Scarred

Chapter 7

She chose the ring tone because it reminded her of a fabulous party with a deluge of presents. Even so the sound of her mobile is never a welcome intrusion.

Trine Juul-Osmundsen, Secretary of State for Justice, flings out her arm towards the bedside table and tries to silence her phone before the noise wakes up Pål Fredrik, who often complains that she always gets up at the crack of dawn. She is too tired to open her eyes while she fumbles for the rectangular instrument of torture. Finally she gets hold of it and slides her thumb across the screen. Peace at last.

Trine sinks back on her pillow. How many hours of sleep did she manage this time?

Far too few.

She had woken up in the middle of the night, soaked in sweat. In her dream she had found herself in a big, open space surrounded by a large crowd. She knew she couldn’t move her hands or her arms, but she still tried to free herself, calmly at first then with rising panic. She turned her head to one side and gasped as she looked up at the grey sky. Something metallic was gleaming above her and she could see that it was sharp. Cheers broke out just as she saw the rope being cut and the huge blade come crashing down towards her. She knew it was the last thing she would ever see; the feeling was so strong, so vivid that she thought she must have died and was still clasping her neck when the terror of her nightmare woke her up and she had to remind herself to breathe.

Trine turns over to look at Pål Fredrik who is snoring away with his mouth half open. Sometimes he will ask what her night terrors were about and every time she gives a vague answer or tries to make light of them before she asks him a question in return in the hope it will distract him. And every time he replies: ‘I dreamt about you, darling. I only ever dream about you.’ And then he smiles, that remarkably charming smile of his that she couldn’t help falling in love with one evening God knows how many years ago when they met in Lillehammer at a conference about economic crime.

She resists the urge to sneak a couple of minutes in his embrace before the day claims her. This tall, slim, muscular man who when he is awake is a bundle of energy, never happier than when he is on a bike or climbing a mountain. Now he is far away in a carefree slumber.

Trine smiles tenderly; she has always envied her husband his ability to sleep. She can’t remember when she was last able just to close her eyes and drift off. She lies awake at night, though she tries not to think about that day’s events, the people and the stories she encountered, tomorrow’s challenges and how she will meet them. Her brain refuses to go into hibernation mode. There is rarely or never room for personal reflection even though Pål Fredrik is good at giving her something to smile about during the night before he turns over on his side and goes to sleep.

Another reason Trine dreads sleep is that her nightmares seem to have a recurrent theme. Things she doesn’t want to dream about. Things she doesn’t want to remember.

She can see that it’s light outside, but it’s not as bright as it was yesterday. Autumn is upon them and the mere thought of it makes it harder to leave the bed. But she forces herself to sit up, stretches out her arms and opens up her lungs, exhaling slowly in a yawn. Naked, she shuffles out into the passage, into the bathroom and steps under the shower where she ponders what lies in store for her this week.

She is off to Sandvika Police Station later today where the police’s IT support and purchasing services department is presenting a technical solution for electronic monitoring of people who have been served with non-contact orders. This will be followed by lunch at the Prime Minister’s office and a Cabinet meeting. Tomorrow she is making a visit to Bruvoll Prison and later she will open a new children’s home in Oslo. She’s also going on a trip to Kongsvinger in eastern Norway to discuss initiatives to strengthen border control. And she has a feeling she is due to speak about police preparedness in this Wednesday’s question time in Parliament.

It’s going to be a busy week.

When she has dried herself, applied body lotion and not too heavy make-up, she returns to the bedroom to select today’s skirt, blouse and jacket. On her way to the kitchen she picks up her mobile, wakes the screen up purely out of habit, but stops in her tracks when she sees that she has already received a call from a VG journalist. Before 6.30 in the morning.

The same man had tried to call her last night, but she never answers calls or requests from the fourth estate on Sundays. Or before she has had her first cup of coffee.

So she goes to the kitchen, turns on the coffee machine and adds ground coffee and water. She waits until the light stops flashing and presses a button with a picture of a miniature cup. Soon she is inhaling the aroma of an espresso, something that usually wakes her up.

Then her mobile rings again.

Trine puts down her cup. This time it’s a reporter from Dagbladet. She sighs and ignores the call. When will they learn that all requests must go through her press office? Trine decides to get a new mobile number – again. Far too many people in the media know it even though she changes it regularly. Someone in her department is clearly keen to curry favour with the press. As if the press has ever done anything to help her.

Trine has gone over to the fridge to get some orange juice and cream cheese when her mobile starts ringing again. Nettavisen this time.

She stops and stares at the display. Three calls this early.

Something must have happened.

Trine is about to go to her study to check the Internet newspapers when her mobile lights up again and beeps. A text message. A moment later another one arrives. And another one. Trine is in the process of opening the first message when the ringing of the doorbell makes her jump.

A visitor at this hour?

Trine pulls her jacket tightly around her, goes into the living room and peeks out from behind the white curtains. There is a reporter outside with a pen and notepad in his hands. A photographer stands right behind him with the camera ready at head height.

But what piques her curiosity, what makes her particularly anxious, is the sight of many cars arriving outside the house she and Pål Fredrik bought in Ullern in west Oslo for almost eighteen million kroner last year. She sees that several of the cars bear the logos of NRK and TV2. A slightly bigger car with a satellite dish on its roof pulls up and parks outside her front door.

Not only has something major happened, Trine realises. Something is terribly, terribly wrong.

Chapter 8

Late to bed, early to rise.

That’s how it has turned out, Bjarne Brogeland concludes, as he sits in his car on his way to work – again. And sometimes that is just the way it has to be. He resigned himself to it long ago and usually he loves giving his all to his work as an investigator. Use his body and his brain to solve a case and then move on to the next one. Do his bit to help make Oslo a city that’s safe to grow up and live in.

But even Bjarne, who has been fit and healthy all his life, who has always watched his diet and rarely poisons his body with alcohol, has started noticing how life as a police officer in the capital takes its toll on him. More importantly it takes its toll on those about him, his family, because he is seldom with them when they get up or go to bed. And when he finally gets home, he is usually so tired and worn out that he can’t be bothered or doesn’t feel like doing anything. He just wants to relax. Enjoy some peace and quiet.

He hasn’t told anyone, not even Anita, that he has written but not yet sent off an application to Vestfold Police. They have a six-month vacancy for a Head of Investigation starting in just four weeks. The current post holder is taking leave to write a book; a crime novel, Bjarne believes. Bjarne thinks this job could give him an opportunity to gain valuable management experience. Everything is about experience.

And that’s the rub. He hasn’t been a detective for very long, but he has been with the police force all his life and is regarded as a safe pair of hands. He has studied management and he has recently made a name for himself with his analytical skills. Previously he always felt he had something to prove whenever he spoke up in a meeting, especially to his boss Arild Gjerstad, Head of Investigation, but he has got over that, thank God.

He has no idea how Anita would react if he were to get the job. It would mean him being away from home, from her and Alisha even more; it would take him further away from the ideal of family life that is so important to his wife. Isn’t he making enough sacrifices as it is?

He can see it in his daughter’s eyes and hear it in the conversation around the kitchen table on the rare occasions they are all there at the same time. He has absolutely no idea how she is getting on. What she learns at nursery, who her friends are. Who is mean to her and who is nice. It’s not easy being a kid, he remembers that from his own childhood. But it’s not easy being a dad, either. Or a dad and a policeman at the same time.

Alisha deigned to let him put her to bed last night as long as he played with her first. Playing covers everything that makes her laugh out loud. He read to her from a Karsten and Petra book, scratched her on the back with sharp nails, something she loves. But he wasn’t allowed to lie next to her when she finally settled down. Only Anita gets to do that.

And maybe it makes no difference how much he plays and reads and scratches. He will always come second. And, yes, that’s still a spot on the podium, but Bjarne has never enjoyed not being first. He has always loathed the thought that someone might be better at something than he is.

I need more hours in the day, he thinks, and turns off towards Grønland. If you could buy time, he would have ordered it by the shed load. Then there would be time for trips to Legoland, a seaside holiday to Sørlandet, he could have gone camping in the mountains, caught those fish. He could have given Anita the children she always said she wanted.

But if he’s going to do his job properly, if he’s going to be as good a policeman as he wants to be, then he has to live the job. He has to be the job. And the job has to be him. All of him.

And soon they will turn forty, both him and Anita. And even if time isn’t running out for him, then it is definitely running out for her. Exactly what that means they haven’t yet sat down to discuss. They haven’t had the time.

Bjarne met Anita at Idretthøgskolen, the Norwegian School of Sports Sciences, in the mid-nineties. She was in the year below him and not really his type; she was into Aerosmith and TV soaps such as Beverly Hills 90210 and Melrose Place, she was twenty-two centimetres shorter than him and played football from time to time. But with her shoulder-length blonde hair, a slightly crooked front tooth and her echoing, infectious laughter, she grew increasingly irresistible to him. He was happy to ignore the fact that she had grown up in Hamar and kept declaring her intention to move back east, to the home of the Hamar Olympic Hall even though she was born in the beautiful scenic fishing village of Henningsvær in the Lofoten Archipelago. She had charm. The raw charm of Arctic Norway. He simply had to have her.

At first she resisted him, primarily because she already had a boyfriend, but she surprised him by going for what she could get, rather than holding on to what she had. Six years later they got married, and because of Bjarne’s job they now live in a semi-detached house on Tennisveien in Slemdal. Their car is a Volvo estate with a fan belt that never stops complaining. They don’t have a holiday cabin and they don’t have a dog, either, but they have a daughter whom he would happily throw himself under a bus to protect. Even if he is only second-best.

You’ve been lucky, he tells himself, and watches the grey band of tarmac that stretches out in front of him. He sees people going to work, cyclists jumping a red light and grim-faced pedestrians. The wind urges them on. Bjarne can feel the gusts against the car. A new spell of bad weather sails towards the city over the pointed roof of Oslo Plaza Hotel.

It’s going to be a cold day, Bjarne forecasts, but hopefully a productive one, even though they didn’t learn much about the eighty-three-year-old victim last night. A widow, retired teacher, born and raised in Jessheim, moved to Oslo in the early nineties. She has a son who doesn’t visit her very often, but it was him in the photograph, Tom Sverre Pedersen, and his family. He is a doctor and lives in Vindern. And the photograph of him and his family had indeed been torn down and smashed.

I’m sure it’s important, Bjarne thinks, but for reasons he has yet to find out. What he finds most peculiar about the case so far is that no one seems to have seen or heard anything. Neither the care workers nor any other staff had noticed if anyone entered or left Erna Pedersen’s room that afternoon. And no one Bjarne spoke to had had a bad word to say about the victim. She never made a fuss, barely communicated with anyone and spent most of her time knitting. An old lady who kept herself to herself and did what little she was capable of.

However, we still have lots of people to interview, Bjarne thinks. Her primary care worker, for example. Daniel Nielsen. The man who looked after her most of the time. The people from the Volunteer Service. And not least – the little boy playing on the wheelchair who discovered the body. He might have bumped into the killer. Someone must have seen something. People in the street. Residents in neighbouring buildings.

We’ve only just scratched the surface, Bjarne predicts, as Oslo Police Station appears to his left with its dirt-grey walls and shiny clean windows. And he feels genuinely excited at the prospect; he is looking forward to getting stuck into a new case.

Oh yes, he thinks with a smile as he drives into the underground car park.

You still love this job.

Chapter 9

Trine Juul-Osmundsen runs to her study, flips open the screen of her laptop and keeps hitting the Internet icon until the computer finally finds the network and downloads the front page of VG Nett. What she sees makes her gasp.

There is a huge close-up of her face under the headline:

What the hell?

Trine clicks on the article while her heart starts to pound. The opening sentence merely repeats the lead-in. What the hell is going on, Trine thinks again as she reads on.

‘What’s going on?’

Trine jumps and spins around, slamming shut the laptop a little harder than she intended. She positions herself in front of the desk and looks at her husband who has come into her study dressed in only blue and black striped pyjama bottoms. His short grey hair stands up and he still has sleep in his eyes. A fine layer of stubble covers his cheeks with a mask of something grey and dark, while the skin on his face reveals many active hours spent in the open air. The muscles in his throat and neck are taut like steel wire.

Even after four years of marriage Trine still feels warm all over whenever she sees him like this, rough, unshaven and shirtless. But his inquisitive eyes, still sleepy, bore into her and leave an open, stinging wound.

‘I thought I heard the doorbell?’ he says.

Trine looks at him, but her gaze soon slips away and fails to find anything to settle on. Now she knows why there is a pack of journalists outside. And why more are bound to turn up.

‘Yes,’ she says.

‘This early?’

‘M-hm,’ she replies, absent-minded, but she still can’t bear to look at him; she has no idea what to say. How can she explain to him what has happened and what they are about to be subjected to?

Trine starts to walk past him when he puts out his arm to stop her.

‘Hey,’ he says. ‘Good morning.’

He smiles and tries to hug her, but Trine can’t cope with it. Not now. So she frees herself from his strong arms and says she is running late. Fortunately he buys her story.

Trine goes into the kitchen where she stops and rests her palms heavily on the worktop while she mutters curses under her breath. She continues swearing until she hears her husband’s voice again.

‘I’m just taking a shower.’

He is on his way to the bathroom when Trine says his name and straightens up. Pål Fredrik stops. She takes a step towards him and sees the look in his eyes, which she knows will change as soon as she starts talking. The doorbell rings again, but Trine doesn’t take her eyes off him.

‘Aren’t you going to answer that?’ he asks her, sounding baffled.

‘No,’ she says quietly.

He glances at the front door.

‘Do you want me to get it?’

Trine shakes her head. She can feel her throat tighten.

‘I need to ask you a favour,’ she whispers and faces him.

‘Okay?’ he replies slowly. ‘What is it?’

Words, sentences – even the air – stop their journey across Trine’s lips.

‘What is it?’ he repeats.

She clears her throat: ‘Don’t read anything they write about me in the papers today.’

Trine waits until she can hear the sound of running water before she goes back to her study, closes the door behind her and hits a key on her mobile.

‘Pick up, Harald,’ she says as she paces up and down the floor.

Harald Ullevik has been Trine’s closest and most important sparring partner for the almost three years she has been Secretary of State for Justice. Always wise and knowledgeable. Always warm and friendly. Some of the speeches he has written for her have been brilliantly insightful and rich in persuasive arguments that she was proud to take the credit for. Several times his elephantine memory has rescued her from embarrassing situations. In fact he has been as much of an adviser to her as a Junior Minister. At times he has practically been acting Secretary, willing to stand in for her whenever she needed it. If anyone can help her out of this mess, it’s him.

‘Hi, Trine.’

As always Ullevik’s voice sounds bright.

‘Have you seen today’s VG?’ Trine says immediately.

‘No,’ he says after a brief hesitation. ‘But they’ve just called me with a summary. I told them to get lost, obviously. We have to draw the line somewhere.’

Trine flings out her other hand.

‘Half of Norway’s media is in my doorstep, Harald. I don’t know what to do.’

‘Trine,’ Ullevik says. ‘Calm down, it’ll be all right.’

Usually his rock solid voice can convince her that everything will indeed be all right. But right now she struggles to believe him.

‘They’re going to bombard you with questions once you leave your house, but for God’s sake don’t start arguing with them. Don’t say anything until we’ve looked at this together and agreed a strategy.’

Trine heaves a sigh and thinks about Pål Fredrik, wondering if the water can wash away some of the shock and the disbelief she saw in his eyes. When she took another step towards him to assure him that the accusations were not true, he simply turned away.

‘It’ll be all right,’ Ullevik reassures her again. ‘You get yourself to work in one piece and we’ll deal with this together.’

Trine continues to listen to the echo of his voice before she utters an ‘okay’ and hangs up. When the silence returns, she realises that her knees are threatening to buckle under her. She orders them to lock. Then she swallows something viscous and thick that is stuck in her throat, disconnects the laptop, puts it in her bag and hurries out into the hallway. She stops in front of the hall mirror, smooths a crease in her jacket and studies her face, her hair and her eyes. She decides she is wearing too much make-up and starts to wipe off the lipstick she applied earlier, but she is desperate to get out of the house, and she doesn’t want to wait for Pål Fredrik to come out of the shower so she can stare into the depths of his shocked and horrified eyes.

She quickly checks her shoes to see if they are clean. Then she braces herself. Put on a brave face. And keep your mouth shut.

Chapter 10

The morning is still only a pale outline over the roofs when Henning wakes up from his usual spot on the sofa. His face is squashed into one of the cushions and he can almost feel the imprint on his cheek.

He stayed up later than he had planned, but he didn’t need coffee to keep him awake. The story he had ready for publication at 8 a.m. practically wrote itself. He said only that the victim was killed and mutilated, a headline he knew would attract hits. He had agreed with Bjarne Brogeland to keep back the grotesque details and he isn’t sure that he will ever make them public. The readers don’t need to know what was done to Erna Pedersen’s eyes.

Henning gets up to check that the story has been uploaded and taken its rightful place at the top of the front page.

It’s not there.

Instead he is shocked to read what his sister Trine Juul-Osmundsen has been accused of. He quickly gets dressed and finds the telephone number of Karl Ove Marcussen in Helgesensgate. It takes a few seconds before a man’s voice answers with a sleepy ‘yes’.

‘Hi, my name is Henning Juul. I’m Christine’s, your neighbour’s, son. You’re the building’s caretaker, aren’t you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Great. I’ve a massive favour to ask you.’

Trine steps out into a roar of voices that stops her in her tracks. A thousand words and sentences are hurled at her, but even if she tried, she wouldn’t be able to tell the questions apart.

