Death in a Cold Climate

by Robert Barnard

  ‘Perfectly capable lad,’ he said, sitting Fagermo down by his desk, piled high with crazy graphs and endless lines of computer figures. ‘Unusually so. A real find, because they’re not so easy to come by these days. He was experienced, and knew what he was doing. The great thing was, you didn’t have to keep your eye on him the whole time.’

  ‘He was crew, was he?’

  ‘That’s right. The Institute has a couple of boats, with full time crew, because one or other lot of us here is out at sea for one reason or another much of the time.’

  ‘Doing what? Or is that top secret?’

  ‘No, no, what we’re doing isn’t top secret, though the details of what we find sometimes are.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Oil. A lot of what we’re doing these days goes straight to the Department of Oil and Energy, or else to the State Oil Company. It’s the sort of information that all sorts of foreign oil companies–especially the American and British–would like to get their hands on. The Russians show a lot of interest as well–that’s partly why there’s been so much Russian activity up in the Northern waters recently: curiously well-equipped fishing-boats–you must know all about that sort of thing, coming from Tromsø.’

  Fagermo nodded. It was a common joke how advanced fishing technology had become in Russia. ‘Could you give me some idea of what Forsyth was involved in, in his work for you?’ he asked.

  ‘Basically it’s a question of collecting scientific data: what everyone is interested in is which areas of the North Sea and the Barents Sea are most likely to be profitable. Let me put it very simply –’ and Gunnar Meisal crouched forward in an expository pose and gave a little lecture involving gas chromatographs, spectrometers, hydraulic content, multi-channel folds and subsamples. At the end (Fagermo had fixed his eyes on him in desperate attentiveness, and tried to stop them glazing over) Meisal leaned back again in his desk chair, a benevolent expression on his face, conscious of having rendered the subject simple almost beyond the limits of scholarly responsibility. Fagermo trod his way carefully forward with his next question, conscious of the danger of revealing his still near-complete ignorance.

  ‘I see,’ he said, sounding unconvincing to himself. ‘The long and the short of it is, you’re getting information, doing research, that a lot of people–foreign companies, and governments as well–would like to get their hands on.’ Meisal nodded. ‘Would that be relatively simple information–the sort of thing that can be carried in the head?’

  ‘No, no–certainly not. Highly technical. It’s the sort of stuff that we would have to analyse in depth. Or often the Oil and Energy Department uses consultants–highly qualified people in universities, technical colleges, and so forth.’

  ‘So it’s difficult to imagine Forsyth being able to make use of the sort of information you might be getting on these trips.’

  ‘Very difficult. Because he’d have to know what he was doing. Much of what we’re up to would be quite meaningless to the average crew member; he wouldn’t know what was of value, what wasn’t. Of course Forsyth was a bright boy, and experienced. It’s just possible, if he was really clued up, he could get hold of the stuff people are willing to pay good money for. But if it’s a question of leaks to foreign concerns, it’s much more likely to happen at the consultant level–they would really know what’s wanted.’

  ‘And the companies would really pay good money for this information?’

  ‘I wouldn’t mind betting. It would have to be good money, to be worth anybody’s while. The oil companies have got their fingers in all sorts of pies in this country, since the various North Sea blocks proved workable and profitable. They use some of the same people as the Americans and Russians use–spies, information agents, whatever you like to call them. And they’ve usually got someone or other on the relevant local councils in their pay: they get a retainer to keep the oil company’s interests in mind.’

  ‘Really? That could be interesting. Mostly the right-wing people, I suppose?’

  Meisal shrugged. ‘Not necessarily. The other lot don’t go much on oil, but they’re pretty fond of money. You know how easy they find it to square things with their consciences. Suddenly you start hearing them say that if there’s one thing they think they can justify spending money on it’s a bit of extra room for the kiddies to play in, and before you can blink your eyes they’ve got five-bedroom houses and ten-acre gardens.’

  ‘You could be right,’ said Fagermo. ‘And of course the oil companies are probably interested in Tromsø.’

