Dead Joker

by Anne Holt

  Quite the opposite. Annmari Skar, the Police Prosecutor, had already started work on a petition for prolonging the custody order, which she had planned to raise the following week. On Thursday afternoon, when she received the papers from Karen Borg stating that the accused intended to petition for release and that the case would be heard on the Friday morning, she had swallowed a juicy oath, at the same time thanking heaven that she had already made thorough inroads into the case.

  “One week to go,” she muttered to Billy T. as they hurried up the stairs in front of Oslo Courthouse and zigzagged their way through a wedding party defying the little cardboard sign requesting them not to throw grains of rice out of consideration for the little birds. “And they just couldn’t wait. One week!”

  For some reason that no one other than the administration of the Courthouse could fathom, the case had been allocated Courtroom 130. Annmari Skar and Billy T. passed through the almost four-meter-high double wooden doors and then through the gigantic swing door into the impressive foyer of the Courthouse. They were immediately plunged into an intense popping of flashbulbs. Billy T. had to stop the petite Police Prosecutor from falling when an over-eager reporter from a minor TV station got it into his head to be the boldest and best and quite literally crept between Billy T.’s enormous legs in order to thrust the microphone into Annmari Skar’s face. The two police officers ploughed their way forward to the glass wall on the western side of the hall. They arrived at the door to the correct room without any further misfortune, but with a gaggle of journalists bringing up the rear.

  “130,” Annmari Skar said with a sigh. “There’s hardly room to breathe in here. How can all these—” She cast a despairing glance over her shoulder.

  “Closed hearing,” Billy T. reassured her. “We’ll have a closed hearing and privacy.”

  “Do you think so?” Annmari Skar said bitterly. “We’ll only get that if Karen Borg requests it. We haven’t—”

  “Shhh,” Billy T. interrupted her. “Keep that in reserve.”

  He pushed a persistent young woman away. She was aged about twenty with long, blond hair and a Dictaphone and she was chewing gum.

  “You’re getting bloody younger by the day, you crime reporters,” he said in a loud, gruff voice. “And cheekier too. The one probably goes with the other.”

  He used his elbows against a stripling from TV2, and eventually had to resort to using his backside as a shield so that Annmari Skar could enter the courtroom at all. Karen Borg was already installed there. She greeted them quietly, and Billy T. assumed she had accompanied her client up from the basement. Karen Borg had made barely any public comment about the case. Despite the major leaks from the police themselves – Billy T. had long ago given up speculating who had such a casual relationship with the press – she had kept resolutely silent. Admirably enough. Now she had chosen to avoid the press entirely.

  The police were granted their petition regarding a closed hearing.

  Annmari Skar knew she could not take credit for that. She had dutifully presented her phrases about how press coverage would be “harmful to the investigation”, but without much confidence. Admittedly, she was convinced of Sigurd Halvorsrud’s guilt, and she had more than once torn through the corridors of the police headquarters in futile pursuit of the many police sources to whom the press obviously had more than liberal access. However, given that the case had already been splashed across one newspaper page after another in all its blood-dripping detail, it would be an achievement to unearth anything new that could be genuinely damaging. Now that she was nevertheless arguing the case behind closed doors, she realized it was just as much for herself that she had wanted it this way. She could not stand journalists. They were presumptuous and submissive at the same time, ignorant know-alls, impudent and yet damned clever. Annmari Skar had no understanding of journalists and despised them with all her heart.

  Even Karen Borg – to Annmari Skar’s enormous relief – had supported the police’s petition, on the grounds of needing to respect the privacy of her client’s personal life, though it was probably not even this that had led to the doors being closed. The journalists had themselves to thank for that. During the hearing about whether or not the case should be held in private, which naturally was open to the public, they had fought over seats like seagulls squabbling over a discarded bag of prawns. The judge, Birger Bugge, a stocky, mean-tempered guy who would soon retire on full pension and who had long since realized he would never be made an Appeal Court Judge, did not share Annmari Skar’s contempt for journalists. Rather, he hated them, so vehemently that he had stopped reading every newspaper other than the Herald Tribune, which he bought at the Narvesen kiosk in Oslo railway station every afternoon on the way home to dinner with his wife in Ski.

