Nemesis

15

Gadjo

'What fantastic weather it is today,' Bjarne Mшller said as he came sailing into Harry and Halvorsen's office the next morning.

'Well, you would know, wouldn't you. You've got a window,' Harry said without looking up from his cup of coffee. 'And a new chair,' he added as Mшller dropped into Halvorsen's defective chair, which gave a scream of pain.

'Hi, sunshine,' Mшller said. 'Having a bad day?'

Harry shrugged. 'I'm pushing forty and I've started to enjoy grumbling. Anything wrong with that?'

'Not at all. Good to see you in a suit, by the way.'

Harry lifted the lapels of his jacket as if he had only now discovered the dark suit.

'There was a meeting of Unit Heads yesterday,' Mшller said. 'Do you want the short or the long version?'

Harry stirred his coffee with a pencil. 'We have to stop investigating Ellen's case. Is that it?'

'The case was closed ages ago, Harry. And the Head of Forensics says you're pestering them to check all sorts of old evidence.'

'We found a new witness yesterday who-'

'There's always a new witness, Harry. They just don't want any more.'

'But-'

'We've drawn a line under it, Harry. Sorry.'

Mшller turned at the door. 'Go for a walk in the sun. It might be the last warm day for a while.'

'Rumours going round it's sunny,' Harry said as he entered the House of Pain and saw Beate. 'Just so you know.'

'Turn off the light,' she said. 'And I'll show you something.'

She had sounded excited on the telephone, but she didn't mention why. She picked up the remote control: 'I didn't find anything on the tape from the day the skip was ordered, but take a peek at this one from the day of the robbery.'

Harry saw the 7-Eleven on the screen. He saw the green skip outside the window, the cream buns inside the shop, the back of the head and bum-crack of the boy he had talked to the day before. He was serving a girl who was buying milk, Cosmopolitan and condoms.

'The recording is timed at 15.05, so about fifteen minutes before the robbery. Look now.'

The girl took her things and left, the queue moved forward and a man in a black boiler suit and a peaked cap with the earflaps pulled well down pointed at something on the counter. He held his head down so that his face couldn't be seen. Under his arm he was carrying a folded black holdall.

'What the hell,' Harry whispered.

'That's the Expeditor,' Beate said.

'Sure? Lots of people wear black boiler suits, and the robber didn't have a cap.'

'When he goes away from the counter, you'll see they're the same shoes as on the video. And notice the bulge on his left. That's the AG3.'

'He's taped it to his body. But what's he doing in a 7-Eleven?'

'He's waiting for the armoured van and he needs a lookout post where he won't be conspicuous. He's done a recce in the area and knows that the security van comes between 15.15 and 15.20. In the meantime, he can't exactly walk around wearing a balaclava and announce his intentions, so he uses a cap which covers most of his face. When he goes to the counter, if you look hard, you can see a small rectangle of light flickering on it. It's a reflection off glass. You're wearing sunglasses, aren't you, you Expeditor bastard.' Beate spoke in a low voice, but fast, with an anger Harry had not heard from her before. 'He's obviously aware of the camera in the 7-Eleven, too. He doesn't show any of his face. Look at him checking the angles! In fact, he does it really well. I've got to give him that.'

The boy behind the counter gave the man in the boiler suit a cream bun and picked up the ten-kroner coin he put down.

'Hello.'

'Right,' Beate said. 'He's not wearing gloves. But he doesn't seem to have touched anything in the shop. And there you can see the rectangle of light I was telling you about.'

Harry didn't say a word.

The man went out of the shop as the last person in the queue was being served.

'Mm. We'll have to start searching for witnesses again,' Harry said, getting up.

'I wouldn't be too optimistic,' Beate said, still staring at the screen. 'Remember only one witness reported having seen the Expeditor escape in the Friday rush hour. The robber's best hiding place is in a crowd.'

'OK, but have you got any other suggestions?'

'Sit down or you'll miss the climax.'

