Sidetracked - By Henning Mankell & Steven T. Murray Page 0,60

your husband in prison in the spring of 1969?”

Her reply was swift and resolute.

“He was in Långholmen between the 9th of February and the 19th of June. I drove him there and I picked him up. He was convicted of fraud and fencing stolen goods.”

Her frankness made Wallander lose his train of thought. But what had he expected? That she would deny it?

“Was this the first time he was sentenced to a prison term?”

“The first and the last.”

“Can you tell me any more about the convictions?”

“He denied having either received stolen paintings or forged any cheques. Other people did it in his name.”

“So you think he was innocent?”

“It’s not a matter of what I think. He was innocent.”

Wallander decided to change tack.

“It has come to light that your husband knew Gustaf Wetterstedt, despite the fact that both you and your children claimed earlier that this was not the case.”

“If he knew Gustaf Wetterstedt then I would have known about it.”

“Could he have had contact with him without your knowledge?”

She thought for a moment before she replied.

“I would find that very difficult to believe,” she said.

Wallander knew at once that she was lying. But he couldn’t see why. Since he had no more questions he stood up.

“Perhaps you can find your own way out,” said the woman on the sofa. She seemed very tired suddenly.

Wallander walked to the door. As he approached the daughter, who had been watching him intently, she stood up and blocked his way, holding her cigarette in her left hand.

Out of nowhere came a slap that struck Wallander hard on his left cheek. He was so surprised that he took a step back, tripped, and fell to the floor.

“Why did you let it happen?” she shrieked.

Then she started pummelling Wallander, who managed to fend her off as he tried to get up. Mrs Carlman came to his rescue. She did the same thing as the girl had just done to Wallander. She slapped her daughter hard in the face. When the girl calmed down, her mother led her over to the sofa. Then she returned to Wallander, who was standing there with his burning cheek, torn between rage and astonishment.

“Erika’s been so depressed about what happened,” said Anita Carlman. “She’s lost control. The inspector must forgive her.”

“Maybe she should see a doctor,” said Wallander, noticing that his voice was shaking.

“She already has.”

Wallander nodded and went out of the door. He tried to remember the last time he had been struck. It was more than ten years ago. He was interrogating a man suspected of burglary. Suddenly the man had jumped up from the table and slugged him in the mouth. That time Wallander struck back. His rage was so fierce that he broke the man’s nose. Afterwards the man tried to sue Wallander for police brutality, but he was found innocent. The man later sent a complaint to the ombudsman about Wallander, but that too was dropped with no measures taken.

He had never been hit by a woman before. When his wife Mona had lost control, she had thrown things at him. But she had never tried to slap him. He often wondered what would have happened if she had. Would he have hit back? He knew there was a good chance he would.

He stood in the garden touching his stinging cheek. All the energy he had felt that morning had evaporated. He was so tired that he couldn’t even manage to hold on to the feeling the girls’ visit had given him.

He walked back to his car. The officer was slowly rolling up the yellow tape.

He put The Marriage of Figaro in the cassette deck. He turned up the volume so high that it thundered inside the car. His cheek stung. In the rear-view mirror he could see that it was red. When he got to Ystad he turned into the big car park by the furniture shop. Everything was closed, the car park deserted. He opened the car door and let the music flow. Barbara Hendricks made him forget about Wetterstedt and Carlman for a moment. But the girl in flames still ran through his mind. The field seemed endless. She kept running and running. And burning and burning.

He turned down the music and started pacing back and forth in the car park. As always when he was thinking, he walked along staring at the ground. And so Wallander didn’t notice the photographer who saw him by chance, and took a picture of him through