DI Barbarotti gave a modest little cough. ‘Hrrm, I think it might be because that case is solved,’ he said. ‘Might be, at any rate.’

  ‘You’ve solved it?’ exclaimed Eva Backman. ‘You know who PIZ and ZIP are, then?’

  ‘I’m not certain,’ said Barbarotti. ‘But my solution is on Asunander’s desk, so you might say the ball’s in his court now.’

  ‘What the heck are you on about?’ asked Backman.

  ‘Maybe we can leave that until we get back,’ suggested Barbarotti. ‘I think we ought to concentrate on what’s happened down in Maardam.’

  ‘All right,’ sighed Eva Backman. ‘Oh bollocks!’

  ‘What is it?’ said Barbarotti.

  ‘Our family pow-wow,’ she groaned, scrabbling for her mobile. ‘I completely forgot to call it off. Pipe down for a minute, I must get hold of Ville and tell him what’s happened. If they cancel their training session and I don’t show up, I shall lose custody and the house and the whole shebang.’

  ‘Never a dull moment working with you,’ said Barbarotti. ‘Hardly ever, anyway.’

  ‘Shut up,’ said DI Backman.

  48

  No skimping at the end.

  Someone had said that to him long ago, he couldn’t remember who. It sounded like something Uncle Leopold would have said, around the time of the funeral, but Valdemar was not entirely sure it had been him.

  Whatever the case, he remembered the advice: No skimping.

  He was aware of a kind of lightness inside him as he walked round the centre of Maardam, buying the things he needed. There were really only two – a fiendishly sharp knife and a fiendishly expensive whisky – but he took his time. No rushing either, he thought. At the end.

  He had lunch at an outdoor cafe. It was beside a canal. The weather was nice and he treated himself to two glasses of red wine with his pasta, and left a generous tip. He stayed on for a while over a cup of coffee, smoking his pipe and watching the dark water, the trees with their branches almost dipping into it and the moored boats bobbing up and down.

  The people strolling by. All sorts.

  Never better than this.

  It took a couple of hours to find a good forest. He drove west, into the sun, and he was still not rushing. He left the motorway at random, at the junction for a place called Linzhuizen, turned onto a narrower road that led south, drove on through a small place with a name he couldn’t pronounce, starting with Sz–, then through an even smaller one called Weid, and eventually eased the car along the base of a tree-covered ridge running parallel to the road, along by a little river.

  He crossed the river via a narrow iron bridge and turned left onto a simple dirt road heading up over the ridge. The road wound its way in gentle curves, a couple of hairpins, too, and eventually came to a car park that seemed to be the starting point for a footpath for walkers.

  Here, he thought. He turned in, parked and switched off the engine. This is it.

  There was still some warmth in the air as he got out of the car. Hardly a breath of wind, and way down in the valley he could hear a dog barking. There were no other vehicles in the parking area, just a rubbish bin and a little noticeboard telling him that there was a choice of three walking routes, marked in red, yellow and white.

  He opted for the red one. The noticeboard proclaimed it to be 6.2 km long. It doesn’t matter, he thought, I won’t be doing the whole thing anyway.

  He put what he needed in a plastic carrier bag and set off.

  Whisky, knife, notebook and pen.

  When he had been walking for about twenty minutes, he could suddenly hear his father’s voice. Gruff and a little out of practice after all these years, but still fully recognizable.

  Look around you, Valdemar my lad.

  He stopped. Wiping his forehead with the arm of his jacket, he realized it was just the right advice. A little to the west he caught sight of a clearing; it was not large, about the size of a circus ring, but there were lots of rocks to sit on and it had a view of the countryside below. He had topped the crest of the ridge now and was on the far side, looking west.

  He made his way over to the clearing and sat down on one of the rocks; the sun had warmed it up, although it was well into October. It’s different down here on the continent, he thought. The summers and autumns last so much longer. Maybe I should have lived my life here. Like Greger.

  He uncorked his whisky and took a mouthful. It was a litre bottle, the stuff was called Balblair and it had cost him €229.

