1222

12

‘He answered no to your first question. This is a written answer to your second question.’

Geir handed me a sheet of paper, placed a large glass of strong beer on the desk, sat down on a chair he had moved across from one of the other work stations, and stroked his beard. It now covered his cheeks completely, thick and dark with greyish streaks at the corners of his mouth. He pushed a substantial plug of snuff under his lip. I didn’t really understand what he was waiting for. I didn’t need him any longer. It was possible that he had read the message from Severin Heger, but by no means certain. If he had, it wouldn’t have meant anything to him, so I had no need to worry.

There was just a name; a name and a few simple facts on a piece of white paper.

Margrete Koht. Born 14.10.1957. Died 07.01.2007. Convicted of embezzling 3,125,000 Norwegian kroner in 1998. In-patient at Gaustad Hospital from the date of the verdict until her death.

Margrete, that was it.

During my last conversation with Roar Hanson, he talked about a woman. I had tried to remember the name, just as I had tried to remember everything Roar Hanson had said and done. The key to the murder of Cato Hammer lay with Roar Hanson. I was convinced of that. I had spoken to him and seen him devastated by mental agony during the last twenty-four hours of his life, and I had hoped that in spite of Adrian’s interruption and the priest’s own hesitancy, I might find clues and answers in what remained of him within my memory.

But I hadn’t been able to recall the woman’s name. It was mentioned in passing, and disappeared in my own confusion about the man’s disjointed talk of the Public Information Service, which I thought was an organization that had something to do with meat and vegetables.

It was when the two of us were working in the Public Information Service. I remembered his voice had trembled slightly. I mean, Cato was… He took a deep breath and held it as if he needed to brace himself. I really can’t understand why I didn’t raise an objection at the time. Why I didn’t do anything. And Margrete… I can’t bear it. Of course I couldn’t have known, but it seemed so… unthinkable that he would…

As soon as I saw the name on the piece of paper, I remembered what Roar Hanson had said. Word for word. I closed my eyes and saw him standing there in front of me. Nervous and shrunken. Watchful glances in all directions. He sat there hitting his painful, injured shoulder as he talked, a middle-aged priest doing penance for a sin that wasn’t even his own.

Perhaps he didn’t see it that way. He had talked about Cato Hammer’s betrayal and greed, but he was just as devastated by his own guilt, his own failure to raise the alarm about something I was beginning to think I had worked out.

‘Isn’t there something you should be doing?’ I asked without looking up from the piece of paper. ‘Clearing some snow? Digging out some houses? Anything, really.’

It was nine thirty on Friday evening.

From the lobby I could hear laughter and quiet music. One of Mikkel’s gang had speakers with his iPod, and for the first time since the accident the clearly defined boundaries between the different groups from the train were becoming blurred. Middle-aged ladies were laughing as they bobbed around the floor dancing, celebrating the fact that the storm had abated. The fourteen-year-olds were allowed to sit with the bad boys. Eventually I had felt compelled to whisper in Berit’s ear that the boys were busy getting two of the handball players drunk. The church commission had temporarily dissolved itself, and its members were dispersed throughout all the different rooms, relaxed from the effects of red wine and various other beverages. Elias Grav’s widow was the last person I saw as I fled to the office, weary of all this happiness. She was still shocked following her husband’s death, but at least she had come down from her room and politely asked for something to eat. The cheerful and friendly assistant from the kiosk had put her arm around the widow’s shoulders and accompanied her down to the dining room.

Johan still hadn’t got the satellite phone working, so I had been left with no choice. I had been forced to ask Severin for help.

When I watched him hurry down to the cellar after the others earlier in the day, I had decided to forget all about the secret carriage. It had nothing to do with us, and that was that. The murders of Cato Hammer and Roar Hanson were a different matter altogether from this business of the men who were determined not to let anyone near them, and who were hardly likely to emerge from their hiding place until Finse was virtually empty. When the rest of us had gone, picked up by Sea King helicopters or trains or all-terrain vehicles, only then would the four men in the cellar leave the hotel and eventually be conveyed to their destination, probably under cover of darkness.

I had decided to file the whole issue in the section allocated to things that were nothing to do with me.

But then I needed them after all.

‘My, but you’re in a bad mood,’ said Geir. ‘I thought you’d cheered up a bit.’

He picked up the glass of beer in both hands. His index fingers made patterns in the condensation as he turned the glass around slowly.

‘I’m not in a bad mood,’ I said, still not looking up from the piece of paper giving the name of the woman Cato Hammer had so brutally betrayed, if my assumptions were correct. ‘I’m sad.’

I smiled briefly to take the sting out of what I had just said, and added:

‘Did it go all right?’

‘Well, I’m not sure I’d put it quite like that.’ He drank some of his beer. ‘At first they didn’t want to open the door. I had to talk to your mate for bloody ages through it. As far as the gun went, the answer was a flat no. Not that I know what you want with…’

I gave him a quick warning look.

He put down the glass and held up his hands, palms facing me.

‘No questions. I promise. But it didn’t take long for him to understand your query. He was prepared to help with that, at any rate. Eventually he pushed that piece of paper out through a crack this narrow’ – he measured a centimetre between his thumb and index finger – ‘before he shut the door again. What was it you actually asked?’

He raised his hands again and stopped speaking.

‘They’ve got the very best equipment,’ I murmured. ‘I’m absolutely certain they have the best communication equipment there is. And at the other end there are people who have access to all the information in the world. Data. Registers. Everything. If Severin would just agree to help me, I knew things would work out.’

I wasn’t sure if I was talking to him, or just summarizing for myself. I had taken out Berit’s list of names, and my gaze settled on one of my fellow passengers. One of the guests had a name that didn’t help me get where I wanted to be.

But I had made significant progress.

I hoped I had got far enough, and I folded up all the papers and tucked them in the side pocket where Adrian’s list already lay. There was a weather report on the desk. Berit had given me an odd look when I asked for it, but had given me a copy without any fuss. One of the staff had mapped the progress of the storm from Wednesday morning until an hour ago. I searched for what I needed. Then I folded that sheet of paper up as well and put it with the others. Unfortunately Berit hadn’t managed to find out why Kari Thue was going to Bergen. I suspected that she had forgotten to ask.

‘Hanne,’ said Geir. ‘Yes?’

‘Do you trust me?’

‘Yes.’

‘I mean, do you really trust me?’

I looked up and into those grey eyes. Or brown. Or blue-grey. It was difficult to tell, actually.

I nodded. It was true. I did trust Geir Rugholmen.

‘In that case, can’t you tell me about those four men in the cellar? After all we’ve gone through up here, I think I deserve to know.’

‘You deserve nothing,’ I said. ‘Apart from a medal for gallantry. A prize for a victorious campaign against the storm. An award for putting up with yours truly for two days. Which looks like turning into three.’

He grinned, and the juice from the tobacco ran down between his front teeth.

‘I don’t want anything like that. I just want to know what that extra carriage was about.’

‘I don’t know,’ I said in all honesty.

‘Rubbish,’ he said.

‘No, I really don’t know. But I do have a distinct feeling.’

‘Which is?’

‘Shall we have a smoke?’ I said. ‘Have you got any cigarettes?’

He looked around, slightly confused.

‘Berit will be furious.’

‘Of course. Forget it. I think they’re guarding a terrorist. I think they were transporting a terrorist to Bergen.’

‘A – a terrorist? But what would… why the hell would they be taking a terrorist to Bergen?’

‘I’ve no idea,’ I said. ‘There are both prisons and military institutions in Bergen as well, you know. At any rate, he was being moved.’

‘Moved where? And why? What makes you even think there’s a terrorist on Norwegian soil? And on the Bergen train!’

‘Keep it down,’ I hushed him. ‘The fact that I’m sharing my theories with you doesn’t mean the entire hotel has to know.’

‘The entire hotel? Everybody here knows about that bloody carriage! And how are they going to explain this, when everybody can just leave and say what they like to whoever they like?’

He took a quick breath.

‘You cannot begin to imagine,’ I said quietly, ‘what kind of cover stories the authorities can cook up. In the end you almost believe them yourself, in spite of the fact that you know the real truth. I’ve experienced it myself, Geir.’

