The Hunting Dogs

by Jorn Lier Horst

  When the DNA result arrived, it had only been confirmation of what they already knew, or thought they knew, that they had arrested the right man. It was not only the DNA evidence. Rudolf Haglund fitted the description given by the witness on the tractor, and Cecilia herself on the tape. There was also the conveniently disappeared car, and his fishing trip alibi that had been shown to be worthless.

  They had been certain, every single one of them. All their experience and common sense told them Rudolf Haglund was the right man, although they understood this would not be enough to secure a conviction. The question now was whether one of the investigators had tipped the burden of proof in the right direction by swapping evidence item A-3 for one of the cigarettes Rudolf Haglund had stubbed out in an ashtray here.

  He released his grip on the railings and turned his back on the town, deciding it was not necessary to take his younger self for a fool. It must have happened as the front page of VG declared. Someone in the police station had planted the evidence. Squeezing his eyes shut, Wisting ran his hand over his face, aware of how wet he had become, but continued to stand with his eyes closed, almost afraid to gather his thoughts.

  When the column supporting the chain of evidence collapsed, other possibilities opened. The DNA result had changed everything and their wide-open investigation suddenly had its focus razor sharp on one thing, one man. It went from being broad-spectrum to the narrow pursuit of one person. The time then leading to the court case had been concentrated on finding circumstantial evidence to support the indictment.

  Haglund had placed personal ads in pornographic magazines. They found an old high school teacher who had caught him secretly watching girls in the shower, and unsolved incidents of indecent exposure where he fitted the description of the culprit. Nothing had been done about the possible innocence of the accused, that he did not possess a cellar like the one Cecilia had described, or that they had not found as much as a strand of Cecilia’s hair in his house.

  That had been Wisting’s responsibility and choice. If he viewed the case from the present perspective, then his suspension was unavoidable. Through the fresh analyses, the defence counsel had tipped the balance of probability towards the DNA evidence being manufactured by the police. To retain any kind of credibility he, as leader of the investigation and accountable individual, had to be removed from his post. It was a matter of public confidence in the police.

  He determined to prove himself worthy of that confidence.

  Entering his office again, he removed the cardboard box with the copy documents from the Cecilia case. If he could not use his own office he would work from home. Carrying the box into the corridor, he shouldered open the door to the stairwell to find Audun Vetti standing in front of him, silent, and with his eyes fixed on the cardboard box. Then he nodded, as though satisfied that Wisting had packed and was on his way out.

  The deputy chief constable moved aside to let him pass, but Wisting remained in the doorway. There was something he had wanted to say for a long time, from seventeen years before. Now he blurted it out.

  ‘We killed her,’ he said.

  Audun Vetti looked unsure whether he had heard correctly.

  ‘We killed Cecilia Linde,’ Wisting repeated. ‘When you approached the media and told them about the cassette you gave the murderer no alternative. He was forced to dispose of her.’

  ‘The journalists knew about it already. I simply confirmed it.’

  ‘That was what killed her.’

  Audun Vetti’s face darkened. ‘He would have killed her regardless. You had come up with nothing in ten days. I know it tormented you, but I don’t understand how you could bring yourself to falsify evidence.’

  Wisting watched the door slide shut behind Audun Vetti as he left. Arguing would not help. He had to take action to prove his innocence.

  He stowed the box in the boot of his car and replaced the luggage cover before locking the vehicle and twisting the police station key from his key ring.

  A patrol car drove into the backyard, the garage door slid open and Wisting followed it inside. He walked quickly, eager to hand over his key and admittance card so that he could make a start. He would go through the entire Cecilia case with a fresh pair of eyes and the benefit of seventeen more years of experience.

  Christine Thiis’ office was tidy and well organised, as usual. Recently appointed to the post that Audun Vetti had vacated when he had been promoted to deputy chief constable she had, last autumn, taken responsibility for the prosecution when a dead body was discovered in a summer cottage closed for winter. Though lacking experience, she had handled both criminal proceedings and media interest with a deft and effective touch. Wisting had come to appreciate her good judgment although she had, perhaps, greater knowledge of human nature than of investigative tactics.

