The Consorts of Death

23

At the police HQ in the Red Cross building, the atmosphere was sombre with a thin veil of control. The police rooms were on the second floor, with a view of the wetland area at the back of the hotel. The area by the reception desk was swarming with reporters. An impatient photographer stood with his camera slung over his shoulder, ready to snap away if anything were to happen.

As I arrived, a uniformed policeman announced that there would be a short press conference at eleven and another in the afternoon after national KRIPOS representatives had come and been allowed to make their first assessments of the case. The press took note without much enthusiasm. Some stayed in the room, others wandered off in the direction of the nearest cafes.

I had picked up a couple of newspapers on my way from the hotel. None of the Oslo papers had come to Forde yet, but Firda Tidend, Bergens Tidende and Bergensavisen had big front page spreads on what they called the ‘Double Killing in Angedalen’. There were large photographs of the Libakk farm, deserted and abandoned with the exception of a couple of parked cars in the farmyard, and a few smaller, somewhat fuzzy shots of the police cars carrying Silje, Jan Egil and the rest of us as we passed the press ranks on our way down from Trodalen. In the press reports, the gruesome murders were portrayed in detail, based doubtless on sources within the police force. Jan Egil was described as a ‘member of the family’ who after a ‘hostage situation’ in Trodalen had given himself up to the police and for the moment was being ‘questioned’ at the local police offices in Forde. Kari and Klaus Libakk were described as ‘decent folk’ about whom no one had anything negative to say, and it was stressed that the tragedy had spread ‘unease and horror’ in the tiny rural community of Angedalen. In Firda Tidend Helge Haugen had concentrated on the Trodalen murder and I did indeed recognise several of the phrases he had entertained me with almost an hour earlier. In Bergens Tidende they had written a small parallel article about ‘murders in the fjord county’ in which they summarised the cases of Trodalen Mads, Hetle, the ‘contraband murder’ of 1973 and many others. Bergensavisen ’s coverage was coloured by the fact that they didn’t have a provincial correspondent and it was based mainly on the Norwegian News Agency’s sober account of events. There would be enough other articles to digest when the Oslo tabloids caught up, I imagined. But I was pleased that none of them had named Jan Egil so far.

I elbowed my way through the throng of press reps and reported in at the desk, where I introduced myself and said that the sergeant had summoned me to appear.

‘Really?’ The officer behind the counter looked at me in bewilderment.

‘He would certainly like to know what I had to say about the case.’

‘A witness then, I think we’ll say,’ mumbled the officer. His hair was thin and his skin pale, and there wasn’t a trace of enthusiasm in the way he spoke. But at least he opened the gate in the counter, let me in and showed me to a kind of waiting room further into the office area. ‘I’ll tell the sergeant you’ve come. The name was Veum, wasn’t it?’

‘It was.’

I took a seat in the lounge area and spread out one of the newspapers I had brought with me. I had a suspicion I was unlikely to be the first person in the queue, and I was right. I didn’t see anything of the sergeant until he walked past, pursued by several other officers, on his way to the eleven o’clock press conference. He was almost surprised to see me but gave a quick nod and made a sign to say that we would talk when he was back.

Nevertheless I strung along with the others to the reception area to attend the brief, somewhat off-the-cuff press conference held there. I saw Helge Haugen and a couple of familiar faces from Bergen in the audience.

There was not much new to report, apart from what was already in the papers. The couple, Kari and Klaus Libakk, had been found shot and killed in their own home. There were no signs of a break-in. A close relative of theirs was in the interview room at this moment, and two KRIPOS officers were expected on the morning flight from Oslo to assist the local constabulary with the investigation.

‘Has the person in question been charged?’ one of the pressmen wanted to know.

‘No,’ said the sergeant before adding, almost involuntarily: ‘Not yet.’

‘But he will be?’

‘At this moment in time I am unable to say.’

‘Is it true that he took a girl from the neighbouring farm with him as a hostage?’

‘I don’t wish to comment on that.’

‘Are there any theories as to what the motive might have been?’

‘I don’t wish to comment on that, either.’

They didn’t get much more out of him, and Sergeant Standal concluded the conference by hoping they would return later that day, either at four or at eight o’clock. More details would be announced as soon as the timing was decided.

With that the conference was over. Some of the journalists tried, unsuccessfully, to set a trap for the local police boss with a few additional questions. The only ones to get a few words with him were a couple of radio reporters, who asked the same questions and were given the same answers as during the conference.

When he was safely on the inside of the counter again, Standal motioned to me to follow. ‘Come with me, Veum. We’ll take it in my office.’

