One Step Behind (16 page)

He put his pencil down and leaned back in his chair. His back ached. He looked over at Nyberg.

"I should perhaps add that both Nyberg and I feel there is something artificial and arranged about the scene of the crime."

"I just can't understand how they could have lain there for 51 days without anyone finding them," Hansson said despondently. "A lot of people visit the reserve during the summer."

"I don't either," Wallander said. "There are three possibilities. We could be completely wrong about the time of death. Maybe it wasn't Midsummer's Eve; maybe it was later than that. Or else the scene of the crime and the place we found the bodies aren't the same. The third possibility is that these two places are one and the same, but someone moved the bodies and returned them at a later date."

"Who would do that?" Höglund asked. "And why?"

"That's what I think happened," Nyberg said.

Everyone looked at him. It was unusual for Nyberg to speak with such conviction so early on in an investigation.

"At first I just kept seeing the same thing Kurt did," he began. "That there was something fake about the whole scene, like a photographer had arranged it for the camera. Then I found some things that made me rethink."

Wallander waited with excitement, but it was as if Nyberg lost his train of thought.

"Go on," he said.

Nyberg shook his head. "It doesn't make any sense," he said. "Why would anyone move the bodies just to return them at a later date?"

"There might be a lot of reasons," Wallander said. "To delay a discovery or to give himself time to escape."

"Or to send a number of postcards," Martinsson said.

Wallander nodded. "We'll take this step by step. We don't know if our thinking is right or wrong."

"Well, it was the glasses that made me think again," Nyberg said slowly. "There was wine left in two of them. A little less in one, a little more in the other. It should have evaporated a long time ago, but what really surprised me was what wasn't there. There were no insects in the glasses, which there should have been. We know what happens if you let even an empty glass that has had wine in it sit out overnight. In the morning it's full of insects. But there was nothing in these glasses."

"What do you make of that?"

"That the glasses had been sitting out for only a couple of hours when Leman found the bodies."

"How many hours?"

"I can't tell you exactly."

"What about the remains of the food?" Martinsson objected. "The chicken was rotten, the salad mouldy, and the bread stale. Food doesn't go bad that quickly."

Nyberg looked at him. "But isn't that exactly what we're discussing now? That the scene that Mats and Rosmarie Leman discovered had been pre-arranged. Someone puts out a couple of glasses and splashes wine in the bottom. The food has been decomposing elsewhere, and is distributed on the plates."

Nyberg sounded as certain as he had when he'd begun to speak. "We'll be able to prove it, if it is the case," he said. "We'll be able to determine exactly how long the wine we found in the glasses had been exposed to air. But I already know what I think. I think the Lemans would not have found anything at all if they had gone for their walk on Saturday morning."

The room was silent. Nyberg had followed his train of thought much further than Wallander had realised. It hadn't occurred to Wallander that the bodies might only have been lying out for about a day. The killer must have been close by. What Nyberg said also affected Svedberg's relationship to the crime. He could have killed them and hidden the bodies, but he could not have brought them out again.

"I can tell you feel sure of this," Wallander said. "What's the likelihood that you could be mistaken?"

"None. I may be wrong in the exact hours and times I've been suggesting. But it must have happened in the way I have described."

"Is the place we found them also the scene of the crime?"

"We're not finished yet," Nyberg said. "But it does seem as if blood has seeped through into the ground."

"So you think they were shot there and then moved?"

"Exactly."

"So where were they taken?"

They all sensed the importance of this question. They were charting the movements of the killer. Although they couldn't see him clearly, they were zeroing in on his actions. That was a crucial step.

"I think we should assume that this is the work of a man acting alone," Wallander said. "But there may have been more than one person involved. This seems more probable if it turns out that the bodies were moved and later replaced."

"Perhaps we're using the wrong words," Höglund said. "Perhaps instead of moved we should be saying concealed."

Wallander was thinking the same thing. "The spot is not deep inside the reserve," he said. "It's possible to drive a car up there, but it is not allowed and it would attract attention. The alternative is easy. The bodies could have been concealed somewhere in the area, perhaps quite close to the scene of the crime."

"The dogs didn't pick up any tracks," Hansson said. "Not that that means anything."

