The Cabin

by Jorn Lier Horst

  There were three listings of her name.

  ‘Her daughter’s called Josefine,’ Line told him. ‘She’s five.’

  Wisting found the right Henriette Koppang. Her mother was dead, and her father was listed as living abroad.

  ‘See who Josefine’s father is, then,’ Line asked. ‘I think they live together.’

  Wisting keyed in the further search but, at that moment, Line’s phone rang. ‘It’s her,’ she said. She answered and turned on the phone’s loudspeaker.

  ‘Hi,’ Henriette said. ‘I know you’ve been trying to call me. Sorry. There’s been a lot going on here at home.’

  ‘Has something happened?’ Line asked.

  ‘We’ve bought a new car, you see,’ Henriette explained. ‘Neither me nor my bank account were ready for that.’

  Wisting lifted Amalie on to his knee and let her take charge of the iPad.

  ‘Apart from that, I’ve spoken to the guy I know in the police,’ Henriette went on.

  ‘Oh?’ Line replied.

  ‘I think I’ve found out who may have taken the money. The guy who died in the motorbike accident was called Lennart Clausen. He was the son of the politician, Bernhard Clausen.’

  Wisting moved closer. Line glanced across at him, uncertain of how to respond. ‘The one who just died?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Henriette answered at the other end.

  Wisting wrote Aleksander Kvamme on a sheet of paper and pushed it towards her.

  ‘I’ve also spoken to someone in the police,’ Line said. ‘Somebody who works in intelligence. He told me that a man called Aleksander Kvamme was probably the ringleader in the airport robbery.’

  Henriette Koppang repeated the name.

  ‘Do you know him?’

  ‘I know who he is,’ Henriette replied. ‘I interviewed him for Goliat once, but I don’t think he’s a front-runner. I got the impression that he likes to boast about things. The police fall for it, of course, but most of the charges against him have been dropped. They once thought he’d killed a Pakistani guy, but he was later acquitted.’

  ‘Have you spoken to him recently, in connection with Simon Meier?’

  ‘No, but if your policeman thinks there’s something in it, maybe I should.’

  ‘I don’t think you should do that,’ Line warned her. ‘At least not until we have more information. I think we should concentrate on Lennart Clausen.’

  ‘Agreed,’ Henriette said. ‘We must find out more about him. If he took the money, he must have hidden it in a secure location. We have to find someone who might know where that would be.’

  ‘I can try to track down some of his friends,’ Line said. ‘Then you can continue to make inquiries in criminal circles.’

  ‘OK,’ Henriette said. ‘How are things otherwise?’

  Wisting saw that his daughter looked hesitant.

  ‘Fine,’ she answered. ‘Just fine.’

  ‘Great – we’ll speak later, then!’

  The conversation drew to a close and Line rang off.

  ‘I think we should prioritize a chat with Tommy Pleym,’ Wisting said. ‘Find out who beat him up.’

  ‘I looked into Kim Werner Pollen,’ Thule said. ‘The fire wasn’t reported to either the police or the security company.’

  ‘Suspicious,’ Wisting commented.

  ‘I found one more thing,’ Thule went on. ‘In 2002, according to the vehicle licensing authority, he bought a motorbike from Jan Gudim. Those two know each other. He has to be the inside guy – he worked at the airport at the time.’

  55

  The sun slanted through the venetian blinds in the private ward and one of the shadows settled on Oscar Tvedt’s face and eyes.

  Stiller crossed to the windows and adjusted the slats. Oscar Tvedt blinked and his twisted mouth made a gurgling sound. According to the charge nurse, that was as much as he could articulate. He was both physically and mentally disabled. Despite physiotherapy and other forms of exercise, he was slipping more and more into a vegetative state. He could open his eyes and breathe unassisted, but had no voice and very seldom responded to what was happening around him. He was reminiscent of a doll. His eyes were open, but his face was emaciated and his eyes were empty.

  Stiller cast around for something to say, struggling to explain his presence. ‘I’m a police investigator,’ he said in a loud voice, as if speaking to an elderly person.

  The face of the man in the bed was unresponsive, but it was possible he could hear and understand what Stiller was saying.

