The Dogs of Riga - Wallander 02

  He drank his coffee and thought about the two colonels. And Sergeant Zids, who might have been personally responsible for murdering Inese. Somewhere out there in this awful darkness was Baiba Liepa, and she was waiting for him. "Baiba Liepa will be very pleased." Those were just about the last words Inese had spoken in her short life.

  He looked at the clock over the bar counter. Nearly 10.30 p.m. He paid his bill, and calculated that he had more than enough money to pay for a hotel room. He left the cafe and stopped outside the Hermes Hotel not far away. The outside door was open, and he tramped up a creaking staircase to the upper floor. A curtain was drawn aside, and he found an old, hunch-backed woman peering at him from behind thick glasses. He smiled the friendliest smile he could conjure up, said "Zimmer? and put his passport on the desk. The old woman nodded, said something in Latvian, and gave him a card to fill in. As she hadn't even bothered to look at his passport, he made up his mind on the spot to change his plans and signed himself in under an invented name. He was so flustered that the only name he could think of was Preuss. He gave himself the first name Martin, claimed he was 37 years old, from Hamburg. The woman gave him a friendly smile, handed over the key, and pointed to a corridor behind his back. Unless the colonels are so desperate to find me that they organise raids on every single hotel in Riga tonight, I'll be able to spend a quiet night here, Wallander thought. Needless to say, they will eventually realise that Martin Preuss is in fact Kurt Wallander, but by then I should be miles away. He unlocked his door, was delighted to find there was a bathroom, and could hardly believe his luck when the water gradually became warm. He undressed, and slumped into the bath. The heat seeping into his body made him feel drowsy, and he nodded off.

  When he woke, the water was stone cold. He got out of the bath, dried himself and went to bed. A tram clattered by in the street. He stared into the darkness, and felt his fear returning. He must stick to his plan. If he lost control over his own judgement, the dogs on his trail would soon catch his scent. Then he would be sunk. He knew what he had to do. He would look for the only person in Riga who might possibly be able to put him in touch with Baiba Liepa. He had no idea what her name was, but he did remember that she had red lips.

  CHAPTER 16

  Inese returned just before dawn.

  She came to him in a nightmare in which both colonels were keeping watch over him from somewhere in the shadows, though he couldn't see them. She was still alive, and he tried to warn her, but she didn't hear what he said and he knew he wouldn't be able to help her. He woke with a start and found himself in his room in the Hermes Hotel.

  He'd put his wristwatch on the bedside table. It was just after 6 a.m. A tram clattered past in the street below. He stretched out in bed, feeling thoroughly rested for the first time since he'd left Sweden.

  He lay in bed and relived with agonising clarity the events of the previous day. His mind was now fully alert, and the horrific massacre seemed unreal. The indiscriminate killing was incomprehensible. He was filled with despair at the death of Inese and didn't know how he would be able to cope with the knowledge that he had been unable to help her, or the cross-eyed man and the others, the people who had been waiting for him but whose names he didn't even know. His agitation drove him out of bed. He left his room shortly before 6.30 a.m., went out to reception and paid his bill. The old woman took his money, and a quick check revealed that he had enough left to spend another few nights in a hotel, should it prove necessary.

  It was a cold morning. He turned up the collar of his jacket and decided to get some breakfast before putting his plan into operation. After wandering the streets for 20 minutes or so, he found a cafe. It was half empty, but he went in and ordered coffee and some sandwiches, then sat down at a corner table that was hidden from the entrance. By 7.30 a.m. he knew he could wait no longer. Now it was make or break time.

  Half an hour later he was standing outside the Latvia Hotel, exactly where Sergeant Zids had waited for him in his car. He hesitated. Maybe he was too early. Maybe the woman with the red lips hadn't arrived yet? He went in, glanced over at reception, where several early birds were paying their bills, passed the sofa where his shadows had sat buried in their newspapers, and discovered that the woman actually was there, standing at her counter, carefully setting out various newspapers in front of her. What if she doesn't recognise me, he wondered. Perhaps she's just a messenger who doesn't know anything about the errands she is running?

