by K. O. Dahl
'Travelling, literature… my God, you should see all the books…' She tossed her head in the direction of another room.'…they're as fat as bibles, and he read and read…'
'Travelling?'
'Yes, he spent all his money on travelling.'
Gunnarstranda nodded. 'Did you meet her?'
'The girl from the rehab centre? Never.'
'Did you know your son occasionally took drugs?'
She sat up erect and the expression that had brightened up for a few moments when she was talking about her son's literary feats, darkened again. 'Does that make him a bad person?'
'Of course not. Did you know?'
'Yes.'
'Let me be honest with you, fru Kramer. There is a strong likelihood your son died by his own hand.'
The woman on the sofa was taken aback and was on the cusp of objecting again, but Gunnarstranda held up a hand. 'The reason I cannot exclude such an eventuality is threefold: first, the way he died - so far it looks like an undeniable case of suicide. Second, the fact that he was a drug addict…'
'He was not,' the woman interrupted with vehemence.
Gunnarstranda raised his hand in defence. 'Let's not squabble about that. The fact of the matter is that many occasional drug-users often suffer from depression, long and short-term. A psychiatrist would be able to say something more intelligent than you and I could about whether Henning's death was due to an acute depression, drugs or no drugs. The third fact that suggests your son hanged himself is his relationship with Katrine Bratterud.'
'But why would the death of this poor girl suggest Henning would take his own life?'
Gunnarstranda turned to the window again. In the street a middle-aged lady wearing pink shorts and a white blouse walked past. She was pushing a pram. 'Give it some thought,' he said.
'What do you think I'm doing? I've been doing nothing else for the last day or so, but it doesn't make sense to me.'
'What if Henning killed Katrine?' Gunnarstranda said.
'Are you crazy? He loved her!'
'I can understand your reaction,' the policeman said. 'But since I've been employed to clear up this case, it would be unforgivable of me not to keep the option open that he might have killed her. If Henning did do it, you could understand this resulting in a depression, which in turn may have fed to suicide, especially if he loved her as you say he did.'
'But why would he have killed her?'
'Good question,' Gunnarstranda said. 'Until the answer to that becomes apparent, we have to work on finding out what actually happened the night Katrine died.'
'Nothing happened that night. Henning was at home and asleep when she was killed.'
'Was he?'
'What do you mean?' The woman at the table was fidgeting with her handkerchief.
'I mean,' Gunnarstranda said, 'that Henning's statement doesn't ring true. There's something that's just not right. He claimed he left a car park by Lake Gjer at three o'clock in the morning - and arrived here at half past three at the latest. But he didn't. A taxi driver is willing to swear in court that he saw Henning's car parked in the same place at seven in the morning - the very morning that Katrine was killed. And he swears that Henning's car was in the exact same place that Henning claimed he had left over four hours earlier. Now I'm asking you, and I know it's difficult, but your answer will and must be used in court: When did Henning come home that night?'
'At the latest at half past three in the morning.'
'So my witness is lying?'
'I didn't say that.'
'But you're saying the car was here at half past three. How could it have been parked by the lake at seven?'
The woman bit her lip.
'Answer me,' the policeman whispered.
'He went back.'
'Have you just made this up or is it really true?'
'It's true. He went back.'
'Why?'
'Because…'
Gunnarstranda couldn't stand the tension. He knocked the cigarette down from behind his ear. He lit it with his stained Zippo without giving her a glance and inhaled. He opened the window and politely blew the smoke through the crack. 'Come on,' he prompted. 'Why did Henning go back'
'Because he was worried about her.'
She stood up and fetched an ashtray from one of the kitchen cupboards. It was made of solid glass.
'He was worried about her?' Gunnarstranda asked, unconvinced.
'Yes. I told him to go back.'
Gunnarstranda flicked the ash off his cigarette.
'Have you one for me as well?' she asked.
Gunnarstranda passed her the tobacco pouch. She began to roll a cigarette, but had to give up when the paper split. The detective put his roll-up in the ashtray, made one for her and flicked the Zippo.
Henning Kramer's mother took a deep breath. She blew a cloud of smoke towards the ceiling and watched it. Then she told Gunnarstranda how she had sat up waiting for Henning and how he had told her why he was worried about Katrine.
'He had gone to sleep with her in the car earlier that night. When he woke up she had disappeared!'
'She wasn't there?' 'No, vanished. He got out and went looking for her but she was nowhere to be seen.' Kramer's mother put the roll-up in the ashtray and stood up as the policeman was about to interrupt. She stopped in the doorway to the living room and turned to him. 'He drove here and woke me up. I know it was half past three because I couldn't understand why he was in my bedroom and waking me up, so I glanced at the alarm clock. Henning was nervous, unsure what to do. He said he had no idea where she could have gone and when I saw how nervous he was, I advised him to go back and search the area.'
She went into the hall and Gunnarstranda shouted. 'What was the time then?'
'He left before six,' she shouted back. And in a louder voice: 'I made him something to eat and we talked for quite a long time.'
She appeared in the doorway.
'When did he leave?'
'I only know it was before six o'clock.'
