The Devil's Star

by Jo Nesbo

‘Wasn’t that the time you were going round with a bruised neck?’

  ‘Harry! Tom never . . .’

  Beate stopped when she realised that she was raising her voice. The echo resounded upwards in the stairwell, but was drowned out by the lift coming to a halt in front of them with a brief dull thud.

  ‘You don’t like him,’ she said. ‘So you imagine things. In fact, Tom has a number of good sides you know nothing about.’

  ‘Mm.’

  Harry stubbed his cigarette out on the wall while Beate pulled open the door to the lift and went in.

  ‘Aren’t you coming up?’ she asked, looking at Harry who was still outside intently staring at something. The lift. There was a sliding gate inside the door, a simple iron grille that you push open and close behind you so that the lift can operate. There was the scream again. The soundless scream. He could feel sweat breaking out all over his body. The nip of whisky had not been enough. Nowhere near enough.

  ‘Something the matter?’ Beate asked.

  ‘Not at all,’ Harry answered in a thick voice. ‘I just don’t like these old-fashioned lifts. I’ll take the stairs.’

  4

  Friday. Statistics

  The house did have attic flats, two of them. The door to one stood open, but some orange police tape placed it off-limits. Harry stooped to get his full height of 192 centimetres under the tape and quickly took another step to steady his balance when he emerged on the other side. He was standing in the middle of a room with an oak parquet floor, a slanting ceiling and dormer windows. It was warm, much like a bathroom. The flat was small and furnished in a minimalist style, as his own was, but that was where the similarity ended. This flat had the latest sofa from Hilmers Hus, a coffee table from r.o.o.m. and a small 15-inch Philips TV in ice-blue translucent plastic to match the stereo system. Harry looked through doorways to a kitchen and a bedroom. That was all there was. And it was strangely still. A policeman in uniform with his arms folded was standing by the kitchen door rocking on his heels. He was sweating and watching Harry from under raised eyebrows. He shook his head and smirked when Harry went to show his ID card.

  Everyone knows the monkey, Harry thought. The monkey doesn’t know anyone. He wiped his face with his hand.

  ‘Where is the Crime Scene Unit?’

  ‘In the bathroom,’ the police officer said, nodding towards the bedroom. ‘Lønn and Weber.’

  ‘Weber? Have they started calling in pensioners now as well?’

  The officer shrugged his shoulders. ‘Holiday period.’

  Harry had a look around.

  ‘OK, well, close off the entrance and the door. People wander in and out of this building quite freely.’

  ‘But –’

  ‘Listen. That’s all part of the scene of the crime. Alright?’

  ‘I understand,’ the officer said with an edge to his voice, and Harry knew that in two sentences he had managed to find himself another enemy on the force. The queue stretched for miles.

  ‘But I was given clear instructions to . . .’ the officer went on.

  ‘. . . to keep an eye on things here,’ said a voice from inside the bedroom.

  Tom Waaler appeared in the doorway.

  Despite the dark suit he was wearing, there was not so much as a bead of sweat under his dark, thick hairline. Tom Waaler was a good-looking man. Not a charmer perhaps, but he had uniform, symmetrical features. He was not as tall as Harry, but many would have perceived him to be. Perhaps because of Waaler’s upright bearing. Or the effortless self-confidence he exuded. Most people working around him were not only impressed, they also felt that his composure rubbed off on them, so they relaxed and found their natural place. The impression of good looks could also emanate from his physical presence – no suit could hide five workouts a week doing karate and weights.

  ‘And he should continue to keep an eye on things here,’ Waaler said. ‘I’ve just sent someone down in the lift to close off whatever is needed. Everything in order, Hole.’

  The last was delivered with such flat intonation that it was unclear whether it was to be taken as a statement or a question. Harry cleared his throat.

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘In here.’

  Waaler’s face feigned a look of concern as he moved aside to let Harry pass.

  ‘Hit yourself, did you, Hole?’

