Akeson nodded, but said nothing.
Wallander went to get his jacket and the keys to one of the squad cars. It was 2.15 p.m. when he left Ystad. He briefly considered putting on the emergency light, but decided against it. It wouldn’t get him there any faster.
He reached Lund at about 3.30 p.m. A police car met him at the entrance to town and escorted him to Siriusgatan, in a residential neighbourhood east of the centre of town. At the entrance to the street the police car pulled over. Another car was parked there. Wallander saw Kalle Birch get out. They had met several years back at a conference of the Southern Sweden Police District held in Tylosand, outside of Halmstad. The purpose of the conference was to improve operational cooperation in the region. Wallander had participated grudgingly. Bjork, Ystad’s chief of police at the time, had ordered him to go. At the lunch he had sat next to Birch. They discovered that they shared an interest in opera. They had occasionally been in contact since then. From various sources Wallander had heard that Birch was a talented detective who sometimes suffered from deep depression, but he seemed cheerful enough today. They shook hands.
“One of Blomberg’s colleagues is on his way to identify the body. They’ll let us know by phone.”
“And the widow?”
“Not yet informed. We thought that was a little premature.”
“That’s going to make the interview more difficult,” Wallander said. “She’ll be shocked, of course.”
“I don’t think that we can do anything about that.”
Birch pointed to a cafe across the street. “We can wait there,” he said. “Besides, I’m hungry.”
Wallander hadn’t eaten lunch either. They went into the cafe and had sandwiches and coffee. Wallander gave Birch a summary of the case to date.
“It reminds me of what you were dealing with this summer,” he said when Wallander had finished.
“Only because the murderer has killed more than one person,” Wallander said. “The method here is quite different.”
“What’s so different about taking scalps and drowning somebody alive?”
“I might not be able to put it into words,” Wallander said hesitantly. “But there’s still a big difference.”
Birch let the question drop. “We sure as hell never thought about things like this when we joined the force,” he said instead.
“I hardly remember what I imagined any more,” Wallander said.
“I remember an old commissioner,” Birch said. “He’s been dead a long time now. Karl-Oscar Fredrick Wilhelm Sunesson. He’s practically a legend. At least here in Lund. He saw all of this coming. I remember that he used to talk to us younger detectives and warn us that everything was going to get a lot tougher. The violence would get more widespread and more brutal. He said that this was because Sweden’s prosperity was a well-camouflaged quagmire. The decay was underneath it all. He even took the time to put together demographic analyses and explain the connections between various types of crime. He was that rare sort of man who never spoke ill of anyone. He could be critical about politicians, and he could use his arguments to crush suggested changes to the police force. But he never doubted that there were good, albeit confused, intentions behind them. He used to say that good intentions that are not clothed in reason lead to greater disasters than actions built on ill will. I didn’t understand it back then. But I do now.”
Birch could have been talking about Rydberg.
“That still doesn’t explain what we were really thinking when we decided to join the force,” he said.
But what Birch had in mind, Wallander never found out. The phone rang. Birch listened without saying anything.
“It’s Eugen Blomberg. There’s absolutely no doubt about it.”
“So let’s go in,” Wallander said.
“If you want, you can wait until we inform his wife,” said Birch. “It’s usually rather painful.”
“I’ll go with you,” Wallander said. “It’s better than sitting here doing nothing. Besides, it might give me an idea what kind of relationship she had with her husband.”
They encountered a woman who was unexpectedly composed. She seemed to understand why they were standing on her doorstep at once. Wallander kept in the background as Birch told her of her husband’s death. She sat down on the edge of a chair, as if to bear the brunt of it with her feet, and nodded silently. Wallander assumed that she was about the same age as her husband, but she seemed older, as if she had aged prematurely. She was thin, her skin stretched taut across her cheekbones. Wallander studied her furtively. He didn’t think she was going to fall apart. At least not yet.
Birch nodded to Wallander to step forward. Birch had merely said that they had found her husband dead in Krageholm Lake. Nothing about what had happened. This was Wallander’s job.
“Krageholm Lake comes under the jurisdiction of the Ystad police,” said Birch. “Which is why one of my colleagues from there is with me. This is Kurt Wallander.”
Kristina Blomberg looked up. She reminded Wallander of someone, but he couldn’t think who it was.
“I recognise your face,” she said. “I’ve seen you in the papers.”
“That’s quite possible,” Wallander said, sitting down on a chair across from her. Birch had taken over Wallander’s position in the background. The house was very quiet. Tastefully furnished. But quiet. It occurred to Wallander that he didn’t yet know whether they had children.
That was his first question.
“No,” she replied. “We don’t have any children.”
“None from earlier marriages?”
Wallander immediately noticed her uncertainty. She paused before answering; it was barely noticeable but he saw it.
“No,” she said. “Not that I know of.”
Wallander exchanged a glance with Birch before slowly pressing on.
“When did you last see your husband?”
“He went for a walk last night as he usually did.”
“Do you know which way he went?”
She shook her head. “He was often gone for more than an hour. Where he went, I have no idea.”
“Was everything normal last night?”
“Yes.”
Wallander again sensed a shadow of uncertainty in her answer. He continued cautiously.
“So he didn’t come back? What did you do then?”
“At 2 a.m. I called the police.”
“But didn’t you think he might have gone to see some friends?”
“He didn’t have many friends. I called them before I contacted the police. He wasn’t with them.”
She looked at him. Still composed. Wallander realised that he couldn’t wait any longer.
“Your husband was found dead in Krageholm Lake. We have determined that he was murdered. I regret this very much, but I have to tell you the truth.”
Wallander studied her face. She’s not surprised, he thought. About him being dead, or that he was murdered.
“Of course it’s important that we catch the person or persons who did this. Did your husband have any enemies?”
“I don’t know,” she replied. “I didn’t know my husband very well.”
Wallander paused to think before he continued. Her answer made him uneasy.
“I don’t know how to interpret your answer.”
“Is it really so difficult? I didn’t know my husband very well. Once upon a time, a long time ago, I thought I did. But that was back then.”
“What happened? What changed things?”
She shook her head. Wallander saw something he interpreted as bitterness in her expression. He waited.
“Nothing happened,” she said. “We grew apart. We live in the same house, but we have separate bedrooms. He has his own life, and I have mine.”
Then she corrected herself. “He had his own life. And I have mine.”
“And he was a researcher at the university?”
“Yes.”
“Milk allergies? Is that right?”
“Yes.”
“Do you work there too?”
“I’m a teacher.”
Wallander nodded. “So you wouldn’t know whether your husband had any enemies?”
“No.”