Sidetracked - By Henning Mankell & Steven T. Murray Page 0,84

they sought – about whom they seemed to know less, if that were possible – would force him to postpone his holiday.

He stood waiting outside the hovercraft terminal in Malmö. It was the morning of the last day of June. Wallander had decided the night before to take Höglund rather than Svedberg when he returned to Malmö to talk to Fredman’s family. She’d asked whether they could leave early enough for her to do an errand on the way. Svedberg hadn’t complained in the least at being left behind. His relief at not having to leave Ystad two days in a row was unmistakable. While Höglund took care of her errand in the terminal – Wallander hadn’t asked what it was – he’d walked along the pier. A hydrofoil, the Runner, he thought it said, was on its way out of the harbour. It was hot. He took off his jacket and slung it over his shoulder, yawning.

After they’d returned from Malmö the night before, he’d called a meeting with the investigative team, since they were all still there. He and Hansson had also held an impromptu press conference. Ekholm had attended the meeting. He was still working on a psychological profile of the killer. But they had agreed that Wallander should inform the press that they were looking for someone who wasn’t considered dangerous to the public, but who was certainly extremely dangerous to his victims.

There had been differing opinions on whether it would be wise to take this action. But Wallander had insisted that they couldn’t ignore the possibility that someone might come forward out of sheer self-preservation. The press were delighted with this information, but Wallander felt uncomfortable, knowing that they were giving the public the best possible news, since the nation was about to close down for the summer holiday. Afterwards, when both the meeting and the press conference were over, he was exhausted.

He still hadn’t gone over the telex from Interpol with Martinsson. The girl had vanished from Santiago de los Treinta Caballeros in December. Her father, Pedro Santana, a farm worker, had reported her disappearance to the police on 14 January. Dolores María, who was then 16 years old, but who had turned 17 on 18 February – a fact that made Wallander particularly depressed – had been in Santiago looking for work as a housekeeper. Before then she had lived with her father in a little village 70 kilometres outside the city. She had been staying with a distant relative when she had disappeared. Judging by the scanty report, the Dominican police had not taken much interest in her case, though her father had hounded them to keep looking for her, managing to get a journalist involved, but eventually the police decided that she had probably left the country.

The trail ended there. Interpol’s comments were brief. Dolores María Santana hadn’t been seen in any of the countries belonging to the international police network. Until now.

“She disappears in a city called Santiago,” said Wallander. “About six months later she pops up in farmer Salomonsson’s rape field, where she burns herself to death. What does that mean?”

Martinsson shook his head dejectedly. Wallander was so tired he could hardly think, but he roused himself. Martinsson’s apathy made him furious.

“We know that she didn’t vanish from the face of the earth,” he said with determination. “We know that she had been in Helsingborg and got a lift from a man from Smedstorp. She seemed to be fleeing something. And we know she’s dead. We should send a message back to Interpol telling them all this. And I want you to make a special request that the girl’s father be properly informed of her death. When this other nightmare is over, we’ll have to find out what terrified her in Helsingborg. I suggest you make contact with our colleagues there tomorrow. They might have some idea what happened.”

After this muted outburst, Wallander drove home. He stopped and ordered a hamburger. Newspaper placards were posted everywhere, proclaiming the latest news on the World Cup. He had a powerful urge to rip them down and scream that enough was enough. But instead he waited patiently in line, paid, picked up his hamburger, and went back to his car.

When he got home he sat down at the kitchen table, tore open the bag and ate. He drank a glass of water with the hamburger. Then he made some strong coffee and cleared the table, forcing himself to go over all the