1222

11

‘This ought to do,’ said Berit, putting down a three-litre thermos. ‘Milk?’

‘Normally, yes, but since the intention is to keep me awake, I think I’ll take it black. I’m sure it’s just my imagination, but I think it works better the darker it is.’

The very thought that I wouldn’t sleep before tomorrow afternoon at the earliest was making my head feel unbelievably heavy. Geir had suggested I should have a little nap on my own in the small office behind reception. Nobody was going to be murdered at three o’clock in the afternoon when everybody was awake, he insisted with a wry smile. And he was right, of course. Anyway, I said I’d rather not, but I did agree to use the office. One hour in the land of dreams would make me even sleepier. From experience I knew that I could be on the go for another twenty-four hours as soon as I had passed over the borderline between deathly tired and overtired. A strong dose of caffeine would therefore be more useful than a one-hour nap.

‘Do you need anything else?’

Berit threw her arms wide as if she could offer me whatever I might wish for. I looked at a dead computer screen and tried to come up with something.

‘No. But thank you anyway. You’re a marvel, Berit. I’m so impressed by the way you’ve dealt with all this.’

‘It’s doing you good to be in the mountains,’ said Geir with a smile, clipping the back of my head before moving towards the door. ‘You should come here more often!’

It was half past two in the afternoon, and I couldn’t really see the humour in what I was planning to do.

Sometimes I imagine that I still have feeling in my legs. I have never wanted to bother anybody with complaints about an injury for which I have only myself to blame, so I never speak about that hint of pain that reminds me from time to time of what it’s like to stand on two legs.

Not that I usually have all that many people to share my thoughts with. It can be weeks between those occasions when I have to speak to anyone other than Nefis, Ida and old Mary, our housekeeper. This is the life I have chosen, and this is the way my life has turned out.

But now I was sitting alone, and feeling lonely.

It was very strange.

The wound in my thigh was hurting. I mean, really hurting. Of course I realize it was my imagination; I’ve seen the pictures of the severed nerves in the small of my back. Like porridge, the surgeon had said, peering in fascination at the pictures they had taken when they operated on me.

There is no possibility that the cells below my navel can send any kind of signal to my brain. Communication has broken down for ever, something that I accepted long ago. And yet it was as if I could still feel the searing pain in the wound left by the ski pole. Not like a phantom pain, but like a real injury that hurt.

It was strange to feel so alone.

Cato Hammer must have had many enemies. Perhaps enemies was the wrong word. He wasn’t dangerous enough for that. Too rotund and nice. His constant pronouncements were irritating rather than sharp, loud rather than offensive. And yet I was still certain that many people must have felt like me: the man was intolerably self-obsessed in his alleged concern for others.

But that kind of person doesn’t usually provoke murder.

The flip chart was still in the corner of the little office. The sheet on which I had written the names of the two victims was untouched. I moved slowly over to the chart and picked up the red marker pen. Beneath the two names I drew a line, dividing the sheet in two. Then I began to add more names.

Einar Holter, the train driver I had never met.

Elias Grav, I wrote.

Steinar Aass.

Sara.

I wished I knew her surname. The way it looked now on the sheet of paper, you might have thought I didn’t like the little girl. Not using her surname showed a lack of respect, as if she were worth less than the others. As if she were a dog. Or a cat, with no relatives, no sense of being part of a real family.

Rosenkvist, I wrote slowly in my best handwriting. Sara Rosenkvist. It suited her.

Four people were dead, and nobody could be blamed for their deaths apart from this bloody storm. Einar, Elias, Steinar and little Sara Rosenkvist. They had been torn from their lives as unexpectedly as the two who had been murdered. And just as pointlessly. And yet when the police got here, to this cold place, tonight, tomorrow or in two days at the worst, they would concentrate on the two names at the top of the list of the fallen at Finse during the storm of February 2007. They would put all their resources and manpower into the investigation, and within a day or two they would have driven the perpetrator into a corner, and would have made sure he was looking through prison bars for the next fifteen years or so.

What was actually the difference between these people?

Was the fact that Cato Hammer or Roar Hanson had lost their lives worse than the fact that Sara would never grow up? Was Cato Hammer’s death a greater loss for his family than the fact that Einar Holter’s three children would barely remember their father by the time they were grown up? Why should society put all its resources into punishing the person or persons responsible for two of the deaths, while the others would be forgotten by the public as soon as they were in their graves?

Concentrate, I thought, and had some more coffee.

I stared at Cato Hammer’s name and tried to picture him in my mind’s eye. However hard I tried to see him as he had been when he was alive, it was only his dead, surprised expression as he lay on the kitchen worktop that had stuck in my memory.

The information meeting.

The thought suddenly struck me, and I realized why. I closed my eyes so that I could think back to that first evening, when only the train driver was dead and everyone seemed relieved and excited following the accident rather than shocked. Before Berit Tverre began to speak, I had seen Cato Hammer disappear behind one of the pillars in the lobby, and had noticed that he seemed different. Earlier in the evening he had been positively bubbling with obtrusive happiness and irritating energy. He had even managed the harsh confrontation with Kari Thue with a self-confident smile on his lips. Therefore, it had struck me as strange that he seemed so serious later on. Depressed, somehow.

Afraid?

When I saw him disappear behind the pillar, I immediately thought it was Kari Thue who had frightened him. I had no reason to reflect further on his change of mood at the time. But now, when I thought back, I became more and more certain that he had seemed just as mild-mannered and smug after Kari Thue’s bizarre rant as he had been before he got mixed up in the quarrel between her and the Kurds.

I tore off the sheet of paper and wrote Cato Hammer’s name again. Underneath it I drew a timeline, writing in the approximate times of the heated discussion and the information meeting. I used a green pen to mark the first event, black for the second. In green I wrote happy, eager and patient. Then I drew an arrow pointing to the right; I couldn’t indicate when his good mood had started to deteriorate. With the black pen I wrote serious, possibly afraid. After a brief pause I added a question mark after the last word.

As far as I could work out and recall, there was a gap of one and a half hours between the two events. Kari Thue had been in the lobby the whole time. Cato Hammer had been in the hobby room where the prayer meeting had taken place, and the big bridge tournament was under way. I had fallen asleep, but that could hardly have been for more than a few seconds, perhaps a couple of minutes. I was as sure as I could be that Kari Thue and Cato Hammer had not spoken to each other during the period that was marked out on the sheet in front of me.

Kari Thue had not frightened Cato Hammer.

At least not then.

It must have been someone else.

There were far too many people to choose from. And of course Cato Hammer’s change of mood didn’t necessarily have anything whatsoever to do with the fact that he was murdered a few hours later.

I was stuck, and wearily tossed the pen aside.

There was a gentle tap on the door.

‘Am I disturbing you?’ said Magnus, and came in without waiting for an answer. ‘So this is where you are, is it?’

There was no reason to answer either question.

‘I’m feeling much better,’ he said mildly, and sat down. ‘She’s a marvellous woman, that Berit Tverre. She finds solutions to most things. What are you doing?’

‘Trying to think.’

‘I see! That can be difficult. Particularly under circumstances like these.’

‘Yes,’ I said, although I wasn’t sure what circumstances he meant.

He took out his thick horn-rimmed glasses and perched them on his nose.

‘What have we here,’ he said. ‘A… timeline, I imagine.’

He leaned forward and peered at it. Then he clicked his tongue, which was obviously one of his many little habits.

‘So you noticed it too.’

‘What?’ I asked.

‘This…’

He smiled and took his glasses off again. The lenses were so sticky I felt like grabbing them and cleaning them.

