The Caveman

by Jorn Lier Horst

  The spruce forest had encroached all the way to the walls, branches weighed down with snow and, as she drew closer, she saw that the place was in need of maintenance. Both paintwork and plaster were peeling, and the timber was rotting. Three satellite dishes pointed in different directions on the roof, one badly stained with rust.

  There were no other buildings in the vicinity, but when you were stuck with the nickname ‘German Ole’, more than sixty years after the war, perhaps this was the sort of place you would want to live. She parked behind an old Mercedes.

  Ole Linge greeted her without showing how he felt about her visit, no fleeting smile, welcoming look or brief nod. Only the pinched, stiff expression of someone accustomed to keeping his feelings to himself. ‘Come in,’ he said.

  She took her boots off in the hallway and followed him upstairs. Everything in the house seemed old: laminated furniture, shagpile carpets, striped wallpaper and fringed lampshades. A television stood on a crammed bookcase.

  He invited her to sit in one of two brown leather chairs beside a circular table in front of the window. A car towing a horsebox passed on the main road. Ole Linge must have waited for her here, watching her approach. ‘Thanks for letting me come,’ she said with a smile.

  Ole Linge responded with a nod.

  ‘It was Annie Nyhus who told me you knew Viggo Hansen.’

  ‘Can’t really claim that,’ Ole Linge said, as he took his seat. ‘Must be twenty years since I spoke to him. Maybe longer.’

  He picked up a remote control and turned down the sound on the TV.

  ‘You live on your own as well,’ Line remarked, thinking it could as easily have been Ole Linge dead in the chair.

  ‘That’s how things turned out,’ he said slowly, choosing his words carefully. ‘Have you talked to anyone else, other than Annie?’

  ‘I’ve spoken to Odd Werner Ellefsen and Eivind Aske.’

  ‘What did they tell you?’

  ‘Not much. They hadn’t had any contact with him for a long time either.’

  ‘Did they say anything about me?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Who else are you going to talk to?’

  ‘I’m trying to track down Frank Iversen. Do you remember him?’

  Ole Linge looked through the panorama windows.

  ‘He was the ship pilot’s son,’ Line said. ‘Do you have any idea what happened to him?’

  ‘He must have moved away. I haven’t seen him in years.’

  Line drew out her notepad, although she felt the man facing her would not have much to contribute. ‘What I’m looking for is someone who can tell me about Viggo, as they remember him.’

  ‘I’m not so good at stories,’ Ole Linge warned her. ‘I’ve no wish to appear in the newspaper either. That’s not for me.’

  ‘Although you’re a few years older, I understand you spent a lot of time together when you were growing up. Do you recall any incidents?’

  Ole Linge shook his head. ‘Viggo wasn’t very self-assured. The way I remember him, he usually stood on the sidelines, just watching.’ Line jotted some notes. ‘And then he was kind. Kind and helpful. There was never any nonsense with him.’

  ‘Did you visit him at home?’

  ‘Never went inside.’

  ‘Did you talk to his parents?’

  ‘Not much. They were like Viggo. Didn’t say much.’

  Line stayed for another half hour. Ole Linge’s words were slow and measured, and although he did not say much about Viggo Hansen, he said something she could use in her article.

  Loneliness is not being alone, but not having anyone to miss.

  49

  Line took the local paper from the mailbox before letting herself into the house. The phone rang as she removed her boots in the hallway. She dashed into the kitchen, throwing the newspaper on the table, to take the call.

  ‘Is that William Wisting’s house?’

  ‘Who’s calling?’ she asked, wriggling out of her jacket.

  ‘Henning Juul, journalist with 123 News. Sorry if I’m disturbing you, but I’ve tried to reach him at his office and on his mobile, and he isn’t answering.’

  Line knew who the man was. They had covered some of the same stories, and she knew he was competent. ‘He’s not at home.’

  He apologised for disturbing her and hung up.

  Line put down the receiver, but continued to gaze at the phone. Henning Juul was so desperate to speak to her father that he had tried his private number. It could only relate to one case, the dead man from the felling area out at Halle.

