Nemesis

13

Marble

Harry was aware that, on certain matters, he was small-minded. Take Bogstadveien, for example. He didn't like Bogstadveien. He didn't know why; perhaps it was because in this street, paved with gold and oil, the Mount Happy of Happyland, no one smiled. Harry didn't smile himself, but he lived in Bislett, wasn't paid to smile and right now had a few good reasons for not smiling. However, that didn't mean that Harry, in common with most Norwegians, didn't appreciate being smiled at.

Inwardly, Harry tried to excuse the boy behind the counter in the 7-Eleven. He probably hated his job, he probably lived in Bislett, too, and it had started to piss down with rain again.

The pale face with the fiery red pimples cast a bored eye over his police ID card: 'How should I know how long the skip's been outside?'

'Because it's green and it covers half of your view of Bogstadveien,' Harry said.

The boy groaned and put his hands on hips which barely held up his trousers. 'A week. Sort of. Hey, queue of people waiting behind you, you know.'

'Mm. I had a look inside. It's almost empty apart from a few bottles and newspapers. Do you know who ordered it?'

'No.'

'I see you have a surveillance camera over the counter. Looks as if it might just catch the skip?'

'If you say so.'

'If you still have the film from last Friday I would like to see it.'

'Ring tomorrow. Tobben's here.'

'Tobben?'

'Shop manager.'

'I suggest you ring Tobben now and get permission to give me the tape, then I won't detain you any longer.'

'You have a look for it,' he said and the spots went redder. 'I haven't got time to start searching for some video now.'

'Oh,' Harry said without making a move. 'What about after closing time?'

'We're open twenty-four hours,' the boy said, rolling his eyes.

'That was a joke,' Harry said.

'Right. Ha ha,' said the boy with the somnambulant voice. 'You going to buy sumfin or what?'

Harry shook his head and the boy looked past him: 'Till's free.'

Harry sighed and turned to the queue crowding towards the counter. 'The till is not free. I am from Oslo Police.' He held up his ID. 'And this person is arrested for being unable to pronounce th.'

Harry could be small-minded on certain matters. At this particular moment, though, he was extremely pleased with the response. He appreciated being smiled at.

But he didn't like the smile which appeared to be part of the professional training of preachers, politicians and undertakers. They smile with their eyes while speaking and it gave herr Sandemann of Sandemann Funeral Directors a sincerity which together with the temperature in the coffin storeroom under Majorstuen church made Harry shudder. He surveyed the locale. Two coffins, a chair, a wreath, a funeral director, a black suit and a comb-over.

'She looks wonderful,' Sandemann said. 'Peaceful. Restful. Dignified. Are you a member of the family?'

'Not exactly.' Harry showed his police card in the hope that sincerity was reserved for closest family. It wasn't.

'Tragic that such a young life should pass on in this way.' Sandemann smiled, pressing his palms together. The funeral director's fingers were unusually thin and crooked.

'I would like to have a look at the clothes the deceased was wearing when she was found,' Harry said. 'At the office they said you had brought them here.'

Sandemann nodded, fetched a white plastic bag and explained that he had done this in case parents or siblings turned up, and he could dispose of them. Harry searched in vain for pockets in the black dress.

'Was there anything specific you were after?' Sandemann asked in an innocent tone of voice as he peered over Harry's shoulder.

'A house key,' Harry said. 'You didn't find anything when you…' He stared at Sandemann's crooked fingers. '…undressed her?'

Sandemann closed his eyes and shook his head. 'The only thing under the skirt was herself. Apart from the picture in the shoe, of course.'

'The picture?'

'Yes. Curious, isn't it? What customs they have. It's still in her shoe.'

Harry lifted a black, high-heeled shoe out of the bag and caught a flash of her in the doorway when he arrived: black dress, black shoes, red mouth.

The picture was a dog-eared photograph of a woman and three children on a beach. It looked like a holiday snap from somewhere in Norway with large, smooth rocks in the water and tall pine trees on the hills in the background.

'Has anyone from her family been here?' Harry asked.

'Only her uncle. Together with one of your colleagues, naturally.'

'Naturally?'

'Yes, I understood he was serving a sentence.'

Harry didn't answer. Sandemann leaned forward and bent his back in such a way that the little head withdrew between his shoulders making him resemble a vulture: 'I wondered what for.' The whisper sounded like a hoarse birdcall: 'Since he won't even be allowed to attend the funeral, I mean.'

Harry cleared his throat. 'May I see her?'

Sandemann seemed disappointed, but gestured civilly with his hand to one of the coffins.

As usual, it struck Harry how a professional job could enhance a corpse. Anna really did seem at peace. He touched her forehead. It was like touching marble.

'What is the necklace?' Harry asked.

