The Leopard

4
Sex Pistols

The old hostel owner placed a thoughtful finger on his forehead under the turban and looked at her long and hard. Then he picked up the telephone and dialled a number. He said a few words in Arabic and rang off. ‘Wait,’ he said. ‘Maybe, maybe not.’

Kaja smiled and nodded.

They sat observing each other from either side of the narrow table that served as a reception desk.

Then the phone rang. He picked it up, listened and put it down without a word.

‘One hundred and fifty thousand dollars,’ he said.

‘One hundred and fifty?’ she repeated in utter disbelief.

‘Hong Kong dollars, lady.’

Kaja did some mental arithmetic. That would be about one hundred and thirty thousand Norwegian kroner. Roughly double what she had been authorised to pay.

It was past midnight, and almost forty hours since she had slept, when she found him. She had trawled H-Block for three hours. Had sketched out a map of the interior as she moved through hostels, cafes, snack bars, massage clubs and prayer rooms until she arrived at the cheapest rooms and dormitories where the imported labour force from Africa and Pakistan stayed, those who had no rooms, just cubicles without doors, without TVs, without air conditioning and without a private life. The black night porter who admitted Kaja looked at the photo for a long time and at the hundred-dollar bill she was holding for even longer before he took it and pointed to one of the cubicles.

Harry Hole, she thought. Gotcha.

He was lying supine on a mattress, breathing almost without sound. He had a deep frown on his forehead, and the prominent jawbone under his right ear was even more defined now that he was asleep. From the other cubicles she heard men coughing and snoring. Water dripped from the ceiling, hitting the brick floor with deep, disgruntled sighs. The opening to the cubicle let in a cold, blue stripe of light from the neon tubes in reception. She saw a clothes cupboard in front of the window, a chair and a plastic bottle of water beside the mattress. There was a bitter-sweet smell, like burned rubber. Smoke rose from a cigarette end in an ashtray beside the baby’s bottle on the floor. She sat down on the chair and discovered that he was holding something in his hand. A greasy, yellowish-brown clump. Kaja had seen enough hash the year she worked in a patrol car to know this was not hash.

It was almost two o’clock when he awoke.

She heard a tiny change in the rhythm of his breathing, and then the whites of his eyes shone in the dark.

‘Rakel?’ He whispered it. And went back to sleep.

Half an hour later he opened his eyes wide, gave a start, cast around and made a grab for something under the mattress.

‘It’s me,’ Kaja whispered. ‘Kaja Solness.’

The body at her feet stopped in mid-movement. Then it collapsed and fell back on the mattress.

‘What the hell are you doing here?’ he groaned, his voice still thick with sleep.

‘Fetching you,’ she said.

He chuckled, his eyes closed. ‘Fetching me? Still?’

She took out an envelope, leaned forward and held it up in front of him. He opened one eye.

‘Plane ticket,’ she said. ‘To Oslo.’

The eye closed again. ‘Thanks, but I’m staying here.’

‘If I can find you, it’s only a matter of time before they do, too.’

He didn’t answer. She waited while listening to his breathing and the water that dripped and sighed. Then he opened his eyes again, rubbed under his right ear and hoisted himself up onto his elbows.

‘Got a smoke?’

She shook her head. He threw off the sheet, stood up and went over to the cupboard. He was surprisingly pale considering he had been living in a subtropical climate, and so lean that his ribs showed, even on his back. His build suggested that at one time he had been athletic, but now the wasted muscles appeared as sharp shadows under the white skin. He opened the cupboard. She was amazed to see that his clothes lay folded in neat piles. He put on a T-shirt and a pair of jeans, the ones he had been wearing the day before, and with some difficulty tugged a creased packet of cigarettes out from his pocket.

He slipped into a pair of flip-flops and edged past her with a click of his lighter.

‘Come on,’ he said softly as he passed. ‘Supper.’