  The headlines in the paper related to the cold front and the big freeze. Line riffled through the pages, in two minds about whether to phone Sandersen in the news section. If something was brewing, her newspaper was in danger of being beaten to it by 123 News.

  Change in weather at end of week, she read, leafing past the readers’ letters about school buildings, reports of a Christmas market and property adverts, all the way to the TV listings at the back. There was no follow-up story about the mysterious death among the Christmas trees.

  She found Sandersen’s number on her mobile, but had nothing to give him apart from confirming that they probably had a story. He was already aware of that and, if she called, he might assign her away from her own story to the Halle case. As things stood, she had no desire either to give up on Viggo Hansen or get involved in her father’s work.

  Her phone vibrated in her hand. The number on the display was not stored in her contacts list. ‘Hi, this is Line,’ she answered.

  ‘Hi,’ said a young man at the other end. ‘Roger Nicolaysen. I’m responding to an unanswered call.’

  Line struggled to place the name until it dawned on her that this was the locksmith who had been at Viggo Hansen’s house. ‘Thanks for calling back,’ she said, explaining that she worked at VG and had some questions about a job Nicolaysen had done in August.

  The man whistled, as if to give notice that August was a long time ago.

  ‘You fitted two new locks at a house in Herman Wildenveys gate.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ he replied, surprisingly fast. ‘I remember that well. He’s the guy who died. I was there for the police last week too, after they found him. Had to drill through the same locks.’

  ‘Why did he want to replace the lock?’

  ‘The one he had was too old, he said.’

  ‘But you fitted two locks?’

  ‘That’s right. He was a fairly nervous type.’

  ‘How do you mean, nervous?’

  ‘Well . . . he just seemed nervous, as if he was scared of something. He was very cautious when he opened the door.’

  ‘What was he scared of?’ Line asked.

  ‘I don’t know, but we’re always reading in the newspapers about foreigners breaking into people’s houses, aren’t we? Even when people are at home.’

  ‘Can you recollect anything else?’

  ‘No, not really.’

  ‘Did he say anything?’

  ‘He mumbled when he spoke. Said yes and thank you, and that was that. Why are you asking?’

  ‘You were probably the last person he spoke to,’ she said, and went on to tell him she was writing an article about loneliness. ‘I might be able to use a photograph of you in your work clothes and maybe with your van in the background.’

  That would enhance the selection of photographs, she thought. Among the pictures of old classmates and everything belonging to the past, it would be a good idea to have a picture of the last person to talk to Viggo Hansen. It being a random tradesman would suit the narrative. They arranged for Line to phone next day so that they could meet.

  Frank Iversen was the next bullet point on her list. She ate a slice of bread as she re-read the email from the researchers in the fact-checking department. They had tracked down a Frank Iversen, one year older than Viggo Hansen, who had lived in Stavern but later moved to Langesund. He was now listed as living in Denmark, with an address in Hirsthals.


  She keyed in the number supplied in the email. It rang for some time before a man answered in Danish. ‘Hello, this is Frank, Aqua Consulting.’

  ‘Frank Iversen?’

  ‘Yes, that’s me.’

  ‘Hi, my name is Line Wisting and I’m calling from Stavern in Norway. Is it true you once lived here?’

  He did not answer immediately. ‘Yes,’ he finally said, ‘but that was years ago.’

  ‘I’m calling about Viggo Hansen,’ she continued. ‘Do you remember him? You worked together at the prawn factory at one time.’

  Again he hesitated. ‘That was years ago.’

  Line sat at the kitchen table. ‘I don’t know if you’ve heard, but Viggo Hansen is dead.’

  ‘No, that’s a shame. When did it happen?’

  ‘He died last summer.’

  ‘Who is this I’m speaking to?’

  Line explained the circumstances of the death and that she was a former neighbour, now intending to write about Viggo Hansen in the newspaper she worked for. ‘I’m talking to the people who used to know him,’ she said. ‘Trying to find out what he was like as a person.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘Can you spare a minute?’

