He went to the coffee room and made himself a cup. He was the only one there. They'd canceled today's meeting. He'd have to sum up tomorrow, but everybody knew what they had to do today.

When he got back from his discussion with Jeanette, he would be expecting to know the outcome of the checks on known felons, potential suspects. They were likely to come up empty, but even that was an outcome of sorts. Elimination. This or that person couldn't have done it. Not this time. A convicted rapist had a solid alibi for that particular night. This particular murderer had been in jail. That one had been in bed asleep, with cast-iron proof. The ruthless GBH merchant had been busy beating up somebody else at that moment, but at the other end of town, or the other end of the country. Or somewhere abroad.

And so on, and so on.

The pavement outside looked white in the glow of morning. It was probably eighty-five degrees by now. Just like Marbella. He thought about his father, buried in a pretty little churchyard on the mountainside overlooking the sea at Puerto Banus, and the house in Nueva Andalucia where his mother had decided to stay put.

Winter had been present when his father died. Had attended the funeral, spent the night in the garden with the three palm trees, and eventually managed to think about nothing at all.

He returned to his office. The sun seeped in through the Venetian blinds, creating patterns on the brick walls of the corridors.

Back in his office, he stood in front of the window, smoking. It was his first of the day, after nearly two hours' work, and that was a step forward. Tomorrow he'd work for an extra fifteen minutes before his first Corps.

He sat down again and put on his glasses.

There was another thing. A woman in her twenties had been attacked and raped by a "slim" and "quite tall" man three days after the murder of Beatrice. There were similarities-but then, there always were in rape cases. This woman said she thought the man had been talking to himself when he attacked her, "mumbling," as she described it in the report Winter was holding in his hand.

The house was overlooked by trees that could be a hundred years old. The house itself might also be a hundred years old, Winter thought. A well-preserved centenarian. Old money. Like so much around here, the oldest part of Längedrag. He had grown up only a mile or so closer to town, biked along these streets occasionally. Welcome to Pleasantville.

Two boys came toward him on skateboards. They were good. He stood to one side, then continued along the street and up the drive to the house. A man was sitting on the verandah and stood up when he saw Winter coming up the steps. They shook hands. Jeanette's father. Winter hadn't met him before. Nor had he met Jeanette, it had been Halders. But Halders had different problems today.

"Is this really necessary?" Kurt Bielke asked. He was shorter than Winter, but didn't look up when he spoke to him. His tone was not aggressive, more of a troubled sigh.

That was a good question. How many times could one come back to the victim without her becoming resentful? That would do more harm than good.

"If you push them too hard you'll get all you want out of them in the end, but is what you get the truth?" Halders had said two days ago, when they were sitting in Winter's office. A good point. You can overdo questioning.

"We need to talk to Jeanette a little bit more."

"We?" said Bielke. "I can only see one of you."

"I."

What do you need to talk about? She's told you a hundred times now what she's been through."

Winter made no reply. He wondered whether there was any point in explaining about all the little details that could slowly find their way into a victim's consciousness, bits of an experience that build up to form something more substantial. Sometimes everything could come out at once. At 2:00 a.m. in a lonely place, like a sword in the soul. If Jeanette remembered now it would make things easier for her later.

"Things sometimes become clearer after a while," said Winter. "After a few days."

"What kinds of things?" Bielke was gazing into the distance behind Winter. He still didn't sound aggressive. His face was tense, stiff, as if it was molded aluminum. "Exactly what happened second by second during the rape? How he pulled the noose around her neck, or what?"

Winter said nothing.

"What good will it do her to remember all the details?"

"I don't know," said Winter.

"Why are you here then?"

"There's been a murder," said Winter.

Bielke looked at him. He'd moved closer. Winter thought he could smell alcohol, but it might have been shaving lotion. Shaving lotion was alcohol, after all. Bielke wiped his brow. Winter could see the sweat at his hairline. He was feeling the heat himself, now that they'd been standing still for a while on the verandah under a canopy that seemed to raise the temperature, if anything. The verandah must be like a sauna during the afternoon.

"My God, yes," mumbled Bielke. "I should have realized." He wiped his brow again. "You think it might be the same… criminal?"

"It could be the same person," Winter said. "We have no proof, but it's a possibility."

"You call it a possibility?"

"I'm sorry?"

"I wouldn't have used that word," said Bielke.

He blinked repeatedly. Winter suddenly had the feeling that Bielke was thinking about something quite different. He seemed lost in memories.

"Can I see Jeanette now?" asked Winter, taking a step to one side.

"She's up in her room." Her father backed away, as if the path was now clear to walk on. Cleared of mines. "She didn't want to come down."

Winter entered the house with Bielke behind him. Bielke pointed up a staircase to the left of the door. Winter could hear the sound of clinking glass and china coming from somewhere inside the house. He saw nobody else as he went up the stairs. The house reminded him of a palace.

Jeanette's door was open. Winter could see the corner of a bed, and a window in the shade of one of the big trees. The uncomfortable feeling he'd had in the car on the way here had grown stronger after the conversation with the girl's father. It crept all over him, inside all his professional thinking. Angela would say that was no bad thing. That it had to be that way, or it was not good, not good at all.

"Come in," she said, when he knocked on the door frame. He still couldn't see her. "Come on in."

She was sitting in an armchair. There was a sofa and a table, and a bit farther away a desk, next to a door that he could see led into a private bathroom. Old money, or new, or a combination of both.

She was brushing her dark brown hair. A face without makeup, as far as he could see. Jeans, T-shirt, no socks. A fine gold chain round her neck. She continued brushing her hair with long strokes and her face distorted slightly with each one: her eyes narrowed, giving her an almost oriental look.

She gestured toward the sofa. Winter sat down and introduced himself.

"It was a different one before," said Jeanette.

Winter nodded.

"Is that a sort of tactic?" she asked.

"What do you mean?"

"You send different people to take care of the… talking. Interrogation, or whatever you call it."

"Sometimes," said Winter. "But not on this occasion."

"What do you mean by that?"

Winter didn't reply.

"I liked the one who was here before," said Jeanette, putting down her brush. "Fredrik… Inspector Halders." She looked at Winter. "Isn't that good? In which case it's a rotten tactic to change that, don't you think?"

OK, thought Winter, I'll tell her. And he explained what had happened to Halders's ex-wife.