“Did Martinsson understand what we came up with?”
“I think so.”
“Then let’s go.”
Wallander leaned back and closed his eyes. The best thing he could do on the way to Lund was sleep.
Katarina Taxell lived in a block of flats on a square that Wallander wasn’t familiar with.
“It might be best if we call Birch,” Wallander said. “So there won’t be any trouble later on.”
Svedberg reached him at home. He handed the phone to Wallander, who explained what had developed. Birch said he’d be there within 20 minutes. They sat in the car and waited. The sky was grey, and the wind had picked up. Birch drew up behind them and they went inside.
“I’ll stay in the background,” Birch said. “You can conduct the conversation.”
Svedberg rang the bell of a flat on the third floor. The door opened almost at once. A woman wearing a dressing gown stood in front of them. She had dark circles under her eyes. She reminded Wallander of Ann-Britt.
Wallander tried to sound as friendly as possible. But he noted her reaction when he said that he was a police officer from Ystad. They went into the flat, which was small and cramped. Everywhere were signs that she had just had a baby. It reminded Wallander of how his own home had looked when Linda was just born. They went into a living room with light-coloured, wooden furniture. On the table lay a brochure that caught Wallander’s attention. “Taxell’s Hair Products”.
“I apologise for coming so early in the morning,” he said as they sat down. “But this can’t wait.”
He wasn’t sure how to continue. She sat across from him and didn’t take her eyes off his face.
“You’ve just had a child at Ystad’s maternity ward,” he said.
“A boy,” she replied. “He was born on 15 October.”
“My congratulations,” Wallander said. Svedberg and Birch murmured something similar.
“About two weeks before that,” Wallander continued, “or to be precise, on the night of 30 September, I wonder if you had a visitor sometime after midnight?”
She gave him a look of incomprehension. “Who would that have been?”
“A nurse who you might not have seen before?”
“I knew all of the nurses who worked at night.”
“This woman came back two weeks later,” he continued. “And we think she was there to visit you.”
“At night?”
“Yes. Sometime after 2 a.m.”
“No-one visited me. And besides, I’m a sound sleeper.”
Wallander nodded slowly. Birch was standing behind the sofa. Svedberg was sitting on a chair against the wall. All of a sudden it was quiet. They were waiting for Wallander to go on, and he planned to do so in a moment. But first he wanted to collect himself. He was still tired. He really should ask her why she was in the maternity ward for so long. Were there complications with her pregnancy? But he didn’t ask her this. Something else was more important.
She wasn’t telling the truth, he knew it. He was convinced that she’d had a visitor, and that she knew the woman who’d been to see her.
CHAPTER 28
Suddenly a child started to cry.
Katarina Taxell got up and left the room. At that moment Wallander decided how he would proceed with the interview. He had sensed that she was being evasive. His years as a policeman had taught him to tell when someone was lying. He stood up and went over to the window where Birch was standing. Svedberg followed. Wallander spoke in a low voice, keeping his eye on the door.
“She’s not telling the truth,” he said.
The others didn’t seem to have noticed anything, or weren’t as convinced as he was, but they made no objections.
“This may take some time,” Wallander went on. “But since in my opinion she’s crucial for us, I’m not going to give up. She knows who that woman is, and I’m more convinced than ever that she’s important.”
Birch suddenly seemed to understand the connection.
“You mean there might be a woman behind all this? The killer is a woman?” He sounded almost frightened by his own words.
“She doesn’t necessarily have to be the killer,” Wallander said. “But there is a woman somewhere near the heart of this investigation. I’m certain of that. At the very least she’s blocking our view of what’s behind all this. Which is why we have to get to her as soon as possible. We have to find out who she is.”
The crying stopped. Svedberg and Wallander returned quickly to their places in the room. A minute went by. Katarina Taxell came back and sat down on the sofa. Wallander could see that she was very much on her guard.
“Let’s return to the maternity ward in Ystad,” Wallander said in a friendly voice. “You say that you were asleep. And nobody visited you there at night?”
“That’s right.”
“You live here in Lund. Yet you choose to give birth in Ystad. Why?”
“I prefer the methods they practise there.”
“I understand,” Wallander said. “My own daughter was born in Ystad.”
She didn’t respond. Wallander sensed that she wanted only to answer the questions. She wasn’t going to say anything voluntarily.
“I have to ask you some questions of a personal nature,” he continued. “Since this is not an interrogation, you can choose not to answer. But then I must warn you that we may have to take you down to the police station and arrange a formal interrogation. We came here because we’re looking for information connected with a number of extremely brutal and violent crimes.”
Still she didn’t react. Her gaze was fixed on his face. It felt as if she was staring straight into his head. Something about her eyes made him nervous.
“Did you understand what I said?”
“I understand. I’m not stupid.”
“Do you agree that I can ask you some questions of a personal nature?”
“I won’t know until I hear them.”
“It seems that you live alone in this flat. You’re not married?”
“No.”
The reply came very swiftly and hard, Wallander thought, as if she was hitting something.
“May I ask who the father of your child is?”
“I don’t think I’ll answer that. It’s of no concern to anyone but myself. And the child.”
“If the child’s father has been the victim of a violent crime, I would say it has something to do with the matter that I am concerned with.”
“That would mean that you knew who the father of my child is. But you don’t. So the question is unreasonable.”
Wallander saw that she was right. There was nothing wrong with her mind.
“Let me ask another question. Do you know a man named Eugen Blomberg?”
“Yes.”
“In what way do you know him?”
“I know him.”
“Do you know that he was murdered?”
“Yes.”
“How do you know that?”
“I saw it in the paper this morning.”
“Is he the father of your child?”
“No.”
She’s a good liar, thought Wallander. But not good enough.
“You and Eugen Blomberg had a relationship, didn’t you?”
“That’s correct.”
“But he isn’t the father of your child?”
“No.”
“How long did you have this relationship?”
“For two and a half years.”
“It must have been kept secret, since he was married.”
“He lied to me. I didn’t find out about that until much later.”
“What happened then?”
“I ended it.”
“When did that happen?”
“About a year ago.”
“After that you never met again?”
“That’s right.”
Wallander seized the moment and went on the attack.
“We’ve found letters at his house that you wrote to him as recently as a few months ago.”
She stood her ground.
“We wrote letters, but we didn’t meet.”
“The whole thing seems rather strange.”
“He wrote letters. I answered them. He wanted us to meet again. I didn’t.”
“Because you had met another man?”
“Because I was pregnant.”