‘This change of mood,’ he went on, put his glasses down on the desk. ‘Cato Hammer was cheerful and exhilarated from the time we arrived at the hotel. But he was taciturn and serious when he came back to the information meeting.’

‘Came back? From the hobby room, you mean?’

‘Yes, he was in there most of the time. But not all the time. Me, I was running about all over the place!’

His index finger waved about in the air.

‘We had a lovely little chat, you and I! I offered you some wine, but you were determined to stick to your vow of sobriety!’

‘I haven’t made any vow of -’

‘And then I went down to the hobby room. Hammer was there. Full of energy, I have to say. He had a voice, that man. And good humour, thank heavens. Perhaps a little too much good humour and eagerness to get involved. But then he left us. I had just bid six spades, and was sure of taking the game. Later, when I got back to the lobby, Cato Hammer wasn’t there either. He arrived just before the information meeting began. But then this building has countless rooms, so he could have been absolutely anywhere.’

‘Did you ever speak to him?’

‘No, I didn’t, actually. As I mentioned to you during our little session when we were… viewing the body… he was my patient. Something I would never have told you if the man hadn’t been dead. In such extraordinary circumstances, I must add. I have developed the habit of never speaking to my patients when I meet them outside the surgery, unless they speak to me first. It’s simply a matter of discretion. Respect for patient confidentiality.’

‘And he never did that? He never spoke to you?’

‘No. He didn’t even say hello. Perhaps he didn’t recognize me.’

I pretended to yawn. For a long time.

‘I’m sure he recognized you,’ I said eventually, biting my lower lip so hard I could taste the sweetness of blood on my tongue.

Magnus shook his head, lost in thought.

‘Hello,’ I said tentatively.

A deep, wide furrow appeared down the centre of his forehead. He took a deep breath as if he were about to say something, but then sat in silence with his thought, unsure if he should share it.

‘One could of course ask oneself,’ he said at last, ‘why I noticed that Cato Hammer’s mood in particular had altered.’

His eyes fascinated me. His unusual facial features drew the attention away from the fact that his eyes were actually beautiful, and such a deep blue shade that they were almost indigo.

‘Then I’ll ask the question,’ I said. ‘Why did you notice that Cato Hammer’s mood in particular had altered?’

‘Well,’ he said with a smile. ‘Let me explain. I noticed because I know something about him.’

I nodded and waited.

‘I know that Cato Hammer’s temperament, this keen commitment he shows in public, has’ – he fiddled with his glasses and searched for the right words – ‘has an excessive level of tolerance and openness towards more or less everything and everybody. I know it isn’t entirely genuine. In many ways he was a considerate man. And over-scrupulous, in the sense that he could be tormented by a guilty conscience. As to whether he really was a good person…’

His index finger rasped against his cheek, where the stubble had started to form strange, patchy patterns on his skin.

‘To tell the truth, I’m not entirely convinced that he was.’

I wasn’t sure whether I should say anything, or just wait for him to go on.

‘Of course you have to be very careful with things like that. Very careful.’

He gave me a quick look, as if it were me he was warning.

‘Judging other people, I mean. Particularly on inadequate grounds, such as those I have. Cato Hammer came to see me three, four times before I realized that all those vague illnesses he kept complaining about were the expression of a very disturbed psyche. Very disturbed indeed. So I referred him to someone else.’

His face broke into a smile.

‘But I’ve told you all this before.’

‘Why do you doubt his goodness?’

‘Can I use this cup?’

His hand closed around an unwashed coffee cup; I had no idea who had used it before. I shrugged my shoulders; he placed it under the dispenser and filled it right up to the brim.

‘What does being a good person involve?’ he asked, rolling his eyes to take the sting out of the banal aspect of his question. ‘Does it involve doing good? Or, since we human beings are permanently wired to care about ourselves and our offspring, is it more a question of the ability to be aware of our inadequacies and deplore our faults? To take responsibility for the fact that we can’t manage to be good, I mean. In other words, is goodness an indication of our willingness to engage in an eternal struggle against the ego, or is it only the victor, the person who has already defeated his egoism, who can call himself good?’

I wasn’t really with him. Perhaps I was too tired. Or perhaps I just thought he was talking absolute rubbish.

‘I don’t really know,’ I mumbled. ‘But what was Cato Hammer’s problem?’

‘He had done something evil,’ said Magnus, stretching.

The tone of his voice had changed. It grew deeper, and he was speaking directly to me now, not to himself or to an imaginary, more philosophically inclined listener than I had managed to appear.

‘What?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said briefly. ‘We never got that far. But he was a tormented person. It only took a few conversations with him for me to realize that he was weighed down with deep feelings of guilt. Which is in itself an indication that he had a conscience, at least. But he never did anything about it.’

‘How can you be sure of that?’

‘Good question.’

He leaned back in his chair with both hands around the coffee cup.

‘I definitely got the impression,’ he said, considering his words carefully before proceeding. ‘I definitely got the impression that he was guilty of something that was punishable by law. Since he had so much exposure in the media, you and I and everybody else would have known about it if he had admitted to such a thing. Even a speeding fine would have ended up on the front pages. Deduction, in other words. Drawing a conclusion on my part. He has never come to terms with himself. And yet he set up this facade of an abundance of love. Something doesn’t match. That’s why I noticed that sudden seriousness when he came back from the information meeting. It was almost…’

He glanced at my notes on the flip chart.

‘Fear. He seemed afraid. You can cross out the question mark.’

‘Greed and betrayal,’ I heard myself say.

‘What?’

‘It was something Roar Hanson said. He came to find me twice before he was murdered. It was obvious he wanted to tell me something. Something that would- He said he knew who the murderer was.’

‘What? What?’

The coffee splashed everywhere as he banged the cup down on the table.

‘Did he tell you who killed Cato Hammer?’

‘You’re not listening,’ I said. ‘He said he knew who it was. He didn’t tell me anything. We were interrupted. Both times.’

The very thought of Adrian made the heat rise in my cheeks.

‘But what do you mean by greed and betrayal?’

His fingers drew big quotation marks in the air.

‘That’s what he said.’ I closed my eyes. I always remember better when I close my eyes. ‘He said that you can make amends for betrayal, but there can be no forgiveness for greed. No, I think it was the other way round. Greed can be forgiven, he said, but never betrayal. Something like that.’

‘I thought everything could be forgiven,’ Magnus mumbled.

‘That’s exactly what I said. The first time he came to find me was before anyone else knew we were talking about murder. Everybody else obviously believed the story about a brain haemorrhage. Roar Hanson, on the other hand, was convinced that the man had been murdered.’

‘Strange. Very strange indeed.’

The coffee was working. I felt brighter than I had for a long time. Absurdly, I was enjoying myself. It was ages since I had talked to someone who made me relax the way that Magnus Streng did. His friendly forwardness and obtrusive friendliness were qualities that would normally have put me off. Instead I was beginning to toy with the idea of inviting him to dinner. Him and his wife, perhaps, if he had one.

When all this was over.

When I finally got home, to everything that was mine.

Of course I wouldn’t invite him to my home. I hadn’t invited anyone for many, many years. It was Nefis who had friends, not me. She stopped nagging me about it a long time ago. But it would have pleased her enormously.

‘I was wondering,’ I said with a smile. ‘Do you think you might like…’

The pause was too long.

‘Might like what?’

‘Are you married?’

‘Yes,’ he said delightedly. ‘I’ve been married for forty-two years!’

A quick calculation made him at least sixty-two. Probably more. He seemed younger.

‘We’ve had three fantastic children,’ he said contentedly, taking an oversized wallet out of his inside pocket. ‘And five grandchildren. So far. My youngest daughter is expecting twins, so soon we’ll have seven, my Solfrid and I.’

