by Holt, Anne
Ruth-Dorthe’s expression of gratitude sounded almost like a threat.
FRIDAY, APRIL 11
10.55, STORTORGET SQUARE
Not since the old King’s funeral in January 1991 had Oslo city center been so crowded. The side streets leading to the main square were closed to vehicular traffic, and a phalanx of stern-looking uniformed police officers was trying to keep the road through Kirkegata open so that the cortège, which was expected in a few minutes, would have a clear route through. For the moment the line stayed firm, the gap between the bystanders on either side of the street no wider than a generous path. TV cameras were everywhere, and here and there Brage Håkonsen could see the ridiculously easy to recognize plain-clothes police officers from the Security Service, who were wearing ear plugs and sun-glasses despite the overcast sky.
Two police horses rounded the corner adjacent to Karl Johans gate, trotting gracefully and nervously on either side of the road. It was effective: people pulled back in genuine alarm at the sight of the enormous animals frothing at the mouth and showing the whites of their eyes. All of a sudden four motorbikes raced around the corner from Karl Johans gate and across Kirkegata, followed by limousines in a cortège.
They advanced at top speed toward Oslo Cathedral, where they came to a sudden halt, forming a line. Prominent guests from far and near were quickly, and sometimes rather abrasively, hustled into the vestibule by uniformed and plain-clothes police officers. Brage Håkonsen, from his lookout point at the intersection between Grensen and Kirkegata, grinned when he spotted the German Chancellor Helmut Kohl protesting as he was led by the arm; he pushed aside the over-eager officer – a whole head shorter – and took the time to turn to some acquaintance and greet him politely.
The musicians of the Royal Guards arrived, and Chopin’s Funeral March fell like a cloak of silence on the thronging crowds. Brage Håkonsen removed his cap, not out of respect, but because he knew how important it was to behave identically to everyone else.
Behind the Guards swept a black hearse with Norwegian flags on the hood and mourning drapes at the windows, though these did not prevent the multitudes from seeing that Birgitte Volter’s coffin was white. A wreath of deep-red roses, like a circlet of thick, coagulated blood, crowned the casket. Brage Håkonsen could hear people starting to sniff. For reasons he could not explain, and certainly would not admit to, he too became caught up in the solemnity of the occasion; in its ceremony and its sorrow.
He shook off the emotion, feeling annoyed, and moved to the front of the crowd, toward the actual square.
It happened all of a sudden.
Four men and seven women, yelling and shouting, pushed their way through the packed sidewalk and onto the road in front of the funeral cortège before any of the police had time to react.
“Stop the whaling,” they screeched. “Killers! Killers!”
Brage stopped short; he found himself suddenly staring into the eyes of a colossal rubber whale that swelled and rose into the air, powered by an activist holding a helium pump between his legs.
“Stop the whaling NOW! Stop the whaling NOW!”
The rhythmic shouts almost drowned out the music played by the Royal Guards, the only people within earshot who paid no attention to the commotion. They played on, the somber cadences pounding out an accompaniment to the yells of the demonstrators and the wheezing of the whale, which had now grown to almost life size. It writhed and twisted as it expanded, and seemed intent on swimming right into the Cathedral. One of the activists – Brage had no idea where he’d come from, but he appeared to be in his late fifties, with a huge seaman’s beard and a number of insignia on his shoulders – grabbed a bucket that had been hoisted to him by a young woman. In a flash, he prised the lid open with a Swiss army knife, and with a sweeping, unrestrained movement hurled red paint at the hearse. However, the chauffeur had grasped the situation, and was now reversing at speed; the horses behind him whinnied in fear and trotted back. The red paint splashed on the asphalt, and only a few drops reached the vehicle conveying Birgitte Volter’s earthly remains.
Though the police had been taken by surprise, it took them very little time to put a stop to the protest. Twenty police officers flung themselves at the demonstrators, and it took almost exactly five minutes to clap them in irons, puncture the whale, and cram both activists and deflated sperm whale into a Black Maria parked next to the H&M department store. The entire episode was dealt with speedily and efficiently, despite the actions of a group of male spectators who had felt called upon to help the police but whose screaming, hot-tempered behavior had made the task considerably more onerous than it might have been.
