The Troubled Man (2011)

red handkerchief had been lying unnoticed among the white items, and the colour had run, turning everything pink. He started the machine yet again. Then he sat down on the edge of the bed, pricked a fingertip and measured his blood sugar. That was another thing he kept forgetting. But the result was just about acceptable at 146.

While the washing machine was doing its job for the third time, he lay down on the sofa and listened to a newly bought recording of Rigoletto. He thought about Baiba; his eyes filled with tears and he imagined her restored to life. But she was gone, and would never return. When the music had finished he heated a fish stew he had taken out of the freezer and washed it down with a glass of water. He eyed a bottle of wine standing on the worktop but didn’t open it. The vodka he had drunk earlier was enough. He spent the evening watching Some Like It Hot, a favourite of his and Mona’s, on television. He had seen the film many times before, but it still made him laugh.

He slept well that night, to his surprise.

Linda called the next morning as he was having breakfast. The window was wide open; it was a lovely warm day. Wallander was sitting naked on his kitchen chair.

‘What did Ytterberg have to say about Hakan getting in touch?’

‘I haven’t spoken to him yet.’

She was shocked.

‘Why not? If anybody should know that Hakan isn’t dead, surely it’s him.’

‘Hakan asked me not to say anything.’

‘You didn’t tell me that yesterday.’

‘I must have forgotten.’

She realised immediately that his reply was both hesitant and evasive.

‘Is there anything else you haven’t told me?’

‘No.’

‘Then I think you should call Ytterberg the moment we finish this conversation.’

Wallander could hear the anger in her voice.

‘If I ask you a straightforward, honest question, will you give me a straightforward, honest answer?’ she asked.

‘Yes.’

‘What’s behind all this? If I know you, you have an opinion.’

‘Not in this case I don’t. I’m just as bewildered as you are.’

‘But the suggestion that Louise was a spy is just ridiculous.’

‘Whether it’s plausible or not is not something I can judge. The police found those items in her handbag.’

‘Somebody must have planted them there. That’s the only possible explanation. She certainly wasn’t a spy,’ Linda asserted once more.

She paused. Perhaps she was waiting for him to agree. He heard Klara screaming in the background.

‘What’s she doing?’

‘She’s in bed. But she doesn’t want to stay there. Incidentally, that’s something I’ve been wondering: what was I like at her age? Did I cry a lot? Have I asked you that before?’

‘All babies cry a lot.’

‘I was just wondering. I think you see yourself in your children. Anyway, you’re going to call Ytterberg today, I hope?’

‘Tomorrow. But you were a well-behaved child.’

‘Things got worse later, when I was a teenager.’

‘Oh yes,’ Wallander said. ‘Much worse.’

When they hung up, Wallander remained seated. That was one of his worst memories, something he rarely allowed to bubble up to the surface. When she was fifteen, Linda had tried to take her own life. It probably wasn’t all that serious, more of a classic cry for help, a desire to attract attention. But it could have ended very badly if Wallander hadn’t forgotten his wallet and returned home. He had found her, slurring her words, with an empty jar of pills by her side. The panic he felt at that moment was something he had never experienced again. It was also the biggest failure of his life - not having realised how bad she felt as a vulnerable teenager.

He shook off the painful memory. He was convinced that if she had died, he would have taken his own life as well.

He thought back to their conversation. Her absolute certainty that Louise couldn’t have been a spy made him think. It wasn’t a matter of proof, but of conviction. But if she’s right, Wallander thought, what is the explanation? Despite everything, was it possible that Louise and Hakan were somehow working together? Or was Hakan von Enke such a cold-blooded liar that he talked about his great love for Louise in order to ensure that nobody would think what he said wasn’t true? Was he behind her death and now trying to send investigators in the wrong direction?

Wallander scribbled a sentence in his notebook: Linda is convinced that Louise is innocent. But deep down he didn’t believe it. Louise was responsible for her own death. That had to be the case.

Shortly before two Wallander rang the bell outside the glass front door of the exclusive offices at Rundetarn in Copenhagen. A busty young lady let him in through the whispering doors. She called for Hans, who appeared in reception without delay. He looked pale and tired. They passed by a conference room where an argument was taking place between a middle-aged man speaking English and two fair-haired young men speaking Icelandic. Their interpreter was a woman dressed entirely in black.

‘Hard words,’ Wallander said as they passed by. ‘I thought finance people had pretty discreet conversations?’

‘We sometimes say that we work in the slaughterhouse industry,’ Hans said. ‘It sounds worse than it is. But when you work with money, your hands get covered in blood - symbolically speaking, of course.’

‘Why are they arguing so vehemently?’

Hans shook his head.

‘Business. I can’t say what exactly, not even to you.’

Wallander asked no more questions. Hans took him to a small conference room made entirely of glass - even the floor - and apparently hanging on the outside wall of the office building. Wallander had the feeling of being in an aquarium. A woman, just as young as the receptionist, came in with a tray of coffee and Danish pastries. Wallander placed his notebook and pencil by the side of his cup as Hans served the coffee. Wallander noticed that his hands were shaking.

‘I thought the days of the notebook were past,’ said Hans when he had filled both cups. ‘Aren’t police nowadays only issued cassette recorders, or perhaps video cameras?’

‘Television series are not always a true reflection of our work. I do use a tape recorder sometimes, of course. But this isn’t an interrogation; it’s a conversation.’

‘Where do you want to start? I really do have just this one hour. It was extremely difficult to rearrange things.’

‘It’s about your mother,’ Wallander said firmly. ‘No work can be more important than finding out what happened to her. I take it you agree with me on that?’

‘That isn’t what I meant.’

‘OK, let’s discuss what this is all about. Not what you meant or didn’t mean.’

Hans stared hard at Wallander.

‘Let me say from the start that my mother couldn’t possibly have been a spy. Even if she could act a bit secretive at times.’

Wallander raised his eyebrows.

‘That’s something you never said before when we talked about her. That she could be secretive.’

‘I’ve been thinking since we last spoke. I do find her increasingly puzzling. Mainly because of Signe. Can you imagine a more outrageous deceit than concealing from a child that he has a sister? I sometimes regretted being an only child. Especially when I was very young, before I’d started school. But there was never anything evasive in her answers. Now it seems to me that she answered my childish longing with ice-cold indifference.’

‘And your father?’