That was how he noticed that it was not the face of the man she was studying through the magnifying glass.
‘The knee,’ she said. ‘Can you see it?’
Bjørn went closer.
‘What about it?’ he said.
‘On the left knee. Looks like a plaster.’
‘You mean we should keep an eye open for people with plasters on their left knee?’
‘Very funny, Holm. Before we can find out who it is in the photo we have to find out if he could be the Courier Killer.’
‘And how do we do that?’
‘We visit the only man we know of who has seen the Courier Killer close up. Make a copy of the photo while I fetch the car.’
Sven Sivertsen stared at Harry, thunderstruck. Harry had just explained his theory to him, his impossible theory.
‘I really had no idea,’ Sivertsen whispered. ‘I never saw any of the pictures of the victims in the papers. They mentioned names when they questioned me, but none of them meant a thing.’
‘For the moment it’s simply a theory,’ Harry said. ‘We don’t know it’s the Courier Killer. We need concrete proof.’
Sivertsen smiled and said, ‘You’d better convince me first that you’ve got enough to get me off the hook already. Then I’ll agree to our giving ourselves up and you can have the use of my evidence to incriminate Waaler.’
Harry shrugged.
‘I can ring the head of my section, Bjarne Møller, and ask him to come in a patrol car and get us out of here safely.’
Sivertsen shook his head firmly.
‘There have got to be others involved in this, in higher positions in the police force than Waaler. I don’t trust anyone. You’ll have to find the proof first.’
Harry opened and closed his fist. ‘We have an alternative. One that would protect both of us.’
‘And that is?’
‘Go to the papers and tell them what we know. About the Courier Killer and Waaler. Then it would be too late for anyone to do anything.’
Sivertsen wore a sceptical expression.
‘Time’s running out for us,’ Harry said. ‘He’s getting closer. Can’t you feel it?’
Sivertsen rubbed his wrist.
‘OK,’ he said. ‘Do it.’
Harry shoved his hand in his back pocket and pulled out a crumpled business card. He hesitated for a second. Possibly because he anticipated the consequences of what he was about to do. Or perhaps because he didn’t anticipate them. He tapped in the work number. The reply came surprisingly quickly.
‘Roger Gjendem.’
Harry could hear the hum of voices, the clatter of computer keyboards and telephones ringing in the background.
‘This is Harry Hole. I want you to listen very carefully, Gjendem. I have some information about the Courier Killer. And arms smuggling. One of my colleagues in the police is involved. Do you understand?’
‘I believe so.’
‘Good. The story’s yours exclusively so long as you publish it on Aftenposten’s web pages as quickly as possible.’
‘Of course. Where are you ringing from, Inspector Hole?’
Gjendem sounded less surprised than Harry had expected.
‘It’s not important where I am. I have information which proves Sven Sivertsen cannot be the Courier Killer and that a leading policeman is involved in a network of arms smuggling that has been operating in Norway for several years.’
‘That’s fantastic. But I’m sure you’re aware that I cannot write that on the basis of one telephone conversation.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘No serious newspaper would print an allegation about a named police inspector smuggling arms without checking that the sources are reliable. I don’t doubt for a minute that you’re the person you say you are, but how do I know that you aren’t drunk or crazy or both? If I don’t check this out properly, the paper can be sued. Let’s meet, shall we, Inspector Hole. Then I’ll write everything you tell me. I promise.’
In the pause that followed Harry could hear someone laughing in the background. A carefree ripple of laughter.
‘Don’t even think about ringing other papers – they’ll give you the same answer. Trust me, Inspector.’
Harry took a deep breath.
‘OK,’ he said. ‘At Underwater in Dalsbergstien. At five o’clock. Come on your own or I won’t turn up. And not a single word about this to a living soul, understood?’
‘Understood.’
‘See you.’
Harry pressed the ‘off’ button and chewed his bottom lip.
‘I hope that was wise,’ said Sven.
Bjørn Holm and Beate turned off busy Bygdøy allé and one moment later they found themselves in a silent road with misshapen detached timber houses on one side and fashionable brick apartment buildings on the other. The kerbsides came complete with rows of German makes of car.
‘Nobsville,’ Bjørn said.
They pulled up outside a doll’s-house-yellow building.
A voice answered the intercom after the second buzz.
‘Yes?’
‘André Clausen?’
‘I believe so, yes.’
‘Beate Lønn, police. May we come in?’
André Clausen was waiting for them in the doorway, dressed in a thigh-length dressing gown. He was scratching at the scab of a cut on his cheek as he made a half-hearted attempt at suppressing a yawn.
‘Apologies,’ he said. ‘I got home late last night.’
‘From Switzerland perhaps?’
‘No, I’ve just been up in the mountains. Come in.’
Clausen’s sitting room was a little on the small side for the collection of objets d’art he had, and Bjørn Holm was quick to establish that Clausen’s taste tended more towards Liberace than minimalism. Water trickled through a fountain in the corner where a naked goddess stretched up towards the Sistine paintings on the vaulted ceiling.