I left it at that.

In the spring two years ago, I hid the American President in my apartment for several days. This utterly absurd situation ended when she shot dead an FBI agent. That same evening the story was distorted, simplified, and conveyed to the public in a way that frightened the life out of me. But most of all, and extremely reluctantly, I was impressed. There were still only a handful of us who knew the truth about the American President’s visit to Norway, and that was the way it was going to stay.

‘Believe me,’ was all I said. ‘Right now, well-paid and well-equipped specialists are sitting there cooking up a story that all these people…’

I jerked my thumb over my shoulder in the direction of the lobby.

‘… will swallow hook, line and sinker.’

‘But what about me? I mean, I can say what I like when -’

‘As I said,’ I broke in. ‘I trust you. Besides which, no one is likely to believe your story.’

‘My story,’ he repeated. ‘So far I haven’t got a story. Why do you think… what makes you think this is to do with a terrorist? Here?’

He was still immensely worked up. A vein was throbbing at the side of his neck, and his face had taken on a different flush from when he had been out in the storm for several hours.

‘The scope of it,’ I said, trying to force tears to my dry, smarting eyes. ‘The planning needed to carry the whole thing through. The insanity of it.’

And the fact that the Foreign Secretary himself is involved, I thought, without saying it out loud. The only reason I could see why they had the minister’s telephone number as a contact to inspire confidence in case of a crisis was that they were absolutely one hundred per cent dependent on being believed without any further questions. They needed an authority figure with a voice everyone recognized.

‘The insanity.’

Geir had fallen back into his old bad habits. He had reverted to repeating what I had just said.

‘We talked about it, don’t you remember?’ I asked. ‘Outside the cold room? We decided it must be a high-risk prisoner. Who was in a position to be able to make demands. Don’t you remember that?’

‘I suppose so…’

He fished out the snuff with his index finger and threw it in the bin. Then he wiped his hand on his trousers and gulped down the rest of his beer.

‘You said it was absolutely ridiculous to move a prisoner by train,’ he said, suppressing a belch. ‘You said it had to be every police officer’s worst nightmare. And that they must have planned the entire journey taking all eventualities into account. Wind and weather and power failure. Possible escape routes. All the way from Oslo to Bergen.’

I nodded.

‘But a terrorist.’

He still couldn’t utter the word without looking as if he’d just swallowed a wasp.

‘In Norway?’

‘Souhaila Andrawes,’ I said drily. ‘One of the most wanted terrorists from the 1970s. She lived here for several years with her husband and children in a nice little apartment in Oslo before she was discovered and unmasked. And many people also feel that Mullah Krekar isn’t exactly an honoured guest in our country. But nobody has managed to dig him out yet. Not that I’m taking a stand on…’

I shrugged my shoulders instead of completing the sentence.

‘This is something completely different,’ muttered Geir, looking around for something else to drink. ‘I’m going for another beer. Do you want anything?’

I did, really. A big glass of good red wine would be wonderful.

‘Just a Farris,’ I said. ‘With ice, please.’

‘I won’t be long. Don’t go. Don’t go!’

I had no intention of going anywhere.

Geir was right. The case of Mullah Krekar was something completely different from our current situation. The only threat he posed was that he was still legally resident in Norway, many years after the first attempts to throw him out came to nothing. It was true that Mullah Krekar had given various ministers with responsibility for foreign affairs a headache, but he was hardly a danger to others. At least not in this country.

I could understand Geir’s scepticism. I was sceptical myself. But my terrorist theory was the only one that could explain this absurd mystery. The whole thing was so huge, so spectacular and so unnecessarily risky that I couldn’t imagine the Norwegian authorities going along with something like this unless…

‘You’re still here,’ said Geir, putting down the glasses before closing the door. ‘I’ve been thinking.’

And you interrupted my train of thought, I wanted to say.

I picked up my drink and felt the coldness of the glass. The ice cubes clinked delicately and the wind was now so far away that I could hear the faint hiss of the carbon dioxide.

‘You know,’ said Geir, settling down, ‘there could be something in what you say. Terrorists have more bargaining power than other prisoners. Much more. They have information about future attacks on civilian targets, about terror cells, about… And besides…’

He looked thoughtful and seemed to be examining something in the foam on the top of his beer.

‘The Americans are stupid,’ he said calmly.

‘I’m not saying that.’

‘Just imagine the dilemma that would have arisen,’ he said, addressing the air in front of him and putting down the glass of beer without having a drink, ‘if a terrorist were seized on Norwegian soil. A Norwegian terrorist blasting his way into a Norwegian embassy, for example. Or the Norwegian forces in Afghanistan having… You see what I mean!’

He was animated now, resting his elbows on his knees. His breath smelled of beer and snuff, and he thought for a few seconds before he carried on, making a point of emphasizing certain words.

‘I’m not talking about some idiot who carries out the odd attack on the synagogue in Oslo. I’m talking about a real terrorist. One that the Americans want. One they want more than anything! One who has helped to strike a blow against American interests.’

Suddenly he leaned back and folded his arms.

‘They would never have got him,’ he said in a surprisingly low voice.

‘I…’

‘They can’t have him! Norway would not be able to extradite a terrorist to the USA, however good the Americans’ reasons for putting him on trial might be. We couldn’t do it, however much we might want to. Neither we nor our closest allies for the past sixty years could do that. A tricky situation for both parties, to say the least. They would never have got him.’

‘Because they have the death penalty for terrorism,’ I said slowly.

‘Yes. Yes!’ He slammed his fist down on the desk. ‘Which means that we -’

‘The USA could promise not to make use of that law,’ I interjected. ‘Norway extradites prisoners to countries that have the death penalty as long as we receive guarantees that the death sentence will not be imposed or carried out.’

‘But they-’

‘The USA is a country we trust,’ I said, raising my voice. ‘There is no doubt that someone like… a central figure within al Qaeda, for example, would have been handed over. Al Qaeda has killed thousands of Americans. They have the right to demand it, for fuck’s sake!’

Now I was the one raising my voice. I don’t know who was most surprised, Geir or me. He smiled sweetly. Picked up his glass. Had a drink.

‘I doubt whether the Americans would have made such a promise,’ he said after an embarrassing pause. ‘And then everything immediately becomes more complicated. But let’s not fall out. This isn’t actually my main point.’

‘So what is your main point?’

With everything that had happened over the past couple of days, I had forgotten that Geir Rugholmen was a solicitor. To me he was a man of the mountains. A local hero in shabby mountain clothes, a resident of Finse.

That was the way I had come to know him.

The way I liked him.

‘I thought your speciality was property,’ I said, more sourly than I had intended.

‘That’s right,’ he said, inserting a new plug of snuff. ‘But my wife is also a solicitor. She deals with completely different issues from me.’

There was an invitation in his words. I was supposed to ask what his wife did.

‘You said you had more ideas.’

‘If we toy with the idea that you’re right,’ he said, poking at the snuff with his tongue, ‘and that there actually is a terrorist down in the cellar…’

Once he had actually spoken the words out loud, he started to laugh. His laughter was even more girlish than before. Panting, almost giggly.

‘Sorry,’ he said, raising one hand, ‘but it’s just so…’ He shook his head and swallowed, pulling himself together. ‘Well,’ he continued firmly. ‘If we really are dealing with a terrorist here, then it isn’t the Norwegian authorities he should be most afraid of, or hard-hitting interrogations, or a difficult journey over the mountains.’

I knew I was tired and I did actually have a damaged auditory nerve, but I was beginning to wonder if I was suffering from auditory hallucinations. Since the storm had abated I had been able to hear a faint rushing sound in my ears. It was as if the sound of wind and whirling snow had attached itself to my eardrum for good. But the deep, monotonous hum that I could hear far, far away had nothing to do with the weather. I swallowed and opened my mouth wide so that my ears popped. Geir didn’t appear to notice.

‘Our friend the terrorist ought to be afraid of the Americans,’ he said, rubbing the back of his neck. ‘Not only do they have an ugly history when it comes to liquidations outside their own country, but they -’

‘That was during the Cold War. Everything was different during the Cold War, and we ought to be more sympathetic towards -’

‘Hanne!’

