by K. O. Dahl
Frølich nodded. He had the impression the smile on Gunnarstranda's lips was even more pronounced. He had no idea what scheme Gunnarstranda had devised, but at that moment things were going his way, that much Frølich did know.
Fristad went on: 'The whole business with the jewellery stands or falls with the girl, Linda Ros, doesn't it? Right? You found the jewellery there, at Skau's place… then… a week later with Skau completely out of the picture… Kramer took his own life in a fit of depression. He felt guilty, perhaps because he had left the car park without finding her. The thought that she might have been lying on the ground being strangled while he drove away - that sort of thought could have pushed Henning Kramer over the edge.
When Kramer killed himself, Skau saw a chance to save his own skin and forged the suicide note to lead suspicion away from him. He wrote an unsigned letter in Kramer's name confessing the murder.'
Fristad beamed in triumph. 'Is that how it could have happened? I'm asking! Could that have happened? Is it a possibility?'
His boyish face shone like in a TV commercial.
Gunnarstranda said nothing.
Frølich was about to say something, but the public prosecutor intercepted first. 'I like the theory about Skau,' the public prosecutor said with enthusiasm. 'Skau is stupid enough to write an unsigned suicide letter. He's unscrupulous enough. Isn't he? Eh?'
Frølich cleared his throat ready to speak.
Gunnarstranda's eyes were like an eagle's. 'Let the public prosecutor finish,' the inspector snapped.
'Yes,' repeated Fristad in a dream. 'I do like the Skau theory. It explains why this ridiculous suicide letter turns up in Frølich’s pigeonhole. Skau was being held across the street, in custody. He just dropped off a letter in an envelope in the corridor when he was let into the yard for a walk. It was addressed to a policeman. He smuggled it out. What do you think? The theory is simple, plausible, could have happened. Remember, Gunnarstranda, this is not the first time…'
'Then we'll have to try to persuade Linda Ros to admit she was lying about the jewellery,' Gunnarstranda said in a soft voice. 'And then we just have to wait for the results of the DNA test, don't we?'
'Mm… exactly! We need the results of the DNA test,' the public prosecutor concluded automatically. 'If the particles of skin under the victim's nails belong to Skau…'
He stood up in his excitement. 'Then it's probable that Skau strangled her,' he repeated. 'We'll have to wait for the results of the DNA test,' the public
prosecutor stated. 'Thank you, gentlemen.'
'It can't have been Skau,' Frølich said after the two policemen were on their own. 'How the hell would he have got access to a computer in custody?'
'Absolutely. Sounds unlikely.'
'But why didn't you say anything? Why should we leave here with that man's conclusions?' Frølich asked, tossing his head in the direction of the public prosecutor's door.
'I had my reasons,' the policeman said in a cutting tone. 'What I'm wondering about is what kept you last night.'
'I went back to sleep after you rang. Sorry.'
'Did you go back to bed after I had dragged you out of it?'
Frølich gave a sleepy smile. 'I had my reasons.'
'But if you leave me to do the dirty work on my own, don't stick your nose in my business, as you tried to do here,' Gunnarstranda chided, annoyed.
Gunnarstranda went down the stairs with Frølich in his wake. He already had a cigarette out. 'Fristad wants a simple, easy-to-follow case to plead. For that he needs evidence. He's relying on you and me to know what we are doing. And he wants more than half the glory. At the moment he thinks he's helped us on our way. So we have a free hand for a while yet.'
'A free hand to do what?'
'To find evidence, of course.'
'What evidence?'
'My dear colleague,' Gunnarstranda said in a patronizing voice. 'Hasn't it occurred to you that the DNA sample they found under Katrine's nails may not belong to either Kramer or Skau?'
'Have you been told that?' Frølich quizzed.
'I haven't been told anything, but I intend to find out.'