Wallander had made up his mind. "We can't wait for all the results to come in. I want to search the area again at dawn for somewhere the bodies may have been concealed. If we're right, it'll be nearby."

It was just after 1 a.m. Wallander knew everyone needed a few hours' sleep before the morning.

He was the last to leave the room. The night air was warm, with no hint of wind. He pulled the air deep into his lungs, walked behind the back of a police car, and relieved himself. He would miss his appointment with Dr Göransson in the morning. His blood-sugar level was way too high at 15.5, but how could he think about his health at a time like this?

He started to walk home through the deserted town. Something was bothering him, a fear he knew he shared with the others although no one had said so. They were close to tracking the killer's movements, but they had no idea what he was thinking or what motivated him. They had no idea if he was planning to strike again.

Wallander didn't make it into bed that night. As soon as he stopped outside his door on Mariagatan and fumbled for his keys, anxiety overtook him. He put the keys back in his pocket, walked over to his car and jumped in. Somewhere out there a killer was hiding in the shadows and he would remain there until they caught him. They had to find him. He simply couldn't be allowed to get away, to become one of the people who would haunt Wallander in his dreams.

As he drove through the calm night, he thought about a case in the early 1980s, shortly after he had moved to Ystad with Mona and Linda. Rydberg had called him late one night with the news that a young girl had been found dead in a field outside of Borrie. She had been bludgeoned to death. They drove out there together that November evening. Hard flecks of snow were drifting through the air.

The girl had taken the bus from Ystad after going to the cinema, got off at her normal stop, and followed her usual shortcut through the fields to the farm where she lived. When she hadn't arrived at the time she said she would be home, her father went down to the road to look for her, and found her.

The investigation went on for years and filled thousands of pages of reports, but they never found the killer, nor any possible motive. The only clue was a piece of a wooden clothes-peg found close to the dead girl's body which bore traces of blood. Apart from that there was nothing. Rydberg would often come to Wallander's office to talk about it. During his last days, when he was dying of cancer, he mentioned her again. Wallander understood that he didn't want him to forget about the dead girl in the field. Once he was gone, only Wallander would be left to solve the case. He seldom thought about her now, but occasionally she appeared in his dreams. The image was always the same. Wallander was leaning over her, with Rydberg somewhere in the background. She looked back at him but was unable to speak.

Wallander took the turn-off for the nature reserve. I don't want three young people haunting my dreams, he thought. Nor do I want Svedberg there. We have to find the one who did this.

He parked his car and saw to his surprise that the officer on duty was Edmundsson.

"Where's your dog?" Wallander asked.

"At home," Edmundsson said. "I don't see why he should have to sleep in the car."

Wallander nodded. "How is everything out here?"

"Only Nyberg is here, as well as those of us on duty."

"Nyberg?"

"He arrived a little while ago."

He's also haunted by anxiety, Wallander thought. It shouldn't surprise me.

"It's too hot to be August."

"Autumn will come, just you wait," Wallander said. "It'll come when you least expect it."

He turned on his torch and walked into the reserve.

The man had been hiding in the shadows for a long time. In order to enter the nature reserve without being seen, he had approached it from the sea. He followed the beach, climbed the dunes, and disappeared into the woods. To avoid running into the policemen or their dogs, he took a circuitous route towards the trail that led into the main hiking area. From there he could always make his way onto the road if the dogs picked up his scent. But he wasn't worried. They wouldn't expect him to be there.

Under the cover of darkness he saw police officers come and go along the path. Two of the officers were women. Shortly after 10 p.m. many of them left the reserve, and he sat down to drink the tea he had brought with him in a thermos. The order he sent to Shanghai had already been filled. He would pick it up early the next day. When he finished his tea, he packed the thermos away and made his way to the place where he had killed them. There were no more dogs in the area, so he felt safe. From a distance he could see big spotlights that were set up around the scene, casting an unearthly glow. It was like a theatre production, but one that was closed to the ordinary public. He was tempted to sneak close enough so he could hear what the policemen were saying and watch their faces. But he controlled himself, as he always did. Without self-control you couldn't be sure that you would get away and be safe.

The shadows danced in the spotlights. The police looked like giants, although he knew it was just an illusion. They fumbled around like blind animals in the world he had created. For a moment he allowed himself to enjoy a feeling of satisfaction. But only for a moment. He knew pride was dangerous and could make you vulnerable.