Geir slammed his fist down on the desk. The glass of beer was still half full. It fell over. He leapt to his feet and backed away to avoid getting wet.

‘Shit. Shit! What’s the matter with you?’

‘With me? I’m not the one who just knocked a glass over!’

‘Are you the American ambassador to Norway, or something? Don’t you understand what I’m saying? Haven’t you realized that the Americans literally kidnap prisoners in other countries and put them in their horrendous camps? If a terrorist really has been caught or sought refuge on Norwegian soil, then it’s the Americans he ought to be afraid of! They would go to any lengths.’

He pushed the spilt beer across the desk with his hand. It splashed onto the floor. A sweet aroma of malt and alcohol pervaded the room.

‘It wouldn’t surprise me if the bloody Yanks had a man on the train,’ he said angrily. ‘Or several, in fact. If your crazy theory is correct, then I understand why the terrorist insisted on travelling by train. An attack on the railways is much more difficult to cover up than a carefully arranged plane crash. One strike against a plane, and everybody dies. To kill all the passengers on a train, you’d have to… Bloody hell!’

The front of his trousers was soaking wet.

‘I haven’t got any clothes down here,’ he groaned. ‘And I don’t feel like going out and shovelling snow. Shit.’

The noise outside had grown louder. The humming had turned into a throbbing, even roar.

‘Quiet,’ I said. ‘Can you hear that?’

He stood there with his legs apart looking as if he had wet himself. His expression sharpened, with narrowed eyes and his mouth slightly open.

‘A helicopter,’ he said, fascinated. ‘They’re here already?’

He had forgotten his wet trousers.

I put aside all thoughts of terrorists and American attacks on foreign soil. It struck me briefly that the story of the secret prisoner was a sign of how small the world has become. Even in Finse, the Norwegian mountain village where the train struggles up through valleys so Norwegian that you imagine you can see nineteenth-century paintings flickering by outside the windows; even now, in a snowstorm, in ultra-Norwegian isolation in an old National Romantic wooden building, even here the outside world has made its presence felt. The presence of the terrorist was life’s reminder that the world was no longer so alien or so far away; it was here with us, always, and we were a part of it whether we liked it or not.

But I didn’t want to think about the terrorist.

Instead I thought about Cato Hammer and Roar Hanson.

‘They’re coming! They’re coming!’

The lobby was in joyous uproar. People were clapping and laughing as if they were sitting on a charter flight that had just touched down on the runway. A few were raising their glasses in a toast, while others were starting to gather their belongings as if they thought they might be going home in ten minutes. The fourteen-year-olds had already started putting on their outdoor clothes; none of them wanted to miss the spectacle of a heavy helicopter landing on deep snow.

‘They can’t land,’ said Johan. ‘There’s no way they can land on this powdery snow. The thing will tip over!’

He was standing at the window by the long table, watching the lights as they approached over Finsevann. The helicopter was low in the sky and moving slowly. The searchlights swept from side to side across the vast expanse of snow. The ice crystals glittered so beautifully in the dazzling, blue-white light that some of the older ladies gasped out loud. As the machine came in above the roof and we lost sight of it, there couldn’t have been more than twenty metres between the ridge of the roof and the helicopter. The whole building was shaking, but this time the racket was not a sign of a threatening danger. This noise was a welcome consolation, a greeting from the lives we really lived, far away from both Finse and a storm that we didn’t yet know had been given the name Olga.

All those who had seen the helicopter coming ran to the front door. Even Adrian seemed excited. He left Veronica sitting alone by the kitchen door with those stupid cards spread out on the floor. He was chatting enthusiastically to one of the girls from the handball team, as if he’d completely forgotten how cool he actually was.

‘They can’t land,’ Johan said again.

A metallic voice sliced through every other sound and most people stopped dead before they even reached the door.

‘This is the police. I repeat: this is the police. We are going to winch down three men. Stay away from the station platform. I repeat: everyone must stay away from the platform.’

Johan sighed with relief, then ran towards the door.

‘Move away!’ he shouted. ‘Inside, everybody! Stay away from the door! Inside, all of you!’

The teenagers protested defiantly. A couple of men started arguing outside the kiosk, and Mikkel had to intervene. The lady with the knitting started crying again, loudly and piercingly. Berit came running from the kitchen.

‘Calm down!’

Over the past couple of days Berit had become a new person. She had acquired a strength that surpassed Johan’s, despite the mountain man’s indisputable physical superiority. From being an ordinary hotel landlady with a pleasant nature, Berit had taken control at Finse 1222.

‘OK, we’re going to remain completely calm,’ she bellowed, paradoxically with a smile. ‘Go and sit down either in Blåstuen or St Paal’s Bar – and I mean everybody. Come along!’

People calmed down. They shrugged their shoulders and glanced at one another. Nobody said anything much, but they moved back into the hotel as one man, removing hats and outdoor clothes. A few shuffled along slowly and sullenly, others strutted along arrogantly, heads held high, as if they had been proved right in some way, although I had no idea what this could possibly be.

‘This is the police,’ the metallic voice intoned again. ‘We are asking everyone to remain indoors during the operation. I repeat: everyone must remain indoors.’

Kari Thue was not in the lobby. When I thought about it, I hadn’t seen her since dinner. Perhaps that wasn’t so strange; I had spent most of the time in the office, and hadn’t seen anybody except Geir Rugholmen.

But I didn’t like it.

Severin had sent for the police. In the letter Geir had smuggled to him, I had not only asked who had embezzled funds from the Public Information Service Foundation at some point towards the end of the nineties, I had also asked him to inform the authorities that there had been not only one murder at Finse 1222, as they had been told before communication with the outside world broke down, but two.

People moved towards the side wing as the helicopter’s rotor blades sent deep vibrations through the battered hotel. The disappointment over the fact that the helicopter had not come for them, that the journey home was postponed, the embarrassment at having got excited and happy for no reason meant that everybody had a long face as they passed by without looking in my direction.

I just stayed where I was in the middle of the floor, waiting.

Although one of the police officers gave me an almost imperceptible nod as he walked past on the way down to Blåstuen, none of them seemed to recognize me from the old days. When I saw them, two men in their thirties from the Bergen police authority and an older man from the National CID, I felt a pang. They reminded me of the fact that I had once been part of something different, something bigger than life on Krusesgate with Nefis, Ida and Mary. For a long time I had felt as if that cold, dramatic December night in 2002 was not just the end of an epoch; my break with the police service was just as much the beginning of something new. Something I had wished for. The injury made it possible to create an existence for which I had the strength, a life where I was seldom afraid and never worn out.

When I saw the three officers talking quietly together, using an abbreviated language they were trained to interpret, and with glances only they could decipher, I wondered if I had been fooling myself. These years of silence, these days that were longer than I ever imagined days could be, the nights of loneliness in front of the TV, all these months that followed each other smoothly and without friction, when the only reminders that the year was passing were Christmas celebrations and Ida’s wonderful birthdays: was this what I really wanted?

I had thought I had swapped one life for another. After these days at Finse, it struck me that I had actually swapped a vital, ambitious life for an existence in waiting.

During the night I waited for the others to wake up. During the day I waited for Nefis and Ida to come home from nursery. I waited in the company of books, films and newspapers, I allowed time to pass by without really bothering about anything except a little girl who would soon need so very much more than the endless oceans of time I was able to offer her in our closed little universe.

Geir appeared behind me and placed a hand on my shoulder.

‘We’ll finish our conversation later.’

I could feel the warmth of his rough hand through my sweater. I closed my eyes, dizzy with tiredness. Exhaustion. Longing, perhaps, for Ida and Nefis, but also, I realized reluctantly, for another life.

They knew who I was, the police officers.

They didn’t know me, but they knew who I was. One of them had merely glanced in my direction, but there was a kind of respect in that look. Admiration, perhaps. The older man turned around. Berit had said he was from the National CID. He looked at me expressionlessly for a brief moment before raising two fingers to his forehead and nodding slightly.

Everyone was to assemble downstairs in the wing.

Including me.

I didn’t know for certain who had murdered Cato Hammer and Roar Hanson. But I was quite convinced that I knew who Roar Hanson had suspected. As soon as I began to have my suspicions, it wasn’t difficult to find evidence that supported the murdered priest’s theory. The man had in fact tried to tell me the name of the person who would later murder him. Grotesquely, there was already a great deal to indicate that he had been right.