Mildly disconcerted, Harry shot her a look and faced the screen. The boy behind the counter had turned towards the camera with a finger jammed up his nose.

'One man's climax is another-' Harry grumbled.

'Look at the skip outside the window.'

The window pane reflected the light, but they could still see the man in the black boiler suit. He was standing on the pavement between the skip and a parked car. His back was to the camera and a hand was resting on the edge of the skip. He seemed to be keeping an eye on the bank while eating the cream bun. The holdall he was carrying was on the tarmac.

'That's his lookout post,' Beate said. 'He ordered the skip and had it placed on that precise spot. It is ingeniously simple. He can watch for the security van while hiding from the security cameras. And notice the way he stands. First of all, half of the passers-by won't even be able to see him because of the skip, and those who can will see a man in a boiler suit and cap beside a skip: a builder, a removal man or a waste-disposal worker. In short, nothing that will gain a foothold in the cerebral cortex. No wonder we didn't get any witnesses.'

'He's leaving some nice, fat fingerprints on the skip,' Harry said. 'Shame it's done nothing but rain for the last week.'

'But the cream bun-'

'He's eating his fingerprints too,' Harry sighed.

'-makes him thirsty. Watch this now.'

The man bent down, unzipped the holdall and pulled out a white plastic bag. From this he removed a bottle.

'Coca-Cola,' Beate whispered. 'I zoomed in on a still before you came. It's a Coke bottle with a cork in.'

The man held the bottle at the top while pulling out the cork. Then he threw back his head, held the bottle high in the air and poured. They could see the last dregs running out, but the cap blotted out the open mouth and face. Then he put the bottle in the plastic bag, knotted it and was about to put it in his holdall when he paused.

'Watch. Now he's thinking,' Beate whispered, and in a low monotone: 'How much room will the money take up? How much room will the money take up?'

The protagonist studied the holdall. Looked at the skip. Then he made up his mind and with a quick toss of his arm the bag, with the bottle inside, sailed in an arc through the air and landed in the open skip.

'A three-pointer!' Harry roared.

'The crowd goes wild!' Beate yelled.

'Fuck!' Harry shouted.

'Oh no,' Beate groaned and banged her forehead against the wheel in despair.

'They must have just been here,' Harry said. 'Hang on!'

He flung open the car door in front of a cyclist who swerved out of the way, and ran across the street, into the 7-Eleven and over to the counter.

'When did they take the skip?' he asked the boy who was about to wrap two Big Bite sausages for two large-bottomed girls.

'Wait your turn, for Christ's sake,' the boy said without looking up.

One of the girls let out an indignant whine as Harry leaned over, blocking access to the ketchup bottle, and grabbed hold of the boy's green shirt front.

'Hello there, it's me again,' Harry said. 'Now follow this carefully, otherwise this sausage will be going right up…'

The boy's terrified expression forced Harry to collect himself. He released his grip and pointed to the window, through which you could now see Nordea Bank on the other side of the street because of the gaping hole left by the skip. 'When did they take the skip? Quickly!'

The boy swallowed and stared at Harry. 'Now. Just now.'

'When is now?'

'Two minutes ago.' His eyes had glazed over.

'Where were they going?'

'How should I know? I don't know nuffin about skips.'

'Nothing.'

'Eh?'

But Harry had already gone.

Harry put Beate's red mobile phone to his ear.

'Oslo Waste Management? This is the police, Inspector Harry Hole. Where do you empty those skips of yours? The private ones, yes. Metodica, OK. Where are…Verkseier Furulands vei in Alnabru? Thank you. What? Or Grшnmo? How do I know which one…?'

'Look,' Beate said. 'A traffic jam.'

Cars formed an apparently impenetrable wall down towards the T-junction in front of Kafй Lorry in Hegdehaugsveien.

'We should have taken Uranienborgveien,' Harry said. 'Or Kirkeveien.'

'Shame you're not driving,' Beate said, forcing the front offside wheel up onto the pavement, leaning on the horn and accelerating. People jumped out of the way.