'When did he come back?'
'At eight.'
'And he hadn't found her?'
'No.'
'Why did your son keep this quiet?' Gunnarstranda asked.
The woman in the doorway just shook her head. She sat down and, with an apologetic expression, produced a packet of Marlboro Light. 'Yours are a bit strong,' she said, putting one of her own in her mouth and allowing the policeman to light it.
'And why did Henning lie to us about what happened?' Gunnarstranda pocketed the lighter.
'He was afraid you would suspect him.'
'But, as you said yourself, why would we believe he had killed her?'
'I have no idea, but he was all over the place. He didn't know what had happened to her and he had a bad conscience about not carrying out a more thorough search when he woke up to find her gone. He was convinced she had to be close by. She could have lost her way or someone could have prevented her from shouting for help. And he was even more convinced that was what had happened when he came back the second time.'
'But he didn't find anything?'
'I'm not sure.'
'What do you mean by that?'
'That I'm not sure. I asked him if he had found her. He said no and gave me a very funny look. I wanted to ask more questions, but he told me to be quiet, not to say any more.'
Gunnarstranda watched the woman take a lungful of cigarette smoke and exhale with her eyes closed. 'I think something must have happened when he went back,' she said.
'Like what for example?'
'I don't know, but I have my own ideas.'
'What ideas?' Gunnarstranda asked.
'He found the corpse. Her dead body.'
Gunnarstranda crushed his cigarette in the ashtray. 'Did he say anything else about her?'
'No.'
'Did he talk about his police interview?'
She nodded.
'What did he say?'
'He said he had lied. He hadn't told you a
bout going back to search for her the second time. I said that was stupid of him. I said you would see through the lie.' She paused.
'How did he answer?' Gunnarstranda asked in a quiet voice.
'He said: "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it,'" she replied.
'How do you interpret that?' the policeman asked.
'Don't know.'
Gunnarstranda mumbled, 'We'll cross that bridge when we come to it…'
They exchanged glances.
'I don't know,' she said. 'But I do know he didn't kill her.'
Gunnarstranda waited. In the end, she glanced up and said with a joyless smile: 'Mothers know that kind of thing.'
The policeman nodded to himself. 'Your son's death is tragic and I appreciate you don't like to think about the events, but what you have told me now may have had an effect on Henning. He may have felt guilty about what happened and gone into a depression…'
The detective's face was tired and lines of resignation began to appear around his mouth and eyes.
'I know he didn't do it,' she whispered.
'From what you've told me, I cannot exclude the possibility that he killed her.'
'But I think he was serious about this girl.'
'What do you mean by serious?'
'That there was something more between her and Henning than with anyone else.'
'You mean their relationship was special. But there is very little to suggest that is the case, fru Kramer. Katrine Bratterud had a boyfriend.'
'But she still felt something special for Henning. She was also precious to him.'
'Of course, the special relationship between them, if he did kill her, must have meant that the final act would have brought on a very bad depression.'
'Would you kill the person with whom you were going to share your life?'
'Share your life?' Gunnarstranda opened his eyes wide. 'You just said he was sceptical about concepts like love.'
'Being sceptical about such concepts does not mean he stopped loving her. What bothered Henning was that words like love camouflaged other things. He wanted to go deeper, to the core, beneath her skin.'
She sat looking into space, and added: 'And that is in fact the essence of love, isn't it?'
In silence, the policeman stared into the middle distance. He was thinking about his conversations with Edel, his own loss and his longing for isolation. 'I'm sure Henning was a very intelligent young man and a wonderful human being,' he said by way of a conclusion and sprang to his feet. 'But we in the police have to work with hard evidence and facts, so we would be interested in anything you might turn up… or remember.' He grasped her hand and took his leave.
* * *
Chapter Thirty-Four
The Archives
Gunnarstranda had just put a pan of potatoes on the stove when the telephone rang.
'I know what you're going to say,' Frølich said before Gunnarstranda could answer with his usual arrogance. Frølich went on: 'I'm ringing from the archives.'
Gunnarstranda watched Kalfatrus swimming restlessly around his glass bowl. The water was beginning to get dirty. Algae and sediment. 'Why's that?' he asked looking down at himself. In his hand he was holding a knife with a blob of butter on the tip and a fork.
'Because of Tormod Stamnes - the social worker who administered Katrine Bratterud's adoption. The guy's over seventy years old and in reduced circumstances,' Frølich said.
'Reduced in what sense?'
'He goes to Lorry during the day. He's one of the boys who hangs his head over his beer glass for ten minutes, then drains it in one go.'
'I see.'
'How much would you be willing to pay for a good motive?' Frølich asked with a grin.
'That's how you want to top up your pay, is it? I've got a frying pan on the go in the kitchen,' Gunnarstranda growled.
'Stamnes was involved in the relocation of Katrine in 1977. But that's not the most interesting bit. The crazy thing is that this guy spoke to Katrine the day before she was killed.'
Gunnarstranda put the kitchen utensils down beside Kalfatrus's bowl. His eyes glowed with the fiery intensity of old as he bit his lip and inhaled.
