Nemesis

Vigdis Albu opened the door. She was wearing a freshly ironed white blouse and a short skirt, but her blurred eyes seemed to have come straight from bed.

  'I rang your husband's workplace,' Harry said. 'They told me he was at home today.'

  'Could be,' she said. 'He doesn't live here any more, Inspector. You were the one who dragged up this whole business with . . . with . . .' She gesticulated as if she were looking for the right word, but with a smile of distaste she resigned herself to admitting there was no other word for it: '. . . the whore.'

  'May I come in, fru Albu?'

  She hunched her shoulders, and shuddered to register her disgust. 'Call me Vigdis or anything, but not that.'

  'Vigdis.' Harry stooped. 'May I come in now?'

  The thin plucked eyebrows angled. She hesitated. Then she thrust out her hand. 'Why not?'

  Harry thought he could detect a faint smell of gin, but it might have been her perfume. Nothing in the house suggested anything out of the ordinary - it was clean, fragrant and tidy. There were fresh flowers in a vase on the sideboard. Harry noticed the sofa cover was a touch whiter than the off-white he had sat on last time. Low classical music was playing from speakers he couldn't see.

  'Mahler?' Harry asked.

  'Greatest hits,' Vigdis said. 'Arne only bought collections. He always said everything except the best was worthless.'

  'Nice that he didn't take the collections with him then. Where is he, by the way?'

  'First of all, he doesn't own anything you can see here. And I neither know nor wish to know where he is. Have you got a cigarette, Inspector?'

  Harry passed her the packet and watched her fumbling with a large teak-and-silver table lighter. He leaned over the table with his disposable version.

  'Thank you. He's abroad, I would guess. Somewhere hot. Not as hot as I would like it to be, I'm afraid.'

  'Mm. What do you mean he doesn't own anything here?'

  'Exactly what I say. The house, the furnishings, the car - it's all mine.' She blew out the smoke with force. 'Ask my solicitor.'

  'I thought your husband had the money for--'

  'Don't call him that!' Vigdis seemed to be trying to suck all the tobacco out of the cigarette. 'Yes, Arne had money. He had enough to buy this house, the furniture, the cars, the suits, the chalet and the jewellery he gave me for no other reason than to show off in front of all the so-called friends. The only thing that had any meaning for Arne was what others thought of him, you see. His family, my family, colleagues, neighbours and student friends.' The anger gave her voice a harsh metallic timbre as though she were talking through a megaphone. 'Everyone was a spectator to Arne Albu's fantastic life. They were meant to applaud when things were going well. If Arne had put as much energy into running the company as he did reaping plaudits, perhaps Albu AS would not have gone downhill the way it did.'

  'According to Dagens Naeringsliv Albu AS was a successful enterprise.'

  'Albu AS was a family business, not a stock-exchange-listed company which has to publish details of its accounts. Arne made it look profitable by selling off its assets.' She crushed the half-smoked cigarette in the ashtray. 'A couple of years ago the company had an acute liquidity crisis and since Arne was personally responsible for the debt, he put the house and all our other possessions in my name and the children's.'

  'Yes, but the buyers paid a tidy sum. Thirty million, the papers said.'

  Vigdis gave a bitter laugh. 'So you swallowed the story of the successful businessman stepping down to spend more time with his family, did you? Arne's good at PR, I'll give him that. Let me put it this way - Arne had the choice of losing the business or going bust. Naturally, he chose the former.'

  'And the thirty million?'

  'Arne can put on the charm when he wants to. And people fall for it. That's why he's good at negotiating, especially in pressurised situations. That was what made the bank and the supplier keep the business alive for as long as they did. Arne negotiated two clauses in the contract with the supplier in what ought to have been an unconditional capitulation. He would be allowed to keep the chalet, which was still in his name, and he got the buyer to put the purchase figure at thirty million. That didn't mean much to them as they could write the whole sum off with the debts of Albu AS. He made a bankruptcy look like a sales coup. And that's not such a mean feat, is it.'

  She threw back her head and laughed. Harry could see the little scar under the chin left by a facelift.

  'What about Anna Bethsen?' he asked.