A small plastic accordion tumbled out of the wallet. In every pocket was a photograph: wife, children and grandchildren. Christmas Eve, Norwegian Constitution Day and something that looked like a summer’s evening by the sea. He pushed it across to me. I flicked slowly through it. The last picture was a photo of the whole family. Children and their respective partners. Children of all ages, with the proud paternal and maternal grandparents in the middle; a woman with greying hair and fine features had her arm around the bent, abnormal Magnus Streng. Something must have given me away, even though I was doing my best not to show anything other than friendly and polite interest.

‘My condition is hereditary,’ he said calmly. ‘Achondroplasia. But that doesn’t mean my children will necessarily inherit it. There’s a fifty per cent chance each time, because my wife doesn’t have the condition. Fate has been kind to me, and allowed my children to escape. Not that my life has been particularly difficult. But I’m not so different from other people in that respect; I want the very best for my children.’

He had three daughters. They were all pretty women of normal height, with long hair and warm smiles. They were very like their mother, who looked about thirty centimetres taller than her husband.

‘I really did hope they would be normal,’ he said, taking back the bundle of photos.

‘Of course,’ I mumbled. ‘We all feel the same.’

‘Not necessarily,’ he said.

I didn’t pursue that comment.

‘You started to ask me something,’ he said.

‘No.’

‘Yes, you did. You said: “Do you think you might like…” Like what?’

‘Oh, that. Do you think you might like… Do you think Roar Hanson really knew who murdered Cato Hammer?’

‘I have no idea. I wasn’t the one who talked to the man.’

Suddenly he seemed completely uninterested. Indifferent. He stood up and finished off his coffee. Then he put the cup down on the table, once again a little too forcefully, and headed for the door.

‘Just one more thing,’ I said in order to stop him. ‘Don’t you think it’s strange that so many of you actually already knew Cato Hammer?’

He looked at me, his face totally expressionless.

‘Isn’t it a bit odd?’ I went on after a brief hesitation. ‘Geir knew him from the board at Brann. Berit had met him here at Finse before. He was one of your patients. Isn’t that a conspicuous series of coincidences?’

‘You could see it that way,’ he said, shrugging his shoulders. ‘And if you think it makes us all suspects, then you’re entitled to your point of view. Personally, I would say that it underlines the obvious: Cato Hammer was an active man. A sociable, bumptious man who knew a lot of people. But right now I could do with a proper drink. Even though it is a little early. I’ll see you later.’

He didn’t even slam the door.

Sometimes I’m an idiot.

All too often, in fact.

I could simply lock the door, of course, and let the others carry on with whatever they were doing.

Perhaps I ought to do just that. Despite the fact that the windows in the little office were completely covered in snow, which meant that I couldn’t be sure of anything, the weather seemed just as hopeless and unchanging as it had been for two days. But the wind wasn’t howling quite as loudly any more. The fact that the temperature was rising had to be a good sign too, of course. At any rate, the storm couldn’t continue for ever. I keep myself better informed than most people, and the horror stories about global warming could frighten the life out of those less nervous than me. But I have never heard anyone seriously claim that the mountain regions of Norway are likely to be devastated by continuous hurricanes.

At some point the storm would abate.

Tonight. Or tomorrow. Or perhaps not until Sunday.

Cato Hammer’s name in red ink on the greyish white paper now looked almost luminous. I blinked, shook my head and refilled my coffee cup.

Cato Hammer’s sin lay in the past.

He must have committed a major transgression.

Roar Hanson had been seriously unbalanced, perhaps on the verge of a breakdown. People who are highly strung can say strange things. In addition, his vague, disjointed stories were shot through with religious torment, and to tell the truth I have to confess that I wouldn’t have taken much notice, if it hadn’t been for the information Magnus Streng had given me about Cato Hammer’s medical history.

There was too much that matched, and I was no longer in any doubt.

But it didn’t help a great deal.

Do you believe in vengeance? Do you think it’s ethically defensible to avenge a great injustice?

I remembered Roar Hanson’s words as I closed my eyes. That was exactly what he had said in our final conversation, I could literally hear his tense, high-pitched voice: Do you believe in vengeance?

The fact that he asked the question at all had to mean that he himself had his doubts. At any rate, he had a certain amount of understanding of the dilemma. Which once again underlined the seriousness of whatever he believed Cato Hammer to be guilty of.

Greed and betrayal, he had said.

Greed is linked to money. Capital. Mammon.

Greed is a mortal sin for Catholics. But it’s hardly something to get worked up about in a society where greed no longer makes people shudder, but is more likely to evoke a nod of approval.

I picked up the red pen and wrote greed above the timeline.

Betrayal?

Of course you can betray someone by being greedy.

Roar Hanson must have meant that the victim of Cato Hammer’s greed and betrayal was here at Finse.

If he was right, Cato Hammer couldn’t have discovered this until several hours after our arrival at the hotel. Strange. I could see him in my mind’s eye, going from room to room, chatting and shaking hands as he went. It had struck me at an early stage: Cato Hammer was the person who had the best overview of the assembled party, even if he had once made a mistake with the woman in the headscarf.

The confrontation between Kari Thue and Cato Hammer took place at approximately quarter to eight.

By that time we had already been at Finse 1222 for several hours, or at least many of us had. The last few were not rescued from the train until about five, but at any rate Cato Hammer had had plenty of time to acquaint himself with most people before eight o’clock. But he was as gentle as a spring shower, even after he had been shouted at in front of everybody.

If Roar Hanson was right in his assertion that there was someone amongst us who had good reason to kill Cato Hammer, why did the victim not know this himself? At least not before the information meeting, which began around ten. And even that was far from certain; his change of mood didn’t necessarily have anything to do with that. But for the time being, I chose to assume there was a connection.

I tore off the sheet and screwed it up. On a blank page I wrote:

The perpetrator was not recognized straight away.

I sat there for a while, looking at the words.

The perpetrator, I thought. It could just as easily be a man or a woman. Or perhaps not. If it was a woman, she would have to be strong. To kill someone with an icicle must demand both strength and technique, although I am ashamed to admit that I have never thought about how you use frozen water to kill a person.

It wasn’t necessarily an icicle.

There was a great deal to suggest that it was an icicle.

But when the murderer clearly had a gun, providing him or her with the easiest method in the world when it comes to killing people, why not use it again? If Roar Hanson was pierced through with an icicle or some other spear-like weapon, why on earth wasn’t he shot?

I pushed my hand into the side pocket of my chair and took out the box of painkillers. To be on the safe side I took three, and washed them down with lukewarm coffee.

Cato Hammer was murdered outdoors. Roar Hanson in the cellar. Geir thought it was fairly clear that the murder had tahen place in the dog room. There were no traces of blood outside the door. In fact, all the blood was concentrated in the spot where he and Berit found the body.

One outdoors. One indoors.

The wound in my thigh was extremely painful. I couldn’t understand it. I realized I was trying to raise my leg.

The two locations where the bodies were found had only one thing in common: they were out of the way. The chances of bumping into anyone outside in the storm at night, and in a locked room containing a pit bull, were negligible. At least if the murderer had noted the dog owner’s routine when it came to visiting the animal. I bit the marker pen so hard that the metal buckled.

Both victims went willingly to the slaughter, I wrote, before crossing out the last word and adding another.

Both victims went willingly to the slaughter rendezvous.

It couldn’t be any other way. Cato Hammer had been willing to go out of the hotel, in spite of the weather, to meet someone. That must mean that not only the perpetrator, but also Cato Hammer, were keen that the meeting should take place discreetly. Perhaps only Hammer.

It was difficult to see why Roar Hanson would go along with something similar. He had obviously been anxious about the meeting, because he had repeatedly asked his roommate to wait for him. I wasn’t sure what Sebastian Robeck might have done if he hadn’t fallen asleep.