'Hello?' Harry said on the mobile phone. 'You've just collected a green skip from Bogstadveien by the Industrigata crossroads. Where is it going? Yes. I'll wait.'

'Let's take a chance on Alnabru,' Beate said and swung out into the crossroads in front of a tram. The wheels spun on the steel rails until they got a grip on the tarmac. Harry had a vague feeling of dйjа vu.

They had come to Pilestredet when the man from Oslo Waste Management came back to say that they couldn't contact the driver on his mobile, but the skip was probably on its way to Alnabru.

'Fine,' Harry said. 'Can you ring Metodica and ask them not to empty the contents of the skip into the incinerator until we…Your office is closed from 11.30 to 12.00? Careful! No, I was talking to the driver. No, my driver.'

In the Ibsen tunnel Harry called Police HQ and asked them to send a patrol car to Metodica, but the closest available car was at least fifteen minutes away.

'Fuck!' Harry threw the mobile phone over his shoulder and smacked the dashboard.

At the roundabout between Byporten and Plaza Beate sneaked into the space between a red bus and a Chevy van, straddling the white line. When she came down the raised intersection known as the traffic machine doing 110 km/h and performed a controlled skid on screaming tyres, into the hairpin bend on the fjord side of Oslo Central station, Harry realised that all hope was not yet lost.

'Who was the mad bastard who taught you to drive?' he asked, holding on tight as they swerved in and out between cars on the three-lane motorway leading to Ekeberg tunnel.

'Self-taught,' Beate said.

In the middle of the Vеlerenga tunnel a large, ugly, diesel-vomiting lorry loomed up ahead of them. It lumbered into the right-hand lane; on the back, held in place by two yellow arms, was a green skip bearing the words OSLO WASTE MANAGEMENT.

'Yess!' Harry shouted.

Beate swung in front of the lorry, slowed down and activated the right indicator. Harry rolled down the window, stretched out a hand holding his ID and waved the lorry into the side of the road with the other.

The driver had no objection to Harry taking a look inside the skip, but wondered if they shouldn't wait until they were in the Metodica yard, where they could empty the contents onto the ground.

'I don't want the bottle to be smashed!' Harry yelled over the noise of passing traffic from the back of the lorry.

'I was thinking about your nice suit,' the driver said, but by then Harry had already scrambled up into the skip. The next moment, a rumble of thunder could be heard from inside, and the driver and Beate heard Harry roundly cursing. Then quite a bit of rooting around. And finally another 'Yess!' before he reappeared over the top of the skip with a white plastic bag held above his head like a trophy.

'Give the bottle to Weber immediately and tell him it's urgent,' Harry said as Beate started the car. 'Say hello from me.'

'Will that help?'

Harry scratched his head. 'No. Just say it's urgent.'

She laughed. Not very much, nor heartfelt, but Harry noted the laughter.

'Are you always so enthusiastic?' she asked.

'Me? What about you? You were ready to drive us into an early grave for this evidence, weren't you?'

She smiled, but didn't answer. Checked the mirror before returning to the carriageway.

Harry glanced at his watch. 'Damn!'

'Late for a meeting?'

'Do you think you could drive me to Majorstuen church?'

'Of course. Is that why you're wearing the black suit?'

'Yes. A…friend of mine.'

'Then perhaps you'd better try and get rid of the brown stain on your shoulder first.'

Harry craned his head. 'From the skip,' he said, brushing at it. 'Has it gone now?'

Beate passed him a handkerchief. 'Try a little spit. Was it a close friend?'

'No. Or yes…for a while perhaps. But you have to go to funerals, don't you.'

'Do you?'

'Don't you?'

'I've only been to one funeral all my life.'

They drove in silence.

'Your father?'

She nodded.

They passed the intersection at Sinsen. At Muselunden, the large area of grass below Haraldsheimen, a man and two boys had a kite in the air. All three stood looking at the blue sky and Harry saw the man give the string to the taller of the two boys.