  ‘They’re interested in all the bigger towns in the North–for when the bonanza starts north of the sixty-second parallel. It’ll be this year, or next year–but whenever it is they want to have their lines open well in advance. They say there’s even more money to be made from the Northern blocks than there has been from the Southern ones. And they’re damn right!’

  Fagermo sat for a moment in thought. ‘Well, well,’ he said finally. ‘The modern gold rush. It seems to have some funny side-effects . . . Now, this boy, Forsyth, did he strike you as trustworthy?’

  Meisal pondered. ‘It’s not something we think about: security is something that usually only matters higher up, and anyway the cloak-and-dagger aspects are not really our affair, only the research . . . I was just with him on a couple of trips. He was certainly a pleasant chap: not talkative, but you could talk to him. He fitted in well, even though he didn’t talk much Norwegian. He liked earning money–from overtime, that sort of thing–but most of the crew-men do. And I knew we wouldn’t keep him for long, because he was too bright. There are lots of jobs waiting for a chap like that. I imagine he was biding his time, saving up, and he just moved on when he was ready.’

  ‘So you weren’t surprised when he left? Did he actually give in his notice?’

  ‘I imagine so, though you never know with crew: they can be pretty casual. Would you like me to find out?’

  ‘Can you?’

  Meisal took up the phone and dialled a number: ‘Kjell–you remember that Forsyth boy, on the boat? Did he give in his notice before he left? . . . Just took off . . . No hint at all? . . . When was this? . . . I see, thanks . . . Not the immigration people, the police . . . He’s dead.’

  He put down the phone.

  ‘He left without giving notice just before Christmas, and never came back.’

  ‘The last part I know already,’ said Fagermo. ‘Well, I’m grateful to you for your help.’ He got up to go, but paused at the door. ‘You’ve not given me much idea of the boy’s personality. Did you know him well enough to get one? Did he make any impression on you at all?’

  Meisal thought, his Grand Canyon face resting on his cupped hands: ‘Self-contained . . . self-reliant . . . ruthless . . . ’

  ‘Why ruthless?’

  ‘You asked for impressions. That was mine. You don’t get much opportunity to be ruthless in the middle of the North Sea on a geological research expedition. But that’s how he struck me. Someone who knew what he wanted, and went after it.’

  • • •

  Back in Tromsø, Fagermo went straight to the station in the setting sun of early evening and caught up with developments. Sergeant Ekland was off duty, and even now (no doubt) was snoring in front of his television set with a beer-glass in his hand. He had left behind a report of very much the kind which Fagermo had anticipated: written in a Norwegian which (even granted the chaotic free-for-all which is the current state of the language) could only be described as semi-literate, it detailed the various approaches by members of the public to the police following publication of the artist’s impression of the dead boy in the local paper two days before. Reading through the details as mistyped by Ekland, Fagermo could only feel that there was more to be said for literacy than was usually allowed these days–and for typing lessons for policemen as well.

  Among the disorganized mass of details and names and addresses there was one item that caught his eye. Among others who said they had seen him (but, a
s far as could be judged from Ekland’s notes, had had nothing whatsoever more to say about him) was a Fru Barstad who manned a kiosk up in Biskopsgate as it wound up from the main street towards the top of the island. Ekland had noted down the date she gave–December 20–but beyond that his notes consisted entirely of irrelevancies: her marital status (widow); her age (sixty-five); the number of years she had worked at the kiosk (twenty-five). But Fagermo did not need to be told how long Fru Barstad had worked at the kiosk. He had known Fru Barstad from her first days there. On an impulse he put on his coat and went out into the street.

