Her eyes did not deviate for an instant, but they seemed to be veiled by a shiny membrane. ‘The committee? Who’s …?’ She broke off.
‘No, you didn’t tell me a thing, did you, when we spoke yesterday. Not a single thing.’
‘These are all private matters, Veum. I don’t understand what you’re digging for. Margrethe and Kalle have gone missing, you say, but what has that got to do with anyone else?’
‘Haven’t the police been in touch?’
‘The police? Why should they?’
‘If for nothing else because both your brother and your sister have disappeared. Your brother used to give your address as his place of abode when he had a pass, and you were in regular contact with Margrethe, so … You’ll get a visit from them, that’s for definite.’ I cast an eye over the room. ‘Neither of them has been here recently, have they? Margrethe or Kalle, I mean.’
‘Does it look like it?’
‘No, it looks … I assume you don’t want to show me the other rooms …’
‘You can bet your life I don’t.’
‘When the police come they’ll ask you.’
‘Then I’ll show them. The police are different after all … from your kind.’
I made a mental note of that. ‘But this committee, let’s return to that.’
‘And why should we?’
‘You didn’t have an easy upbringing, I’ve been told.’
She measured me with her eyes, showing no willingness to answer.
‘But you get good references from the committee and those who taught you at school.’
Her voice trembled as she said: ‘I have to say you’ve got around a bit since we last met! What sort of investigations are these?’
I leaned forward a smidgeon. ‘What I’m doing is searching for your sister, Siv. Others are sure to be searching for your brother. There has been a shocking death. Things are coming out of the woodwork, as it were. Some claim it was you who held the façade together to the outside world, that it was you who made sure your brother and sister got up in the morning and went to school, had packed lunches, did their homework …’
‘So what did we need the committee for then, eh?’ she said with barely concealed sarcasm.
‘You were too young for that kind of responsibility, Siv! You were ten years old when social services received the first report expressing concern.’
She pinched her lips, as if holding back all she wanted to say.
‘I can’t remember if I told you yesterday, Siv, but I worked for social services at one point. I’ve done a few home visits. Very often social services get some support when they raise a matter. This is the first time I’ve ever heard of anyone forming a committee to help. Close family, yes. Grandparents, uncles, aunts. There are many safety nets of that kind. But a committee of neighbours with parish council support …’ I tried to give this a positive spin. ‘That says volumes about the enormous concern there was for you all, doesn’t it.’
She sent me defiant, silent glares, like a small child refusing to obey.
‘Yet things still didn’t go well. At least, not for your brother and sister.’
Again she looked at her watch, but said nothing. She stirred uneasily.
‘Why were you the only one to attend your father’s funeral, Siv?’
She gasped. ‘What the … who told you that?’
‘I spoke to your mother.’
Her mouth twisted with bitterness. ‘I see.’
‘That was in 1993, and since then not one of you has visited her, she said.’
‘No.’
‘Quite dramatic, don’t you think? Have you broken all ties with her?’
She glanced across at me. ‘What business is that of yours? Has this got anything to do with your assignment?’ As I didn’t answer she added: ‘Will it help you to find Margrethe?’
‘Not in any direct way.’
‘Well! Have we finished now?’
‘Just a couple more questions. Have you any idea where she could be hiding? Are there any old girlfriends? Any places where you spent your summer holidays?’
‘Summer holidays?’ She snorted. ‘At holiday camps or in the street at home. Sometimes we had to go to Torvaldsen’s cabin, that was the closest it got. The photo you showed me yesterday.’
‘Right, and fru Torvaldsen helped you with your homework, didn’t she?’
She shrugged. ‘Maybe she did. I don’t remember.’
‘You might have repressed it.’
Another twist of the mouth.
‘Have you repressed a lot? Can you remember the details surrounding what happened to your brother … at Gimle?’
‘Details? Nothing apart from what was in the papers. He never told us anything. And when it had happened, it, then he ended up on remand and later in the clink.’