  “Today the court will hear case number 99-02376F/42,” he intoned once the tumult had finally abated, the journalists had been chased off by a fiery court usher, and calm had been restored to Judge Birger Bugge’s little kingdom. “The defense counsel is Karen Borg, the prosecutor Annmari Skar, and I, Birger Bugge, am the judge. I know of no circumstances that would disqualify me. Are there any objections?”

  Billy T. caught himself shaking his head in concert with attorneys Skar and Borg. It was rare for him to find anyone intimidating, but Judge Bugge’s bulldog head could strike fear into anyone. With his pronounced underbite, conspicuous double chins, and tiny gimlet eyes under gray eyebrows that bobbed up and down like two horns on his temples, he didn’t need to say much in order to command respect.

  “Harumph,” Judge Bugge grunted, gesturing with his hand in the direction of the witness box.

  Karen Borg shot up from her seat.

  “Your Honor, I request that my client be allowed to remain seated, on health grounds.”

  She placed her left hand gently on Halvorsrud’s shoulder, as if to emphasize the man’s extreme need of care and attention.

  “Harumph,” Judge Bugge reiterated, and Karen Borg chose to interpret that as assent. “And so you are Sigurd Harald Halvorsrud. Date of birth?”

  Billy T. leafed through the documents while the personal details were attended to. Then he reclined in his chair, glancing obliquely at Annmari Skar. She was good-looking rather than actually pretty. Her body was short and quite thickset, but she had a femininity that more than once had made him steal a secret look at her. Her face was strong and open, with large brown eyes and dark-brown hair that was beginning to be streaked with gray even though she was still a few years shy of forty. Billy T. felt a sudden drag in his gut, and had to stop himself from putting his hand on her back as she sat there drumming a pencil on the bench, to Judge Bugge’s great irritation.

  “Would the Police Prosecutor stop that racket immediately,” he barked.

  Annmari Skar stiffened and a faint blush suffused her cheeks.

  And I need to fucking sharpen up, Billy T. thought, taking control of his hand as it reached halfway toward the Police Prosecutor’s back.

  Someone opened the door. Hanne Wilhelmsen slowly entered the almost square courtroom and conferred in a low voice with the court usher. He knew her well and let her pass before diligently closing the door behind her. A brief glance allowed Billy T. to ascertain that the journalists had not conceded defeat.

  “Sorry,” she said out loud to the judicial bench. “I have important information for the prosecutor.”

  “Harumph,” Judge Bugge said yet again. “Be quick about it.”

  Hanne Wilhelmsen opened the low wooden swing doors separating the spectators’ seats from the rest of the courtroom. She passed the witness box without glancing at Karen Borg and Halvorsrud, and leaned over the counter with her hands on the wooden surface.

  “I’ve been called as a witness by Karen Borg,” she whispered to Annmari Skar. “The document was lying on my desk when I came back from … Half an hour ago.”

  “Witness summons,” Billy T. spluttered. He had leaned forward and heard what Hanne had said. “It’s not blo
ody usual practice to call witnesses at a preliminary hearing!”

  “Hush!” Annmari Skar put her hand on his arm. “Because it’s not usual, doesn’t mean it’s not permissible. I learned about it myself a few minutes ago.”

  She was holding her hand in front of her mouth, as if afraid to say what was on her mind.

  “Do you know anything about why you’ve been asked to come?” she eventually asked, so softly that Billy T. was almost unable to catch it.

  Hanne Wilhelmsen did not reply, but her gaze dropped from the Police Prosecutor’s face to the copious documentation in front of her.

  “Have you already discussed this with Karen Borg?” Annmari Skar continued angrily; by now she had forgotten to keep her voice down.

  “Not directly,” Hanne said in a hurried whisper. “I haven’t spoken to her about being a witness. I really haven’t.”