“Hey!” Brage Håkonsen yelled, tugging and tearing at his handcuffs. “I’m not involved in this!”
He resisted as vigorously as he could as three men forced him into the vehicle.
“I’m not fucking involved in this! Can’t you hear?”
“Shut your mouth,” snarled a uniformed woman at the front of the van. “You lot lack all sense of decency. To wreck a … wreck a funeral! Have you no shame!”
She had turned to face him, and her words seemed almost to punch holes in the wire screen that separated off the space at the back where the detainees sat on benches.
“But I’m not bloody part of this!” Brage screamed again, banging his head repeatedly on the wall. “Let me go, for God’s sake!”
The only response was the rumble of the engine as it started, and a mumbled mantra from his fellow prisoners: “Stop the whaling NOW! Stop the whaling NOW!”
12.13, OSLO CATHEDRAL
“It was absolutely beautiful. So touchingly beautiful.”
Birdie Grinde tried to keep her voice down, but it was so high-pitched that, even when she whispered, it could be heard from a radius of several meters. She clung to her son’s arm, dressed in the kind of black clothing that would be more suitable for a funeral in The Godfather than that of a Norwegian, social democrat Prime Minister. Everything was black. And shiny. High-heeled shoes, fishnet stockings, dress, and cape; to round it off she wore a glossy pillbox hat, with a stiff black veil covering her face. What she did not yet know, but would take great pleasure in witnessing later that evening when she watched the footage of the ceremony on television, was that she was repeatedly captured by the TV cameras; this sobbing woman dressed in full mourning must surely be a close family member.
“Tone it down, Mother,” Benjamin Grinde whispered. “Can you just tone it down a little?”
Roy Hansen and Per Volter were standing in the vestibule, both wearing dark suits. The son was half a head taller than his father, but both had gray complexions and downcast eyes. They held out their hands at random intervals, and after a moment’s hesitation, many people chose to walk past the two of them without offering their condolences. Others stood for a few seconds in quiet conversation, and most of the female government ministers gave them both long, heartfelt hugs.
Little Lettvik was with a group of journalists several meters away, scrutinizing the mourners. When Ruth-Dorthe Nordgarden stepped forward, last in the line of Cabinet ministers, Little noticed that Roy Hansen turned away, apparently overcome by a wave of sobs, but the spasm did not subside until Ruth-Dorthe gave up and headed for the massive oak doors of the exit. Per Volter had been more obvious than his father: he refused to take her proffered hand and turned decisively toward the Bishop of Oslo, who towered over the mourners in full pontificals, looking like an old eagle in borrowed feathers.
“Roy,” whispered Birdie Grinde when she finally reached him. “Roy! What a tragedy!”
Little Lettvik moved closer to the exit: who was this old woman on Judge Grinde’s arm?
“And Birgitte too,” Birdie Grinde continued; people were beginning to turn and look at her. “What a dreadful thing to happen. Little Birgitte! Little, innocent, lovely Birgitte!”
She sniffed loudly as she turned toward Per Volter, who stared in surprise at this strange woman he had never clapped eyes o
n before.
“Per! So tall and handsome!”
She tried to embrace the young man, but he stepped back in alarm. Birdie Grinde was left hanging onto her son’s arm, teetering dangerously because her high heels had got caught in a crack on the floor; she was on the verge of falling over.
“My God, I think I’m going to faint,” she gasped.
Benjamin Grinde clutched his mother’s arm tightly, and a police officer managed to grasp her around the waist and lift her upright.
“May I help you outside, madam?” he said politely, and without waiting for an answer, he escorted her out of the doors, through the crowds and across to the Parliament Building thirty meters away. Benjamin Grinde slinked after them, his lapels pulled up to conceal his face.
The journalists in the vestibule chortled at the incident. Everyone apart from Little Lettvik. Instead, she jotted down a few words on a spiral notepad: “Old woman with BG. Interesting?”