But not enough.

I could share my thoughts with the police. That was what I ought to do. They could treat my statement in the way that this kind of statement should be treated, in a targeted process involving facts and speculation, forensic evidence and tactical considerations, rumours, carelessness and precise observation.

That would take time.

A difficult time for everyone in the hotel, and for those who were running it. For Berit and her staff. And for me. I wanted to go home.

Perhaps I should let Roar Hanson solve his own murder.

‘Can you organize some coffee for me?’ I asked Geir. ‘The biggest mug you can find.’

‘It’s late. Don’t you think you should -’

‘Coffee,’ I repeated with a smile. ‘I need to sharpen my little grey cells.’

‘Please yourself,’ he said without so much as a hint of a laughter line appearing around those chapped lips with brown tobacco juice at the corners.

Perhaps I hadn’t been quite as amusing as I thought.

As yet no one from the other buildings in Finse village had emerged from their snowed-in existence. Presumably they were waiting for the all-clear. Besides which, it was late and still bitterly cold. As far as the people in the wing were concerned, the Red Cross personnel had dug their way out and made contact with Johan. After a short conversation with the police, he informed us that everybody should stay calm. They had evidently managed to get the situation under control after the mutiny earlier, and the police wanted to deal with one thing at a time.

One building at a time, if you like.

I closed my eyes and imagined what it must look like out there, with snow so deep that there was no one alive who could remember anything like it. Hurricane Olga had left behind a station community that was neither a station nor a community; most of the houses were invisible, and the railway line had disappeared. And beneath all this, beneath an inconceivable number of hexagonal ice crystals, dry and almost weightless in the biting cold, beneath this immense covering of air and frozen water that stretched from Hallingdal to Flåm, from Hardanger to Hemsedal, beneath all this there were people, tiny as insects, who didn’t yet dare to believe that the whole thing was over, and that they could creep out into the world once more.

I really hoped I would leave here in daylight.

I wanted to see it all.

I opened my eyes.

The atmosphere at Finse 1222 was discontented and expectant at the same time. Most people were still affected by disappointment over the fact that the helicopter had not come to begin the evacuation. On the other hand, it was as if the murder of the two priests, from which most people had managed to distance themselves because they couldn’t cope with the knowledge that there was a murderer among us, had suddenly become a brutal reality when the investigators arrived. The three police officers brought with them a reassuring, safe air of authority; they came up to the mountain with elements of the society that still existed out there, where there were laws and rules and order. The police were here, the storm had abated and nothing was really all that bad any longer.

People around me were finally able to appreciate what they had lived with, how they had lived. And it was exciting.

I saw them coming.

Kari Thue and her entourage marched in with determination, practically doing the goosestep, with Kari at their head. They sat down at the far side of the room, next to the terrace. Mikkel’s gang were no longer so disciplined; they came in one by one, ambling along, the skinniest one with a half-smoked cigarette butt dangling from the corner of his mouth. The older ladies and the handball players, the men with their laptops under their arms, Johan and Berit and the Germans, they all walked past me on their way into the wing to hear what the powers of law and order had to say.

Finally, along came Mikkel himself. As usual, he barely looked at me.

‘Mikkel,’ I said. ‘Can I ask you something?’

He shrugged his shoulders and took a step towards me, his expression indifferent.

‘Like what?’

‘Why were you going to Bergen? What were you going to do there?’

‘Concert. Maroon 5. Missed it. It was yesterday.’

He turned away and carried on walking.

‘Mikkel! Mikkel! Come back here, please.’

Two steps back.

‘Did you know Kari Thue before you met her here?’

‘Slightly,’ he said, a fraction too quickly. ‘But only slightly.’

He was determined to go this time, so I gave up.

Adrian and Veronica were still sitting by the kitchen door, next to the green cupboard with gourds painted on it. They were playing their peculiar game and didn’t even look up when the knitter from the church commission stood on the jack of clubs.

‘May I?’ said Geir, placing a hand on my wheelchair.

I nodded, and he pushed the chair carefully down the three steps.

The Muslim couple were almost the last to arrive.

‘Stop a minute,’ I said quietly to Geir, ‘and let them pass.’

People were gathering in Blåstuen. The Kurds went and sat by the window right next to the little half-wall separating the room from St Paal’s Bar, on a sofa they had all to themselves for the time being.

‘Come along, Adrian,’ I called over my shoulder. ‘You too, Veronica.’

They really were an odd couple. I was no longer surprised that Veronica had picked out the boy as soon as we arrived. In some ways they suited each other very well: two lost, truculent individuals who refused to be like other people. Who refused to be with other people. Whom other people refused to be with.

But I hadn’t forgotten what Adrian said about Veronica the first time he interrupted Roar Hanson in his hesitant attempts to make his confession.

I remembered it very well, because I think he was lying when he said it.

Veronica was still sitting on the floor by the kitchen door. She had picked up the cards, and was shuffling them as elegantly as a poker player.

‘You too,’ I called.

For the first time since I met Veronica, she seemed unsure of herself. On the one hand she wanted to demonstrate her independence. On the other, she was smart enough to realize she would look like a stubborn brat if she didn’t go along with everybody else.

The police had arrived. They had issued an order. Everybody was doing as they were told.

Including Veronica, once she had thought things through.

Several times during the past couple of days Veronica had reminded me of a cat. She got up reluctantly from the floor with soft movements. She padded across the floor in a slight arc, as if she were on the alert, approaching her prey. Only now did I notice that she had her bag with her once more, a medium-sized shoulder bag I hadn’t seen before.

I’d only read about it, on Adrian’s list.

‘Not there,’ I said quickly as she headed towards Adrian.

I pointed in the opposite direction.

‘There! You too, Adrian. Sit over there by the fire. On the sofa. There’s plenty of room.’

I pointed to the Muslim couple.

Fortunately both Adrian and Veronica did as I said. I hadn’t really expected it to be that easy. The youngest police officer gave me a sceptical look, and it seemed as if he was about to say something. But he closed his mouth.

‘My name is Per Langerud,’ said the oldest of the three detectives, clearing his throat with his hand in front of his mouth. ‘First of all I would like to take this opportunity to express…’

It was probably difficult to find the right word.

‘… my sympathy,’ he said eventually, ‘for the incredibly difficult situation in which you have found yourselves over the past few days. I realize that you all want to go home as soon as is humanly possible. And I can assure you that is what will happen.’

A delighted murmur rippled through the room. Someone applauded tentatively.

‘I did say as soon as possible,’ said Per Langerud, raising his voice. ‘Which means when we have carried out the most essential aspects of our investigation. The more cooperative you are, the quicker our work will proceed. But I’m afraid none of you should expect to leave before tomorrow afternoon at the earliest. Perhaps not until -’

‘Tomorrow afternoon,’ shouted Mikkel, getting to his feet. ‘Fuck that! I’m leaving here as soon as it’s light.’

‘Me too,’ said the lady with the knitting. ‘I want to go home. I have to get home. My cat is all alone and I wasn’t going to…’

‘We don’t have to put up with this,’ said Kari Thue, gaining the support of the older businessmen who had been hanging around her for the past couple of days. ‘What right do you have to stop us from leaving here as soon as it’s feasible? You have the right to hold me here only if you have reason to suspect me of committing a criminal offence, which you don’t.’

‘Quiet!’ shouted Per Langerud in a voice that broke from baritone to bass. ‘I can assure you that we have the right to -’

‘Fuck it,’ said Adrian suddenly, getting up from the sofa and taking a threatening step towards Langerud.

The boy looked comical more than anything; he was fifty kilos lighter and at least twenty years younger than the police officer. But still he hissed: ‘We don’t even know if you really are cops. I’m leaving here tomorrow if I have to.’

‘Are you going to ski?’ I asked loudly. ‘Is that what you’re all intending to do? Put on your skis and ski down?’

The younger officers had moved closer to Adrian. I signalled to them to leave him alone. They drew back hesitantly and sat down right on the edge of their seats, ready to leap into action. Several of the fourteen-year-olds were crying and sobbing. The knitting lady had once again buried her face in her handiwork, which by this stage must have been completely ruined by snot and tears.

