An Event in Autumn: A Kurt Wallander Mystery Read Online Free PDF Page A

was looking forward to living in that house,” he said. “Or at least I’d begun to believe that I could move out of town at long last.”
    “There are other houses,” said Linda.
    “It’s not as easy as that.”
    “What’s so difficult about it?”
    “I think I demand too much.”
    “Demand a bit less then!”
    Wallander could feel that he was beginning to get angry again. Ever since she had been in her teens, Linda had accused him of making his life more complicated than it needed to be. He knew that what irritated him most of all was that, on occasions like this, Linda reminded him of her mother. And her voice was almost identical to Mona’s. If Wallander closed his eyes he felt uncertain about who was actually sitting opposite him at the kitchen table.
    “Enough of that now,” said Wallander, rinsing out his cup.
    “I’m going to bed,” said Linda.
    Wallander sat up for a while, watching the television with the sound turned down. One of the channels was showing a program about penguins.
    He woke up with a start. It was four o’clock in the morning. The television was blank but buzzing. He switched it off and hurried to bed before he had time to wake up properly.

CHAPTER 8
    It was two minutes past eight on Monday, October 28, when Wallander closed the door of one of the police station’s conference rooms behind him. He had slept badly after waking up on the sofa. And to make things worse, his electric razor had broken. He was unshaven and felt dirty. Sitting around the table were the people he was used to working alongside. He had been working with some of them for over fifteen years. It occurred to him that these were people who made up the content of a large proportion of his life. He was now the one who had been working longer than anybody else in the Ystad CID. Once upon a time he’d been the newcomer.
    Those present at the meeting, apart from Wallanderhimself, were Nyberg, Martinson and the chief of police, Lisa Holgersson. She was the first female boss Wallander had worked for. When she first came to Ystad some time in the 1990s, he had been as skeptical as all the other—mainly male—officers. But he had soon realized that Lisa Holgersson was very competent. It became clear to him that she might well be the best boss he had ever had. Over the years that ensued he had found no reason to reconsider that judgment, even if they had occasionally had fierce disagreements.
    Wallander took a deep breath and turned first to Nyberg, then to Martinson, who had spoken to Stina Hurlén before the meeting.
    Nyberg was tired and looked at Wallander with bloodshot eyes. He ought to have retired by now, but he had changed his mind and stayed on. Wallander was not surprised. Despite all the unpleasant aspects of his work, without it Nyberg would find life pointless.
    “A dead body,” said Nyberg. “A few decayed scraps of clothing. It’s not my job to look for the cause of death among all the old bones, but nothing seemed to be broken or crushed. I haven’t found anything else. The question is, of course, whether we should dig up the whole garden.”
    “How did that new machine perform?” asked Holgersson.
    “Exactly as I thought it would,” growled Nyberg. “It’s a bundle of crap that some idiot has tricked the Swedishpolice into buying. Why can’t we have a dog trained to sniff out corpses?”
    Wallander found it hard not to burst out laughing. Even if Nyberg could be surly and difficult to work with, he had a unique sense of humor. He also had views that Wallander shared.
    “Stina Hurlén needs a bit of time,” said Martinson, leafing through his notebook. “The bones have to be examined. But she thought she would be able to give us some kind of report later today.”
    Wallander nodded. “So, that’s all we have to go on so far,” he said. “It’s not a lot—but of course we have to face up to the possibility that this might become a murder inquiry. For the moment, we have to wait for