It was nearly three in the morning. Grey iron shutters had been pulled down over shops and restaurants in Chungking. Apart from at Li Yuan’s.

‘So how did you wind up in Hong Kong?’ Kaja asked, looking at Harry, who, in an inelegant but effective way, was shovelling shiny glass noodles into his mouth from the white soup bowl.

‘I flew. Are you cold?’

Kaja automatically removed her hands from under her thighs. ‘But why here?’

‘I was on my way to Manila. Hong Kong was only supposed to be a stopover.’

‘The Philippines. What were you going to do there?’

‘Throw myself into a volcano.’

‘Which one?’

‘Well, which ones can you name?’

‘None. I’ve just read that there are loads of them. Aren’t some of them in… er, Luzon?’

‘Not bad. There are eighteen volcanoes in all, and three of them are in Luzon. I wanted to go up Mount Mayon. Two and a half thousand metres. A stratovolcano.’

‘Volcano with steep sides formed by layer upon layer of lava after an eruption.’

Harry stopped chewing and looked at her. ‘Any eruptions in modern times?’

‘Loads. Thirty?’

‘Records say forty-seven since 1616. Last one in 2002. Can be held to account for at least three thousand murders.’

‘What happened?’

‘The pressure built up.’

‘I mean to you.’

‘I’m talking about me.’ She fancied she saw a hint of a smile. ‘I exploded and started drinking on the plane. I was ordered off in Hong Kong.’

‘There are several flights to Manila.’

‘I realised that apart from volcanoes Manila has nothing that Hong Kong doesn’t have.’

‘Such as?’

‘Such as distance from Norway.’

Kaja nodded. She had read the reports on the Snowman case.

‘And most importantly,’ he said, pointing with a chopstick, ‘Hong Kong’s got Li Yuan’s glass noodles. Try them. That’s reason enough to apply for citizenship.’

‘That and opium?’

It was not her style to be so direct, but she knew she would have to swallow her natural shyness. This was her one shot at achieving what she had come to do.

He shrugged and concentrated on the noodles.

‘Do you smoke opium regularly?’

‘Irregularly.’

‘And why do you do that?’

He answered with food in his mouth. ‘So that I don’t drink. I’m an alkie. There, for example, is another advantage of Hong Kong compared with Manila. Lower sentences for dope. And cleaner prisons.’

‘I knew about your alcoholism, but are you a drug addict?’

‘Define drug addict.’

‘Do you have to take drugs?’

‘No, but I want to.’

‘Why?’

‘To numb the senses. This sounds like a job interview for a job I don’t want, Solness. Have you ever smoked opium?’

Kaja shook her head. She had tried marijuana a few times backpacking around South America but had not been particularly fond of it.

‘But the Chinese have. Two hundred years ago the British imported opium from India to improve the trade balance. They turned half of China into junkies just like that.’ He flicked the fingers of his free hand. ‘And when, sensibly enough, the Chinese authorities banned opium, the British went to war for their right to drug China into submission. Imagine Colombia bombing New York because the Americans confiscated a bit of cocaine on the border.’

‘What’s your point?’

‘I see it as my duty, as a European, to smoke some of the shit we have imported into this country.’

Kaja could hear herself laughing. She really needed to get some sleep.

‘I was tailing you when you did the deal,’ she said. ‘I saw how you do it. There was money in the bottle when you put it down. And opium afterwards. Isn’t that right?’

‘Mm,’ Harry said with a mouth full of noodles. ‘Have you worked at the Narc Unit?’

She shook her head. ‘Why the baby’s bottle?’

Harry stretched his arms above his head. The soup bowl in front of him was empty. ‘Opium stinks something awful. If you’ve got a ball of it in your pocket or in foil, the narco dogs can sniff you out even in a huge crowd. There is no money back on baby’s bottles, so no chance of some kid or some drunk nicking it during a handover. That has happened.’

Kaja nodded slowly. He had started to relax, it was just a question of persisting. Anyone who hasn’t spoken their mother tongue for a while gets chatty when they meet a compatriot. It’s natural. Keep going.

