“You’re very upset, I know,” he began, “but we have to have a talk.”
She nodded without replying.
“Let’s see, this morning you discovered that somebody had been in your garden during the night,” Wallander said.
“I could see it right away,” she said.
“What did you do then?”
She looked at him in surprise. “I’ve already told you,” she said. “Do I have to go through everything again?”
“Not everything,” Wallander said, patiently. “You only need to answer the questions I ask you.”
“The sun was coming up,” she said. “I’m an early riser. I looked out at the garden. Somebody had been there. I called the police.”
“Why did you call the police?” Wallander said, watching her carefully.
“What else was I supposed to do?”
“You might have gone out to see what damage had been done, for instance.”
“I didn’t dare.”
“Why not? Because you knew there was something out there that could be dangerous?”
She didn’t answer. Wallander waited. Nyberg shouted angrily in the garden.
“I don’t think you’ve been completely honest with me,” Wallander said. “I think there is something that you ought to tell me.”
She put a hand over her eyes, as if the light in the kitchen was affecting her. Wallander waited. The clock on the kitchen wall showed 11 a.m.
“I’ve been frightened for so long,” she said suddenly, peering up at Wallander as if it were his fault. He waited for more, but in vain.
“People aren’t usually frightened unless there is a cause,” Wallander said. “If the police are going to be able to find out what happened to Gustaf and Sten Torstensson, you have got to help us.”
“I can’t help you,” she said.
Wallander could see that she was liable to break down at any moment. But he pressed on nevertheless.
“You can answer my questions,” he said. “Start by telling me why you’re frightened.”
“Do you know what’s the most scary thing there is?” she said. “It’s other people’s fear. I’d worked thirty years for Gustaf Torstensson. I wasn’t close to him, but I couldn’t avoid noticing the change. There came to be a strange smell about him. His fear.”
“When did you first notice it?”
“Three years ago.”
“Had anything specific happened?”
“Everything was exactly as usual.”
“It’s very important that you try to remember.”
“What do you think I’ve been trying to do all this time?”
Wallander tried to think how best to keep Mrs. Dunér going—despite everything she seemed willing to answer his questions now.
“You never spoke to Mr. Torstensson about it?”
“Never.”
“Not to his son either?”
“I don’t think he’d noticed anything.”
She could be right, Wallander thought. She was Gustaf Torstensson’s secretary, after all.
“Do you really have no explanation for what happened today? You realize that you could have been killed if you had gone into the garden. I think you suspected as much and that’s why you called the police. You’ve been expecting something to happen. But you have no explanation?”
“People started coming to the office during the night,” she said. “Both Gustaf and I noticed. A pen lying differently on a desk, a chair somebody had been sitting on and put back almost in its proper place but not quite.”
“You must have asked him about it,” Wallander said.
“I wasn’t allowed to. He forbade me.”
“So he did speak about these nocturnal visits, then?”
“You can see by looking at a person what you’re not allowed to mention.”
The conversation was interrupted by Nyberg tapping on the window.
“I’ll be back in a moment,” Wallander said. Nyberg was standing outside the kitchen door, holding out his hand. Wallander could see something badly burned, hardly half a centimeter across.
“A plastic land mine,” Nyberg said. “I can confirm that even at this stage. We might possibly be able to find out what type it is, even where it was made. But it’ll take time.”
“Can you say anything about whoever it was who laid the mine?”
“I might have been able to if you hadn’t thrown a directory at it,” Nyberg said.
“It was easy to see,” Wallander said.
“A person who knows what he’s doing can plant a mine so that it’s invisible,” Nyberg said. “Both you and that woman in the kitchen could see that somebody had been digging up the lawn. We’re dealing with amateurs.”
Or somebody who wants us to think that, Wallander thought. But he didn’t say so and went back to the kitchen. He only had one more question.
“Yesterday afternoon you had a visit from an Asian woman,” he said. “Who was she?”
She looked at him in astonishment. “How do you know that?”
“Never mind how,” Wallander said. “Just answer the question.”
“She’s a cleaner, she works at the Torstensson offices,” Mrs Dunér said.
So that was it! Wallander was disappointed.
“What’s her name?”
“Kim Sung-Lee.”
“Where does she live?”
“I have her address at the office.”
“What did she want?”
“She was wondering if she could keep her job.”
“I’d be grateful if you could let me have her address,” Wallander said, standing up.
“What will happen now?”
“You don’t need to be afraid anymore,” Wallander said. “I’ll make sure there’s a police officer on hand. For as long as it’s necessary.”
He told Nyberg he was leaving and went back to the police station. On the way there he stopped at Fridolf’s Café and bought some sandwiches. He shut himself in his office and prepared for his meeting with Björk. But when he went to his office, Björk was not there. The conversation would have to wait.
It was 1 p.m. by the time Wallander knocked on the door of Åkeson’s office at the other end of the long, narrow police station. Every time he was there he was surprised by the chaos that seemed to prevail. The desk was piled high with paper, files were strewn around the floor and on the visitors’ chairs. Along one wall was a barbell and a hastily rolled-up mattress.
“Have you started working out?”
“Not only that,” Åkeson replied with a self-satisfied grin, “I’ve also acquired the good habit of taking a nap after lunch. I’ve just woken up.”
“You mean you sleep here on the floor?”
“A thirty-minute nap,” Åkeson confirmed. “Then I get back to work full of energy.”
“Maybe I should try that,” Wallander said doubtfully.
Åkeson made room for him on one of the chairs by dumping a stack of files onto the floor. Then he sat down and put his feet on the desk.
“I’d almost given up on you,” he said with a smile, “but deep down I always knew you’d be back.”
“It’s been a hell of a time,” Wallander said.
Åkeson became serious. “I really can’t imagine what it must be like killing a man. Never mind if it was self-defense. It must be the only human act from which there’s no going back. I don’t have enough imagination to conjure up anything except a vague image of the abyss.”