The Cabin

by Jorn Lier Horst

  ‘They’re going to go on searching,’ Thule suggested.

  ‘Then we’ll give them some help,’ Stiller said.

  ‘How will we do that?’ Line asked.

  ‘Our advantage is that they have no idea that we know about Henriette’s double role. Next time you talk to her, say that you think you know where Lennart Clausen may have hidden the money. We’ll lead them there and catch them red-handed.’

  ‘The same tactic we tried to use with Oscar Tvedt,’ Thule commented.

  ‘We’ll move the undercover operators and the cameras,’ Stiller said, nodding.

  ‘But where?’ Line asked. ‘Where is it likely that Lennart Clausen would have hidden the money, and how could I possibly have found out about it?’

  ‘The garage,’ Wisting said.

  ‘What garage?’

  ‘At his father’s house,’ Wisting clarified. ‘The garage is full of motorbike parts and tools. It’s been left like that ever since Lennart died.’

  ‘That’s perfect,’ Mortensen said.

  ‘I ought to have a more detailed background story, though,’ Line said.

  ‘Talk to his girlfriend,’ her father suggested. ‘The woman in Spain. Get her to tell you about the garage, and then you can use that.’

  ‘Go ahead,’ Stiller said, indicating the phone on the table. ‘Then you can arrange a meeting with Henriette tomorrow.’

  Line drew the phone towards her. ‘I already have an appointment with Trygve Johnsrud tomorrow,’ she said.

  ‘Cancel that,’ Mortensen suggested.

  ‘He used to be Finance Minister,’ Line reminded him. ‘It wasn’t easy getting an appointment. I can’t just call it off now.’

  ‘When is it?’ her father asked.

  ‘Ten a.m., at his cabin in Kjerringvik.’

  ‘Then you can manage both,’ Wisting told her.

  With a nod of the head, Line took the phone out of the room. Standing at the kitchen window, she gazed down at her own house while she made the call. She should have switched on some lights, she thought. Twilight came increasingly early and darkness was already closing in now.

  The ring tone was faint and quivering, but the voice sounded close when Rita Salvesen answered.

  ‘How are things?’ Line asked. ‘Have you spoken to that lawyer about the estate settlement?’

  ‘Yes, he’s going to take care of everything. It seems there’s no will or anything like that. Lena will inherit everything, so thank you for phoning me about it. Maybe we can meet up when I come to Norway?’

  ‘That would be lovely,’ Line replied. ‘What were you planning on doing with the house?’

  ‘Selling it.’

  ‘You wouldn’t consider moving back to Norway?’

  ‘Not yet, at least.’

  ‘I drove past it, in fact, when I was in Kolbotn,’ Line went on. This was not true, but she was keen to turn the conversation to the house and garage. ‘It’s in a beautiful situation, great for a family with young children,’ she added.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Were you there much when you and Lennart were together?’

  ‘We mostly spent time at my place.’

  ‘Lennart spent most of his time in the garage, as far as I understand?’ Line said.

  Rita laughed. ‘You’d better believe it,’ she answered. ‘He worked on those motorbikes day and night. It was practically forbidden for anyone else to set foot in there.’

  That was perfect, Line thought. She could use what Rita had said in her conversation with Henriette. ‘Why not?’ she asked.

  ‘I don’t know. But I paint, and I really don’t like anyone to see my paintings while I’m working on them. I won’t show a picture until I’ve finished it. I think it was something similar with Lennart, too. He assembled motorbikes, cleaned and painted them. He certainly didn’t want anyone to look at them until he was completely finished. It’s probably like that for you as a journalist as well. You don’t want anyone to read your first drafts.’

  ‘That’s true,’ Line said.

  ‘It grew worse during the summer before he died,’ Rita went on. ‘I think maybe he was working on a motorbike for me. At least, he was desperate for me to pass my test so that we could go out biking together.’

  ‘Did you do that?’

  ‘I never got that far.’

  Line had all the information she needed, but went on chatting all the same. ‘Send me a message, then, whenever you’re in Norway,’ Line finally said, to round off the conversation.