  “But why—”

  “I think we’ll draw a line under that now,” the judge growled irascibly from the bench. “I presume all the vital information from the police has been dealt with and we can continue.”

  Hanne Wilhelmsen left the courtroom. As she mounted the stairs to the first floor of the Courthouse to get a cup of coffee in the canteen, it struck her that she should have sent someone else with the message. Since she in all probability would be called as a witness – it was up to Judge Bugge whether in fact he wanted to hear her evidence – then strictly speaking she should not have been in the courtroom during the proceedings at all. She shrugged it off. In the first place, she was not a lawyer. And secondly, she had not heard anything of what was going on.

  Neither had Billy T. for that matter.

  His ears were buzzing with rage.

  Hanne Wilhelmsen must have known something. If Karen Borg wanted to produce her as a witness, it was obviously because the defense lawyer thought Hanne had something to say to Halvorsrud’s advantage. Until now, Hanne’s doubt about the Chief Public Prosecutor’s guilt had been professionally conditional. At least as Billy T. saw it. Damn it all, he had been puzzled too; he was not unused to having doubts either. That was how it should be. The police should always keep all possibilities open. Guilty or not guilty. That’s what they had to find out. The police had to remain impartial. However, if Karen Borg’s belief that Hanne’s testimony could benefit Halvorsrud’s case was based on something Hanne herself had given her, then the Chief Inspector’s conduct was approaching betrayal.

  He let his eyes wander around the room.

  At each corner, immediately in front of the hip-height partition wall dividing off the public benches, two police officers sat twiddling their thumbs. One, a female officer with very short, bleached hair and a face plastered in make-up, looked as if she was nodding off.

  Halvorsrud, on the other hand, looked as though he had not slept in weeks.

  Karen Borg must have got hold of a new suit for him. It hung better than the old dark one had at the funeral on Monday. His shirt was snowy-white and freshly ironed. It would not have surprised Billy T. if Karen had wielded the iron herself that morning. The diamond on his tie had gone; something like that could easily provoke a foul-tempered, irate judge.

  His immaculate, discreet clothing made a stark contrast with the head that protruded above the tightly knotted tie. Halvorsrud’s neck had become jowly, like a turkey’s, because of his rapid weight loss. The lower part of his face was slack and sallow, with deep lines on either side of his formerly strong chin. His eyes were covered in a bloodshot film, like a mask someone had hastily painted on. His lips hardly moved when he spoke. His words were indistinct, his voice monotonous. Now and then he pressed a handkerchief to his mouth.

  The questioning of Halvorsrud commenced.

  Judge Bugge himself did not pose very many questions. Instead he gave the floor to the two sides, waving his hands in exasperation. From time to time it even appeared as if he wasn’t following what was being said particularly carefully. Billy T. was well aware this was a sham; there was hardly a sharper judge in the entire court service than Birger Bugge. His lack of promotion through the ranks was entirely due to his difficult manner and unfriendly tone.

  Eventually Halvorsrud had said his piece. Nothing unexpected had emerged from this. He held firm as a rock to his own innocence. He was concerned about his daughter. He had bleeding stomach ulcers. Nothing the police had not previously known.

  “I would like to beg your indulgence and produce medical certificates for father and daughter,” Karen Borg said.

  Judge Bugge nodded faintly, with a heavy sigh, and extended a huge fist for the documents that were handed to him. His eyes raced rapidly over the papers before he passed them to the court reporter, who sat aloof and silent on his right-hand side.

  “In addition I would like to call Chief Inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen as a witness,” Karen Borg added, remaining on her feet in front of her chair. “It is of—”

  “Rather irregular,” Judge Bugge grumbled. “What then is—”

  “Your Honor,” Annmari Skar interjected, realizing too late that she had interrupted him.

  “Would the Police Prosecutor please refrain from interrupting the court?” Judge Bugge snarled.

  Annmari Skar dropped back down onto her seat.

  “What then is this Wilhelmsen going to tell us?” the judge continued, directing his question at Karen Borg, who had lowered her eyes in embarrassment on behalf of the Police Prosecutor.