Her bodyguards manage to clear a narrow path for her and she keeps her eyes firmly on the ground. She is aware of the presence of a photographer who has climbed a tree in her neighbour’s garden. His camera is aimed at her. It feels as if he is about to shoot her.

Trine would never have believed there was room for that many people outside her house. Her black government car appears in front of her. She aims for the open door on the right-hand side while her bodyguards try to keep the press at bay. They are fairly successful, she manages to get inside, but even though the window behind which she is hiding is tinted, the flashlights continue to go off.

The car pulls away. Trine turns around to see if they are being followed.

‘Yep, they’re after us,’ Trine’s driver says and looks for her eyes in the rear-view mirror.

Trine has always liked her driver, a middle-aged man who hasn’t had a single day off sick during the three years she has been Justice Secretary. No matter what has happened, he greets her with a calm and pleasant voice. The car is a safe haven where she can take some time out. She likes being in the car, talking to him, inhaling his warm smell, but she doesn’t know if he has seen today’s headlines yet and she doesn’t have the energy to discuss them with anyone before she has to.

Trine clutches her mobile, which vibrates and beeps every two seconds. She feels like kicking a hole in the seat in front of her. Her mood worsens when she realises that her tights have laddered below the knee. Trine in a hole will probably be the headline in some newspaper soon. And how they’ll laugh at the editorial offices. Fortunately she is not due in Parliament until later today and she knows they sell tights in the Parliament shop.

Trine usually spends her time in the car catching up on the news, but not today. She dreads the moment when the car stops and she will have to get out and face the vultures. She spots the media the moment the car pulls up in front of H Block in the government district.

Trine tries to focus on the sound of her own footsteps as she walks the short distance to the entrance. Click, click, quick and hard. Words and predictable questions rise and fall before rising again because she doesn’t answer. The sound waves follow her even after the security guard has admitted her. As she enters the lift and the doors close behind her, the noise instantly disappears. It is like wearing noise-cancelling headphones. Suddenly she can hear her own hectic breathing.

Trine closes her eyes as the lift sweeps her upwards. She doesn’t open them again until it pings and the doors slide open.

As soon as she steps out into the corridor, she feels the probing looks of people coming in the opposite direction. Normally she would have met them with her head held high and a friendly nod. But not today. She is burning up inside and her rage expresses itself as angry lines around her eyes. Your feet, she thinks. Concentrate on your feet.

At the door to the wing where Trine and the administration of the Justice Department have their offices, she is met by Katarina Hatlem, her Director of Communications. She ushers Trine in while she continues to talk on her phone.

‘I understand,’ she says. ‘But Trine isn’t here yet. We’ll have to get back to you—’

Hatlem rolls her eyes.

‘Fine,’ she says eventually. ‘The people’s demand has been duly noted. I’m going into a meeting now. Goodbye.’

Then she hangs up and shakes her head so her long red curls bounce from side to side.

Over time Katarina Hatlem has become one of Trine’s closest friends. Trine can talk to her about anything, but the main reason she wanted Katarina as her Director of Communications was that she had worked for the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation, NRK, for many years. She knows the media inside out.

Trine rushes down the corridor leading to her office, but slows down when she reaches the portrait wall where former Justice Secretaries smile at her from gilded frames. It is a world dominated by men, but with a stronger female presence in the last two or three decades. The pictures act as a reminder of how quickly a life in politics can change. Many of the Ministers resigned under a cloud, Trine remembers, and some of them fell hard. She knows that her department has already prepared a framed picture of her in case her departure turns out to be sudden. They have even bought her leaving present. It is like working under the sword of Damocles.

She speeds up, enters her office and hangs her jacket on a coat stand behind her desk.

‘Is everyone in yet?’ she says brusquely.

‘Everyone who needs to be here, yes,’ Hatlem says.

‘Okay, let’s start the meeting.’

Hatlem leaves the moment Harald Ullevik enters. He stops and says ‘hi’ to Trine with a warm gaze that, like the sound of his voice earlier, makes her throat feel tight and raw. She forces herself to look at something other than the elegant man in front of her. With his short, greying hair and his perfect posture Harald Ullevik could easily feature in a Dressmann ad. At a party once Katarina Hatlem compared him to Harrison Ford and the forty-six-year-old Junior Minister is probably the man in this building who attracts the most attention – also from other men.

‘How was it?’ he asks. ‘Was it as bad as you feared?’

‘Worse,’ Trine snorts and turns away from him.

‘But it went okay? You didn’t say anything?’

Trine shakes her head.

‘Good,’ he says and steps closer to the large boardroom table. ‘The other Under Secretaries are out of the office today, not that it makes much difference. And you won’t be needing these,’ he says, picking up a pile of newspaper cuttings that the press office has left for her on the table. ‘The only thing the media are interested in right now is how you’re going to respond to the allegations. So we need to find out what you’re going to say – if, indeed, you’re going to say anything at all.’

Ullevik tosses aside the pile, takes a seat at the table and pours some water into a glass. Trine doesn’t feel like sitting down until everyone else has taken their places. It doesn’t take long before she hears more footsteps approaching.

Permanent Secretary Hilde Bye enters with Trine’s political adviser, Truls Ove Henriksen, at her heel. They nod to Trine and mutter an almost synchronised ‘good morning’. Then they take their usual seats around the table and have time to pour themselves coffee before Katarina Hatlem enters and closes the door behind her.

Trine sits down and puts her hand on today’s diary printout. Everyone around the table looks as if they are waiting for Trine to say something, but she doesn’t know where to begin. She grabs hold of the press cuttings and stabs her finger so hard at the top sheet that it bends.

‘Is this really legal?’ she says.

‘Is what legal?’ asks the Permanent Secretary, a woman who has been in charge of the Justice Department’s administration for many years, interrupted only by a three-year period when she was District Governor on Svalbard. Trine has never got on with Hilde Bye, but has never quite understood why. Perhaps it’s just a difference in age. Trine has always detected a hint of scepticism in Bye’s eyes and it hasn’t faded now.

‘I haven’t read everything yet,’ Trine says. ‘But in its lead story, VG refers to sources its reporter has spoken to. Can you really publish any allegation as long as two sources are prepared to back it up? No matter what the subject matter is?’

Trine looks around the table for an answer.

‘Are you saying the story isn’t true?’

Trine looks daggers at the Permanent Secretary’s raven black hair.

‘That’s exactly what I’m saying.’

Trine had been asked to say a few words at Hilde Bye’s recent fiftieth birthday party. She had sweated over her keyboard trying to think of something nice because it was so much easier to mention all the things Hilde Bye wasn’t. Not especially friendly, not especially talented – jobwise or with people. Too enamoured with being in charge.

‘But if that’s the case,’ says Truls Ove Henriksen, ‘then that’s what you say. That the allegations are false.’

‘If that’s the case’, Trine snarls to herself and glares at the bald man. She knows what he is really thinking, this wet rag of a political adviser who was foisted on her when she was made a Minister three years ago. She had been so overcome by her unexpected appointment that she had agreed to everything her party wanted. Such as having a political adviser, a man she didn’t know very well, but who was part of the political horse-trading after the election – because he had previously been the secretary of the Labour Party’s branch in Trom.

‘I’m not going to dignify this tabloid tosh by commenting on it,’ she says, jabbing her finger on the file again.

‘But you’re going to have to,’ Katarina Hatlem argues. ‘The media won’t stop clamouring until they get something and you won’t be able to go anywhere or do anything without this becoming the story.’

‘I’ll talk to the Prime Minister’s office and get them to drop you from question time on Wednesday,’ Ullevik says.

‘That’s probably wise,’ Hatlem says and nods. ‘I also think we should issue a press release as soon as possible—’

‘No,’ Trine interrupts her and clenches her fists so hard her knuckles go white.

‘No to what?’

‘We’re not going to issue a press release. If I have to refute these allegations, then they’ve already won. I’m being accused of something I haven’t done, and I can’t respond without knowing the source. Nor has the matter been reported to the police.’

‘Not yet.’

‘What are you saying?’ says Trine, glowering at her political adviser.

‘I’m just saying that could happen before we know it. There’ll certainly be a public demand for it.’

Trine snorts.

‘This is bullshit,’ she shouts. ‘I’ve no idea where it’s coming from. But I can promise you, I’m going to find out.’

Harald Ullevik clears his throat.

‘Let’s take this one step at a time,’ he says, calmly. ‘This incident is supposed to have taken place at last year’s party conference in Kristiansand. Everyone who has ever attended a party conference knows that things go on there, all sorts of things.’

‘Are you saying that—’

‘No, no, Trine, I’m not saying anything, but I know what people will think. That’s why I’m asking you: what do you remember from that day?’

Trine exhales hard through her mouth while she thinks back. She has been to so many party conferences that they all blur together.

‘Not very much. But I know what I didn’t do.’

Silence falls around the table. Her Permanent Secretary sips her coffee while she glances furtively at Henriksen across the table. She has doubts, Trine thinks. That woman doesn’t believe me.

‘Okay, I have a suggestion,’ Katarina Hatlem says. ‘Even though this story is very much about you, we won’t involve you at this stage. We’ll deal with each press request in turn and repeat the same message: that you refuse to respond to anonymous allegations, you’re not going to waste your time on this, and blah blah blah. If that doesn’t take the sting out of what’s coming towards you, we’ll select one or two journalists we know are sympathetic towards us and give them a little more.’

‘There is nothing more,’ Trine insists. ‘ I didn’t do it.’

‘No, no, but we can say something about your work in recent years specifically to crack down on sexual assaults and domestic violence. We can probably produce some statistics to prove our commitment to these particular issues.’

Trine nods, so far so good.

‘If the allegations remain vague, I don’t think it’ll do us any harm to take the moral high ground,’ Hatlem continues.

‘VG refers to a “young, male politician”,’ Truls Ove Henriksen says. ‘Could the alleged victim have been someone from the Party’s youth branch?’

Trine shrugs her shoulders.

‘I assume most people would think so, yes. But I’ve no idea how VG got its story. I’ve been married to Pål Fredrik for four years and I’ve never been unfaithful to him. I haven’t even been tempted.’

Henriksen makes no reply. His shiny head is now sprinkled with beads of sweat.

‘But at some point you may have to provide an explanation,’ Ullevik says.

‘We won’t say anything about that now,’ Hatlem maintains. ‘We don’t want to create expectations that Trine will make a statement.’

‘No, no, of course not,’ Ullevik says. ‘I’m just saying that you need to review your movements that day very carefully. Who did you sit next to during dinner? Who did you speak to? When did you go to bed? Can anyone give you an alibi – things like that. The more details you can provide about what you actually did on 9 October last year, the better. And if you do say something, you must be absolutely sure that it’s true. If you make even one little mistake, the press will question everything else you’ve said and done.’

Trine makes no reply, she just closes her eyes and disappears into a world of her own. Then she opens her eyes.

‘What did you just say?’

‘Hm?’

‘Did you say 9 October?’

‘Yes?’

And she suddenly feels hot. Terribly hot. That’s not possible, she thinks. It’s just not possible that anyone would ever find out about that.

‘What is it?’ Katarina Hatlem says. ‘You’ve gone white.’

Trine continues to stare into space while her jaw drops. This is a trap, she thinks to herself.

I’ve been set up.

Chapter 11

Henning takes a quick shower, eats some baked beans straight out of a tin and makes his way to Grønland where the offices of 123news are based. It’s a grey morning. It’s yet another day when the city tries its hardest to seem even less attractive than it does in the winter.

While he walks he thinks about his sister and the media witch hunt she will be subjected to in the coming days. Working on any other news item is almost pointless. The front pages of every newspaper will be plastered with stories about Trine for the foreseeable future.

Even so.

The police are giving a press conference at 10 a.m., an event Henning under normal circumstances would have ignored except that Assistant Commissioner Pia Nøkleby is likely to be leading it. Henning has a bone to pick with her.

The sight that greets him as he steps on to the grey carpets in the 123news offices reminds him of an anthill. People are scurrying back and forth, they are practically running. Henning can see it in their eyes, expressions verging on panic. Stressed fingers flying across the keyboards. It’s the same, it’s the usual. And he knows why, of course.

National news editor Heidi Kjus spots him in the commotion and walks up to him, addressing him in a bossy, metallic voice that always makes him think of dog training. Heidi is wearing a short, dark blue skirt with a matching jacket. If she hadn’t been a journalist, if she hadn’t been middle management, she would have looked at home in a solicitor’s office.

Henning had hoped that she would comment on the story he filed last night, but she simply stops and looks around. The pumping vein on her neck is working hard. Her cheekbones are – if possible – even more pronounced than usual.

‘I’ve been wondering about something,’ she begins.

Henning waits for her to continue.

‘As you probably know the—’

Heidi looks across the room as if the atmosphere will justify what she is about to suggest. Henning has a pretty good idea of what is coming next.

‘No one can get hold of your sister,’ Heidi then says.

She fixes him with a look again. In the past the expression in her eyes has been icy, but not today. Now they are dark brown, verging on black. They match her personality.

‘Have you spoken to her today?’ she asks him.

He snorts and bursts out laughing.

‘Heidi, I haven’t spoken to Trine for years.’

‘No, but—’

‘And even if I had been in contact with her, I couldn’t ring her now, you know that. I can’t work on a story that involves Trine.’

‘No, but I thought that maybe you could—’

Again her gaze disappears out into the room.

‘You thought that I might try to get a comment from her all the same,’ he says and checks her face for a reaction. And it comes. Her gaze is sharp, a little offended at first, then it changes to aggressive.

He shakes his head.

‘Even if I did have Trine’s number, which I don’t, then I highly doubt that she would pick up if I called. Trine and I haven’t seen each other for a long time. She didn’t even attend Jonas’s funeral. Nor was I invited to her wedding.’

Henning sits down and switches on his computer.

‘Yes, but at least you could have tried,’ Heidi says, showing no signs of leaving. ‘That’s the problem with you, Henning. You won’t even try. You can never do as you’re told, you always have to argue. Is it too much to ask that you show a bit of team spirit just once in a while?’

Henning looks up at her again.

‘Team spirit?’

He spits out the words as if they had a bad taste.

‘If your sister has screwed up, then it’s our duty to report it, Henning, you know that.’

‘Yes, I know. But there’s a difference between—’

Henning stops, checks himself.

‘It’s a waste of time, Heidi. I don’t like wasting my time.’

‘No, I know,’ she snarls. ‘Just imagine if you actually had to work with other people.’

‘I work with Iver.’

‘Yes, but Iver isn’t here. And he’s not coming back for a while.’

Henning makes no reply, he can’t think of anything to say. Neither can Heidi. So she storms off in a huff.

Chapter 12

‘I need a moment to myself,’ Trine says in a low voice.

She is aware of the looks being exchanged in the meeting room, but right now she is focusing mainly on not throwing up.

‘Please,’ she says. ‘I need a few minutes alone.’

Chairs are quietly pushed back. It takes half a minute, then only Katarina Hatlem remains. She stops with her hand on the door handle.

‘Is everything okay?’ she asks.

Trine turns around, but doesn’t look at her friend; she just nods quickly while her eyes well up. Everything is not okay. When the room is silent, she sits down again. Buries her face in her hands. Sniffs and shakes her head.

9 October.

With hindsight it’s not difficult to list the reasons why she could and should have acted differently. But she remains convinced that she did the right thing. And she would do it again, should the same situation arise. She would just have been more careful about covering her tracks. Because that must be what happened. Someone must have seen her and talked. It’s the only logical explanation.

Why on earth did she ever say yes to this job?

When the Prime Minister called, her first thought was the opportunities opening up to her. A chance to achieve more, more power, bigger budgets. But also more publicity, more disapproving voices, more criticism. There will always be someone who wants more, who thinks your priorities are wrong, that your strategy is a mistake, that you’re not up to the job. Even so, she said yes, she didn’t consider the offer for more than a few seconds before she jumped at the chance. Prime Minister William Jespersen wanted her to work for him. William Jespersen.

She knew it was a thankless task, but that was part of its appeal. Norway hadn’t had all that many strong Justice Secretaries in the post-war period. The chance to put her name on the map, writing herself into history as an effective Justice Secretary, was too tempting. She wanted to be a respected Minister whose visions were implemented. She imagined that life as Justice Secretary would be about prevention, response, investigation and rehabilitation.

And now – it’s all gone.

Her dreams, her ambitions, her visions. All gone. This is what they’ll remember her for. Not for any of her achievements.

The Prime Minister had warned her what to expect. He said that everyone’s eyes would be on her because she wasn’t an obvious choice. She hadn’t even been in the reserve, he said, and hey presto, suddenly she is playing in the first eleven. Trine didn’t understand what he meant, nor did she ask, after all it was the Prime Minister who was talking to her. Later she realised it was a football metaphor.

Jespersen also warned her that there was bound to be gossip ‘because you’re a beautiful woman’, and he wanted to know if she had the guts to handle it. She had responded by giggling like a little girl.

What she wouldn’t give to be a little girl again. She feels so vulnerable, so unprotected against the media scrutiny that has already begun and so scared of what else might surface in the next few days. The consequences it can have. For everyone.

But will they really manage to dig that deep?

Trine wakes up the screen in front of her. Her mailbox comes up. Countless emails appear, the unread ones marked in bold. Her gaze stops at an email that was sent less than ten minutes ago. She doesn’t recognise the sender; it’s the text in the subject field that attracts her attention.

She clicks on it against her better judgement. And the message makes her clasp her hand over her mouth.

Chapter 13

The radio is on, but Bjarne Brogeland isn’t listening. His eyes scan the city that glides past him. There is a muffled sound of tyres against wet tarmac.