  ‘We’ve found the cash from the Gardermoen airport robbery,’ he continued. ‘All of it. Worth more than 80 million kroner today.’

  Another gurgling sound came and Stiller moved closer to the bed. Oscar Tvedt lay with his arms by his sides. The palms of his hands seemed dry and his nails were long.

  ‘It was a perfect robbery, until the cash went missing.’ Stiller leaned over the man in the bed. ‘I think you got the blame for that,’ he said. ‘Your gang agreed that you had run off with the cash. They needed a scapegoat, someone to blame so that they could take their anger out on him. That person was you.’

  There was no reaction to be detected on Oscar Tvedt’s face. He appeared unperturbed, as if he lay there resting.

  ‘They say you don’t possess the power of logical thought,’ Stiller went on. ‘That the brain injury they inflicted on you means your ability to learn, remember and understand is limited. But I’d like to believe there’s one thing you’ve spent your time here thinking about. The money. What happened to the money?’

  He crossed to the other side of the room and pulled a chair slightly towards the bed. When he sat down, Oscar Tvedt had closed his eyes.

  ‘Fine,’ Stiller said. ‘I don’t know what happened to it either. That doesn’t really interest me, but whatever happened, it cost Simon Meier his life. That’s why I’m here. That’s why I’m going to find out what took place.’

  His earplug crackled. The detective seated at the entrance of the nursing home whispered: ‘Two men in blue overalls just went in. Muscular-looking brutes. Apparently from Flex Ventilation. One of them is carrying a large bag. I’m going in after them.’

  ‘Copy,’ he answered, pushing the chair back into place before he left the room.

  Further along the corridor there was a table with a Thermos of coffee and some cups laid out. Stiller sat down, took out his phone and found the live-stream of Oscar Tvedt’s room.

  The men in overalls appeared at the foot of the corridor, where they knocked on the nearest door and went inside without waiting for a response. Presumably, no one was there, as the men returned a couple of minutes later. One was holding an iPad in his hands while the other was carrying the bag. Stiller did not recognize either of them.

  They knocked on the door on the other side of the corridor and stepped inside. Stayed for two minutes again and then re-emerged. The same procedure was repeated as they trawled along the corridor. They nodded briefly to Stiller, disguised as a care worker, as they passed.

  The next room was Oscar Tvedt’s. When they knocked and went inside, Stiller got to his feet. ‘Come now,’ he spoke into the microphone.

  The detective made an appearance at the end of the corridor. Stiller headed for the door, adjusted the gun concealed inside his jacket, and watched the footage on his phone.

  ‘There’s someone lying in here,’ the man with the bag said.

  ‘He’s sleeping,’ the other man replied. ‘Just let’s get this over with.’

  The first man drew a measuring instrument shaped like a funnel from his bag. He lifted it to the ceiling and opened the air-vent valve.

  ‘Eight seven two,’ he said, reading off a number on the instrument display.

  The other man seemed to make a note of this. Several values were read off.

  Stiller raised his left wrist to his mouth. ‘I think they’re measuring the room temperature,’ he said into the microphone.

  The detective further
down the corridor held up his thumb before returning to his post at the nursing-home entrance.

  The men exited and moved into the next room while Stiller filled a cup with coffee. His phone buzzed as he took the first mouthful. He swallowed and answered quietly.

  ‘This is Einar Harnes, I’m a lawyer,’ the caller introduced himself. ‘Jan Gudim is my client. I understand that you and one of your colleagues interviewed him in Halden prison yesterday.’

  ‘We had a chat with him,’ Stiller corrected.

  ‘He’d like to pick up from that meeting,’ the lawyer explained.

  ‘What’s it about?’

  ‘He wants to make a statement about the airport robbery,’ the lawyer answered. ‘Can we make an appointment? Preferably today. He’s ready to talk.’

  56

  Wisting put the phone down on the table and turned to Thule. ‘Jan Gudim wants to give a statement,’ he said.

  Audun Thule put his arms behind his head and leaned back in his chair. ‘That’s a surprising turn of events.’

  ‘What does it mean?’ Line asked.

  ‘It means that Stiller’s plan won’t work,’ Wisting told her. ‘His lawyer contacted us instead of some of the other robbers.’