‘You like horses?’

He was chewing on a toothpick. ‘Not really. They’re so bloody moody.’

‘But you like betting on them?’

‘I like it, but compulsive gambling is not one of my vices.’

He smiled, and again it struck her how his smile transformed him, made him human, accessible, boyish. And she was reminded of the glimpse of open sky she had caught over Melden Row.

‘Gambling is a poor winning strategy long term. But if you have nothing left to lose, it’s the only strategy. I bet everything I had, plus a fair bit I didn’t have, on one single race.’

‘You put everything you had on one horse?’

‘Two. A quinella. You pick out the two horses to come first and second, regardless which of the two is the winner.’

‘And you borrowed money from the Triad?’

For the first time she saw astonishment in Harry’s eyes.

‘What makes a serious Chinese gangster cartel lend money to an opium-smoking foreigner who has nothing to lose?’

‘Well,’ Harry said, producing a cigarette, ‘as a foreigner you have access to the VIP box at Happy Valley racecourse for the first three weeks after your passport has been stamped.’ He lit his cigarette and blew smoke at the ceiling fan, which was turning so slowly that the flies were taking rides on it. ‘There are dress codes, so I had a suit made. The first two weeks were enough to give me a taste for it. I met Herman Kluit, a South African who earned himself a fortune in minerals in Africa. He taught me how to lose quite a lot of money in style. I simply loved the concept. The evening before race day in the third week Kluit invited me to dinner, at which he entertained the guests by exhibiting his collection of African torture instruments from Goma. And that was where I got insider info from Kluit’s chauffeur. The favourite for one of the races was injured, but this titbit was being kept secret because it was going to run anyway. The point was that it was such a clear favourite that a minus pool came into question, that is, it would be impossible to earn any money by betting on it. However, there was money to be earned by hedging your bets with several of the others. For example, with quinellas. But, of course, that would require quite a bit of capital if you were going to earn anything. I was given a loan by Kluit on the basis of my honest face. And a made-to-measure suit.’ Harry studied the glow of his cigarette and seemed to be smiling at the thought.

‘And?’ Kaja asked.

‘And the favourite won by six lengths.’ Harry shrugged. ‘When I explained to Kluit that I didn’t own a bean he seemed genuinely sorry and explained politely that, as a businessman, he was obliged to stick to his business principles. He assured me that these did not include the use of Congolese torture weapons, but quite simply selling debts to the Triad with a discount. Which, he conceded, was not a lot better. But in my case he would wait thirty-six hours before he sold so that I could get out of Hong Kong.’

‘But you didn’t go?’

‘Sometimes I’m a bit slow on the uptake.’

‘And afterwards?’

Harry opened his hands. ‘This. Chungking.’

‘Future plans?’

Harry shrugged and went to stub out his cigarette. And Kaja was reminded of the record cover Even had shown her with the picture of Sid Vicious from the Sex Pistols. And the music playing in the background, ‘No fu-ture, no fu-ture.’

He stubbed out his cigarette. ‘You’ve heard what you need, Kaja Solness.’

‘Need?’ She frowned. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘Don’t you?’ He stood up. ‘Do you think I babble on about opium and debts because I’m one lonely Norwegian meeting another?’

She didn’t answer.

‘It’s because I want you to appreciate that I am not the man you all need. So that you can go back without feeling you haven’t done your job. So that you don’t get into trouble in stairwells, and I can sleep in peace without wondering whether you will lead my creditors straight to me.’

She looked at him. There was something severe, ascetic, about him, yet this was contradicted by the amusement dancing in his eyes, saying that you didn’t need to take everything so seriously. Or to be more exact: that he didn’t give a flying fuck.

‘Wait.’ Kaja opened her bag and took out a small, red booklet, passed it to him and observed the reaction. Saw incredulity spread across his face as he flicked through it.

‘Shit, looks just like my passport.’