13.00, SLOTTSBAKKEN, THE SLOPE LEADING UP TO THE ROYAL PALACE
The journalists had been right. They had scored a bull’s-eye in a total of sixteen ministerial posts. The pre-appointment talks had not produced a single surprise. Tryggve Storstein stood in the middle of the long row of ministers with a large bouquet of red roses and a preoccupied, aloof smile appropriate to the occasion. After all, only an hour had passed since his predecessor had been laid to rest. Fewer spectators than normal had gathered to greet the new Cabinet, but even more journalists and photographers.
It was drizzling, and the Minister of Transport and Communications appeared impatient to have the customary photo session over and done with. She continually looked at her watch, and was premature in heading for the black government cars; Tryggve Storstein hauled her back.
Finally it was all over, and the crowd dispersed. Grabbing hold of Ruth-Dorthe’s arm, Little Lettvik coerced her into an embrace. “Cell phone tonight,” she whispered in her ear.
17.15, OSLO POLICE STATION
“First he invites the cops to look at his guns; then he vanishes into thin air! Don’t you realize this stinks to high heaven, Håkon?”
Håkon Sand used his right hand to produce an exuberant drum roll on the desk.
“Not being at home when you’re on sick leave is not what I call ‘vanishing into thin air,’ Billy T. He could be anywhere. At the doctor’s. At his girlfriend’s. At his mother’s, for that matter.”
“But he’s not answering his phone either! I’ve phoned him several times since yesterday evening, and he can’t be at the bloody doctor’s for twenty-four hours!”
“At the hospital, then. Or at his girlfriend’s, as I said.”
“That guy doesn’t have a girlfriend. Sure as shooting.”
Running his hands through his hair, Håkon Sand invited Billy T. to take a seat.
“What do you actually think you’ve got on this guard?” he asked wearily.
“In the first place, he was definitely at the scene. Secondly, he owns guns. Four listed here in the gun register. And most suspicious of all …”
Reaching out for a half-empty bottle of cola, Billy T. guzzled the contents without asking the owner’s permission.
“You’re welcome,” Håkon said sourly.
“But listen,” Billy T. said, before his face changed into a grimace as he raised one buttock to emit a substantial, prolonged fart.
“For fuck’s sake, Billy T., can’t you cut that out?”
Standing up, Håkon waved one hand frantically as he held his nose with the other. Then he clumsily unlatched the window, throwing it open as wide as he possibly could. Billy T. guffawed and threw the cola bottle in the wastepaper basket.
“The most suspicious thing of all,” Billy T. repeated, “is that the man changed his mind.”
“What do you mean by changed his mind?”
Håkon was holding a box of matches, lighting them one at a time until the sulfur had burned out and he could light another.
“First of all he said that I could come home with him to check his guns. Then he changed his mind and told me that he’d bring them here. I accepted gracefully. Since then, we haven’t seen hide nor hair of him. And now he’s supposed to be on sick leave. Huh!”
“So you think, then,” Håkon said slowly, “that we should pull in a guy that we have nothing more on than that he did his job last Friday. A guy who has made the grave error of not coming running to Billy T. as he had promised, and what’s more has made himself guilty in this particularly serious criminal case by falling ill!”
He threw the box of matches across the table; then tilted his head back and supported his hands on the armrests.
“Then you’ll have to find a different lawyer. A search warrant implies there will be an arrest. We’ve had one over-hasty warrant already. Besides, this is not your job, in fact. You have just as much a problem as Hanne! In sticking to what you’re meant to do, I mean. The role of the security guard in all this is not up to you to judge.”
“Bloody hell, Håkon!”
Billy T. slammed his fist down on the desk.
“It was Tone-Marit who insisted that I interview the guy!”
“It’s no use.” Håkon grinned. “Forget it. Just you shuffle back to your own office and find some more of Volter’s friends to talk to.”
Without uttering a word, Billy T. left the room and slammed the door behind him.
“Stop the whaling NOW,” Håkon Sand said, giving a long and hearty chuckle.
