Before the Frost Read online

  “Have you told your mom?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t know. I suppose I’m still in shock.”

  “I’d say you’re still not fully convinced it was him.”

  Anna looked at her with pleading eyes.

  “I know it was. If it wasn’t, my brain has suffered a major short-circuit. That’s why I asked you if you’ve ever been afraid you were going crazy.”

  “But why would he come back now, after twenty-four years? Why would he turn up in Malmö and look at you through a hotel window—how did he know you were there?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Anna got up again, making the same journey to the window and back.

  “Sometimes I wonder if he really disappeared at all. Maybe he just chose to make himself invisible.”

  “But why would he have done that?”

  “Because he wasn’t up to it, to life. I don’t mean just his responsibilities for me or my mom. He was probably looking for something more. That search drove him away from us. Or perhaps he was only trying to get away from himself. There are people who dream about being like a snake, about changing their skin from time to time. But maybe he’s been here all along, much closer than I realized.”

  “You wanted me to listen to you and then tell you what I thought. You say you’re sure it was him, but I can’t accept it. It’s too close to a childhood fantasy, that he would suddenly turn back up in your life. I’m sorry, but twenty-four years is too long.”

  “I know it was him. It was my dad. I’m not wrong about this.”

  They had reached an impasse. Linda sensed that Anna wanted to be left alone now, just as she had earlier craved some company.

  “I think you should tell your mom,” Linda said as she got up to leave. “Tell her that you saw him, or someone you thought was him.”

  “You still don’t believe me?”

  “What I believe is neither here nor there. You’re the only one who knows what you saw. But you have to admit it sounds far-fetched. I’m not saying that I think you’re making it up; obviously you have no reason to. I’m just saying it’s very unusual for a person who’s been gone as long as your dad has to turn up again, that’s all. Sleep on it and we’ll talk about it tomorrow. I can come by around five—is that good for you?”

  “I know it was him.”

  Linda frowned. There was something in Anna’s voice that sounded shrill and hollow. Is she making it up after all? Linda thought. There’s something that doesn’t ring true in all of this. But why would she lie to me?

  Linda walked home through the deserted town. Some teenagers were standing in a group outside the movie theater on Stora Östergatan. She wondered if they could see her invisible uniform.

  6

  The following day Anna Westin disappeared without a trace. Linda immediately knew that something was wrong when she rang Anna’s doorbell at five o’clock and no one answered. She rang the bell a few more times and shouted Anna’s name through the mail slot, but still no one answered. After thirty minutes Linda took out a set of passkeys that a fellow student had given her. He had bought a collection of them on a trip to the United States and given them out to all his friends. In secret they had then spent a number of hours learning how to use them. By now Linda was proficient with any standard lock.

  She picked Anna’s lock without difficulty and walked in. She toured the empty, well-kept rooms. Nothing seemed amiss; the dishes were done and the dish towels hanging neatly on the rack. Anna was orderly by nature. What had happened? Linda sat down on the sofa in the same spot as the night before. Anna believes she saw her father, she thought. And now she disappears herself. Of course these two events are connected—but how? Linda sat for a long time, ostensibly trying to think it through, but in reality she was simply waiting for Anna to come back.

  The day had started early for Linda. She had left for the police station at seven-thirty in order to meet with Martinsson, one of Kurt Wallander’s oldest colleagues who happened to have been assigned to be her supervisor. They were not going to be working together, as Linda—like the other new recruits—would be assigned to a patrol car with experienced colleagues. But Martinsson was the senior officer she would turn to with questions should the need arise. Linda remembered him from when she was little. Martinsson had been a young man then. According to her father, Martinsson had often thought of quitting. Wallander had managed to talk him out of it on at least three occasions over the last ten years.

  Linda had asked her father if he had had anything to do with Lisa Holgersson’s decision to assign Martinsson as her mentor, but he vehemently denied any involvment. His intention was to stay as far away from any matters concerning her work as possible, he said. Linda had accepted this declaration with a grain of salt. If there was one thing she feared, it was precisely that he would interfere with her work. That was the reason she had hesitated so long before deciding to apply for work in Ystad. She thought about working in another area of the country, but this was where she had ended up. In retrospect it seemed fated.

  Martinsson met her by the front desk and escorted her to his office. He had a picture of his smiling wife and their two children on his desk. Linda wondered whose picture she was going to have on hers. That decision was part of the everyday reality waiting for her. Martinsson started by talking about the two officers she was teamed up with.

  “They’re both fine officers,” he said. “Ekman can give the impression of being a bit tired and worn-out, but no one has a better grasp of police work than he does. Sundin is his polar opposite and focuses on the little things. He still tickets people who cross against a red light. But he knows what it means to be a policeman. You’ll be in good hands.”

  “What do they say about working with a woman?”

