Free The White Lioness by Henning Mankell Page B

see. It's certainly not a Luger or a Beretta."
    "What is it, then?"
    "Too early to say," Nyberg said. "But I'll let you know as soon as we find out."
    Nyberg filled his pipe and lit up. "What do you think about this little lot?" he said.
    Wallander shook his head. "I don't think I've ever been so confused," he answered honestly. "I can't find any links. All I know is I'm looking for a missing woman, and all the time I keep coming across the damnedest things. A severed finger, parts of a radio transmitter, unusual weapons. Maybe it's precisely these unusual features I should take for a starting point. Something I haven't come across before in all my police experience."
    "Patience," Nyberg said. "We'll establish the links sooner or later, no doubt about it."
    Nyberg went back to his meticulous piecing together of the jigsaw. Wallander wandered around for a while, trying yet again to summarise everything to his own satisfaction. In the end he gave up. He called the station from his car.
    "Have we had many leads?" he asked Ebba.
    "The calls are coming in non-stop," she said. "Svedberg told me a couple of minutes ago that some of the people offering information seemed reliable and interesting. That's all I know."
    Wallander gave her the number of the Methodist chapel, and made up his mind to do another thorough search of Louise Akerblom's desk at the office, when he'd finished talking to the minister. He felt bad about not having followed up his first cursory search.
    He drove back to Ystad. As he had plenty of time before he was due to meet Tureson, he parked at the square and went into the stereo shop. Without spending much time comparing one model against another, he bought a walk-man. Then he drove home to Mariagatan. He'd bought a CD of Puccini's Turandot . He put on the earphones, lay back on the sofa, and tried to think of Baiba Liepa. But instead, Louise Akerblom's face kept filling his mind.
    He woke with a start and looked at his watch. He cursed when he realised he ought to have been at the chapel ten minutes ago.
    Pastor Tureson was waiting for him in a back room, a sort of store-room and office combined. Tapestries with Bible quotations were hanging on the walls. A coffee machine stood on a window ledge.
    "Sorry I'm late," Wallander said.
    "I'm well aware you police have a lot to do," Tureson said.
    Wallander sat down on a chair and took out his notebook. Tureson offered him a cup of coffee, but he declined.
    "I'm trying to build up an image of what Mrs Akerblom is really like," he said. "Everything I've found out so far seems to indicate just one thing: Louise Akerblom was a woman at peace with herself, who would never voluntarily leave her husband or her children."
    "That's the Louise Akerblom we all know," Tureson said.
    "At the same time, that makes me suspicious," Wallander said.
    "Suspicious?" Tureson looked puzzled.
    "I cannot believe that such perfect individuals exist," Wallander said. "Everybody has his or her secrets. The question is: what are Louise Akerblom's? I take it she hasn't vanished because she hasn't been able to cope with her own good fortune."
    "You'd get the same answers from every single member of our church, Inspector," Tureson said.
    Afterwards, Wallander could never manage to put his finger on just what had happened; but there was something in Tureson's response that made him sit up and take notice. It was as if the minister were defending Louise Akerblom's image, even though it was not being questioned. Or was there something else he was defending?
    Wallander swiftly shifted his approach and put a question that had seemed less important before.
    "Tell me about your congregation," he said. "Why does one choose to become a member of the Methodist church?"
    "Our faith and our interpretation of the Bible stand out, quite simply, as right."
    "Is that justified?" Wallander wondered.
    "In my opinion and that of my congregation it is," Pastor Tureson said. "Needless to say, members of other