He returned to his lookout beside the main trail. He was thinking of leaving when someone walked by. The beam of a torch flickered over the ground. A face was visible for an instant and the man recognised him from the papers. His name was Nyberg and he was a forensic specialist. He smiled to himself. Nyberg might be able to identify the individual pieces, but he would never see the whole pattern.

He had finished putting his rucksack on and was about to cross the path when he heard another person approaching. Again a torch flickered between the trees and he jumped back into the shadows. The officer was large and moved heavily. The man felt a sudden impulse to make his presence known, to dash out like an animal of the night, before being swallowed up again by the darkness.

Suddenly the officer stopped. He let the torch shine on the bushes to the side of the trail. In a moment that lengthened into sheer terror the man thought that he had been caught. He was frozen and couldn't get away. Finally the light disappeared as the officer walked away. But then he stopped a second time, turned off the light, and waited in the dark. After a while he turned the torch back on and continued.

The man lay still for a long time, his heart pounding. What had caused the policeman to stop? He couldn't have heard anything, or seen him. For once his inner clock failed him. He had no idea how long he lay there before getting up, crossing the path, and making his way back down to the sea. It could have been an hour, maybe more. When he reached the beach it was starting to get light.

Wallander saw the lights from a distance. From time to time he heard Nyberg's tired and irritated voice. One officer was up on the path, smoking. He stopped again and listened. He didn't know where the feeling had come from, the sense that the killer was out there somewhere in the dark. Had he heard something? He stopped and felt a rush of fear. Then he realised that it must be his imagination. He stopped one more time, turned off the light, and listened. But there was only the sound of the sea.

He greeted the officer, who made an attempt to put out his cigarette. Wallander stopped him. He was a young policeman by the name of Bernt Svensson.

"How's it going?" he asked.

"I think I saw a fox," Svensson said.

"A fox?"

"I thought I saw a shadow back there. It was bigger than a cat."

"There are no foxes in Skåne. They all died from the plague."

"I still think it was a fox."

Wallander nodded. "Then we'll say it was a fox. Just a fox."

He continued on down and into the ring of light. Nyberg was examining the place under the tree where the three bodies had lain. Even the blue cloth was gone now.

"What are you doing here?" he asked when he saw Wallander. "You should sleep. You have to have the energy to keep going."

"I know. But sometimes you can't sleep."

"Everyone should sleep," Nyberg said. His voice was cracking with fatigue. Wallander sensed how distraught he was.

"Everyone should sleep," he repeated. "And things like this shouldn't happen."

"I've been in the force for 40 years," Nyberg said. "I'm going to retire in another two."

"What will you do then?"

"Go crazy with boredom maybe," he said. "But you can bet I won't be standing around forests looking at the half-rotten corpses of some young people."

Wallander remembered what Sundelius had said. I used to go to work every day. Now I climb the walls.

"You'll find something," Wallander said encouragingly.

Nyberg muttered something unintelligible. Wallander tried to shake the tiredness out of his body.

"I came out to start planning the morning's activities," he said.

"You mean digging around for a possible hiding place?"

"If we're right about this, we should be able to deduce where he hid the bodies."

"He, or they. He may not have been alone," Nyberg answered.

"I think he was. It just doesn't make sense for two people to organise this kind of massacre. We're assuming the killer is a man, but I think that's a safe assumption. Women don't shoot people in the head. Especially young people."

"What about last year?"

Nyberg was referring to a case in which the killer of several people turned out to be a woman. But that did not change Wallander's mind.

"Not this time," he said. "So who are we looking for? An escaped lunatic?"

"Maybe. I'm not sure."

"But this gives us a starting point."

"Exactly. If he's alone, he has three bodies to hide. What does he do?"

"He won't move them very far, for practical reasons. He has to carry them, unless he brought a wheelbarrow, which would have drawn attention. I think he's a cautious person."

"So he buries them near here?"

"If he buried them at all," Wallander said. "Did you have the impression that the bodies had been exposed to animals or birds?"

"No. But I'm not a pathologist."

"Still, that confirms our idea that the bodies were in the ground. But animals can dig. That means the bodies have been protected somehow, by a box or plastic sheeting."

