“I can do it now, if you like.”
“Hold off on it. There’s nothing from the pathologist?”
“I don’t think they’ll be able to say anything until tomorrow at the earliest.”
“Then plug in the names. If you have time.”
In contrast to Wallander, Martinsson loved his computer. If anyone at the station was having a computer problem they always turned to him for help.
Wallander turned back to the Lundberg murder case. At three o’clock, he went to get some coffee. He was no longer so congested; his throat was basically back to normal. Hansson told him that Hoglund was talking to Eva Persson. Everything is flowing nicely, he thought. For once we have time for everything we need to do.
He had just sat down with his paperwork when Chief Holgersson turned up at his door. She had one of the evening papers in her hand. Wallander could see from her face that something had happened.
“Have you seen this?” she asked, and handed him the newspaper. Wallander stared at the photograph. It was a picture of Eva Persson sprawled on the floor of the interrogation room. It looked as if she had fallen.
He felt a knot form in his stomach when he read the accompanying text.
Well known policeman assaults teenage girl. We have the pictures.
“Who took this picture?” Wallander asked in disbelief. “There were no journalists around, were there?”
“There must have been.”
Wallander had a vague recollection of the fact that the door to the hallway had been slightly open, and there might have been a shadow of a person there.
“It was before the press conference,” Holgersson said. “Maybe one of the reporters came early and was hanging around the hallway.”
Wallander was paralyzed. He had often been involved in scuffles and fistfights in his thirty-year career, but that had always been during a difficult arrest. He had never jumped anyone in the middle of an interrogation, however irritated he had become.
It had only happened once, and just that once there had been a photographer present.
“There’s going to be trouble here,” Holgersson said. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
“She was attacking her mother. I slapped her to keep her from hurting her mother.”
“That’s not the story the picture tells.”
“That’s how it was.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Wallander had no answer.
“I hope you understand I’m forced to order an investigation into this.”
Wallander heard the disappointment in her voice. It angered him. She doesn’t believe me, he thought.
“Am I suspended from my job?”
“No, but I want to hear exactly what happened.”
“I’ve already told you.”
“Eva Persson gave a different account of the incident to Ann-Britt. She said your assault came out of the blue.”
“In that case she’s lying. Ask her mother.”
Holgersson hesitated before answering.
“We did,” she said finally. “She says her daughter never hit her.”
Wallander was quiet. I’m going to quit, he thought. I’m going to quit the force and leave this place. And I’m never coming back.
Chief Holgersson waited for an answer, but Wallander didn’t say anything.
Finally she left the room.
Chapter Nine
Wallander immediately left the station.
He wasn’t sure if he was running away or just going out for air. He knew he was right about what had happened, but Chief Holgersson didn’t believe him and that upset him.
It was only after he got outside that he remembered he didn’t have a car. He swore. When he was upset he liked to drive around until he had calmed down again.
He went down to the liquor store and bought a bottle of whiskey. Then he went straight home, unplugged the phone, and sat down at the kitchen table. He opened the bottle and took a couple of deep draughts. It tasted bad. But he felt he needed it. If there was one thing that made him feel helpless, it was being accused of something he didn’t do. Holgersson hadn’t spelled it out for him, but he wasn’t wrong about her doubts. Maybe Hansson had been right all along, he thought angrily. You should never have a woman for a boss. He took another swig. He was starting to feel better, and was even starting to regret the fact that he had come straight home. That could be interpreted as a sign that he was guilty. He plugged the phone back in. He felt a sense of childish impatience over the fact that no one had called him. He dialed the number to the police station and Irene picked up the phone.
“I just wanted to let you know I’ve gone home for the day,” he said.
“I have a cold.”
“Hansson has been asking for you, and Nyberg. Also people from several newspapers.”
“What did they want?”
“The papers?”
“No, Hansson and Nyberg.”
“They didn’t say.”
She probable has the paper in front of her right now, Wallander thought. She and all the rest of them. It wouldn’t surprise me if no one’s talking about anything else. And I’ll bet some of them are downright happy about the fact that that bastard Wallander has finally gotten what’s been coming to him.
He asked Irene to put him through to Hansson’s office. It took a while before he picked up. Wallander suspected that Hansson had been poring over some complicated gambling sheets that were supposed to get him that big jackpot, but that never helped him do much more than break even.
“How are the horses doing?” Wallander asked when Hansson picked up, to let him know that the story in the evening papers hadn’t affected him.
“What horses?”
“You’re not betting on horses these days?”
“No, not right now. Why do you ask?”
“It was just a joke. What was it you wanted to ask me?”
“Are you in your office?”
“I’m at home with a cold.”
“I wanted to tell you that I’ve worked out the times that our cars went up and down that road. I’ve talked to the drivers, and no one saw Sonja Hökberg. All in all that stretch of road was covered four times.”
“Then we know she didn’t walk. She must have caught a ride. The first thing she did when she left the station was call someone. Or else she walked to someone’s house first. I hope Ann-Britt knew to ask Eva Persson about that, about who could have given Sonja Hökberg a ride. Have you talked to Ann-Britt yet?”
“I haven’t had time.”
There was a pause. Wallander decided to be the first to bring it up. “That picture in the paper wasn’t too flattering, I suppose.”
“No.”
“The question is what a photographer was doing floating around the hallways like that. They’re always brought in as a group for the press conferences.”
“It’s strange that you didn’t notice someone taking pictures.”
“With today’s cameras it’s not so easy.”
“What happened, exactly?”
Wallander told him what had happened. He used exactly the same words that he had used when he talked to Holgersson. He didn’t add or omit anything.
“There were no witnesses?” Hansson asked.
“No one apart from the photographer, and he’s going to lie. Otherwise his picture wouldn’t be worth anything.”
“You’ll have to make a public rebuttal and tell your side.”
“And how well would that work? An aging police officer’s word against a mother and her daughter? It’ll never work.”
“You forget that this particular girl committed murder.”