Phantom

31

It was four o’clock and Harry was standing under a shower on the eighteenth floor of the Radisson Plaza. He hoped the gaffer tape would hold in the hot water — at least it was dulling the pain for a short while. He had been allocated room number 1937, and something fluttered through his mind as he was given the key. The king’s year of birth, Koestler, synchronicity and all that. Harry didn’t believe it. What he believed in was the human mind’s ability to find patterns. And where, in fact, there were none. That was why he had always been a doubter as a detective. He had doubted and searched, doubted and searched. Seen patterns, but doubted the guilt. Or vice versa.

Harry heard the phone peep. It was audible but discreet and pleasant. The sound of an expensive hotel. He turned off the shower and went to the bed. Lifted the receiver.

‘There’s a lady here,’ the receptionist said. ‘Rakel Fauske… My apologies. Fauke, she says. She has something she would like to give you.’

‘Give her a lift key and send her up,’ Harry said. He eyed his suit hanging in the wardrobe. It looked as though it had been through two world wars. He opened the door and wound a couple of metres of towel around his waist. Sat down on the bed listening. Heard a pling from the lift and then her footsteps. He could still recognise them. Quite firm but short steps, with a high frequency, as though she always wore a tight skirt. He closed his eyes for a second, and when he reopened them she was standing in front of him.

‘Hi, naked man,’ she smiled, dumping the bags on the floor and herself on the bed beside him. ‘What’s this?’ She stroked the gaffer tape with her fingers.

‘Just an improvised plaster,’ he said. ‘You didn’t need to come in person.’

‘I know,’ she said. ‘But I couldn’t find any of your clothes. They must have gone missing during the move to Amsterdam.’

Been chucked out, Harry thought. Fair enough.

‘But then I spoke to Hans Christian, and he had a wardrobe full of clothes he doesn’t wear. Not quite your style, but you’re not too far apart size-wise.’

She opened the bags, and he looked with horror as she took out a Lacoste shirt, four pairs of ironed underpants, a pair of Armani jeans with a crease, a V-neck sweater, a Timberland jacket, two shirts bearing polo players and even a pair of soft, brown leather shoes.

She began to hang them in the wardrobe, and he got up and took over. She observed him from the side, smiled as she tucked a lock of hair behind an ear.

‘You wouldn’t have bought any new clothes until that suit literally fell off you. Isn’t that right?’

‘Well,’ Harry said, moving the hangers. The clothes were unfamiliar but there was a faint, familiar aroma. ‘I have to concede that I was considering a new shirt and perhaps a pair of underpants.’

‘Haven’t you got any clean underpants?’

Harry looked at her. ‘Define clean.’

‘Harry!’ She slapped his shoulder with a laugh.

He smiled. Her hand remained on his shoulder.

‘You’re hot,’ she said. ‘Feverishly hot. Are you sure whatever is under your so-called plaster isn’t infected?’

He shook his head. Knowing full well, from the dull, pulsating pain, that the wound was inflamed. But with his many years of experience from Crime Squad he knew something else as well. That the police had interviewed the barman and the customers at the Nirvana bar and would know the person who had killed the knifeman had left the place with deep cuts to his chin and neck. They would also have alerted all the doctors in town and run surveillance on A amp;E departments. And this was no time to be held on remand.

She stroked his shoulder, up as far as his neck and back again. Over his chest. And he thought she must be able to feel his heart beating and that she was like the Pioneer TV they had stopped producing because it was too good, and you could see it was good because the black bit of the picture was so black.

He had managed to open a window a fraction; they didn’t want suicides on their hands at the hotel. And even up on the eighteenth floor they could hear the rush hour, the occasional car horn, and from somewhere else, perhaps another room, an inappropriate, belated summer song.

‘Are you sure you want this?’ he said without trying to cough away his hoarseness. They stood there; she with a hand on his shoulder, her eyes fixed on his like a concentrated tango partner.

She nodded.