* * *
Chapter Forty
Uphill
Bente Kramer trudged up the hill the police station bestrode like a castle at the end of a footpath. A man wearing a cowboy hat was taking his dog for a walk on the green grass stretching across to Oslo prison. A group of homeless tramps were having a meeting on a bench under one of the trees. Bente Kramer stopped to collect her breath. A uniformed woman with a contented face and blonde hair in a pony-tail under a police cap came striding down the hill. Bente nodded to her. The policewoman nodded back, and puckered her brow in a questioning frown. Bente put on a tired expression and battled on. Having come this far, she would manage the last bit.
Inside the heavy doors, she stopped and watched the hectic activity around the reception desk.
'I would like to speak to Police Inspector Gunnarstranda,' she said to the kindest-looking of the men.
'Have you got an appointment?'
Bente Kramer shook her head.
The police officer picked up a telephone and called. A tired-looking man smelling of stale beer and garlic pushed to the front and shouted something across the desk. The man with the telephone ignored him and, with the receiver under his chin, asked: 'What's it about?'
Bente cleared her throat. 'It's about a ring,' she said. 'Tell him it's Bente Kramer with a ring that belonged to Katrine Bratterud.'
* * *
PART 3
THE LAST FIX
* * *
Chapter Forty-One
Hamlet
The scratch marks down his chest and side had faded; now they were mere pale, almost invisible red lines, not unlike the marks after a hot night with the woman you love. Beneath the nipple on his right hand side her nail had dug into him leaving a cut which was also healing now. With his eyes closed, he could still conjure up the sensation of her fingers scratching him, freezing, as death finally came to his rescue in the grass and took her into shadowland as violent jerks shook the young body for five seconds. Her final, but presumably her greatest climax ever. A gift - delivered after a few tender moments of doubt from his side. She had thought he was going to mount her. She had felt the pressure from his stiff member against her body and assumed he wanted to take her. She had relaxed in the hope she would be allowed to live. He had read that in her blue eyes. Eyes that now - at this very second - caused him to bend his head in pain and doze as the sweat broke out over his entire body - still - so long afterwards. just do it, said the blue eyes. Do what you want. Just let me live. She had almost succeeded in bewitching him - forestalling her own destiny. But only almost. Even now he could still feel the same fury rising inside him. As the fury rose the memory of her eyes could cause him to pull up short at any moment, to immerse himself in profound thoughts, a memory that thus became the best way to maintain his aggression, to think about how she had just been asking for it - by spreading her legs and opening them wide to let him in. That was when he no longer had any choice. The hardness she felt was no precursor of sensual pleasure; it was a precursor of death.
There would never be such eyes again. He put on a white shirt and quickly tied his tie. Inspected himself in the mirror and threw his suit jacket across his shoulders. Think of her. You're doing it for her. Think of her. Get it over with.
'Hamlet,' Frølich said with a grin. 'Quite convincing, too. You should go on the stage.'
'At least I don't fall asleep,' Gunnarstranda answered, weighing the ring in his hand. Frølich was supporting his chin on his hand and said, 'What's the question?'
'The question is: If Henning Kramer posted Katrine's jewellery to Raymond Skau, why didn't he send this one?' Gunnarstranda held the ring between thumb and first finger while squinting through the hole at Frølich.
'Because he never posted anything.' Frølich mused on what he had said and at length asked, 'Do we know if she was wearing th
is ring on the night of the murder?'
'Eidesen noticed this ring was missing when we found her jewellery. We can prove it belonged to Katrine.'
'If Kramer had wanted to point the finger of blame at someone else I don't think he would have left a ring in his room that clearly belonged to her… so the logical explanation must be that Kramer never posted any jewellery anywhere.'
'You're getting warm, Frølich. Kramer didn't send any jewellery. All he had was this ring. Someone else must have posted the jewellery to Skau, and if there is a someone else, it must be a person who first killed Katrine Bratterud and then Henning Kramer. And then,' Gunnarstranda grunted, 'we're facing a problem I do not understand at all.'
'What's that?'
'I don't understand why Kramer had to die.'