  He needed time to consider this: ‘Yes, okay.’

  Line took out a notepad. ‘Is it a long time since you were in Stavern, or Norway?’

  This time the response came more quickly. ‘I’m in Norway now,’ he said. ‘In Larvik.’

  ‘In Larvik? But you live in Denmark?’

  ‘I’m a consultant with a company that deals in fish farming and aquaculture. At the moment I’m checking a mussel farm outside Stavern.’

  ‘Can we meet?’

  ‘Well, I don’t know . . .’

  ‘Where are you staying?’

  Frank Iversen hesitated again. ‘At the Farris Bad Hotel.’

  ‘Could I meet you there?’ she suggested, glancing at the clock. ‘At eight?’

  ‘I suppose that wouldn’t do any harm.’

  20.00, Line noted on the pad. ‘Brilliant, see you then,’ she wrapped up the conversation, ringed the time on her notepad when, as she did so, a thought struck her which she could not quite catch hold of. It had something to do with the television magazine on Viggo Hansen’s coffee table.

  She took out her laptop and opened the folder of photographs, clicking through to the picture of the TV listings.

  20.00 was the start time of FBI’s Archives on the Discovery Channel. Follow the FBI’s investigators in their pursuit of criminals, she read. Viggo Hansen had drawn an asterisk to show his intention of watching the programme. Later that evening, he had circled 22.50, when a nature programme about elk in Alaska started on NRK2.

  First an asterisk, then a circle. Two methods of marking the broadcasts. Why had he done that?

  50

  Nils Hammer unrolled a sizeable map across the office desk. Wisting did not take long to find his bearings and point out the two hills and the spot called Skaret. ‘There,’ he said, putting his finger on the map.

  ‘Not so good,’ Hammer said. ‘The tank is on open ground, with free access.’ Wisting walked to the window and stared into the evening darkness. Grey-white snow had been whipped into drifts at the street corners. ‘I’ll find a solution,’ Hammer promised, rolling up the map. ‘We’ll do it early tomorrow.’

  Someone lit an Advent star in a window across the street.

  ‘I’m going home now,’ Hammer said. ‘See you in the morning.’

  Wisting turned to face the room as his colleague disappeared through the door.

  His mobile phone rang. The third time from the same number. Again he did not answer but, once it had rung out, he sat at his computer and tapped in the number.

  123 News.

  He had managed to keep the VG journalist at bay but he was not going to give up. The story would probably receive some coverage in tomorrow’s paper, but in the meantime the journalists did not have a clue what this was all about.

  He reached across his desk for the case files for a total of twelve missing women. The names on the main list, as Leif Malm had described it.

  Investigators in the various police districts had worked systematically to account for the women who had vanished without trace. Every conceivable fact had been brought to light. Personalities and life situations had been probed, electronic clues from mobile phones and bank cards had been checked, but the twelve cases remained unsolved.

  What the investigators had failed to do was look at the cases in connection with each other. It was not to be expected that investigators in one part of the country would link their case to another in a different location and at another time. Some may have considered the idea, but probably it had been too much to manage.

  The case at the top of the pile concerned Charlotte Pedersen, aged twenty-one, from Porsgrunn, last seen at a Statoil service station on route E18 at Eidanger, just outside the town. On 19th June 2009 at 16.23, she bought a packet of chewing gum and ten Prince Mild. Images from the CCTV camera inside the petrol station were included in the case notes. All traces ended there.

  The next folder contained documents from a case in Drammen, in the autumn of 2007. Nineteen-year-old Diana Bender worked at a fast food kiosk in Tollbugata. The kiosk had closed at half past ten on the evening of Thursday 27th September. She had placed the day’s takings in the night safe at the bank in Strømsø and afterwards was seen in Konnerudgata, but she never got home to her parents in Tårnveien, no more than a kilometre from where she was employed.

  Then there was twenty-year-old Hilde Jansen who had hitchhiked from Risør to Kristiansand in 2005 to attend the Quartfestivalen music festival. She had been given a lift by a lorry driver delivering to the Sørlandsenteret shopping centre. He dropped her off at the exit road for Kristiansand Zoo where several witnesses saw her at the verge trying to get a lift into town. No one saw her being picked up.