‘You will stay here for as long as the authorities decide you will stay here,’ I said loudly. ‘For one thing, you have no way of leaving here under your own steam.’

The implacable logic in this simple statement made an impression. The teenagers snivelled and wiped their eyes. Mikkel sat down. It was so quiet that I could hear the click of the needles as the lady from the church commission once again began knitting frenetically, before she suddenly stopped and put down the half-finished sweater.

‘You will sit here and listen to what the police have to say.’

My voice was trembling, but I didn’t know if it was because of nerves or rage. Both, probably. Despite the fact that I felt neither angry nor anxious. Just exhausted.

‘And nobody is leaving here until the police give us permission to do so,’ I added when there was total silence.

Per Langerud ran his hand over his chest as if the rough bobbles on the old woollen cardigan would disappear with a little brushing. Adrian was right when he said these men didn’t look like police officers. Langerud was wearing knee breeches, slightly too tight, and grey socks that were conversely too loose, and kept on slipping down over his high ski-boots. The younger officers looked as if they were on their way to an aprés ski session at Geilo. Both were wearing blue jackets. I knew they cost around six thousand kroner, and their ski-boots were probably in the same price bracket. You definitely don’t buy clothes like that on a police officer’s salary. Perhaps they had been told to go off and shop for their own equipment for the expedition, and had taken the opportunity to blow the state’s entire purchasing budget.

Langerud took his time. Ran his hand over his chest again. He tried to tug at the tight knee breeches a little with his thumb and index finger. Then he examined his knuckles and shook his head, as if he could hear a strange sound that no one else was able to perceive. Only when everybody had had the opportunity to feel really embarrassed did a forgiving smile spread over his angular face. He opened his mouth.

‘Excuse me,’ I said loudly. ‘Excuse me, Inspector.’

I took a chance on the title. It found its mark. He turned towards me. He looked surprised, annoyed and curious all at the same time.

‘I was wondering whether… Could I possibly have a word?’

‘With me?’

‘Yes.’

He held out his hand in an inviting gesture.

‘Carry on.’

‘Could you perhaps come over here for a moment?’

He frowned again, his expression encapsulating more feelings than I could read. He probably thought the easiest thing would be to listen to what I had to say. And perhaps the most sensible thing too. At any rate he came over to me, and when I waved my index finger he leaned down and put his ear to my mouth.

He smelled of sweet aftershave and coffee.

When I had said my piece, he slowly straightened up.

It was no longer difficult to interpret his expression. I knew exactly what he was thinking. He was doubtful. What I had asked for was far from normal procedure in a murder enquiry. If either of us had dared to take the time to think about it, we might have realized it probably wasn’t even legal. There was at the very least good reason to question the ethics of what I was asking him for. He ought to say no. Both his age and the task he had been given indicated that Per Langerud was an experienced and skilled police officer.

That was why he said yes.

Or rather: he nodded. It was the tiniest, most imperceptible nod, but it conveyed his consent. I had his permission to try, and he turned away so quickly that I suspected he didn’t want to infect me with his doubts.

‘I have been given permission,’ I said, rolling my chair closer to everyone else, cto ask a few questions first. Before the police do what they have to do, and we can all go home.’

Three police officers, a handful of hotel staff and Red Cross personnel, a gang of girls dressed in red with ponytails, some doctors, Kari Thue and Mikkel, Magnus and the lady with the knitting, the Germans and the rest of the passengers from the derailed train: they were all looking at me, and only at me. I could see contempt and curiosity in their eyes, expectation and impatience, indifference and possibly something reminiscent of fear. But not where I had hoped to see it.

Suddenly I didn’t know what to say.

The silence was so strange.

I still had a rushing sound in my ears, but this echo against my eardrums of a storm that had died away was the only thing I could hear in the big room. These people would start kicking off at any moment, they would protest, demand that something must be done, something must be said. I would lose this opportunity in a few seconds.

‘Why are you wearing Adrian’s red socks?’ I asked, looking at Veronica.

Somebody sniggered. Others shushed them.

A fine, slender furrow divided her forehead.

‘I borrowed them,’ she said slowly.

‘Sorry? Could you speak up, please?’

‘I borrowed them. My feet were cold.’

Her expression left me in no doubt of what she thought of me. Her voice, which was already remarkably deep, became even deeper.

‘Adrian was cold and I lent him my sweater,’ she added. ‘My feet were cold and he lent me his socks.’

‘But not at the same time,’ I said. ‘He borrowed your sweater that very first evening, or at least before he settled down to sleep. You borrowed his socks the following day.’

She gazed blankly straight ahead. Her gaze was fixed on me, but it didn’t look as if she was seeing anything at all. The thin, crooked line on her forehead was gone, and she was once again a deathly pale creature utterly devoid of expression.

‘Whatever,’ she said, pushing her hair behind her ear.

A contemptuous snort could be clearly heard from the far side of the room. The sound was easy to recognize.

‘Kari Thue,’ I said loudly. ‘I realize you’re impatient. You’re not interested in borrowed socks and sweaters. But I can ask you a question straight away. Could you stand up, please? I can’t see you very well from over here.’

No reaction.

‘OK,’ I said. ‘But I’m sure you can hear me. How did you know that the storm eased at around three o’clock on the night Cato Hammer died?’

Still she sat there, quiet as a mouse. I couldn’t see her, but I suddenly saw a hare in my mind’s eye, a little brown terrified hare pressing itself to the ground, thinking it can make itself invisible.

A sense of unease spread around her.

‘Answer the question, then.’

‘She asked you a question.’

‘I didn’t know that the storm had eased at around three o’clock,’ said Kari Thue, without getting up. ‘How can you say that I -’

‘When the rumour started,’ I interrupted her. ‘When people started saying that Cato Hammer had run away, you added weight to the theory of a stolen snowmobile by informing everyone that the storm had eased just then.’

‘I suppose I must have been awake at about three,’ said Kari Thue, still invisible to me. ‘There’s nothing odd about it, I just happened to be awake! I noticed things were calmer outside.’

‘Yes,’ I agreed. ‘You were awake. And yes, the storm had in fact eased for a while just then. The weather log confirms that.’

Now she got to her feet. She smiled triumphantly at her entourage and they smiled back, with a slight hint of anxiety.

‘Exactly. In which case I don’t really understand why-’

‘However, you did state that you were asleep,’ I broke in. ‘In the morning when you came down into the lobby, you complained about how heavily you had slept. You believed it was irresponsible of Berit to let the guests sleep all night. We could all have had concussion, you insisted, and should have been woken up.’

‘But I -’

‘Judging by the evidence, Cato Hammer was murdered at about three o’clock. Were you asleep or were you awake? At three o’clock, I mean. I think you have to choose one or the other, since it isn’t possible to combine the two alternatives. When were you lying; then or just now?’

It occurred to me that I liked this. I was enjoying it.

‘I was… I was awake. But only for a few minutes because I… I had to go to the loo. Then I slept heavily.’

‘OK.’

I adopted an indifferent expression before turning my attention to Mikkel.

‘So I expect you went to the loo as well. At about three o’clock in the morning on Thursday.’

He blushed. He actually blushed.

‘We’ll leave it there,’ I said. Tor the time being, anyway. But let’s ask everybody else: who was awake at three o’clock on Thursday morning?’

An arm was raised. It was one of the staff, a lad of no more than twenty who had spent more or less the whole time since the accident in the smallest of the offices behind reception.

‘I was on night duty,’ he said tentatively. ‘I was in the office all the time.’

One of the doctors gave a sign.

‘I was awake for most of the night,’ he said, without any attempt to disguise the sarcasm in his voice as he went on. ‘As some people might remember, there was a terrible storm. It kept me awake. But I didn’t get out of bed.’

Another hand went up. And another. Several more followed. In the end I was able to establish that no fewer than thirty-two people admitted to having been awake for the whole night or parts of it. All of them, except for the lad on night duty, swore that they had remained in their rooms. Most of them had been sharing a room with others, but this didn’t really constitute an alibi. Kari Thue was right about one thing, anyway: most people had enjoyed a deep, dreamless sleep after the violent experience and the depredations of Wednesday 14 February.