  When Elin Barstad had begun to work at the kiosk in Biskopsgate she was a capable woman of forty whose husband had begun to take the easy way out of marriage to her and was graduating to full-time alcoholism. Fagermo had not yet even begun at gymnas. She had sold him chocolates, mild pornography and his first cigarettes. Over the years the pornography on offer had got less mild, but Fagermo had lost the need for it. For old times’ sake, though, he still bought chocolates or cigarettes there, if he was in the vicinity. And as he had grown into a young-looking middle-aged policeman with an amused mouth and sharp eyes, Fru Barstad had aged into the kind of old lady Norway alone can produce–the kind of old lady who is convinced she is the backbone of Norway. Bulky, upright, tougher than any man, she was a heavyweight opponent, and took on all comers. At sales or crushes of any kind her umbrella, wielded vigorously, felled all bystanders and brought her to the front of the queue, where her voice, first cousin to Kirsten Flagstad’s without the musicality, summoned the shop assistant to her immediate service. She was tough, pushing, opinionated, aggravating and totally irresistible, a force of nature that the most foul-mouthed teenager or drunken tramp could never hope to best. She sat in her kiosk like Pius IX in the Vatican, ruling her roost and the streets around, utterly secure in her own infallibility. She made no concessions to manners, good-nature or old acquaintanceship. She simply was.

  ‘Yes?’ she enunciated sourly, when Fagermo had stood patiently before her counter for something approaching a minute.

  ‘I’ll have a bar of chocolate,’ he said. She handed it to him silently, took his money, and slapped it into the till.

  ‘I hear you’ve been giving us some valuable information,’ said Fagermo conversationally. Fru Barstad sniffed virtuously, as if to say: I did my duty.

  ‘Mind if I ask you a few more questions?’

  A smile of triumph wafted over Fru Barstad’s face. ‘I knew that chap didn’t know his job! I said to myself: those are stupid questions you’re asking, and you’re forgetting to ask the right ones! But it wasn’t my business to teach him his job!’ She sniffed again. She took great pleasure in the inferiority and moral frailness of the world in general. Fagermo saw no reason to take up the cudgels for Sergeant Ekland’s intelligence. No policeman likes lost causes.

  ‘How can you be sure it’s the same boy?’ he asked.

  ‘Well, of course I can’t, and I’m not. I said so to him. These artist’s impressions–they’re very clever, but they’re not like a photo, are they?’

  ‘We could show you the body,’ said Fagermo. A definite flicker of interest passed over Fru Barstad’s face.

  ‘That’s as you please. Anyway, as I told your little I-should-be-on-TV sergeant, I know most of the customers at this kiosk by this time. Most of them live around here-or they wander up after the pictures.’ She surveyed gloomily the white road shading into darkness as it wound down to the town. ‘And there’s not much I don’t know about some of them that come here, I can tell you! Don’t give me you’re police, because police don’t know half of it! So anyway, when there is someone completely new, and in the middle of winter to boot, you notice them.’

  ‘I suppose you do,’ said Fagermo, who believed her. ‘But the date–I don’t see how you can be so sure of that.’

  ‘Ah, but I can!’ said Fru Barstad, with gloomy triumph. ‘Because it was my last night on before Christmas. I’d ordered a taxi to take me to the airport, because my sister was coming up on the night plane from Bodø to stay with me for Christmas–and a right foolish idea that turned out to be! Anyway, I was just thinking of locking up for the night when he came along and demanded a hot dog or something, I forget what. I muttered a bit, but I could hear he was English –’

  ‘You’re sure about that?’

  ‘You think I could have been here twenty-five years without being able to hear whether someone’s English or not? We used to have hundreds and hundreds here every summer, before they got their Troubles.’

  ‘That makes it pretty certain it was Forsyth you saw, then.’

  ‘Anyway, I got it for him, whatever it was, and then I locked up. Then, when the taxi came, we drove to the airport, and I saw him again, just up the road here–’ she nodded her head up the road, along the way that led over the crown of the island to the airport–‘there he was finishing his hot dog and standing talking to someone, and I thought to myself: Well, you are a fast one, and no mistake.’

  ‘What do you mean? Was it a woman?’

  ‘Of course it was a woman. He was talking to her by the roadside as if he’d just picked her up–or her him, you can’t tell these days.’ She sniffed vigorously, a testimony that she was brought up in the days when men were men and women were women, and the ritual dance was danced with quite other steps.