‘I suppose you must have visited him though?’
‘Ye-es …’
‘And later he stayed here, on weekend passes?’
‘A few times over the last couple of years. He wasn’t exactly on leave every weekend.’
‘But you must have spoken about …’
‘No, we did not. We never spoke about it. Never!’
‘Karl Gunnar had a childhood friend, I’ve been told. Rolf Terje Dalby.’
For the first time this evening she showed me the shadow of a smile. ‘Rolf Terje, yes. That was weird. He hadn’t had such a good home life, himself.’
‘Really?’
‘His father was at school, and Rolf Terje still went round spouting a load of strange expressions we didn’t understand a word of.’ She imitated him. ‘Cattle dies, kith dies … Ugh, ugh!’
‘The Håvamål.’
‘The what?’
‘Good advice from old Norse times, in a manner of speaking. And later?’
‘Later?’
‘Did you see him in later years, after you moved from Minde?’
‘Rolf Terje? Not that I can recall.’
‘He’s got a photo of you at home.’
‘A photo! Rolf Terje?’
‘Taken some time in the 1980s from what I saw. You and another girl in the sun in Minde.’
She made a show of rolling her shoulders. ‘Funny. Must have been Anne-Lise, I suppose.’
‘Anne-Lise?’
‘She was in my class at the time.’
‘But you had no idea he had that photo of you?’
‘No, I told you!’
‘OK, OK. He was secretly in love with you. Perhaps he kept it, as a souvenir.’
‘Perhaps! He was five years younger than me, so … Have we finished now?’
‘Almost. What I wanted to ask was … did Karl Gunnar and Rolf Terje stay in touch? Could Rolf Terje have helped Karl Gunnar go underground?’
‘And how would I know? I haven’t seen him for ages, as I said.’
‘He’s kept in touch with Margrethe.’
‘Has he?’ Her expression betrayed uncertainty.
‘He’s one of those men who … protects her, if I can put it like that.’
The doorbell rang. She jumped up: ‘I told you, didn’t I! I had no time for this!’ She grabbed the towel and feverishly dried her hair as though I had prevented her from finishing.
I got up. ‘OK, OK. Of course. Please don’t let me disturb you.’
She scowled at me and headed for the front door, slinging the towel in a room as she went by and trying to smooth her hair. I was putting on my jacket when she opened the door. A half-strangled cry escaped her lips, as though she was just as surprised as me to see the person standing in the doorway.
For a moment we stood staring at each other. He seemed no less surprised. ‘Varg?’
‘Nils? A little collegial visit of an evening?’
‘A collegial conversation,’ he mumbled, apparently the first thing that occurred to him, without succeeding in making it sound very convincing.
‘Veum’s on his way out,’ said Siv Monsen, blushing.
‘Uhuh,’ N
ils Åkre mumbled, no less embarrassed. ‘We’ll catch up another time,’ he said to me as he passed.
‘Have fun,’ I said, as she closed the door hard behind me. But I didn’t hear her slide the security chain. She had nothing to be frightened of any more.
21
I HAD HIM ON THE TELEPHONE before I was in the car. He spoke quickly in a low voice, and it was my hunch she was in another room fixing her hair or changing her clothes. Or perhaps she was as God made her, for all I knew.
‘Varg … we must have a chat.’
‘I’m ready anytime you like. At your office or …?’
‘Not this time. Can I come to yours, before office hours?’
‘Before your office hours or mine?’
‘I’ll be at yours for eight,’ he gabbled. Suddenly his voice was raised. ‘No, I don’t have any time right now. If we could talk tomorrow we can take it from there. Alright? Bye.’
Then he rang off. She was obviously back in the room, dressed or undressed.
I sat in the car peering up at what I had worked out had to be her windows. No curtains drawn, no lights turned off. Not yet.
Then I twisted the key and drove back down to the centre. I was in Kong Oscars gate when my mobile rang again. I drove straight to the crossroads by Nygaten and pulled in by Bergen Cathedral School before answering. ‘Yes?’
