The Troubled Man (9 page)

He had parked his car at the train station. He crossed over the tracks and followed a well-trodden path towards the rear of the station building. He suddenly felt a blow in the small of his back and fell over. Two young men, eighteen or nineteen, were standing over him. One of them was wearing a hooded sweater, the other a leather jacket. The one with the hood was carrying a knife. A kitchen knife, Wallander noted before being punched in the face by the one in the leather jacket. His upper lip split and started bleeding. Another punch, this time on the forehead. The boy was strong and was hitting hard, as if he was in a rage. Then he started tugging at Wallander’s clothes, hissing that he wanted his wallet and mobile phone. Wallander raised an arm to protect himself. The whole time, he was keeping an eye on the knife. It then dawned on him that the kids were more scared than he was, and that he didn’t need to worry about that trembling hand holding the weapon. Wallander braced himself, then aimed a kick at the kid with the knife. He missed, but grabbed hold of his hand and gave it a violent twist. The knife flew away. At the same time, he felt a heavy blow to the back of his neck, and he fell down again. This time the blow had been so hard that he couldn’t stand up. He managed to raise himself onto his knees, and he felt the chill from the wet ground through his trouser legs. He expected to be stabbed at any moment. But nothing happened. When he looked up, the kids had disappeared. He rubbed the back of his head, which felt sticky. He slowly got to his feet, realised that he was in danger of fainting, and grabbed hold of the fence surrounding the tracks. He took a few deep breaths, then made his way gingerly to the car. The back of his neck was bleeding, but he could take care of that when he got home. He didn’t seem to have any signs of a concussion.

He sat behind the wheel for a while without turning the ignition key. From one world to another, he thought. First I’m sitting in a theatre but don’t feel a part of what’s happening. So I leave and then find myself in a world I often come across from the outside; but this time I am the one lying there, injured, under threat.

He thought about the knife. Once, at the very beginning of his career, as a young police officer in Malmo, he had been stabbed in Pildamm Park by a madman running amok. If the knife had entered his body only an inch to one side it would have hit his heart. In that case he would never have spent all those years in Ystad, or seen Linda grow up. His life would have come to an end before it had started in earnest.

He remembered thinking at the time:
There’s a time to live, and a time to die
.

It was cold in the car. He started the engine and switched on the heating. He relived the attack over and over again in his mind. He was still in shock, but he could feel the anger boiling up inside him.

He gave a start when somebody knocked on the window, afraid that the young men had come back. But the face peering in through the glass was that of a white-haired elderly lady in a beret. He opened the door a little.

‘Don’t you know it’s forbidden to leave your engine running for as long as you have?’ she said. ‘I’m out walking my dog, but I’ve been checking my watch and know how long you’ve been standing here with the engine on.’

Wallander made no reply, simply nodded and drove off. That night he lay in bed without being able to sleep. The last time he looked at the clock it was 5 a.m. The following day Hakan von Enke disappeared. And Wallander never reported the attack he had suffered. He told no one, not even Linda.

When von Enke failed to turn up after two days, Wallander’s future son-in-law called and asked him to go to Stockholm. Since he was still off sick, he agreed. Wallander realised that it was in fact Louise who had asked for help. He made it clear that he didn’t want to meddle in police business; his colleagues in Stockholm were dealing with the case. Police officers who interfered in other forces’ work and poked their noses where they shouldn’t were never popular.

The evening before Wallander left for Stockholm, one of those pleasant evenings in early spring when it was growing noticeably lighter, he paid a visit to Linda. As usual, Hans was not at home; he always worked late on what Wallander referred to wryly as ‘financial speculations’. That had led to the first and so far only argument between him and his prospective son-in-law. Hans had protested that he and his colleagues were not involved in anything as simple as that. But when Wallander asked what they did do, he had the impression that the answer referred in fact to speculations in foreign exchange and shares, derivatives and hedge funds (things that Wallander freely admitted he didn’t understand). Linda had intervened and explained that her father had no idea about mysterious and hence frightening modern financial goings-on. There had been a time when Wallander would have been upset by what she said, but now he noticed the warmth in her voice and simply flung his arms out wide as a sign that he submitted to her judgement.

But now he was sitting in the house shared by his daughter and her partner. The baby, who still hadn’t been given a name, was lying on a mat by Linda’s feet. Wallander observed her, and it occurred to him, perhaps for the first time, that his own daughter would never sit on his knee again. When one’s own child has a child, some things are gone forever.

‘What do you think happened to Hakan?’ Wallander asked. ‘What’s your view, both as a police officer and as Hans’s partner?’

Linda replied immediately - she had clearly been prepared for the question.

‘I’m sure something serious has happened. I’m even afraid he might be dead. Hakan isn’t the type of person who just vanishes. He would never commit suicide without leaving a note. Mind you, he would never commit suicide, full stop; but that’s another matter. If he had done something wrong, he would never slink off without taking his punishment. I simply don’t believe that he disappeared of his own free will.’

‘Can you explain?’

‘Do I need to? Surely you understand what I mean.’

‘Yes, but I want to hear it in your own words.’

Wallander noted yet again that she had prepared herself meticulously. Linda was not merely somebody talking about a relative; she was also a shrewd young police officer setting out her view of the case.

‘When you talk about something not happening of the victim’s own free will, there are two possibilities. One is an accident - he fell through thin ice or was run over by a car, for instance. The other is that he was subjected to premeditated violence, abducted or killed. The accident explanation no longer seems feasible. There are no reports of him in the hospital. So that possibility can be ruled out. That leaves only the other possibility.’

Wallander raised his hand and interrupted her.