  ‘It won’t be long,’ Rita promised. ‘I’ll probably have some papers to sign soon.’

  ‘Great!’

  They hung up. Line stood deep in thought, considering how to tackle her conversation with Henriette.

  Her father entered the room behind her. Line turned her back to the window and leaned towards the kitchen table. ‘It’s not certain she’ll answer,’ she said.

  ‘Try,’ her father told her. ‘Maybe she’ll call back again.’

  Line switched on the loudspeaker function. There was music in the background when Henriette picked up.

  ‘Any news?’ she asked.

  ‘You could say so,’ Line replied. ‘Something’s happened to make me consider dropping the whole story.’

  The music was turned down. ‘What’s that?’

  ‘I was attacked,’ Line told her. ‘My laptop was stolen. I think it may have something to do with the investigation.’

  ‘What happened?’

  Line explained about the assault but did not mention anything about having been to the National Library to read Henriette’s old articles.

  ‘Why do you think it had something to do with the airport robbery?’ Henriette asked.

  ‘Other things have happened, too,’ Line continued. ‘It’s complicated, but I think someone knows I’ve starting digging into this.’

  Her father nodded to indicate that it was a smart move to give the impression that the threats had made an impact on her.

  ‘Who could that be?’

  ‘I don’t want to talk about it on the phone.’

  ‘So you’re withdrawing from it all entirely?’ Henriette asked.

  Line struggled to work out if she was pleased or not. ‘I’m not really sure,’ she said. ‘But I do have a theory about where the money may be hidden.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘An obvious hiding place.’

  ‘You can’t give up now,’ Henriette told her. ‘Could we meet up, maybe tomorrow?’

  ‘I have another appointment in the morning,’ Line said, ‘and I only have a babysitter until two o’clock.’

  ‘I can come down to you,’ Henriette said. ‘We could meet at the same place as last time.’

  ‘I’m not sure,’ Line said. ‘This whole business is starting to get dangerous.’

  ‘You’ve started, so you should finish,’ Henriette insisted. ‘At the very least, you owe me the information about where you think the money is located, after all the time I’ve spent approaching my sources. If you’re not going to follow this up, then I will. It’ll make a sensational story if the cash is found.’

  ‘OK, then,’ Line said. ‘Let’s meet at one o’clock.’

  62

  The temperature had plummeted overnight. The sky was covered in a layer of grey cloud and a light breeze made the trees sway. Line was in her own house, pulling on a sweater and collecting a jacket for Amalie. Before she drove off, she brought the tracking device that Mortensen had found into the car, so that whoever was following her would see she was on the move.

  After dropping off Amalie, she drove into town and further out to the eastern side of the Larvik fjord. A narrow, twisting track took her the final few kilometres to the old harbour near the open sea where the former Finance Minister and Bernhard Clausen’s Party colleague had his country house. She followed the signs to a white captain’s house in a sheltered area under the steep, craggy hillside by the shore. Nevertheless, with a shudder, she drew her shoulde
rs together as a keen blast of sea air assailed her.

  ‘We’ll sit inside,’ Trygve Johnsrud suggested when he appeared at the front door.

  Line followed him into a living room with panorama windows overlooking the sea. Johnsrud cleared away newspapers and magazines from the dining table to make space for them both.

  ‘Well, then, Bernhard Clausen,’ he began. ‘He leaves behind quite a void.’

  ‘A few different things have emerged about him since we arranged our meeting,’ Line said.

  ‘You’re thinking of his book?’

  Line nodded. ‘Do you know what he was writing in it?’ she asked.

  Johnsrud smiled. ‘I haven’t read any of it,’ he answered.

  ‘I spoke to Guttorm Hellevik last week,’ Line continued. ‘I got the impression that Clausen had become a freethinker who no longer felt attached to social democratic ideals.’

  The former Finance Minister agreed. ‘A good politician is usually regarded as one who stands firm, but I believe the ability to change your point of view as a result of social debate or personal experience is an excellent political attribute.’