  “She’s in charge of the police investigation, Your Honor, and I think she can throw light on—”

  “Throw light on?” Judge Bugge croaked. “We have here a prosecutor who I would presuppose intends to throw light on the case from the police point of view. Is that not so, Prosecutor?”

  Annmari Skar stood up hesitantly. “Yes, Your Honor, absolutely. Besides, matters are such that …”

  She hesitated slightly, and thought it safest to wait for permission to continue. This came in the shape of a forceful nod that caused the judge’s double chins to wobble in waves of flesh.

  “As I see it, Ms. Borg has no authority to call Chief Inspector Wilhelmsen as a witness in the ordinary way of things. If Wilhelmsen is to give evidence in court, then that evidence must consist of either an account of the investigation itself, or a statement about the progress of the investigation. I cannot see why these can’t be covered in my own account, potentially with the aid of my advisory assistant.”

  She pointed at Billy T..

  “Moreover, I’d like to say that I take a dim view of the way Ms. Borg has handled this matter, Your Honor. If she considered it necessary for the case to listen to the Chief Inspector, she could have simply asked me. A witness summons is highly irregular, and smacks of undue gamesmanship. Besides, I have not had the opportunity to confer with Chief Inspector Wilhelmsen in advance of—”

  “Confer?” Judge Bugge repeated. “And why would it be necessary for you to confer with your own colleague? What she knows, you are sure to know also, is that not so, Ms. Skar?”

  Annmari Skar was all at sea. She riffled aimlessly through the papers in front of her before concluding that she had nothing more to say and sat down without a word.

  “The court does not entirely see the point of this witness statement,” Judge Bugge said lugubriously. “However, in light of the grave charges made against the accused, I will permit a short interview. Is Chief Inspector Wilhelmsen available at present?”

  “I expect she is standing outside waiting,” Karen Borg said, clearing her throat nervously.

  The court usher opened the door discreetly and a few seconds later Hanne Wilhelmsen was standing in the witness box giving her personal details. She tried to catch Billy T.’s eye, but her colleague was studying his own hands and turned subtly away from Hanne by inclining his right shoulder toward her in a frosty gesture.

  “I’ll come straight to the point, Hanne Wilhelmsen.” Karen Borg tugged at the lapels of her jacket, studiously avoiding looking in the direction of the Chief Inspector. Karen
Borg knew what she was doing. She was shuffling her cards. Emphatically, and probably unpardonably. They had spoken so many times about this: she and Håkon, Hanne and Cecilie and Billy T.. The close friendship between legal opponents brought enormous challenges. It was self-evident that she and Håkon could not oppose each other in court. Their relationship with Hanne and Billy T. was far more ambiguous. If not legally, then at least morally. After lengthy discussion, they had arrived at the conclusion that they should all watch their step and see how far that took them. Since much of Karen’s portfolio comprised criminal cases, she would have suffered substantially if she could never touch a Hanne Wilhelmsen case.

  Things had gone well. Until now. By calling Hanne as a witness, Karen Borg had put a strain on the trust she owed Hanne as a friend. Not as a lawyer. Nevertheless, as far as Karen Borg was concerned, loyalty to her client was always of paramount importance. Always.

  Hanne Wilhelmsen believed in Halvorsrud’s innocence. She had expressed her doubts about the value of continued custody. She had even challenged Karen to try and petition for his release. Karen Borg could not let something like that lie. At least not when her client was about to go under.

  “Do you really believe there is still a danger of evidence being destroyed in this case?”

  “I hate you for doing this,” was what Hanne Wilhelmsen wanted to yell. Instead, she coughed quietly into a tightly closed fist, and answered, “The police are of that opinion. I would simply refer you to what I expect Annmari Skar has already stated.”

  “I’m not asking about that, Wilhelmsen. I’m asking about your own opinion. You are in charge of this investigation and ought to have an independent point of view about whether there are sufficient grounds for imprisonment.”