  'His tart?' She crossed her slim legs, flicked her hair away from her face with a finger and stared into space with an air of indifference. 'She was just a toy. His big mistake was his keenness to show off to the boys about his authentic gypsy lover. Not everyone Arne regarded as friends felt they owed him any particular loyalty, shall we say. In short, it came to my ears.'

  'And?'

  'I gave him another chance. For the children's sake. I'm a reasonable woman.' She looked at Harry through heavy eyelids. 'But he didn't take it.'

  'Perhaps he discovered she was more than a toy?'

  She didn't answer, but the thin lips became even thinner.

  'Did he have a study or anything like that?' Harry asked.

  Vigdis Albu nodded.

  She led the way up the stairs. 'He used to lock himself in and sit up here half the night.' She opened the door to an attic room with a view of neighbouring roofs.

  'Working?'

  Surfing the Net. He was utterly hooked. Said he looked at cars, but God knows what he did.'

  Harry went to the desk and pulled out one of the drawers. 'Emptied?'

  'He took everything he had here with him. It filled one plastic bag.'

  'The computer too?'

  'It was a laptop.'

  'Which he attached to a mobile phone?'

  She raised an eyebrow. 'I don't know anything about that.'

  'I just wondered.'

  'Anything else you want to see?'

  Harry turned round. Vigdis was leaning against the door frame with one arm over her head and the other on her hip. The feeling of deja vu was overwhelming.

  'I have one last question, fru . . . Vigdis.'

  'Oh, are you in a rush, Inspector?'

  'The clock's running on a taxi outside. The question is simple. Do you think he could have killed her?'

  She studied Harry in her own time as she lightly kicked at the door sill with the heel of her shoe. Harry waited.

  'Do you know the first thing he said when I told him about his whore? Promise me you won't tell anyone, Vigdis. I shouldn't tell anyone! For Arne the notion that others considered us happy was more important than whether we really were. My answer, Inspector, is that I have no idea what he is capable of. I don't know the man.'

  Harry took a card out of his inside pocket. 'I'd like you to give me a call if he contacts you or if you find out where he is. Immediately.'

  Vigdis looked at his card with a tiny smile playing around her pale pink lips. 'Only then, Inspector?'

  Harry didn't answer.

  On the stairs outside he turned to her. 'Did you tell anyone?'

  'That my husband was unfaithful? What do you think?'

  'I think you're a practical woman.'

  She beamed.

  * 'Eighteen minutes,' Oystein said. 'Shit, my pulse was beginning to race.'

  'Did you ring my old mobile number while I was in there?'

  'Of course. It just rang and rang.'

  'I didn't hear a thing. It's not there any more.'

  'Sorry, but have you heard about vibrate?'

  'What?'

  Oystein simulated an epileptic fit. 'Like that. Vibrate mode. Silent phone.'

  'Mine cost one krone and just rang. He's taken it with him, Oystein. What happened to the blue BMW down the street?'

  'Eh?'

  Harry sighed. 'Let's get going.'

  31

  Maglite

  'Are you telling me some psycho is after

 
us because you can't find the person who killed a member of his family?' Rakel's voice screeched down the phone.

  Harry closed his eyes. Halvorsen had gone to Elmer's and he had the office to himself. 'In a nutshell, yes. I've come to an agreement with him. He's kept his part.'

  'And that's why we're being hunted? That's why I have to leave the hotel with my son, who in a few days' time will find out whether he's allowed to stay with his mother or not? That's . . . that's . . .' Her voice rose into a furious, intermittent falsetto. He let her go on without interrupting. 'Why, Harry?'

  'The oldest reason in the world,' he said. 'Blood revenge.

  Vendetta.'

  'What's it got to do with us?'

  'As I said: nothing. You and Oleg are not the end, only the means.

  This man sees it as his duty to avenge the killing.'

  Harry called Vigdis once Rakel had hung up. She answered after the first ring.

  'Duty?' Her scream pierced Harry's eardrum. 'Vengeance is one of

  these territorial things you men like so much. It's not about duty, it's

  the Neanderthal urge!'

  He waited until he thought she was finished. 'I'm sorry about this,

  but there's nothing I can do right now.'