‘Varg Veum?’ It was a woman’s voice, and it took me a couple of seconds to recognise Inspector Annemette Bergesen.
‘Yes?’
‘Where are you?’
‘In Kong Oscars gate, a stone’s throw from the police station.’
‘Yes, but that’s not where I am. Are you driving?’
‘I’m sitting behind the steering wheel and I’m stinking sober, if I can put it like that.’
‘I wonder if you could come to Tollbodhopen?’
I had an unpleasant feeling in my gut. ‘Tell me more.’
‘We’ve found a body in the sea. A young woman.’
The feeling rose to my throat region, and I found it difficult to swallow. ‘But why ring me?’
‘We checked her purse for ID and found your card, among other things.’
‘What colour’s her hair?’
‘Just get over here and we’ll take it from there.’
It was an unpleasant drive. To the best of my memory, I had given my card to Hege and Tanya. Passing through C. Sundts gate, I noticed the street was conspicuously empty of working girls. At Tollbodhopen I saw an ambulance and two police vehicles, as well as a throng of spectators. I parked my car by the kerb in front of the large, white customs building with the hipped roof.
In the car park to the west a large crowd of people had gathered. As I approached I scanned the ranks but it was difficult to make out those I was looking for in the darkness. The police had cordoned off the area where they had found the body by the sea. I elbowed my way roughly through the milling masses. At the front I was stopped by an officer, but when I said I had been summoned by Inspector Bergesen I was allowed through. Behind me camera flashes went off. The press was on the spot, as always. Not for nothing did they have police radios on their office desks.
The woman had been dragged up onto the quay. There was a defibrillator on the ground beside her, but it was too late for that. Much too late.
Annemette Bergesen met my eyes as I arrived, but I looked past her and down. Her hair was red, even though it was soaked in seawater. Her skin was pale blue, her eyes unnaturally wide open, and there were dark marks around her neck. Even in death I seemed to be able to hear her northern Norwegian tones.
Annemette Bergesen looked at me. ‘Do you recognise her?’
I nodded. ‘Her name’s Tanya. I don’t know her other names. Russian. I talked to her a couple of days ago about a case I’m investigating. A young woman who’s missing, from the same milieu.’
‘Can you confirm she’s a prostitute?’
‘Yes.’ I hesitated. ‘Who found her?’
She looked round. ‘The man over there. With the dog. He was out taking it for a walk.’
A man in a blue coat with an old-fashioned peaked cap on his head and a red setter on a lead was speaking to one of the police officers.
‘Where was she found?’
‘Down there.’ She pointed to the big rocks by Tollbod Quay, and I shuddered. The sea washed in from Byfjorden, black and cold. Not a nice place to be found.
‘Any idea how long she might have been there?’
‘Not yet. When did you see her last?’
‘Monday evening.’
She made a note on her pad. ‘We shall of course have to question the others, but for the moment we have to wait for the report from Forensics.’
‘The marks on her neck …’
‘Yes.’
‘When I spoke to her she told me she had been subjected to an assault by two very brutal punters before the weekend. For your information.’
‘Did she have those marks then? When you spoke to her, I mean.’
‘No.’
‘She didn’t say anything that could identify the customers, I suppose?’
‘No, but her so-called protectors are Kjell Malthus and Rolf Terje Dalby. I wanted to speak to them.’
She nodded and took notes.
‘Do you need me any more?’
She considered the question. ‘In fact we don’t. Drop by early tomorrow so that we can question you formally.’
I smirked. ‘As a suspect?’
‘As a witness, Veum. For the moment.’
