Henning Mankell: An Event in Autumn: A Kurt Wallander Mystery

Wallander said nothing. He didn’t doubt for a moment that what he had just heard was true. Every single word.

The abandoned horse and caravan in October 1942 had been a red herring. It had remained a red herring for sixty years.

There was disappointment, but at the same time relief in the knowledge that they hadn’t wasted a lot of energy unnecessarily.

“Why are you asking about all this?”

“An investigation that has to be concluded. Two skeletons have been discovered in somebody’s garden. Perhaps you’ve read about it in the newspapers? I’ll leave the business of the grocer’s shop in Limhamn to my colleagues in Malmö for the time being.”

“It wasn’t me.”

“I heard you say that.”

“Can I go now?”

“Yes, you can.”

He accompanied her to reception.

“I liked them,” she said before leaving. “Both Grandad and Grandma. They were odd people, both secretive and open at the same time. I just wish I could have spent more time with them than turned out to be possible.”

Wallander watched her walk away in her high-heeled boots. It occurred to him that she was somebody he would never meet again in this life. But not somebody he would forget all about.

Shortly before twelve he talked briefly to Martinson and Lindman. He explained that the lead had gone cold. They could drop it and move on. Then he informed the prosecutor.

Wallander took the rest of the day off. He bought a new shirt in a shop down in the square, had a pizza at the restaurant next door, then went home to Mariagatan.

When Linda came in that evening, he was already asleep.

The following day was a clear December day with glittering sunshine. Wallander got up early and went for a long walk by the sea before deciding at eight o’clock that it was time to become a police officer again, and headed for the station. They would be forced to take a step backward, and restart the investigation where they had left it when the Simon Larsson lead cropped up.

Before he got down to business, however, there was a telephone call he needed to make. He looked up the number. It rang several times before anybody answered.

“Larsson.”

“It’s Wallander. Nice to see you the other day.”

“Ditto.”

“I just wanted to tell you that we’ve looked into the information you gave us — but there was a natural explanation. Would you like me to tell you what it was?”

“I’m interested, of course.”

Wallander spelled it out. Simon Larsson listened in silence.

“Well, at least I now know what really happened,” he said. “I’m sorry I landed you with unnecessary work.”

“Nothing is unnecessary,” said Wallander. “You know what being a police officer involves. In many cases it is just as important to eliminate leads as it is to find them.”

“Maybe that’s the way it was. But I’m so old now that I don’t remember much of my time in the police.”

“There’s nothing wrong with your memory. You’ve proved that already.”

Wallander could feel that Simon Larsson wanted to continue talking. Even though they had no more to say, he kept the conversation going. Wallander thought of the woman he had seen lying asleep on top of the bed.

He eventually managed to end the call, and couldn’t help wondering what growing old entailed. How would he manage it himself? Becoming ancient and unable to stop talking?

At nine o’clock they assembled in the conference room.

“We’ll have to start up again where we finished,” said Wallander. “There is a solution to this mystery, even if we can’t see it at the moment.”

“I agree with you,” said Martinson. “Sweden is a small country, but it has unusually good records of the people who live here. It was the same sixty years ago, even if people then didn’t have the personal numbers that accompany us from the cradle to the grave. Somebody must have missed those people. Somebody must have asked after them.”

Wallander had an idea.

“You’re right. Somebody ought to have missed them. Two middle-aged people who disappeared. But if we think that nobody actually did miss them after all, that nobody did ask after them — surely that’s meaningful in itself?”

“Nobody misses them because nobody knows they went missing?”

“Possibly. It could just as well be that somebody did in fact miss them — but not here.”

“Now you’ve lost me.”

Stefan Lindman joined in the conversation.

“You’re thinking about the Second World War. We spoke about it earlier. Skåne was an isolated province, surrounded by countries at war. British and German bombers made emergency landings here in our fields, refugees arrived from all over the place.”

“Something like that, yes,” said Wallander. “I don’t want us to jump to conclusions too soon. I just want us to keep all our options open. There are lots of possible explanations, not just those that our experience tells us are the most likely ones. There might also be an explanation that we haven’t really thought of yet. That’s all I meant.”

“It wasn’t all that unusual for people to earn a bit of extra cash by looking after and letting rooms to refugees.”

“Who paid?”

“The refugees had their own organizations. People who had money helped those who hadn’t. It produced some extra income for farmers — especially as they probably didn’t pay any tax on it.”

Martinson reached for a file lying on the table.

“We’ve received an additional report from Stina Hurlén,” he said. “Nothing that changes anything we know already. The only thing is she says that the woman had bad teeth while the man’s were more or less perfect.”

“Do you think there are dental records that go that far back?”

“That wasn’t what I was thinking about. Nor was Stina Hurlén. It was merely a statement of fact. One of the skulls had lots of mended teeth, the other one had perfect teeth. That also tells a story, even if we don’t know what it is.”

Wallander noted down the information about the teeth on a sheet of paper in his file.

“Has she written anything else?”

“Nothing that seems significant just now. The man had broken his arm at some point. His left arm. That might be helpful to know if we get close to identifying them.”

“Not if,” said Wallander. “When. In any case, we must find out how things stand with old dental records.”

They ran through all the investigation material one more time. There were a lot of possibilities that they hadn’t yet started to look into. They broke up as lunch-time approached, having made plans for the next few days.

Martinson had more to say to Wallander after Stefan Lindman had left.

“What about the house? What shall we do about that?”

“It doesn’t seem very important just now. As I’m sure you understand.”

“Of course. But I thought you should have a bit more time. My wife agrees with me. It could be that you’ll view things differently once we’ve identified the skeletons, all being well.”

Wallander shook his head.

“I think you should look for another buyer,” he said. “I wouldn’t be able to live in a place that’s probably the scene of a crime. Nothing can change that, even if we manage to solve the case.”

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely certain.”

Martinson seemed disappointed. But he said nothing, merely left the room. Wallander opened a bottle of mineral water and sat with his feet up on the table.

He had been on the point of buying a house. But his vision of the house had been undermined by two dead bodies that had been lying in the ground for many years, and now had come up to the surface.