Not until he had concluded two telephone conversations and was about to get down to work again did he discover that Billy T. had duped him completely.
The copy of the autopsy report that most certainly had nothing to do with Billy T. but that he had fussed like a child to be allowed sight of, was no longer on his desk.
Not to put too fine a point on it, Billy T. must have swiped it.
19.00, STOLMAKERGATA 15
“Don’t you want to watch the news roundup, Hanne?”
Taking a cold beer from the fridge, Billy T. surveyed his living room with an air of satisfaction. Although he had never noticed the orange curtains that had hung there before, he could see that the new, Air Force blue ones were more attractive, especially now that Hanne had been to the Idé Skeidar furniture store to buy a settee, also in blue. And she had found some old posters lying in the attic. He had no idea where she had got hold of the frames, but they looked very attractive on the wall behind the settee. On the other hand, the potted plants were quite unnecessary. Even though the pots with their Indian patterns were fine in themselves, the greenery would be dead within three weeks. He knew that only too well. He had tried it before.
Hanne, sitting engrossed in the copy of the autopsy report, chewing on a pen, did not reply.
“Hello! Earth calling Hanne Wilhelmsen! Do you want to watch Dagsrevy?”
He tapped her head with his bottle and switched on the television. Funeral music thundered from the loudspeakers.
“Fine. But don’t disturb me!”
Irritated, she rubbed her head where the bottle had thumped her, but did not even lift her eyes to the screen. Billy T. groaned and sat on the floor to watch the broadcast.
Without warning, he burst into gales of laughter.
“Look at those idiots! Look!”
An astonishing piece of footage captured the hotheaded protesters whose chief aim, quite literally, was to put an end to Norwegian whaling. A voiceover related that one Norwegian, three Dutch, two French and six American citizens had been arrested after the demonstration in front of Oslo Cathedral.
“Those Americans who protest against whaling! The very people who grill and gas and poison human beings! And who have millions of citizens living below the poverty line! Bloody hypocrites!”
He took a proper slug of the beer, and farted again.
“You really need to cut that out,” Hanne muttered, but she still didn’t look up. “Didn’t your mother teach you to go to the loo to do that sort of thing?”
&nb
sp; “First it was my ear,” Billy T. said testily. “Now that’s better, but my stomach’s playing up. I just have to get rid of that gas! Better out than in, as my grandmother used to say. Hush!”
There was no need to hush her, as Hanne was completely immersed in the autopsy report. The news bulletin about the demonstrators had finished, and the anchorman informed them that the Norwegian had been freed when it turned out that he had not had anything to do with the protest, while the foreigners had been remanded in custody.
“What is it you’re actually looking for?” Billy T. asked, for the first time showing more than a passing interest in what Hanne was doing.
“Nothing,” Hanne sighed, gathering the papers together before inserting them in a plastic wallet. “Absolutely nothing. I thought I’d had an ingenious idea that would have given us the answer to everything.”
“What?”
“But as usual it wasn’t so ingenious after all. The autopsy report precludes what I thought. But it was helpful to check it out. Thanks for getting it for me.”
“I had to fool that nice boy of yours. What was it you thought that was so ingenious?”
“Nothing,” Hanne said with a smile. “It didn’t add up. Shall we play?”
“Yes!”
Billy T. sprang up to fetch the bulky, old-fashioned table-soccer set from the bedroom.
“I bags being England,” he shouted as he maneuvered the table with its rubber figures impaled on eight steel rods into the living room.
“Fine. I’ll be the Netherlands.”
It did not bother either of them in the slightest that one team had pale green shirts and the other blue. After all, they could have been old spare kits.
21.30, OLE BRUMMS VEI 212
Alone at last. His dark suit jacket, which looked just as tired and dejected as he did, was hanging on the back of a chair. Roy Hansen gazed at the photo of Birgitte on the sideboard. The candle beside it, the only source of light in the room, seemed almost hypnotic.
This past week had been unbelievable. He had never had any interest in New Age or paranormal phenomena, and was not religious either. However, the last few days had been as close to an out-of-body experience as he reckoned it was possible to have.