  He turned to face Thule. ‘You two were a bit too convincing, perhaps.’

  ‘I’ll take a confession any time,’ Thule said with a smile.

  ‘Do you think he’s going to confess?’ Line asked.

  Thule shrugged. ‘It remains to be seen, but I can’t see any other reason for him to speak to us again.’

  ‘Stiller has made an appointment for five o’clock,’ Wisting said. ‘This case could be done and dusted by tonight.’

  ‘Then we’ll have to get moving,’ Thule said. ‘An Oslo detective is going to Ullevål Hospital at two o’clock to interview Tommy Pleym. We have permission to accompany him. Then we can pick up Stiller before heading for Halden.’

  Wisting glanced at his daughter. ‘You’ll be left on your own,’ he said. ‘Is that OK?’

  ‘It’s fine, as long as you keep me posted.’

  Wisting looked around the basement. ‘Will you sit in here or upstairs?’

  ‘Upstairs,’ Line replied. ‘You can lock up this area, but I’ll need my computer. It’s at home.’

  ‘I’ll come down with you to get it.’

  They brought Amalie with them too. Mortensen had placed the dead cat in a box and was busy washing down the door when they arrived.

  ‘I’ve had an answer from Kripos,’ he said, straightening up. ‘There was blood in the pump house, right enough.’

  ‘DNA?’ Wisting asked.

  ‘That’s the next step.’

  Line and Amalie went inside to pack some toiletries, clothes and other items they would need if they were going to be away for a few days. Mortensen moved to the CSI van and brought something from the passenger seat.

  ‘I found this on Line’s car,’ he said, holding up an evidence bag containing a black plastic box about the size of a matchbox. ‘It’s a GPS tracker with a magnet bracket,’ he explained. ‘It was attached under the wheel arch.’

  ‘A tracker unit,’ Wisting said thoughtfully.

  ‘Someone has been following her movements,’ Mortensen confirmed. ‘That’s professional equipment.’

  Line emerged with her belongings. When they explained what Mortensen had found, she took the bag and peered more closely at the little block.

  ‘What should we do about it?’ Mortensen said. ‘If I deactivate it, the person who put it there will know that we’ve found it.’

  ‘We’ll leave it here,’ Line said, tossing it into the hallway before locking the door behind her.

  Wisting carried her largest bag up to his house. ‘Are you sure you don’t mind being left on your own?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s fine,’ Line assured him.

  ‘I can get a patrol car to drive past every hour.’

  ‘I’m sure that’s not really necessary, Dad. We’ll be fine.’

  She and Amalie both received hugs before Wisting and Thule got into the car.

  The traffic on the motorway into Oslo was flowing smoothly. When they passed Tønsberg, Wisting’s phone rang.

  ‘Christine Thiis,’ he read from the display on the dashboard.

  ‘I’ve missed you,’ she said.

  ‘You’re on loudspeaker,’ Wisting told her cheerfully. ‘I’m with a colleague from Romerike, Audun Thule.’

  ‘Hello,’ Audun said.

  Christine Thiis laughed. ‘We all miss you, then,’ she said. ‘Do you know how much longer your investigation might take?’

  ‘No, but I think we’re closing in now.’

  ‘Good. I’m calling about the fire at Bernhard Clausen’s cabin. I know it has some connection to what you’re working on.’

  Wisting did not reply but waited for her to continue.

  ‘I thought it might be of interest for you to know that Aksel Skavhaug has disappeared,’ Christine Thiis went on.

  ‘What do you mean by “disappeared”?’

  ‘Well, he confessed that he had set fire to the cabin. I have the report from your questioning, and he was supposed to come in for a formal interview today. He didn’t turn up.’

  ‘Have you tried to phone him?’

  ‘He’s not answering,’ Christine Thiis explained.

  ‘He has a live-in partner and two small children,’ Wisting said.

  ‘We’ve spoken to her. She says he went to a job yesterday. He had said he might be late, but he didn’t come home at all last night.’

  ‘What kind of job?’

  ‘He was to lay a new roof on a cabin in Østfold. We’re working on trying to find out who it was for.’