  ‘What signs did you see that he had changed his opinions?’

  ‘We mostly discussed financial politics,’ Johnsrud explained. ‘Bernhard disagreed with the tax proposals put forward by the Labour Party. He wanted a lower tax threshold, leading to higher personal consumption. He thought that we politicians should have greater confidence in allowing people the right to choose what they wanted to spend their own money on. He felt that hard work and private initiative should be more generously rewarded. Maybe that was a natural consequence of having worked hard all his life.’

  He got to his feet and fetched two cups and a coffee pot.

  ‘When did he change his political viewpoint?’ Line queried.

  Johnsrud filled the cups.

  ‘I’m not so sure that “changed his political viewpoint” is the right way to put it. That sounds so dramatic, but he had strong opinions about individual freedom and personal responsibility. They weren’t really evident until his last period in government,’ he answered. ‘But those close to him noticed a change after his spell of sick leave when he was Health Minister.’

  Line seized the opportunity to direct the conversation on to the time in Bernhard Clausen’s life that interested her most.

  ‘After his son died?’ she asked.

  Trygve Johnsrud gave this some thought. ‘It was probably really after his wife died,’ he said. ‘I think that triggered a lot of soul-searching.’

  ‘In what way?’

  The Labour Party veteran picked up his coffee cup and drank deeply before putting it down again. ‘Health care is one of our most important welfare benefits, but to retain a good service we can’t help everyone with everything. The medicines Lisa needed cost millions and would probably have given her a year or two more, at most. The decision-making committee had already turned down that treatment, both on the basis of price, and also because there was no proof of its efficacy. I remember some talk of an operation in Israel, but her doctors didn’t support it. In many ways, Bernhard Clausen became a political hostage. He made up his mind to sell the cabin in Stavern and buy private health care but it meant he would have had to resign as Health Minister.’

  Trygve Johnsrud pursed his lips, as if he had said more than he should have.

  ‘In the end it was Lisa who begged him not to do it. The point is that he did not feel free to choose what was best for him and his family. I think, eventually, that spurred his thoughts towards a more liberal view.’

  ‘I understand that Lennart blamed his father for his mother’s death,’ Line said.

  ‘Indeed he did, but not as much as Bernhard Clausen blamed himself. It wasn’t something that divided them.’

  Line disagreed as Trygve Johnsrud stood up. ‘The relationship between father and son can be difficult,’ he said, crossing to the other side of the room. ‘I’ll show you a photo.’

  He opened a sideboard drawer and took out an envelope full of photographs. ‘I came across this when I was leafing through some old photos yesterday,’ he said, placing a picture of Lennart and his father in front of her. They stood with their arms around each other’s shoulders. Bernhard Clausen held a hammer in his free hand and both smiled broadly at the photographer.

  ‘Isn’t that a good photo?’ Johnsrud asked.

  Line lifted it up. There was something about their smiles – they did not seem genuine.

  ‘Is that at the cabin in Stavern?’

  ‘That was the summer after Lisa died,’ Johnsrud told her, putting down the other photographs. ‘There was a get-together at the cabin so that we could help him to build a new patio. Lennart came down on his motorbike with some documents Bernhard had left behind.’

  Line had read about that work party in the cabin visitors’ book. It was the weekend after Simon Meier’s disappearance. She recognized a few of the politicians in the picture.

  ‘Who is that?’ she asked, pointing at a man with a paintbrush.

  Trygve Johnsrud leaned across the table. ‘That’s probably our next Minister of Justice,’ he said, smiling.

  ‘Arnt Eikanger?’ Line asked. ‘But surely he was working as a police officer in those days?’

  ‘He knows where the shoe pinches,’ Johnsrud replied. ‘He’s a major political talent. Bernhard acted as a kind of mentor to him.’

  Line lingered on that photograph before looking at the others. She recognized Guttorm Hellevik from Oslo City Council in one of them. He stood tossing sand into an old-fashioned cement mixer along with a man in a red Labour Party cap.