  ‘This is interesting,’ said Fagermo. ‘If you’re right about the date this was only his second night here.’

  ‘This town,’ said Fru Barstad darkly.

  ‘Was it someone you knew, this woman? One of the usual?’

  ‘Oh no–though I think I’ve seen her before. Definitely from Tromsø or around, I’d say. Looked quite respectable. Smart, permed hair, took care of herself. Oh no, definitely not one of the regulars.’

  ‘Could you describe her, or recognize her again?’

  ‘Not to swear to–I only saw her in the headlights. She was a blonde: twenty-five, thirty, thirty-five–these days you can’t tell, not like you could thirty years ago. Good-looking, well-dressed–there’s nothing that stands out about her that I remember.’

  ‘Just thinking back to how they looked,’ said Fagermo carefully, ‘would you say they were meeting by appointment, or just casually?’

  Fru Barstad considered the question carefully, gazing up into the darkness. ‘Well, as I said, my impression was that one had picked the other up, and I dare say there was something made me think that–I’m not one for jumping to conclusions without I have my reasons. It’s the way people stand, isn’t it? I mean, not too close, trying to look casual, sizing each other up. It’s like dogs, isn’t it? And it usually ends up pretty much the same way, too!’

  Fagermo sighed. ‘It’s a pity. If it was just something casual, like asking the way, it probably led to nothing. But the boy did get in late that night, and it would have been interesting if he’d met this woman by appointment.’

  ‘Well, he wouldn’t have been just asking her the way somewhere, you can bank on that,’ said Fru Barstad. ‘If he’d wanted to know that, he’d have asked me. People do all the time–it’s more likely I’d know than someone you stop casually in the street.’

  ‘She may have stopped him.’

  ‘But I think she’s local. And he didn’t look in the least Norwegian, in spite of being fair.’

  ‘Do you think she lives around here?’

  ‘No–I’d have seen her more often. But there are people you just see occasionally–walking home after the last bus has gone, or out for their Sunday stroll. She’s one of them.’

  ‘She may have just asked him the time,’ said Fagermo despondently. But Fru Barstad was not willing to have her information disregarded as easily as that.

  ‘Very likely she did ask him the time,’ she said, with her lips pursed. ‘It’s been done before! But it didn’t stop at that. The lights were on them as we drove up the hill, and when we passed them they were talking. You don’t talk when somebody asks you the time, unless you
’re hoping it will lead to something else.’

  ‘You could be right,’ said Fagermo.

  ‘There’s no “could be” about it,’ she returned sharply. ‘No doubt you smart boys in the police think you know better than the rest of us, but you parade around in your uniforms and people make themselves scarce when they see you coming. You don’t see the half of what’s going on. Do you know what this job has made me?’

  A cantankerous old battle-axe, thought Fagermo to himself, but he merely raised his eyebrows.

  ‘A student of human nature. You look at the way people walk, the way they hold their hats, the way they get into their cars, and you can tell what they’re up to, or what’s about to happen to them.’

  ‘You didn’t by any chance guess the young man was about to be murdered, I suppose?’ murmured Fagermo.

  ‘Not that. Of course not. But I’ll tell you this. When I saw him in the headlights, he was thinking of bed. And it wasn’t his own!’

  CHAPTER 11

  MARITAL RELATIONS

  ‘That’s funny,’ said Sergeant Ekland, with an expression of sublime complacency on his face. ‘Aren’t women funny. She never said anything about that to me.’

  ‘No,’ said Fagermo, with equal complacency.

  It was the next morning, and Ekland was sitting in Fagermo’s office–massive, self-congratulatory and elegantly lethargic. He had the happy knack of never being able to see that he had done wrong, or done too little, or might have done better. He had the equally happy knack of giving to everything he did an equal amount of attention or inattention: knocking up a shelf in the garage or investigating a murder case occupied in his mind places of equal importance or unimportance, and were accordingly done in much the same take-it-or-leave-it manner. Such men live to a ripe and inconvenient old age.