Knife
Page 53
“Since you ask, I’d quite like some volume,” Harry said, pointing towards the television, where Katrine Bratt and the Head of Information, Kedzierski, a man with a head of thick, curly hair, were sitting behind the desk in the Parole Hall, the usual venue for press conferences, on the fourth floor of Police Headquarters. Below them ran the single, repeated line of text: Murder suspect Svein Finne shot by unknown sniper in Smestad.
“Sorry,” the bartender said. “All televisions in the airport have to be silent.”
“There’s nobody here except us.”
“Those are the rules.”
“Five minutes, just this item. I’ll give you a hundred kroner.”
“And I can’t accept bribes.”
“Mm. It wouldn’t be a bribe if I ordered a Jim Beam, then gave you a tip if I thought I’d received particularly good service?”
The bartender smiled briefly. Looked at Harry more closely. “Aren’t you that author?”
Harry shook his head.
“I don’t read, but my mum likes you. Can I have a selfie?”
Harry nodded towards the screen.
“OK,” the bartender said, leaning over the counter with his phone in his hand and snapping a selfie of the pair of them before pressing the remote. The television rose a few cautious decibels and Harry leaned forward to hear better.
Katrine Bratt’s face seemed to glow every time a flash went off. She was listening intently to a question from the floor that the microphone couldn’t pick up. Her voice was clear and firm when she answered the reporter.
“I can’t go into detail, only repeat that in the process of investigating the murder of Svein Finne earlier today, Oslo Police District has found compelling evidence that Finne was responsible for the murder of Rakel Fauke. The murder weapon has been found in Svein Finne’s hideout. And Finne’s lawyer has told the police that Finne told him he killed Rakel Fauke and afterwards planted evidence to frame Harry Hole. Yes?” Katrine pointed to someone in the room.
Harry recognised the voice of Mona Daa, VG’s crime reporter. “Shouldn’t Winter be here to explain how he and Kripos were so thoroughly taken in by Finne?”
Katrine leaned towards the forest of microphones. “Winter will have to answer that when Kripos hold their own press conference. We at Oslo Police District will be sending what we know about Finne’s connection to the Rakel Fauke case to Winter, and we’re here primarily to account for Finne’s murder, seeing as that case is solely our responsibility.”
“Do you have any comment on Winter’s handling of the case?” Daa went on. “He and Kripos have gone public with allegations of murder against an innocent and deceased police officer who worked here in the Crime Squad Unit.”
Harry could see Katrine stop herself just as she was about to speak. Swallow. Compose herself. Then she said: “I and Oslo Police District aren’t here to criticise Kripos. On the contrary, one of Kripos’s detectives, Sung-min Larsen, has been instrumental in what appears to be our successful identification of Rakel Fauke’s killer. One last question. Yes?”
“Dagbladet. You say you haven’t identified a suspect for Finne’s murder. We have sources who’ve told us he had been threatened by men he was in prison with who have since been released. Is that something the police are looking into?”
“Yes,” Katrine said, and looked at the Head of Information.
“Well, thanks very much for coming,” Kedzierski said. “We don’t have another press conference planned, but we’ll…”
Harry signalled to the bartender that he’d heard enough.
He saw Katrine stand up. Presumably she would be going home now. Someone would have been watching Gert for her. The child who had lain there in the baby carrier, smiling, just awake, peering up at Harry as he carried him through the city streets. He had rung the buzzer for Katrine’s flat, felt something around his forefinger and looked down. The tiny, pale baby fingers looked like they were clutching a baseball bat. Those intense blue eyes looked like they were commanding him not to go, not to leave him like this, not here. Telling Harry that he owed him a father now. And when Harry had stood in the darkness of one of the doorways on the other side of the street and watched Katrine come out, he had been on the verge of stepping forward into the light. And telling her everything. Letting her make the decision for herself, for them both. For all three of them.
Harry straightened up again on the bar stool.
He saw that the bartender had placed a glass containing something brown next to him on the bar. Harry studied it. Just one glass. He knew it was the voice he mustn’t listen to talking. Saying: Come on, you deserve a little celebration!
No.
