on that one?'
'They were the only ones who didn't look at us. They also picked up speed.'
Wallander pointed to the car phone. 'Phone Martinsson,' he said. 'I take it you made a note of the registration number. Not just the Audi, the others as well. Give them to him. Tell him it's urgent.'
He gave her Martinsson's home number and drove on, keeping his eye open for a telephone box where he hoped he might find a phone book with a map of the area. He heard her speaking to one of Martinsson's children, probably his little daughter. After a short pause Martinsson came on the line and she gave him the registration numbers. Then she handed the phone to Wallander.
'He wants to speak to you,' she said.
Wallander braked and pulled in to the side before taking the phone.
'What's going on?' Martinsson asked. 'Can't these cars wait until tomorrow?'
'If Ann-Britt calls you and says it's urgent, then it's urgent,' he said.
'What have they done, these cars?'
'It would take too long now. I'll tell you tomorrow. When you've got the information you can phone us here in the car.'
He brought the call to an end, so as to give Martinsson no chance to ask any more questions. He saw that Hoglund had been offended.
'Why can't he trust me? Why does he have to check with you?'
Her voice had become shrill. Wallander wondered if she could not control her disappointment, or did not want to.
'It's nothing to worry about,' he said. 'It takes time to get used to changes. You are the most shattering thing that's happened to the police station in Ystad for years. You're surrounded by a pack of old dogs who haven't the slightest desire to learn new tricks.'
'Does that include you?'
'Of course it does,' Wallander said.
Wallander failed to find a phone box before they had reached the ferry terminal. There was no sign of the white Audi. Wallander parked outside the railway station, and found a dirty map on the wall inside showing Gjutargatan on the eastern edge of the town. He memorised the route, and returned to the car.
'Who could it be that's following us?' she said as they turned left and passed the white theatre building.
'I don't know,' Wallander said. 'There's too much about Gustaf and Sten Torstensson that's odd. I get the feeling we're always shooting off in the wrong direction.'
'I have the feeling we're standing still,' she said.
'Or that we're going round in circles,' Wallander said. 'And we don't see that we're treading in our own footsteps.'
Still no sign of the Audi. They drove into a housing estate. There was no-one about. Wallander parked at number 12, and they got out of the car. The wind threatened to blow the doors off their hinges. The house was a red-brick bungalow with garage incorporated, and a modest garden. Wallander thought he could see the outline of a boat under a tarpaulin.
The door opened before he had chance to ring the bell. An elderly, white-haired man in a tracksuit eyed them up and down with an inquisitive smile.
Wallander produced his ED.
'My name's Wallander,' he said. 'I'm a detective inspector, and this is Ann-Britt Hoglund, a colleague. We're from the Ystad police.'
The man took Wallander's ID and scrutinised it - he was obviously short-sighted. His wife appeared in the hall, and bade them welcome. Wallander had the impression he was standing on the threshold of a contented couple's home. They invited them into their living room, where coffee and cakes were prepared. Wallander was about to sit down when he noticed a picture on one of the walls. He could not believe his eyes at first - it was one of his father's paintings, one without a grouse. He saw that Hoglund had noticed what he was looking at, and she gave him a questioning look. He shook his head, and sat down. This was the second time in his life he had gone into a strange house and discovered one of his father's paintings. Four years ago he had found one in a flat in Kristianstad, but there had been a grouse in the foreground of that one.
'I apologise for calling on you so late,' Wallander said, 'but I'm afraid we have some questions that simply can't wait.'
'I hope you've time for a cup of coffee,' said the lady of the house.
They said that of course they had. It occurred to Wallander that Hoglund had been keen to accompany him so that she could find out how he conducted an interview of this nature, and he felt insecure. There's been a lot of water under this bridge, he thought. It's not a case of me teaching her, but of me relearning how to do it, trying to remember all that I had written off as the end of an era in my life, until a couple of days ago.
His mind went back to those limitless beaches at Skagen. His private territory. Just for a moment, he wished he were back there. But that was history. More water under the bridge.
'Until a year ago you ran a hotel, the Linden Hotel,' he began.
'For 40 years,' Bertil Forsdahl said, and Wallander could hear he was proud of what he had achieved.
'That's a long time,' he said.
'I bought it in 1952,' Forsdahl said. 'It was called the Pelican Hotel in those days, a bit on the scruffy side and with not a good reputation. I bought it off a man called Markusson. He was an alcoholic, and just wasn't bothered. The last year of his tenancy the rooms were used mainly by his drunken cronies. I have to admit I got the hotel cheaply. Markusson died the following year. His wake was a drunken orgy in Elsinore. We renamed the hotel. In those days there was a linden tree outside. It was next to the old theatre - that's been demolished now, of course, like everything else. The actors used to stay with us sometimes. Inga Tidblad was our overnight guest on one occasion. She wanted an early-morning cup of tea.'
'I expect you've kept the ledger with her name in it,' Wallander said.
'I've kept all of them,' Forsdahl said. 'I've got 40 years of history tucked away downstairs.'
'We sometimes sit down after dinner,' Forsdahl's wife said, 'and we leaf through them all, remembering the good old days. You see the names and you remember the people.'
Wallander exchanged glances with Hoglund. They already had the answer to one of their key questions.
A dog started barking in the street outside.
'Next door's guard dog,' Forsdahl explained apologetically. 'He keeps an eye on the whole street.'
Wallander took a sip of the coffee, and noticed that it said Linden Hotel on the cup.
'I'll explain why we're here,' he said. 'You have the name of your hotel on the coffee cups, and you had printed letterheads and envelopes. In July and August last year, two letters were posted from here in Helsingborg. One was in one of your printed envelopes. That must have been during the last few weeks you were open.'
'We closed on September 15,' Forsdahl said. 'We made no charge for the final night.'
'Might I ask why you closed down?' Hoglund said.
Wallander was irritated by her intervention, but he hoped she would not notice his reaction. As if it were natural for a woman to be answered by another woman, it was Forsdahl's wife who responded.
'What else could we do?' she said. 'The building was condemned, and the hotel wasn't making any money. No doubt we could have kept going for another year or two if we'd wanted, and if we'd been allowed. But that wasn't how it turned out.'
'We tried to maintain the highest standards for as long as we could,' Forsdahl said. 'But in the end it was
