Sidetracked - By Henning Mankell & Steven T. Murray Page 0,98
can look it up.”
“Do it.”
Wallander waited while Hjelm left the room. He could hear whispering voices, at least one of which sounded annoyed. Hjelm came back and handed Wallander a piece of paper. Then he followed him out to the hall.
Hjelm had sobered up, but he still seemed completely unfazed by what had happened to his friend. Wallander felt a great uneasiness at the coldness Hjelm exhibited. It was incomprehensible to him.
“That crazy man . . .” Hjelm began, without finishing his sentence. Wallander understood his unasked question.
“He’s after specific individuals. If you can’t see yourself in any connection with Wetterstedt, Carlman, and Fredman, you have nothing to worry about.”
“Why haven’t you caught him?”
Wallander stared at Hjelm, his anger returning.
“One reason is that people like you find it so hard to answer simple questions,” he said.
When he got down to the street he stood there facing the sun and closed his eyes. He thought over the conversation with Hjelm, and the anxiety that the investigation was on the wrong track returned. He opened his eyes and walked over to the side of the building, into the shade. He couldn’t shake off the feeling that he was steering the whole investigation into a blind alley. He remembered the half-formed idea that he’d had, that something he’d heard was significant. There’s something missing, he thought. There’s a link between Wetterstedt and Carlman and Fredman that I’m tripping over. The man they were searching for could strike again, and Wallander knew one thing about the case for certain. They had no idea who he was. And they didn’t even know where to look. He left the shadow of the wall and hailed a cab.
It was past midday when he got out in front of the Malmö station. When he reached Forsfält’s office he got a message to call Ystad. Again he had the terrible feeling that something serious had happened. Ebba answered. She reassured him and then switched him over to Nyberg. They had found a fingerprint on Fredman’s left eyelid. It was smudged, but it was still good enough for them to confirm a match with the prints they had found. There was no longer any doubt they were after a single killer. The forensic examination confirmed that Fredman was murdered less than twelve hours before the body was discovered, and that acid had been poured into his eyes while he was alive.
Next Ebba put him through to Martinsson, who had received a positive confirmation from Interpol that Dolores María Santana’s father recognised the medallion. It had belonged to her. Martinsson also mentioned that the Swedish embassy in the Dominican Republic was extremely unwilling to pay to transport the girl’s remains back to Santiago.
Wallander was listening with half an ear. When Martinsson finished complaining about the embassy, Wallander asked him what Svedberg and Höglund were working on. Martinsson said that neither of them had come up with much. Wallander told him he’d be back in Ystad that afternoon and hung up. Forsfält stood out in the hall sneezing.
“Allergies,” he said, blowing his nose. “Summer is the worst.”
They walked in the dazzling sunshine to a restaurant where Forsfält liked to eat spaghetti. After Wallander told him about his meeting with Hjelm, Forsfält started talking about his summer house, up near Älmhult. Wallander guessed that he didn’t want to spoil their lunch by talking about the investigation. Normally this would have made Wallander impatient, but he listened with growing fascination as the old detective described how he was restoring an old smithy. Only when they were having coffee did they return to the investigation. Forsfält would try to interview Marianne Eriksson that same day. But most important was the revelation that Louise Fredman had been a patient in a psychiatric hospital for the past three years.
“I’m not sure,” said Forsfält. “But I’d guess that she’s in Lund. At St Lars Hospital. That’s where the more serious cases finish up, I think.”
“It’s hard to bypass all the obstacles when you want to get patient records,” said Wallander. “And that’s a good thing, of course. But I think we must know everything about Louise Fredman. Especially since the family haven’t told the truth.”
“Mental illness isn’t something people want to talk about,” Forsfält reminded him. “I had an aunt who was in and out of institutions her whole life. We almost never talked about her to strangers. It was a disgrace.”
“I’ll ask one of the prosecutors in Ystad to get in touch with Malmö,” said Wallander.