Burned

Chapter 30

He lets it ring a long time. Perhaps her display informs her that it is him? Or she might have got a new mobile and not transferred the numbers from the old one? Or maybe she has quite simply deleted him? Or she is busy doing something? Like having a life.

He is surprised when she finally picks up. He could and probably should have hung up after the tenth ring, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Her voice is awake when she says ‘hi, Henning’. He replies:

‘Hi, Nora.’

Christ, how it hurts to say her name out loud.

‘How are you?’ she says. ‘I heard what happened.’

‘I’m good.’

‘You must have been terrified?’

‘More angry, really.’

That’s actually true. He isn’t trying to come across as some macho action hero. He did get angry, mainly because he didn’t want his life to end like that, in a crescendo, in the middle of something unresolved.

They fall silent. They used to be very good at silence, both of them, but now it is merely uncomfortable. She asks no followup questions. He starts a conversation before it gets too awkward. He imagines that she doesn’t want to seem overly concerned about his welfare if Gundersen is in the room with her.

‘Listen, I’m working on a story and I came across an article you wrote about a gang, Bad Boys Burning, about six months ago. Do you remember?’

A few seconds of silence follow.

‘Yes. They had a bust-up with another gang, if I remember rightly. Hemo Raiders, or someone like that.’

They sound like a nice, friendly bunch, he thinks.

‘That’s right.’

‘Four or five of them ended up in hospital. Stab wounds and broken bones.’

‘Right again.’

‘Why are you writing about them?’

He debates whether to tell her, but remembers that they work for rival newspapers and that trust is a closed chapter in their joint book of memories. Or, partly closed, at any rate.

‘I’m not writing about them. Or, at least, I don’t think so.’

‘BBB is no joke, Henning.’

‘I never joke.’

‘No, I mean it. Some of those boys are psychopaths. They don’t give a toss about anyone. Do you think that they’re behind the murder of Tariq Marhoni?’

Oh, Nora. She knows him far too well.

‘I don’t know. It’s early days yet.’

‘If you decide to go after them, Henning, then be careful. Okay? They’re not nice people.’

‘It’ll probably be all right,’ he says, thinking how weird it is to discuss stories and sources with Nora again. Journalists inevitably end up talking shop. When you live together as well, it just becomes more shop. Until the whole thing topples.

He worked too much for a while. When he finally got home, Nora was so tired that she didn’t want to hear another word about newspapers. It all got too much. It was his fault, obviously. That, too. It is becoming the pattern of my life. I manage to destroy even the finest things, he thinks.

He thanks her for her help and hangs up. He stays on the sofa, staring at the telephone as though she is still down the other end. He presses the telephone against his ear again. Nothing but silence.

He is reminded of a double murder in Bodo he covered some years ago. Before Nora went to bed, one of the first nights they were apart, he called her. They spoke for half an hour, longer possibly. When he heard her yawn, he told her to put the handset on her pillow but not hang up. He wanted to hear her sleep. He sat in his hotel room, listening to her breathing which was rapid to begin with. Then deeper and deeper. Then he lay down, too. He doesn’t remember if he hung up. But he remembers how well he slept that night.