“When are you coming home?” she said again.
“Soon.”
“They’ve raised the rent again.”
“Think of me in your prayers.”
“Because they’ve raised the rent?”
“Don’t worry about the rent. Just think of me. Every morning and every night.”
“Do you think of me when you say your prayers?”
“I don’t say any prayers, Maria, you know that. You’re the one who does that job in our household. I have to go now. I’ll call again later.”
“When?”
“I can’t say. Goodbye, Maria.”
He put the phone down, and at once it occurred to him that he should have told her he loved her, even if he didn’t. After all, she was the one who was always around, she’d be the one who held his hand when he was dying. He wondered if what he’d told her had sunk in.
He stood up and went over to one of the low windows. It was light outside now. He looked at the mountains, and in his mind’s eye he could also see Maria, sitting in the plush red armchair next to the little table with the telephone.
He needed to get back home.
He made some coffee and opened the front door to let in some air. If anybody were to come along the path to the house, he knew what he would say. He’d tell them he’d killed Molin, but not the other man. But nobody would come, he was convinced of that. He was alone here. He could make this little chalet his base while he tried to find out what had happened to Andersson.
There was a framed photograph on a shelf. Two children were sitting on the stone slab under which he’d found the key, smiling at the camera. He took it down and looked at the back. He could just about make out a date: 1998. It also said “Stockholm.” He searched for the name of the owner of the cabin. He found an invoice from an appliance store in Sveg addressed to a man by the name of Frostengren with a home address in Stockholm. That persuaded him that he need have no fear of being disturbed. The chalet was a long way off the beaten track, and November was not a month for hikers or skiers. The only thing he’d have to avoid was being seen when he got onto the main road. He’d also better keep an eye on the other cottages whenever he left or returned, to make sure that they were closed up for the winter.
He spent the rest of the day in the chalet. He slept a lot, dreamlessly, and woke up without feeling restless. He drank coffee, grilled a hamburger, and occasionally went out to look at the mountains. At about 2 P.M. it started raining. He switched on the light over the table in the living room and sat by the window to work out what to do next.
There was only one obvious and absolutely incontrovertible starting point: Aron Silberstein or Fernando Hereira, whoever he happened to be at the time, had committed murder. If he’d been a believer, like Maria, that would have ensured eternal hell. He was not a believer, however; as far as he was concerned there were no gods, apart from those he occasionally created for himself in moments of weakness, and then only fleetingly. Gods were for the poor and weak. He was neither poor nor weak. Even as a child he’d cultivated a thick skin, which had become part of his nature as the years went by. He was unsure if he was first and foremost a Jew or a German emigrant to Argentina. Neither the Jewish religion and traditions nor the Jewish community had given him any assistance in life.
He had visited Jerusalem once, in the late 1960s. It was after the first of the wars with Egypt, and it was in no sense a pilgrimage. He’d made the journey out of curiosity and perhaps as a penance for his father, an apology for not yet having traced the man who killed him. Staying at the same hotel as Silberstein in Jerusalem was an old Jewish gentleman from Chicago, an orthodox believer, and they’d often eaten breakfast together. Isak Sadler was a friendly man. With a friendly smile that did not disguise the fact that he was still astonished at how it happened, he told Silberstein how he survived a concentration camp. When the U.S. troops arrived to liberate them, Sadler was so emaciated that he’d had to use his last reserves of strength to let the Americans know he was still alive and shouldn’t be buried. After that it seemed only natural that he should go to America and spend the rest of his life there. One morning they’d spoken about Eichmann, and discussed the principle of revenge. It had been a depressing time for Silberstein. He’d grown resigned by the end of the 1960s, and supposed that he would never be able to trace the man who’d killed his father.
However, his conversations with Sadler had given him the inspiration to take up the search once more. Sadler had argued very strongly that the execution of Eichmann had been appropriate. The hunt for German Nazis must continue for as long as there was the slightest hope of finding alive anyone who had been associated with the horrendous crimes.
When he returned from Jerusalem, Silberstein had cared no more about his Jewish origins, but he’d resumed his search and received assistance from Simon Wiesenthal in Vienna, although it led to nothing. He didn’t know it at the time, but he would have to wait until Höllner appeared before he found the clue he’d been looking for.
He sat in the chalet belonging to the man named Frostengren, gazing at the mountains and valleys. He’d managed to find a needle in a haystack, and when the moment of truth came, he hadn’t hesitated. Molin was dead. Everything had gone according to plan up to that point. Then they’d found the other man, murdered in the woods outside his own house.
There were similarities between the two deaths, as if whoever killed Andersson had imitated what Silberstein had done with Molin. Two old men who lived on their own. Both had a dog. Both were killed in the open. Yet more important were the differences. He couldn’t tell how much the police had noticed, but he could see the differences because he had had nothing to do with Andersson’s death.
Silberstein looked at the mountains. Clouds of mist drifted down to the valley. He was close now to a decision. Whoever killed Andersson had tried to make it look as if the same murderer had come back to strike again. This raised an intriguing question: who knew so much about the way Molin died? Silberstein did not know what had been in the newspapers, and he had no idea what the police had revealed at the press conferences they’d presumably held.
There was another “why” that he was trying to find an answer to. The person who killed Andersson must have had a motive. A spring had been wound up, it seemed to him. When Molin died, it triggered some mechanism that meant Andersson had to be killed as well. Why, and by whom? He spent the whole day analyzing these questions from different points of view. He made lots of meals, not because he was especially hungry, but to quell his nervousness. He couldn’t help worrying that somehow, he was responsible for what happened to Andersson. Was there a secret between the two men? Was there a risk that Andersson might reveal it after Molin’s death? That must have been it. Something he hadn’t known about. Molin’s death meant that somebody had been put in danger, and therefore Andersson had to die as well to prevent the secret from coming out.
He opened the door and went outside. It smelled of damp moss. Clouds were drifting past, very low. Clouds in complete silence. He walked slowly around the wooden chalet, then once again.
Another person had appeared in the place where Molin and Andersson lived their lives. A woman. He’d seen her three times when she came to visit Molin. He’d followed them when they went for walks on forest tracks. Once, during her second visit, they’d gone towards the lake and he’d been afraid they might discover his tent. Luckily they turned back before they came to the last bend. He’d followed them through the trees, like a Boy Scout or one of those Red Indians he’d read about as a child, in the books by Edward S. Ellis. Sometimes they talked, and very occasionally they laughed.