  At that very moment she saw him, standing next to one of the big columns in the foyer. He could tell that she recognised him immediately, knew who he was, and wasn't frightened to see him again. He went over to her table, reached out his hand, and explained loudly in English that he wanted to buy postcards. In order to give her time to get used to his sudden appearance, he kept on talking. Did she happen to have any postcards of old Riga? There was nobody nearby, and when he thought he'd been talking for long enough he leaned forward, as if to ask her to explain some detail or other on one of the postcards.

  "You recognise me," he said. "You gave me a ticket for the organ concert where I met Baiba Liepa. Now you must help me to see her again. You're the only person who can help me. It's very important for me to meet Baiba, but at the same time, you ought to be clear that it is very dangerous, as she's being watched. I don't know if you are aware of what happened yesterday. Show me something in one of your brochures, pretend you are explaining it to me, but answer my question."

  Her bottom lip started trembling, and he could see her eyes filling with tears. As he couldn't risk her crying and drawing attention to them, he quickly explained how he was very interested in postcards not only of Riga, but also of the whole of Latvia. A good friend of his had said there was always an excellent selection of cards at the Latvia Hotel.

  She pulled herself together, and he told her he realised she must know what had happened. But did she also know he had returned to Latvia? She shook her head.

  "I have nowhere to go," he said. "I need somewhere to hide while you arrange for me to meet Baiba."

  He didn't even know her name. Did he have any right to ask her to do this for him? Wouldn't it be better if he gave up and went looking for the Swedish Embassy? Where do you draw the line on what is reasonable and decent in a country where innocent people are gunned down indiscriminately?

  "I don't know if I can arrange for you to meet Baiba," she said in a low voice. "I've no idea if it's still possible. But I can hide you in my home. I'm much too insignificant a person for the police to be interested in me. Come back in an hour. Wait at the bus stop on the other side of the street. Go now."

  He stood up again, thanked her like the satisfied customer he was pretending to be, put a brochure in his pocket, and left the hotel. He spent the next hour among the crowd of customers at one of the big department stores, and bought himself a new hat in an attempt to change his appearance. After an hour he went to stand at the bus stop. He saw her emerge from the hotel, and when she came to stand beside him, she pretended he was a total stranger. A bus came after a few minutes, they got on, and Wallander sat a couple of rows behind her. For over half an hour the bus circled around the city before heading off in the direction of the suburbs. He tried to make a note of the route, but the only landmark he recognised was the enormous Kirov Park. They came to a huge, drab housing estate, and when she pressed the bell to stop the bus he was taken by surprise, and almost didn't get off in time. They walked through a frosty playground where some children were climbing on a rusty frame. Wallander trod on the swollen body of a cat lying dead on the ground. He followed the woman into a dark, echoing entrance. They emerged into an open atrium where the cold wind bit into their faces. She turned to face him.

  "My flat is very small," she said. "My father lives with me, he's very old. I'll just tell him you're a homeless friend. Our country is full of homeless people, and it's only natural for us to help each other. Later on my two children will come home from school. I'll leave them a note to say t
hey should make you some tea. It's very cramped, but it's all I can offer you. I must go straight back to the hotel."

  The flat consisted of two small rooms, a kitchenette and a minuscule bathroom. An old man lay resting on a bed.

  "I don't even know your name," Wallander said, accepting the coat-hanger she held out for him.

  "Vera," she said. "You're called Wallander."

  She said his surname as though it had been his first name, and it occurred to him that he barely knew what to call himself at the moment. The old man on the bed sat up, but when he was about to stand up with the aid of his walking stick and shake hands, Wallander protested. That wasn't necessary, he didn't want to cause any inconvenience. Vera produced some bread and cold meat in the little kitchen, and he protested again: what he was looking for was somewhere to hide, not a restaurant. He felt embarrassed at having to ask her to help him out like this, and guilty about the fact that his own flat in Mariagatan was three times the size of the space she had at her disposal. She showed him the other room where most of the space was taken up by a large bed.

