“Did the man have any identification?”
“He had three different passports. Korean, Thai and, strangely enough, one from Romania.”
“None from Angola?”
“Nope.”
“I’m going to talk to Nyberg.”
Wallander returned to his general remarks. Modin sat impatiently in front of the computer.
“We only have thirteen hours left until the twentieth of October,” he continued. “And right now we have three main points of interest. Everything else can wait.”
Wallander looked around. Martinsson’s face was devoid of expression. The swelling at his lower lip was starting to turn blue.
“The first question is if the twentieth of October is the real date,” Wallander said. “If it is, what will happen? The third question that follows from this is, if something is about to happen, how can we prevent it? Nothing else matters except these three things.”
Wallander finished.
“There haven’t been any responses from abroad,” Alfredsson said.
Wallander suddenly remembered the paper he should have signed and authorized before it was sent out to police organizations across the world.
Martinsson must have read his mind.
“I signed it. Just to save time.”
Wallander nodded.
“And no one has written back or sent further inquiries?”
“Nothing yet. But it hasn’t been long, and it’s still Sunday.”
“That means that we’re on our own for now.”
Then Wallander looked at Modin.
“Robert told me on the way over that he had some new ideas. Hopefully they will lead us to new information.”
“I’m convinced it’s the twentieth of October,” Modin said.
“Then your job is to convince the rest of us.”
“I need an hour,” Modin said.
“We have thirteen,” Wallander said. “And let us all assume for now that we really don’t have more than that.”
Wallander walked away. The best thing he could do now was leave them alone. He drove to the station.
What is it I’ve overlooked? he thought. Is there a clue in all of this that could bring Everything together in a single stroke? The thoughts in his head tumbled around without connecting. Then he thought back to when he had seen Elvira in Malmö. She had seemed different. He couldn’t say exactly what it was, but he knew it was something, and it worried him. The last thing he wanted was for her to start finding fault with him at this stage. Perhaps taking Robert to her had been a mistake. Perhaps he had involved her too quickly and too abruptly to the realities of his life.
He tried to shake off these thoughts. When he got to the station, he tried to find Hansson. He was sitting in his office researching companies from a list that Martinsson had compiled. Wallander asked him how it was going and Hansson shook his head despondently.
“Nothing hangs together,” he said. “The only thing that seems to be a common denominator is that most of them are financial institutions. But there’s also a telecommunications firm and a satellite company.”
Wallander frowned.
“What was the last one?”
“A satellite company in Atlanta, Telsat Communications. As far as I can tell, they rent broadcasting space on a number of communications satellites.”
“Which would fit with the field of telecommunications.”
“I suppose you can even get it to fit with the financial companies, from the standpoint that they’re also involved in the large-scale electronic transfer of sums.”
Wallander thought of something.
“Can you see if any of the company’s satellites cover Angola?”
Hansson typed something into the computer. Wallander noticed that he had to wait longer than he usually did with Martinsson.
“Their satellite coverage covers the globe,” he said finally. “Even to the poles.”
Wallander nodded.
“It may mean something,” he said. “Call Martinsson and tell him.”
Hansson took the opportunity to ask something else.
“What was it that happened out there on the field anyway?”
“Martinsson is full of shit,” Wallander said. “But we won’t go into that right now.”
Chief Holgersson organized a hasty press conference for two o’clock in the afternoon. She had tried to reach Wallander beforehand, but he’d made himself unavailable and instructed Höglund to say he was out of the office. Now he stood in front of his window for a long time and stared at the water tower. The clouds had disappeared. It was a cold and clear October day.
At three o’clock he couldn’t stand it any longer and drove down to Runnerström Square, and walked in on an intense debate about how best to interpret a new combination of numbers. When Modin tried to involve Wallander, the latter simply shook his head.
At five he went out and had a hamburger. When he came back to the station he called Elvira, but there was no answer, not even an answering machine. He was immediately suspicious again, but too tired and distracted to hang on to these thoughts.
At half past six Ebba turned up unexpectedly. She had some food with her for Modin. Wallander asked Hansson to drive her down to Runnerström Square. Afterward he realized he hadn’t thanked her enough.
At seven he called the team at Runnerström Square and Martinsson answered. Their conversation was brief. The team were not yet able to answer a single one of Wallander’s questions. He put down the phone and went to find Hansson, who was sitting in front of the computer with bloodshot eyes. Wallander asked if there had been any messages from the international community, and Hansson had only one word in reply: “Nothing.”
At that moment Wallander was overcome by rage. He grabbed one of the chairs in Hansson’s office and threw it against the wall. Then he left the room.
At eight o’clock he was back in Hansson’s office.
“Let’s go down to Runnerström Square,” he said. “We can’t go on like this. We have to get an idea of where we stand.”
They stopped by Höglund’s office on the way out. She was half asleep at her desk. They drove in silence. When they reached the apartment they saw Modin seated against the wall, Martinsson on his folding chair, and Alfredsson lying on the floor. Wallander asked himself if he had ever led a more exhausted and dispirited team. He knew that the physical exhaustion was due more to their lack of progress rather than to the events of the night before. If only they had come a few steps closer to the truth, if only they could break down the wall, they could each summon sufficient energy to see it through. But for now the dominant mood was one of hopelessness.
Wallander sat down on the chair in front of the computer. The others gathered around him, except Martinsson, who positioned himself in the background.
“Let’s sum up where we are,” he said. “What is the situation right now?”
“There are several indications that the date in question is the twentieth of October,” Alfredsson said. “But we have no indications of a precise time for the event, so we cannot know if it will begin on the stroke of midnight or later. Quite possibly the intended event is a form of computer virus that targets all of these financial institutions we’ve identified. Since they are mostly large and powerful financial institutions, we imagine the event has something to do with money, but if we’re talking about a form of electronic bank robbery or not we don’t know.”
“What would be the worst thing that could happen?” Wallander asked.
“Total collapse of the world financial markets.”
“But is that even possible?”
“We’ve been through this point before. If there were a significant enough disruption of the markets or a severe fluctuation in the dollar, for example, it could incite a panic in the public that could be hard to control.”