“Why are you asking about this?” said Svedberg. “It’s hardly likely that an American Indian murdered Wetterstedt.”
“Who would take his scalp?” asked Wallander.
“A madman,” said Svedberg. “Anyone who does something like this has to be nuts. We must catch him as fast as possible.”
“I know,” said Wallander.
Svedberg stood up and left. Wallander got a mop and cleaned the floor. Then he went in to see Hoglund in the study.
“Your father didn’t sound too happy,” she said. “But I think the main thing that was bothering him was that you hadn’t called earlier.”
“He’s right about that,” said Wallander. “What have you found?”
“Surprisingly little,” she said. “On the surface nothing seems to have been stolen. No cabinets are broken open. I think he must have had a housekeeper to keep this big place clean.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Two reasons. First, you can see the difference in the way a man and a woman clean. Don’t ask me how. That’s just the way it is.”
“And the second reason?”
“There’s a note in his diary that says ‘charwoman’ and then a time. The note comes up twice a month.”
“Did he really write ‘charwoman’?”
“A fine old contemptuous word.”
“When was she here last?”
“Last Thursday.”
“That explains why everything seems so clean and tidy.”
Wallander sank down into a chair in front of the desk.
“How did it look down there?” she asked.
“An axe blow severed the spine. He died instantly. The killer cut off his scalp.”
“Earlier you said there had to be at least two of them.”
“I know I did. But now all I’m certain about is that I don’t like this one bit. Why would someone murder an old man who’s been living in seclusion for 20 years? And why take his scalp?”
They sat for a while in silence. Wallander thought about the burning girl. About the man with his hair torn off. And about the pouring rain. He tried to push these thoughts away by remembering himself and Baiba in a hollow behind a dune at Skagen in Denmark. But the girl kept running through the field with her hair on fire. And Wetterstedt lay scalped on a stretcher on the way to Malmo.
He forced himself to concentrate, and looked at Hoglund.
“Give me a run-down,” he said. “What do you think? What happened here? Describe it for me. Don’t hold anything back.”
“He went out,” she said. “A walk down to the beach. To meet someone. Or just to get some exercise. But he was only going for a short walk.”
“Why?”
“The clogs. Old and worn out. Uncomfortable. But good enough if you’re just going to be out for a short time.”
“And then?”
“It happened at night. What did the doctor say about the time?”
“He’s not sure yet. Keep going. Why at night?”
“The risk of being seen is too great in the daytime. At this time of year, the beach is never deserted.”
“What else?”
“There’s no obvious motive. But I think you can tell that the killer had a plan.”
“Why?”
“He took time to hide the body.”
“Why did he do that?”
“To delay its discovery. So he’d have time to get away.”
“But nobody saw him, right? And why a man?”
“A woman would never sever someone’s spine. A desperate woman might hit her husband with an axe. But she wouldn’t scalp him. It’s a man.”
“What do we know about the killer?”
“Nothing. Unless you know something I don’t.”
Wallander shook his head.
“You’ve outlined everything we know,” he said. “I think it’s time for us to leave the house to Nyberg and his people.”
“There’s going to be a big commotion about this,” she said.
“I know,” said Wallander. “It’ll start tomorrow. You can be glad you’ve got your holiday coming up.”
“Hansson has already asked me whether I’d postpone it,” she said. “I said yes.”
“You should go home now,” Wallander said. “I think I’ll tell the others that we’ll meet early tomorrow morning to plan the investigation.”
Wallander knew that they had to form a picture of who Wetterstedt was. They knew that every evening at the same time he called his mother. But what about all the routines that they didn’t know about? He went back to the kitchen and searched for some paper in one of the drawers. Then he made a list of things to remember for tomorrow morning’s meeting. A few minutes later Nyberg came in. He took off his wet raincoat.
“What do you want us to look for?” he asked.
“I want to be able to rule out that he was killed inside. I want you to go over the house in your usual way,” Wallander answered.
Nyberg nodded and left the kitchen. Wallander heard him reprimanding one of his crew. He knew he ought to drive home and sleep for a few hours, but instead he decided to go through the house one more time. He started with the basement. An hour later he was on the top floor. He went into Wetterstedt’s spacious bedroom and opened his wardrobe. Pulling the suits back, he searched the bottom. Downstairs he could hear Nyberg’s voice raised in anger. He was just about to close the wardrobe doors when he caught sight of a small case in one corner. He bent down and took it out, sat down on the edge of the bed, and opened it. Inside was a camera. Wallander guessed that it wasn’t particularly expensive. He could see that it was more or less the same type as the one Linda had bought last year. There was film in it, and seven pictures out of 36 were exposed. He put it back in the bag. Then he went downstairs to Nyberg.
“There’s a camera in this bag,” he said. “I want you to get the photos developed as quickly as possible.”
It was almost midnight when he left Wetterstedt’s villa. It was still pouring outside. He drove straight home.
When he got to his flat he sat down at the kitchen table, wondering what the photographs would be of. The rain pounded against his windows, and he was aware of a feeling of foreboding. He sensed that what had happened was only the beginning of something much worse.
CHAPTER 8
On Thursday morning, 23 June, there was no Midsummer Eve mood in the Ystad station. Wallander had been woken at 3 a.m. by a reporter from Daily News in Stockholm who had heard about Wetterstedt’s death from the Ostermalm police. Just when Wallander finally managed to get back to sleep, the Express called. Hansson had also been woken during the night. They gathered in the conference room just after 7 a.m., everyone looking haggard and tired. Nyberg was there, even though he had been going through Wetterstedt’s house until 5 a.m. Before the meeting, Hansson took Wallander aside and told him that he would have to run the investigation.
“I think Bjork knew this would happen,” said Hansson. “That’s why he retired.”
“He didn’t retire,” said Wallander. “He was promoted. Besides, seeing into the future was definitely not one of his talents. He worried enough about what was happening around him from day to day.”
But Wallander knew that the responsibility for organising the hunt for Wetterstedt’s killer would fall to him. The big difficulty was the fact that they would be short of staff all summer. He was grateful that Ann-Britt Hoglund had agreed to postpone her holiday. But what was going to happen to his? He had counted on being on his way to Skagen with Baiba in two weeks.
He sat down at the table and took stock of the exhausted faces around him. It was still raining, but it was easing off. In front of him on the table he had a pile of messages that he had picked up at the reception desk. He pushed them aside and tapped on the table with a pencil.
“We have to get started,” he said. “The worst thing possible has happened. We’ve had a murder during the summer holiday. We’ll have to organise ourselves as best we can. We also have the Midsummer holiday coming up that will keep the uniformed officers busy. We’ll have to plan our investigation with this in mind.”
No-one spoke. Wallander turned to Nyberg and asked how the forensic investigation was going.