Falk’s Apartment Broken Into and Materials Stolen

The break-in at Tynnes Falk’s flat transforms a scene Wallander had visited in secret into a direct challenge to the investigation. The intruder has torn through the apartment but taken only two items that Wallander can identify: a photograph of a group of men and Falk’s diary. Their disappearance suggests that the disorder is not random. Someone wants the police kept from examining what those objects might reveal, and may know that Wallander has already seen them.

Discovery of the Break-In

Wallander and Martinsson arrive at 10 Apelbergsgatan with Marianne Falk, who is waiting outside. She is angry that Falk’s body has gone missing and calls the situation unacceptable. At the top landing, the officers discover that the flat’s door stands open. The locks Wallander had carefully tried not to disturb during his visit the previous night have been broken with something like a crowbar.

The possibility that someone remains inside changes the officers’ approach. Neither Wallander nor Martinsson is armed, so Wallander signals them to retreat down the stairs and calls for backup rather than entering blindly. Marianne is told to wait in her car. The officers remain still and quiet until Hansson arrives with three others; Wallander takes a gun from one of them. After calling into the flat and receiving no answer, the group enters. The apartment is empty.

A Ransacked Interior and Missing Evidence

The state of the rooms contrasts sharply with the meticulous order Wallander remembers from the night before. Drawers have been pulled out and their contents emptied across the floor; paintings hang askew, and the record collection is shattered. The extensive damage makes the flat look as though it has been searched, but the crucial clue is not the general destruction. Wallander senses that something specific is missing.

He removes his shoes and approaches the desk, examining the floor and lifting scattered papers one by one. The photograph of a group of men posed against a white stone wall is gone. So is Falk’s diary, which Wallander had read the previous night. The two absences give the break-in a sharper meaning: the intruder has taken objects capable of informing the inquiry, rather than simply damaging or stealing whatever is easiest to reach.

Wallander wonders whether someone saw him come and go. During his earlier visit, he had twice looked out of the windows, uneasy without being able to identify why. The break-in makes that unease newly significant, but it does not establish who watched him or how much the intruder knew. What Wallander can infer is more limited and more urgent: whoever entered the flat did not want the photograph and diary examined by the police.

Securing the Scene

Wallander tells Martinsson to speak to every resident in the building, despite Martinsson’s objection that he already has more than enough to do. Wallander insists that the enquiries must be done properly and notes that relatively few people live there. Martinsson begins interviewing neighbours; one woman reports nothing unusual. The absence of a witness does not resolve the question of when the break-in happened or who carried it out.

Wallander also asks the officers to have Nyberg’s forensic team examine the flat without disturbing it further. He wants the whole apartment videotaped and searched down to the last detail, and asks for the answering machine to be examined. These instructions reflect how much remains unknown: the missing objects have been identified, but the investigators have not yet established what else was taken, what traces were left, or whether the apartment can yield a lead.

Marianne is asked to return after the forensic examination and help identify anything missing. She doubts she can do so. Although she and Tynnes had remained on good terms and she had visited the flat, she says she knew him less well after their marriage ended: he changed, kept secrets, and no longer shared what he was thinking or doing. She believes she might recognize a missing lamp or painting, not the contents of a hidden life. Her account underlines the gap between her familiarity with the flat and her knowledge of Falk.

Significance and Immediate Aftermath

The stolen diary is particularly consequential because Marianne says she is sure Tynnes never kept one. Wallander, however, has already read it. The break-in therefore exposes both a concealed part of Falk’s life and a sharp limit to what his former wife knew about him. Alongside the missing photograph, the diary makes the intruder’s purpose appear selective, even though the evidence does not identify the person responsible or explain the photograph’s contents.

Later, back inside the still-disordered apartment, Wallander connects the missing items with the earlier disappearance of Falk’s body. He concludes that someone does not want the police to study either the photograph or the diary, and curses himself for not taking the photograph when he had the chance. As footsteps approach, he expects Marianne; when the flat’s door opens, he senses danger and pulls back just before a shot tears through the apartment. The attack is a separate escalation, not proof of who committed the burglary, but it makes the danger surrounding the investigation immediate. The break-in has already shown that Falk’s private materials are being targeted; the gunshot makes clear that Wallander himself may now be part of what someone wants to silence.