  She didn't answer.

  'Rakel?'

  'Yes.'

  'Where are you?'

  'If what you say is right, about how easily they found us, I'm not

  sure I'll risk telling you on the phone.'

  'OK. Are you somewhere safe?'

  'I think so.'

  'Good.'

  A Russian voice faded in and out, like on a short-wave radio station. 'Why can't you reassure me that we're not in any danger, Harry?

  Tell me it's your imagination, they're bluffing . . .' Her voice had

  become frayed at the edges. '. . . anything . . .'

  Harry took his time to answer. Then he said in a slow, clear voice:

  'You need to be frightened, Rakel. Frightened enough to do the right

  thing.'

  'And that is?'

  Harry took a deep breath. 'I'll straighten things out. I promise you.

  I'll straighten things out.'

  'Hole here. Are you sitting by the phone waiting for someone, fru

  Albu?'

  'What do you think?' Harry could tell by the slurred speech that

  she had had at least a couple of drinks since he left.

  'I've no idea, but I'd like you to report your husband missing.' 'Why? I don't miss him.' She gave a short, sad laugh. 'Well, I need a reason for setting the search machinery in motion.

  You can choose. Either you report him missing or I announce he's

  being investigated. For murder.'

  A long silence followed. 'I don't understand, Constable.' 'There's not a lot to understand, fru Albu. Shall I say you've

  reported him missing?'

  'Wait!' she shouted. Harry could hear a glass being smashed at the

  other end. 'What are you talking about? Arne is already being

  investigated.'

  'By me, yes, but I haven't informed anyone yet.'

  'Oh? And what about the three officers who came here after you

  left?'

  Harry could feel a cold finger running up his spine. 'Three

  officers?'

  'Don't you communicate in the police force? They wouldn't go. I

  was almost frightened.'

  Harry had got out of his office chair. 'Did they arrive in a blue

  BMW, fru Albu?'

  'Do you remember what I told you about the fru stuff, Harry?' 'What did you tell them?'

  'Not much. Nothing I didn't tell you, I don't think. They had a

  look at some photos and . . . well, they weren't exactly impolite,

  but...'

  'How did you get them to leave?'

  'Leave?'

  'They wouldn't have left unless they found what they were after.

  Believe me, fru Albu.'

  'Harry, now I'm getting tired of reminding--'

  'Think! This is important.'

  'My God, I didn't say anything, I'm telling you. I . . . yes, I played

  a recorded message Arne left on the answerphone two days ago. Then

  they left.'

  'You said you hadn't talked to him.'

  'I haven't. He just said he'd picked up Gregor. And that was true.

  I could hear Gregor barking in the background.'

  'Where was he ringing from?

  'How should I know?'

  'At any rate, your visitors knew. This is a matter of . . .' Harry tried

  to think of another way of saying it, but gave up: '. . . life or death.'

  There was a lot Harry didn't know about roads and communication. He didn't know that calculations had shown that the building of two tunnels in Vinterbro and the extension of the motorway would reduce rush-hour congestion on the E6 south of Oslo. He didn't know that the crucial argument in favour of this billion-kroner investment had not been the voters who commuted between Moss and Drobak, but traffic safety. The road authorities used a formula to calculate the social benefit, based on an evaluation of one human life at 20.4 million kroner, which included ambulances, re-routing of traffic and future loss of tax income. Heading south on the E6 in Oystein's Mercedes, bumper to bumper, Harry didn't even know what value he placed on Arne Albu's life. He certainly didn't know what could be gained by saving it. All he knew was that he couldn't afford to lose what he risked losing. Not under any circumstances. So it didn't do to think too much.

  The recorded message Vigdis Albu had played him over the telephone had lasted five seconds and contained only one valuable piece of information. It was enough. There was nothing in the ten short words Arne Albu said before ringing off:

  I took Gregor with me. Just so that you know.

  It wasn't Gregor's frenetic barking in the background. It was the cold screams. The seagulls.

  It was dark when the sign for the Larkollen turn-off appeared.

  Outside the chalet was a Jeep Cherokee, but Harry continued up to the turnaround. No blue BMW there. He parked immediately beneath the chalet. There was no point trying to sneak in; he had already heard the barking when he rolled down the window on the way in.