‘And what about you,’ I said, looking at Adrian. ‘Were you asleep?’

‘Me? Why the fuck are you asking me? I wasn’t fucking sleeping. I mean, I was sleeping in the same…’ He stopped and started again. ‘I was sleeping in the lobby. Just a few metres from you, for fuck’s sake.’

‘And what about you,’ I said to Veronica. ‘As I understand it, you were the only person who begged for a single room right away on Wednesday?’

‘I didn’t beg,’ she replied calmly. ‘Nobody wanted to share a room with me. I got the distinct impression early on that I’m not exactly what you’d call popular.’

She looked me straight in the eye.

She didn’t mention Adrian. She didn’t reveal that the boy would have been more than happy to share far more than a room with her.

That was considerate. Almost kind. Adrian had been holding his breath. Now he let it seep out slowly as he picked at a spot near the top of his nose.

‘In that case I am really only interested in you two,’ I said.

The Kurdish man looked at me in surprise.

‘Us?’ he said enquiringly, running his thumb over his beard. ‘We were asleep, of course. I’m afraid we’re in the same situation as her. Nobody exactly complained when my wife and I were given a room to ourselves.’

The alleged wife gazed at her folded hands without expressing anything at all. A few seconds passed, and she gave no sign of either confirming or contradicting the man’s statement.

Another loud snort came from the direction of the window.

‘Kari Thue,’ I said, and had to swallow in order to control my voice. ‘Is there something you’d like to say? Something you’d like to share with the rest of us?’

Per Langerud cleared his throat. I had almost forgotten him, in spite of the fact that his brooding figure was just a metre away, off to the side behind my chair. I turned my head and noticed him glance almost imperceptibly at his left wrist.

‘Two minutes,’ I whispered with my hand covering my mouth. ‘Give me two more minutes.’

I didn’t know if he had agreed to my request before I raised my voice dramatically and said:

‘Kari Thue. What have you got in your handbag?’

‘That’s got nothing to do with you.’

‘No. But I expect the police will want to know what’s in there.’

Langerud took a step closer and gently touched my shoulder. I understood the warning, but I couldn’t give up yet. Nor did I want to.

‘If you have nothing to hide, then I don’t see why it’s a problem to tell us what’s in your bag. I mean, you never let it out of your sight. Is it something valuable? Or is it something more… compromising?’

‘I don’t have to put up with this!’

She was on her feet again, pressing herself against the window with her arms wrapped around that ridiculous bag that looked like a rucksack.

‘Nobody… nobody can insist on looking in my bag!’

So far she was quite right. Nobody could insist on looking through her things. What’s more, I had a pretty clear idea of what was in there.

Presumably she was carrying around some kind of electronic device. A USB drive, perhaps. A memory stick. It wasn’t many weeks since I read that she was just finishing a book based on her work on the documentary film Deliver Us From Evil. The title of the book was to be For Ours Is The Kingdom, and was expected to do well in the bestseller lists in the autumn.

Whenever Nefis is nearing the end of a scientific work, she becomes paranoid about losing any of it. The small diskettes are therefore stashed everywhere, at home and in the car, in her study and in the office down in the cellar, in case of fire, burglary, a computer crash or indeed nuclear war. Nefis and Kari Thue have very little in common. However, I presumed that most writers share the fear that a piece of work to which they have devoted a great deal of time could be lost.

Kari Thue also had something else in her bag. Something she didn’t want us to see. It could be something quite innocent, like a packet of cigarettes. Apart from her anti-Muslim crusade, she wielded her sword against all forms of tobacco products, and had played a not insignificant role in shaping opinion when the new smoking ban was introduced. A packet of cigarettes in her handbag would of course be embarrassing. Or she could be hiding something a little more spicy, such as a clever little aid from one of those shops you might prefer to access via the computer in your own bedroom. The bag wasn’t large, but it was big enough.

I assumed.

No doubt she had make-up. A packet of chewing gum or throat sweets. A notebook, pens and a little pack of tissues. I presumed that the contents of Kari Thue’s bag were more or less typical of her sex, apart from the fact that there was something in it that she wanted to keep to herself at all costs. I intended to let her do so.

All she had done was sleep with Mikkel. She was probably in love with him. He had spent part of the night after the accident with Kari Thue, and had shown a certain amount of interest in the endless, monotonous message she spread. But that was all. The quarrel I had observed between them was presumably a good old-fashioned break-up. Unpleasantly done, of course, dumping someone at a table where lots of other people could hear, but neither of them had done anything criminal.

Kari Thue was still standing up.

The people around her were looking curiously at her bag, which she was clutching to her chest as if it were a beloved child someone was threatening to snatch away from her. Her eyes were big and wet; she was on the point of bursting into tears.

Kari Thue would be allowed to keep her secrets.

Before I met her, when I knew only the hard, impersonal debater from the television, radio and press, I despised her. Now I despised only what she stood for. I felt nothing but sympathy for Kari Thue herself. She was so afraid all the time, without really being aware of it. I have also lived a life where I was constantly afraid without realizing that was what I was. Fear made me withdraw and retreat inside myself. In Kari Thue, the fear created anger, an implacable, stubborn rage that was directed at far too many people.

Ever since Cato Hammer was murdered, I had hoped she would be behind his death. The need to hurt this person, to see her fall, be humiliated and destroyed, the desire to unmask Kari Thue had been so pressing that I had almost thought I could pull it off.

I feel sorry for people like Kari Thue.

But she hadn’t murdered anyone.

‘Sit down,’ I said calmly.

She looked at me suspiciously. The tears spilled over. Someone sitting nearby started sniggering. She was still clutching the bag. Her chin trembled and she was biting her lower lip, not daring to sit down.

‘You can sit down,’ I said. ‘Nobody is going to look in your bag.’

People looked from me to her, back and forth, as if we were playing tennis.

‘Adrian,’ I said, and all eyes turned to the new player.

The boy didn’t respond.

‘Yesterday morning,’ I said. ‘Yesterday morning I was sitting talking to Roar Hanson. You remember that.’

Adrian leaned back on the sofa with an expression indicating that he had no interest whatsoever in anything that was being said.

‘You interrupted us,’ I went on. ‘And Roar Hanson said something to you. You responded by telling him to mind his own business, in rather less polite terms. You remember that. Don’t you? Adrian? Adrian?’

I put all my strength into my voice. The lady with the knitting let out a terrified squeal, but Adrian still didn’t react. He pulled out a long strand of chewing gum then stuffed it back in his mouth, showing no interest whatsoever. I carried on:

‘I thought Roar Hanson said: “Wash your hands every day”. Which was of course a peculiar thing to say. But then Roar Hanson was a strange man. After Cato Hammer’s death, at any rate. I couldn’t really understand why he should be concerned about your hygiene, even if you definitely did need a shower.’

Like many others, I thought; the air was heavy with body odour and bitter coffee in spite of the high ceiling.

‘Then I asked you earlier today what he had actually said. I still suspected strongly that I had misheard. It was difficult to understand why you would react so violently to a quiet admonition to wash your hands.’

‘I can’t deal with this any more,’ said Adrian, suddenly getting to his feet. ‘I’m off. I’m not sitting here and -’

‘You’re going nowhere!’

Per Langerud took a step towards the young lad. Adrian sat down hesitantly. For a moment it looked as if he were weighing up the odds of getting away if he ran for it. They were dire. As indifferently as possible, he leaned back against the cushions.

‘Today you said he had told you to “watch yourself”,’ I said. ‘That was probably when I realized what he had actually said.’ I let my gaze roam across the room. ‘Because, you see, I am slightly hard of hearing. It isn’t really a major problem, but I don’t like not being able to see the person I’m talking to. If I get distracted for a moment, as I was during the conversation to which I am now referring, I don’t always pick up the whole sentence. With experience and association skills, it’s usually fine. But not always.’

An impatient whispering began to spread around the room. The smaller children were getting restless. Their parents were doing their best to keep them quiet, but I thought most people seemed genuinely interested in what I had to say.