‘It is.’

‘I doubt Crime Squad had the budget for this.’

‘Your debts have sunk in value,’ she lied. ‘I got a discount.’

‘I hope for your sake you did because I have no intention of returning to Oslo.’

Kaja subjected him to a long stare. Dreading it. There was no way out now. She was being forced to play her final card, the one Gunnar Hagen had said she should leave to last if the old bastard proved obdurate.

‘There is one more thing,’ Kaja said, bracing herself.

One of Harry’s eyebrows shot into the air; perhaps he detected something in her intonation.

‘It’s about your father, Harry.’ She could hear that she had instinctively used his first name. Convinced herself it was meant sincerely, not just for effect.

‘My father?’ He said this as if it came as something of a surprise that he had one.

‘Yes. We contacted him to find out if he knew where you were living. The long and short of it is he’s ill.’

She looked down at the table.

Heard him exhale. The drowsiness was back in his voice. ‘Seriously ill?’

‘Yes. And I’m sorry to be the one to have to tell you this.’

She still did not dare to raise her gaze. Ashamed. Waited. Listened to the machine-gun sounds of Cantonese on the TV behind Li Yuan’s counter. Swallowed and waited. She would have to sleep soon.

‘When does the plane go?’

‘At eight,’ she said. ‘I’ll pick you up in three hours outside here.’

‘I’ll get there under my own steam. There are a couple of things I have to fix first.’

He held out his palm. She questioned him with her eyes.

‘For that I need the passport. And then you should eat. Get a bit of meat on your bones.’

She wavered. Then she handed him the passport and the ticket.

‘I trust you,’ she said.

He sent her a blank look.

Then he was gone.

The clock above gate C4 in Chek Lap Kok Airport showed a quarter to eight, and Kaja had given up. Of course he wasn’t coming. It was a natural reflex for animals and humans to hide when hurt. And Harry Hole was definitely hurt. Reports on the Snowman case had described in detail the murders of all the women. But Gunnar Hagen had added what had not been included. How Harry Hole’s ex-partner, Rakel, and her son, Oleg, had ended up in the clutches of the deranged killer. How she and her son had fled the country as soon as the case was over. And how Harry had handed in his resignation and slung his hook. He had been more hurt than she had realised.

Kaja had already handed in her boarding card, was on her way up to the boarding bridge and beginning to consider the formulation of her report on the failed mission when she saw him jogging through the slanted sunbeams that penetrated the terminal building. He was carrying a plain holdall over his shoulder, a tax-free bag and was puffing away furiously at a cigarette. He stopped at the gate. But instead of giving the waiting personnel his boarding card he put down his bag and sent Kaja a despairing look.

She went back to the gate.

‘Problems?’ she asked.

‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Can’t come.’

‘Why not?’

He pointed to the tax-free bag. ‘Just remembered that in Norway the allowance per person is one carton of cigarettes. I’ve got two. So unless…’ He didn’t bat an eyelid.

She rolled her eyes heavenwards, trying not to look relieved. ‘Give it here.’

‘Thank you very much,’ he said, opening the bag, which she happened to notice did not contain any bottles, and passing her an opened carton of Camel with one pack already gone.

She walked in front of him to the plane so that he would not be able to see her smiles.

Kaja stayed awake long enough to catch take-off, Hong Kong disappearing beneath them and Harry’s eyes watching the trolley as it approached fitfully with its joyful clink of bottles. And him closing his eyes and answering the stewardess with a barely audible ‘No, thank you.’

She wondered whether Gunnar Hagen was right, whether the man beside her was really what they needed.

Then she was gone, unconscious, dreaming that she was standing in front of a closed door. She heard a lone, frozen bird-call from the forest and it sounded so strange because the sun was shining high in the sky. She opened the door…

She woke with her head lolling on his shoulder and dried saliva at the corners of her mouth. The captain’s voice announced that they were approaching the runway at London Heathrow.