'We still haven't caught the man who did it,' she said.

'No, we haven't,' Harry said. 'Not yet.'

'God giveth and God taketh away,' the priest said, peering down over the empty rows of benches and at the tall man with cropped hair who had just tiptoed in, looking for a seat at the very back. He waited as the echo of a loud, heart-rending sob died away under the arched ceiling. 'But on occasion it can seem as if He is merely taking.'

The priest stressed 'taking' and the acoustics lifted the word and carried it to the back of the church. The sobbing grew in volume again. Harry watched. He had thought that Anna, who was so extroverted and bubbly, would have had lots of friends, but Harry counted only eight people, six in the front row and two further back. Eight. Yes, well, how many would go to his funeral? Eight people was perhaps not such a bad turnout.

The sobbing came from the front row where Harry could see three heads wrapped in bright scarves and three bare-headed men. The other two were a man sitting to the left and a woman in the middle. He recognised the globe-shaped afro of Astrid Monsen.

The organ pedals creaked, then the music began. A psalm. The grace of God. Harry closed his eyes and felt how tired he was. The notes from the organ rose and sank, the high notes trickled like water from the ceiling. The frail voices sang for forgiveness and mercy. He longed to immerse himself in something which could warm and conceal him. The Lord shall come to judge the quick and the dead. God's vengeance. God as Nemesis. The low organ notes caused the unoccupied wooden benches to vibrate. The sword in one hand and the scales in the other, punishment and justice. Or no punishment and no justice. Harry opened his eyes.

Four men were carrying the coffin. Harry recognised Officer Ola Li behind two swarthy men in Armani suits, white shirts open at the neck. The fourth person was so tall he made the coffin tip. The suit hung loosely on the thin body, but he was the only one of the four who did not seem weighed down by the coffin. Harry's eye was particularly caught by the man's face. Narrow, finely formed with large, pained, brown eyes set in deep hollows in the cranium. The black hair was swept back in a long plait, leaving the high, shiny forehead bared. The sensitive, heart-shaped mouth was enwreathed by a long, well-groomed beard. It was as if Christ had stepped down from the altar behind the priest. And there was something else: there are very few faces you can say this about, but this face was radiant. As the four men approached Harry down the aisle, he tried to see what made it radiant. Was it grief? Not pleasure. Goodness? Evil?

Their eyes met for a brief moment as they passed. Behind them followed Astrid Monsen with eyes downcast, a middle-aged accountant-like man and three women, two older and one younger, dressed in colourful skirts. They sobbed and wailed, rolling their eyes and wringing their hands in silent accompaniment.

Harry stood as the tiny procession left the church.

'Funny, these gypsies, aren't they, Hole?' The words resounded around the church. Harry turned. It was Ivarsson, black suit, tie and smile. 'When I was growing up, we had a gypsy gardener. Ursari, they travelled round with dancing bears, you know. Josef he was called. Music and pranks all the time. But death, you see…These people have an even more strained relationship with death than we have. They are scared stiff of mule-spirits of the dead. They believe they return. Josef used to go to a woman who would chase them away. Only women can do that apparently. Come on.'

Ivarsson touched Harry's arm lightly. Harry had to grit his teeth to resist the impulse to shake it off. They walked down the church steps. The noise of the traffic in Kirkeveien drowned the peeling of the bells. A black Cadillac with the rear door open waited for the funeral procession in Schшnings gate.

'They take the coffin to Vestre crematorium,' Ivarsson said. 'Burning the body, that's a Hindu custom they took with them from India. In England, they burn the deceased's caravan, but they're not allowed to lock the widow in any more.' He laughed. 'They're allowed to take personal effects. Josef told me about the gypsy family of a demolition man in Hungary. They put his dynamite in the coffin and blew the whole of the crematorium sky high.'

Harry took out a pack of Camels.

