“Where are you?”
“I went home.”
“Why? Couldn’t you get a hold of Molin?”
“Modin. Robert Modin. No, I started feeling like it wasn’t such a good idea after all.”
“Why not?”
“You know how it is. There are regulations stipulating that we can’t simply bring in whoever we want on a case from outside the force. And Modin has been convincted of a crime — even if his jail time was only a month or so.”
Martinsson was getting cold feet. That had happened before. At times it had even led to conflicts between them. Sometimes Wallander thought Martinsson was too careful. He never used the word “cowardly,” but that was what he meant deep down.
“Strictly speaking, we should get Viktorsson’s approval first,” Martinsson continued. “At the very least we should talk to Lisa.”
“You know I’ll take full responsibility on this,” Wallander said.
“Even so.”
Martinsson had clearly made up his mind on the matter.
“Give me Modin’s address,” Wallander said. “That way you’ll be absolved of all responsibility.”
“You don’t think we should wait?”
“No. Time is running out and I want to know what’s in that computer.”
“What you really need to do is sleep, you know. Have you looked in the mirror recently?”
“Yes, I know,” Wallander said. “Now give me the address.”
He found a pen in the glove compartment, which was stuffed full of papers and folded-up paper plates from fast-food kiosks. Wallander wrote down what Martinsson said on the back of a gas receipt.
“It’s almost midnight,” Martinsson said.
“I know,” Wallander said. “See you tomorrow.”
He hung up and put his phone down on the passenger seat. But before he started the engine, he thought about what Martinsson had said. He was right about one thing. They needed to sleep. What was the point of going out to Löderup in the middle of the night? Robert Modin was probably sleeping. I’ll let it go until tomorrow, he thought.
He started the car and headed east in the direction of Löderup.
He drove fast to try to wake himself up. He wasn’t even acting on his own decisions anymore.
He didn’t need to consult the scrap of paper with the address. He’d known exactly where it was even as he had been writing it down. It was an area only a few kilometers from where his father’s house had been. Wallander also had the feeling that he had met Robert Modin’s father before somewhere. He rolled down the window and let the cold air wash over his face. He was irritated with both Hansson and Martinsson right now. They re bending to pressure, he thought. Kowtowing to their boss.
He turned off the main highway at a quarter past twelve. There was a good chance that he was about to arrive at a dark house whose inhabitants were sleeping. But his anger and irritation had chased the tiredness away from his own body. He wanted to see Robert Modin. And he wanted to take him to Runnerström Square.
He arrived at the house, which was in a rural area. There was a large garden, and a paddock to one side with a lone horse. The house was whitewashed. There were a jeep and a smaller car parked in front. There were still lights on in several of the downstairs windows.
Wallander turned off his engine and got out of the car. At the same time, the porch light came on and a man walked out of the house. Wallander had been right. They had met before somewhere.
He walked over and greeted the man, who was around sixty, thin and slightly bowed. His hands didn’t feel like a farmer’s.
“I recognize you,” Modin said. “Your father lived not too far from here.”
“I know we’ve met before,” Wallander said. “But I can’t remember the context.”
“Your father was out walking in one of the fields around here,” Modin said. “He was carrying a suitcase.”
Wallander remembered that time. His father had had one of his episodes of confusion and had decided to go to Italy. He had packed his suitcase and started walking. Modin had seen him tromping through the mud and had called the police station.
“I haven’t seen you since he passed away,” Modin said. “The house is sold, of course.”
“Gertrud moved to be close to her sister in Svarte. I don’t even know who ended up buying the place.”
“It’s some man from up north who claims to be a businessman,” Modin said. “I suspect he’s actually a moonshiner.”
Wallander had an image of his father’s studio converted into a brew house.
“I guess you’ve come on account of Robert,” Modin said suddenly.
“I thought he had paid for his sins?”
“I’m sure he has,” Wallander said. “Though you’re right that I’m here to see him.”
“What’s he done now?”
Wallander heard the dread in the father’s voice.
“Nothing, nothing. In fact, it seems he may be able to help us with something.”
Modin looked surprised at this, but also relieved. He nodded at the door and Wallander followed him inside.
“The wife’s sleeping,” Modin said. “She wears earplugs.”
Wallander remembered that Modin was a surveyor. He didn’t know how he knew this.
“Is Robert here?”
“He’s at a party with some friends. But he has his phone with him.”
Modin showed him into the living room.
Wallander jumped. One of his father’s paintings was hanging over the sofa. It was the landscape motif without the wood grouse in the foreground.
“He gave it to me,” Modin said. “Whenever it snowed a lot, I would go over and shovel his driveway for him. Sometimes I stopped by and we talked. He was an unusual man, in his own way.”
“That’s an understatement,” Wallander said.
“I liked him. There aren’t too many of his kind anymore.”
“He wasn’t always easy to deal with,” Wallander said. “But I miss him. And it’s true that old men like him are getting more rare. One day there won’t be any left.”
“Who is easy to deal with, anyway?” Modin said. “Are you? I don’t think I could say that about myself. Just ask my wife.”
Wallander sat down on the couch. Modin was cleaning out his pipe.
“Robert is a good boy,” he said. “I thought he was given a harsh sentence, even if it was only a month. The whole thing was just a game to him.”
“I don’t know the whole story,” Wallander said, “other than that he broke into the Pentagon’s computer network.”
“He’s very good with computers,” Modin said. “He bought his first one when he was nine years old, with money he had saved up from picking strawberries. Then he was swallowed up by it. But as long as he continued to do all right in school, it was fine with me. Of course my wife was against it from the start, and now she feels justified by what happened.”
Wallander had the feeling that Modin was a somewhat lonely person, but however much he would have liked to sit and chat with him, Wallander had to move on. There was no time to waste.
“I need to get a hold of Robert as soon as possible,” he said. “His computer expertise may help us with a case.”
Modin puffed on his pipe.
“Can I ask in what way?”
“I can only tell you that it involves some complicated computer programming we’d like his opinion on.”
Modin nodded and got up.
“I won’t ask any more questions.”
He walked out into the hall. Soon Wallander heard him speaking on the phone. He twisted around on the couch to look at his father’s painting.