They finished the morning briefing only fifteen minutes ago. Today’s tasks were explained and allocated under Arild Gjerstad’s skilful management. Now a large number of officers, led by Emil Hagen, are on their way to Grünerhjemmet to continue interviewing everyone who was there yesterday. At the police station Fredrik Stang is doing background checks on all the staff members at the care home, focusing on those who worked on Erna Pedersen’s ward. Crime scene officers are supporting the investigation by taking fingerprints and looking for matches on record.

Bjarne was tasked with visiting Ulrik Elvevold Sund, the boy who discovered Erna Pedersen’s body; a job he was happy to accept since Ella Sandland, the station’s femme fatale, was coming with him. Bjarne has been smitten with her for a long time, but none of his flirtatious remarks or come-ons has ever provoked as much as a shrug. That, however, Bjarne thinks, only makes working with her all the more charged.

He gazes at her, at her discreet make-up, the elasticity of her cheeks, her chin, her lips slightly dry right now, but normally moist and soft. Her eyelashes arch up over her eyelids. Sandland is like the sun. It’s always warm wherever she is.

‘So,’ he says, exhaling hard. ‘What do you make of all this?’

Sandland, who sits straight upright and looks out of the window with an alert expression, turns to him.

‘I don’t know what to think. Who would do something like that? I mean – even thinking of pushing knitting needles through the eyes of an old lady in the first place? How sick is that?’

As always her west Norwegian accent tugs at his heartstrings. She shakes her head; her short, blonde hair doesn’t even move.

‘Someone must have really hated her,’ she concludes.

‘Do you think it’s symbolic that he used the Bible to whack the knitting needles through her eyes?’

‘I don’t know,’ Sandland replies. ‘Was she a Christian?’

‘Or perhaps it was about her eyes,’ Bjarne speculates. ‘Perhaps she’d seen something. It’s a very symbolic action, targeting her eyes.’

Sandland makes no reply, she just nods to herself.

Bjarne switches on the sat nav and takes a right, finds where he is going and parks facing the direction of traffic in Jens Bjelkesgate, right outside the entrance to an apartment block with the number 43. The wall is yellow with white painted windowsills and render below them. The door to Entrance B is blue.

Bjarne has phoned ahead to say that they are on their way, that Martine Elvevold should prepare both herself and her son for a chat. When Sandland rings the bell, they are admitted immediately, and are met on the ground floor by a woman with a gaunt face who greets them with a ‘hi’. Her face is pale and drawn as if she hasn’t slept well. Her brown hair lies messily on her shoulders.

‘Come in,’ she says when they have shaken hands. They enter a living room filled with film sounds. Bjarne recognises it immediately as one of the Shrek movies. Ulrik, a boy with blond, longish hair – just like his father – sits slumped on the floor in front of the TV.

‘Can I get you some coffee or something?’ Martine offers.

‘No, thank you,’ the officers reply in unison.

‘How is he?’ Bjarne says.

Martine Elvevold hesitates for a few seconds before she answers.

‘It’s difficult to say,’ she begins. ‘I’ve kept him at home from school today, but he seems a little – how can I put it – detached. There are moments when he’s his old self, but every now and then he’ll stare vacantly into space. Ulrik has always been a rather fidgety boy. Always a little on the anxious side.’

Bjarne nods.

‘Has he said anything about – about what happened?’

Elvevold shakes her head.

‘I haven’t pressed him, either. I decided it might be good to give him time.’

‘Unfortunately time isn’t a luxury that we can allow ourselves,’ Bjarne says. ‘Do you mind if I have a word with him?’

‘No,’ Elvevold says, but her eyes immediately assume a worried expression. ‘Only – go easy on him.’

Bjarne smiles empathetically.

‘Of course.’

He signals to Sandland that he will take this chat on his own.

‘I think I would like that cup of coffee after all,’ she says.

Martine Elvevold smiles and leads the way to the kitchen. Bjarne waits until he and Ulrik are alone. He sits down on the floor, not too close to him, but a little to the side.

‘What are you watching?’ he says, looking at the boy’s flitting eyes, which follow the images on the screen. Fiona is busy beating up a guy pretending to be Robin Hood.

‘Holy cow,’ Bjarne says. ‘That’s one tough lady.’

Ulrik makes no reply.

‘My little girl loves this film,’ Bjarne says after a pause. ‘I think I must have seen it thirty times.’

Ulrik still hasn’t got anything to say. Bjarne lets his gaze roam around the room while he thinks about how best to approach this nine-year-old boy. DVD boxes for several films are piled up in front of the television. There is a crate of Lego under the coffee table. Marbles lie scattered around. There is an indoor football on the floor near the sofa.

‘Ulrik,’ Bjarne says, turning to the boy. ‘My name is Bjarne. I work for the police.’

The boy doesn’t take his eyes off the screen.

‘I’m trying to find out what happened at the care home yesterday. I know that you were the first person who saw that Erna Pedersen had died.’

This time the nine-year-old looks at Bjarne.

‘Can you tell me what you saw?’

Ulrik’s eyes return to the TV.

‘Would you mind if I turn down the volume?’ Bjarne says, pointing to the remote control. ‘Makes it easier to talk?’

Ulrik says nothing, but Bjarne takes it as an indication that it’s fine. He reaches out for the remote control and turns off the sound. Immediately they can hear noises coming from the kitchen. Muffled talking, a cup clattering.

‘We know that somebody hurt her,’ Bjarne continues. ‘And it’s my job to stop anything like that from happening again. I’m hoping you might be able to help me.’

Ulrik meets Bjarne’s eyes.

‘Did you see someone hurt Mrs Pedersen?’

Ulrik lowers his gaze and fidgets. This time Bjarne waits.

‘She was just dead,’ Ulrik says eventually.

‘You didn’t see what happened when she died?’

Ulrik shakes his head fiercely. Bjarne nods and tries to think of another way to ask the same question. Can’t think of one.

‘Did you see anyone in her room?’

Same response. Again there is something brooding and sad about Ulrik.

‘Was she nice, Mrs Pedersen?’

The boy nods.

‘She used to give me toffees.’

‘Toffees? That was nice of her,’ Bjarne says. ‘So you knew her?’

‘Not very much.’

‘But a little?’

Ulrik stares down at the floor again. Bjarne doesn’t know if there is any point in continuing the interview. Though he doesn’t know the boy, it’s clear to see that he has retreated deep inside himself. If that is for any other reason than having seen a dead body, a murdered body at that, it is hard to say.

‘Okay,’ Bjarne says and gets up. ‘Thanks for talking to me, Ulrik. I hope we can talk some more another time.’

The boy says nothing and Bjarne gives him the remote control. The room immediately fills with song. It’s a pretty melody, totally unsuited to the moment.

Bjarne finds the others in the kitchen.

‘He’s a great kid,’ he says to Martine Elvevold. ‘I think he’s going to be all right.’

Ulrik’s mother smiles tenderly.

‘Was he any help?’

‘He was,’ Bjarne says and nods at the same time.

‘I think perhaps I should let him spend some time with his friends after school today. If he wants to. It might be good for him to do something normal again.’

Sandland smiles and puts down her cup.

‘That sounds like a good idea,’ she says.

Chapter 14

The words in the email hit Trine so hard she starts to hyperventilate. It is as if the room begins spinning and she has to sit down in order not to fall. At her desk she rests her head in her hands and leans forwards on her elbows. Her hair falls over her eyes and forms a shield around her face, but one that offers no protection.

She raises her head and notices that the email was sent by biglie0910@hotmail.com. She splutters at the sender’s name and guesses that whoever is threatening her isn’t using an IP address that will prove easy to trace. Nor will she tell the Security Service about it either; she doesn’t want to involve anyone else.

Then she remembers that her secretary automatically receives copies of all emails that go to the Justice Secretary’s email address. Trine gets up, a little too quickly and instantly feels dizzy again. She clutches her head and regains her balance. Then she goes to the door and opens it. Sees that her secretary isn’t at her desk right now.

A stroke of luck.

Trine rushes outside, glancing quickly up and down the corridor; she can hear voices and noises from every direction, but even so she races around to the back of the reception counter, wakes up the computer mouse and finds the email program and the email from biglie0910. She deletes it, both from the inbox and from the deleted items folder. She hurries back to her office before anyone sees her.

When she has shut the door, she leans against it, closes her eyes and hyperventilates. Again she has to concentrate hard not to cry. But how can anyone know what she did? Who is trying to set her up?

There is no shortage of enemies, neither in the Ministry of Justice itself, the police force or the Labour Party. Several people felt overlooked when she was appointed Justice Secretary three years ago. Words such as quotas for women were mentioned, there were hints that Trine would never have got the job if the Prime Minister hadn’t had to appoint a woman. I bet my enemies are gloating now, she thinks. But who could have found out what she did? She didn’t tell anyone, did she?

Trine shakes her head, goes back to her chair and sits down. She checks her mobile. Sixteen missed calls in only the last twenty minutes.

How quickly things can change. When she first appeared on TV or in the newspapers, she would get heaps of supportive text messages from people she knew and quite a few she didn’t. It hardly ever happens now. That’s why she makes a point of sending sympathetic messages to Ministers or other politicians, especially women, when they have been involved in a controversy. Quite simply because nobody else will. Not a single one of her government colleagues has texted her their support. Nor have any of her friends.

Maybe she doesn’t have any. Not any real friends.

Her thoughts are interrupted by a knock on the door. Trine sniffs, straightens up and blinks hard a couple of times. The door opens and Harald Ullevik pops his head around.

‘Hi,’ he says softly. ‘Can I come in?’

Trine feels incapable of saying anything yet, so she simply nods. Ullevik opens the door fully, enters and quickly closes it behind him. Takes a slow step forwards, presses his palms together and looks at her.

‘Please,’ she whispers. ‘No pity. I don’t think I can handle that right now.’

Ullevik says nothing, but nods gently.

‘I just wanted to ask if there’s anything I can do for you.’

‘You can sue VG,’ she says half in earnest, half in jest. ‘No,’ she sighs. ‘I don’t know.’

Ullevik doesn’t move. The walls radiate silence.

‘Trine, I—’

Ullevik lowers his gaze and digs the toe of his shoe into the floor.

‘What is it, Harald?’

It takes a few moments before he looks up at her.

‘I just wanted you to know that I… that you have my full support. No matter what. You’ve done a brilliant job as Justice Secretary. You’re the best one we’ve had for years.’

Don’t cry, Trine tells herself. Don’t you dare start crying now.

‘If there’s anything you need, then… Don’t hesitate to ask. Okay?’

Stupid eyes.

‘I will,’ she stutters while the corners of her mouth start to tremble. ‘Thank you, Harald. It means a lot to me to hear you say that.’

Ullevik smiles warmly. Eyes meet eyes and she could have hugged him if there hadn’t been a desk between them, as well as her knowledge that she would most certainly burst into tears.

‘Okay,’ he says. ‘I’ll leave you in peace.’

She watches him go and soon she is alone in the silence once more – normally a welcome friend on a noisy day. But not today.

Eventually Trine gets up and rings an internal number. Katarina Hatlem shows up in her office less than one minute later.

‘What is it?’ she asks and closes the door behind her. And before Trine has time to respond, she says: ‘How are you?’

‘I can’t handle this on my own,’ Trine says. ‘You have to help me.’

Chapter 15

Emilie Blomvik can’t sit still for one minute. It’s almost like being back at school and waiting to get the results of a test you know you have done well in. She is quivering with anticipation, but it’s still a welcome sensation. She can only imagine how Mattis must be feeling right now.

Before he left work last Friday, the partners told him they would like to meet with him Monday morning. You’ve been doing very well recently, they said, but that was all they told him. Emilie has asked him several times during the weekend why he thought they wanted to meet with him. And even though he only shrugged and replied ‘I don’t know’, she could tell from looking at him what he was thinking. The way a small smile would curl up at the corners of his mouth though he tried very hard to suppress it.

Is it finally his turn to be made a partner?

Emilie isn’t quite sure what being made a partner entails, but she is absolutely sure that it’s a good thing. It holds out a promise of better times to come. Nicer holidays. More of everything. Before Mattis went to work today, he promised to ring her as soon as the meeting with his bosses was over. She doesn’t know what a Monday morning means for a lawyer, but surely it can’t be that long before he calls?

Emilie smiles to herself when she remembers how she met Mattis, or rather how he met her. He came up to the check-in counter at Gardermoen Airport where she worked and asked if she had ever been reindeer hunting. Emilie was lost for words after this unexpected question and when she didn’t reply immediately, he said: ‘Would you like to try?’

She didn’t know what to say; she is quite sure that she blushed as she sat there behind the counter. She had had her fair share of chat-up lines over the years, but the word ‘reindeer’ had never featured in any of them. And she was instantly attracted to the idea of leaving everything behind, eloping with a total stranger to a foreign place. He looked almost ruggedly handsome as he stood there, even though he is really quite skinny and not particularly attractive or brave, but Emilie had never been drawn to men with film star looks. And she had no trouble imagining how much tougher he would look with a hunting rifle in his hand. Had she been ten years younger, she might have thrown caution to the wind and gone off with him.

But she remembered him the next time he came to check in. She spotted him in the crowd, saw him wait until her counter was free. She got butterflies in her stomach and felt hot all over. She is quite sure that he noticed the warmth in the smile she flashed him. And there was something appealing about his confidence when he asked her if he could buy her a cup of coffee when he came back. Or a beer. Or a Strawberry Daiquiri.

Now the latter might have been a fluke, but at the time she loved Strawberry Daiquiris. And one Strawberry Daiquiri turned into two and three when he called her one month later. Now they have been living together for three years and been parents for two and a half. And she would have to agree that they’re happy.

But she is not sure that he is Mr Right.

Mattis is kind, funny and sociable. He is a great father to Sebastian – when he is at home, that is. He gets on very well with Emilie’s mother, with her friends, he even says that he likes or indeed ‘absolutely loves’ Jessheim, where they live. But sometimes it’s as if they are on different planets. One fortnight every year he goes hunting up in Finnmarksvidda in northern Norway. In the summer he prefers to go to rock festivals with his friends, while she prefers sun loungers and all-inclusive holidays. They don’t spend very much time together these days. He is busy with his work in Oslo; she with hers at the airport. Emilie had thought that living together, being a family, would be about more than just simple logistics, the organisation of everyday life. And the question she has been asking herself more and more often recently is: does she really love him?

Fortunately deciding where they were going to live required little discussion. Mattis wasn’t particularly bothered. Nor was he worried about how the house should look. Interiors, choice of sofa, the colour on the walls, the dinner service, none of that mattered to him and he was happy to leave all the decisions to her. So they bought a house that Emilie plans to redecorate over time, once she gets a clearer idea of what she wants.

Her only regret is that Johanne didn’t move back home to Jessheim once she had finished her studies. It would have made it so much easier for them to meet, or at least they would be seeing each other more than they do now. A whole summer has come and gone since the last time. And that is why Emilie is particularly excited about having lunch with her friend tomorrow.

But tomorrow is twenty-four hours away. Right now it is about the usual morning routine. Give Sebastian his breakfast, clean his teeth, brush his hair, make his packed lunch, help him into his coat and wellies, pack a spare set of clothing in case – no, not in case – because he inevitably gets dirty or wets himself.

She can’t wait until that stage is over. Sometimes she wishes it was possible to press the fast-forward button, as if life was a DVD series where you could skip all the boring episodes. But then Sebastian will smile or laugh or say something that gives her a warm glow all over, and she wishes she could change the pace of life to slow motion instead.

It is just past 8.30 in the morning when Emilie parks outside Nordby Nursery, a long flat building that has never been painted any colour other than red. She went there herself when she was little. She doesn’t remember very much about it except that they spent most of the day outdoors regardless of the weather – a tradition that seems to have endured. The nursery has a large outdoor space with plenty of playground equipment and a hill where the children can toboggan and roll down in winter.

Emilie gets out of the car, adjusts her clothing slightly, lifts Sebastian out of his car seat and puts him down carefully on the ground. Then she holds out her hand to him and he takes it. Slowly they start walking towards the entrance, a tarmac footpath where prams are lined up all the way to the wall. A father she meets practically every morning smiles to her. Emilie smiles back. It’s a fine morning and it’s important to enjoy it while it lasts. The sun breaks through the trees, which are craning their necks towards the sky. An autumnal morning mist has wrapped the branches and leaves in candy floss.

Her attention is drawn to a man standing close to the fence behind a fir tree. He is holding up a camera and isn’t moving. Emilie slows down and narrows her eyes to get a better look at him. She can’t see much in the drowsy morning light other than that he wears a khaki army jacket and that his face is obscured by the camera. When he lowers it, he seems to be staring right at her. At them.

‘Mummy,’ says a small, squeaky and impatient voice at her side. She looks down at Sebastian who is pulling at her.

‘I’m coming, darling, I was just—’

She turns again and looks towards the fir tree. The man is no longer there. She tries to work out where he could have gone, but all she can see are branches swaying in the wind and clouds of dust whirling up from the ground.

How strange, she thinks. Was he taking pictures of us?

She looks around. Right now they are the only people outside. And she thought there was something familiar about him.

She brushes the idea aside. He might just have been taking pictures of the beautiful light. Nothing to worry about.

Emilie carries on walking to the entrance while she glances at her watch. And it comes back, this twitchy, nagging feeling. Surely Mattis has to ring soon?

Chapter 16

The reporters gathered around the big staircase at Oslo Police Station instantly fall silent when Pia Nøkleby arrives. She is usually accompanied by Chief Inspector Arild Gjerstad, but this time she is alone.