  The bedroom was simply furnished, but with taste and a touch of romance. A bed made for one – but with room for two – gave on to a supporting beam carved with something that looked like a heart with a triangle inside it. Perhaps a lover’s mark, Harry thought. On the wall over her bed hung three framed pictures of naked men, erotically PC, lying somewhere between soft porn and intimate art. No personal pictures or objects, as far as he could see.

  The bathroom an en suite. It was no bigger than the room needed to accommodate a sink, a lavatory, a shower without a curtain and Camilla Loen. She lay on the tiled floor with her face twisted towards the door, but she was looking upwards, at the shower, as if waiting for more water.

  She was naked under the sopping wet, white bathrobe which lay open and covered the drain. Beate was standing in the doorway taking photographs.

  ‘Anyone checked how long she’s been dead?’

  ‘Pathologist’s on his way,’ Beate said. ‘But rigor mortis hasn’t set in and she’s still not completely cold. I’d guess a couple of hours at most.’

  ‘Wasn’t the shower on when the neighbour and the caretaker found her?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘The hot water could have maintained her body temperature and delayed the onset of stiffening.’

  Harry looked down at his watch: 6.15.

  ‘Let’s say she died at about five o’clock.’

  It was Waaler’s voice.

  ‘Why?’ Harry asked, without turning round.

  ‘There’s nothing to suggest that the body has been moved, so we can assume that she was killed while she was in the shower. As you can see, her body and her bathrobe are blocking the drain. That’s what caused the flooding. The caretaker who turned off the shower said that it was on full, and I checked the water pressure. Pretty good for an attic flat. With it being such a small bathroom it can’t have taken many minutes before the water spilled over the threshold and out into the bedroom. And then not much longer before the water found a way down to the flat underneath. The woman downstairs says that it was exactly twenty minutes past five when she discovered the leak.’

  ‘That’s just an hour ago,’ Harry said. ‘And you’ve been here half an hour. Seems as if everyone here has reacted unusually quickly.’

  ‘Well, not everyone,’ Waaler said.

  Harry didn’t answer.

  ‘I’m thinking of the pathologist.’ Waaler smiled. ‘He should have been here by now.’

  Beate finished taking photos and exchanged glances with Harry.

  Waaler touched her arm.

  ‘Call me if there is anything. I’m going to the second floor to talk to the caretaker.’

  ‘OK.’

  Harry waited until Waaler had left the room.

  ‘Can I . . . ?’ heasked.

  Beate nodded and moved.

  Harry’s shoes squelched on the wet floor. There was condensation on all the surfaces in the room from the steam and it ran down in stripes. The mirror looked as if it had been weeping. Harry went into a squat, but had to hold onto the wall not to lose balance. He breathed in through his nostrils, but could detect only the smell of soap, none of the other smells he knew had to be there. Dysosmia it was called, according to the book Harry had borrowed from Aune, the Crime Squad’s resident psychologist. A condition of the brain when it refused to recognise some smells, it said; often the result of emotional trauma. Harry wasn’t so sure about that. He just knew that he couldn’t smell a dead body.

  Camilla Loen was young. Somewhere between 27 and 30, he guessed. Good-looking. Full figure. Her skin was smooth and tanned, but with the pallor that dead bodies quickly
acquire underneath. She had dark hair, which would certainly grow lighter in colour as it dried, and a small hole in her forehead that would soon disappear once the undertaker had done his job. There was not much else for him to do, just put some make-up over what seemed like a swelling in her right eye.

  Harry concentrated on the black, circular hole in her forehead. It was hardly bigger than the hole in a one-krone coin. He was always surprised how small holes could be and still take a human life. Occasionally they were deceptive because skin grew over the entry wound. Harry assumed that the bullet in this case had been larger than the hole it left behind.

  ‘Shame she’s been lying in water,’ Beate said. ‘Otherwise we might have found the killer’s fingerprints, some threads or DNA on her.’

  ‘Mm. At any rate her forehead was above water. And it didn’t get too much water on it from the shower, either.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘There is black, congealed blood round where the bullet entered. And there are burn marks on the skin from the shot. Perhaps this little hole can tell us one or two things right now. Magnifying glass?’