  It was smooth and delicious. Thank bloody goodness, thought Ante Valdemar Roos, it’s the best spirit I’ve tasted in my entire life.

  Not before time. He got out his pipe and tobacco. Shuffled down onto the ground and leant his back against the rock instead. That was better. Even better.

  The afternoon sun in his face. Pure, clear air, still pleasantly warm. Yellowy-green broadleaved trees that were whispering all around him in the lightest of breezes.

  He lit his pipe and drank another gulp. Took out his notebook.

  Its contents were extremely varied.

  As he slowly and purposefully worked his way through the bottle of whisky, and as the sun sank in the west with the same slow pace and firm purpose, allowing the shadows free rein in the clearing, he read everything he had written since he started – in those five or six weeks, or however long it was.

  He did not rush this, either. He stopped now and then to think, reflect and make a correction. He replaced one word with another, or found a better expression. Some of the maxims, those that had come from Anna or the Romanian, he left untouched. Got to respect the moral rights of the author, he thought. It was not his business to express an opinion on them.

  He had made his last entry the day before, after Anna had left him and he had paid a visit to his son on Keymerstraat. He had spent a long time in that hotel room – it had been the longest night of his life, though by no means the worst – leafing back and forth in the Romanian before he found it.

  For when two people travel side by side, this generates the narrative of the love between them, the narrative that is always another and always has a personality which could not have been foreseen, like a child conceived from their minds in passionate embrace, and at the same time the leaden, lacklustre book is not the book itself but the tool by which the book has a chance to be born.

  That is not exactly, he had thought – and was thinking again now, as he took another swig of whisky and his eyes scanned the open vista – that is not exactly how my life has panned out. I have none of the prerequisites for understanding this, and yet I do.

  And yet I do.

  He could feel the whisky starting to play its intended role. He filled his pipe and lit it for a final smoke, turned over to a fresh page and started to apply himself to his closing remarks.

  He wanted something short. Pithy, certainly, but also a sort of summing up.

  And his own words, not borrowed ones.

  No words came into his head. But people did, a whole succession of them:

  Alice.

  Signe and Wilma. Wrigman, Red Cow and Tapanen.

  Espen Lund. Greger and his wife, whatever she was called. He’d only ever seen her in a photo.

  His father. His mother. Someone he did not recognize, claiming to be called Nabokov and wanting to make some kind of elucidation. He took no notice of him.

  And finally – but only once the others had run riot inside him for a good while – Anna. And when she came, everything else faded into the background.

  Yes, everything and everyone else made way for her and he had a sense of his whole life, all these hours and days and years, suddenly assembled at this single point. Just here, just now. And Anna was with him in some unfathomable but at the same time completely natural way; perhaps she was not really aware of it herself, but she would come to realize it, he knew. One day when she was well again she would understand everything, and know that his last thought was of her. She was the one he carried in his arms as he walked through the Twilight Land.

  In some goddamned unfathomable way, that is.

  With Anna, the final words presented themselves. He took a last swig of whisky as he weighed them in his mind, so they would be absolutely right.

  He swallowed, put pen to paper, and wrote.

  Events, always so infernally overestimated, are nothing compared to the parentheses around the spaces in between. You do well to bear that in mind, all you people who blindly rush about the world and think you are on the way somewhere – everything is in the pauses. It is also worth noting that expensive whisky tastes significantly better than the cheap kind. Now I am done and have nothing more to add.

  He read it through twice, nodded to himself in confirmation, and took out the knife.

  He suddenly felt doubtful.

  49

  Barbarotti and Backman landed at Sechshafen airport outside Maardam at half past three in the afternoon, and caught a taxi straight to the Gemejnte Hopsital.

  After diverse misunderstandings and wrong turns, they finally found their way to the right ward. There they were met by a ward sister called Sister Vlaander and a detective inspector who introduced himself as Rooth.