The sergeant’s office had a view straight across the wetlands to the tall cranes in the shipyards and the narrow landing strip. Standal indicated a chair, took a seat himself behind the desk and rested his pale blue eyes, with a slight squint, on me. ‘Now tell me all you know about this Jan Egil Skarnes which, I am informed, is his real name. You knew him from before, I’m led to understand?’

‘Barely, in fact.’ In brief outline I told him about Jan Egil’s unhappy life, from the first meeting I had had with him on the Rothaugen estate during the summer of 1970, while he still had Elvis as a middle name, until the tragic events of 1974.

The sergeant bent forward, eager to hear. ‘So he was involved in a suspicious death then, too?’

‘Involved?! He was six and a half years old. And the foster mother soon confessed that she had caused the accident.’

‘I see.’ He had jotted down the names of Vibecke and Svein Skarnes long ago. ‘Any more?’

‘No, nothing… We in social services followed his case for six months afterwards, before he was transferred to a foster home up here, with Kari and Klaus Libakk, and that is, in fact, the last I’d heard of him until I was told yesterday to get here asap.’

‘So you know nothing about how his life had turned out in Angedalen?’

‘No. I thought you would be able to fill me in on that.’

He looked at me blankly. ‘And why?’

‘Well, don’t you have any records on him? Hasn’t he been in the police spotlight before?’

‘Not at all. Like you… to be precise, I’d never heard of him until yesterday.’

‘But you knew about the Libakks?’

He trod water. ‘I knew who Klaus was. This isn’t a big region.’ For a second he seemed to be in two minds. ‘But nothing of specific importance to this case.’

I leaned forward a fraction. ‘So he’s never been involved in any indecency cases?’

His mouth tightened. ‘Indecency cases?’

‘Yes, we all heard what she said last night. Silje. He was an old pig, she said. And she called him Uncle Klaus. Was he her uncle?’

He nodded slowly. ‘She comes from a farm further down the valley. Almelid. Her mother is Klaus’s sister.’

‘Has she been questioned, too?’

‘Not yet.’

‘Where is she then?’

‘She was given permission to go home.’

‘What!’

‘Her parents collected her.’

‘But… she confessed!’

He seemed to project his lips forward, forming a kind of funnel, supposedly perhaps to signal profound scepticism. ‘I wasn’t very convinced by that, Veum.’

‘Why not?’

‘Well…’ He thrust a hand between us. From one finger to the next he counted his points. ‘First of all, it was Jan Egil holding the weapon when the constable observed them on the way up the mountainside. Secondly, the murders were executed in such a brutal fashion it is difficult to believe that they were committed by a sixteen-year-old girl. Thirdly, it was Jan Egil who spoke up during the whole dialogue with the police, if we can call it that, and fourthly, there was nothing at all to suggest that anyone else was responsible for what had happened until she burst out with this, er, statement. Sort of hysteria, if you ask me.’

‘She said the same thing to me earlier when I was negotiating with them up in the scree.’

‘Nevertheless. It seems totally unfounded.’

‘Even though we’re assuming that this Uncle Klaus had abused her?’

‘We know nothing about that, Veum. And why would she take Kari’s life as well?’

I threw out my arms. ‘She was in a frenzy. If you’ve shot one person… I assume you haven’t released her for good?’

He gave me a condescending look and checked his watch. ‘She’s on her way now. We’re going to have a long chat with her, Veum. And she’ll be examined by a doctor.’

‘Has she got herself a solicitor, too?’

‘One of the local ones, Oygunn Bratet. Furthermore, fru Mellingen from social services spent the night up there, in the same house as her.’

There was a knock at the door, and Reidar Ruset opened. He nodded to me before turning to Standal. ‘The solicitor says Jan Egil is ready again.’

The sergeant acknowledged the information. ‘Good, let’s get going.’

‘What shall I do?’ I said.

He eyed me as if he wasn’t quite sure. ‘I can’t see that we have an urgent need for your services right now, Veum. But if you’re not too busy it would be nice if you’d stay in Forde for at least a couple more days.’

‘Alright.’

‘You’ll have to do what you can to kill time.’

I nodded slowly. Fine by me. But I was not at all sure he would like the way I would do it.

‘At any rate, I’ll have to pick up my car. Can I pass you the taxi bill?’

‘As long as you don’t take the scenic route, yes. That’s fine.’

Five minutes later I was sitting in the back seat of a taxi past Fordehus, the culture house, towards Angedalen. Halfway up, we passed a car with several passengers. For a second or two I met Grethe’s eyes through one of the side windows, it was so quick that the smiles we sent missed each other.