  ‘Could I borrow this one, please?’ she asked, holding up the picture of Lennart and his father.

  ‘Take them all,’ Johnsrud suggested. ‘It would be a good idea to use the one of Eikanger,’ he added, perhaps thinking that the work-party pictures would have a positive impact on the forthcoming election campaign.

  ‘We worked together throughout the day,’ he went on, ‘and in the evening we carved out our political plans.’

  Line collected the photos, leaving the one of Lennart and his father on top.

  ‘That’s probably the last photo of the two of them together,’ Johnsrud said with a smile. ‘Family was important to him, and Bernhard loved that boy. The cancer that claimed Lisa was hereditary. He was afraid his son would be affected, too, but only a few months after that photo was taken, he was killed in a motorbike accident.’

  Line nodded. ‘Did you all stay at the cabin that weekend?’ she asked, placing the photos in her bag.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Don’t you think it’s a bit odd that the cabin has burned down?’

  ‘It’s more difficult to envisage Bernhard being gone, to be honest.’

  After almost two hours, Line had enough material to write an article about how the old social democratic ideals were crucial to the renewal of the welfare state but not much more about what had happened in the summer of 2003.

  63

  The hinges on the garage doors screeched when Wisting pulled them up. The piercing noise sounded like the agonized cry of someone in pain.

  Two windows were placed high on the wall and a heavy work lamp hung from the ceiling in the middle of the untidy space. Beneath it stood a motorbike stripped of its tyres and petrol tank, propped up on a frame. The engine lay in pieces on the concrete floor with tools and dirty, twisted rags. A pair of overalls was draped over the back of a camping chair beside an open tool chest. Around it were dotted other half-finished projects, cases of engine parts, boxes of screws and half-filled oilcans.

  They strode in, with Stiller pointing out where he wanted to mount the hidden cameras.

  The technician from his section at Kripos set to work at once. The tiny cameras would relay the live-stream to Bernhard Clausen’s office, where the police would monitor what was going on.

  ‘We won’t get them sentenced for robbery even if we can prove they broke into a
garage,’ Thule commented.

  ‘We’ll use this to break their weakest link,’ Stiller said. ‘Henriette Koppang. She’s the one who’ll lead them here. She’s the one who has to start talking.’

  Wisting flicked through an instruction book left open on a workbench. It contained advanced illustrations of various motorbike parts. He felt optimistic at the thought of a breakthrough. The possibility of a prison sentence and the consequences for her daughter would be enough to make Henriette Koppang spill the beans. Simon Meier’s disappearance would be a different matter. The people who might know something were both dead: Bernhard Clausen and his son.

  ‘What’s this in here?’ Stiller asked, tugging at the handle of an interior storage room on the far wall of the garage.

  Thule pointed down at the floor. ‘It’s secured with an extra padlock,’ he said.

  A metal bar and lock had been fitted across the threshold.

  ‘We could use that room,’ Stiller said. ‘If anyone wanted to hide something here, they’d use that storeroom.’

  He cast around and found a large pair of wire cutters. ‘I want a camera in there, too,’ he said, struggling to cut off the padlock.

  ‘I saw a bigger pair somewhere,’ Thule said, turning around.

  He found a large pair of bolt shears on a shelf and used them to cut through the padlock. The lock on the door itself was a standard interior-door lock. Stiller returned to the house to find a key in the key cupboard there.

  ‘Maybe the money really was in there,’ Wisting suggested when Stiller returned.

  ‘Well, he has certainly secured this door well,’ Stiller said.

  Inserting a key, he turned it and pulled the door open. A clammy, cloying smell wafted towards them and combined with the miasma of oil and engines out in the garage. Stiller located the light switch.

  The room inside was about two square metres in size with a desk against one wall, a grubby office chair on wheels and a few shelves on the wall. A padlocked wooden chest was pushed against the other wall and above it was displayed an Easy Rider film poster depicting Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper on their motorbikes. In the right-hand corner of the poster a bunch of dried-up air fresheners was nailed up.