He tried to understand what the images communicated. Why did Simon Lamberg have this uncommon photo album? Why had he distorted the pictures? Was it in order to work on this album that he had spent his evenings at the studio alone? Wallander had increased his concentration. Behind Simon Lamberg's well-ordered facade there was obviously something else. At least a man who deliberately destroyed the faces of well-known people.

He turned another page. Winced. An acute discomfort radiated through his body.

He had difficulty believing it was true.

At that moment Svedberg came into the room.

'Look at this,' Wallander said slowly.

Then he pointed at the picture. Svedberg bent over his shoulder.

'That's you,' he said with amazement.

'Yes,' Wallander answered. 'It's me. Or at least maybe.'

He looked at it again. It was a photograph from a newspaper. It was him, and yet it wasn't. He looked like an unusually abominable individual.

Wallander could not think of a time when he had been so shaken. The distorted and grotesque depiction of his face nauseated him. He had certainly been the object of verbal assaults from criminals he had arrested, but the thought that someone had spent hours producing this hate-picture of him was frightening. Svedberg registered his reaction and went to get Nyberg. Together they went through the album. The last picture was from the day before, when the Swedish prime minister had had his face destroyed. The date was written in next to it.

'The person who did this has to be sick,' Nyberg said.

'There's no doubt that it is Simon Lamberg who has spent his evenings on these photographs,' Wallander said. 'What I am naturally wondering is why I've been included in this macabre collection. The only person from Ystad, no less. Among men of state and presidents. I won't deny that I find it very disturbing.'

'And what is the purpose?' Svedberg asked.

No one had any reasonable answer to offer.

Wallander felt he had to leave the studio. He asked Svedberg to take over an examination of the room. For his part, he would soon have to give the press the information they were waiting for. By the time he was back out on the street, his nausea was clearing up. He stepped over the police tape and went straight to the police station. It was still drizzling. Even though the nausea had passed, he felt ill at ease.

Simon Lamberg spends his evenings in his studio, listening to music. At the same time he distorts the faces of various prominent heads of state. And a detective inspector from Ystad. Wallander tried furiously to find an explanation, without success. That a man could lead a double life, concealing insanity under a surface appearance of complete normality, was nothing unique. You could find many examples of this in the annals of criminal history. But why was Wallander himself in the album? What did he have in common with the other individuals represented there? Why was he the exception?

He walked straight into his office and closed the door. When he sat down in his chair, he realised that he was concerned. Simon Lamberg was dead. Someone had crushed the back of his head with violent force. They did not know why. And in his desk they had found a secret photo album with grotesque contents.

He was wrenched out of his thoughts by a knock on the door. It was Hansson.

'Lamberg is dead,' he said, as if delivering a piece of news. 'He took pictures of me when I was confirmed, many years ago.'

'You've been confirmed?' Wallander asked, surprised. 'I thought you would be the person least likely to care about the higher powers.'

'And I don't,' he answered happily, while carefully picking at his ear. 'But I very much wanted to get a watch and my first real suit.'

He pointed over his shoulder back out into the corridor.

'Reporters,' he said. 'I thought I'd better tag along and listen and learn what's happened.'

'I can tell you that now,' Wallander said. 'Someone bashed in the back of Lamberg's head last night, between eight and midnight. It doesn't seem to be a case of burglary. That's about all we know.'

'Not much,' Hansson said.

'No,' Wallander answered, and stood up. 'It could hardly be any less.'

The meeting with the press was largely improvised, and short. Wallander gave a sketch of what was known and brief answers to individual questions. The whole thing was over in half an hour. The time had become half past three. Wallander noticed that he was hungry. But the picture in Simon Lamberg's album remained on his mind the whole time, worrying him. The question gnawed at him: why had he been chosen to have his face shrunken and deformed? He sensed that this was the work of an insane person. But still, why him?

At a quarter to four he decided that it was time to go to Lavendelvägen, where the Lambergs lived. When he left the station, the rain had stopped. The wind, however, had picked up. He wondered if he should try to get hold of Svedberg and bring him along. But he let this stay as a thought. What he most of all wanted was to meet with Elisabeth Lamberg alone. There was a great deal that he wanted to talk to her about. But one of the questions was more important than the others.

He found his way up to Lavendelvägen and got out of the car. The house lay within a garden that he could see was well tended, despite the empty flower beds. He rang the doorbell. It was opened almost immediately by a woman in her fifties. Wallander stretched out his hand and said hello. The woman seemed guarded.

'I'm not Elisabeth Lamberg,' she said. 'I'm a friend. My name is Karin Fahlman.'

She let him into the hall.

'Elisabeth is resting in the bedroom,' she said. 'I take it this conversation can't wait?'

'No, unfortunately. When it comes to apprehending whoever committed this crime, it's important not to lose any time.'

Karin Fahlman nodded and showed him into the living room. Then she left without a sound.

Wallander looked around the room. The first thing that struck him was how quiet it was. No clocks. No sounds from the street penetrated inside. Through a window he saw some children playing, but he could not hear them even though it was obvious they were shouting and screaming. He walked over and inspected the window. It was doubleglazed and appeared to be a particular model that was extremely soundproof.

He walked around the room. It was tastefully furnished, neither tacky nor overdone. A mixture of old and new. Copies of old woodcuts.

A whole wall covered with books.

He did not hear her enter the room. But suddenly she was there, right behind him. He gave an involuntary start. She was very pale, almost as if her face bore a thin layer of white make-up. She had dark and straight short hair. Wallander thought she had probably been very beautiful at one time.

'I'm sorry to have to disturb you,' he said and stretched out his hand.

'I know who you are,' she said. 'And I do understand that you have to come here.'

'I can start by expressing my condolences.'

'Thank you.'

Wallander could see that she was doing her utmost to remain collected. He wondered how long she would be able to do this before she lost control.

They sat down. Wallander caught sight of Karin Fahlman in a nearby room. He assumed she was sitting there in order to listen to their conversation. For a moment he thought about how to begin. But he was interrupted in his thinking by Elisabeth Lamberg posing the first question.

'Do you know anything about who killed my husband?'

'We have no direct leads to follow. But there isn't much to support it being a burglary. This means either your husband must have let the person in or the person had keys.'

She shook her head energetically, as if she violently opposed what Wallander had just said.