  The ward sister explained that her patient, Anna Gambowska, had been admitted to the hospital the previous day and undergone an operation later that evening, and was not yet in a fit state to answer questions. But the operation had gone well, Dr Moewenroede who had performed it would be coming round in an hour or so, and if the police officers would like a brief word with him, having travelled so far, that would be fine.

  Then she left Barbarotti and Backman with DI Rooth in the waiting room.

  ‘So why are you sitting here, exactly?’ asked Eva Backman once a helpful nursing assistant had brought them all cups of coffee.

  ‘Orders,’ said Rooth genially. ‘That’s the way it usually is in the force here. You get an order and you obey it. Isn’t that what happens up in your country, then?’

  Backman conceded that it did. More often than not, anyway.

  ‘Oh, and she’s a murder suspect as well,’ added Rooth. ‘That’s the impression I got, at any rate. But I expect you two know more about that than I do.’

  Backman conceded this, too.

  ‘Do you know how she’s doing?’ asked Barbarotti. ‘Beyond what Sister Vlaander told us, I mean?’

  Rooth nodded and popped a biscuit in his mouth. ‘They seem pretty sure she’s going to be all right,’ he said. ‘But surely she can’t have murdered anybody, that little thing?’

  ‘That isn’t entirely clear yet,’ said Barbarotti. ‘She was involved, though. In some way.’

  ‘And what are your orders?’ Rooth asked them.

  ‘To interview her as soon as possible,’ said Backman. ‘Take her back home with us if we can. But we ought not to stay more than a couple of days.’

  ‘Maardam isn’t a bad town,’ said Rooth. ‘There are a few nice pubs if you get the chance. And autumn’s the best time of year.’

  Barbarotti nodded and studied his colleague. He looked to be in his fifties, powerfully built with a square face and thinning hair. There was something familiar about him, but Barbarotti could not put his finger on it.

  ‘Are you going to sit here and wait for Dr Moewenroede?’ asked Rooth. ‘Because if you are . . .?’

  ‘You can go off for a couple of hours,’ said Backman. ‘How about if we call you when it’s time for us to think about leaving?’

  ‘Great,’ said DI Rooth. ‘There are a couple of things I need to sort out in town. I’ll be back within two hours.’

  They exchanged mobile numbers and Rooth left them on their own.

  ‘I thought I recognized him,’ said Barbarotti.

  ‘Me too,’ said Backman. ‘OK then, we’ll sit here, I suppose.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ said Barbarotti. ‘Maybe I should ask them to take a look at my foot? What do you reckon?’

  ‘I reckon that would be pushing it,’ said Backman.

  When Dr Moewenroede turned up, he asked them if they preferred a brief or a full description of Anna Gambowska’s condition and Backman said they would be happy with the condensed version. Moewenroede told them she had been suffering from a subdural haematoma, quite common after a head injury, and although the operation had proved slightly complicated, it had gone well. The patient now needed plenty of sleep, and would probably have to spend a week in hospital, but unless there were any unforeseen developments it should be perfectly all right for them to have a short conversation with her the following day.

  Barbarotti and Backman thanked him and handed over to DI Rooth, who had returned to the ward.

  They ordered a taxi at the front desk and went to Keymerstraat to speak to Greger Roos, hoping that he, at least, would be able to talk to them.

  He was a tall, spare man of about forty, possibly a little younger. Barbarotti immediately looked to see if he had any features in common with pictures of his father, but could detect no resemblance. He was wearing cords and a white shirt unbuttoned at the neck, and made a vaguely sophisticated impression. None of those they had spoken to had ever used the word ‘sophisticated’ when attempting to describe Ante Valdemar Roos, and Barbarotti began to appreciate that the indications they had very little in common were evidently true.

  Though they must share a few deeply buried genes, he supposed.

  A wife and two children in the six-to-eight bracket said hello and withdrew to some corner of the big flat with its tastefully minimalist décor, leaving them in the living room with three beers and a bowl of nuts.

  ‘So we gather you were surprised when he turned up?’ began Backman.