  “If they have anything to say about that, ignore them. It’s not how it was even ten years ago.”

  “And my father?”

  “What about him?”

  “What do they say about my being his daughter?”

  Martinsson waited a moment before answering.

  “There are probably one or two people in the station who would be happy to see you fall on your face. But you must have known that coming in.”

  Then they talked at length about the state of affairs in the Ystad police district. The “state of affairs” was something Linda had heard about at home from early childhood, as she played under the table with the sounds of clinking glass and the voice of her father and a colleague discussing the latest difficulties above her. She had never heard of a positive “state of affairs”; there was always something to lament. A substandard shipment of uniforms, detrimental changes in patrol cars or radio systems, a rise in crime statistics, poor recruitment numbers, and the like. In fact, this ongoing discussion about the “state of affairs,” about how this day was different from the day before, seemed to be central to life on the force. But it’s not an art they taught us at the academy, Linda thought. I know a lot about how to break up a fight in the main square and very little about pronouncing judgments on the general state of affairs.

  They went to the lunchroom for a cup of coffee. Martinsson’s assessment of the situation was fairly concise: there were too few officers working in the field.

  “Crime has never paid as well as it does today, it seems. I’ve been researching this. To find a historical equivalent you have to look back as far as the fifteenth century, before Gustav Vasa pulled the nation together. In that time, the era of small city-states, there was widespread lawlessness and criminality just as there is today. We’re not in the business of upholding law and order. We’re just trying to keep this spread of lawlessness from getting any worse.”

  Martinsson followed her out into the reception area.

  “I hope all this talk hasn’t depressed you. We certainly don’t need more demoralized police officers—in order to be a good police officer you’ll need all the courage and faith you can muster. A chee
rful disposition also helps.”

  “Like my dad?”

  Martinsson smiled.

  “Kurt Wallander is very good at his job,” he said. “You know that. But he’s not renowned for being the life of the party around here, as I’m also sure you’ve already figured out.”

  Before she left, he asked her about her reaction to the murdered officer. She told him about the cadet ball, the TV in the kitchen, and its effect on the festivities.

  “It’s always a blow,” Martinsson said. “It affects all of us, as if we’re suddenly surrounded by invisible guns out there aimed at our heads. Whenever a colleague is killed a lot of us think about leaving the force, but in the end most people choose to stay. And I’m one of them.”

  Linda left the station and walked to the apartment building in the eastern part of Ystad where Zeba lived. She thought about what Martinsson had told her—and what he had left out. That was something her father had drilled into her: always listen for what is left unsaid. That could prove to be the most important thing. But she didn’t find anything like that in her conversation with Martinsson. He strikes me as the simple and straightforward type, she thought. Not someone who tries to read people’s invisible signals.

  She only stayed at Zeba’s briefly because Zeba’s boy had a stomach ache and cried the whole time. They decided to meet over the weekend when they would be able to have some peace and quiet to discuss the cadet ball and the success of Zeba’s handiwork.

  But the twenty-seventh of August did not go down in Linda’s mind as the day she met with Martinsson, her mentor. It would be filed away in her mind as the day that Anna disappeared. After Linda had let herself into the apartment by picking the lock, she sat on the sofa and tried to recall Anna’s voice telling her about the man who met her gaze through the hotel window and who bore a striking resemblance to her father. What was it she had really been trying to say? She had insisted that it was her father. That was like Anna—she sounded convincing even when she was claiming as facts things that were imagined or invented. But she was never late for an appointment, nor would she forget a date with a friend.

  Linda walked through the apartment again, stopping in front of the bookcase by Anna’s desk in the dining room. The books were mostly novels, she determined as she read the titles, as well as one or two travel guides. Not a single medical textbook. Linda frowned. The only thing even close to a textbook was a volume on common ailments, the kind of encyclopedia a lay person would have. There’s something missing, she thought. These don’t look like the bookshelves of a medical student.

  She proceeded to the kitchen and took note of the refrigerator contents. There were the usual food items, a sense of future use suggested by an unopened carton of milk with a September 2 expiration date. Linda went back into the living room and returned to the question of why a medical student would have no textbooks in her bookcase. Did she keep them somewhere else? But that made no sense. She lived in Ystad, and she had often told Linda she did most of her studying here.

  Linda waited. At seven o’clock she called her father, who answered with his mouth full.

  “I thought you were coming home for dinner tonight,” he grumbled.

  Linda hesitated before answering. She was torn between wanting to tell him about Anna and saying nothing.

  “Something came up.”

  “What is it?”

  “Something personal.”

  Her father growled on the other end.

  “I had a meeting with Martinsson today.”

  “I know.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “He told me—only that you met. Nothing else. Don’t worry.”