‘I’d like you to concentrate first and think about the time you saw the Courier Killer in the reception area at the solicitors’ office,’ Beate said. ‘And then look at this.’
Clausen took hold of the picture and studied it while running a finger across the cut on his cheek. Bjørn Holm examined the sitting-room area. He heard a shuffling noise behind a door and the sound of paws scratching against the other side.
‘Maybe,’ Clausen said.
‘Maybe?’ Beate was perched on the edge of the chair.
‘Very possible. The clothes are the same. The cycling helmet and the sunglasses too.’
‘Good. And the plaster on his knee. Did he have that?’
Clausen laughed softly.
‘As I told you, it is not my habit to study men’s bodies in such detail. But if it makes you happier, I can say that my immediate reaction is that this is the man I saw. Beyond that . . .’
He made a gesture with outstretched arms.
‘Thank you,’ Beate said getting up.
‘My pleasure,’ Clausen said, following them to the door where he proffered his hand. That was a strange thing to do, Holm thought, but he took it. But when Clausen proffered his hand to Beate, she shook her head with a little smile:
‘Sorry, but . . . you have blood on your fingers. And your chin’s bleeding.’
Clausen put a hand up to his face.
‘Indeed,’ he said smiling. ‘That’s Truls. My dog. Our games at the weekend got a little out of hand.’
He looked Beate in the eyes and his smile became broader and broader.
‘Goodbye,’ Beate said.
Bjørn Holm was not quite sure why he shuddered when he emerged into the heat again.
Klaus Torkildsen had pointed both fans in the room towards his face, but it felt as if they were only blowing the hot air from the machine back at him. He tapped his finger against the thick glass of the screen. Under the internal number in Kjølberggata. The subscriber had just rung off. That was the fourth time today that the person in question had spoken to precisely
that mobile phone number. Brief conversations.
He double-clicked on the mobile phone number to find the subscriber’s name. A name appeared on the screen. He double-clicked to find an address and a profession. When it came up, Klaus sat looking at the information for a moment. Then he dialled the number he had been told to call when he had something to report.
A phone was picked up.
‘Hello?’
‘This is Torkildsen at Telenor. Who am I talking to?’
‘Never mind about that, Torkildsen. What have you got for us?’
Torkildsen could feel his sweaty upper arms sticking to his chest.
‘I’ve done a bit of checking around,’ he said. ‘Hole’s mobile is constantly on the move and impossible to trace. But there is another mobile which has rung the internal number in Kjølberggata several times.’
‘Right. Whose is it?’
‘The subscription is under the name of Øystein Eikeland. His profession is given as taxi driver.’
‘So?’
Torkildsen pushed out his lower lip and tried to blow hot air upwards to clear his glasses, which were wet with condensation.
‘I was just thinking that there could be a connection between a telephone that is continually on the move all over town and a taxi driver.’
The line went quiet at the other end.
‘Hello?’ Torkildsen said.
‘Received and understood,’ the voice said. ‘Keep tracing the numbers, Torkildsen.’
As Bjørn Holm and Beate wandered into reception in Kjølberggata, Beate’s mobile phone bleeped.
She whipped it out of her belt, read the display and placed it against her ear in one sweeping movement.
‘Harry? Ask Sivertsen to roll up his left trouser leg. We’ve got a picture of a masked cyclist in front of the Fountain at half past five last Monday with a plaster on his knee. And he’s holding a brown polythene bag.’
Bjørn had to take longer strides to keep up with his diminutive female colleague as she made her way down the corridor. He heard a voice crackling on the phone.
Beate swung into her office.
‘No plaster and no wound? No, I know that doesn’t prove anything, but for your information André Clausen has more or less identified the cyclist in the picture as the same person he saw at Halle, Thune and Wetterlid.’
She sat down behind her desk.
‘What?’
Bjørn Holm saw three deep sergeant’s chevrons appear on her forehead.
‘Right.’
She put down the phone and stared at it as if she didn’t know whether to believe what she had just heard.
‘Harry thinks he knows who the Courier Killer is,’ she said.
Bjørn didn’t answer.
‘Check to see if the lab is free,’ she said. ‘He’s given us a new job.’
‘What kind of job?’ Bjørn asked.
‘A real shit job.’
Øystein Eikeland was sitting in a taxi in the parking area below St Hanshaugen with his eyes half closed, peering down the street at a girl with long legs, imbibing caffeine on a seat on the pavement outside Java. The hum of the air conditioning was drowned out by the sounds of music the loudspeakers were emitting.
Malicious rumour had it that the song was a Gram Parsons number and that Keith and the Stones had nicked it for the Sticky Fingers album while they were down in France. The ’60s were over and they were trying to drug themselves into creativity: ‘Wild Horses’.
One of the back doors opened. Øystein was startled. Whoever it was must have come from behind, from the park. In the mirror he saw a tanned face with a powerful jaw and reflector sunglasses.