'Gold coins,' Sandemann said. 'Her uncle brought it.'

'And what's this?' Harry lifted up a wad of paper held together by a thick, brown elastic band. It was a stack of hundred-kroner notes.

'A custom they have,' Sandemann said.

'Who are these they you keep talking about?'

'Didn't you know?' Sandemann formed his thin, wet lips into a smile. 'She was a gypsy.'

All the tables in the canteen at Police HQ were occupied by colleagues in animated conversation. Except for one. Harry walked over to it.

'You'll get to know people by and by,' he said. Beate looked up at him with incomprehension, and he realised they might have more in common than he had thought. He sat down and placed a video cassette in front of him. 'This is taken from the 7-Eleven shop diagonally opposite the bank on the day of the robbery. Plus a recording of the Thursday before. Could you check it for anything interesting?'

'See if the bank robber's on it, you mean?' Beate mumbled with her mouth full of bread and liver paste. Harry studied her packed lunch.

'Well, we can only hope,' he said.

'Of course,' she said and her eyes filled with water as she struggled to swallow the food. 'In 1993, the Kreditkasse in Frogner was held up. The robber had taken plastic bags with the Shell logo on to put the money in, so we checked the surveillance camera at the nearest Shell station. Turned out he had been in to buy bags ten minutes before the job. Wearing the same clothes, but without a mask. We arrested him half an hour later.'

'We, eight years ago?' Harry asked, not thinking.

Beate's face changed colour like traffic lights. She snatched a slice of bread and tried to hide behind it. 'My father,' she muttered.

'I apologise. I didn't mean it like that.'

'It doesn't matter,' came the swift response.

'Your father…'

'Was killed,' she said. 'It's a long time ago now.'

Harry sat listening to the sounds of chewing while studying his hands.

'Why did you take a tape of the week before the robbery?' Beate asked.

'The skip,' Harry said.

'What about it?'

'I rang the skip company and asked. It was ordered on a Thursday by one Stein Sшbstad in Industrigata and delivered to the agreed site directly outside the 7-Eleven the day after. There are two Stein Sшbstads in Oslo and both deny having ordered a skip. My theory is that the robber had it placed there to cut off the view through the window so that the camera won't film him crossing the road as he leaves the bank. If he had been scouting around the 7-Eleven the same day as he had ordered the skip, we might see someone looking into the camera and out of the window towards the bank, checking angles and so on.'

'With a bit of luck. The witness outside the 7-Eleven says the robber was still masked when he crossed the road, so why would he go to all the bother with a skip?'

'The plan might have been to take off the balaclava while crossing the road.' Harry sighed. 'I don't know, I only know there is something about that green skip. It has been there for a week and apart from the odd passer-by throwing refuse in it, no one has used it.'

'OK,' Beate said, taking the video and standing up.

'One more thing,' Harry said. 'What do you know about this Raskol Baxhet?'

'Raskol?' Beate frowned. 'He was a kind of mythical figure until he gave himself up. If the rumours are true, in one way or another he's had a hand in ninety per cent of the bank robberies in Oslo. My guess is he could finger everyone who has committed a bank robbery here over the last twenty years.'

'So that's what Ivarsson is using him for. Where's he banged up?'

Beate thrust a thumb over her shoulder. 'A-Wing over there.'

'In Botsen?'

'Yes. And he's refused to utter a word to any policeman for the duration of his sentence.'

'So what makes Ivarsson think he can succeed?'

'He's finally found something Raskol wants that he can use to negotiate. In Botsen they say it's the only thing Raskol has asked for since he arrived. Permission to go to the funeral of a relative.'

'Really?' Harry said, hoping his face didn't give anything away.

'She'll be buried in two days' time, and Raskol has lodged an urgent plea with the prison governor to be allowed to attend.'

After Beate had gone, Harry remained at the table. The lunch break was over and the canteen was thinning out. It was supposed to be light and snug and was run by a national catering company, so Harry preferred to eat in town. But he suddenly remembered this was where he had danced with Rakel at the Christmas party; it was precisely here he had decided to make a move on her. Or was it vice versa? He could still feel the curve of her back on his hand.

Rakel.

In two days Anna would be buried, and no one had the slightest doubt that she had died by her own hand. He was the only person who had been there and could have contradicted them, but he couldn't remember a thing. So why couldn't he let sleeping dogs lie? He had everything to lose and nothing to gain. If for no other reason, why couldn't he forget the case for their sake, for his and Rakel's?

Harry put his elbows on the table and cradled his face in his hands.

If he had been able to contradict them, would he have done?

At the neighbouring table they turned when they heard the chair scraping on the floor and watched the close-cropped, long-legged policeman with the bad back stride quickly out of the canteen.