  He placed the key and electronic admittance card on her desk, hesitating slightly before following with his service ID. It was obvious that she was as discomfited as he. ‘It’s okay,’ he said; she could not do other than follow Audun Vetti’s orders.

  Christine Thiis picked up his police badge, fingered it thoughtfully and, as he headed for the door, opened the top drawer of her desk. ‘I’ll put it here for the time being.’

  Their eyes met as he gave an answering nod and left.

  Before departing the police station he wanted to speak to Nils Hammer, the detective he had worked with most closely over the years. Like Wisting, he had started in the department as a young man. They did not socialise outside working hours, and Wisting did not know much about his personal life; but, as far as work was concerned, considered him indispensable. Efficient, committed and professionally sound, he thought logically and acted deductively. Wisting stepped into his office and closed the door.

  Hammer looked up. ‘Good to see you,’ he said. ‘I have something here we ought to look at.’

  ‘I can’t …’

  ‘A report of a missing girl,’ Nils Hammer interrupted. ‘Linnea Kaupang. Seventeen years old. She’s been missing since Friday.’

  Wisting glanced at the photograph. A young girl with slightly crooked teeth. Her eyes were dark and bright, and her fair hair fell in loose curls around her shoulders with a little yellow bow-shaped hair clip on one side. The thought that something awful could have happened to her felt like physical pain. Thoughts of how they should approach the case were already forming in his mind.

  ‘I can’t …’ he said, as he returned the photo. ‘You’ll have to deal with it by yourself.’

  23

  Not much material to build a story, Line thought as she left the police station. Nothing new had emerged from the press conference. ‘Lunch?’ she suggested to Erik Fjeld.

  Hooking his camera over his shoulder, he nodded. They found a café in a pedestrian street reminiscent of the café-bar Suzanne had opened at home in Stavern, a quiet place serving hot and cold lunches. She bought them each a baguette with a cola for the photographer and a foaming chai latté for herself. Erik found a spot well inside the premises where he ejected the memory card from his camera.

  After placing the food on the table, Line took her laptop from her bag. Opening it, she inserted the memory card and loaded the photos from the press conference. The first was a close-up of her with makeup covering only some of the bruising around her eye, but she looked much better than in the previous evening’s photos.

  ‘Nothing at the press conference suggested an early arrest,’ Erik Fjeld said.

  Line agreed, but was curious whether the police really had as little to go on as they said. Clicking the next image she realised she had been luckier than she could have even hoped. The document on the screen carried the title Deceased’s mobile phone.

  She enlarged the photo. Jonas Ravneberg had owned a Nokia 6233. In addition to the phone number, the report writer had included the fifteen-digit IMEI number, followed by a chronological schedule of incoming and outgoing calls over ten days. The list was short, confirming the impression of Jonas
Ravneberg as a loner.

  02.10 - 14.32 hours Outgoing: 69330196 Duty lawyer, Fredrikstad

  02.10 - 14.28 hours Outgoing: 1881 Directory Enquiries

  02.10 - 14.17 hours Incoming: 69310167 Unregistered

  01.10 - 12.33 hours Outgoing: 99691950 Astrid Solli­bakke, Gressvik

  30.09 - 21.43 hours Incoming: 99691950 Astrid Solli­bakke, Gressvik

  30.09 - 10.22 hours Outgoing: 46807777 Fredrikstad Blad

  29.09 - 21.45 hours Outgoing: 48034284 Torgeir Roxrud, Fredrikstad

  27.09 - 13.45 hours Outgoing: 93626517 Mona Husby, Fredrikstad

  25.09 - 20.15 hours Outgoing: 99691950 Astrid Solli­bakke, Gressvik

  Three names. Three people who might tell her more about the murder victim. Most exciting, however, were the conversations on the actual day of the murder. First an unknown caller, followed by a call to a lawyers’ office.