It struck me that the explanation must lie in something I have no chance of understanding: religion.

Religion.

Nonsense. I really could not understand why the man had gone to meet someone he thought had murdered Cato Hammer, with no protection of any kind, in a room in the cellar where no one could come to his aid.

Did he want to give the murderer a chance? To turn over a new leaf?

The marker pen was running out, and squeaked horribly as I wrote:

Was Roar H. sympathetic towards the perpetrator?

Perhaps I was right after all. Perhaps there was enough of the priest left in Roar Hanson for him to take on the role of spiritual mentor, however stupid and naive it might seem to try and talk a murderer into seeing the error of his ways.

After the railway carriage fell, there were 118 of us in the hotel. Then the four mysterious guests had arrived, but they were under lock and key in the cellar, and did not need to be taken into account. Since both Steinar Aass and Roar Hanson had died, and I still counted myself as innocent, we were now down to 115 possible perpetrators. If I discounted all those under fifteen, I arrived at ninety-seven.

Ninety-seven suspects.

Far too many.

If I were to draw conclusions of a tentative and extremely temporary nature, based on the methods and the scenes of the crimes, then I was looking for someone strong and fit, who had access to a gun, and whose story could arouse the sympathy of a priest. This person must also carry within them a hatred powerful enough to make them murder Cato Hammer, with sufficient will to survive to kill Roar Hanson to avoid being unmasked.

Now I was going too far, of course. Unprofessional.

The Kurds had guns. Mikkel was strong and fit. I had no doubt that Kari Thue’s personality made it possible for her to feel hatred. Most of us could probably persuade Roar Hanson to feel sorry for us, at least on a bad day.

I couldn’t do this.

The best thing would be to mind my own business, keep my fingers crossed and wait for the police.

However, I did decide to look for Adrian. I had to find out what Roar Hanson had said to him when I was distracted by my annoyance at being given paprika-flavoured crisps, and failed to grasp why Adrian reacted so aggressively to the pallid priest with the white flecks at the corners of his mouth.

At least it would pass the time.

For some reason I was disappointed by the sight that met me when I got back to the lobby.

At one end of the long table right next to the shabby wicker chairs with the tartan cushions that were never used by anybody except the lady who knitted, Kari Thue and Mikkel were absorbed in a quiet conversation. The lobby was so full of people that they didn’t notice my arrival. Their heads were almost touching in a display of intimacy that I didn’t like. Kari Thue was sitting at the end of the table, Mikkel at the side with his back to me.

Of course I shouldn’t let it bother me.

The fact that Mikkel had saved my life and in addition had started to behave in a way that was bordering on the acceptable didn’t mean he was someone to be reckoned with. On the contrary, he was high on the list of those I suspected of having murdered both Cato Hammer and Roar Hanson. True, the list was extremely long and I had no evidence against the boy apart from the fact that he was strong and fit, but still: Mikkel was not my friend.

Suddenly he got to his feet so abruptly that the chair fell over. I couldn’t hear what he said, but there was no misunderstanding the gesture with his finger.

I smiled. Kari Thue picked up a book with lightning speed and immediately appeared to be so absorbed in its contents that I almost began to doubt what I had seen. But I was still smiling.

Mikkel really was on the way to making important decisions in life.

‘Adrian! Adrian!’

The boy didn’t even bother looking in my direction. He was sitting on the floor between the kitchen door and the dresser with Veronica. I didn’t recognize the game they were playing. They had a lot of cards spread out on the floor in a strange pattern, face up. It looked as if Veronica had considerably more cards in her hand than Adrian, which struck me as an appropriate metaphor for their relationship. I no longer believed she was as young as she seemed at first glance, and I found it odd, to put it mildly, that she got any pleasure from hanging out with a kid of fifteen.

It didn’t have to be about pleasure, of course. It could be a question of usefulness, or necessity, for that matter; the way Veronica behaved towards her fellow human beings made me look like an open and sociable person. Adrian was the only one of all the passengers from the train who hadn’t given the skinny figure dressed in black a wide berth right from the start.

‘Adrian,’ I said again when I reached them. ‘I need to talk to you.’

‘Forget it,’ he snapped.

Adrian and I had certainly had our differences, but the boy must be somewhat oversensitive if he thought our arguments justified such behaviour. I could only imagine that Veronica had persuaded him to go against me.

‘Come on,’ I said calmly. ‘I really do have to talk to you.’

‘But I don’t have to talk to you.’

The young woman was examining her cards. She placed the queen of hearts on the floor before picking up two of the cards that were lying face up.

Two aces.

The boy swore vehemently and threw the jack of clubs on top of the queen, then picked up a king.

‘What are you playing?’ I asked.

Neither of them answered. I sat there for a few minutes following the game, which seemed increasingly absurd.

‘Isn’t there somewhere else you need to be?’

He didn’t look at me.

‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m going to sit right here until you’re ready to talk to me.’

‘There!’ he hissed, banging the ace of spades down on top of the nine of diamonds, which Veronica had just put down. ‘Ha!’

When he was about to pick up a card, Veronica placed her hand on his.

‘Hang on,’ she said in that deep voice that contrasted so sharply with her thin body. ‘Look.’

She placed four twos on the floor one after the other, gave a little smile and gathered up all the other cards on the floor.

‘Paris,’ she said.

‘Shit,’ said Adrian.

I’ve played a lot of cards in my life, but this was the most ridiculous, incomprehensible game I’d ever seen.

‘What do you want?’ mumbled Adrian, getting stiffly to his feet.

‘I just want to talk to you. In private.’

The boy had already smelled less than sweet on the train. By now the smell around his skinny body was so unpleasant that I wrinkled my nose and moved back.

‘Look, I haven’t got a room of my own, OK! Which means I haven’t got a bathroom!’

‘That’s the most stupid thing I’ve ever heard. You were the one that chose to sleep in the window. And even if you don’t want a room, there’s nothing to stop you from using a shower. Any time.’

‘Haven’t got any clean clothes,’ he muttered. ‘No point in having a shower.’

‘Come with me,’ I said, taking advantage of the fact that he was too embarrassed to refuse.

The smell was so strong that I had no desire to take him into the little office. Instead I went ahead of him towards the wicker chairs that were still unoccupied. Kari Thue was no longer sitting at the wooden table. I nodded towards one of the chairs. Adrian sat down, sullen and reluctant.

‘How’s it going?’ I asked, moving my wheelchair so close to his knees that he couldn’t get up without pushing me away.

His mouth took on a sulky expression that presumably meant that I should mind my own business.

‘Adrian. I don’t really understand what I’ve done to upset you. You make your own decisions about who you want to be with while we’re up here, but it won’t be long until they come for us. When that happens, I don’t think Veronica will be in as strong a position to help you as I will. I am after all -’

‘So you’re using blackmail now?’

He looked me briefly in the eye. He was close to tears. His lips were trembling and he suddenly lashed out with his right hand. I don’t think he meant to hit anything, but he caught my thigh with a hard blow.

‘Sorry,’ he said, pulling back his hand. ‘I didn’t mean… I’m sorry, OK!’

‘It’s fine. I didn’t feel a thing. It’s OK.’

I wondered what his hair looked like underneath that bloody hat. As if he had read my mind, he pulled the hat off and placed it on his knee before scratching his scalp frantically with both hands, his fingers stiff.

‘What do you want?’ he mumbled eventually, putting his hat back on.

‘What was it about Roar Hanson that made you so angry, Adrian?’

‘He was fucking disgusting.’

‘What was it that was so disgusting about him?’