‘Let’s make an assumption,’ he said. ‘You and I know this happens much more often than you might think. Especially where older men are concerned.’

‘You mean that he might have run off with some woman?’

‘Something along those lines, yes.’

She shook her head firmly.

‘I’ve spoken to Hans about that. He says there are definitely no skeletons in the closet. Hakan has been faithful to Louise throughout their marriage.’

Wallander interrupted again.

‘What about Louise? Has she been faithful?’

That was a question Linda hadn’t asked herself, he could see. She hadn’t yet learned all the possible twists that can take place in an interrogation.

‘I can’t believe she hasn’t. She’s not the type.’

‘Not a good response. You should never say a person is “not the type”. That exposes you to an underestimation.’

‘Let me put it this way: I don’t think she’s had any affairs. But obviously, I can’t be certain. Ask her!’

‘I have no intention of doing any such thing! It would be a disgraceful move in the current circumstances.’

Wallander hesitated before asking the next question that came into his head.

‘You and Hans must have discussed this over the last few days. He can’t have been glued to his computer all the time. What does he have to say? Was he surprised when Hakan vanished?’

‘Why wouldn’t he have been surprised?’

‘I don’t know. But when I was in Stockholm, I had the impression that Hakan was worried about something.’

‘Why didn’t you say so?’

‘Because I tried to banish the thought. I told myself I was imagining things.’

‘Your intuition doesn’t usually let you down.’

‘Thank you. But I’m becoming less and less sure about that - as I am about so many other things.’

Linda didn’t respond. Wallander studied her face. She’d put on a bit of weight after her pregnancy; her cheeks had become fuller. He could see from her eyes that she was tired. His thoughts turned to Mona, and how she was always angry because he never made any move to help her when Linda woke up crying during the night. I wonder how Linda is really feeling, he thought. When you have a child, it’s as if every heartstring is stretched to the limit. One or two are likely to snap.

‘Something tells me you’re right,’ she said eventually. ‘Now that I think about it, I can remember situations, barely noticeable at the time, when he seemed worried. He kept looking over his shoulder.’

‘Literally or figuratively?’

‘Literally. He kept turning round. I didn’t think about it before.’

‘Can you remember anything else?’

‘He was very careful about making sure the doors were locked. And he insisted that some lights be left on round the clock.’

‘Why?’

‘I don’t know. But the desk lamp in his study always had to be on, and the light in the hall next to the front door.’

An old naval officer, Wallander thought, making sure navigational channels were properly illuminated during the night by specific lighthouses.

At that point the baby woke up, and Wallander held her until she stopped crying.

On the train to Stockholm, he continued to think about those lights that had to be kept on. It was something he needed to investigate. Perhaps there was an innocent explanation. The same thing might apply to the disappearance of Hakan von Enke. So far he had no idea how to find that out. But he hoped that no matter what, there would be a plausible and undramatic explanation.

At the end of the 1970s he and Mona had gone on a trip to Stockholm. Wallander seemed to recall that they stayed at the Maritime Hotel in the Soder district, so he called and reserved a room for two nights. When he got off the train he wondered whether he should go to the hotel by subway or take a taxi. He ended up walking, his heavy bag slung over his shoulder. It was still cold, but it was sunny, and no rain clouds were gathering on the horizon.

As he walked through the Old Town he thought about that trip with Mona. It was her idea. She had suddenly realised that she’d never set foot in the country’s capital city and thought it was high time to remedy such a scandalous omission. They spent four days there. Mona had recently gone back to college and so had no income or paid holiday. They arranged for Linda to stay with a classmate for a few days - she was due to begin third year in the autumn. If his memory served him correctly, it was the beginning of August. Warm days, and the occasional thunderstorm followed by oppressive heat that encouraged them to go for walks through the parks, where they could enjoy the shade of the many trees. That was more than thirty years ago, he thought as he approached Slussen and started walking up the hill to the hotel. Thirty years, a whole generation; and now I’m back. But this time on my own.

When he entered the lobby he didn’t recognise it at all. Had it really been this hotel they’d stayed at? He shook off a sudden feeling of unease, dismissed all thought of the past, and took the lift up to his room on the first floor. He turned down the bedspread and lay down. It had been a tiring journey - he had been surrounded by screeching children, and to make things worse, a party of drunk young men had joined the train at Alvesta. He closed his eyes and tried to sleep. When he woke up with a start he checked the clock and found that he had dozed off for ten minutes at most. He stood up and walked over to the window. What had happened to Hakan von Enke? If he tried to fit together all the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle, what he had heard from Linda and what he knew from his own experience, what was the result? He didn’t have even the beginnings of a solution.

He had arranged to arrive at Louise’s place at seven o’clock that evening. Once again he decided to walk. As he passed the royal palace, he paused. He had been here with Mona, he was quite sure of that. They had stopped on the bridge where he was now and agreed that their feet hurt. The memory was so vivid that he could hear their conversation echoing in his ears. There were moments when he was overwhelmed by sadness thinking about how their marriage had collapsed. This was one of them. He looked down into the swirling water and thought about how his life was now centred increasingly on recalling things from the past that he now realised he missed.

Louise von Enke had made a pot of tea. She was visibly suffering from lack of sleep, but she was remarkably composed even so. The living-room walls were adorned with paintings of the von Enke family and various battle scenes in muted colours. She saw him looking at the pictures.

‘Hakan was the first naval officer in the family. His father, grandfather and great-grandfather were all army officers. One of his uncles was chamberlain to King Oscar - I don’t remember if it was Oscar the First or Second. The sword standing in the corner over there was awarded to another relative by Karl XIV for services rendered. Hakan always says that his job was to supply the king with suitable young ladies.’