"You know what we've decided," Wallander said. "If it's anything to do with Harderberg we should pretend we're not very wide awake."
Svedberg shook his head. "I don't like this," he said.
"All you need to do is to drive to Mariagatan and make an observation," Wallander said. "Then I'll go back to my flat. I'll phone you if I need help."
"I suppose you know best," Svedberg said, sitting on a stool in order to tie his shoelaces.
They went down to the street and got into Svedberg's Audi, then drove past Stortorget, down Hamngatan and left into Osterleden. When they got to Borgmastaregatan they turned left again. Wallander asked Svedberg to stop when they came to Tobaksgatan.
"I'll wait here," he said. "The car's ten metres behind."
Minutes later Svedberg was back. Wallander got into the car again.
"There was only the driver."
"Thanks for your help. You can go home now. I'll walk from here."
Svedberg gave him a worried look. "Why is it so important to know how many there are in the car?" he asked.
Wallander had forgotten to prepare for that question. He was so focused on what he had decided to do that he had not taken Svedberg's natural curiosity into account.
"I've seen that car before," he lied. "There were two men in it then. If there's only the driver in it now, it could mean the other man isn't far away."
This explanation was pretty feeble, but Svedberg raised no objections.
"FHC 803," he said. "But I expect you've noted that down already."
"Yes," Wallander said. "I'll look it up in the register. You don't need to bother about that. Just go home now. I'll see you tomorrow. Thanks for your help."
He got out of the car and waited until Svedberg had disappeared down Osterleden, then he started walking towards Mariagatan. Now that he was on his own again he could feel himself getting agitated, the nagging worry that his fear was making him weak.
He went in by the back door and left the stair lights off when he returned to his flat. If he stood on tiptoe on the toilet seat and looked through the little bathroom window, he could see the street below. The car was still there. Wallander went to the kitchen. If they had meant to blow me up, they'd have done that already, he thought. They must be waiting for me to go to bed, and for the lights to go out.
He waited until nearly midnight, then went back to the bathroom and checked to be sure the car was still there. Then he switched off the kitchen light and switched on in the bathroom. After ten minutes he switched off in the bathroom and switched on in the bedroom. He waited for ten more minutes, and switched off in there as well. Then he went rapidly down the stairs and left the building through the back door, crouched behind the drainpipe at the corner of the car park and waited. He wished he had put on a warmer jumper. A cold wind was getting up. He cautiously moved his feet about in an attempt to keep warm. By 1 a.m. the only incident of note was that Wallander needed to pee against the wall. Apart from the occasional car driving past, all was peaceful.
At about 1.40 he heard a noise from the street. He peered out from behind the drainpipe. The driver's door had opened, although the inside light had not come on. After a few seconds' pause the driver emerged and closed the door quietly behind him. He was staring up at Wallander's windows all the time. He was wearing dark clothes, and Wallander was too far away to make out his features. Even so, he was sure he had seen the man before. He tried to remember where. The man hurried across the street and vanished through the front entrance.
Then it came to Wallander where he had seen him. He was one of the men lurking in the shadows at the foot of the stairs at Farnholm Castle, on both occasions Wallander had been there. He was one of Harderberg's shadows. And now he was on his way up the stairs to Wallander's flat, perhaps with the objective of killing him. Wallander felt almost as if he were lying in bed, in spite of being where he was, outside in the street, in the cold.
I am witnessing my own death, he thought.
He pressed himself tightly against the drainpipe and waited. At 2.03 the door opened without a sound and the man emerged again into the street. He looked round, and Wallander drew back behind the corner. Then he heard the car take off in a racing start.
He's going to report to Harderberg, Wallander thought. But he's not going to tell him the truth because he would not be able to explain how I could be in the flat one minute, switch off the light and go to bed, and have disappeared the next.
Wallander could not exclude the possibility that the man had left some device in the flat, so he got into his car and drove to the police station. The officers on duty greeted him in surprise when he appeared in reception. He collected a mattress he knew was stored in the basement, then lay on the floor of his office. It was gone 3.00, and he was worn out. He had to get some sleep if he was going to be able to think clearly, but the man in the dark clothes followed him into his dreams.
Wallander woke up covered in sweat after a series of chaotic nightmares. It was shortly after 5 a.m. He spent a while thinking about what Norin had told him, then he got up and went to fetch some coffee. It tasted bitter after standing all night. He did not want to go back to his flat yet. He took a shower in the changing room downstairs. By 7.00 he was back at his desk. It was Wednesday, November 24.
He recalled what Hoglund had said a few days earlier: "We seem to have all the data, but we can't see how it hangs together." That's what we must start doing now, Wallander thought. Make everything fit together. He phoned Nyberg at home. "We have to meet," Wallander said.
"I tried to find you yesterday," Nyberg said. "Nobody knew where you were. We have some news."
"We? Who's we?"
"Ann-Britt Hoglund and I."
"About Avanca?"
"I got her to help me. I'm a technician, not a detective."
"I'll see you in my office as soon as you can get here. I'll phone Hoglund."
Half an hour later Nyberg and Hoglund were sitting in Wallander's office. Svedberg put his head round the door. "Do you need me?" he said.
"FHC 803. I haven't got round to looking it up. Could you do that for me, please?"
Svedberg nodded and closed the door.
"Avanca," Wallander said.
"Don't expect too much," Hoglund said. "We've only had a day in which to look into the company and who owns it, but we've already established that it's no longer a family business run by the Romans. The family let the company use their name - and their reputation - and they still have some shares, possibly quite big holdings. But for several years now Avanca has been part of a consortium comprising several different firms associated in some way or other with pharmaceuticals, health care and hospital equipment. It's incredibly complicated, and the firms all seem to be intertwined. The umbrella for the consortium is a holding company in Liechtenstein called Medicom. It is divided up in turn among several owning groups. They include a Brazilian company concerned mainly with producing and exporting coffee. But what's much more interesting is that Medicom has direct financial links with Bayerische Hypotheken-und-Wechsel-Bank."
"Why is that interesting?" Wallander said. He had already lost track of Avanca.
"Because Harderberg owns a plastics factory in Genoa," she said. "They make speedboats."
"I'm lost," Wallander said.
"Here comes the punchline," Hoglund said. "The factory in Genoa is called CFP, whatever that stands for, and helps its customers to arrange funding by way of a sort of leasing contract."
"Avanca, please," Wallander said. "I couldn't care less about Italian plastic boats just now."
"Perhaps you should," Hoglund said. "CFP's leasing contracts are drawn up in cooperation with Bayerische Hypotheken-und-Wechsel-Bank. In other words, there is a link with the Harderberg empire. The first one we've found since the investigation began."