  "Close the door if you want some peace," she said. "You can rest here. I'll try to get back from the hotel as soon as I can."

  "I don't want to put you in any danger," he said.

  "When something is necessary, it has to be done," she said. "I'm glad you came to me."

  Then she left. Wallander slumped down on the edge of the bed. He'd got this far. Now all he needed to do was to wait for Baiba Liepa.

  Vera got back from the hotel just before 5 p.m. By then Wallander had had tea with her two children, Sabine aged 12 and her elder sister Ieva, 14. He had learnt some Latvian words, they had giggled at his hopeless rendition of "This little piggy went to market", and Vera's father had even sung an old soldier's ballad for them in a shaky voice. Wallander had managed to forget his mission and the image of Inese shot through the eye and the brutal massacre. He had discovered that normal life existed away from the clutches of the colonels, and that was precisely the world Major Liepa had been defending. People were meeting in remote hunting lodges and warehouses for the sake of Sabine and Ieva and Vera's ancient father.

  When Vera got back she hugged her daughters, then shut herself in her bedroom with Wallander. They were sitting on her bed, and the situation suddenly seemed to embarrass her. He touched her arm in an effort to express his gratitude for what she had done, but she misunderstood the gesture and pulled away. He realised it would be a waste of time trying to explain, and instead asked whether she had managed to contact Baiba Liepa.

  "Baiba is crying," she said. "She is mourning her friends. Most of all she is crying for Inese. She had warned them the police had stepped up their activities, and pleaded with them to be careful. Even so, what she most dreaded came to pass. Baiba is crying, but she is also possessed by fury, just like me. She wants to meet you tonight, Wallander, and we have a plan for how to proceed. But before we do anything else, we must have something to eat. If we don't eat, we have as good as given up all hope."

  They managed to fit themselves around a dining table that she folded down from one of the walls in the room where her father had his bed. It seemed to Wallander that it was as if Vera and her family lived in a caravan. In order to make room for everything, meticulous organisation was essential, and he wondered how it was possible to live a whole life in such cramped conditions. He thought of the evening he had spent in Colonel Putnis's mansion outside Riga. It was in order to protect their privileges that one of the colonels had instructed his subordinates to undertake an indiscriminate witch-hunt for people like the major and Inese. Now he could see how great the differences were in their lives. Every transaction between these people left blood on their hands.

  *

  The meal consisted of vegetable stew produced by Vera on her tiny stove. The girls set the table with a loaf of coarse bread and beer. Wallander could sense the tremendous tension in Vera, but she succeeded in concealing it from her family. Yet again he asked himself what right he had to expose her to such risks. How would he ever be able to live with himself if anything happened to her?

  After the meal the girls cleared the table and did the washing up, while the old man went back to bed to rest.

  "What's your father's name?" Wallander asked.

  "He has a strange name," Vera told him. "He's called Antons. He's 76 years old, and has bladder trouble. He's spent the whole of his life working as a foreman at a printing works. They say old typographers can be affected by some kind of lead poisoning that makes them absent-minded and confused. Sometimes he seems to be living in another world. Maybe he's been affected by the disease."

  They were sitting on the bed in her room again, and she had drawn the door curtain. The girls were whispering and giggling in the tiny kitchen, and he knew the moment had come.

  "Do you remember the church where you met Baiba after a concert?" she asked. "St Gertrude's?" He nodded, he remembered.

  "Do you think you could find your way back there?" "Not from here."

  "But from the Latvia Hotel? From the city centre?" "Yes, I could."

  "I can't go to the centre of town with you, it's too dangerous. But I don't think anybody suspects you are here in my flat. You must take the bus back to the city centre on your own. Don't get off at the stop outside the hotel -use the one before or the one after. Find the church and wait until 10 p.m. Do you remember the back gate in the churchyard you used when you left the church that first time?"