‘This is almost like a word game,’ I said, looking at Adrian. ‘You told me the first word he said to you was “watch”. “Watch yourself”. Not “wash”. You insisted that was all he said, but I know there was more since the sentence “wash your hands daily” doesn’t make any sense.’

Someone giggled, the knitter laughed out loud.

‘So I started working on associations. It was easy. What Roar Hanson said when you came over to us was -’

‘You can’t know what he said,’ shouted Adrian. ‘You’re practically deaf, for fuck’s sake. You said so yourself! You can’t.’

Veronica had sat there motionless and silent the whole time, like the wax doll she resembled. Now she placed her slender hand on his thigh, and he stopped speaking at once.

‘“Watch yourself with her, she’s dangerous”.’

I said it loudly and very slowly.

‘That’s what Roar Hanson said to you when you replied “fuck you”, and it was Veronica he was looking at when he said it.’

Nobody said anything. Nobody moved. It was as if everyone wanted to go through my reasoning for themselves, they wanted to double check and work out whether it really was possible to mishear like that. They sat there lost in their own thoughts, their mouths moving soundlessly, tasting the words, the rhythm of the sentence, the uneven rhymes, and eventually they concluded that there was a logic in it.

There was still total silence. Even the children understood that something significant was happening; they clung anxiously and silently to their parents.

‘Your socks were wet,’ I said, looking at Veronica. ‘That’s why you had to borrow Adrian’s the following morning. It was Cato Hammer who insisted on going outside. He was so afraid when you made contact that he wanted to get as far away as possible from anyone who might hear you. You sought him out before the information meeting. Told him that your mother had recently died, and said that you wanted to have a serious talk with him. When you met during the night as agreed, and to be honest I don’t know where, he wanted to go outside for safety’s sake.’

I paused, and got the feeling that everyone was holding their breath.

After Cato Hammer’s death I couldn’t understand how someone had managed to lure him outside. It was only when I realized he must have been the one who wanted it that way that the pieces began to fit together.

‘You didn’t go far,’ I went on. ‘You were probably standing beneath the roof. He was just outside. You weren’t wearing any shoes. Most people had been in their stocking feet all evening, once the floor had dried and nobody was bringing snow in from outside. Looking for your boots in the middle of the night would have been much too great a risk. You went out in your stocking feet. When you came back in, your socks were covered in snow, which melted and left them soaking wet.’

Everyone looked at Veronica’s red socks.

‘That’s bullshit!’ Adrian yelled. ‘They weren’t wet. That’s not why Veronica wanted to borrow my socks. Her feet were cold, for fuck’s sake! That’s all – her feet were cold!’

She placed her hand on his thigh once again.

‘This isn’t true,’ she said calmly.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘More or less.’

Her face was no longer so pale. I thought I could see a faint hint of pink across her cheekbones and her mouth, which was turning upwards in a slight, almost imperceptible smile.

‘But of course a pair of socks is not enough,’ I said. ‘Your name is Veronica Larsen, isn’t it?’

She just looked at me. That Mona Lisa smile was still there.

‘Your name is actually Veronica K. Larsen,’ I said, emphasising the K, ‘or at least that’s how you’re registered on Berit Tverre’s list of the passengers from the train. And I would guess that K stands for Koht. Your mother’s surname.’

She shook her head slightly.

I rolled my chair a little closer, while making an effort to look as weary as possible. Presumably I overdid it, because some of the handball players started giggling. There were now three metres between me and Veronica Koht Larsen. I stopped and put the brakes on.

‘Finding out your name is the easiest thing in the world,’ I said calmly, looking her in the eye. ‘It would just be foolish to -’

‘It’s true,’ she interrupted. ‘Koht is my middle name.’

‘You mother is Margrete Koht,’ I said.

Now I was speaking only to her. I lowered my voice. Out of the corner of my eye I could see many of the others leaning towards us, some with a hand behind their ear. I didn’t help them; in fact I spoke even more quietly.

‘She was employed by the Public Information Service Foundation. An embezzlement took place within that organization. During 1998. A comprehensive deception that damaged the institution, and not only in terms of the financial loss. Your mother was picked out as the guilty party, and was later convicted. I have a strong feeling that she didn’t do it. She was either badly taken in, or perhaps… persuaded. To accept the blame for something she hadn’t done at all.’

I think she blinked. I can’t be sure, my eyes were dry and smarting, and I was blinking myself the whole time. But I think her eyelids moved a fraction.

‘You brought a gun with you on this trip,’ I said. ‘Something that is obviously going to make the police wonder if the murder of Cato Hammer was planned. I’ll leave that for now.’

Adrian flung his arms wide and roared: ‘Stop it! Stop it, Hanne! Veronica hasn’t-’

‘No, you stop it,’ Veronica said sharply. ‘Just shut up, Adrian!’

He glared at her with his mouth open before collapsing. It was as if the air slowly ran out through his gaping mouth until there was nothing left of the skinny boy’s body but a limp, soft shell.

‘You’re wrong,’ said Veronica, keeping her eyes fixed on mine.

‘You shot Cato Hammer,’ I said. ‘And you had a gun in your bag, which you kept hidden up in your room until now. Adrian noticed that something was in the bag when you arrived at the hotel. Not all that big, but heavy. He hoped it was…’

Adrian whimpered. I stopped, then went on:

‘Adrian thought it was something completely different.’

She didn’t even reach for the bag. It was lying there beside her, on the end of the sofa between her thigh and the armrest.

Not a glance at the compromising bag.

Not even the slightest quiver in her hand. She simply sat there, motionless as always, smiling enigmatically.

I hadn’t expected this.

I was sweating.

‘You’re the only one who’s had a room to yourself,’ I said. ‘The only one, apart from the staff. Of course you could have hidden the gun in the room and locked the door, but you thought it was safer to leave it in the bag and hide the whole thing. To be honest, I think you felt the revolver was difficult to deal with once you had killed Cato Hammer. You found it hard to look at it.’

She definitely blinked this time. The small tip of a wet, pale pink tongue ran over her lower lip.

‘But I don’t think that’s what stopped you from using it again,’ I said. ‘It was something quite different that made you murder Roar Hanson with an icicle, and I will come back to the reason why you didn’t choose to use the gun a second time.’

‘Icicle? Icicle! Icicle…’

The word ran through the room like a cockroach. At first it was whispered, then spoken out loud, and finally it was shouted; in disbelief and delight, with doubt and a huge exclamation mark: Icicle!

‘I didn’t understand that business with the icicle,’ I said quietly when Langerud had exercised his authority to calm people down. ‘An unusual weapon. Difficult to handle. It places particular demands on the attacker, not least in terms of skill and precision. But something Adrian had said came back to me.’

The boy was weeping. He had pulled off his hat and was pressing it to his face to muffle the humiliating sobs. I wanted to console him. I wanted to put my arms around him and rock him and say that he’d just been bloody unlucky yet again. I wanted to whisper calming words in his ear and reassure him that at some point in the future he would meet an adult he could trust. One day.

I couldn’t help Adrian. Perhaps no one could help Adrian.

‘Hanne Wilhelmsen.’

Per Langerud placed a hand on my shoulder, and I came to with a start.

‘Sorry,’ I mumbled.

‘Perhaps we ought to -’

‘No,’ I said. ‘No!’

‘I think this is -’

‘Adrian told me you’re a black belt in Tae Kwondo,’ I interjected, fixing my gaze on Veronica once more. ‘I thought he was lying. Or that you were lying to him. But it’s true, isn’t it? You are.’

‘I am a black belt.’

Hence the self-control, I thought, and took a deep breath.

‘If anyone could commit murder with an icicle,’ I said, ‘it would have to be a martial arts practitioner. You are also a genuine dog lover.’

Her tongue ran over her lower lip once again.

‘The only time you really bothered about anyone other than Adrian was when the dog died. Muffe. You were furious. You talked about laws and regulations, and you wanted to find out who was responsible. You patted the body and sympathized with the owner. It was a touching show of concern, given how dismissive you have been towards everybody else. Nothing would stop you from going into a room with a pit bull locked inside. On the contrary, you are one of the very few people in this hotel who would dare to do so. Possibly the only one, apart from the owner. That’s what I think, anyway.’

I smiled briefly, and noticed that I was having difficulty in breathing.