‘Lake Maridal, driver.’ The voice was soft, but the command intonation was unmistakable. ‘If it isn’t too much trouble . . .’
‘Not at all,’ Øystein mumbled as he turned down the music and took a last deep drag of his cigarette before he tossed it out of the open window.
‘Whereabouts by Lake Maridal?’
‘Just drive. I’ll tell you.’
They drove down Ullevålsveien.
‘Rain is forecast,’ Øystein said.
‘I’ll tell you,’ the voice repeated.
No tip then, Øystein thought.
After a ten-minute drive they had left the residential quarter behind them and suddenly it was all fields, farms and Lake Maridal. It was such a wonderful transition that an American passenger had once asked Øystein if they were in a theme park.
‘You can take the turning up there to the left,’ the voice said.
‘Up into the woods?’ Øystein asked.
‘Right. Does that make you nervous?’
The thought had never occurred to Øystein. Until now. He looked into the mirror again, but the man had moved across to the window so that he could only see half of his face.
Øystein slowed down, indicated he was turning left and swung into the turning. The gravel track in front of them was narrow and bumpy with grass growing in the middle.
Øystein hesitated.
Branches with green leaves that reflected in the light hung over the track on each side and seemed to be waving them on. Øystein put his foot on the brake. The gravel crunched under the tyres and the car came to a halt.
‘Sorry,’ he said to the mirror. ‘Just had the chassis fixed for 40 thousand and we are under no obligation to drive on tracks like these. I can ring for another car if you like.’
The man in the back seat appeared to be smiling, at least the half he could see.
‘And which telephone were you thinking of using, Eikeland?’
Øystein felt the hairs on the back of his neck rising.
‘Your own telephone?’ the voice whispered. ‘Or Harry Hole’s?’
‘I’m not exactly sure what you’re talking about, but the trip stops here, mister.’
The man laughed.
‘Mister? I don’t think so, Eikeland.’
Øystein felt an urge to swallow, but resisted the temptation.
‘Listen, you don’t have to pay since I couldn’t drive you to your destination. Get out and wait here and I’ll organise another car for you.’
‘Your record says that you’re smart, Eikeland. So I assume you know what I’m after. I hate to have to use this cliché, but it is up to you whether we do this the easy way or the hard way.’
‘I really don’t know what . . . Ow!’
The man had slapped the back of Øystein’s head, just above the headrest, and as Øystein was automatically thrust forwards, he could feel, to his surprise, his eyes filling with tears. It wasn’t that it hurt particularly. The blow had been of the type they handed out at junior school: light, a sort of introductory humiliation. The tear ducts were, however, already aware of what his brain still refused to accept. That he was in serious trouble.
‘Where’s Harry’s phone, Eikeland? In the glove compartment? In the boot? In your pocket perhaps?’
Øystein didn’t answer. He sat still as his eyes fed his brain. Forest on both sides. Something told him that the man in the back seat was fit and that he would catch Øystein in a matter of seconds. Was the man alone? Should he set off the alarm that was connected to the other cars? Was it a good idea to get other people involved?
‘I see,’ the man said. ‘The hard way then. And do you know what?’ Øystein was unable to react before he felt an arm around his neck pulling him back against the headrest. ‘Deep down, that’s what I’d hoped.’
Øystein lost his glasses. He stretched his hand out towards the steering column, but couldn’t reach.
‘Press the alarm and I’ll kill you,’ the man whispered into his ear. ‘And I’m not speaking metaphorically, Eikeland, but in the sense that I will literally take your life.’
Despite the fact that his brain was not getting oxygen, Øystein Eikeland could hear, see and smell unusually well. He could see the network of veins on the inside of his own eyelids, smell the aroma of the man’s after-shave and hear the slightly whining
overtone of glee – like a kind of drivebelt – in the man’s voice.
‘Where is he, Eikeland? Where is Harry Hole?’
Øystein opened his mouth and the man released his grip.
‘I have no idea what it is you –’
Then the arm was back, squeezing.
‘Last try, Eikeland. Where’s your piss-artist pal?’
Øystein felt the pains, the irritating will to live, but he also knew that it would soon be over. He had experienced similar things before. It was just a phase, a stage before the much more pleasurable sense of indifference kicked in. The seconds passed. The brain was beginning to shut down branch lines. First his sight went.
Then the man let go again and the oxygen streamed into his brain. Sight returned. And the pain.
‘We’ll find him anyway,’ the voice said. ‘You can choose whether it’s before or after you’ve left us.’
Øystein felt something cold and hard move across his temples. Then across the bridge of his nose. Øystein had seen his share of Westerns, but he had never seen a .45calibre revolver close up before.
‘Open up.’
Let alone tasted one.
‘I’m going to count to five. Then I’ll shoot. Nod if there’s something you want to say to me. Preferably before I count to five. One . . .’
Øystein tried to combat his fear of death. Tried telling himself that mankind is rational and that the man behind him would not gain anything by taking his life.
‘Two . . .’
Logic is with me, Øystein thought. The barrel had a nauseous smell of metal and blood.