No? OK, not to celebrate, but to show respect to the dead, to drink a toast in their memory, you heartless, dishonourable bastard.
Harry knew that if he entered into a discussion with that voice, he would lose.
He looked at the departure board. At the glass. Katrine was on her way home. He could walk out of here, get in a taxi. Ring her doorbell again. Wait in the light this time. Rise from the dead. Why not? He could hardly hide forever. And now that he was no longer a suspect, why should he? A thought struck him. In the car, under the ice in the river, there had been something there. But it had slipped away from him. The question was: What did he have to offer Katrine and Gert? Would the truth and his presence do them more damage than good? God knows. God knows if he had invented these dilemmas to give himself an excuse to leave. He thought of those small fingers wrapped around his. That commanding stare. His thoughts were interrupted when he felt his phone ring. He took it out and looked at it.
“It’s Kaja.” Her voice still sounded close. Perhaps the Pacific wasn’t so far away after all.
“Hi. How are you getting on?”
“It’s been crazy. I’ve only just woken up, I slept for fourteen hours solid. I’m standing outside the tent, on the beach. The sun’s just coming up. It looks like a red balloon being slowly inflated, and sometime soon it might just pull free of the horizon and take off.”
“Mm.” Harry looked at the glass.
“How about you? How are you coping with waking up?”
“Being asleep was easier.”
“It’s going to be tough, the grieving process you’re setting out on. And now that you’ve lost Bjørn too. Have you got people around you who can…”
“God, yes.”
“No, you haven’t, Harry.”
He didn’t know if she could sense him smiling. “I just need someone to make some decisions,” he said.
“Is that why you called?”
“No. I called to say I’d put your key back. Thanks for letting me stay.”
“Letting you stay…” she repeated. Then sighed. “The earthquake’s wrecked a lot of what few buildings there were, but it’s incredibly beautiful here, Harry. Beautiful and wrecked. Beautiful and wrecked, get it?”
“Get what?”
“I like beautiful and wrecked. Like you. And I’m a bit wrecked myself.”
Harry guessed where this was going.
“Can’t you get a flight out here, Harry?”
“To a Pacific island that’s just been wiped out by an earthquake?”
“To Auckland in New Zealand. We’ll be coordinating the international effort from there, and they’ve put me in charge of security. I’m setting off on a transport plane this afternoon.”
Harry looked at the departure board. Bangkok. Maybe there were still direct flights from there to Auckland.
“Let me think about it, Kaja.”
“Great. How long do you think—”
“One minute. Then I’ll call you back, OK?”
“One minute?” She sounded happy. “OK, I can just about cope with that.”
They ended the call.
He still hadn’t touched the
glass in front of him.
He could disappear. Sink down into the darkness. And then he caught it again, the thought that kept escaping him, from when he was in the car under the ice. It had been cold. Frightening. And lonely. But something else too. It had been quiet. So incredibly peaceful.
He looked at the departure board again.
Places a man could disappear.
From Bangkok he could go to Hong Kong. He still had connections there, he could probably get a job without too much difficulty, maybe even something legitimate. Or he could head off in the other direction. South America. Mexico City. Caracas. Really disappear.
Harry rubbed the back of his neck. The ticket desk closed in six minutes.
Katrine and Gert. Or Kaja and Auckland. Jim Beam and Oslo. Sober in Hong Kong. Or Caracas.
Harry felt in his pocket and pulled out the small, blue-grey lump of metal. Looked at the dots on its sides. Took a deep breath, cupped his hands, shook the dice. Rolled it along the counter.
A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JO NESBØ is a musician, songwriter, economist, as well as a writer. His Harry Hole novels include The Redeemer, The Snowman, The Leopard and Phantom, and he is also the author of several stand-alone novels and the Doctor Proctor series of children’s books. He is the recipient of numerous awards including the Glass Key for best Nordic crime novel.
A NOTE ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR
NEIL SMITH majored in Scandinavian Studies at University College London and lived in Stockholm for several years. He now lives in Norfolk, England. His translations include books by Liza Marklund, Mons Kallentoft, Leif GW Persson, Marie Hermanson and Anders de la Motte.
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