When Wallander woke up on the morning of Monday, November 22, he had a headache. He was surprised, as he hadn't had a drop to drink the previous night. Then he realised he hadn't slept well. He had had one horrific nightmare after the other. His father had died suddenly, but when he went to see him in his dream coffin, he hadn't dared to look as he knew it was really Linda lying there.
He got up reluctantly and dissolved two painkillers in half a glass of water. It was still below freezing. As he waited for the coffee water to boil, he thought that his nightmares were a prologue to the meeting he and Bjork were due to have with Akeson that morning. Wallander knew it was going to be tricky. Although he had no doubt Akeson would give them the green light to continue concentrating on Harderberg, he knew that their results had been unsatisfactory so far. They had not been able to get their material to point in any one particular direction. The investigation was drifting. Akeson would, with good reason, want to know how much longer the investigators could go on standing on one leg, as it were.
He scrutinised his wall calendar, coffee mug in hand. Just over a month to go before Christmas. He would say they needed as long as that. If they were no nearer to cracking the case by then, he would have to accept that they would need to start investigating other leads in the new year.
A month, he thought. Something needs to happen pretty fast.
He was interrupted by the phone ringing.
"I hope I didn't wake you up," Hoglund said.
"I'm drinking coffee."
"Do you take Ystad Allehanda?" she said.
"Of course."
"Have you read it today?" she said.
"I haven't even collected it from the letter box."
"Do," she said. "Turn to the job adverts."
Wondering what was going on, he went out into the hall and fetched his paper. Telephone in hand, he started turning to the adverts.
"What am I supposed to be looking for?" he asked.
"You'll see," she said. "See you later."
She hung up. He saw it at once. An advertisement for a stablegirl at Farnholm Castle. To start immediately. That's why she had worded her call the way she did. She had not wanted to mention Farnholm Castle on the telephone.
This could be their chance. As soon as he had got through the meeting with Akeson he would phone his friend Sten Widen.
As Wallander and Bjork settled down in Akeson's office, Akeson told the switchboard they were not to be disturbed. He had a bad cold, and blew his nose frequently.
"I really ought to be at home in bed," he said, "but let's get through this meeting as arranged." He pointed to the heap of files before going on. "You won't be surprised to hear that with the best will in the world, I can't say the results you've achieved so far are satisfactory. A few extremely vague pointers in the direction of Alfred Harderberg is all we've got."
"We need more time," Wallander said. "This is a particularly complicated investigation. We knew it would be from the outset. This is the best lead we've got."
"If we can call it a lead," Akeson interrupted. "You made a case for concentrating on Harderberg, but we haven't really got any further since then. Looking through the material, I'm forced to conclude that we're only marking time. The fraud squad haven't come up with any financial irregularities either. Harderberg seems to be a remarkably honourable gentleman. We have nothing to link him or his businesses directly or indirectly with the murder of Gustaf Torstensson and his son."
"Time," Wallander said again. "That's what we need. We could also stand the whole thing on its head and say that the moment we can definitely exclude Harderberg from our deliberations, we'll be in a better position to approach the case from a different angle."
Bjork said nothing. Akeson looked hard at Wallander.
"I really ought to call a halt to it at this point," he said. "You know that. Convince me that we ought to carry on a little longer concentrating all our efforts on Harderberg."
"The justification is in the paperwork," Wallander said. "I'm still sure we're on the right track. The whole team agrees with me, come to that."
"I still think we ought to consider splitting the team and setting some of them to work from another angle," Akeson said.
"We don't have another angle," Wallander said. "Who fakes an accident to cover up a murder, and why? Why is a solicitor shot in his office? Who plants a mine in an elderly lady's garden? Who blows my car up? Are we supposed to think it could be a madman who's decided for no reason at all that it would be fun to kill off everybody employed by a firm of solicitors in Ystad, and why not a police officer as well while we're at it?"
"You still haven't sifted through all the files of the solicitors' clients," Akeson said. "There's a lot we don't know yet."
"I still think we need more time," Wallander said. "Not unlimited time. But more time."
"I'll give you two weeks," Akeson said. "If you haven't come up with anything more convincing by then, we'll take a new approach."
"That's not enough," Wallander said.
"I could stretch it to three," Akeson said with a sigh.
"Let's take Christmas as the landmark," Wallander said. "If anything crops up before then to suggest that we ought to change course, we can do that straight away. But let's keep going as we are until Christmas."
Akeson turned to Bjork. "What do you think?"
"I'm worried," Bjork said. "I don't think we're getting anywhere either. It's no secret that I've never really believed that Dr Harderberg has anything to do with all this."
Wallander felt the urge to protest, but resisted the temptation. If needs be he would have to accept three weeks.
Akeson turned to the pile of papers on his desk. "What's this about organ transports?" he said. "I read that you'd found a cool box for transporting human organs in Gustaf Torstensson's car. Is that true?"
Wallander told them what Nyberg had discovered, and what they had subsequently managed to find out.
"Avanca," Akeson said. "Is that a company quoted on the Stock Exchange? I've never heard of it."
"It's a small company," Wallander said. "Owned by a family called Roman. They started in the 1930s, importing wheelchairs."
"In other words, it's not owned by Harderberg," Akeson said.
"We don't know that yet."
Akeson eyed Wallander up and down. "How can a company owned by a family called Roman also be owned by Harderberg? You'll have to explain that to me."
"I'll explain when I can," Wallander said. "But what I do know on the basis of what I've learned this last month is that the real owner of a company can be someone quite different from what it says on the company logo."
Akeson shook his head. "You're a hard nut to crack," he said. He consulted his desk diary. "Let's say Monday, December 20. Unless we've made a breakthrough before then. But I'm not going to allow you a single day more if the investigation hasn't produced significant results by then."
"We'll make the most of the time," Wallander said. "I trust you realise that we're busting ourselves here."
"I know," Akeson said. "But the bottom line is that I'm the prosecutor, and I have to do my duty."
The meeting was over. Bjork and Wallander went back to their offices.
"It was good of him to give you as much time as that," Bjork said as they parted in the corridor.
"Give me time?" Wallander said. "You mean us, don't you?"
"You know exactly what I mean," Bjork said. "Let's not waste time discussing it."
"I entirely agree," Wallander said.
When he had got to his office and closed the door, he felt at a loose end. Somebody had put on his desk a photograph of Harderberg's jet parked at Sturup. Wallander glanced at it, then pushed it aside.