  Harry was conscious that he should have taken a gun with him. Not that there was any reason to assume Arne Albu was armed; he couldn't know that someone craved his life - or to be more precise, his death. But they weren't the only actors in this drama any more.

  Harry got out of the car. He couldn't see or hear any gulls now - perhaps they only make noises in daylight, he mused.

  Gregor was chained to the railing by the front steps. His teeth glittered in the moonlight, sending cold shivers down Harry's stillsore neck, but he forced himself to approach the baying dog with long, slow strides.

  'Do you remember me?' Harry whispered when he was so close he could touch the dog's grey breath. The taut chain quivered behind Gregor. Harry crouched down and, to his surprise, the barking subsided. The rasping sound suggested it had been going on for quite some time. Gregor pushed his front paws forward, lowered his head and completely stopped. Harry held the door handle. It was locked. Could he hear a voice inside? A light was on in the living room.

  'Arne Albu!'

  No answer.

  Harry waited and tried again.

  The key wasn't in the lamp. So he found a suitably large stone, climbed over the veranda railing, smashed one of the small panes in the veranda door, reached his hand through and opened the door.

  There was no sign of a fight in the room. More a hasty departure. A book lay open on the table. Harry lifted it up. Shakespeare's Macbeth. One line of the text had been ringed with a blue pen. I have no words; my voice is in my sword. He scanned the room but he couldn't see a pen anywhere.

  Only the bed in the smallest bedroom had been used. There was a copy of a men's magazine on the bedside table.

  A small ra
dio, more or less tuned in to P4 news, babbled quietly away in the kitchen. Harry switched it off. On the worktop was a thawed entrecote steak and broccoli still encased in plastic. Harry took the meat and went to the porch. The dog was scratching at the door and he opened up. A pair of brown puppy-dog eyes stared up at him. Or, to be more accurate, at the entrecote, which had hardly landed with a splat on the step before it was ripped to pieces.

  Harry observed the ravenous dog while pondering what to do. If there was anything he could do. Arne Albu didn't read Shakespeare, that much was certain.

  When the last scrap of meat was gone, Gregor began to bark with renewed vigour towards the road. Harry walked over to the railing, loosened the chain and just managed to stay on his feet on the wet surface as Gregor tore loose. The dog dragged him down the path, across the road and down the steep incline where Harry could see black waves crashing onto smooth rocks gleaming white in the light of the half-moon. They waded through tall, wet grass which clung to Harry's legs as if it didn't want to let them go, but Gregor didn't stop until pebbles and sand crunched beneath Harry's Doc Martens. Gregor's rounded stump of a tail pointed upwards. They were standing on the beach. It was high tide; the waves almost reached the rigid grass and bubbled as if there was carbon dioxide in the foam left on the sand as the water retreated. Gregor began to bark again.

  'Did he take a boat?' Harry asked, half to Gregor and half to himself. 'Was he alone or did he have company?'

  He didn't draw a response from either of them. Nevertheless, it was clear the trail ended here. As Harry pulled at the collar, the large Rottweiler refused to budge. So Harry switched on his Maglite and shone it at the sea. All he could see were rows of white waves, like lines of cocaine on a black mirror. There was clearly a gentle slope beneath the water. Harry pulled at the chain again, but then with a desperate howl the dog started to dig in the sand with its paws.

  Harry sighed, switched off the torch and walked back to the chalet. He made himself a cup of coffee in the kitchen and listened to the distant barking. After rinsing his cup, he walked back down to the beach and found a gap between rocks to settle down and shelter from the wind. He lit a cigarette and tried to think. Then he pulled his coat tighter around him and closed his eyes.

  *

  One night they had been in her bed and Anna had said something. It must have been towards the end of the six weeks - and he must have been more sober than usual because he could remember it. She had said that her bed was a ship, and that she and Harry were two castaways, lonely people drifting on the sea, terrified they would sight land. Was that what had happened next? Had they sighted land? He didn't remember it like that. He felt as if he had jumped ship, jumped overboard. Perhaps his memory was playing tricks on him.