'I know why you're here, Hole,' Ivarsson said without relaxing the smile. 'You wanted to see if the occasion would throw up a chat with him, didn't you.' Ivarsson motioned with his head to the procession and the tall, thin figure stepping out slowly as the other three tripped along, trying to keep up.

'Is he the one called Raskol?' Harry asked, inserting a cigarette between his lips.

Ivarsson nodded. 'He's her uncle.'

'And the others?'

'Friends, apparently.'

'And the family?'

'They don't acknowledge the deceased person.'

'Oh?'

'That's Raskol's version. Gypsies are notorious liars, but what he says squares with Josef's stories about their thinking.'

'And it is?'

'Family honour is everything. That's why she was thrown out. According to Raskol, she had been married off to a Greek-speaking gringo-gypsy in Spain when she was fourteen, but before the marriage was consummated she'd hopped it with a gadjo.'

'Gadjo?'

'A non-gypsy. A Danish sailor. Worst thing you can do. Brings shame on the whole family.'

'Mm.' The unlit cigarette jumped up and down in Harry's mouth as he spoke. 'I understand you've got to know this Raskol pretty well?'

Ivarsson wafted away imaginary smoke. 'We've had the odd chat. Skirmishes. I would call them. Substantial talks will come after our part of the deal has been kept, in other words, when he has attended this funeral.'

'So, he hasn't said a lot so far?'

'Nothing of any import to the investigation, no. But the tone has been positive.'

'So positive that I see the police are helping to carry his kin to her resting place?'

'The priest asked if Li or I would be one of the bearers to make the numbers up. That's OK, we're here to keep an eye on him anyway. And we will continue. To keep an eye on him, that is.'

Harry squinted into the piercing autumn sun.

Ivarsson turned towards him. 'Let me make one thing clear, Hole. No one is allowed to speak to Raskol until we've finished with him. No one. For three years I've tried to make a deal with the man who knows everything. And now I have it. No one will be allowed to screw up. Do you understand what I'm saying?'

'Tell me, Ivarsson, since we're having a tкte-а-tкte here,' Harry said, plucking a flake of tobacco from his mouth. 'Has this case turned into a competition between you and me?'

Ivarsson raised his face to the sun and chuckled. 'Do you know what I would have done if I were you?' he said with closed eyes.

'What's that?' Harry said when the silence was no longer tolerable.

'I would have sent my suit to the dry cleaner's. You look as if you've been lying in a rubbish tip.' He put two fingers to his brow. 'Have a good day.'

Harry stood alone on the steps smoking as he watched the uneven passage of the white coffin along the pavement.

Halvorsen spun round on his chair when Harry came in.

'Great you're here. I've got some good news. I…shit, what a smell!'

Halvorsen held his nose and said with shipping forecast intonation: 'What happened to your suit?'

'Slipped in a rubbish skip. What's the news?'

'Ooh…yes, I thought the photo might have been of a holiday area in Sшrland, so I e-mailed it to all the police stations in Aust-Agder. And, bingo, an officer from Risшr rang straight away to say he knew the beach well. But do you know what?'

'Er, no, actually.'

'It wasn't in Sшrland, but in Larkollen!'

Halvorsen looked at Harry with an expectant grin and added, when Harry failed to react: 'In Шstfold. Outside Moss.'

'I know where Larkollen is, Halvorsen.'

'Yes, but this officer comes from-'

'People from Sшrland go on holiday, too. Did you ring Larkollen?'

Halvorsen rolled his eyes in desperation. 'Yes, of course. I rang the camping site and two places where they rent chalets. And the only two grocery shops.'

'Any luck?'

'Yep.' Halvorsen beamed again. 'I faxed the photo and one of the guys running the grocery shop knew who she was. They've got one of the most fantastic chalets in the area. He drives deliveries up there now and then.'

'And the lady's name is?'

'Vigdis Albu?'

'Albu? Elbow?'

'Yep. There are just two of them in Norway. One was born in 1909. The other is forty-three years old and lives at Bjшrnetrеkket 12 in Slemdal with Arne Albu. And hey presto-here's the telephone number, boss.'