Such a cosmic, intense black in the blackness that it sucked you in. He didn’t even notice her raise her foot and close the door. He heard it close, so gently, that was all, the sound of an expensive hotel, like a kiss.

And while they made love he thought only of the darkness and the aroma. The darkness of her hair, eyebrows and eyes. And the aroma of the perfume he had never asked her about, but that was only hers, which was in her clothes, in her wardrobe, which had rubbed off on his clothes then, when they hung together with hers. And which was now in the wardrobe here. Because the other man’s clothes had also hung in her wardrobe. And that was where she had found them, not at his house, perhaps it had not even been his idea, perhaps she had just taken them straight from the wardrobe and brought them here. But Harry said nothing. Because he knew he had her on loan, that was all. He had her right now, and it was either that or nothing. So he held his tongue. Made love to her the way he always had, with intensity and at his leisure. Not allowing himself to be influenced by her greed or impatience, but did it with such slow passion that she alternated between cursing him and gasping. Not because that was how he thought she wanted it, but because that was how he wanted it. Because he only had her on loan. He had only these few hours.

And when she came, stiffened and stared at him with that paradoxical, wronged expression, all the nights they had spent together came back, and he was close to tears.

Afterwards they shared a cigarette.

‘Why won’t you tell me that you’re a couple?’ Harry said, inhaling and passing her the cigarette.

‘Because we aren’t. It’s a… a stop-gap thing.’ She shook her head. ‘I don’t know. I don’t know anything any more. I should stay away from everything and everyone.’

‘He’s a good man.’

‘That’s the point. I need a good man, so why don’t I want a good man? Why are we so bloody irrational when we actually know what’s best for us?’

‘Humans are a perverted and damaged species,’ Harry said. ‘And there is no cure, only relief.’

Rakel cuddled up to him. ‘That’s what I like about you, the indomitable optimism.’

‘I see it as my duty to spread sunshine, my love.’

‘Harry?’

‘Mm.’

‘Is there any way back? For us?’

Harry closed his eyes. Listened to the heartbeats. His own and hers.

‘Not back, no.’ He turned to her. ‘But if you think you still have some future left in you…’

‘Do you mean that?’

‘This is just pillow talk, isn’t it?’

‘Muppet.’ She kissed him on the cheek, passed him the cigarette and stood up. Got dressed.

‘You can stay upstairs at mine, you know.’

He shook his head. ‘It’s best like this now.’

‘Don’t forget I love you,’ she said. ‘Never forget that. Whatever happens. Do you promise?’

He nodded. Closed his eyes. The door closed as gently again the second time. Then he opened his eyes. Looked at his watch.

It’s best like this now.

What else could he have done? Gone back to Holmenkollen with her, ensuring Dubai had followed his trail there, and dragged Rakel into this confrontation, the way he had done with the Snowman? Because he could see it now, he could see they had been dogging his steps from the very first day. Sending an invitation to Dubai via his pushers had been superfluous. They would find him before he found them. And then they would find Oleg.

So, the sole advantage he had was that he could choose the place. The scene of the crime. And he had chosen. Not here in the Plaza, this was so that he could have some time out, a couple of hours’ sleep and collect himself. The place was Hotel Leon.

Harry had considered contacting Hagen. Or Bellman. Explaining the situation to them. But it would give them no other choice but to arrest him. Even so, it was just a question of time before the police would put together the three descriptions they had been given by the barman in Kvadraturen, the security guard at Vestre Cemetery and the old lady in Madserud alle. A man, one ninety-two, wearing a linen suit, scar on one side of his face and a bandaged chin and neck. They would soon be putting out a call for Harry Hole. So it was urgent.

He got up with a groan, opened the wardrobe.

Put on the ironed underpants and a shirt with a polo player. Mulled over the Armani trousers. Shook his head with a soft expletive and donned his suit instead.

Then he pulled out the tennis bag lying on the hat shelf. Hans Christian had explained it was the only one he had with enough space for a rifle.

Harry bundled it over his shoulder and left. The door behind him closed with a soft kiss.