Before the Frost
- Автор: Манкелль Хеннинг
- Серия: Linda Wallander #1
- Год: 2004
- Язык: английский
- Год: The Harvill Press
- ISBN: 978-1-84343-113-8
- Переводчик: Ebba Segerberg
- Жанр: Полицейские детективы
Электронная книга - «Before the Frost». Краткое содержание книги:
She opened a window, pulled up a chair, and opened Anna’s journal. There has to be a clue somewhere, she thought. Something that can explain what’s happened.
Linda started reading, going back about a month into the past. Suddenly she stopped. There was a name scribbled in the margin, as if a reminder by Anna to herself. Linda frowned. She knew she had seen or heard it recently, but where? She put down the diary. There was a distant rumble of thunder. The heat was oppressive. A name that she had seen or heard, the question was where or from whom. She made herself some coffee and tried to distract herself enough to make her brain relax and shake out the name. Nothing happened.
It was only later when she was about to give up that she finally remembered.
She had seen it less than twenty-four hours ago. It was the name of one of the people living in the apartment building on Nedergade.
29
Vigsten. She knew she was right. She wasn’t sure if it was someone living on the street side or in the inner building over the courtyard, nor if there was a D or an O as a first initial, but she knew she was right about the surname. What do I do now? she thought. I’m working on something that is actually starting to hang together. But I’m the only one who takes it seriously; I haven’t managed to convince anyone else. Of course, I have no idea what is actually going on. Anna thought she saw her father and then she disappeared. Two disappearances that camouflage each other, cancel each other out, or complete each other? Linda felt a sudden need to talk to someone, and there was no one to turn to except Zeba. She ran down the stairs of Anna’s building and drove to Zeba’s place. Zeba was just on her way out with her son. Linda tagged along. They went to a nearby playground, where the boy ran off to the sandbox. There was a bench there, although it was littered with dirt and chewing gum.
They sat on the edge of the sandbox while the boy threw sand around and let out whoops of joy. Linda looked at Zeba and felt the usual sting of envy: Zeba was extravagantly beautiful. There was something arrogant and inviting about her at the same time, the kind of woman Linda had once dreamed of becoming. But I became a policewoman, she thought. A policewoman who hopes she won’t turn out to be a scaredy-cat.
“I’ve been trying to reach Anna,” Zeba said. “She hasn’t been home. Have you seen her?”
This infuriated Linda.
“Hello? Have you been listening to a single word I’ve said? About her being gone, that I’m worried about her, that I think something’s happened to her?”
“But you know what she’s like, don’t you?”
“Do I? Apparently not. What is she like?”
Zeba frowned.
“Why are you so worked up?”
“I’m worried about her.”
“What do you think has happened? And what is that bruise on your head, for heaven’s sake?”
Linda decided to fill her in on the latest events. Zeba paid attention in silence. The boy played.
“I could have told you that,” she said when Linda finished. “The part about Anna being religious.”
Linda looked at her.
“Religious?”
“Yes.”
“She never said anything to me.”
“You only just met up again, after a long gap. And Anna is the kind of person who says different things to different people. She tells a lot of lies.”
“Really?”
“I had been meaning to warn you, but I thought it would be best if you discovered it for yourself. Anna is a compulsive liar. She can say just about anything.”
“She didn’t used to be like that.”
“People change, don’t they?” Zeba said in a mocking tone. “I’m friends with Anna because of her good qualities. She’s cheerful, nice to my son, helpful. But when she starts telling one of her stories, I don’t bother to listen. Do you know that she spent last Christmas with you?”
“I was still in Stockholm last winter.”
“She said she had been up to see you. Among the many things you did together, apparently, was a trip over to Helsinki on the ferry.”
“That’s absurd.”
“Of course it is. But that’s what Anna told me. I don’t know why she lies, perhaps it’s an illness or else she’s just bored.”
“Do you think she was lying when she said she had seen her father in Malmö?”
“Of course. It’s so typical of her to invent an amazing reappearance like that, even though her father has probably been dead for a long time.”
“So you don’t think anything has happened to Anna?”
Zeba looked at her with an amused expression.
“What could possibly have happened to her? She’s gone off like this many times before. She comes back when she’s done, and then she has a fantastic and completely fabricated story about where she’s been.”
“And nothing of what she says is true?”
“Compulsive liars are only successful if they weave in enough aspects that are true. Then we believe it, then the lie sails by, until we finally realize their whole world is built out of lies.”
Linda shook her head in slight bewilderment.
“The medical studies?”
“I don’t believe a word of it.”
“But where does she get her money? What does she do?”
“I’ve wondered about that. Sometimes I think she might be a professional con artist, but I really don’t have a clue.”
Zeba’s son called out to her and she joined him in the sandbox. Linda watched her as she walked over. A man walking by on the street also turned around to look at her. Linda thought about what Zeba had said. It doesn’t explain everything, she thought. It explains a part of it, and it reduces my anxiety and above all infuriates me, since I now know that Anna has been feeding me lies. I don’t like people claiming to have gone to Helsinki with me when it’s not true. It explains a lot, she thought. But not everything.
When they had gone their separate ways, Linda walked down into the center of town and withdrew some money from an ATM. She was careful with money since she worried about finding herself without. I’m like my dad, she thought. We’re both thrifty to the point of being miserly.
She walked home, cleaned the apartment, and then called the housing agency. After several tries she managed to reach the man in charge of her case. She asked if she could move into the apartment earlier than planned, but apparently that wasn’t possible. She lay on the bed in her room and thought more about the conversation with Zeba. Her concerns for Anna’s well-being had been replaced by a feeling of unease over the fact that she hadn’t seen through her lies. But what should she have noticed? How did one see through a person who did not concoct remarkable, fantastic stories but lied about everyday events?
Linda got up and called Zeba.
“I never finished talking to you about Anna’s religiosity.”
“Why don’t you ask her about it when she comes back? Anna believes in God.”
“Which one?”
“The Christian one. She goes to church occasionally, or she says she does. But she does pray. I know because I’ve caught her in the act a couple of times. She gets down on her knees.”
“Do you know if she belongs to a particular congregation or sect?”