  ‘OK,’ Wisting said, explaining that they were on their way to Oslo but would be driving through Østfold en route to Halden later that afternoon. ‘Call me if there are any developments.’

  Wisting rounded off the conversation and looked across at Thule. ‘Line robbed, Tommy Pleym beaten up and Aksel Skavhaug missing,’ he said. ‘There’s a lot of movement going on now. I don’t like it one little bit.’

  They drove on in silence. The fields and forest that flanked the car were replaced by tall buildings as they approached Oslo. Wisting turned off on to the ring road that led to the hospital at Ullevål.

  A plain-clothes Oslo detective met them outside the ward where Tommy Pleym lay. Wisting understood him to be a chief inspector who worked in the violent-crime division and that his name was Wibe.

  ‘He’s been given a real going-over,’ he told them. ‘Two cranial fractures and a punctured lung are the most serious of his injuries.’

  ‘What do you know about it?’ Wisting asked.

  ‘It was a taxi driver who found him,’ Wibe said. ‘He came crawling out of an old industrial building that’s being renovated down in the city centre. We’ve located the crime scene. It’s covered in fucking blood.’

  ‘Any witnesses? Evidence?’

  The chief inspector shook his head before opening the door into the ward and showing them inside.

  ‘The officers on patrol spoke to him while they waited for the ambulance, but they got very little out of him except that it was two guys in balaclavas.’

  ‘Masked?’ Thule queried. ‘So we’re not talking about a random attack?’

  Wibe stopped outside a numbered door. ‘Well, you wouldn’t be here if that was the case,’ he commented. ‘I don’t know what kind of crime you’re investigating, but to me it looks like some kind of confrontation. Your friends have probably been messing with the wrong people. I doubt we’ll get anything whatsoever out of him.’

  ‘We’ll see,’ Wisting replied.

  Wibe pushed open the door.

  Tommy Pleym, his head bandaged and his left arm in plaster, was in a single room. His nose had also received treatment of some kind. He peered up at them through crusted eyes.

  The Oslo detective made the introductions. ‘Can you tell us what happened?�
�� he asked.

  ‘They took me with them,’ the man in the bed whispered.

  ‘Who did?’ Wibe asked.

  The answer came in fits and starts, blunted by painkillers. ‘Don’t know … strangers …’

  He raised his plastered arm but let it drop again. ‘Balaclavas …’ he went on. ‘They took me with them in a car.’

  Tommy Pleym swallowed and moved his head slightly to one side to look around. Audun Thule picked up a glass and put the straw into his mouth.

  ‘It had to do with Lennart,’ Pleym added.

  Wisting took a step closer. ‘Lennart Clausen?’ he asked.

  The chief inspector glanced across at Wisting as Tommy Pleym nodded.

  ‘Lennart has been dead for years,’ Pleym went on.

  ‘We know that,’ Wisting said, nodding. ‘Motorbike accident. You and Aksel Skavhaug were with him.’

  Tommy Pleym’s battered, discoloured face looked puzzled, as if he could not understand how Wisting knew that.

  ‘What did they say about Lennart?’ Thule probed.

  ‘That he’d stolen money from them … that I had been in on it.’ Tommy Pleym pulled a face. ‘I don’t know about any money … they drove me into a backyard. Dragged me into a building. Wanted to make me talk. I didn’t know anything.’

  Wisting could guess what had happened. Line’s journalist friend had started to ask questions in the criminal fraternity. A rumour swirled that the cash had been stolen by someone who died in a motorbike accident and that the money was still where he had left it. Tommy Pleym had been one of Lennart Clausen’s closest friends. It was only natural to home in on him.

  ‘Lottery …’ he said.

  ‘You won the lottery?’ Wisting recalled.

  Tommy Pleym nodded. ‘My money … they thought I … that it was theirs …’

  Wisting nodded.

  ‘A journalist,’ Tommy Pleym barked out. ‘A journalist visited me before the weekend … She asked about Lennart, too, and about Simon Meier.’

  Line, Wisting thought.

  ‘Haven’t spoken about Lennart for years … Now twice in one …’

  ‘Who is Simon Meier?’ Wibe asked, but the conversation was interrupted by a nurse.