Henning has to be honest: he has grown to like Pia Nøkleby since he returned to work in the spring. He likes her dark hair, the fringe that she always brushes behind her right ear even though the hair instantly falls back over her eyes again. And her eyes – brown with a fleck of green, eyes that never look tired. The little beauty spot left of her nose, which gives him yet another reason to look at her heart-shaped face. Her lips always moist, not too red, as if she deliberately stops herself from being too beautiful. Her cheeks, soft and rosy with only a hint of pale, delicate hairs, are tempting to touch.

She is always very serious when the microphone is switched on, behaving like she thinks she should and ought. But as soon as the cameras are turned off, her personality changes and she will come out with quick and insightful comments. She has always had this professional acuity that rarely or never leads her astray in interviews.

Henning has seen something in her eyes, not often, but every now and then she drops her facade. True, it’s some time since he last felt a woman’s warmth, or even interest, but he hasn’t completely lost his touch. Pia’s voice tends to soften when she speaks to him, also when other journalists or police officers are present.

But Henning also remembers how Pia’s replies became more and more evasive when he started asking questions about the police investigation into a murder of which ex-torpedo and property magnate Tore Pulli was found guilty. At first he had put her behaviour down to work-related stress, concluding that she might not be inclined to answer questions from someone who was clearly critical of an investigation she had headed. But ever since Henning discovered that Pia had redacted a report in the police investigation program, Indicia, a report that stated that Tore Pulli was outside Henning’s flat on the night of the fire that killed his son, it’s tempting to think that her less than forthcoming answers were prompted by other motives.

All Henning knows about the Pulli report is that Pulli was sitting in a car outside Henning’s flat in Markveien 32, on 11 September 2007, and that he had been there several nights in a row. But why was he there? Was he waiting for a meeting? Was he planning to beat someone up – after all, he had previously made his living as one of Oslo’s best-known enforcers? Or was he simply observing?

Henning has been asking himself those same questions in the last few weeks. Last month Pulli contacted Henning and told him he had information about what happened on the night that Jonas died. But before Pulli was able to tell him, he was murdered in Oslo Prison. Because of what he was about to tell Henning? And what did the original Indicia report say about Pulli’s movements on the night in question? Who might that information have incriminated – unless it was damaging to Pia Nøkleby herself?

Henning was tempted, of course he was, to confront Nøkleby when he discovered what she had done, but he has since had second thoughts. He decided to protect his source who had told him Nøkleby had edited the report and find another way to proceed. There must be others who know something.

He looks at Nøkleby as she stops on the fourth step from the bottom and surveys the crowd. TV camera lights are switched on. Microphones are stretched out. Mobile telephones switched to recording mode.

Henning knows the police are not about to disclose anything that he doesn’t already know. They might release a photograph of the victim, tell them a little about her background and confirm the information that Henning has already included in the article he filed earlier today. But Nøkleby won’t say anything about how the victim was maimed. Instead she will say that the investigation is looking at every aspect, technical as well as tactical, and that they have solid evidence that they are following up. But no one will be told what that solid evidence is, obviously.

Henning is there mainly to see how Nøkleby behaves, if her face gives anything away. He tries to catch her eye, but her gaze glides across the large room and the reporters assembled there.

When she has finished her statement and everyone has gone their separate ways, Henning sends her a text message asking politely for a private chat. He sits down on a bench outside the police station from where he has an uninterrupted view of Oslo Prison and waits for her to reply. This is the place they usually meet. Occasionally she invites him to her office, but only when she has information she officially wants the media to know about.

While he clutches his mobile waiting for her to get back to him, life in Oslo rushes by on the roads below. The sky is just as restless as satellite images played back at high speed. And he wonders how long it will be before another gigantic bucket of water will be tipped over the city.

He thinks about the murder of Erna Pedersen. Given the number of potential witnesses it’s odd that no one saw anything. On the other hand – all the patients on Ward 4 were suffering from some form of dementia, so even if they had seen something, there is no guarantee that they would have remembered it. It is even possible that one of them might have killed her and not even know it.

He tries to visualise Erna Pedersen, old and grey, in her wheelchair when she met her killer. He must have been known to her. No stranger would enter the room of an eighty-three-year-old woman, strangle her and then proceed to whack knitting needles into her eyes afterwards.

But why do it when the woman was already dead?

The killer must have suffered an enormous, pent-up rage. Killing her wasn’t enough. This gives Henning an idea. The murder is unlikely to have been planned in advance. Not in detail, at any rate. Then the killer would have used something other than the victim’s own knitting needles – unless he knew that she always had them by her side.

There can be no doubt that this was a crime of passion. And everyone who commits a crime of passion is affected by it one way or another. It takes time to recover from such raw emotions. How can the killer have found an outlet for such tremendous pressure without anyone noticing a change in him?

Since no one at the care home saw the killer, they must have been distracted. Or did the killer switch from being Mr Hyde one moment to Dr Jekyll the next? In which case they are looking for a killer who is extraordinarily callous.

Henning ponders the most important question in every murder investigation. Why? Several motives can be eliminated immediately. Jealousy. Desire. Some people kill for the thrill of it, but it’s rare. Neither is there anything to suggest that this murder was committed to cover up another crime. Nor is loss of honour a likely motive, since it mostly occurs between gang members or people with extreme religious convictions. Personal gain? It’s possible, of course, since no information has yet been published about the victim’s financial circumstances, be it anything she might have kept in her room or any money she might have had in her bank account. No more alternatives exist, except the usual one:

Revenge.

And in view of the killer’s unbridled rage, revenge is the most obvious motive. But what could an eighty-three-year-old woman ever have done to anyone? Nothing, probably, in the last few years. Not much happens at a care home. So we need to go further back in time, Henning reasons. But how far back? To the time before she was moved to a care home? Or even further back? Surely there is a limit to how much evil a woman can do after she turns seventy?

At the police press conference they learned that the victim was originally from Jessheim – where Henning also grew up, incidentally. Perhaps the answer lies there? In which case he knows exactly who to ask for help.

Henning is so completely lost in thought that he doesn’t hear the footsteps behind him, and when Pia Nøkleby sits down next to him, he spins around so fast that she starts to laugh.

‘I didn’t know you scared so easily.’

‘Oh,’ Henning says and blushes. ‘Occupational hazard.’

Nøkleby laughs again.

Henning likes laughter. He especially likes her laughter. And it’s hard to believe that Pia Nøkleby would have been able to sit here with him and act as if nothing had happened unless she had a clear conscience. She knows Henning’s story, knows what happened to Jonas. So could she really have tampered with the Tore Pulli report in Indicia and still sit here joking with him?

‘I should have brought you a strawberry ice cream,’ he says.

Nøkleby smiles and brushes some hair behind her ear.

‘I’m still feeling sick from the last one you gave me.’

Henning smiles and watches her lips stretch out, moist and perfect, as if she put on fresh lipstick just before she came down to see him.

‘Nice summary you just gave us,’ he continues. ‘Nice and professional, as usual.’

‘Hah,’ she snorts. ‘There wasn’t much for you lot to go on. Or, at least, not for you.’

He lowers his gaze.

‘Sometimes, Henning, your sources are a little too well informed.’

‘So you don’t fancy becoming one of them?’

This time they both smile.

‘I thought I was one of your sources?’

‘Yes, but on-the-record sources are boring, Pia. You know that.’

She laughs again.

‘But I won’t lie – you’re my dream source. No doubt about it.’

‘Oh?’

‘But more than anything, I wish I had a source who could grant me access to the information held in Indicia.’

Henning looks up at her.

‘Now that would be worth having,’ he continues.

Nøkleby doesn’t reply immediately.

‘Yes, I can imagine that’s every journalist’s wet dream,’ she then says.

‘Mm.’

Henning had expected that her eyes would start to flicker the moment he mentioned the word ‘Indicia’, especially if she understood why he was bringing it up. But there was no hint of a change. No quick, nervous glance. Not even a twitching in the corner of her mouth.

Perhaps it was too much to hope for. Pia has worked for the police for years; she is used to keeping secrets, to keeping a straight face in front of the media.

But would she be able to conceal something as big as that?

‘How easy is it for an outsider to gain access to Indicia?’

Nøkleby turns to him.

‘How do you mean?’

‘Could I, for example, log on to Indicia if I knew your username and password? From the outside?’

Nøkleby’s mouth starts to open, but she hesitates before she replies.

‘I hope you’re not about to make me an indecent proposal?’

‘You know me better than that, Pia.’

Her face darkens slightly. Her gaze sharpens.

‘But could I? I mean, purely hypothetically, of course, just to be clear.’

Nøkleby doesn’t reply. She simply stares at him with searching eyes.

‘I thought you wanted to talk to me about the murder of Erna Pedersen?’

‘That too.’

Her eyes probe him so hard that her gaze pricks him.

‘The functionality of a program such as Indicia isn’t something we share with the public, Henning. Not even with off-the-record news-hungry journalists.’

‘Sorry,’ he says and smiles.

‘Tell me, why do you want to know?’

He shrugs his shoulders.

‘I’m just curious.’

‘Yeah, right,’ she says, sarcastically. ‘You always have an agenda.’

True, Henning thinks and pauses before he replies. Then he holds up his hands in defence.

‘There’s an exception to every rule,’ he says and smiles again, hoping that will be enough to lift the veil of scepticism over her eyes.

He isn’t that lucky.

‘Well, if there’s nothing else, then—’

Nøkleby stands up.

‘There is.’

She stops and looks down at him.

‘How far back in time are you going to have to go to find the reason for the revenge killing of Erna Pedersen?’

Nøkleby looks at him. She shakes her head almost imperceptibly.

Then she leaves.

Chapter 17

Bjarne has only just stepped out of the lift on the third floor at Grünerhjemmet when Emil Hagen sees him and signals for him to wait. Bjarne duly stops halfway between the two corridors that run parallel like an H with the TV lounge to the right and the nursing station to the left. Behind a large glass window a woman is concentrating on a computer screen. Its green glare reflects in her glasses.

Hagen, a police officer with short legs and brown spiky hair, ends the call and snaps shut his mobile, then comes towards Bjarne with bouncy trainer steps that squeal against the shiny, polished floor. His jeans fit snugly around his thighs. A black leather jacket envelops taut upper body muscles that strain against a plain white T-shirt.

Emil Hagen joined the Violent Crimes Unit less than three years ago, straight out of the police academy. At first his youthful enthusiasm and naivety might give people the impression that he was head over heels with the profession and the status it gave him. But Bjarne soon realised that there was an entirely different reason for Hagen’s dedication.

Hagen had been brought up in a home without any boundaries, where his parents were rarely present or, if they were there, were rarely sober. Hagen rapidly realised that if he wanted to escape, he had only himself to rely on. He would need to take responsibility for his own life. Work hard at school, look out for himself. And he did it, that wasn’t the problem.

The problem was his sister, Lise Merethe.

Boys quickly discovered her; she would often come home drunk late at night and at the age of sixteen she was well on her way to becoming a fully paid up member of the intravenous drug user community. Hagen grew up as he walked the streets of Oslo trying to save his baby sister from ruin. To no avail. One autumn day in 2005 she was found under a bridge near Oslo’s Stock Exchange. Killed by an overdose. But instead of burying himself in grief, Hagen set to work systematically; caring little for the tough guys he encountered on the drugs scene or how he spoke to them, he just wanted to find the answer to the question of who had sold Lise Merethe the fatal dose.

The dealer in question turned out to be a small fish in a big pond, but Hagen realised something about himself: he had a gene or two that made him well suited for investigative work. The course of the rest of his life had been set. Every day he turns up for work with a resilience and a spring in his step that Bjarne envies him. As if he is still trying to save his sister.

As far as Bjarne is concerned, the reason for his choice of career was nowhere near as noble. For him being a police officer made you a tough guy. As did wearing the uniform, being where the action was, speeding away in a car without worrying about losing your licence. And it was also about the women. For a while everything was about them. He worked out and knew that he looked good; he had the uniform, the handcuffs and the gun – three attributes you can never go wrong with when you’re trying to become an alpha male. A test, however, he has yet to pass when it comes to Ella Sandland.

Now she comes up alongside him while Emil Hagen pushes two pieces of chewing tobacco under his upper lip.

‘The pathologist says the victim was killed sometime between three and six yesterday afternoon,’ he begins. ‘I’ve gone through the visitors’ log and eliminated everyone who came and left before that time. That leaves us with twenty-three potential suspects.’

‘Right,’ Bjarne replies.

‘Yes, this is a big care home. If we were to include everyone who worked here during that slot we’re talking about sixty to seventy people. But I’ve made a list of the twenty-three visitors.’

Hagen hands Bjarne a sheet of paper.

‘The names of anyone who visited someone in Ward 4 in that three-hour window are in bold.’

Bjarne studies the list and recognises the names of several people he spoke to the night before.

‘And the people whose names are followed by “VS” – they’re the ones from the Volunteer Service?’ Bjarne asks.

‘Yes.’

‘We should also take into account that not everyone signs themselves in,’ Ella Sandland interjects. ‘Especially not frequent visitors.’

Bjarne nods.

‘It’s also easy to move between floors here, using either the lift or the stairs,’ Hagen continues. ‘But we’re starting with anyone who is known to have been to Ward 4.’

‘And do you have a list of staff members?’

Hagen nods.

‘Plus the patients, of course.’

‘Okay,’ Bjarne says as he visualises an endless queue of interviewees. ‘Discovered anything interesting yet?’

‘Might have,’ Hagen says, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. ‘One of the cleaners told me she heard an argument up here yesterday afternoon. She didn’t know if it was between patients, staff or relatives, but she thought she heard doors slamming. And that it was on this side of the corridor,’ Hagen says, taking a step towards the nursing station and pointing down the corridor in the direction of Erna Pedersen’s room.

‘She couldn’t give me the exact time, but she was sure it was in the afternoon. We haven’t spoken to anyone else so far who has seen or heard anything,’ Hagen finishes and licks his upper lip.

‘Which might suggest that the killer is known to most people here.’

‘You mean he works here?’

‘Could be. If you pass someone you see every day, you don’t really notice them. Take you, for example, I know that you come to get water from the water cooler outside my office every day. If I asked you if the water cooler was half or quarter full, would you be able to tell me?’

Hagen thinks about it for a few moments before he shakes his head.

‘So the killer could have been here so often that people didn’t question his presence.’

‘Or hers,’ Sandland says.

Bjarne raised an eyebrow.

‘Do you really think that a woman could have done this?’

‘Why not? You don’t have to be especially strong to strangle an old woman who was half dead already.’

Bjarne quickly rubs the bridge of his nose.

‘Incidentally, the manager was very chatty about a lot of other problems they’re having here,’ Hagen continues. ‘But I don’t know how important they are.’

Another furrow appears in Bjarne’s brow.

‘Why do you say that?’

‘The question is how relevant they are,’ Hagen muses.

‘Right now everything is relevant. What did he say?’

‘She,’ Hagen says, jutting out his chin a little.

‘Eh?’

‘The manager is a woman.’

‘Oh.’

Hagen looks down at his notes.

‘Her name is Vibeke Schou,’ he informs them. ‘She talked about relatives who moan and complain, patients who steal, broken equipment, medication going missing.’ Hagen throws up his hands. ‘You wouldn’t believe it, everything was a problem. That’s what they call care for the elderly today, eh,’ he tuts and sighs.

‘Medication going missing?’ Bjarne asks.

‘Yes, apparently. But she told me something that is quite interesting now that I think about it. Not all that long ago they had to introduce house rules in the TV lounge over there.’

Hagen points with his thumb over his shoulder.

‘House rules?’ Bjarne says.

‘Yes, about who gets to decide what they watch and when. Some of the men were hogging the remote control a little too much and the women got upset about it. Erna Pedersen was one of them.’

Sandland tries to keep a straight face, but fails to suppress her smile.

‘I can’t imagine that those rules went down terribly well with the men.’

‘No. Especially not with one particular resident, a—’

Hagen glances down at his lists again.

‘Guttorm Tveter,’ he says.

Bjarne looks over at Sandland.

‘I’ll see if I can find him,’ Sandland says.

‘Great,’ Bjarne says.

Sandland walks past both of them, past the TV lounge and turns left into the corridor. Both officers turn to follow her with their eyes. Her uniform seems to fit her figure exactly.

‘Have you seen Daniel Nielsen around?’ Bjarne asks and shakes his head to dispel the image. Hagen licks his lips.

‘Who’s he?’

‘Erna Pedersen’s primary care worker. I’ve tried calling him several times today, but there’s no reply. He’s not returning my calls, either.’

Hagen takes out a fresh sheet of paper from his jacket pocket. His eyes skim it a couple of times before he replies: ‘No. He’s not in today.’

‘Okay,’ Bjarne says and nods. ‘I’ll talk to some of the others instead. Who do you suggest I start with?’

Chapter 18

It’s not often that Trine drives herself these days, but it feels good to be behind the wheel again, alone and in perfect silence. The steady sound of tyres against tarmac makes her feel drowsy, something that surprises her. She would never have thought she could feel sleepy now after what has happened and given what she is doing now.

Resign or the truth will come out.

Replying to that email was not an option. She would never agree to enter into an email exchange that would be difficult to keep private. But neither could she stand staying in her office, being interrupted every five minutes by new problems, new statements, new media stories and new demands. The walls were starting to close in on her. She needed to be alone for a while; she couldn’t bear the thought of fighting her way through a media scrum every time she tried to get in or out of a building. Not without knowing what to say or do.

She told Katarina Hatlem that she thought she had been set up, quite simply because she couldn’t keep her suspicions to herself any longer. But she said nothing about the email because she didn’t want Katarina to initiate her own investigation. Katarina can be quite headstrong once she gets the bit between her teeth.