  The next image was the front page of a report from the site where the body was found. Line leaned into the screen. The report was introduced by the name of the person who had conducted the investigation and how the assignment had been given. This was followed by a description of the discovery site, the weather, the environs and the practical steps that had been taken to preserve the crime scene, as well as a paragraph about the dog and how it had been taken care of.

  It continued with a description of the victim: ‘male, aged around fifty, wearing a Helly Hansen rain jacket, dark blue jeans and green Wellington boots with the Viking trademark. The deceased lay prostrate on the pedestrian and cycle path with his upper torso partly protruding from the pathway. He had major contusions on his face’.

  She could not see anything else. The numbering in the top right-hand corner said page one of four.

  Next was a screen printout from the National Population Register concerning Jonas Ravneberg, his eleven-digit National Insurance number and a date indicating that Ravneberg had lived at the same address for sixteen years but, apart from that, nothing that Line did not already know.

  The next two photos were too fuzzy to read, but the third was the green cover of a document folder. This was useful because it contained a numbered list of the documents in police possession. The first of these was a report produced by the first patrol to arrive at the crime scene. She recognised the titles of the reports dealing with the mobile phone and the crime scene examination. Two witnesses had been interviewed: first the man who had found the body, and who had also sent the tip-off to the newspaper. The other witness was a female: Christianne Grepstad, such an unusual name that Line would easily manage to track her down.

  The final image was an Outline Report following Preliminary Examination of W. Blakstads gate 78. This described the interior of the house: ‘a terraced house of two storeys, with a basement underneath, its ground floor including a porch, kitchen and living room leading out to a little terrace, the second floor comprising a hallway, bathroom, three bedrooms and a balcony. The basement contains several storerooms and cellarage’.

  Holding the baguette in one hand, she continued to eat while she read. The report writer believed the perpetrator had been in the house for a considerable period of time. It appeared to have been searched thoroughly and systematically. Every drawer and cupboard had been opened and the contents removed. It was obvious that the perpetrator had been searching for something but impossible to know whether or not he had found it.

  ‘Good,’ she said, pointing at the screen.

  ‘Is there something?’

  ‘Definitely,’ she nodded. ‘He was looking for something.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The murderer.’

  She put her food aside to drink her tea. She had a story, a follow-up. Mysterious break-in. The kind of thing people liked to read. She would give the police a few hours before phoning them. If she were lucky, she would succeed in getting someone to agree with her opinion that there was something mysterious about how the burglary had been executed.

  ‘That was really risky, though,’ Erik Fjeld suggested. ‘Breaking into the house of somebody you’ve just killed. The police were certain to show up.’

  ‘He must have been looking for something worth the risk,’ Line agreed. ‘Something worth killing for.’

  24

  Above his head a flock of migrating birds ploughed their way south, wing-to-wing in synchronised formation below low clouds. Wisting was not driving home. Instead he passed quickly through Stavern and along the main road to Helgeroa, ignoring the exits leading to the Justice Department’s conference and training centre, the sports ground, the hospital and the Folk High School.

  Crows flapped like dark shadows across the flanks of brown ploughed fields. He pulled into the side at a sign pointing along the gravel track to the left, Gumserød farm, and halted where the witness on the tractor had said the white Opel had been parked.

  The young woman whose photograph Nils Hammer had shown him was in his mind, the one with the yellow bow in her hair. Linnea Kaupang. Somewhere, her despairing parents were waiting. Hammer knew what had to be done, but Wisting felt bad, not being able to contribute.

  He forced himself to concentrate on seventeen years back in time.

  Almost all murders in Norway are solved, which brings its own pressure. He was not the only one who had felt the Cecilia case heavy on his shoulders. When Rudolf Haglund appeared it felt as if a burden had been lifted from them all and Wisting experienced the satisfying feeling of success: of finally making a breakthrough, having a name, a suspect on whom the investigation could focus. But all they had achieved was the construction of their own version. They had invested their professional pride into drawing a convincing picture of Rudolf Haglund as a murderer.