'Don't call me that,' Harry said, grabbing the telephone.

Halvorsen groaned. 'What's up? Are you in a bad mood or something?'

'Yes, but that's not why. Mшller is the boss. I'm not a boss, OK?'

Halvorsen was about to say something when Harry imperiously held up a hand: 'Fru Albu?'

Someone had needed a lot of time, money and space to build the Albus' house. And a lot of taste. Or as Harry saw it: a lot of bad taste. It looked as if the architect-if such there were-had tried to fuse Norwegian chalet tradition with Southern US plantation style and a dash of pink suburban bliss. Harry's feet sank in the shingle drive leading past a trim garden of ornamental shrubs and a little bronze hart drinking from a fountain. On the ridge of the garage roof there was an oval copper sign emblazoned with a blue flag containing a yellow triangle on a black triangle.

The sound of a dog barking furiously came from behind the house. Harry walked up the broad steps between the pillars, rang the bell and half-expected to be met by a black mama in a white apron.

'Hello,' she twittered at roughly the same time as the door was flung open. Vigdis Albu was the image of one of those women off the fitness adverts Harry occasionally saw on TV when he came home at night. She had the same white smile, bleached Barbie hair and a firm, well-toned, upper-class body packed into running tights and a skimpy top. And she'd had a boob job, but at least she'd had the sense not to exaggerate the size.

'Harry-'

'Come in!' She smiled with the merest suggestion of wrinkles around her large, blue, discreetly made-up eyes.

Harry stepped into a large hallway populated with fat, ugly, carved wooden trolls reaching up to his hips.

'I'm just washing,' Vigdis Albu explained. She flashed a white smile and carefully wiped away the sweat with a forefinger so as not to streak her mascara.

'I'd better take off my shoes then,' Harry said and at that moment remembered the hole in his sock over his right big toe.

'No, God forbid, not the house. We've got people to do that,' she laughed. 'But I like to wash clothes myself. There have to be limits to how far we let strangers into the house, don't you think?'

'Too true,' Harry mumbled. He had to move briskly to keep up with her up the steps. They passed a classy kitchen and came into the living room. A spacious terrace lay beyond two sliding glass doors. On the main wall there was a huge brick construction, a sort of halfway house between Oslo City Hall and a cenotaph.

'Designed by Per Hummel for Arne's fortieth birthday,' Vigdis said. 'Per's a friend of ours.'

'Yes, Per has really designed one…a fireplace there.'

'I'm sure you know Per Hummel, the architect, don't you? The new chapel in Holmenkollen, you know.'

'I'm afraid not,' Harry said and passed her the photograph. 'Would you mind having a look at this?'

He studied the surprise spreading across her face.

'But that's the photo Arne took last year in Larkollen. How did you get hold of this?'

Harry waited to see if she could maintain her genuinely puzzled expression before he responded. She could.

'We found it in the shoe of a woman called Anna Bethsen,' he said. Harry witnessed a chain reaction of thoughts, reasoning and emotions reflected in Vigdis Albu's face, like a soap opera in fast forward. First surprise, next wonder and afterwards confusion. Then an intuition, which was at first rejected with a sceptical laugh, but took hold and seemed to grow into a dawning realisation. And finally the closed face with the subtitle: There have to be limits to how far we let strangers into the house, don't you think?

Harry fidgeted with the packet of cigarettes he had taken out. A large glass ashtray had pride of place in the middle of the coffee table.

'Do you know Anna Bethsen, fru Albu?'

'Certainly not. Should I?'

'I don't know,' Harry said honestly. 'She's dead. I'm left wondering what such a personal photograph is doing in her shoe. Any ideas?'

Vigdis Albu tried to put on a forbearing smile, but her mouth wouldn't obey. She contented herself with an energetic shake of her head.