Trine has a red baseball cap pulled down over her eyes and is wearing different glasses. She takes care not to look at any of the drivers in the oncoming traffic, but she thinks it’s unlikely that anyone would recognise her. She realises how tempting it would be to try to shake off her bodyguards who are in the car behind her, but she daren’t, she can’t. It would have repercussions not just for her, but also for Katarina.

It was Katarina who helped Trine leave the Ministry of Justice unnoticed less than an hour ago through the concrete tunnel under Building R5 where a man was waiting to take her to a hire car in which she drove off. Katarina had also bought some food, clothes and a new mobile phone, since it would be easy for the police to trace Trine’s old one.

Trine drives into the Lier Tunnel while she remembers the first question she was asked by a journalist when William Jespersen’s newly formed government stepped out on to Slottsplassen for the very first time. ‘Will you still have enough time for your husband now that you’re going to be Justice Secretary?’ Trine was completely taken aback; she had imagined she would have a chance to promote her core issues. No one had prepared her that the media would be more interested in her private life. Afterwards she wished she had been able to come up with something pithy and clever, but all she managed to stutter was: ‘Yes, of course.’

And now she is running away from Pål Fredrik too. She sent him a text message right before she left to let him know that she wouldn’t be coming home tonight, but she hadn’t got a reply by the time she had to leave.

The new mobile rings. She recognises the number.

‘Hi, Katarina,’ Trine says.

‘Hi. Where are you?’

‘I’m close to Drammen.’

‘Are you all right?’

‘Yes, of course, Katarina, I’m all right.’

‘Now this isn’t unexpected, but I thought I should draw your attention to it anyway. As you can imagine, the opposition is having a field day with this, but what’s worse is that the leader of the Labour Party’s youth branch is saying that if the allegations are true then it’s a very serious matter.’

Trine sighs.

‘You know what the media are like. Every headline is now going to preface the allegations with “very serious”. The disclaimer won’t be mentioned until halfway down the story.’

‘Typical. Anything else?’

‘No. That’s all for now.’

‘Okay.’

‘Call me when you get there.’

‘Mm.’

But Trine doesn’t want to call or talk to anyone. She just wants to get out of Oslo.

She glances up at the rear-view mirror and sees the black Audi behind her with the two men in the front. I bet they’re sweating, she thinks, given the situation and the job they have to do. They are going to an unnamed location and haven’t been able to secure it yet. She sympathises with them. What if something were to happen to the Justice Secretary on their watch?

Chapter 19

He studies the colours and the contrasts on the screen. He can see that he needs to brighten the surroundings, intensify their colour. Or maybe it’s fine as it is.

He likes the mood in the picture. The early morning mist lying across the ground at the nursery. The trees around it, wrapped in nature’s floating cotton wool. He should have taken some pictures of that as well, not just of the boy who has sand around his mouth. He is not smiling in this particular picture. He sits on the ground, lost in a world of his own. His waders keep him dry and warm. He is blissfully ignorant that the world only seems to be a safe place. Anything could happen to a boy of two and a half.

He selects the boy, increases the contrast so his colouring stands out more sharply against the dim morning light, and plays with various filters. Even though he doesn’t need to, he prints out the picture. Soon a long, whooshing sound starts up under his desk. And the boy appears, clear and bright.

He studies the face, the cheekbones he can barely make out under the chubby toddler cheeks. Looks at the nose and the mouth. The teeth.

Does he bear any resemblance to me?

He knows the thought is absurd, but he can’t help himself. And he imagines her, imagines them, hand-in-hand, the way she often drags the boy along, usually because she is late for work. But she can’t have been late for work today given the leisurely pace with which she walked. And always so beautiful. Still so bloody beautiful. And the boy. Small and untouched.

At least for now.

He sits down in front of his computer again and feels the soft latex around his fingers when he rubs them together. He goes on Facebook to check the latest updates. Shakes his head. Everyone is so bloody happy and successful. He starts to play a computer game, but finds it impossible to concentrate.

He thinks about yesterday and how it all happened before he had time to savour it. The old woman died almost immediately. He didn’t really know what he had done before he had done it and so he never saw the light go out. He never felt the struggle, no matter how short and feeble it would have been, in her fingers.

Four intense beeps from his mobile snap him out of his reverie. He picks up the phone and heaves a sigh.

He visualises his mother on her lunch break at work calling him to find out what he is up to, if he would like to come home for dinner tomorrow. He can’t be bothered to reply. Nag, nag, nag. Every time the same questions: ‘Have you been down to the job centre yet?’ ‘How do you pass the time?’

If only you knew, he thinks. And he won’t be coming home for dinner tomorrow. He has plans. Big plans.

He looks at the boy again. Then he scrunches up the printout and throws it at the wall, finds his USB-driven mini Hoover, points its nozzle at the keyboard and removes any breadcrumbs or dust that might have settled in the last few days. And especially any DNA.

When he has finished, he pushes himself away from the desk, opens the desk drawer and looks at the open envelope with the large, green ‘G’ on the outside. He takes it out and puts it next to a wrap – slightly bigger than a street dose – of morphine capsules.

He can hardly wait until the next struggle. He is desperate to experience that. He wants to see the light. Especially when it goes out.

Chapter 20

Back at the offices of 123news Henning sits down at his desk and reflects. Did he actually glean anything from his meeting with Pia Nøkleby?

Only a professional liar can control the reflexes of their facial muscles when confronted with compromising information. The tell is in the movements of the eyes. But rather than getting nervous or appearing ill at ease, Pia looked inquisitive and alert.

Is she really that good a liar?

If that’s the case he has to find another way of solving the Indicia problem. And he thinks he has.

According to 6tiermes7, Henning’s secret Internet source, a man called Andreas Kjær was the officer on duty on the night of the fire. It’s not unthinkable that he might remember something from that night. Perhaps he can provide Henning with information about which patrol car he despatched to investigate what Tore Pulli was doing in Markveien around 8.30 p.m. Perhaps the officers in that patrol car could be traced. It’s definitely worth following up, especially now when Henning has some free time. The police investigation at the care home is trundling along and the online newspapers are focusing mainly on Trine.

Henning discovers that Directory Enquiries list several Andreas Kjærs, but only one who lives in Oslo. Henning steps inside an office the size of a telephone booth and calls the number. A deep, male voice answers after just two rings.

‘Hi, my name’s Henning Juul. I’m looking for Andreas Kjær.’

‘That’s me.’

‘Hi,’ Henning says again. ‘I’m calling because two years ago you were working at Oslo Police’s control centre. Is that right?’

‘Yes, that’s correct. I’m still there.’

‘Okay. Fine. I have a question that might be a bit – which might not make sense straightaway, but I ask you to bear with me because it’s important.’

Henning gets no reply and takes it as a sign that he should keep talking.

‘On 11 September in 2007 there was a fire in my flat in Markveien in Grünerløkka. You were on duty that night and I know that a patrol car was despatched to Markveien 32 shortly before the fire started.’

Henning stops to make sure that Kjær is keeping up with him.

‘Okay?’ Kjær says, sounding unwilling. ‘I’m sorry to hear that. But why are you calling me?’

‘Because you were on duty that night. I also know that it was—’

‘How do you know that?’

‘I lost my son in that fire,’ Henning says and clears his throat. ‘And apart from being more than understandably keen to know what happened, I’m also a journalist. I have sources.’

Kjær says nothing. Henning decides to plough on.

‘A traffic warden had observed a man sitting in a car several evenings in a row outside the building where I lived; he got suspicious, called it in and you despatched a patrol car to the address.’

Henning holds another pause.

‘Ring any bells, Kjær?’

Silence.

‘The man sitting in the car was Tore Pulli,’ Henning continues when Kjær still doesn’t say anything. ‘You’ve heard of him, haven’t you?’

‘Yes, of course. But I don’t remember the case.’

‘Are you sure? It would be really helpful if you could try to think back. Like I said, it’s very important to me.’

‘I understand,’ Kjær replies. ‘But yes, I’m sure. And even if I did remember that case I wouldn’t be able to discuss it with you.’

‘Okay, I understand, but—’

‘I have to go now.’

Henning is about to launch a fresh protest before he realises his words will have no effect. The line has already gone dead.

Chapter 21

Pernille Thorbjørnsen is perching on the edge of a chair and leaning forwards with one leg slung over the other. The care worker has a round face with dimpled cheeks. Her brown hair is swept back in a low ponytail. Bjarne Brogeland puts her at thirty, perhaps a few years older.

They are in a meeting room on the ground floor of the care home where a couple of IKEA tables have been pushed together. The light from two large windows casts a layer of something sallow across Thorbjørnsen’s face.

‘Thanks for coming in at such short notice,’ he says.

‘Don’t mention it,’ she smiles and leans back.

‘When did you leave work yesterday?’

‘My shift ended at five o’clock.’

‘Okay. Did anything strike you as unusual? I’m thinking about anyone who might have been acting differently. Staff. Patients. Visitors.’

Bjarne flings out his hands.

‘Anything and anyone is of interest,’ he says.

Thorbjørnsen squeezes her fingers for a moment, brushes a few stray strands of hair behind her ears; then she folds her arms across her chest.

‘I don’t think so,’ she begins. ‘I can’t really think of anything. I was working and I didn’t realise I was meant to be looking out for something.’

‘No, I know. But try to think back. Was anyone a bit more agitated than they normally were, or calmer than usual, or more exalted—’

Thorbjørnsen looks up to the left.

‘I don’t think so.’

Bjarne doesn’t continue until he is sure that she has finished sifting through her memories.

‘Were you here when the people from the Volunteer Service arrived?’

‘Yes, but I didn’t join in the entertainment this time.’

‘Why not?’

‘I had things to do. The residents here are ill, Officer. Not everyone is able to take part in the entertainment every time. And there isn’t room for us all, either.’

‘So you don’t know if Erna Pedersen took part yesterday?’

‘Yes, I do actually. Ole Christian told me that she didn’t.’

‘Ole Christian – you mean Ole Christian Sund?’

Thorbjørnsen nods.

‘When did you talk to him?’

‘Last night.’

Bjarne looks at her for several long moments. A hand shoots up to her cheek and her nails scratch a dark brown mole.

‘I’ve been told that someone had an argument in Ward 4 yesterday afternoon.’

Thorbjørnsen quickly glances up at him, but when she doesn’t comment on his statement, Bjarne continues: ‘Did you see or hear anything about that?’

She shakes her head.

Bjarne tries to make eye contact, but Thorbjørnsen is looking down now.

‘There’s always a little bit of arguing here and there,’ she says eventually and juts out her chin. ‘That doesn’t mean that anyone here would stick knitting needles through the eyes of our patients. You don’t seriously think that any of the staff or one of the patients could have done it?’

‘It’s too soon to say,’ Bjarne responds, surprised at the sudden resistance in her voice, but he doesn’t have time to think about it further before Ella Sandland knocks on the door and pops in her head to signal that she wants a word.

Bjarne apologises, irritated at the interruption because it shouldn’t happen during an interview. But because Sandland is aware of that and yet still interrupts him, he gets up and asks Thorbjørnsen to stay where she is. Then he steps out into the corridor and closes the door behind him.

‘What is it?’ he asks.

Sandland’s gaze is serious.

‘There’s something I’ve got to show you.’

Chapter 22

Henning was sorely tempted to ring back Andreas Kjær immediately, but on second thoughts he decided against it. It was too desperate. Maybe Kjær was on his way to work, perhaps he was about to walk an impatient dog. Or maybe he is one of those people who don’t like answering the same question twice. Therefore another call would only make matters worse.

Henning grew up in Kløfta, seven or eight kilometres south of Jessheim where Erna Pedersen originally came from. One of his childhood friends is called Atle Abelsen. They didn’t really get to know each other until after sixth form when they discovered a shared love of music. They would meet up from time to time and try to put words to something that was supposed to be a melody. And where Henning’s interest in technology has remained at the gifted amateur level, Atle’s passion for cyberspace and computers fed and sustained him all the way into his choice of career. He now works as a programmer for a company in Lillestrøm, but every now and then he will take on work of a quirkier nature – as long as he considers it a challenge. Henning sends him an email and explains what he wants help with this time with the usual promise of a bottle of Calvados as a thank you.

Henning then thinks about Erna Pedersen’s closest family. Surely no one is better placed to tell him about any former enemies that she might have had and he finds out that Pedersen has a son called Tom Sverre Pedersen who works as a doctor at Ullevål University Hospital.

Tom Sverre Pedersen has featured in the media a few times in recent years because he believes that the training of doctors is ripe for reform. If Henning is not mistaken, Pedersen took part in a debate on NRK on exactly this subject not that long ago.

Henning finds Pedersen’s mobile number, but his call goes straight to voicemail. I’m not the only one who wants to get hold of him today, Henning guesses. For all he knows Pedersen could be being interviewed at the police station right now. Even so Henning leaves a message and asks Pedersen to return his call. He probably won’t, but you never know, he just might. Sometimes people with a public profile are happy to speak to the media when the opportunity presents itself.

The buzz in the offices of 123news hasn’t diminished – on the contrary; Henning can’t remember when he last heard his sister’s name mentioned so many times in one day. And it occurs to him that he hasn’t even bothered to find out why every news organisation in Norway seems to have gone overboard with this story.

He brings up the front page of 123news where he encounters fat, bold typeface against a black background and large pictures of Trine standing on a podium with a hotel logo strategically placed as near the microphone as possible. ‘Shortly after giving this speech she assaulted a young, male politician,’ the lead-in says.

Henning clicks on it and learns that Trine took part in the Labour Party’s annual conference on 9 October last year where she is alleged to have forced a young man to have sex with her. ‘The worst abuse of power,’ someone states. ‘Shameful,’ cries another. A third person says that Trine ought to be reported to the police. So far the police haven’t taken action; they are waiting for someone to file a complaint, but the public prosecutor the newspaper has spoken to will not rule out that the police might launch their own inquiry.

The lead story is accompanied by background material, reactions, comments, blogs and quotes. There are several other pictures of her; Henning looks at the new Trine as he has slowly started to know her. Smooth skin, nice make-up, elegant clothes, excellent posture and political gravitas in her eyes.

Henning clicks his way through several articles. An unnamed source claims that the unidentified, up-and-coming politician had tried to resolve the issue with Trine, to get her to apologise unreservedly, but that she refused. There are also speculations as to whether the Party knew about the accusations and failed to deal with them.

Henning’s attention is drawn to the TV screen to his right. The news channel is on and Prime Minister William Jespersen is seen getting out of a car. The footage is from earlier that morning and Jespersen is asked to comment on the story in today’s edition of VG. But Jespersen merely says that he agrees with the Justice Secretary, that he, too, refuses to comment on anonymous allegations, and that is all he is prepared to say for the time being.

The camera cuts back to the studio where a news anchor and a commentator look gravely at each other. The anchor asks how toxic this issue is for Jespersen’s government.

‘It’s highly toxic,’ the commentator replies. ‘Last year alone the Prime Minister had to replace several government Ministers and many have started to doubt his judgement when it comes to making appointments. Trine Juul-Osmundsen represents a huge headache for the Prime Minister since she – despite speculation to the contrary – has proved to be a very popular and effective Minister. The fact that even someone like her finds herself in hot water must cause the Prime Minister to lose sleep, I’m absolutely sure of it.’

‘Talking about sleep,’ the anchor continues, ‘how do you think that Juul-Osmundsen is feeling? It’s no secret that she struggled with mental health issues not all that long ago and that she had been on sick leave due to depression. How do you think all this is going to affect her?’

‘It’s far too early to say, but it clearly isn’t going to be easy for her. I don’t recall that we’ve ever had a case where a female Minister is alleged to have exploited her position in this way. Now we have to treat this matter with caution because we’ve yet to hear the Justice Secretary’s side of the story, but I find it hard to see how she can continue in her post after this.’

Depression, Henning thinks and frowns. That comes as news to him, but perhaps it shouldn’t. Until his return to work last spring, he had barely read a newspaper or seen any TV while he was in Haukeland Hospital or later at Sunnaas Rehabilitation Centre. But why was Trine depressed?

The screen blurs and an image of Trine as a little girl appears in Henning’s head. She is jumping through a garden sprinkler at their home in Kløfta; she is probably no more than six or seven years old. Her hair is wet; it sticks to her back and neck. Excited, she races towards him with a triumphant smile across her face. She takes a run-up, leaps through the water, breaking the jets before they point up at the sky in an elegant arc once more. ‘Come on, Henning,’ she calls out in her childish voice. And for a moment her voice reminds him of Jonas.

Henning watches himself take a step towards her. Just one, then he stops. Trine shouts that he must have a go because it’s such fun. Sitting on a flimsy director’s chair nearby is their mother who is holding a cigarette and smiling. She follows her daughter with her eyes, but her expression changes as she looks at him as if to order him into the water. So Henning does it, he takes a run-up and jumps; the jets cut through him like icy knives and he hears Trine squeal and shout out: ‘I told you it would be fun!’

Henning blinks and is back in the office. He sees all the people in front of him, he hears the noise, senses the mood, the chaos; everything springs to life again. And he understands, possibly for the first time, the kind of strain Trine will be under for days to come. People will follow her wherever she goes, demand answers, try to speak to anyone who knows her, friends, family. Opposition politicians will make statements, there will be opinion polls and the telephones won’t ever stop ringing in the office of any Norwegian newspaper with more than ten readers. Every news organisation will try to catch up on the head start that VG currently has with its exclusive. This means high publication frequency and a low quality threshold for what is published. Single source journalism. And it won’t be long before other stories will come out; anything even vaguely controversial that Trine has ever done will be re-examined.