‘Didn’t you see him? That greasy hair with a comb-over, and that horrible white stuff at the corners of his mouth. And he stank.’

He stopped and lowered his eyes.

‘He was coming on to Veronica.’

‘Yes, so you said. How old is Veronica, actually?’

‘Twenty-four. That fucking priest was a pig, running after little girls.’

‘I don’t think twenty-four counts as a little girl, Adrian. If he was into that kind of thing, there’s a whole load of fourteen-year-old handball players here.’

‘They haven’t even got tits! Hardly, anyway.’

‘Unfortunately, that’s part of the appeal,’ I said drily. ‘If Roar Hanson really did prefer girls who were a little bit too young, then he would have preferred them without tits. But he wasn’t like that, Adrian. There’s absolutely no evidence to suggest it. And you are far too intelligent to go along with crap like that.’

‘But he was after Veronica! It’s true! I saw it with my own eyes! And she wasn’t the only one who thought the old bastard was vile. There were two old women in the hobby room who told him to fuck off as well.’

‘I’m sure they didn’t.’

‘Well, maybe they didn’t say that exactly, but he was all over them and they moved several times. What a fucking…’

He couldn’t find the right swear word.

‘What was it he said to you?’ I interjected while he was thinking.

‘Said? I don’t talk to wankers like him!’

‘You did talk to him. Yesterday morning. After you’d been to the kiosk to get me some crisps and cola. He said something to you about washing your hands, I think. I didn’t hear properly because I was distracted by the fact that you’d brought me paprika-flavoured crisps, and I don’t like them.’

Adrian sat motionless, staring into space. It was as if thinking back made him confused. Or perhaps he wasn’t entirely sober; I thought I could smell alcohol on his breath. That first morning I had suspected that Veronica had alcohol with her. I must have been wrong. As far as I could see, she didn’t drink alcohol at all. She always carried a bottle of mineral water with her, during the evenings too.

‘I don’t remember,’ he said, pulling at his hat. ‘It wasn’t anything to do with washing my hands, anyway.’

‘You do remember,’ I said.

‘He said… he said “watch yourself”.’

‘Watch yourself? Was that all?’

‘Yes.’

‘Watch yourself as in “can you move out of the way”?’

‘No. Watch yourself as in “WATCH YOURSELF!”’

His body lurched forward as he snapped out the words, and I moved back in my chair.

‘It’s odd that I didn’t pick it up,’ I said, taken aback.

The corners of Adrian’s mouth turned down in an indifferent expression.

‘It’s not my fault if you can’t hear properly.’

He thought the conversation was over. He couldn’t get up because of my chair, and tried to push me away.

‘Hang on,’ I said. ‘I’ve got more questions.’

‘But I haven’t got any more answers.’

‘Why do you sleep in the window, Adrian?’

He blushed noticeably. Small patches of pink on his shiny skin rapidly grew bigger.

‘What’s it got to do with you?’

‘Veronica doesn’t want you in her room, is that it?’

His whole face was red by now.

At least Veronica had some kind of decency, I thought, if she hadn’t even touched the boy. She was setting clear boundaries for the dreams in which he could entangle himself.

‘I think,’ he said, clearing his throat. ‘I think being near you is OK. At night, anyway.’

The reply was such a surprise that all I could think of was to smile at the boy. His face had darkened, and when he tried to get up again, I let him. He had lied to me about what Roar Hanson had really said, but I wasn’t going to get any more out of him.

Not at the moment, anyway.

Like other practised liars, he had stuck close to the truth. As a rule it’s the sensible thing to do, but Adrian had given me a piece of a jigsaw puzzle without realizing that I only needed a fragment of sky to sense the outline of the entire finished picture.

And I was beginning to understand why he was lying.

It was definitely not a pleasant thought, but if I was right, at least I was on the way to something.

A kind of goal, perhaps.

I didn’t really know.

It was five past five by now, and there were still two hours to go to the first sitting for dinner. I was starving, and absolutely full of caffeine. I was tired of coffee, myself, and my disjointed thoughts. When Adrian left I had thought I was getting close to something, but now I was no longer so sure. At any rate, a break might be good for me. I had wheeled my chair over to the sofas by the Millibar. The only people keeping me company in the small seating area were the Kurds.

To begin with it was difficult to understand why they didn’t spend more time in their room. They never spoke to anyone. Nobody ever bothered with them. They seldom exchanged more than a word or two with each other, and that was in a language I had so far been unable to identify. It was only during dinner the previous evening that I had seen them engaged in something that could be called a real conversation. Now they were sitting bolt upright on the yellow sofa that really belonged in Blåstuen, each with a glass of water in front of them. Even though I had said I had no intention of sleeping tonight, Berit had left the sofa there. Just in case, she said with a smile, and hurried away.

One of the kitchen staff came through the swing doors with a large basket full of buns. My mouth started to water, and I had to swallow. He smiled when he saw me, and offered me the basket before putting it down on the counter next to the hot chocolate machine and hurrying back to the kitchen. I took two.

‘Delicious,’ I mumbled, smiling at the dark-skinned man.

The buns were so hot they were still steaming.

The man nodded, but made no move to help himself. The woman kept her eyes downcast almost all the time, glancing surreptitiously around only now and again.

‘The storm seems to be on the way out,’ I said, sinking my teeth into the second bun. ‘The wind is easing, and the temperature is rising.’

The man gave a slight nod. The woman didn’t move.

The Germans passed us on their way down into the wing. They had grown tired. One day in the midst of the storm had been sensational, a unique experience to write home about. Now, well into our third day of isolation, nothing was exciting any longer. Their restlessness was not helped by the fact that Berit had restricted the sale of beer. The taps would not be opened until seven o’clock. This was the third time I had seen the three young men get up and move elsewhere in less than twenty minutes, with no apparent goal or purpose.

Bearing in mind all that had happened during these three days, I was more and more surprised by the atmosphere in the hotel. With every harrowing experience that occurred, it took less and less time for people to settle down. Most looked as if they were bored, but there was an air of patience about the tedium. A sense of resignation over the way things were, a quiet conviction that all would be well if we could just get through one more day on the mountain. The brief glimpse of normal weather we had seen out over the lake had of course helped, but I was still fascinated by the way in which the guests appeared to distance themselves from their own horrific experiences, and the fact that two people had been murdered. It seemed as if I was the only one who feared the night that lay ahead of us, the only one who was conscious of the fact that a murderer was still at large, and that we had no way of knowing whether he planned to strike again. The remaining members of the church commission had resumed their bridge tournament, which I found positively distasteful.

On the other hand, we all needed peace and quiet.

I couldn’t see Kari Thue, which was just as well. Mikkel and his gang had taken over St Paal’s Bar once more, and were idly listening to music, while Mikkel sat with his feet on the table rocking his chair back and forth, a laptop on his knee. Judging by the mechanical sounds and his abrupt movements over the keyboard, he was playing some kind of game.

‘Could you all listen, please!’

Berit’s voice had grown stronger since the evening before last, when she had told us there was no need to worry. Now she could be heard everywhere; even the lads in St Paal’s Bar were startled out of their comatose state and leaned forward to listen.

‘The wind has now dropped to a stiff breeze. The temperature has gone up to minus nineteen. There is no possibility of anyone reaching us tonight, but I think we should be prepared to move out tomorrow. Since it is also snowing less heavily than it has been for the past few days, I would like to ask for volunteers to help open up all the exits. The main entrance has already…’

I hoped I was the only one to pick up on her hesitation. Only those of us in the know were aware that the entrance had been cleared that morning.

‘… Johan cleared the main entrance this morning when the wind began to drop,’ she went on after a pause no longer than a breath.

I liked Berit more and more.