'This guy seems a bit dodgy,' Frølich said. 'For a long time he pretended he didn't understand what I was talking about. But then when I mentioned her name and said she was dead it gave him a shock. There was a real reaction and it all came out. She'd been there and he'd given her the name of her real mother. Katrine had got everything he knew out of him. The day before she was killed!'
'What was her real name?'
'Lockert,' Frølich said. 'Katrine's real mother's name was Helene Lockert.'
'There's something about that name,' Gunnarstranda muttered, thinking hard.«- 'I thought you would say something like that,' Frølich whinnied down the line. 'Does it ring a bell?'
'Not at this moment.'
'Helene Lockert died when Katrine was two years old. But that's not the most interesting thing. The most interesting thing is the cause of death.'
'And that was?'
'The Lockert case. In Lillehammer in 1977. Helene Lockert was strangled and left for dead in her house. Killer unknown.'
* * *
Chapter Thirty-Five
The Clean-Up
After the policeman had gone she plucked up her courage and began to tidy Henning's things. The thought of being in contact with his clothes still repelled her. Seeing his things lying around, where they'd been left, knowing he would never use them again, every little detail reminded her of him, reminded her that he was dead. Outliving your children is a terrible fate, she thought. It is the worst thing that can happen to anyone. When she had finally brought herself to enter his room, she stood studying the room as though it were the first time she had seen it.
The policeman had asked about a letter. But she dreaded going through his drawers, touching his things, confronting her grief, her loss, her emotion. She was exhausted from thinking thoughts about what he would never achieve, what his would never learn, what he would never do or the joys he would never bring her. You should never have dreams, she thought. It's dangerous to dream because dreams make you vulnerable. Dreams that plummet to earth create the greatest pain. She should never have nurtured dreams for Henning. Everyone has enough to deal with inside themselves. She stood in a daze, contemplating sweaters, trousers, shoes that would never be filled with his body, his spirit or his personality.
I have to think about something practical, she said to herself. She didn't want to lift the clothing. It was impregnated with his scent and she knew that would be too much for her. I have to reconcile myself to the fact that Henning is dead, she thought, that he will never come back - not here, not to this life. Her gaze fell on a red book on the bed. The author was Carl Gustav Jung, one of Henning's favourite gurus. Henning had said Jung was the internalized Hindu; Jung had a theory that time was an illusion. Those were the words he had used. The soul isn't reborn, Mum. We live different lives all the time. While you are living this life as my mother you're living another life, in another time, maybe as a French citizen in a Paris commune, maybe as a Stone Age woman, maybe as a camel!
'Camel!' she had screamed in consternation, rejecting his suggestion. The incident still made her smile. She sat down on the bed. Of course he was right. There had to be something after death. Something roaming other places, beyond the mortal frame, whether it was called a soul or a spirit or energy. But Henning had not done away with himself, she was certain of that. The mere idea of doing away With yourself would have been totally alien to him; it wasn't a way of thinking he would have been able to accept. She should have said that to the policeman. In those precise words. Henning did not understand what suicide was.
If Henning was living on some other transient spiritual plane, there was still hope. Hope of a spiritual plane, some form of mental substance - a god. But how would Henning meet God? After all, he had criticized the Bible as no more than a collection of myths and good stories, and
called himself a religious agnostic.
Her eyes fell on the white marble box he had brought back with him from India last summer. She stood up and wondered whether she dared to hold it. A small marble box decorated with onyx and mother of pearl. She studied the box, fought against her feelings, overcame her desire to turn away and lifted the box up. At once she flinched. There was something inside. A low, dry sound indicated that something slid around every time she moved her hand. There was something in the little box. A flood of new emotions streamed through her. It had to be precious. And therefore something secret. Henning had a secret. Would it be right to pry? Or to be more accurate: did she have the strength to pry? Would another unachievable dream issue forth only to dash all her hopes yet again, with all the injustice of fate?
She fought an internal struggle. With tears in her eyes she removed the lid from the little marble box. And found herself looking at a ring.
A ring. She put the box down on his desk and lifted the ring. A heavy ring, a broad ring with two stones inset. She examined it. The ceiling lamp was reflected in all the facets of the two jewels. The light seemed to be sucked into the stones and to explode out again. This was no cheap bauble. She scrutinized the ring. There seemed to be something engraved on the inside. Katrine, she read and burst into tears. The box had contained a vain dream, a dream that might have been better remaining a secret.
* * *
Chapter Thirty-Six
The Detective
Gunnarstranda used his legs and strolled down Maridalsveien to Beyer Bridge. He needed to think and he hated changing buses, so he decided to take a tram instead, a tram to the other side of town. He crossed the Akerselva on foot. By the bridge there was a kind of art installation with balloons. He continued down Thorvald Meyers gate towards Birkelunden. He tried to imagine Katrine Bratterud at the moment she found out the truth about her biological mother. Katrine at the end of her quest. A social worker who would open the door for her, the door out of a life lived in dreams. Would she have been disappointed? He supposed not. The discovery that the mother had been a murder victim of an unknown killer simply threw up yet more secrets.