Wallander lay on a trolley, listening to a drunk ranting in one of the treatment rooms, the pain coming and going, until suddenly he found a young doctor standing beside him. He described his chest pains once again. His trolley was wheeled into a treatment room and he was wired up to an ECG machine. They took his blood pressure, felt his pulse, and answered various questions: no he didn't smoke, he hadn't experienced chest pains before, as far as he knew there was no history of heart disease in his family. The doctor scrutinised the ECG reading.

"Nothing special here," he said. "Everything seems to be normal. What do you think might have caused this?" "I have no idea."

The doctor studied Wallander's records. "You're a police officer, I see," he said. "I imagine things can get a bit hectic at work now and then." "It's like that more or less all the time." "What about your alcohol intake?" "I like to think it's normal."

The doctor sat down on the edge of a table and put down the record cards. Wallander could see that he was very tired.

"I don't think you've had a heart attack," he said. "It might be your body sounding the alarm, announcing that everything isn't as it should be. You're the only one who can know about this."

"That's probably it," Wallander said. "I ask myself every day what my life is doing to me. And I realise I don't have anybody I can talk to."

"You should have," said the doctor. "Everybody should."

He stood up when his pager started peeping like a fledgling in his pocket.

"I'm going to keep you in overnight," he said. "Try to get some rest."

Wallander lay there quite peacefully, listening to the hum of an invisible air conditioning fan. He could hear voices in the corridor.

All pain has a cause, he thought. If it isn't my heart, what is it? The guilt I have at failing to devote enough time and energy to my father? Worry because I suspect the letters my daughter sends me from university in Stockholm don't tell the full story?