Sidetracked - By Henning Mankell & Steven T. Murray Page 0,95
to be a policeman?” the boy asked.
Wallander could tell that he was really interested. His eyes gleamed.
“It’s a little of this, a little of that,” said Wallander, unsure of what he thought about his profession at that moment.
“What’s it like to catch a murderer?”
“Cold and grey and miserable,” he replied, thinking with distaste of all the TV shows the boy must have seen.
“What are you going to do when you catch the person who killed my Dad?”
“I don’t know,” said Wallander. “That depends.”
“He must be dangerous. Since he’s already killed several other people.”
Wallander found the boy’s curiosity annoying.
“We’ll catch him,” he said firmly, to put an end to the conversation. “Sooner or later we’ll catch him.”
He got up from the chair and asked where the bathroom was. The boy pointed to a door in the hall leading to the bedroom. Wallander closed the door behind him. He looked at his face in the mirror. What he needed most was some sunshine. After he’d had a pee he opened the medicine cabinet. There were a few bottles of pills in it. One of them had Louise Fredman’s name on it. He saw that she was born on November 9th. He memorised the name of the medicine and the doctor who had prescribed it. Saroten. He had never heard of this drug before. He would have to look it up when he got back to Ystad.
In the living-room the boy was sitting in the same position. Wallander wondered whether he was normal after all. His precociousness and self-control made a strange impression. But then Stefan turned towards him and smiled, and for a moment the wariness in his eyes seemed to vanish. Wallander pushed away the thought, and picked up his jacket.
“I’ll be calling you again,” he said. “Don’t forget to tell your mother that I was here. It would be good if you told her what we talked about.”
“Can I come and visit you some time?” asked the boy.
Wallander was surprised by the question. It was like having a ball tossed at you and not being able to catch it.
“You mean you want to come to the station in Ystad?”
“Yes.”
“Of course,” said Wallander. “But call ahead of time. I’m often out. And sometimes it’s not convenient.”
Wallander went out to the landing and pressed the lift button. They nodded to each other. The boy closed the door. Wallander rode down and walked out into the sunshine.
It had turned into the hottest day yet. He stood for a moment, enjoying the heat, deciding what to do next, then drove down to the Malmö police station. Forsfält was in. Wallander told him about his talk with the boy. He gave Forsfält the name of the doctor, Gunnar Bergdahl, and asked him to get hold of him as soon as possible. Then he told him about his suspicions that Fredman might have abused his daughter and possibly the two boys as well. Forsfält couldn’t recall that allegations of that nature had ever been directed at Fredman, but he promised to look into the matter.
Wallander moved on to Peter Hjelm. Forsfält told him that he was a man who resembled Björn Fredman in many ways. He’d been in and out of prison. Once he was arrested with Fredman for taking part in a joint fencing operation. Forsfält was of the opinion that Hjelm was the one who supplied the stolen goods, and Fredman then resold them. Wallander wondered whether Forsfält would mind if he talked to Hjelm alone.
“I’m happy to get out of it,” said Forsfält.
Wallander looked up Hjelm’s address in Forsfält’s phone book. He also gave Forsfält his mobile number. They decided to have lunch together. Forsfält hoped that by then he would have copied all the material the Malmö police had on Björn Fredman.
Wallander left his car outside the station and walked towards Kungsgatan. He went into a clothing shop and bought a shirt, which he put on. Reluctantly he threw away the ruined one Baiba had given him. He went back out into the sunshine. For a few minutes he sat on a bench. Then he walked over to the building where Hjelm lived. The door had an entry code, but Wallander was lucky. After a few minutes an elderly man came out with his dog. Wallander gave him a friendly nod and stepped in the main door. He saw that Hjelm lived on the fourth floor. Just as he was about to open the lift door, his phone rang. It was Forsfält.