‘But the opening needs to be made bigger. We also need to clear all the emergency exits. Up to now we have allowed them to become blocked by the snow, which is strictly against the law. I would ask those who are willing to pitch in to go and meet Johan outside the ski room. It’s next to the inside porch, if anyone hasn’t found it yet. We have clothes and boots you can borrow.’

Three men at the table leapt to their feet. One of the handball team raised her hand politely.

I‘d be happy to help!’

‘Only adults,’ said Berit, smiling and shaking her head. ‘The weather is still pretty challenging. But thank you!’

Mikkel closed the laptop and put it down on the table in front of him. Then he got up slowly and prodded two of his well-built subordinates in the chest. They got to their feet without hesitation and followed him in the direction of the ski room. None of them glanced in my direction as they walked past.

‘I think I ought to spare them my input in this particular enterprise,’ said Magnus with a little smile.

He came and stood beside me but didn’t sit down, although there was room on the sofa.

‘Instead I would like to talk to you.’

He glanced sideways at the Muslim couple, who were still clutching their glasses of water, and had not touched the buns.

‘In private,’ he murmured.

The Kurds didn’t seem to have any intention of moving.

The fact that they were still sitting there in the unusual atmosphere that had enveloped them most of the time since the train crash could only indicate one thing: I had interpreted Severin Heger correctly when he looked into my eyes for far too long before hurrying after Berit to lock himself in down in the cellar.

At least, I hoped so.

‘We’ll go into the office,’ I said, pushing my chair slowly away from the Millibar.

‘You asked me about the Public Information Service Foundation this morning,’ said Magnus Streng, munching away at a bun. ‘And I’ve given it some thought.’

He had helped himself to three buns from the basket as we left the Millibar, and gave one to me. I polished it off in four bites. Even Mary’s expertise as a baker fell short of these buns; they were incredibly light, with something that must be raspberry jam and vanilla cream hidden in the middle of the sweet dough as a delicious surprise.

I studied Magnus with interest.

‘I’ve come up with something,’ he said, swallowing. ‘Something that happened in the Public Information Service Foundation. I don’t remember exactly when it was, but it must have been eight or nine years ago. That’s when Cato Hammer was working there.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Well…’

Jam and cream oozed down his strong, square chin.

‘It was there that people first noticed the man,’ he said, looking around for something to wipe his chin with.

‘I didn’t,’ I said, handing him a wet wipe from the side pocket of my chair.

He shrugged his shoulders and opened up the little wipe.

‘OK. Maybe not you. But as far as I know and recall, that case was his… breakthrough in the media, I suppose you could say.’

‘What case?’ I said.

‘That embezzlement case,’ he said, slowly wiping his chin.

‘Cato Hammer was embezzling money? Embezzling?’

‘No, no, no! Just hold your horses!’

He rolled the wet wipe into a ball and placed it on the desk in front of him.

‘It was a female employee,’ he said. ‘She had psychological problems, and reading between the lines you could see that the whole thing was a real tragedy. A case of kleptomania combined with religious obsession and a weak mind. That’s how it was presented, at any rate. Reading between the lines, as I said.’

‘An unfortunate combination,’ I said, raising my eyebrows. ‘But what in God’s name has this got to do with Cato Hammer?’

‘He was the spokesman when it came to dealing with the media. You have to understand, this was potentially explosive for the church. The people’s church, the people’s money. And we’re not talking about an insignificant amount here. Three million kroner, if I remember correctly. Something like that. Big bucks. Since then we have seen Norway go to rack and ruin, with corruption everywhere and the theft of public resources as an everyday occurrence. But this was at a time when such things were still rare.’

‘Or at a time when the exposure of such things was rare,’ I corrected him.

‘That’s probably true,’ he said, nodding. ‘At any rate: Cato Hammer took care of everything. He must have had a position on the board, as I mentioned to you the last time we talked about this. I just can’t remember what it was. Anyway, he really put himself out there, as the papers say these days. Not on his own behalf, but on behalf of the institution. He apologized deeply and sincerely for what had happened, and promised a thorough review of the organization to ensure that something like that could never happen again. And in the middle of all this, he showed great consideration and respect for the unfortunate woman. Her identity was protected, her name was never made public, and the whole thing blew over eventually’

‘Blew over? Wasn’t it a legal matter?’

‘I expect it was. But the woman was seriously ill, and perhaps the press was being kind.’

We both burst out laughing; Magnus laughed loud and long.

‘No,’ he said, wiping away the tears. ‘There must have been something about it in the papers. But as I said it’s nearly ten years since it all happened, and I don’t remember every detail. On the other hand, I remember Cato Hammer very well. He was immediately profiled in a couple of the Oslo newspapers, and was a guest on several TV programmes. In less than a week he had an image: the caring leader. A fine representative for the church’s message of love, Cato Hammer. This was at the time when the men of darkness within the church were allowing themselves to be frightened into the light in order to put a stop to homosexual priests. Cato Hammer was exactly what the church needed at a time when many had begun to leave in protest. Gentle and simple and suitably cuddly. He became a pastor just a few months later.’

‘What a memory you have.’

‘I’ve been training it since early childhood! The brain is a muscle, you know. Not literally, of course. But it’s worth keeping it in trim.’

He smacked his lips contentedly and pushed the little wet-wipe ball around the table.

‘Betrayal and greed,’ I murmured.

‘What did you say?’

He looked up, one hand ready to flick the ball. He had placed an empty coffee cup on its side and was trying to get the ball into it. He kept missing, but wouldn’t give up.

‘Roar Hanson’s words,’ I said. ‘He was referring to an episode within the Public Information Service Foundation. But it doesn’t sound as if… Given what you’ve told me, it sounds as if Cato Hammer…’

‘… was guilty of neither betrayal nor greed,’ he went on as I paused infinitesimally. ‘More like the reverse, I’d say.’

‘Unless…’

I stopped.

‘Unless what?’

‘Nothing. Do you remember… do you remember what the woman was called?’

‘The guilty woman? No.’

He gave a brief laugh and finally scored a goal with the ball of paper.

‘There are limits,’ he said. ‘Even for me. I can’t remember a name that was never made public!’

Once again he became absorbed in the little game he had invented.

I had been struck by a thought, but hadn’t quite managed to catch it. However, something was different, and it was distracting me. Something had changed radically.

‘Listen,’ I said quietly, shaking my head.

‘Certainly,’ Magnus said pleasantly, his expression surprised. ‘And what would you like me to listen to?’

‘To something that is no longer there,’ I said.

There was almost complete silence.

The sound of the wind was still managing to penetrate the thick walls, but it had given up the attempt to tear Finse 1222 to pieces. The howling sounded distant and muted, as if it were no longer anything to do with us. We were safe indoors, behind walls that had protected people for a hundred years. This twisted, warped building had seen storms come and go for an eternity without suffering any significant damage. This time the attack of the storm had been fierce. It would take time to repair the damage. But the hotel at the highest station on the Bergen line had withstood the gales as it was built to do, and like the rest of us had relied on the fact that it would survive.

Magnus and I sat in silence for a few minutes, absorbing the fact that the storm was abating. The windows in the small office were still completely covered in snow. We couldn’t see the change, but we could hear it, feel it, perceive it with every sense except sight.

‘Wonderful,’ Magnus murmured, almost ecstatically. ‘It’s over. Tomorrow we can go home.’

His words jerked me out of an almost physical intoxication. A good dose of endorphins had given me an unfamiliar feeling of happiness, simply because the storm was abating.

The feeling quickly disappeared when Magnus started talking.

‘What is it?’ he asked kindly, almost lovingly.

‘This isn’t going to be easy.’

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, his voice devoid of expression. ‘I don’t understand.’