But this isn’t just about Trine, Henning thinks. There are other people to consider. So he gets up and walks away from the others. He takes out his mobile and sees that the time is 12.21. Then he rings his mother. But instead of a dial tone he gets a message telling him that the number is temporarily unavailable.

Henning nods happily to himself.

Chapter 23

‘How is that even possible?’

Bjarne Brogeland is still standing outside the meeting room on the ground floor of Grünerhjemmet, flicking through the documents that Ella Sandland has had faxed over from the police station. Sandland shrugs.

‘I mean – don’t they run checks on people before they hire them? I thought anyone who wanted a job in the care sector had to disclose criminal convictions.’

Brogeland reads the document from the beginning again, and sees that the conviction of Daniel Nielsen, Erna Pedersen’s primary care worker, dates back to May 2006. Nielsen suspected his girlfriend of being unfaithful and tried to beat the truth out of her. The fact that he was right wasn’t regarded as a mitigating circumstance.

‘So he has a temper and a predisposition for violence,’ Bjarne says.

‘But is it likely that Erna Pedersen could have provoked him in quite the same way?’ Sandland wonders.

Brogeland grimaces quickly before he takes out his mobile and sees that Nielsen still hasn’t returned his call. Brogeland rings the number again, but it goes straight to voicemail. This time he doesn’t leave a message.

‘When is he due in at work?’ he asks Sandland and hangs up.

‘Not until four o’clock this afternoon.’

‘Okay,’ Brogeland says. ‘Let’s pay him a home visit.’

The city is grey from the low hanging clouds when Bjarne starts the car and manoeuvres out into the traffic.

‘What did she have to say in her defence?’ he asks as he turns left into Søndregate. At the bottom of the hill the River Aker winds its way under several bridges, warbles between dense alders and weeping willows whose branches arch down and only just avoid getting wet.

‘Who?’ Sandland asks.

‘The manager of the care home. I presume she was the one who hired Nielsen?’

‘No defence,’ Sandland says with a sigh. ‘She was desperate for people, she said, and Nielsen came across as a good candidate at the interview. And you don’t have a legal obligation to disclose criminal convictions before you start working in a care home.’

Brogeland shakes his head and drives up through Grünerløkka. The wheels find their own path between tramlines and potholes in the streets after years of cable laying and poor maintenance. The buildings they pass look like unwashed Lego bricks, square and painted a range of different colours.

The ground in Sofienberg Park is sated with foliage from the chestnut trees in between patches of wet green grass and dark brown, slippery paths. They continue driving in the direction of Sinsen where the green area of Torshovdalen lies like a deep ravine in between arms of criss-crossing roads leading out of the city. The car ploughs through the wind.

‘Did you get a chance to speak to that angry man from the TV lounge?’ Bjarne asks. ‘Guttorm Tveter or whatever his name was?’

‘I did,’ Sandland says and a smile forms around her lips. ‘It’s a wonder I’ve got any voice left. The old guy’s deaf as a post. And he refuses to wear a hearing aid.’

‘Typical,’ Bjarne says. ‘Did he see anything? Did you get the impression that he might be involved?’

‘It was difficult to get much sense out of him. I’m not even sure he understands that Erna Pedersen is dead.’

‘Really?’

‘He was much more interested in telling me about his childhood in Linderud. He could remember every single detail of that.’

‘That’s often the way it is,’ Bjarne says. ‘Old people can’t remember what happened yesterday, but you try asking them about the war.’

Sandland laughs.

‘Do you know what he asked me?’

‘No?’

‘He asked me to bring a bottle of cognac next time.’

Brogeland smiles.

‘Braastad XO, preferably,’ Sandland says.

‘That’s priceless,’ Brogeland laughs. ‘I think I have a bottle of that at home.’

There is silence between them again. Brogeland turns into Sinsenterrassen, says goodbye to an open, grey Oslo and hello to denser development where the cars drive closer to the pavements and people lean into the weather.

‘But Guttorm Tveter must have had something to say about what happened yesterday. Doesn’t he remember anything?’

‘Doesn’t seem like it,’ Sandland says. ‘He was more concerned about what time it was. There was something he wanted to watch on TV.’

Bjarne finds a parking space outside the supermarket and reluctantly leaves the car in favour of an uninspiring walk that puts an end to their conversation. They step out on the pavement where wet leaves cover the tarmac like a blanket, find the brown building where Daniel Nielsen lives and press a button with his name on. Brogeland stuffs his hands in his jeans pockets in a vain attempt to warm them up and looks up at the grey and white windows.

Soon they hear a voice saying ‘hello?’

‘Hello, this is the police,’ Ella Sandland says. ‘Are you Daniel Nielsen?’

A long silence ensues before the intercom on the wall finally buzzes to let them in.

The officers enter and take the lift up to the fourth floor where a man meets them in the stairwell. Dark hair falls to his ears from a messy centre parting and three-day-old stubble steals the light from his face. He is wearing a black T-shirt with a picture of Whitney Houston. Below the artist’s face the caption says ‘Houston, we have a problem’ in red letters. His trousers, also black, are sagging. Over his belt hangs a belly that would make Bjarne run to the nearest treadmill in sheer panic.

‘Hi,’ Daniel Nielsen says quickly and smiles at the investigators. ‘Have you been trying to get hold of me today?’ He laughs. ‘I’ve been to the gym, you see, and I’ve only just got home this minute.’

‘So you haven’t managed to shower yet?’ Bjarne says.

‘No, I—’ Nielsen runs a hand through his hair. ‘I haven’t got round to that.’

He rubs his hands on his trouser leg. He smiles at them again.

‘Where do you work out?’ Bjarne asks.

‘Eh, Svein’s Gym,’ Nielsen says.

Bjarne nods.

‘Could we come in, please?’ Sandland asks.

Nielsen looks at her.

‘Can’t we just take it out here? My flat’s a real mess and I – I—’

‘We prefer to talk inside,’ Bjarne says firmly and doesn’t offer any explanation.

‘Of course,’ Nielsen nods and goes in first, holds the door open for them and kicks some shoes out of the way before they reach a narrow hallway. Pegs on the wall are taken by jackets, baseball caps and a sad-looking umbrella. They walk past a cracked mirror and a three-drawer white chest where one knob is falling off.

They step inside the living room. There is an open laptop on a desk. Next to it is a plate with a half-eaten sandwich. There are teeth marks in the saveloy. A full glass of milk is standing beside it. On the walls are big framed pictures. Snowboarders in a white mountain terrain. An angler in a river in water up to his waist. Some smaller close-ups of flowers in vivid colours.

‘Let’s talk about Caroline,’ Bjarne says and takes a seat.

The old sofa cushions sag under him and he ends up sitting close to the floor. Nielsen’s eyes widen. And then he slumps.

‘Of course,’ he says, looking down. ‘I should have known you’d find out about her.’

Nielsen heaves a sigh and clenches his fist.

‘Why didn’t you tell your boss about your conviction?’

Nielsen looks at Sandland.

‘Do you think I’d have got the job if I had?’

He shakes his head.

‘I needed money and I—’

He shakes his head again. The officers let him take his time. Soon he looks up at them.

‘But I’ve got nothing to do with what happened to Erna Pedersen,’ he says. ‘I give you my word.’

Nielsen does his best to give them a look that inspires confidence, but it is a staring competition that Bjarne wins easily.

‘Did you know her?’

‘No,’ he says quickly and loudly. ‘I mean, only through work, if that’s what you’re asking.’

‘That was what I was asking.’

‘No,’ Nielsen repeats. ‘Absolutely not.’

Bjarne nods slowly.

‘Did you go to work yesterday?’

‘Eh, no. I mean, I stopped off at work, but I wasn’t working.’

‘Why did you stop off at work?’

‘I was just dropping something off.’

Bjarne looks at him, waits for a continuation that doesn’t come.

‘When was this?’

‘Late afternoon. Four thirty, five or thereabouts.’

It grows quiet between them while Bjarne stares at him.

‘Did you see anyone enter or leave Erna Pedersen’s room while you were there?’

Nielsen shakes his head in jerks before he wipes his nose with the back of his hand.

‘Did you notice anything while you were there? Anything unusual?’

Nielsen scratches his nose vigorously with the nail of his index finger.

‘No, I don’t think so.’

High up his forehead along his hairline the sweat has darkened his brown hair.

Sandland looks around.

‘Why did you need money?’ she asks.

Nielsen looks at her. His eyebrows narrow.

‘Do you know how much it costs to rent a one-bedroom flat in Oslo these days? Even up here?’

Sandland shakes her head.

‘I’m paying just over 12,000 kroner a month before utility bills and phone charges. I have to have a job. Though I guess I’ll get the sack now.’

Nielsen tears a tiny bit of skin off his thumb. It starts to bleed so he reaches out for a loo roll in the middle of the table, next to two lumpy stones that look glued together.

‘How would you describe Erna Pedersen’s behaviour recently?’

Nielsen hesitates, rips off a sheet and wraps it round his thumb.

‘Difficult to say. I didn’t really know her all that well. I’ve only been her primary care worker for a couple of months and I rarely got a sensible word out of her.’

‘Okay,’ Bjarne says and gets up. Sandland does the same. ‘We’ll probably want to speak to you later. And it would be good if you could pick up the phone the next time we call, that way we don’t have to come up to your flat.’

‘Yes, er, sorry, I—’

‘Don’t worry about it,’ Bjarne says. ‘You were at the gym. At Svein’s Gym.’

Bjarne stares at him for a long time.

‘Yes,’ Nielsen says and laughs quickly. ‘So I was.’

‘Thanks for the chat,’ Sandland says and leaves first.

Nielsen accompanies them to the door and closes it firmly behind them.

‘I don’t think he went to the gym,’ Bjarne says once they are inside the lift.

‘Why not?’

‘Did you see a sports bag anywhere?’

Sandland thinks about it, but doesn’t reply.

‘And why was he wearing regular clothes if he hadn’t showered yet? Where were his workout clothes?’

The lift stops at the ground floor. The officers get out.

‘So what do we do now?’ Sandland asks and turns to him with her hand on the front door handle. Brogeland thinks about it.

‘I think he’s hiding something. I’ll call Svein’s Gym to check if he really was there. If it turns out that he wasn’t, we’ll put him under surveillance.’

‘There’s no way you’ll ever get a unit together at such short notice, Bjarne. Don’t—’

‘Oh, yes,’ Bjarne says and smiles. ‘I still have a few favours I can call in. And it would only be for a couple of hours. At least to begin with.’

He smiles, but Sandland merely shrugs.

Bjarne sighs to himself. She is still unimpressed.

Chapter 24

Atle Abelsen replies much more quickly than Henning had expected, but not by email, which is his usual form of communication.

‘Yo,’ Abelsen says when Henning answers the call.

‘Hi, Atle. I guess this means you got my email.’

‘No “how are you?” No “what are you up to these days?”’

‘How are you, Atle? What are you up to these days?’

‘Overworked and underpaid.’

‘I’m surprised to hear that.’

‘It’s a tough life.’

‘So I’ve been told. But I presume you’ve read my email since you’re calling?’

Henning is about to ask Atle what he has found out when he remembers something.

‘Before we start, did you know Erna Pedersen yourself? Did she ever teach you?’

‘No, but I called my mother. She still teaches in Kløfta. She said she had heard about her.’

Henning straightens up a little.

‘And what had she heard?’

‘Erna Pedersen had something of a reputation, as far as I can gather. Positively terrifying. Old school, I mean. We’re talking canes slamming against the desk, that sort of thing. Stand up when the teacher comes into the classroom, mind your manners and always say good morning.’

‘Ah, the good old days.’

‘Quite. But I know that wasn’t the reason for your email. I’ve managed to find out a couple of things about Erna Pedersen that might be of interest. In 1989 she filed a complaint at the local police station because her house had been vandalised. The old witch had finally had enough.’

‘I see,’ Henning says, picking up and clicking on a pen lying next to him.

‘She claimed she knew who the culprits were, but their names aren’t listed in the report. I don’t know if the police ever bothered investigating her complaint, but no one was convicted of anything.’

Henning ponders this for a moment.

‘Did the report say anything about what kind of vandalism it was?’

‘Eggs had been thrown at her house, basement windows had been smashed, that kind of thing. She used to cycle to school, I believe, but someone deliberately damaged her bicycle. Let down the tyres.’

‘Right,’ Henning says.

It sounds mostly like typical schoolboy pranks, he thinks.

‘Then her husband fell off a ladder in the garden in 1991, I think it was, and had a heart attack. Or the other way round, I don’t remember. I can’t imagine that made her less strict and bitter.’

‘No, I don’t suppose it did,’ Henning says while he mulls it over. ‘Was there anything else?’

‘No.’

‘Okay. It would be great if you could email or text me her old address.’

‘Will do. But how are you, mate? Do you still play music these days?’

Henning hesitates before he replies.

‘No, not often, I’m afraid.’

‘For God’s sake, man, you mustn’t stop. You had talent!’

‘Mm. Are you still drinking Calvados?’

‘Oh, forget about that. Let’s go for a beer the next time I’m in town.’

‘Okay. Thanks for your help, Atle.’

‘You’re welcome, dude.’

Chapter 25

A short morning of freedom.

Ever since Emilie Blomvik had a child there is practically nothing she treasures more than that. Several hours in a row where she can do whatever she likes. She can go to the gym, she can read that magazine that has been gathering dust on top of the fridge, she can watch a movie that has taken up space on the recorder for ever. No one needs watching or looking after or checking in. Nor will anyone disapprove if she drinks a can of Coke on a weekday.

Quality time with a capital Q, that’s what it is. However, it continues to surprise her that she rarely ends up doing any of the things she had planned, just like today. She was going to waste some time on the computer, possibly look for some lovely holidays, start one of the books she was given last Christmas. But if she tries to reconstruct the morning, remember what she actually did after taking Sebastian to nursery, she is stumped for an answer. She doesn’t remember anything other than reading the newspaper and tidying up the kitchen. The rest is one big fog of nothing.

Even so it has been bliss. No one needed her to do anything. The sheer knowledge that such moments exist gives her precisely the breathing space she needs.

She only wishes that Mattis would call soon. It has gone eleven now. Perhaps the meeting with the partners didn’t go as well as he had expected?

She hopes he won’t get disappointed or upset. Children hurting themselves or not getting what they want is one thing. It’s part of growing up, meeting resistance and maturing as a result. Adults sulking is another matter. She just can’t deal with it. And Mattis is one of the worst offenders when things don’t go his way. The whole house becomes enshrouded in a thundercloud she can’t get away from soon enough. On this specific point she has very little patience. One child in the house is enough.

Emilie has barely had this thought when the phone rings. She jumps, gets up from the kitchen chair and fetches her mobile from the worktop next to the bread bin.

It’s Mattis.

‘Hello?’ she says with expectation in her voice.

‘You’re speaking to Mattis Steinfjell, partner in Bergman Hoff, Solicitors. Am I speaking to Emilie Blomvik, the most wonderful girl in the world?’

Emilie clasps her hand over her mouth.

‘Is it true?’ she screams.

Self-satisfied laughter bubbles away quietly before Mattis gives up trying to suppress it. He starts laughing out loud.

‘But that’s wonderful, darling. Congratulations.’

Emilie doesn’t know what else to say. Neither does Mattis, or so it seems.

‘So go on then, tell me all about it.’

‘Well, there’s not much to say except that I’m moving up the food chain, sweetheart. You know what that means.’

Emilie shakes her head to herself, but she says ‘yes’ all the same. And then she lets him brag to his heart’s content and she has to pull herself together in order not to cry. One of several things she dislikes about herself since she became a mother is that she cries at the slightest thing.

‘That’s absolutely fantastic, Mattis,’ she says when he finally stops talking. ‘Once again, congratulations.’

‘We’re going to celebrate, sweetheart. I’ll buy some champagne we can open tonight. We’ll order a takeaway and get drunk.’

Emilie doesn’t reply immediately.

‘I’m on nights this week, Mattis. Don’t you remember?’

‘Can’t you swap with someone?’

‘It’s too short notice,’ she replies, but what she is thinking is that she could have asked someone if she really wanted to. And yet there is a part of her that doesn’t want to be with Mattis in his moment of glory. She realises she is worried what he might ask her while he rides his happiness wave. Like, for example, if she will marry him.

‘You’ll just have to celebrate without me,’ she says trying to sound kind, happy and exuberant. And she is, she really is, for him.

‘So when is it official?’ she asks. ‘Can I tell my friends the good news?’

‘Of course you can,’ he says. ‘But I’ve got to go now, darling. Love you.’

Emilie doesn’t reply straightaway. Then she says, more quietly than she had planned to: ‘I love you too.’

Chapter 26

The doorbell rings.

He turns around and frowns. He doesn’t remember the last time he had visitors.

Probably someone trying to get into one of the other flats, he thinks. Or one of his neighbours who has accidentally locked themselves out again. That must be it.

He turns his attention back to the computer monitors. World of Warcraft on one. Facebook on the other where he has clicked on a profile he visits every day even though it always hurts.

The doorbell rings again. He tilts his head slightly and gets up from his chair reluctantly. Shuffles towards the door and looks through the spy hole.

A man he doesn’t remember seeing before is standing outside next to a woman. Plainclothes police officers, he thinks, and is immediately gripped by panic, but he forces himself to think rationally. Even if they are police officers, this can’t possibly be about that old witch.

Or can it?

The man looks like a local politician. Long and lean with thin, grey hair. Can’t be too difficult to knock out. The woman doesn’t look very tough, either. Maximum 1.65 metres. Practically flat-chested. Skinny arms.