  Without taking his eyes off Camilla Loen, Harry reached out, felt the solid weight of a German optical instrument in his hand and began to study the area around the bullet wound.

  ‘What can you see?’

  Beate’s low voice was right down by his ear. She was always keen to learn more. Harry knew it would not be long before there was nothing left to teach her.

  ‘The grey colouring of the burn marks suggests that the shot was fired from close range, but not pointblank,’ he said. ‘I would guess the shot was fired from about half a metre.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘The lack of symmetry of the burn marks indicates that the person who fired the gun was taller than her and shot downwards at an angle.’

  Harry carefully turned the dead girl’s head. Her forehead was not yet completely cold.

  ‘No exit wound,’ he said. ‘That supports the theory that the shot was fired down at an angle. Perhaps she was kneeling in front of the person who fired it.’

  ‘Can you tell what kind of weapon was used?’

  Harry shook his head. ‘The pathologist will know all that, as well as the ballistics guys. But there are graduated burn marks and that would suggest a short-barrelled weapon such as a handgun.’

  Harry systematically scanned the whole body; he tried to take note of everything, but he could feel that the residual alcoholic stupor was filtering away details that he could have used. No, they could have used. This was not his case. When he came to the hand, he saw that something was missing.

  ‘Donald Duck,’ he muttered, bending closer.

  Beate looked at him quizzically.

  ‘They draw them like this in comics,’ Harry said. ‘With four fingers.’

  ‘I don’t read comics.’

  The index finger had been removed. All that remained were black threads of coagulated blood and glistening tendon ends. The cut itself appeared to be even and clean. Harry placed a fingertip cautiously on the white shiny area in the pink flesh. The surface of the severed bone felt smooth and straight.

  ‘Pincers,’ he said. ‘Or an extremely sharp knife. Has the finger been found?’

  ‘Nope.’

  Harry felt suddenly nauseous and closed his eyes. He took a few deep breaths. Then he opened his eyes again. There could be many reasons for nipping off the finger of a victim. There was no reason to think along the lines he already had.

  ‘Could be an extortioner,’ Beate said. ‘They like pincers.’

  ‘Yes, could be,’ Harry mumbled, getting up and discovering the white spaces under his shoes on what he had thought were pink tiles. Beate bent down and took a close-up of the dead girl’s face.

  ‘She certainly bled a lot.’

  ‘That’s because her hand was in the water,’ Harry said. ‘Water stops blood clotting.’

  ‘All that blood just from one severed finger?’

  ‘Yes. And do you know what that indicates?’

  ‘No, but I have a feeling I’m soon going to find out.’

  ‘It means that Camilla Loen probably had her finger cut off while her heart was still beating. In other words, before she was shot.’

  Beate grimaced.

  ‘I’m going to have a chat with the people down-stairs,’ Harry said.

  ‘Camilla was living here when we first moved in,’ Vibeke Knutsen said, quickly looking at her partner. ‘We didn’t have much to do with her.’

  They were with Harry in their sitting room on the fourth floor, directly beneath the attic flat. It looked for all the world as though it was Harry who lived there. The couple sat up straight on the edge of the sofa while Harry had slumped deep down into one of the armchairs.

  They struck Harry as an odd couple. Both were somewhere in their thirties, but Anders Nygård was thin and wiry like a marathon runner. His light-blue shirt was freshly ironed and his hair short, for work. His lips were thin, his body language restless. Although his face was open and boyish, almost innocent, he exuded asceticism and austerity. The red-haired Vibeke Knutsen had deep dimples and a physical voluptuousness that was emphasised by a tight-fitting leopard-pattern top. She gave the impression that she had lived a little. The wrinkles over her lips suggested a lot of cigarettes and the wrinkles around her eyes a lot of fun.

  ‘What did she do?’ Harry asked.

  Vibeke cast a glance at her partner, but when he didn’t answer, she replied:

  ‘So far as I know she was working in an advertising bureau. Design. Or something like that.’

  ‘Or something like that,’ Harry said, half-heartedly making notes on the pad in front of him.