Harry waited, without moving, relaxed. As his shoes had sunk into the shingle, he felt his body sinking into the deep, white sofa. Experience had taught him that silence was the most effective of all methods to make people talk. When two strangers sit facing each other, silence functions like a vacuum, sucking words out. They sat like that for ten eternal seconds. Vigdis Albu swallowed: 'Perhaps the cleaner saw it lying somewhere and took it with her. And gave it to this…was it Anna she was called?'

'Mm. Do you mind if I smoke, fru Albu?'

'This is a smoke-free house. Neither my husband nor I…' She lifted a hand quickly to her plait. 'And Alexander, our youngest, has got asthma.'

'Sorry to hear that. How does your husband spend his time?'

She gaped at him and her big, blue eyes grew even bigger.

'What's his job, I mean?' Harry put his cigarettes back in his inside pocket.

'He's an investor. He sold the company about three years ago.'

'Which company?'

'Albu AS. Importing towels and shower mats for hotels and institutions.'

'Must have been quite a lot of towels. And shower mats.'

'We had the agency for the whole of Scandinavia.'

'Congratulations. The flag on the garage, isn't that a consulate flag?'

Vigdis Albu had regained her composure and took off her hair band. It struck Harry that she had had something done to her face. Something about the proportions didn't tally. That is to say, they tallied too well; her face was almost artificially symmetrical.

'St Lucia. My husband was the Norwegian consul there for eleven years. We had a factory where they sew shower mats. We have a little house there, too. Have you been to-?'

'No.'

'A fantastic, wonderful, sweet island. Some of the older inhabitants still speak French. Incomprehensible French I have to say, but they are so charming you wouldn't believe it.'

'Creole French.'

'What?'

'I've read about it. Do you think your husband might know how this photo ended up in the deceased's possession?'

'Can't imagine how. Why should he?'

'Hm.' Harry smiled. 'It's perhaps just as difficult to say why one would have a photo of a stranger in one's shoe.' He got to his feet. 'Where can I find him, fru Albu?'

As Harry noted down the telephone number and address of Arne Albu's office, he happened to look down at the sofa where he had been sitting.

'Erm…' he said when he saw Vigdis Albu following his gaze. 'I slipped in a refuse skip. Of course, I'll-'

'It doesn't matter,' she interrupted. 'The cover's going to the dry cleaner's next week anyway.'

On the steps outside, she asked Harry if on second thoughts he could wait until five o'clock before he rang her husband.

'He'll be home then and won't be so busy.'

Harry didn't answer and watched the corners of her mouth going up and down.

'Then he and I can…see if we can sort out this business for you.'

'Thank you, that's nice of you, but I have my car here and it's on the way, so I'll drive to his work and see if I can find him there.'

'OK,' she said with a brave smile.

The barking followed Harry down the long drive. At the gate, he turned round. Vigdis Albu was still standing on the steps in front of the pink plantation building. Her head was bowed and the sun shone on her hair and glossy sports gear. From a distance she looked like a tiny bronze hart.

Harry could find neither a legal place to park nor Arne Albu at the address in Vika Atrium. Just a receptionist who informed him that Albu rented an office with three other investors, and that he was having lunch with 'a firm of brokers'.

On leaving the building, Harry found a parking ticket under the windscreen wiper. He took it and his bad mood with him to SS Louise, which was in fact not a steamship but a restaurant in Aker Brygge. Unlike at Schrшder's, they served edible food to solvent customers with office addresses in what somewhat charitably might be called Oslo's Wall Street. Harry had never felt completely at home in Aker Brygge, but perhaps that was because he was Oslo-bred and not a tourist. He exchanged a few words with a waiter, who pointed to a window table.

'Gentlemen, I'm sorry to disturb,' Harry said.

'Ah, finally,' one of the three at the table exclaimed, flicking his fringe back. 'Would you call this wine room temperature, waiter?'

'I'd call it Norwegian red wine decanted into a Clos des Papes bottle,' Harry said.

Taken aback, the Fringe ran his eye down Harry in his dark suit.

'A joke.' Harry smiled. 'I'm a policeman.'