'He must have known something.'
Gunnarstranda chewed on that. 'Possible,' he said. 'If you're right, Kramer must have invited the murderer over the night he was killed. That may also explain why he lied to you about what happened the night Katrine was killed. He may have suspected some people, or a particular person. And called him.'
'Why would he have called the killer?' a sceptical Frølich frowned.
'Because he was killed at home in his brother's flat, not in his room. Henning Kramer was quite unpredictable as regards where he spent the night…' Gunnarstranda mumbled with closed eyes. 'Well, that's how it must have been. Kramer asked to meet up and that resulted in his death. Afterwards the suicide letter was written. Since Kramer is dead, to all outward appearance by his own hand, it's easier to point suspicions in his direction than Skau's, who is alive and can still issue denials. For all the killer knows, Skau has an alibi. Looking at the facts, what do we know so far?'
'We know the killer was not a random assailant. He must have been in her circle of acquaintances.'
Gunnarstranda nodded.
'We know the killer must have known about the connection between Katrine and Skau.'
Gunnarstranda grinned. 'You're the one who's so keen on the theatre. What would Holberg's Erasmus Montanus have said?'
'A stone cannot fly. Mother Nille cannot fly. Ergo… is mother Nille a stone…?' Frølich ventured.
Gunnarstranda shook his head. 'We know that Katrine rang friends and acquaintances before going to the party. We know Katrine made at least five calls and later that night she was murdered. Ergo,' he mumbled, 'it's possible the motive is to be found in the phone calls.'
'We've established that she had a strained relationship with Bjørn Gerhardsen,' Frølich said. 'We know that Annabeth s must have hated her, that Katrine couldn't choose between Ole Eidesen and Henning Kramer, and that she was hiding from her past while trying to clear up a period in her very earliest past - she owed ten thousand kroner to a violent pimp. We've established that on the day before the murder she visited the social worker who knew about her adoption.'
'The last one,' Gunnarstranda smiled. 'It means Katrine knew who she was. She didn't tell Ole Eidesen. Why not? Because she hasn't come to terms with the matter yet. She knows the name of her biological mother and she has had a shock. The circumstances around the adoption must have struck deep. Remember she had far-fetched fantasies about her biological parents dying in plane crashes and all that sort of thing. Now she has discovered the actual truth. What does she do then?'
'So you think the phone calls prove she was continuing to dig up her past?'
'Not necessarily. She may have simply revealed the news to some other person. Although she may also have rung someone who was in the know.'
'But how does that help us?'
'We know she made four or five calls, at least.'
'And we would never get a warrant to check the telephone line. Wait a minute,' Frølich said, excited. 'Gerhardsen,' he went on. 'Gerhardsen has money. He's loaded. Katrine might have called him to ask for a favour. She needed money to pay off Skau. Wow, this is a straight business deal for the two of them. Both Katrine and Gerhardsen have been in this situation before. She asked him for money. That explains why he treated her like a whore at the party afterwards. That explains why she was ill at the party. Suppose he had given her money and wanted repayment in kind - in the form of sexual favours?'
'You may be right. But why would he throttle her?'
Frølich considered the options. 'Because she didn't want to play along,' he concluded. 'And Gerhardsen doesn't have an alibi. He claims he went to Smuget, but no one has corroborated that, neither those who went with him nor the other two in the taxi. Neither Ole Eidesen nor Merethe Fossum remembers him entering. Neither of them can remember having seen the guy inside. But Katrine and Henning must have been five hundred metres away from his taxi outside Smuget. My God, his car in Munkedamsveien, everything fits. He has to cross the City Hall square to fetch the car. If he had gone for it right after the taxi dropped them off he would have seen Katrine and Henning. They were putting on their show on the wharf.'
Gunnarstranda regarded his younger colleague with a smile. 'You'd like to bang up Gerhardsen, wouldn't you.'
'Naturally.'
'Have you got something against him?'