  ‘Surprised is an understatement,’ observed Greger Roos. ‘He rang me from the cafe downstairs and two minutes later he was in the hall. We haven’t met since Mum’s funeral.’

  ‘Ten years ago?’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Greger Roos. ‘It’s a shame to have to say it, but there have never been very strong ties between my father and me.’

  ‘How old were you when they got divorced?’

  ‘Five. From then on I lived with my mother all the time. He – my father – kind of wasn’t even on the map.’

  ‘He vanished off the scene entirely?’ asked Barbarotti. ‘I mean . . .?’

  ‘There were a couple of summers when we spent a few weeks together. To be honest, we both found it rather difficult. Unfortunate, but that was simply how it was. He didn’t make any efforts to foster the relationship, either.’

  ‘And your mother?’

  ‘As regards him, you mean?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I don’t think she actively disliked him. But we never talked about him. She just thought . . . well, I think she just found him terribly boring.’

  Here we go again, thought Barbarotti.

  ‘I remember she once described him as a glass of water. Tepid water.’

  Barbarotti gave Backman a quick glance and thought about what Marianne had said.

  ‘What did he say while he was here?’ asked Backman. ‘How did he seem and how long did he stay?’

  Greger Roos gave a laugh. ‘The oddest thing was how well dressed he was . . . that is, I don’t mean in the sense of super-smart. But he had new clothes. A suit, shirt and tie, and it looked as if he’d bought the whole outfit just that day.’

  ‘Maybe he had,’ suggested Backman with a quick little smile. ‘He’s been on the run for several weeks, after all.’

  ‘Possibly,’ said Greger Roos. ‘Anyway, he apologized for barging in, but said he needed my help with something. Two things, in fact.’

  ‘Two things?’ said Barbarotti.

  ‘Yes. First this letter I told you about. He wanted me to make sure it reached you. It was incredibly important, he said. It would explain everything and he solemnly swore its contents were true.’

  ‘Solemnly swore?’

  ‘That’s what he said,’ said Greger Roos. ‘He used exactly those words.’

  ‘Why couldn’t he just have posted it to us?’ asked Backman.

  Greger Roos shrugged his shoulders. ‘I don’t know. I didn’t ask and he didn’t offer any explanation. I was so taken aback by seeing him that I couldn’t quite think what to say.’

  ‘What else did he want help with?’ asked Barbarotti.

  Greger Roos sipped his beer and wiped the corners of his mouth before answering. ‘He wanted me to forgive him.’

  ‘Forgive him?’

  ‘Yes, precisely that. I said he had nothing to ask forgiveness for, but he persisted and said that I was wrong. And that of course I knew what he was talking about.’

  ‘The fact that he had failed you as a father?’ said Backman.

  ‘I assume that’s what he was thinking of, yes. He was very insistent and in the end I said that I did. That I forgave him. He only stayed half a minute after that, gave me the letter and left. It was . . .’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘It was almost like a dream. I happened to be alone here, as well, and I almost wondered if I’d imagined the whole thing. But I pinched my arm and I – anyway, there was the envelope, so I knew it must actually have happened.’

  ‘How long was he here?’

  ‘Five minutes at most.’

  ‘And he didn’t say anything about where he was going?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Nothing about a young girl?’

  ‘No. And I didn’t pull myself together in time to ask him anything, either. Your phone call was in the back of my mind, of course, but it all happened too fast.’

  Eva Backman sighed. ‘I can understand that,’ she said. ‘This whole business is pretty out of the ordinary. Can we see the letter?’

  Greger Roos went to get it from the next room. He came back and laid it on the table. It was a big, fat envelope. Barbarotti had unconsciously been imagining something smaller, but this looked more like a document wallet of some kind.

  ‘All right,’ said Eva Backman. ‘I think we’ll take this with us. We’ll be in town for a couple of days. We’ll need to talk to you again, I’m sure. You’ll be contactable?’

  ‘No problem,’ Greger Roos assured them, handing her his card. ‘You can ring me any time.’