I nodded in confirmation. Then I took a few steps closer to Tanya and stood studying her. I had little or no idea of her background, but for reasons unknown she had chosen to make her living roaming the streets as a prostitute in Bergen, a coastal town with several hundred years of history of such activity. But once, not a very long time ago, in an overcrowded metropolis or in a frozen rural district, she had been someone’s little daughter, a small girl who played with her tatty dolls, if she had any, a schoolgirl who had taught herself to read, heard about Brezhnev and Kosygin and other famous people, had her first lover, if she hadn’t been raped by a brutal stepfather, a precocious boy or a seaman on leave; one small person on her way into life, later across the border in the neighbouring country in which she stayed long enough to acquire the local dialect before moving south to the town where all too abruptly she would end her days, without anyone knowing where she came from or who she was.
‘Well, well …’ Sad at heart, I took my final leave of Tanya No Surname, nodded to Annemette and plodded wearily back to my car.
A storm of flashes went off, but I dismissed the journalists flocking round me with ‘No comment. No comment, I said!’
They snorted with irritation, but were forced to accept that I had nothing to say to them. Then I caught sight of a figure peeling off from the flock of spectators and following me to the car. It was Hege.
She came up close to me. I saw the trails of tears in the streaks of mascara running down her cheeks. She clasped my lapels and stared me in the eye.
‘Good to see you,’ I said. ‘For a while there I was frightened it was you.’
‘Was she killed? Was she beaten up?’
‘Looks like it. She didn’t die from natural causes at any rate.’
She gasped as she inhaled. She looked around, desperation in her eyes. ‘And Maggi? Have you found out anything about her?’
‘Nothing. At least nothing that can tell me where she is.’
She forced a blink with both eyes and tossed her head towards Tollbodhopen. ‘I’m afraid they’re going to find her like that as well.’
I was about to say something, but she spoke first. ‘Take me with you!’
‘With me … you mean …?’
‘I’m scared, Veum. Scared to death. Next time it could be me.’
‘Why?’
‘Had I known this, I wouldn’t have told you!’
I looked at her. ‘Of course I can. I can drive you home. Wher
e …?’
‘Home! Do you know where I live? In a bloody hospice, full to the brim with dopeheads and … people like me.’ After a brief pause she added: ‘Will you take the responsibility for them finding me tomorrow … like Tanya?’
‘No.’ I opened the door with the remote control. ‘Get in.’
She sat at the front. I sat behind the wheel. Before starting up I turned towards her. ‘But I will say one thing, Hege. This is the first time I have taken a girl home from this area. I hope you won’t make me regret it.’
‘I promise not to tell your mother.’
‘My mother died a long time ago.’
‘The policewoman over there.’
‘Hm.’ I made no comment, just turned the ignition key and set off.
‘I can give you a night you’ll never forget.’
‘Didn’t you say you’d dated Thomas?’
‘That’s why.’
‘Then thanks, but no thanks. A good night’s sleep is what we both need, I’m afraid.’
‘Aren’t you going to offer me a drink first?’
‘Think I can manage that …’
Then we said very little until I parked in Øvre Blekevei and I led her as discreetly as possible to Telthussmauet. If we had met any neighbours on the way my reputation would have been in tatters for good, for all the difference that would have made. But we didn’t bump into anyone, and she sent me a grateful look as I unlocked the front door.
22
WE DOWNED A BOTTLE of red wine between us. When it was empty she asked whether I had another one.
‘I’m afraid not. But I have a bottle of aquavit open.’
She shrugged. ‘Whatever. So long as it works.’
She sat down on the sofa, I sat on a chair. She seemed to have made herself at home. For myself I was still a bit uneasy with the situation. Had the cards played out differently she could have been my daughter-in-law.
I got to my feet, found two spirits glasses and poured from the bottle of Simers.
Her black skirt was short. Her red blouse was décolleté enough to give you problems knowing where to look. She had tousled her black hair, but fear lay smouldering in her eyes, as black as the sea at Tollbodhopen.
She had told me that she had spoken to several of the other girls. No one could remember having seen Tanya being picked up. No one could remember having seen her at all that day. And who said it was a punter who had picked her up? It could have been anyone.
Cold Hearts Page 13