The Blind Goddess

FRIDAY 16 OCTOBER

Two murdered and two in hospital. And all we have to go on are some initials and the vaguest of suspicions.”

It sounded as if they were wading through piles of crisp new banknotes: the yellowing maple leaves had experienced their first night of frost. Patches of fresh snow lay here and there, the nearest it had fallen to the city centre so far. They had arrived at the top of the hill in St. Hanshaugen Park, and the city lay spread before them in its frostbitten autumn pallor. It seemed as caught out by the sudden cold as the motorists on Geitemyrsveien, sliding into one another on their fully inflated summer tyres. The sky looked low. Only the church spires, the high one at Uranienborg and two shorter ones not so far away, were preventing it from total collapse.

Hanne Wilhelmsen had been discharged from hospital, but was hardly in a condition for lengthy walks in the woods. Nor should she really have been inflicting problems on her battered brain, but Håkon Sand couldn’t resist the temptation when she rang and suggested going for a gentle stroll. She was still pale and bore clear signs of her ordeal. The blueness on her jaw had turned light green, and the enormous bandages had been exchanged for large plasters. Her hair was completely lopsided, which surprised him. He’d thought she would have cut it all the same length to match the part that had been shaved smooth, a large area above one ear. When they met, with cautious smiles and a somewhat awkward pleasure at seeing one another again, she had immediately explained that she hadn’t wanted to sacrifice the rest of her long hair. Even though it definitely looked very odd.

“Only one in hospital,” she corrected him. “I’m on my feet again.”

“Yes, from that point of view you’re luckier than our Dutch friend. He’s had a complete breakdown. Retroactive psychosis, the doctor says, whatever that may mean. Stark, staring mad, I should think. He’s in the psychiatric wing at Ullevål Hospital now. Not that there’s any reason to assume he’ll be any more talkative after that. At the moment he’s curled up in the foetal position and burbling like a baby. Scared stiff of everything and everyone.”

“Very strange,” said Hanne, sitting down on a bench. She patted the space next to her and he obeyed.

“Strange that it should happen after only three weeks,” she went on. “I mean, we know what it’s like in those cells. Not exactly a holiday camp. But people are always being held there too long. Have you ever heard of anyone going stir-crazy before?”

“No, but he probably has more reason than most to panic. A foreigner, feeling of isolation and all that.”

“But even so…”

Håkon had learnt to listen when Hanne spoke. He hadn’t pondered very much himself about Han van der Kerch’s mental state, just registered the fact resignedly; yet another door slammed in their face in an investigation that was more or less at a standstill.

“Could something have triggered it off? Could anything have happened to him in his cell?”

Håkon didn’t answer, and Hanne said no more either. Håkon had that peculiar sensation of well-being he always experienced in Hanne’s presence. It was something new in comparison with other women he’d met, a kind of comradeship and professional rapport together with the absolute certainty that they liked and respected each other. It occurred to him that they ought to become friends, but he rejected the thought. He realised intuitively that it was she who would have to take the initiative if they were to be more than colleagues. As he sat there now, on an ice-cold bench in St. Hanshaugen Park on a grey October day, he was more than happy with the feeling of being at one with this woman, who was so close and yet at the same time so remote, so intelligent, and so vital to the job he was trying to do. He hoped she wasn’t having too bad a time.

“Was anything of interest found in the cell?”

“No, not as far as I know, and what the devil could there be anyway?”

“But did they look for anything?”

He ought to be able to answer. He missed her involvement, and he began to see why. He lacked the experience of direct leadership of an investigation; even though he was formally responsible for all the cases in his name, it was rare for any of the police lawyers to take a direct part as he was now doing.

“I have to admit that was something I didn’t think of,” he said.

“It’s not too late,” she consoled him. “You can still check it out.”

He accepted her reassurance, and to make up for his dwindling reputation as an investigator he told her about his enquiries on the subject of Jørgen Ulf Lavik.

Lavik had been fairly successful in quite a short time. After a couple of years with Peter Strup he had started up his own firm with two newly established lawyers about the same age as himself. They covered most aspects of the law, and Lavik himself had a caseload that was about fifty percent criminal with the other half spread over middle-ranging commercial law work. He had acquired a second wife, and had three children with her in quick succession. The family lived in a modest terraced house in quite a respectable part of the city. Their spending didn’t seem on first appraisal to be any more than a man such as Lavik would be able to afford: two cars, a one-year-old Volvo, and a seven-year-old Toyota for his wife. No summer cottage, no boat. Wife at home, necessarily so, of course, with three boys of one, two, and five.

“Sounds like a pretty typical Oslo lawyer,” said Hanne in a resigned tone. “Tell me something I don’t know, pal.”

Håkon thought she seemed exhausted. Her breath in the cold air was getting visibly faster, even though they’d been sitting still for a while. He stood up, brushed his hands over the back of his trousers as if to wipe off imaginary snow, and stretched out his hand to help her up. It was unnecessary, but she accepted it.

“Look into the commercial side of his activities,” she instructed her superior. “And get a list drawn up of all his criminal clients over the last few years. I bet we’ll find something or other.

“And also,” she added, “put the cases together now. They’re mine, both of them, I had the first one.”

She looked almost joyful at the thought.