He opens the door and is blinded by the light outside. He has to shield his eyes with one hand in order to see them.

‘Hello, we’re from the bailiffs.’

The man introduces himself and the woman beside him, names he instantly forgets.

‘Perhaps you know why we’re here?’

He looks at them and shakes his head. He leans against the door frame and feels the pointy, cold edges of the steel lock.

‘You haven’t paid your rent for a long time and as a result you were issued with an eviction notice in accordance with the Eviction Act paragraph 13 section 2. This notice was sent to you and you were given fourteen days to move out. But I can see that you’re still here. Haven’t you packed your stuff yet?’

He had completely forgotten that notice. He has been lost in a world of his own in the last few weeks. And before that he always thought that he would find a way out, that he would be able to get hold of money from someone other than his mother.

The debt collector tries to look over his shoulder, but he blocks his path.

‘I’m sorry, but there is no way around this.’

The debt collector’s words fall like hammer blows. A taste of metal has settled on his tongue. He hugs himself, looks at the young woman with her blonde, shoulder-length hair. There is a hint of contempt in her eyes. And he feels the urge to—

‘So am I right in thinking that you’re not able to move out today?’

He turns his gaze to the debt collector again.

‘No, I – I—’

‘Okay,’ the man says turning to the woman next to him. ‘You’re lucky; you’ve a very kind landlord. He has said he’s willing to give you another three days, but that’s the absolute final deadline. We’ll come back at ten o’clock on Thursday morning and change the locks. So you’ve got three days. That should be more than enough.’

The debt collector seems to be expecting some kind of response, but it is not appropriate to nod or to thank him. So instead the man nods by way of goodbye and they start walking back to the stairwell and the lift. He takes a step back inside and closes the door behind him.

Three days, he thinks when everything around him is quiet again. What the hell is he going to do? He certainly can’t ask his mother if he can move back home again for a while.

With heavy footsteps he plods back to his desk and the computer monitors. The back of the chair creaks as he sits down. It creaks in his brain as well as if the bones inside his head are stretching.

Again he stares at her Facebook profile and the status she posted just after eleven o’clock this morning. Now with forty-nine likes and thirteen comments. Another one is added while he watches.

And that’s when the rage overwhelms him.

Just as well you ended up with Mattis. It could have been much much worse ☺☺☺. Looking forward to hearing all about it tomorrow. Hugs and kisses. JK

He shakes his head, feels a lump in his stomach and clenches his fists. Something cold pricks him in the back of his neck and turns into a restless itch he has to scratch. A light he just has to extinguish.

Chapter 27

To dread coming home is the worst thing.

Or rather, Johanne Klingenberg doesn’t dread it because Baltazar will be there waiting for her, always happy, always eager for her company, but she has been on edge since the break-in – how long has it been now – two weeks ago?

She returned home after a lecture and got a strange feeling that someone must have been in her flat because Baltazar acted so out of character when she went up to greet him. As if he wasn’t sure that she was someone he recognised or that she was a friend. It wasn’t until she poured him a little milk and gave him some treats that she was allowed to stroke his neck and back.

She didn’t get truly scared until she saw the damaged picture on the wall. And the red stain next to Baltazar’s basket. It looked as if someone had smeared blood across the floor. She immediately checked the cat and discovered that he hadn’t hurt himself.

Johanne proceeded to check out the rest of the flat, tiptoeing as quietly as she could from room to room and brandishing a kitchen knife. She wrenched open cupboards and doors in case someone was hiding behind them, but she found no one. Even so she called the police. She knew that these days they can identify a criminal from only a single hair or a trace of blood, but the officers who turned up told her she would just have to be patient. Such tests took forever to carry out. And when the sample finally got to the front of the DNA queue, it would only prove useful if they found a match – something for which there was absolutely no guarantee.

It might have been easier to forget the whole thing – after all nothing was taken. But there have been other incidents. On several occasions she has been absolutely sure that she was being followed, both when she has been for a night out or making her way home after a lecture. Once she saw a man in a khaki army jacket press himself against the wall one hundred metres away from her. He had been staring at her and he had had a camera. The strange thing was that she was sure she had seen him somewhere before, she just couldn’t remember where.

Fortunately she doesn’t believe anyone is following her today. Or yesterday, now that she thinks about it. Perhaps that is why the lecture is still buzzing around her head. Though to call that a lecture is insulting to lecturers. Reading out loud would be a more accurate description. Like sleeping tablets without the need for a prescription.

Johanne had hoped that she would start the new term invigorated after a long warm summer, but from day one she could feel it, the weight of something starting to oppress her. She didn’t want to be there. She was quite simply fed up, fed up with marketing and the crackle of stiff new books being opened for the very first time. But she made herself get out of bed the next day and the day after and decided to put it down to a post-holiday depression that would lift of its own accord once she got back into the routine. But it hasn’t passed. Everything just gets drearier and more exhausting.

It’s no help, either, that the dreaded thesis is lying in wait for her like a troll under a bridge. And her useless supervisor who is always busy and never interested in hearing what she thinks or believes. He is the expert, not her. She is just a student, one of many who have filed through his office over the years. Fresh perspectives, hah!

She has no idea how she will find the strength to get through the last few terms. She recognises the feeling from her time at sixth form when she came to hate everything to do with school. She just wanted to finish the course as quickly as possible. It showed in the grades she got, something that prompted her to try to improve her academic results when she reached her early thirties. And to begin with, going back to school was fine. The partying from her teenage years came back, with all that entailed. And perhaps that’s the only thing that has kept her going.

Her thumb glides up and down her mobile as she walks. She is on Facebook and she feels a warm glow when she reads Emilie’s last status update. Johanne presses ‘Like’ and writes a comment. Only occasionally does she look up to see where she is going.

Luckily the college she attends in Oslo is not far from her flat and it feels good to get home and see that everything is still the same, that Baltazar lies in his basket just as he did when she left him. Black, white and happy.

Johanne Klingenberg throws down her keys, takes out her mobile and goes back on Facebook to update her status.

Home.

Safe at last.

Chapter 28

Henning looks at the clock. The working day has come and gone without Erna Pedersen’s son returning his call. Henning has sent him a text message as well, but has had no reply. Nor does Bjarne Brogeland appear to have had the time to return his calls. Things are moving slowly.

Henning files a story about how Erna Pedersen was strangled, a story he illustrates with a photograph of her that the police have issued to the media. The story reads well even though it is far less sensational than the stories being written about Trine.

The online version of VG, VG Nett, has managed to track down an old boyfriend of his sister’s when she was a law student who can tell the newspaper’s readers that ‘Trine Juul, as she then was, was known for her excessive partying. It certainly wouldn’t surprise him if she is guilty of the accusations being made against her.’ None of the newspapers has a single new picture to publish. The most recent ones they have are from this morning when she hurried inside the Ministry of Justice and didn’t make eye contact with any of the cameras. A headline repeated by several papers is TRINE HIDES.

Henning would have expected that the identity of the young Labour Party politician would have become known during the day, but even though online speculation is rife, no one has yet come forward, nor has any particular name taken more hold in the public imagination than others. As far as Henning can work out, most members of the Labour Party’s youth branch who took part in last year’s conference must have been interviewed by now. All of them are denying that they went to Trine’s hotel room.

The picture the media are creating of her now is very far removed from the little girl he grew up with. He remembers how every Christmas Eve they would sit in front of the television with bags of sweets and watch Christmas movies. They also used to have some bean bags; Trine’s was pink, while Henning’s was mint green. Some evenings he would go to her room just to give her a goodnight hug, and he would stay there and chat for a long time until there would be a knock on the wall from his parents’ bedroom because their talking was keeping them awake.

They also used to play and exercise together down in the basement passage on the grey, knobbly carpet. Often there would be an acrid smell of urine because local cats favoured the foundations of their house. Trine and Henning had a foam ball and switched between playing handball and football; the door to the lavatory and the door to the larder served as goals. One Christmas they were given Adidas shorts, which they wore when they played and their game appeared to improve because they felt they looked so much smarter.

He wonders if Trine ever thinks about those days.

Perhaps they started drifting apart as teenagers when they developed different interests. Once he had finished sixth form and joined the army to do his national service, he barely spoke to her. Whenever he called home, it was always his mother who answered the telephone. Trine never called. Never gave him a welcome-home hug when he visited; instead she would usually go out straight after dinner and come back late.

Despite the lack of contact between them, there is something about her plight that moves him. He doesn’t like to see her bleed. But no matter how tempting it is to get involved, he can’t report on a story about his own sister. Besides, he would meet with closed doors everywhere. He doesn’t have any contacts in the world of politics. And what could he really do? So far her young accuser hasn’t even been named.

Leave it alone, Henning tells himself. It’s not your story.

Chapter 29

Bjarne Brogeland doesn’t know when he will be able to leave the office and anyway the weather doesn’t encourage him to go outside, so he texts Anita to apologise for missing dinner yet again and tells her to eat without him. There is no reply.

The investigation team is about to hold another meeting when Bjarne receives a call from the unit that has spent the last two hours watching Daniel Nielsen’s flat.

‘Yes?’ Bjarne replies.

‘You wanted to know if the subject moved,’ says the voice down the other end.

‘Yes,’ Bjarne replies again.

‘He came outside a little while ago and was picked up by a red BMW with a massive hole in the silencer.’

‘Go on?’

‘They drove up to Holmenkollen via Majorstua and Smedstadkrysset, but we lost him at a red light. And we can’t hear the noisy silencer any more.’

‘Holmenkollen?’

‘Yes.’

Bjarne wonders what Nielsen’s car could be doing there.

‘We’ve checked the registration number. The car belongs to a Pernille Thorbjørnsen. Do you know her?’

Bjarne thinks about it.

‘Yes,’ he replies.

‘But she wasn’t driving the car. The driver was a man with blond, shoulder-length hair.’

A man with blond, shoulder-length hair, Bjarne thinks, and tries to recall all the people he has spoken to recently. It doesn’t take long before he gets a hit.

Could the man have been Ole Christian Sund, the care worker who found Erna Pedersen dead?

The bodyguards offered to carry Trine’s bags of food and clothing, but she declined. The pain burning in her arms and spreading up to her shoulders is something she has to endure if only because it makes her feel vaguely alive. She hasn’t felt that for the last couple of hours. She has merely existed, almost in a state of weightlessness, without being able to sense the ground beneath her feet.

Pål Fredrik doesn’t like the sea, he prefers the mountains. His objection is that nothing ever happens by the sea. No, precisely. That’s exactly why she loves it, because nothing ever happens. It’s about being at one with the wind, the breeze and the sea. Because they never look at her with accusing eyes.

She finds the key where she left it the last time she was here – God knows how many years ago – under the bench by the door to the log cabin. The smell that comes towards her as she enters floods her with memories. Everything is as she remembers it from her childhood. The white, open fireplace in the corner, still in one piece. The crumbling old log basket beside it. The small, dusty portable television, the white display cabinet with glasses and bottles. The sofa bed up against the wall. The table in the middle, which can be extended to almost twice its size if she can be bothered to attach the flaps. Old, worn chairs with blue seat cushions.

She recalls one spring when they came here to get the cabin ready for the season; it might have been the middle of May. They found mouse droppings everywhere. The mice had nibbled the pillows, the bed linen, the wax candles; there were tiny black dots of mouse droppings all over the place. Another time they found a wagtail, completely stiff, but just as beautiful as if it had still been alive. It was lying under a bed. How it had got inside after they had locked up the cabin, nobody could explain. Not even Henning, even though he tried.

Trine sees that as usual the mice have sought refuge inside the cabin. Lots of them. And she discovers that she looks forward to cleaning, moving her body and concentrating on something completely different than the sword hanging over her. She draws the curtains, opens the door and lets in the sea breeze. The clammy, stuffy atmosphere of stale dust will soon be gone. The walls will come alive again. Already she feels what a good idea it was to come here. The constant waves even ease her breathing.

Trine turns on the water. The pipes gurgle and splutter a little before a steady, cold stream comes out of the tap above the utility sink. She puts on water to boil and takes out some cleaning supplies.

Trine has been scrubbing away for an hour when her mobile beeps in her jacket pocket. It’s a text message from Katarina. She wonders if they have arrived yet and if everything is all right. Yes, Trine replies to both questions, surprised that the message goes through as mobile coverage in the area has always been poor. But it takes only a minute, then she gets a reply.

I don’t know if you have a TV where you are, but there will be debates both on NRK and TV2 tonight. The subject is: Has society done too little to prevent sexual harassment – and both male and female incest victims will be in the studio.

Of course, Trine sighs. They’re already having a debate based on the assumption that the allegations are true. But what on earth does incest have to do with anything?

And that’s when she feels it. The pull of the white display cabinet in the corner, next to the TV. She goes over to it and opens the door. A stuffy smell wafts towards her. Glass after glass, neatly lined up. And at the bottom – the bottles. Liqueurs. Cognac.

She recalls that her parents always drank cognac when they went to the cabin. It was part of the whole experience, they said. Coffee, cognac and chocolate. The holy trinity.

Trine takes out a bottle and looks at it. St Hallvard’s liqueur, half empty. She sits down at the table and gazes at the bottle. And she wonders at what point you turn into your parents, no matter how hard you try to fight it.

She fetches a glass from the cabinet, blows the dust out from its bottom and fills it with St Hallvard’s. Finds a cigarette from her bag and lights up. Like mother like daughter, she thinks. And she raises the glass to her lips and proposes a toast to yet another member of the Juul family who has stepped off the cliff while staring down at the bottom of a bottle.

Chapter 30

Above him the wind nudges the grey, dense clouds along. Around him the swallows screech, loud and piercing.

How strange that they never crash into each other, Henning thinks, and tries to follow one of them with his eyes. It flies from side to side, it soars and it plummets. Choppy, sudden turns. A free display of inexhaustible energy. All its movements seem random, as if its entire existence is ruled by impulses, in sharp contrast to the migrating birds that will soon start their annual trip to the south in V formations.

It must be a lovely life, Henning decides, and takes a swig of his daily ration of liquid black sugar. Whether it be living exclusively on whims or having a fixed plan with your life. Right now either option seems equally attractive.

Henning takes another sip of his Coke while he thinks. And thinking is what he always does best in Dælenenga Sports Park. There aren’t many people around yet, but it’s still early afternoon. And even though the weather forecast is bad, he knows they will turn up eventually. Children, teenagers and adults.

So Erna Pedersen was a strict and unpopular teacher. But what was she apart from that? Did she have any interests? Did she get involved with anything?

He believes she enjoyed knitting. Perhaps she had joined forces with people with similar interests, in a club or in an association of some kind. Someone must have known her. But according to Bjarne Brogeland, she hadn’t had a visitor at Grünerhjemmet for ages. There is more and more evidence to suggest that she lived an isolated life while she waited for death to find her.

Henning is halfway through another mouthful when his mobile rings. He is surprised to see that the caller is Tom Sverre Pedersen, the victim’s son. Flustered, Henning puts down the Coke can and takes out his notepad from his inside pocket while he answers the phone.

‘Tom Sverre Pedersen here. You’ve been trying to get hold of me?’

‘Yes, I – yes I have,’ Henning says, biting off the plastic cap of his pen. ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’

‘Thank you.’

Henning makes himself comfortable, wedges the phone in between his ear and shoulder and tries to find a position that means he can make notes at the same time. Not easy on the cold, hard planks.

‘And I’m sorry for disturbing you at such a difficult time.’

Pedersen makes no reply even after Henning has given him an opening.

‘I work for 123news, and I— ’

‘I know who you are, Juul. I follow the news.’

‘Er, okay. Then you can probably guess why I’ve been trying to contact you. I want to write a story about your mother. The kind of person she was. The idea is for our readers to get to know her a little better.’

‘I’m not so sure that they would want to.’

Henning is temporarily wrong-footed by the unexpected answer.

‘What makes you say that?’

‘Listen, Juul, I don’t know how much you’ve found out about my mother, but if you’re looking for a fairy tale to splash across your front page, you’re wasting your time. My mother was no Mother Teresa.’

Henning presses his pen as hard against the paper as he can without tearing it, but no ink comes out. He tries, without success, to shake the pen alive.

‘Strong words coming from her son?’

‘Strong, yes, but true. My mother wasn’t terribly popular.’

Henning gives up, puts down his pen and accepts he will just have to try to memorise the conversation to the best of his ability.

‘I’ve been told she could be quite strict. As a teacher, I mean.’

‘Hah, that’s just for starters. She wanted things her way, and she was extra hard on the hard kids.’

‘She and The Phantom both.’

‘Yes. I’m sure you can imagine what it was like for me to grow up when my friends had my mother for a teacher.’

‘All the kids wanted to come home and play at your house?’

‘Not exactly. It’s hard to separate the apple from the tree, if I can put it like that.’

‘I understand.’

‘I’m not sure that you do, Juul. And the reason I’m telling you this is that I’ve read some of your articles. You seem like a reporter who wants to get to the truth. My experience with the media is that not many of you are. And people in Jessheim will laugh at you if you paint a pretty picture of my mother’s life.’

‘So your mother had many enemies?’

Pedersen snorts.

‘My mother was a real bitch. It’s a miracle that my father managed to stay married to her for all those years. Don’t get me wrong – she was my mother and I loved her in my own way. I made sure that she got a place at Grünerhjemmet because I had neither the time nor the inclination to look after her myself. Now that last bit you don’t need to include in your story, but despite her behaviour I wanted her to end her life in comfort. And with the exception of her actual death, I think she was really quite happy where she was.’