"I'm not an expert on these things," Nyberg said, "but I do know that bodies in sealed containers decompose at a different rate to bodies exposed directly to the earth."

They were closing in on something that could be significant.

"Where does that lead us?" Wallander said.

Nyberg gestured with one arm.

"He wouldn't have gone uphill," he said and pointed back to the path. "Nor would he have crossed a path unless he had to."

They turned their backs to the hillside and looked past the lights, where insects danced in front of the hot lenses.

"To the left of us the ground slopes away steeply, then goes up again almost as sharply. I don't think he'd try there," Nyberg said.

"Straight ahead?"

"It's level, surrounded by thick brush."

"To the right?"

"Also brush, but not as thick. The ground is probably waterlogged from time to time."

"So probably somewhere straight ahead or to the right," Wallander said.

"To the right, I think," Nyberg said. "I forgot to mention something. If you go straight you hit another path."

"So we'll try to the right, once it gets light," Wallander said. "In a spot that looks like it might have been disturbed."

"I hope we're right," Nyberg said.

Wallander was so tired he could no longer speak. He decided to go back to his car and sleep for a few hours. Nyberg followed him up to the main path.

"I had a feeling there was someone sneaking around in the dark when I came up here," Wallander said. "And Svensson said he thought he saw a fox."

"Normal people have nightmares in their sleep," Nyberg answered. "We have our nightmares when we're awake."

"I'm worried he's going to strike again," Wallander said. "Aren't you?"

Nyberg was silent for a moment before answering. "I'm always worried. But I also have the feeling that what happened here won't be repeated."

"I hope you're right," Wallander said. "I'll be back in a couple of hours."

He returned to the car park, without experiencing the feeling that someone was out there in the darkness. He curled up in the back seat of his car and fell asleep immediately.

It was broad daylight and someone was knocking on the window. He saw Höglund's face and hauled himself out of the car. His whole body ached.

"What time is it?"

"It's 7 a.m."

"Damn it, I've slept in. They have to start looking for a place to dig."

"They've already started," she said. "That's why I came to find you. Hansson's on his way."

They hurried up along the path. "I hate this," Wallander grumbled. "Sleeping in the back of a car, getting up unwashed and looking like hell. I'm too old for this. How am I supposed to think without even having a cup of coffee?"

"I think we can fix that," she said. "If the station hasn't supplied us with anything, you can have some of mine. I'll even give you a sandwich."

Wallander picked up his pace, but she still seemed to walk more quickly than he did. It annoyed him. They passed the place where he had felt as if someone was hiding in the bushes. He stopped and looked around, realising that it was the perfect lookout. Höglund looked at him expectantly, but Wallander didn't feel like explaining.

"Do me a favour," he said. "Get Edmundsson and his dog to search this place. Have them go 20 metres into the woods on either side."

"Why?"

"Because I want them to. That's all the explanation I can give right now."

"What do you want the dog to look for?"

"I don't know. Something that shouldn't be there."

She asked no further questions, and he already regretted not telling her more. It was too late now. They kept walking and she handed him a copy of the newspaper. It had a picture of "Louise" printed on the front page. He read the headline without stopping.

"Who's in charge of this?" he asked.

"Martinsson is organising and checking the leads as they come in."

"It's important that it's done right."

"Martinsson is very careful."

"Not always."

He heard how irritated and disapproving he sounded and knew there was no reason to take his tiredness out on her. But there was no one else around.

When all this is over I'll have to speak to her, he thought helplessly.

At that moment a jogger came towards them. Wallander reacted without a second thought by placing himself in the man's way.

"Haven't they sealed off the area? No one should be here except the police!"

The jogger was in his 30s and was wearing headphones. As he tried to run past, Wallander reached out to stop him. The jogger, thinking he was being attacked, hit back. He caught Wallander on the side of his jaw. Wallander was taken by surprise and collapsed. When he got his bearings, Höglund had the man pinned to the ground with his arm twisted behind his back. The headphones had fallen onto the path, and Wallander heard to his surprise that the jogger had been listening to opera. Some officers came running down to help them and handcuffed the jogger. Wallander got up gingerly and felt his jaw. It hurt, and he had bitten the inside of his mouth, but his teeth were unharmed. He looked over at the jogger.