They had stopped by her car. Wallander could tell that she meant everything she said, but he was too tired to take it in.
“Set up this investigation as you see fit. Tell me what you need and I’ll see that you get it.”
Wallander nodded.
“We’ll know more in a few hours. Right now we both need to get some sleep.”
It was almost 2 a.m. when Wallander arrived home. He made a couple of sandwiches and ate them at the kitchen table. Then he set his alarm clock for just after 5 a.m. and lay down on top of his bed.
They gathered once more in the grey dawn. The rain had stopped, but the wind was blowing again, and it had turned colder. Nyberg and the officers who stayed at the scene overnight had been forced to rig up temporary fixtures to keep the plastic sheeting in place. Nyberg and the other forensic technicians were now working down in the ditch, exposed to the biting wind.
On his way there, Wallander had been turning over in his mind how best to run the investigation. They knew nothing about Eriksson. The fact that he was wealthy could be a motive, but this seemed unlikely. The stakes in the ditch spoke another language. He couldn’t interpret it and didn’t know in which direction it led.
As usual when he felt unsure, he thought of Rydberg, the old detective who had been his mentor and without whose wisdom, he suspected, he would have been a mediocre criminal investigator. Rydberg had died of cancer almost four years ago. Wallander shuddered when he thought how quickly time had passed. He asked himself what Rydberg would have done.
Patience, he thought. Rydberg would have told me that now the rule about being patient was more important than ever.
They set up temporary headquarters in Eriksson’s house. Wallander listed the most important tasks and assigned them as efficiently as possible. Next he attempted the impossible task of summarising the situation, but found that he actually had only one thing to say: that they had nothing to go on.
“We know very little,” he began. “An oil-truck driver named Sven Tyren reported what he suspected was a disappearance on Tuesday. Based on what Tyren has said, and taking into account the date on the poem, we can assume that the murder took place sometime after 10 p.m. last Wednesday night. Exactly when, we can’t say. But it didn’t happen any earlier. We’ll have to wait to see what the pathologist can tell us.”
Wallander paused. No-one had any questions. Svedberg sniffled. His eyes were glassy and feverish and he should be home in bed, but they both knew that right now they needed all available manpower.
“We don’t know much about Holger Eriksson,” Wallander went on. “A former car dealer. Wealthy, unmarried, no children. He was a poet and also clearly interested in birds.”
“We do know a little more than that,” Hansson interrupted. “Eriksson was quite well known in this area, particularly a decade or two ago. You might say he had a reputation for being a horse trader with cars. A tough negotiator. Didn’t tolerate the unions. Made money hand over fist. He was mixed up in tax disputes and suspected of certain illegalities, but was never caught, if I remember correctly.”
“So he may have had enemies,” Wallander said.
“It’s probably safe to assume so, but that doesn’t mean they’d be prepared to commit murder. Especially not the way this one was done.”
Wallander decided to wait to discuss the sharpened bamboo stakes and the bridge. He wanted to take things in order, to keep everything straight in his own mind. This was something else Rydberg had often reminded him of. A criminal investigation is like a construction site. Everything has to be done in the proper order or the building won’t hold up.
“Mapping out Eriksson’s life is the first thing we have to do,” Wallander said. “But before we start I want to try and give you my impression of the chronology of the crime.”
They were sitting at the big kitchen table. In the distance they could see the crime-scene tape and the white plastic canopy flapping in the wind. Nyberg stood like a yellow-clad scarecrow in the mud. Wallander could imagine his weary, irritated voice. But he knew that Nyberg was talented and meticulous. If he waved his arms about he had a reason for it.
Wallander felt his attention begin to sharpen. He had done this many times before, and he could sense that at this moment the investigative team was starting to track the murderer.
“I think it happened like this,” Wallander began, speaking slowly. “Sometime after ten o’clock on Wednesday night, or maybe early Thursday morning, Holger Eriksson leaves his house. He doesn’t lock the door because he intends to return soon. He takes a pair of night-vision binoculars with him. He walks down the path towards the ditch, over which he has laid a bridge. He’s probably on his way to the tower. He’s interested in birds. In September and October, the migratory birds head south. I don’t know much about it, but I’ve heard that most of them take off and navigate at night. This would explain the late hour. He steps onto the bridge, which breaks in two because the planks have been sawed almost all the way through. He falls into the ditch and is impaled on the stakes. That’s where he dies. If he called for help, there was no-one to hear him. The farm isn’t named ‘Seclusion’ for nothing.”
He poured some coffee from a thermos before he continued.
“That’s how I think it happened,” he said. “We end up with considerably more questions than answers. But it’s where we have to start. We’re dealing with a well-planned murder. Cruel and grisly. We have no obvious or even conceivable motive and no leads.”
They were all silent. Wallander let his gaze travel around the table. Finally Hoglund broke the silence.
“One more thing is important. Whoever did this had no intention of concealing his actions.”
Wallander had planned to come to that very point.
“I think there’s a chance it’s even more than that,” he said. “If we look at this ghastly trap we can interpret it as a kind of statement.”
“Do you think we’re searching for a madman?” Svedberg asked.
Everyone around the table knew what he meant. The events of the past summer were still raw in their memories.
“We can’t rule out that possibility,” Wallander said. “In fact, we can’t rule out anything at all.”
“It’s like a bear trap,” Hansson said. “Or something you’d see in an old war movie set in Asia. A peculiar combination: a bear trap and a bird-watcher.”
“Or a car dealer,” Martinsson added.
“Or a poet,” Hoglund said. “We have plenty of choices.”
Wallander ended the meeting. They would use Eriksson’s kitchen whenever they had to meet. Svedberg drove off to talk to Sven Tyren and the girl at the oil company who’d taken Eriksson’s order. Hoglund would see to it that all the neighbours in the area were contacted and interviewed. Wallander remembered the letters and asked her to talk to the rural postman too. Hansson would go over the house with some of Nyberg’s forensic technicians, while Chief Holgersson and Martinsson would work together to organise the other tasks.
The investigative wheel had started to turn.
Wallander put on his jacket and walked down to the ditch. Ragged clouds chased across the sky. He bent into the wind. Suddenly he heard the distinctive sound of geese. He stopped and looked up at the sky. It took a moment before he saw the birds, a small group high up, just below the clouds, heading southwest. He guessed that, like all other migratory birds crossing Skane, they would leave Sweden over Falsterbo Point.
Wallander stood there, watching the geese, thinking of the poem lying on the desk. Then he walked on, his unease increasing steadily.
There was something in this brutal killing that shook him to the core. It could be an act of blind hatred or insanity, but cold calculation lay behind the murder. He couldn’t decide which scared him more.
Nyberg and his forensic technicians had begun lifting the bloody stakes from the clay. Each pole was wrapped in plastic and carried to a waiting car. Nyberg had spots of clay on his face and worked with abrupt, angry movements. Wallander felt as though he was looking down into a grave.