People were no longer sitting quietly. This had nothing to do with a lack of interest in my ridiculous public interrogation, a clear infringement of all Veronica’s rights and, moreover, without any perceptible stringency. When some people started whispering, and others didn’t even bother trying to talk quietly, when conversations were conducted across the room and grew louder and louder, it was because people were already convinced. Veronica Koht Larsen, the girl with the pack of cards who usually sat by the kitchen door, that scary creature dressed in black who always had that peculiar, grubby lad trailing behind her, was a murderer. The whole thing was so sensational it was hard to keep quiet. This was such a major experience that it had to be shared with others in order to become real.

I didn’t know what to do.

The pressure on my lungs was increasing, and once again I felt that searing pain from the wound in my thigh, the pain I shouldn’t be able to feel. I closed my eyes and gritted my teeth just as Veronica got to her feet.

The hum of conversation in the room stopped abruptly.

Nobody moved.

Veronica was also standing still. She had looped her bag over her shoulder before any of us had realized what was going on.

‘In that case,’ she said calmly, her voice clear and melodic, ‘can anyone tell me why the hell I would use an icicle as a weapon when you all seem to think I have a revolver in this bag?’

When the helicopter arrived, most of the guests had thought their stay at Finse 1222 was at an end. Many had fetched their outdoor clothes from various corners and from their rooms, and a few had brought down their small amount of luggage. Veronica was one of them. She had thought she was going home, and had brought her bag downstairs. Now she had slipped her hand inside it in an almost imperceptible movement.

‘Good question,’ I said loudly, and took a forbidden risk. ‘A very good question, in my opinion. Perhaps you would like to answer it yourself?’

‘That’s enough,’ said Per Langerud, moving towards Veronica with his hand raised in a calming gesture. ‘Let’s just take it easy and-’

‘Stop.’

She didn’t even raise her voice.

I was right. It was a revolver, not a pistol. And it was pointing at me. Veronica moved slowly sideways.

Somebody screamed and I closed my eyes.

When I opened them again, Veronica was lying on the ground face down.

The Kurd, or the man with the beard whom I had believed to be a Kurd, was sitting with his knee in the back of the skinny figure, locking her arms with one hand. The woman with the headscarf was also on one knee, holding a revolver in a two-handed grip as she pressed it to Veronica’s temple.

Per Langerud roared, and behind me I could hear someone running across the floor. I didn’t hear what they yelled, but I yelled back:

‘Don’t touch them! They’re our people! Don’t touch them!’

The three police officers stopped dead.

‘Let her get up,’ I said, moving my chair over towards Veronica.

The woman slipped her gun into its holster and grabbed Veronica’s revolver. With a practised, sure hand she opened the gun and spun the chamber around.

‘Empty,’ she said, sounding embarrassed. ‘No ammunition.’

‘Exactly,’ I said. ‘Empty.’

I had gambled with high stakes. Far too high, but I had won. I was so sure that the revolver was empty I had risked other people’s lives on the basis that I was right. Perhaps it was best if I stayed away from the police service after all.

But there was no good reason to use an icicle as a murder weapon if you had a revolver. Unless it was broken, or out of ammunition.

Veronica had had one single bullet with her on the train to Bergen.

I didn’t need to ask why. I was remembering another occasion, another time, in a completely different life. A man had inexplicably had two bullets in a magazine with room for nine. The explanation was that he had stolen the gun.

There were just two bullets in the magazine.

Both of them hit me.

Veronica had stolen a revolver containing what should have been exactly the right amount of ammunition. I didn’t know whether she had planned to kill Cato Hammer on the train, or in Bergen. It no longer mattered. She had done it here at Finse, and when Roar Hanson threatened to expose her, she didn’t have a second bullet. But she did have an idea. Veronica was a clever woman, and the refinement of a weapon that actually melted would have been admirable under different circumstances.

In theory, I mean.

Veronica was sitting motionless on the sofa. Her arms were locked behind her back in handcuffs. The three police officers were busy ushering everybody else out of Blåstuen. They had to get people away from Veronica, away from everything that had happened, and the three representatives of law and order were probably wondering how they were going to explain to their superiors what had happened.

Adrian was still sitting in Blåstuen like a forgotten rag doll that a little girl no longer cared about. He had stopped crying. The tears had left wide furrows down his grubby face. His nose was red and swollen, his eyes narrow.

‘Go,’ I said to him. ‘Off you go, Adrian. I’ll come and talk to you later. OK?’

He got to his feet and allowed himself to be led apathetically up to the lobby by Berit.

Veronica didn’t even look in his direction.

She looked at me instead.

‘My mother didn’t do anything wrong.’

‘Don’t say a word,’ I said. ‘I’ll get you a good solicitor. Don’t say any more until then.’

‘She was far too religious.’

For the first time she was showing signs of pure anger.

‘When Cato Hammer had been helping himself to funds for several years, and realized things were starting to get a bit uncomfortable, he managed… He persuaded her to take all the blame. He knew that she would protect the church, above everything. The church was everything to my mother.’

The words came pouring out of her. Some sentences sounded dead and flat until she suddenly raised her voice on the odd word. It was as if something had cracked inside the frail girl; she had to speak.

‘The church and me, that was all my mother had in the world. She would have done anything for both of us. But when my need for a mother was set against the church’s need for protection, I lost. Cato must have gone on and on about how much damage it would do to the church if one of its financial directors was convicted of embezzlement, told her that the whole church would -’

‘Veronica,’ I interrupted her. ‘I’m serious; don’t say any more right now.’

‘Wilhelmsen is right,’ said Langerud. ‘As soon as we’re done here, we’ll take you to Bergen, and you will of course have access to a solicitor there.’

‘Mum was just a simple secretary,’ she carried on, as if she hadn’t heard either of us. ‘A deeply religious secretary with access to a lot of money, and the authority to make payments. Money she never touched! A simple secretary with weak nerves, a great deal of anguish, and a blind faith in God. Both He and Cato Hammer betrayed her worse than… worse than…’

The tears came. But her voice remained steady.

‘I couldn’t get my head around the idea that she’d done it,’ she said. ‘Stealing money. What would she have used it for? It was a straight confession. Nobody made a big deal out of the fact that all the police managed to trace was 800,000 in a recently opened account. Cato must have given her the money in sheer desperation when it was clear that the whole thing was going to come to light. She said she’d frittered away the rest. I didn’t believe that. We never had much money. Then she got… She got sick, and she was put in hospital. I was only fifteen years old. Fifteen!’

She gasped for breath with a short panting sound.

‘For almost ten years she was locked up in a hospital. And she never told anyone she’d taken the blame for Cato Hammer. My childhood home was sold to cover the debt to the foundation. When she finally died in January this year, I found a letter among her papers, a letter she wrote in 1998. My name was on it. When I had read it I decided to-’

‘Shut up, Veronica!’ I said. ‘Langerud – do something!’

The big man squatted down in front of her.

‘My mother has atoned for both of us,’ she said expressionlessly. ‘And I have already paid too much. I couldn’t let Roar Hanson destroy… He said he was going to… He…’

‘Veronica,’ said Langerud. ‘That’s enough. OK?’

She looked past him. He gently took hold of her chin and forced her to make eye contact.

‘Be quiet!’

Suddenly he gave her a feather-light clip around the ear. It happened so fast I would have missed it if I’d blinked.

‘Do you understand? Do you understand?’

‘Yes,’ said Veronica Koht Larsen. ‘I understand everything. I wish I’d understood it long ago. If only I’d understood everything when I was fifteen, then…’

She didn’t finish the sentence. She had already talked herself deep into two premeditated murders, despite the fact that I would never pass the information on to anyone. Per Langerud couldn’t think that way, and too much had already been said. True, Veronica would not say another word, not for several months, but none of us knew that as she stiffly got up from the sofa.

She no longer reminded me of a cat. The woman who obediently followed Per Langerud through the big rooms in the side wing at Finse 1222 was not moving with stealth and suppleness. Her steps were short and stiff, with sudden moves to the side in order to maintain her balance. Her head was bowed. Even the black, loose clothes around her bony figure seemed greyer now, and made her look like a pencil mark that someone had tried hard to erase.

It suddenly occurred to me that that person was me.