The surprise segued into alarm.

'Not environmental crime.'

Relief segued into question marks. Harry heard boyish laughter and breathed in. He had decided how he was going to do it, but had no idea how it would turn out. 'Arne Albu?'

'That's me,' answered the one who was laughing. He was slim with short, curly, dark hair and laughter lines around his eyes, which told Harry that he laughed a lot and was older than the thirty-five years he would have guessed initially. 'Apologies for the misunderstanding,' he continued, still with laughter in his voice. 'Can I help you, Constable?'

Harry observed him, quickly trying to form a picture of him before going on. The voice was the sonorous variety. Fixed gaze. Shiny white collar behind a tie that was not too loose and not too tight. The fact that he hadn't left it at 'That's me,' but had added an apology and 'Can I help you, Constable?'-with a slightly ironic stress on 'Constable'-suggested that Arne Albu was either very self-confident or had a lot of practice giving that impression.

Harry concentrated. Not on what he was going to say, but on how Albu would react.

'Yes, you can, Albu. Do you know Anna Bethsen?'

Albu looked at Harry with the same blue eyes as his wife's and after a moment's reflection gave a loud, clear answer: 'No.'

Albu's face revealed no more to Harry than the mouth said. Not that Harry had thought it would. He had long given up believing the myth that people whose professions brought them face to face with lies on a daily basis learn to recognise them. A policeman had once claimed during a court case that from his long experience he knew when the accused was lying. Stеle Aune, once again a tool of the defence, had answered that research showed that no one single professional group was any better than another at spotting lies; a cleaner was just as good as a psychologist or a policeman, that is to say, just as bad. The only group in the comparative study to have acquitted itself with an above-average score was that of the Secret Service agents. Harry was no Secret Service agent, though. He was an Oppsal boy pressed for time, in a bad mood and right now showing poor judgement. To confront a man with potentially compromising circumstances in the presence of others, without any grounds for suspicion, was hardly very effective and not what anyone would call fair play. So Harry knew he shouldn't be doing what he was doing: 'Any idea who could have given her this photo?'

All three men studied the photograph Harry set on the table.

'Haven't a clue,' Albu said. 'My wife? The kids maybe?'

'Mm.' Harry looked for changes in the pupils, signs of an increased pulse such as sweating or blushing.

'I don't know what this is about, Constable, but since you have taken the trouble to find me, I assume it is not a bagatelle. Perhaps we could discuss this in private after my meeting with these gentlemen from Handelsbanken is over. If you would like to wait, I can ask the waiter to give you a table down in the smoking area.'

Harry could not decide whether Albu's smile was mocking or simply obliging. Not even that.

'I haven't time,' Harry said. 'So if we could sit down-'

'I'm afraid I don't have time, either,' Albu interposed in a calm but firm voice. 'This is my working time, so we'll have to talk this afternoon. If you are still of the opinion there is something I can help you with, that is.'

Harry swallowed. He was powerless and he could see Albu knew.

'Let's say that then,' Harry said and could hear how pathetic it sounded.

'Thank you, Constable.' Albu inclined his head with a smile. 'And you're probably right about the wine.' He turned to face Handelsbanken. 'You were saying, Stein, about Opticom?'

Harry picked up the photograph and had to endure the barely concealed smile from the broker with the fringe before leaving.

At the edge of the quay, Harry lit a cigarette, but it didn't have any taste and he threw it away with a growl. The sun glinted off a window in Akershus fortress and the sea was so calm there seemed to be a thin layer of clear ice on top. Why had he done it? Why this kamikaze attempt to humiliate a man he didn't know? Just to be lifted with silk gloves and gently thrown out.

He faced the sun, closed his eyes and wondered if today he ought to do something intelligent for a change. Like dropping the whole case. Nothing seemed to make sense; it was just the usual state of chaos and bafflement. The bells in the City Hall started chiming.

Little did Harry know that Mшller was to be proved right. It was the last warm day of the year.