'All the same, it's worth bringing him in for questioning again,' Frølich said.
They were interrupted by the telephone, and Gunnarstranda's face split into a huge smile after delivering his arrogant one-liner.
He coughed. 'Of course I remember you,' he said, standing up and fidgeting.
Frølich stood up as well.
'Just a moment,' Gunnarstranda said, holding his hand over the mouthpiece of the receiver. 'Yes, Frølich?'
The reserved expression caused his colleague to burst into a grin. 'A woman, is it?' He beamed.
Gunnarstranda, unmoved, coughed. 'What's the matter, Frølich?' he repeated in unapproachable mode.
Frølich was already by the door. 'Should Gerhardsen be arrested or just brought in for questioning?' he asked in a formal tone.
The inspector gave an impatient shrug and turned away. As soon as he concentrated on the telephone the features of his lean face softened. He sat down and listened with a big smile on his lips. 'And that,' he said with sympathy, 'that's usually a fertilizer problem…'
* * *
Chapter Forty-Two
A Sucker
He drove in the vague direction of the city centre. He needed to find a multi-storey car park. It wasn't so important where he put the car. The main thing was that the place should be anonymous. A place where he would be given a receipt. It was at such moments, when there was no doubt about what had to be done, that all the tiny events put together acquired new meaning - that tiny events became a comprehensible whole. In a way he was back at square one; finally he was where he should have begun. Of course this was a weakness on his part - not starting at the beginning. However, perhaps it is humanity's greatest weakness: a tendency to walk around the target until there is no way back. It's always like that: it isn't until you stand by the quarry that you can see the shortest route - it's only then you know where you should have started.
He grinned. He knew where he should have started. After so much trouble he now knew. Because of the most common weakness in existence: not facing up to the real truth. You shrink from seeing small signs and signals of the illness until these same symptoms have grown so large that the illness keeping the symptoms alive can no longer be denied.
In all these years there had only been one real threat. He had accepted the threat. Not because he was stupid, not because he was weak, but because he had allowed himself to be duped by the symptoms when the malignant tumour began to stir.
But was it in vain?
Nothing is in vain. He turned the car radio up louder. It was the wrong question. That's why nothing is in vain. The car radio began to hiss as he drove down the hills in Fjellinjen. Cars whizzed by on both sides, young people racing by without knowing what it was they were racing after. Urban traffic is a study in impatience. He slowed down and turned off before he was through the tunnel and reappeare
d in daylight just before Filipstad. He turned right and drove slowly into the entrance of the multi-storey car park. The crackling in the speakers disturbed his thinking. He had to switch off the radio. The bends led him gently downwards. Nothing is in vain. It is the endeavour and the exertion that afford insight, that reveal the truth. The others did not die in vain.
They had helped him to point out the real tumour. When the tumour can no longer be concealed there is only one solution: you get rid of it. He left the spiral ramp and drove into the parking area. Out of the darkness; into the darkness.
The sun was baking the policeman's back as he closed the wrought-iron gate behind him and slowly made his way up the garden path alongside a beautiful row of weigela plants whose bell-like flowers were coming to an end now. He stopped and took a spray of fragile, wax-like bells that were still in blossom. He could sense his dread. While he was standing there he heard the rustle of a newspaper from somewhere behind the hedge. So someone was at home. He moved away and walked the last few metres to the broad front door and rang the bell. Not a sound could be heard from inside. Either the bell didn't work or they didn't hear, he thought, and he raised his hand to ring again. At that moment the door opened a crack.
'Gunnarstranda?' Sigrid Haugom said in surprise. 'What brings you here this time?'
The inspector put both hands in his jacket pockets and tried to formulate an answer in his head. 'A sucker,' he said after a pause.
Sigrid Haugom opened the door wide and led the way. She was wearing a flowery dress. It looked as though she had just put it on. As if to underline the correctness of his assumption she stopped in front of a mirror and smoothed a few kinks over her bosom. 'Is that what you think?' she asked.