A deep furrow appeared at the top of his nose.

‘There’s nothing to be sorry about,’ I said hastily. ‘It’s just that I can’t understand how we’re going to be able to leave here tomorrow.’

‘But the storm,’ he said, gesturing with his left arm. ‘It’s obviously on the way out, and -’

‘There is absolutely no way the police are going to let us leave,’ I said calmly.

‘Not going to let us… What do you mean?’

‘There’s a double murderer among us. It would be dreadful police work if they simply let everybody leave before they’ve secured all the clues, interviewed everybody…’

I stopped for breath.

‘There’ll be an absolute outcry,’ said Magnus. ‘A revolution. Mutiny. Nobody in this hotel, with the possible exception of you, me and the hotel staff, will agree to be kept here once it becomes physically possible to leave.’

‘Exactly,’ I said.

‘And what are we going to do about that?’

I was desperate to go home.

My back was hurting and it was difficult to take a deep breath. It felt as if a vice were tightening around my chest. I was reminded of the reason why I had been on the train that derailed: I was on my way to consult an American specialist about all the problems I was now suffering from.

‘I know,’ I said breathlessly. ‘But fortunately it will soon be time for dinner.’

Magnus Streng got to his feet and came around the table. Then he took my head between his big, chubby hands and placed a feather-light, fleeting kiss on my forehead. He didn’t let go, but gazed into my eyes.

‘Hanne Wilhelmsen,’ he said, clearly amused. ‘Things can never go really badly for a person with your appetite. Come on, let’s go and persuade Berit to give us a little aperitif. I didn’t get a drink when I needed one, so it will taste all the better now.’

When he opened the door and went ahead of me into the lobby, I thought he wasn’t waddling any more.

I’m used to good, homely food.

When I was injured in the shooting, something dramatic must have happened to my metabolism, because my weight plummeted and since then I have remained slim, in spite of an appetite that can sometimes be a real pain, both to me and to others.

Mary is a real expert when it comes to cooking.

However, I have never tasted a better cauliflower soup than the one that was served as a starter at Finse 1222 on Friday 16 February 2007. Small florets of cauliflower, the most boring and tasteless of all vegetables in Norwegian cuisine, lay floating in a soup so rich and strong that I wondered how it was possible to get so much aroma into something that basically tasted of cauliflower with a dash of cream.

‘Wonderful soup,’ said Magnus, asking for more. ‘The mountain air really does give you an appetite. My compliments to the chef. Once again.’

He winked at the waiter, who smiled back.

I put down my spoon. Once more I had allowed myself to be carried down the stairs so that I could have dinner in the dining room. All in all, I had accepted more help from people in the past twenty-four hours than in the last four years put together. Berit, Geir and Johan were also at the table. Just like yesterday.

We were getting into a routine.

‘And how are things looking outside?’ Magnus asked enthusiastically. ‘Is it possible to get an idea of the damage?’

Both Geir and Johan had been outside for the last few hours. They looked completely exhausted; Geir was almost falling asleep as he ate.

‘It’s strange,’ said Johan, enjoying his soup. ‘Very strange. Most of the buildings have completely disappeared.’

‘Has the storm taken them?’ Magnus enquired expectantly. ‘I suppose they’re down there somewhere. Under the snow.’

Geir gazed blankly down at his bowl.

‘At any rate, there won’t be any family winter holidays up here. I’d really prefer to let the summer do the job, and melt all the snow away. Which probably means we’ll have to wait until August.’

He gave a long, drawn-out yawn, without a trace of embarrassment.

‘We managed to dig out the snow plough,’ he went on. ‘That Mikkel is a real hard man. Tomorrow we can start clearing the platform. It’s almost stopped snowing. The wind is still blowing hard, but it’s significantly less strong than it was. And it’s dropping by the hour.’

‘The railway company is going to have a hell of a job with the track,’ Johan muttered. ‘But fortunately that’s not my problem.’

‘Does this mean,’ said Magnus, wiping his mouth thoroughly with a large serviette, ‘that we’ll be picked up by helicopter?’

Johan nodded.

‘I should think the first group will be picked up early tomorrow morning.’

I was still surprised that none of them was thinking about the fact that two murders had been committed.

‘How are things over in the wing?’ I asked.

‘No idea,’ said Johan with a wry smile, then he leaned forward and said quietly: ‘In view of what that guy said about the… situation over there, I thought it was best to leave them snowed in for a while longer. The last thing we need is that gang storming in here. When I was over at the Red Cross depot picking up the satellite phone, I could tell they hadn’t made any attempt to dig themselves out. Nor has anybody else, for that matter.’

He grinned and shook his head.

‘The biggest building looks like a roof somebody has just thrown down on the snow.’

Magnus looked around in bewilderment. Johan must have forgotten that the little doctor was the only one at the table who didn’t know about the four people in the cellar. He was in the office when Berit came and told us that somebody was trying to dig their way in, but he had never been told who they were. He hadn’t asked. Nor did he do so now.

‘Have you had enough, sir?’

The waiter smiled at Magnus, who immediately reverted to his normal, jovial self.

‘I’m looking forward to the next course,’ he said, pouring himself another glass of wine.

‘You picked up a satellite phone?’ I said to Johan, trying to appear uninterested. ‘Does that mean we can now communicate with the outside world?’

‘It should do,’ he nodded. ‘But I haven’t managed to get it working yet. I don’t really understand why. I expect I’ll be able to fix it this evening. It’s not really a problem, after all. I mean, it’s not as if we need to call for help. The rescue services know we’re here.’

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Veronica come down the stairs into the dining room. As usual, Adrian was trailing behind her. She stopped, looked around and sat down at a free table. Adrian bent down to her. She whispered something. The boy nodded, picked up two of the four chairs at the table and carried them up to the long table in the lobby.

Veronica stared fixedly down at the table. Her black hair hung like a curtain in front of her face, and she didn’t look out until Adrian came back and sat down on the empty chair. Now they didn’t need to worry about unwelcome companions at their table.

Her make-up was exaggerated. I wondered whether she really was that pale, or whether she used some kind of stage make-up. On the first evening there had been something absurd about the young woman, but now she was starting to lose her grip. The black lines around her eyes were no longer so sharply drawn. Her hair was so greasy that the brown roots along her parting showed up even more clearly. She had taken back the sweater Adrian had borrowed. As she answered the waiter’s questions, she kept anxiously fingering the Valerenga logo on her stomach. She was bouncing her heels nervously up and down on the floor. She still had Adrian’s red socks on her feet.

Veronica never carried a bag.

Odd.

I have little pockets here and there on my wheelchair, so a handbag would be superfluous. And I very rarely use make-up. When I was still able to walk, I usually managed with just the pockets in my jacket.

Women who wear make-up don’t do that. Kari Thue, for example, never let go of that ridiculous little bag with the straps. She clutched it tightly as if it contained the crown jewels, for which she was entirely responsible. I looked over at the bottom table, where she had gathered her entourage. Five other women were sitting around the table, four of them with handbags that were either hanging over the back of the chair, or at the owner’s feet. Kari Thue had placed her bag on her knee, to be on the safe side.

Women take their handbags seriously.

Almost all women. But not Veronica.

On the plate in front of me lay a piece of venison. The sauce was a deep brown colour, almost red. Where the chef had got hold of fresh asparagus during a snowstorm in February was a mystery. I picked up a spear with my fingers and tasted.

‘I don’t understand this,’ I murmured, eating it slowly just the way that delicious, tender asparagus should be enjoyed.

Veronica had had a bag.

I licked my fingers one by one. They tasted of salty butter, with a faint hint of Parmesan.

