The Troubled Man (2011)

‘So where was she transferred?’

‘She ended up on a sort of nursing-home merry-go-round. She went from one place to another, and spent a year in a home on Gotland, just outside Hemse. But she came here twenty-nine years ago, and she’s been here ever since.’

Wallander noted it all down. The image of Klara without any arms kept cropping up in his mind’s eye with macabre obstinacy.

‘Tell me about her capabilities,’ Wallander said. ‘You’ve done that already to an extent, but I’m thinking about how much she understands. Just how much is she aware of?’

‘We don’t know. She only expresses herself by means of basic reactions, and even that is done via body language that can be hard to interpret for anyone who isn’t used to her. We regard her as a sort of infant with a long experience of life.’

‘Is it possible to figure out what she’s thinking?’

‘No. But nothing suggests that she’s aware of how great her suffering is. She never gives any indication of pain or despair. And if that is a reflection of the facts, it’s obviously something we can be grateful for.’

Wallander nodded. He thought he understood. But now he was ready to ask the most important question.

‘Her father came to visit her,’ he said. ‘How often?’

‘At least once a month. Sometimes more. They weren’t short visits - he never stayed for less than several hours.’

‘What did he do? If they couldn’t talk?’

‘She can’t talk. He sat there and talked to her. It was very moving. He would sit there and tell her about everything, about everyday things, about life in their own little world and also in the world at large. He spoke to her just as you would speak to another adult, without ever tiring.’

‘What about when he was at sea? For many years he was in charge of submarines and other naval vessels.’

‘He would always explain that he was going to be away. It was touching to hear him telling her all about it.’

‘And who came to visit Signe when he was away? Her mother?’

Kallberg’s answer was clear and cold, and it came without hesitation.

‘She has never been here. I’ve been working at Niklasgarden since 1994. She has never been to visit her daughter during that time. The only visitor Signe ever had was her father.’

‘Are you saying that Louise never came here to see her daughter?’

‘Never.’

‘Surely that must be unusual?’

Kallberg shrugged.

‘Not necessarily. Some people simply can’t cope with the sight of suffering.’

Wallander put his notebook back in his pocket. He wondered if he would be able to interpret what he had scribbled down.

‘I’d like to see her,’ he said. ‘Assuming that wouldn’t upset her, of course.’

‘There’s something I forgot to mention,’ said Kallberg. ‘She sees very badly. She perceives people as a sort of blur against a grey background. At least, that’s what the doctors say.’

‘So she recognised her father by his voice?’ Wallander wondered.

‘Presumably, yes. That seemed to be the case, judging by her body language.’

Wallander stood up, but Kallberg remained seated.

‘Are you absolutely certain you want to see her?’

‘Yes,’ said Wallander. ‘I’m absolutely certain.’

That wasn’t true, of course. What he really wanted to see was her room.

They went out through the glass doors, which closed silently behind them. Kallberg opened the door to a room at the end of a hallway. It was a bright room with a plastic mat on the floor. It held a couple of chairs, a bookcase and a bed, on which Signe von Enke lay hunched up.

‘Leave me alone with her,’ Wallander requested. ‘Wait outside.’

After Kallberg left, Wallander took a quick look around the room. Why is there a bookcase here when the occupant is blind and unaware of what is going on around her? He took a step closer to the bed and looked at Signe. She had fair, short-cropped hair and looked a bit like Hans, her brother. Her eyes were open but staring vacantly out into the room. She was breathing irregularly, as if every breath caused her pain. Wallander felt a lump in his throat. Why did a human being have to suffer like this? With no hope of a life with even an illusory glimmer of meaning? He continued looking at her, but she seemed unaware of his presence. Time stood still. He was in a strange museum, he thought, a place where he was forced to look at an immured person. The girl in the tower. Immured inside herself.

He looked at the chair next to the window. The chair Hakan von Enke usually sat in when he visited his daughter. He moved over to the bookcase and squatted down. There were children’s books, picture books. Signe von Enke had not developed at all; she was still a child. Wallander went carefully through the bookcase, taking out books and making sure there was nothing hidden behind them.

He found what he was looking for behind a row of Babar the Elephant books. Not a photo album this time, but then he hadn’t expected to find that. He hadn’t been at all sure of what exactly he was looking for, but there was something missing from the apartment in Grevgatan, he was convinced of that. Either somebody had weeded out documents, or Hakan had done it himself. And if it had been him, where could he have hidden something but in this room? Behind the Babar books, which he and Linda had both read when they were children, was a thick file with hard black covers, held closed by two thick rubber bands. Wallander hesitated: should he open it here and now? Instead he slipped off his jacket and fit the book into the capacious inside pocket. Signe was still lying there with her eyes open wide, motionless.

Wallander opened the door. Kallberg was poking a finger into the soil of a pot plant that badly needed watering.

‘It’s very sad,’ said Wallander. ‘Just looking at her makes me break into a cold sweat.’

They went back to reception.

‘A few years ago we had a visit from a young art-school student,’ said Kallberg. ‘Her brother lived here, but he’s dead now. She asked permission to sketch the patients. She was very good - she had brought drawings with her to show what she could do. I was in favour of it, but the board of trustees decided it would be a breach of the patients’ privacy.’

‘What happens when a patient dies?’

‘Most of them have a family. But one or two are buried quietly with no family present. On such occasions as many of us as possible try to attend. There’s not a lot of turnover among the staff here. We become a sort of new family for patients like that.’

After taking his leave, Wallander drove to Mariefred and had a meal in a pizzeria. There were a few tables on the pavement, and he sat outside over a cup of coffee after he had finished eating. Thunderclouds were building up on the horizon. A man was playing an accordion in front of a little shop not far away. His music was hopelessly out of tune - he was obviously a beggar, not a street musician. When Wallander couldn’t put up with it any more, he drained his coffee and returned to Stockholm. He had just stepped in through the door of the apartment in Grevgatan when the phone rang. The ringing echoed through the empty rooms. Nobody left a message on the answering machine. Wallander listened to the earlier messages, from a dentist and a seamstress. Louise had been given a new appointment after a canmobileation - but when was that? Wallander noted the dentist’s name: Skoldin. The seamstress simply said, ‘Your dress is ready.’ But she left no name, no time.

It suddenly started pelting down rain. Wallander stood by the window, looking into the street. He felt like an intruder. But the disappearance of the von Enkes had significance for other people’s lives, people close to him. That was why he was standing there now.

After an hour or more the rain eased up - it had been one of the heaviest downpours to affect the capital that summer. Basements were flooded, traffic lights were out of order due to shorts in the electric cables. But Wallander noticed none of that. He was fully occupied with the ledger Hakan von Enke had hidden in his daughter’s room. It was clear after only a few minutes that he was faced with a hotchpotch of documents. There were short haiku