  Linda went back to the couch. At eight she called Zeba and asked her if she knew where Anna could be, but Zeba hadn’t heard from Anna in several days. At nine o’clock, after she had helped herself to food from Anna’s small pantry and fridge, she dialed Henrietta’s number. The phone rang a number of times before Anna’s mother answered. Linda tried to approach the subject as carefully as possible so as not to alarm the already fragile woman. Did she know if Anna was in Lund? Had she planned a trip to Malmö or Copenhagen? Linda asked the most harmless questions she could think of.

  “I haven’t talked to her since Thursday.”

  That’s four days ago, Linda thought. That means Anna never told her about the man she saw through the hotel window, even though they’re close.

  “Why do you want to know where she is?”

  “I called her and there was no answer.”

  She sensed a tinge of anxiety on the other end.

  “But you don’t call me every time Anna doesn’t answer her phone.”

  Linda was prepared for this question.

  “I had a sudden impulse to have her over for dinner tonight. That was all.”

  Linda steered the conversation over to her own life.

  “Have you heard I’m going to start working here in Ystad?”

  “Yes, Anna told me. But neither one of us understands why you would want to be a policewoman.”

  “If I’d gone on learning how to refinish furniture as planned, I’d always have tacks in my mouth. A life in law enforcement just seemed more entertaining.”

  A clock struck somewhere in Anna’s apartment and Linda quickly ended the conversation. Then she thought it all through again. Anna wasn’t a risk-taker. In contrast to Zeba and herself, Anna hated rollercoasters, was suspicious of strangers, and never climbed into a cab without looking the driver in the eye first. The simplest explanation was that Anna was still disconcerted by what she thought she had seen. She must have gone back to Malmö to look for the man she thought was her father. This is the first time she’s ever stood me up, Linda thought. But this is also the first time she’s been convinced she saw her father walking down the street.

  Linda stayed in the apartment for several more hours.

  By midnight Anna had still not returned.

  Then she knew. There was no good explanation for Anna’s absence. Something must have happened. But what?

  7

  When Linda got home shortly after midnight, she found her father asleep on the couch. He woke up at the sound of the closing door. Linda eyed the curve of his belly with disapproval.

  “You’re getting fatter,” she said. “One day you’re just going to pop. Not like an old troll who wanders out into the sunshine but like a balloon when it gets too full of air.”

  He pulled his robe tighter across his chest protectively.

  “I do the best I can.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  He sat up heavily.

  “I’m too tired to have this conversation,” he said. “When you walked in I was in the middle of a beautiful dream. Do you remember Baiba?”

  “The one from Latvia? Are you still in touch with each other?”

  “About once a year, no more. She’s found someone else, a German engineer who works at the municipal waterworks in Riga. She sounds very much in love when she talks about him, the wonderful Herman from Lübeck. I’m surprised it doesn’t drive me insane with jealousy.”

  “You were dreaming about her?”

  He smiled.

  “We had a child in the dream,” he said. “A little boy who was building castles in the sand. An orchestra was playing in the distance and Baiba and I just stood there watching him. In my dream I thought, ‘This is no dream, this is real’ and I was incredibly happy.”

  “And you complain about having too many nightmares.”

  He wasn’t listening.

  “The door opened—that was you, of course—a car door. It was summer and very warm. The whole world was full of light like an overexposed picture. Everyone’s face was white and without any shadows. It was beautiful. We were about to drive away when I woke up.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He shrugged.

  “It was just a dream.”

  Linda wanted to tell him about Anna, but her dad lumbered out into the kitchen and dran
k some water from the faucet. Linda followed him, and when he was done he stood up and looked at her, smoothing his hair down in the back.

  “You were out late. It’s none of my business, I know, but I have an idea you want me to ask you about it.”

  Linda told him. He leaned against the refrigerator with his arms crossed. This is how I remember him from my childhood, she thought. This is how he always listened to me, like a giant. I used to think my dad was as big as a mountain. Daddy Mountain.

  He shook his head when she finished.

  “That’s not how it happens.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “That’s not how people disappear.”

  “But it’s not like her. I’ve known her since I was seven. She’s never been late for anything.”

  “However idiotic it sounds, some time has to be the first. Let’s say she was preoccupied by the fact that she thought she had seen her father. It’s not unlikely that she—as you suggested yourself—went back to look for him.”

  Linda nodded. He was right. There was no reason to assume anything else had happened.

  Wallander sat down on the sofa.

  “You’ll learn that all events have their own logic. People kill each other, lie, break into houses, commit robberies, and sometimes they simply disappear. If you winch yourself far enough down the well—that’s how I often think of my investigations—you’ll find the explanation. It turns out that it was highly probable that such and such a person disappeared, that another robbed a bank. I’m not saying the unexpected never happens, but people are almost never right when they say ‘I never would have believed that about her.’ Think it over and scrape away the layers of exterior paint and you’ll find other colors underneath, other answers.”