  Wallander nodded. He thought he remembered it, even if he wasn't quite sure.

  "Go in through that gate when you're absolutely certain nobody is looking. Wait there. If it's at all possible, Baiba will come to you."

  "How did you contact her?"

  "I phoned her."

  Wallander looked sceptical.

  "The telephone must be bugged."

  "Of course it's bugged. I called her and said the book she'd ordered had arrived. That meant she knew she should go to a certain bookshop and ask for a certain book. I'd left a note there telling her you had arrived and were in my flat. Some hours later I went to a store where one of Baiba's neighbours usually shops. There was a note from Baiba saying she'd try to get to the church tonight."

  "But what if she can't make it?"

  "Then I can't help you any more. You can't come back here either."

  Wallander could see she was right. This was his only chance of meeting Baiba Liepa again. If it didn't work, he had no choice but to find his way to the Swedish Embassy and get help in fleeing the country.

  "Do you know where the Swedish Embassy is in Riga?"

  She thought for a moment before answering. "I don't even know if Sweden has an embassy here," she said.

  "There must be a consulate, though?"

  "I don't know where."

  "It must be in the telephone directory. Write down the Latvian for Swedish Embassy and Swedish Consulate. There must be a telephone directory in a restaurant. Write the Latvian for telephone directory as well."

  She wrote down what he was asking for on a sheet of paper torn out of one of the girl's exercise books, and taught him the correct pronunciation for the words.

  Two hours later he said goodbye to Vera and her family, and set off. She had given him one of her father's old shirts and a scarf, so that he could change his appearance a bit more. He had no idea if he would ever see them again, and he was already beginning to miss them.

  As he walked to the bus stop, he saw the dead cat, lying at his feet like an ominous symbol of what was to come.

  When he was on the bus he suddenly had the feeling once again that he was being watched already. There were not many passengers going into town in the evening, and he had sat right at the rear of the bus so that he could see everybody's back in front of him. He looked now and then through the filthy back window, but couldn't see a car following them.

  Nevertheless, his instinct made him anxious. He couldn't shrug off the feeling that they were tailing him. He tried
to work out what to do. He had about a quarter of an hour in which to make up his mind. Where should he get off? How should he go about shaking off the shadows? It seemed an impossible situation, but he suddenly had an idea that was bold enough to have a slight chance of succeeding. He assumed it wasn't just him they were keeping an eye on. It must be at least as important for them to follow him until he met up with Baiba Liepa, and then to wait for the moment when they could be certain of finding the major's testimony.

  He ignored the instructions given him by Vera, and got off the bus outside the Latvia Hotel. Without looking round, he strode into the hotel, marched up to the reception desk, and asked if they had a room for one or possibly two nights. He spoke clearly in English, and when the receptionist said they did indeed have a room, he produced his German passport and signed himself in as Gottfried Hegel. He explained that his luggage would be arriving later, and then, in as loud a voice as he dared use without giving the impression he was purposely setting a false trail, he asked to be woken up a few minutes before midnight as he was expecting an important telephone call. He hoped this would give him a start of four hours. As he didn't have any luggage, he accepted the key himself and walked over to the lift. He had been given a room on the fourth floor, and now it was essential for him to act decisively without any hesitation. He tried to remember from his first visit where the back staircase was, and when he got out of the lift on the fourth floor he knew straight away where to go. He went down into the gloom of back staircase and hoped they hadn't had time to put guards round the whole hotel. He went right down to the basement and found his way to the door that opened out on to the rear of the hotel. Just for a moment he was afraid it might not be possible to open the door without a key, but he was lucky. The key was in the lock. He stepped out into the murky back street, stood absolutely still for couple of seconds and looked around. It was deserted, and he couldn't hear any hurried footsteps. He kept close to the walls, turned off into side streets, and didn't stop running until he was at least three blocks from the hotel. He was out of breath by then and withdrew into a doorway while he got his breath back to see if he was being followed. He tried to imagine how, at this very moment in some other part of the city, Baiba