In the left-hand side pocket lay Adrian’s list, his notes on some fifty people and the bags they had brought with them from the train. I had hardly given the list a thought since I saw it for the first time. I placed the sheets of paper on my knee and smoothed them out. The beautiful handwriting flowed over the densely filled pages, perfectly legible. Now that I had a considerably better overview of my fellow passengers than when I asked the boy to compile the list almost two days ago, I was even more struck by how observant he was.

Really skinny woman with even thinner hair and a terrible voice; light brown almost yellow bag, can be worn as a rucksack. Doesn’t look heavy. Not very big. Keeps her eye on it all the time!

Fat git with pale hair; laptop case. Brazilian flag on the flap.

‘What have you got there?’ asked Magnus Streng. ‘Have you tasted this sauce, Hanne? Cranberry, I think.’

I wasn’t really listening to him. My eyes moved down the list.

There.

Veronica.

She was one of only six people Adrian had mentioned by name.

Veronica. Cool girl wearing Gothic clothes and an Enga top; black shoulder bag. Not big, but looks a bit heavy. I think she’s got a bottle with her. (Hope so, anyway!)

‘Your food’s getting cold,’ said Berit, pointing at my plate with her fork. ‘Eat!’

‘If you had something valuable,’ I said, folding the list up carefully before tucking it back in the pocket, ‘here in the hotel, I mean, would you have chosen to drag it around with you? In a bag, for example? Or would you have put it somewhere? Hidden it?’

‘I’ve got cupboards I can lock,’ said Berit with a smile. ‘And a safe as well. Why?’

‘Obviously,’ I said, trying not to sound impatient. ‘But if you were one of the guests?’

She popped a large piece of meat in her mouth and didn’t answer before she had finished chewing and swallowed it.

‘Hidden it, I think. It would depend on the size, of course.’

I measured about twenty-five centimetres between my index fingers.

‘Well. Carting something like that around involves a certain element of risk. I mean, you could leave your bag behind somewhere, just misplace it. It’s probably easier to steal something out of a bag than from a hiding place in your hotel room. On the other hand, it’s fairly easy to get into the rooms here. If you’re intent on stealing something, that is. We rely on people’s honesty, and in principle that always works out well up here on the mountain. Has someone… has someone stolen something from you?’

‘Oh, no. It was just something that occurred to me. A thought. Nothing really. By the way, have you got a list of all the guests? With names and addresses, I mean.’

‘Yes. I’m assuming things could get a bit tricky when it comes to…’ she smiled apologetically before going on, ‘when it comes to who’s going to pay. For board and lodging and… I’m sure it will be some insurance company. Norwegian State Railway’s insurers, or the individual guests’. I don’t know. But I have to have the names in any case.’

‘Could I have a copy of the list?’

‘Well, I don’t know whether…’

‘Please. It could be important.’

She looked from Magnus to Geir as if they could clarify, in their roles as doctor and solicitor, whether the list might be subject to some kind of rule of confidentiality. Neither of them spoke. I wasn’t even sure they’d grasped what we were talking about.

‘OK,’ she said eventually. ‘After dinner.’

‘Just one more thing,’ I said in a whisper. ‘Do you think you could find out what Kari Thue was actually going to do in Bergen? And whether those people she surrounds herself with are people she met on the train, or if they already knew each other? If they were going to the same place, I mean?’

‘Can’t you just ask her?’

‘She doesn’t like me.’

‘She doesn’t like me either.’

‘But your position means you can camouflage the question. You could say that -’

‘OK, OK,’ she mumbled, her mouth full of food. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’

Calm settled over our table.

Veronica and Adrian were also eating in silence. Adrian wiped his soup bowl with a piece of bread, stuffed it in his mouth and emptied his beer glass before he’d finished chewing.

It certainly wasn’t the staff who were providing him with alcohol.

Beneath the table, Veronica’s red feet were dancing up and down, nervously and continuously.

I stared at her for so long she might have felt it. At any rate, she suddenly looked up. I looked away as quickly as possible, only to realize that Kari Thue was staring intently at me, and with far less discretion than I had shown towards Veronica. Mikkel, whom I hadn’t noticed until now, was heading slowly towards our table. Halfway across the floor he hesitated, took one step towards us, then suddenly speeded up and ran up the stairs to the lobby. His two strongest companions sat back down uncertainly at the table just behind Kari Thue, as if they weren’t quite brave enough to follow without their leader’s permission.

Magnus Streng was insatiable. He ate and ate. I liked him. I liked him very much, but I didn’t really know why. I didn’t understand the man at all. He was unusually friendly and outgoing, but he also had a unique way of suddenly taking offence that bordered on presumption. Sometimes he almost seemed conceited, or at least over-fond of his superior intellect, his impressive level of knowledge and his memory. One moment he could appear to be wallowing in the misfortune of others, for example when he couldn’t hide his hopes that the entire community of Finse had been devastated by the storm. At the same time he showed a concern for other people, an insight and understanding into their lives that I found touching. Magnus Streng was a man who could be deeply serious, which in itself was a rare quality these days.

Now he was asking for even more food. The grease from the sauce was smeared around his large mouth like Vaseline, and I had to turn away.

Geir Rugholmen, on the other hand, was a simple soul.

Face value, that’s what the Americans say about people like him.

Perhaps he was the only person among all the adults at Finse 1222 who I could definitely say had not murdered either of the priests. Geir was a genuine man who said what he thought and was in a position to rise above most things. He would be a useless liar, I imagined, quite simply because he wouldn’t see any point in lying. It didn’t matter to Geir Rugholmen what others thought about who he was and what he said.

He was simple. Totally uncomplicated.

People like that don’t commit murder. They turn their backs and move on.

That was what I believed. Absolutely.

It was more difficult to get a handle on Berit Tverre. She had changed over this last couple of days. She had become so different that I barely recognized her from that evening during low season when we came tumbling into her hotel, demanding care, food, lodgings and protection from a storm of which even she was afraid. Absolutely terrified, to be honest. She had changed so radically that it made me uneasy.

While the others at my table ate their way through the main course and dessert, I looked around. My companions were chatting and laughing, relieved because it would all soon be over, and because most things would soon be back to normal. Meanwhile, I let my gaze roam over a collection of people I would never forget.

The woman with the knitting was knitting. The dog owners were watching the clock and keeping an eye on their pets, who were tied up in the lobby, gazing longingly at the aromatic plates from which we were eating. The young handball players were giggling in the way that fourteen-year-olds do, and the Germans were happy because they were allowed to knock back beer and sing drinking songs that made others laugh in embarrassment. The members of the church commission were sitting at a long table of their own; some were drinking wine, others water, and the knitter had a glass in front of her containing a liquid that looked like whisky.

Perhaps it was apple juice.

Perhaps they were just as anxious as I was.

But they were hiding it well, all of them.

I was starting to feel sure I knew who had murdered Cato Hammer and Roar Hanson.

However, one of many problems was that people were not behaving in a manner that matched my theories. They were certainly opening the way for other ideas about connections and causality. Since every theory must be refutable in order to be valid, I ought to dismiss the idea that had been growing stronger in my mind over the past few hours. I ought to start again from the beginning.

I didn’t want to do that. Not yet, anyway.

An even bigger problem was that the weather had seriously begun to change. Through the top part of the window in the dining room I could see that it had stopped snowing.

To put it simply, I didn’t have much time.

What’s more, I had lost my appetite.

I can’t remember when I last left good food lying untouched on my plate, but I just couldn’t manage a single piece of the delicious venison with cranberry sauce, and asparagus that the chef had got hold of from goodness knows where.

If only the snowstorm had gone on for a little bit longer, I thought; and allowed the waiter to take my plate back to the kitchen, virtually untouched.