When he walked down the airplane steps at Frösön he felt the fierce cold. The ground was white with frost. He rented a car — Veronica Molin would pay for it. He had intended to go straight to Sveg, but changed his mind when he drove onto the bridge from Frösön to Östersund. It was unacceptable not to tell Larsson that he’d come back. What reason should he give? Veronica Molin had contacted him confidentially, but he didn’t want to keep it from Larsson. He had enough problems already.
He parked outside the National Rural Agency but stayed in the car. What should he say to Larsson? He couldn’t tell him the whole truth. On the other hand, he didn’t want to tell a complete lie, even if he had become quite good at it lately. He could come out with a half-truth. Say that he couldn’t handle being in Borås, that he preferred to be somewhere else until the radiation therapy actually started. Someone with his illness had the right to be restless and to change his mind.
He went to the reception desk and asked for Larsson. The girl recognized him from his earlier visit, smiled, and said that Larsson was in a meeting but it would be over soon. Lindman took a seat and thumbed through the local paper. The murder investigation was front-page news. Rundström had held a press conference the previous day. It was largely concerned with the weapon, and there was a new appeal for witnesses. No reference to what the police already knew. Nothing about certain makes of car or individuals moving around in the area. The articles implied that the police were marking time and had nothing to go on. Larsson appeared in reception at 11:30 A.M. He was unshaven and looked tired and worried.
“I should say that I’m surprised to see you, but nothing surprises me at the moment.” He looked more resigned than Lindman had ever seen him before. They went to his office, and he closed the door behind them. Lindman said what he’d made up his mind to say, that he’d come back because he couldn’t settle down in Borås. Larsson eyed him sternly.
“Do you go bowling?” Larsson said.
“Do I go bowling?”
“I do, when I feel restless. I sometimes find it difficult to cope too. Don’t underestimate bowling. It’s best to play with a few friends. The pins you knock over can either be your enemies, or problems you can’t solve that are getting you down.”
“I’ve never tried it.”
“Take it as a friendly suggestion. Nothing more.”
“How’s it going?”
“I saw you reading the local rag. We’ve just had a meeting of the investigative team. Wheels are turning, routines are being followed, everybody’s digging away for all they’re worth. Nevertheless, what Rundström told the reporter is true: we’re getting nowhere.”
“Are there two murderers?”
“Presumably. That’s what the evidence suggests.”
“That doesn’t have to mean that the crimes have different motives.”
Larsson agreed. “That’s what we thought. And then there is the business about the dog. I don’t think it’s a macabre joke: I think it’s a conscious effort to tell us something.”
“What, for example?”
“I don’t know. The fact that we realize that somebody is trying to tell us something has created a sort of constructive chaos. We’re forced to accept that there aren’t any simple answers — not that we ever thought there were.”
Someone laughed in the corridor outside. Then it was quiet again.
“There was a sort of fury about it all,” Larsson said. “About both murders. In Molin’s case an insane fury. Somebody drags him around in a bloodstained tango, lashes him to death, and leaves him in the forest. There was anger behind the death of Andersson as well. More controlled. No dead dogs. No bloodstained dance. But an ice-cold execution. I wonder if these two crimes, displaying such different temperaments, can possibly have been hatched in the same brain. Molin’s murder was meticulously planned. Not least your discovery of the campsite makes that clear. But Andersson’s is different. So far I can’t quite work out how.”
It was obvious that Larsson wanted to know Lindman’s opinion.
“If the murders are linked, and if it’s the same murderer, I suppose we have to assume that something happened subsequently that made it necessary for him to kill Andersson.”
“I agree. My colleagues don’t. Or it could be that I haven’t been able to express myself clearly enough. Anyway, I still think the most likely explanation is two different murderers.”
“It’s strange that nobody’s reported anything. The whole community must be as alert as they are fearful.”
“I’ve been playing this game for many years, but I can’t ever remember knocking on so many doors and making so many appeals without hearing so much as a squeak in response. Generally speaking, there’s always somebody peering out from behind their curtains and noticing something different from the usual village routine.”
“Not hearing anything is also significant, of course. You’re dealing with people who know exactly what they’re doing. Even when a plan goes wrong they can still find a way out very fast, in cold blood.”
“You’re saying ‘them.’ ”
“I’m wavering between one murderer and some kind of plot involving more than one.”
There was a knock on the door. A young man in a leather jacket and with highlights in his dark hair marched in before Larsson had time to respond. He nodded to Lindman and put a bundle of papers down on the desk.
“The latest from the house-to-house operation.”
“Well?”
“A crazy old bat from Glöte claims the murderer lives in Visby.”
“Why?”
“Mostly because the Swedish Lottery has its headquarters there. She thinks the Swedish nation is being attacked by insane gamblers. Half the population is running around and killing off the other half to make it easier for them to submit their lottery tickets. That’s your pile.”
The door closed behind him.
“He’s new,” Larsson said. “New, confident, and dyes his hair. He’s a recruit of the type that goes out of his way to stress that he’s young and the rest of us are ancient. He’ll be okay when he grows up.”
He stood up.
“I like talking to you,” he said. “You listen, and you ask the questions I need to hear. I’d like to go on a little longer, but I have an appointment with the forensic boys that can’t wait.”
Larsson went with him as far as reception.
“How long are you thinking of staying?”
“I don’t know.”
“The same hotel in Sveg?”
“Is there another one?”
“A good question. I don’t know. There should be a bed-and-breakfast, I suppose.”
Lindman remembered a question he’d almost let slip. “Have they released Molin’s body for burial yet?”
“I can find out, if you like. I’ll be in touch.”
Driving to Sveg, he remembered what Larsson had said about bowling. He stopped just north of Överberg and got out. It was completely calm and chilly. The ground under his feet was hard. I’m giving way to self-pity, he thought. I’m locking myself up in doom and gloom, and it’s not doing me any good. I’m usually a cheerful type, not at all like the man I seem to be right now. Larsson is quite right when he goes on about bowling. I don’t have to ever aim a single bowling bowl at a row of pins, but I have to take what he’s trying to tell me seriously. I’m trying to convince myself that I’m going to overcome this illness, but at the same time I’m doing my best to play the role of a man on death row, beyond hope.