  Wisting had seen this before. Pressure and the demand to solve a case could lead to rash conclusions. The investigators formed their own impressions of how elements hung together based on the first evidence. After they drew their conclusions, an unconscious process had been set in motion by which they sought confirmation. They had developed tunnel vision and sought evidence to fit their theory, become like hunting dogs following the scent. All sidetracks and possible distractions were passed over. It was Rudolf Haglund they were after, and they circled round him.

  Closing his eyes, he recreated his own picture of that hot summer day when Cecilia ran along the gravel track, the sunlight filtering through the leafy trees, muscles visible under her singlet, her hair pulled back in a ponytail swinging from side to side, earphones pressed close to her head, Seal, Kiss from a Rose, perspiration forming beads on her forehead and a veneer of moisture on her chest.

  In Wisting’s mind it was still Rudolf Haglund who was waiting, perched on the edge of the open car boot. White T-shirt and jeans. Small, close-set eyes, crooked nose and cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth. When he caught sight of her, he discarded the cigarette end, glanced from side to side to ensure he was entirely alone, and positioned himself with his back half-turned. When she passed, he pounced and upended her into the boot.

  For Wisting, Rudolf Haglund was still the man who had abducted Cecilia Linde but, realistically, there was doubt. He glanced in the mirror. The cardboard box on the rear seat contained thousands of documents. Several hundred names. He could not shake off the idea that it also contained an alternative name. An alternative killer.

  A man with a stick and heavy rainwear came walking along the farm track in the direction of the mailboxes. Tim Bakke, Wisting decided. A grizzled, green-eyed man with strong arms who lived in the first red house on the right-hand side of the track. He kept four hens in a chicken run behind his garage. When Wisting interviewed him he was most concerned about the fox that had snatched the fifth hen.

  He put the car into gear, crunching across the rough gravel. Ten minutes later, he swung off the road again. It was almost a year since he had taken over the cottage out at Værvågen, and he had grown fond of the place. He could relax there.

  Two parallel wheel ruts filled with brown muddy water
stretched before him, ascending to a plateau where he could see the smooth coastal rock of the shore. The track ended at an open area surrounded by thick wild rose bushes about thirty metres from the cottage. A footpath covered the final stretch. Down on the shore a seagull posed on one of the mooring posts. Wisting parked and lifted the box of case documents out of the boot. The wind rustled the autumn leaves and waves broke against the beach. He sank his shoulders and exhaled.

  Inside the cottage, he could smell the fresh paint from the final week of summer when he had been here with Line. The living room was bright and attractive with new covers on the soft furnishings as well as cushions and curtains in matching colours. The necessary female influence was his daughter’s.

  He set the box down in the centre of the table and removed his jacket before emptying the contents. He placed the ring binders in the centre of the table and sorted them according to colour. When he had finished, a cassette still lay at the bottom of the box: a copy, a BASF tape, marked exactly as Cecilia’s. CL.

  He looked around. Their old portable radio cassette player was still sitting underneath the windowsill. He pressed the eject button and inserted the cassette, spooling back slightly before commencing playback, and straightened up as he waited. Cecilia’s voice interrupted just as abruptly as the first time he had heard her.

  ‘On Saturday 15th July a man kidnapped me while I was out running. It took place at the crossroads beside Gumserød farm. He had an old white car. I’m lying inside its boot right now. It all happened so fast. I didn’t manage to get a good look at him, but he had a foul smell, of smoke, though something else as well. I’ve seen him before. He was wearing a white T-shirt and jeans. Dark hair. Small dark eyes and bushy black eyebrows. A crooked nose.’

  He listened to the entire one minute and forty-three seconds, moving his lips and repeating parts of the statement along with her. Her voice was clear and distinct, but she spoke rapidly, as though in a rush. Even though he had heard it many times before, it seemed nevertheless that there was something new there. He spooled back.