Henning nods to himself as he senses the temptation of handing over the responsibility for his mother to someone who can do a better job than him.

‘I’ve heard that there was quite a lot of vandalism done to your mother’s house while she lived in Jessheim?’

‘Yes, at one point it almost seemed as if it had become a sport.’

‘Did you ever find out who did it?’

‘No, but I know that my mother had her suspicions. And there were several different gangs of kids who could have done it. You only had to look at the graffiti on the walls of Jessheim School.’

‘Do you happen to know if anyone hated her more than others?’

Pedersen is quiet for a few moments.

‘Not that I can recall. Don’t forget it’s a really long time ago.’

Henning raises his gaze in the pause that follows. He spots Adil walking towards the Astroturf with a bag slung over his shoulder.

‘I presume the police have interviewed you?’

‘They have.’

‘Then they’ve probably asked you if you suspect anyone of murdering your mother.’

Pedersen waits a little before he replies.

‘They have.’

‘And do you?’

Long pause. Henning doesn’t push him.

‘No. But I’m concerned that someone might have a grudge against me too.’

Henning sits up.

‘What do you mean?’

‘I’m thinking about the damaged photo in my mother’s room.’

Henning doesn’t interrupt, but lets Pedersen tell him the story in his own words. And when he has finished, Henning feels a slight chill down his neck.

‘So do you have any enemies? Someone you’ve reason to be scared of?’

‘No. And that’s what I told the police.’

‘Okay.’

At that moment Henning sees another boy walking towards the football pitch, holding hands with his mother. And suddenly he remembers who the boy’s father is.

‘Thank you for being so frank with me, Pedersen. I really appreciate it.’

Henning gets up and looks at the boy.

‘You’re welcome. So will you be writing about my mother?’

Henning thinks about it.

‘Yes, I hope so. But right now I don’t know what kind of story it’s going to be.’

Chapter 31

The incident room is filled with officers and investigators. As usual everyone’s attention is focused at the head of the boardroom table where Arild Gjerstad is reviewing the discoveries, evidence and facts of the murder case.

‘How far have you got with interviewing people at the care home?’ he asks.

Emil Hagen clears his throat.

‘We’ve yet to cross the finishing line.’

‘Does anyone stand out?’

Hagen shakes his head.

‘Many people have alibied each other and most of them say that they didn’t see anything. We’re going to have to be a little more thorough in our interviews.’

Gjerstad nods. ‘Forensics have finished analysing the crumbs and the dust they found on Erna Pedersen’s clothing,’ he informs them, running his index finger and thumb over his moustache. ‘It’s rock, that’s all. Tiny rock fragments, probably from the other weapon that we’ve yet to trace.’

‘The weapon used to whack the knitting needles into her eyes?’ Ella Sandland asks. Gjerstad nods to confirm it is.

‘A few wool fibres were found on one of the fragments. Wool with a tiny speck of glue.’

‘Wool?’ Emil Hagen says in disbelief and licks his upper lip.

‘Rock, wool and glue,’ Gjerstad says, looking around. ‘What does that make?’

The officers stare at each other.

‘Hair,’ Sandland says.

More baffled expressions.

‘Didn’t you ever make stone trolls when you were little?’

‘No,’ Hagen says quickly and snorts at the same time.

‘You take two stones,’ Sandland explains. ‘You glue them together and decorate them with straw or wool or something like that to make the hair. Then you paint on the eyes, the nose and the mouth. It’s a very popular activity in nurseries and schools.’

‘That’s what Ann-Mari Sara thought as well,’ Gjerstad says. ‘So we’re probably looking for a stone troll that has lost a little hair and has dents or marks from knitting needles.’

Hagen shakes his head.

‘Do people normally make stone trolls in a care home?’ he asks and looks at Sandland.

‘I haven’t seen that particular activity before, but it’s not uncommon for patients to take part in different kinds of art and craft work – if they feel up to it. But I asked one of the care workers about leisure activities and it’s not something they do very much of.’

‘So how did the stone troll end up there?’ Pia Nøkleby asks.

Bjarne coughs and looks at Sandland.

‘Daniel Nielsen had something similar on his table when we visited him earlier today, but I didn’t notice if it was dented. And I don’t think he would be stupid enough to keep a weapon in plain sight. Incidentally, it was right next to a loo roll.’

‘Perhaps he’s one of those guys who gets turned on by that,’ Hagen suggests.

‘Turned on by what?’ Sandland frowns.

‘The guy lives alone. Murder weapon. Loo roll.’

Sandland still looks clueless. Hagen sighs in despair.

‘Perhaps he was sitting there looking at his weapon, reliving the whole episode and got so excited that he needed something to wipe up the mess afterwards,’ he says.

‘I know what you meant. I just wanted to see if you had the guts to say it out loud,’ Sandland replies with a mischievous smile.

‘It might have been the little boy who made the stone troll,’ Bjarne suggests. ‘According to his father the boy came with him to work quite often. He was a popular visitor. Perhaps he made several stone trolls at school and brought one with him as a present. You know how kids love giving away things they’ve made themselves. He could have given one to Erna Pedersen and that’s another reason to surmise that the killing wasn’t premeditated. The use of the Bible also suggests that. Erna Pedersen always had it lying on her bedside table.

Bjarne can feel that he is starting to warm to his subject.

‘So you’re saying the killer simply used whatever he found in the room?’ Gjerstad says.

Bjarne nods.

The room falls silent for a few seconds.

‘It’s a good theory,’ Gjerstad then says.

‘There’s something else about Nielsen,’ Bjarne says and quickly summarises Nielsen and Sund’s trip up to Holmenkollen earlier that day.

‘And you’re quite sure it was Ole Christian Sund driving Pernille Thorbjørnsen’s car?’ Nøkleby asks.

‘Absolutely,’ Bjarne nods.

‘But you don’t know the address they went to or what they did when they got there?’

‘No. But there is something fishy about Daniel Nielsen, I’m sure of it. I’ve already caught him lying to me once. He never worked out at Svein’s Gym that morning, like he told me. I checked.’

‘What an idiot,’ Hagen sighs.

‘Yes, but that’s just it,’ Bjarne says. ‘It seems like a white lie to me. He doesn’t want to tell us where he really was or what he was doing. So he says the first thing that comes into his head.’

‘In which case he’s unlikely to be a hardened criminal,’ Nøkleby says. ‘If he lies about something we can quite easily find out.’

‘I agree,’ Bjarne says.

But the point Nøkleby has just made troubles him. Only a total amateur would drop himself in it like that. It’s not the action of a man capable of bashing knitting needles into the eyes of an old lady. It is too crude and too brutal. But the care workers at Grünerhjemmet are up to something, he just doesn’t know what or how he can get to the bottom of it – or indeed if it has anything to do with Erna Pedersen’s death.

‘Do we have anything else?’ Gjerstad says.

No one says anything.

‘Okay,’ Gjerstad says, getting up. ‘What do you think, Pia – Nielsen’s flat first and the care home afterwards?’

Pia Nøkleby nods.

Chapter 32

Henning’s hips ache as he gets up from the rough seating planks. His legs feel stiff and he shakes them to boost his circulation.

He stops at the entrance to watch Adil and his friend who have sat down on the ground. They are not talking to each other; they just watch others play football on the Astroturf.

Henning turns and looks around for the boy’s father, the man he met behind Grünerhjemmet yesterday, the man who was in such a rush to get home to his son. His son, who was the first person to realise that something was terribly wrong with Erna Pedersen.

Henning bends down, slips through a gap in the fence and carefully approaches the boys.

‘Hi, boys,’ he says. Only the boy with the blond fringe turns to face him. Henning smiles as he takes another step forwards.

‘So you’re a United fan too?’ he says to Adil, pointing to the sticker of Wayne Rooney on his sports bag. The name of the football club makes Adil glance up at Henning.

‘Is Rooney your favourite player?’

It takes a few seconds, then he nods.

‘Mine too. But then again I’m a big fan of all the Man U players.’

Henning smiles and sees a tiny twitch reflected in the corner of Adil’s mouth.

‘Boys, I’ve been watching you practise. Can I show you something?’

The blond boy continues to sit motionless on the ground. Adil looks up at him; this time his gaze is more alert.

‘Come on then, up you get.’

Adil hesitates.

‘Come on,’ Henning says again. ‘It works, I promise you.’

He holds out his hand to help Adil to his feet, but the boy doesn’t take it. Instead he looks at his friend before he gets up unaided.

‘Do you have a football in your sports bag?’

Adil slowly loosens the strings and takes out a ball. Henning smiles.

‘A Man U football. Good heavens,’ he says and looks at the ball, which is printed with pictures of the whole team. He squeezes it. Not enough air. But it will have to do.

‘Right, let’s get started,’ Henning says, putting the ball on the ground. ‘Can you see that wall over there?’

He points to a high wall at the end of the football pitch. He takes care not to look at the other boy.

‘The best way to practise passing and gaining possession of the ball is to kick it against a wall. That way you have a fellow player who never moves. Watch me.’

Henning kicks the ball quite hard. It hits the wall and bounces back.

‘When the ball comes back towards you, you stick out your foot to meet it and then you use your foot to slow it down. You have to move your leg or the ball will simply slip under your foot. It’ll be much harder for you to regain possession of the ball. Do you understand?’

Henning demonstrates again and stops the ball with his foot.

‘Your turn.’

Adil is still a little reluctant. Then he takes a step back, kicks the ball, but has to move to the side to stop it as it comes back. It jumps out from under his foot, just like before. He looks at Henning.

‘Okay, not bad. But you saw what happened if you don’t kick the ball straight to your teammate, didn’t you? It forces him to move to one side and makes it more difficult for him to control the ball. Have another go. And remember your foot is there to slow down the speed of the ball, not to stop it completely. Your foot is not a wall. Come on, try again.’

Adil sets down the ball on the ground, kicks it, it hits the wall and this time he doesn’t have to move; it comes straight back towards him. He sticks out his foot again. Same result, the ball escapes.

‘Try to exaggerate the movement to start with so you learn how the ball behaves. And try to relax your foot, let your leg be loose and flexible when the ball comes towards you.’

Henning demonstrates again and then it’s Adil’s turn.

This time the ball doesn’t roll quite as far away from his foot as it did before.

‘Great,’ Henning shouts out a little louder than he had intended. ‘Good job! Now do the same again. And relax your leg even more.’

Adil kicks the ball against the wall one more time. Then he sticks out his foot and slows down the speed of the ball so it comes to a halt against his trainer.

Henning says nothing; he just waits for Adil to look at him.

‘I don’t think even Wayne Rooney could have managed that.’

Adil smiles shyly.

‘So all you have to do now is to practise this again and again until you can do it in your sleep.’

Adil smiles. Henning goes over to him and ruffles his hair.

‘You did really well.’

Adil doesn’t say anything, but this time he looks straight at Henning. Henning turns and looks at the blond boy.

‘So how about you? Do you fancy a go?’

Chapter 33

Not only does Henning show the boys how to practise passing, he also teaches them how to improve their technique by keeping the ball in the air with either foot, not just their better one. He also shows them basic techniques for side foot passing, again using both their left and their right feet. Standing in a triangle, they kick the ball back and forth to each other. And Henning can see that the boys pay attention to his instructions.

They have been practising for about an hour when Henning says he is tired and needs to sit down for a little while. Adil and his friend do likewise; their brows are sweaty.

‘Doesn’t your coach ever show you things like that?’ Henning asks.

The boys shake their heads.

‘Nobody gets better from being yelled at,’ Henning says. ‘Don’t you agree?’

The boys nod.

Henning leans back on his elbows. It’s a long time since he last played football. He has lost count of the number of times Jonas and he would come down here on a Sunday morning where they would have the whole pitch to themselves. Jonas in goal. Jonas taking penalties. Practising side foot passing, doing ball tricks using both feet. He could have kept going all day if Henning had let him. Without even stopping for food.

Henning looks over at the boy whose name he has learned is Ulrik, a boy who reminds him a little of Jonas. Same facial colouring, same hair. But where Jonas was a powder keg, frequently exploding, Ulrik is withdrawn. He is more of a thinker and not quite so chatty. Jonas talked the whole time. He used to ask all sorts of questions.

‘Do you know what happened to me today?’ Henning says, and doesn’t continue until he is sure that he has the attention of both boys. ‘I saw a bird get hit by a car in Markveien. It didn’t die; the car just clipped it so the bird rolled over and landed near the kerb.’

Henning pauses.

‘What happened?’ Ulrik asks.

‘Well, I went over to it and picked it up. I saw that it had broken its leg, poor thing, so I put a splint on it. Do you know what that means?’

They both shake their heads.

‘It means making sure the fractured bone is kept completely rigid. So it has a chance to heal.’

Henning looks at them.

‘I couldn’t just leave it there. Some cat would have got it.’

The boys nod. Henning stretches out on the ground even though it is damp. He stares up at the ominous grey sky, which will soon turn black. He stays where he is. Right until Ulrik says: ‘I saw a dead person yesterday.’

Henning tries not to lift his head too quickly.

‘Did you?’

Ulrik nods.

‘It was an old lady in a care home.’

Henning sits up and leans forward across his knees. His heart starts to beat faster and he has to force himself to stay calm.

‘She just sat there in her wheelchair. It was really gross.’

Henning waits until the boy looks at him. Then he nods without saying anything.

‘I had been to see her the day before and she told me that she was scared.’

Henning is sorely tempted to bombard the boy with questions, but he manages to restrain himself.

‘And she sat like this,’ Ulrik says, holding up an index finger. ‘Pointing at the wall.’

‘At a picture or something?’ Henning tries.

The boy nods.

‘And she kept saying: “Fractions. Fractions. Fractions.”’

Ulrik imitates her crow-like voice.

‘Fractions?’

The boy nods.

‘What a strange thing to say,’ Henning remarks.

‘That’s what I thought.’

‘Was that all she said?’

‘Yes. And when I came to see her the next day, she was dead.’

Henning can no longer control himself.

‘Was anyone else there?’

Ulrik shakes his head.

‘Did you see anyone else who had been to her room?’

Same response.

Hm, Henning says to himself. Interesting.

He thinks about the photograph of Tom Sverre Pedersen and his family, the photograph that had been smashed. Surely she couldn’t have been pointing at that? What connection could there be between a family photo and some fractions? After all Tom Sverre Pedersen is a doctor, not a teacher.

So what was she pointing at?

Chapter 34

The stone troll in Daniel Nielsen’s flat proved to be free from dents and scratches, exactly as Bjarne had predicted. Before they entered the flat, Nielsen told them that it had been a present from Sund’s son; he got it a couple of weeks ago after the boy had made several stone trolls in a science lesson after a school trip. Nielsen also confirmed that Ulrik had given one to Erna Pedersen as a thank you for all the toffees she had given him.

They found nothing else of interest in Nielsen’s flat, only signs of a family-free life. Nor did his finances suggest anything other than his income was his monthly salary from Oslo City Council and that he had bills to pay like everybody else.

They are currently checking all his electronic traffic, but something tells Bjarne that it’s a dead end as well.

He is about to get back in his car when his mobile rings for the umpteenth time today. It’s Henning Juul. Bjarne looks around. Ella Sandland is still inside Nielsen’s flat so he takes the call.

‘How many pictures were on the wall in Erna Pedersen’s room?’

‘Eh?’

Henning repeats the question.

‘Why do you want to know that?’

‘I might have something for you. But first answer my question.’

Bjarne sighs.

‘None. That’s to say there had been a picture, but someone had torn it down.’

‘Was that a photo of Tom Sverre Pedersen and his family?’

Bjarne freezes.

‘How the hell do you know that?’

‘Take another look at the wall. See if you can find anything to suggest there might have been other pictures.’

‘What makes you think that?’

‘Because I think you’re missing one.’

Bjarne hangs up after talking to Henning and immediately calls Daniel Nielsen. This time he fully expects Nielsen to pick up – even though he is at work. It takes only a couple of seconds before Bjarne is proved right.

He tells Nielsen about the evidence – or lack of – in Nielsen’s flat.

‘That’s what I kept telling you.’

‘I know, but we still had to check it out. However, I want to talk to you about something else. You’re very interested in photography, aren’t you? I noticed that you have a lot of pictures on your walls at home.’

‘Yes, I suppose I do,’ Nielsen replies unwillingly.

‘And no one went to Erna Pedersen’s room more often than you in the last few months?’

‘No, that’s… probably true.’

Bjarne waits a moment before he continues.

‘If I were to say there were two photographs on her wall, next to the chest of drawers – what would you say?’

There is silence for a few seconds.

‘That you would be right. Or at least there used to be two until recently.’

Bjarne sticks a finger in his ear to block out the background noise.

‘What do you mean?’

‘When I started looking after Erna Pedersen, there was only one picture on the wall, a photograph. But not all that long ago a second photograph appeared. Why do you ask about that?’

Bjarne makes eye contact with Ella Sandland, who realises the conversation is important. She comes up to him.

‘I want you to think carefully, Nielsen. One photo was Erna Pedersen’s son and his family. The other one – do you remember what kind of picture it was?’

‘It was a school photo,’ Nielsen replies immediately.

Sandland makes a what’s going on movement with her head, but Bjarne ignores her.

‘A school photo?’

‘Yes, you know – a typical group photo of everyone in the same class.’

‘Aha?’ Bjarne says.

‘But it was taken quite a few years ago.’

Bjarne nods while he thinks about Erna Pedersen again. She was a teacher and she muttered something about fractions before she was killed. And someone recently put up an old school photo on her wall, a picture that wasn’t there after she died. Which means it’s highly likely that the killer took it with him.

Why on earth would he want to do that?