  It was a trick he used when he was questioning people. If you didn’t look at them, they relaxed more. If you gave the impression that what they said was not very interesting, they automatically made an effort to say something that would grab his attention. He should have been a journalist. He felt that there was more sympathy on offer for journalists who turned up drunk for work.

  ‘Boyfriends?’

  Vibeke shook her head.

  ‘Lovers?’

  Vibeke gave a nervous laugh and looked away from her partner.

  ‘We don’t spend our time eavesdropping,’ Anders Nygård said. ‘Do you think it was a lover who did this?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Harry said.

  ‘I can see that you don’t know.’

  Harry noticed the irritation in his voice.

  ‘But those of us who live here would like to know if this looks like a personal matter or if we may have an insane killer running round the neighbourhood.’

  ‘You may have an insane killer running round the neighbourhood,’ Harry said, putting down his pen and waiting.

  He saw Vibeke Knutsen’s startled reaction, but concentrated on Anders Nygård.

  When people are frightened they lose their temper more easily. This was a lesson he had learned during his first year at Police College. As recruits they had been told not to excite frightened people unnecessarily, but Harry had discovered that the opposite was much more useful. Excite them. Angry people often said things they didn’t mean, or more to the point, things they didn’t mean to say.

  Anders Nygård eyed him impassively.

  ‘But it’s more likely that the person who did this is a lover,’ Harry said. ‘A lover or someone she had a relationship with or someone she rejected.’

  ‘Why?’ Anders Nygård put his arm round Vibeke’s shoulders.

  It was an amusing pose because his arm was so short and her shoulders were so broad.

  Harry leaned back in his chair.

  ‘Statistics. Can I smoke in here?’

  ‘We’re trying to keep this a smoke-free zone,’ Anders Nygård said with a thin smile.

  Harry noticed that Vibeke lowered her eyes as he stuffed the cigarette pack back in his trouser pocket.

  ‘What do you mean by statistics?’ the man asked. ‘What mak
es you think they’re valid in a case like this?’

  ‘Well, before I answer your two questions, do you know much about statistics, Mr Nygård? Gausian distribution, significance, standard deviation?’

  ‘No, but I –’

  ‘Fine,’ Harry interrupted. ‘Because in this case you don’t need to. Hundreds of years of crime statistics from all over the world have taught us one simple, basic thing. That she’s the typical victim. Or if she’s not typical, he’s the type to think she was. That’s the answer to your first question. And the second.’

  Anders Nygård snorted and let go of Vibeke.

  ‘That’s completely unscientific. You know nothing about Camilla Loen.’

  ‘Right,’ Harry said.

  ‘So why did you say what you said?’

  ‘Because you asked. And if you’re finished with your questions, perhaps I can continue with mine?’

  Nygård seemed to be on the point of saying something, but then changed his mind and glowered at the table. Harry could have been mistaken, but he thought he spotted a tiny smile form between Vibeke’s dimples.

  ‘Do you think Camilla Loen was taking drugs?’ Harry asked.

  Nygård’s head shot up. ‘Why should we think that?’

  Harry closed his eyes and waited.

  ‘No,’ Vibeke said. Her voice was soft and low. ‘We don’t think so.’

  Harry opened his eyes and smiled at her gratefully. Anders Nygård sent her a somewhat surprised look.

  ‘Her door wasn’t locked, was it?’

  Anders Nygård nodded.

  ‘Don’t you think that was strange?’ Harry asked.

  ‘Not particularly. She was at home after all.’

  ‘Mm. You have a simple lock on your door and I noticed that you . . .’ he nodded towards Vibeke, ‘. . . locked up when I came in.’

  ‘She’s a bit anxious now,’ Nygård said, patting his partner’s knee.

  ‘Oslo isn’t what it was,’ Vibeke said.

  Her eyes met Harry’s for a brief moment.

  ‘You’re right,’ Harry said. ‘And it seems as if Camilla Loen shared your opinion. Her flat has a double lock and security chains on the inside. She doesn’t strike me as a woman who would have a shower with the door unlocked.’