  Wisting went to the photocopy room. On the top shelf of the bookcase, a stock of empty ring binders, notepads, ballpoint pens, paperclips and photocopy paper was kept, together with a rolled-up map of Southern Norway. He took the map back into his office with a box of paperclips and map pins with coloured heads. Pinning it to the wall of his office, he began to plot the missing women, according to where they had lived.

  First he placed the women in the three cases he had already familiarised himself with: Charlotte from Porsgrunn, Diana from Drammen and Hilde from Risør. He wrote their names on the map and noted the dates when they had gone missing on little post-it notes beside their home towns. He found pictures of them in their case files to cut out and fasten to the map.

  He continued to do this with the remainder of the bundle: Anita from Stavanger, Karoline from Kristiansand, Silje from Vinstra, Malin from Halden, Thea and Nora from Oslo, Julie from Arendal, Maja from Hamar and Janne from Sarpsborg.

  He read through accounts of interviews with witnesses: parents, siblings, teachers, work colleagues, neighbours and boyfriends; skimmed through reports of searches, including dog patrols, door-to-door enquiries and telephone tracking. All were equally lacking in results.

  After three hours, the map was covered with twelve names. Twelve faces.

  Ten of the young women were blond. Diana from Drammen was dark, both hair and skin colour. Nora from Oslo was also different. She was plump and, in the photograph, her hair was completely black with a few red streaks. Her eyebrow was pierced and she had a ring in her nose. Apart from them, the girls were all young and blond.

  He took a closer look at Charlotte from Porsgrunn. Her picture was taken at the service station, where all trace of her had ended. Hers was the most recent name on the list and he recalled the case. The picture of her at the counter was the one that had been used in the newspapers when she was posted missing. She had an unruly fringe, just like Line, and inquisitive blue eyes.

  Just as Donald Baker had explained about the Interstate Strangler, the pins on the map were placed along the motorway netw
ork. Route E18 ran like a dark orange line through the towns and cities from Stavanger to Oslo, while the E6 ran in a corresponding line northwards from the capital, through Hamar and up as far as Vinstra. In a southerly direction, it connected Janne from Sarpsborg with Malin down in Halden.

  Larvik lay like an intersection in the centre of the map. From there it was approximately five hours’ drive to Stavanger and almost equally long to Vinstra, though somewhat shorter to Halden. Wisting took a step back, feeling his pulse race. The orange line continued across the broken line marking the border with Sweden. If you followed the E6 as far in a southerly direction as Vinstra lay to the north, you would end up in Gothenburg.

  Names and images blurred on the map facing him, so much so that he had to use the desk for support. The case at once grew into something even more wide-ranging. There was no reason to believe that Robert Godwin had turned at Halden or stopped in Svinesund at the border. They would have to obtain a list of names from the police in Sweden as well.

  The thought made him restless. He paced the room before coming to a halt at the window, where he leaned his forehead on the cold glass in an effort to gather his thoughts, his eyes drawn to the lights of the ferry as it glided across the dark fjord on its way to Denmark.

  There was something terrifying about this case. Something he had never experienced before made him feel like a child afraid of the dark.

  51

  The hotel was located at the head of the Larvik fjord, partly on pillars above the beach and the sea. A colossal structure, it looked like a stranded cruise ship. Line had been inside only once before, and was again fascinated by its atmospheric calm, harmonious proportions, flooring, walls and interior furnishings in natural colours. She asked Reception to phone Frank Iversen’s room to let him know she had arrived.

  ‘He’ll be down shortly,’ the receptionist said.

  She put her waiting to good use by looking at the pictures on the walls, imposing black and white photographs by Morten Krogvold and Robert Mapplethorpe.

  Though Frank Iversen was silver-haired, his complexion was still smooth. He approached directly, without showing any of the hesitation apparent in their phone conversation. ‘Line Wisting?’ he asked.