The Consorts of Death

by Gunnar Staalesen

  ‘Tell me … are you so keen to die? Are you in such a hurry?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I am. Enough people have died in this case already. It has to stop at some point.’

  ‘In this case?’

  ‘In this case, yes.’ I could feel the fury rising in me. ‘Haven’t you understood? Haven’t any of you understood? Everything is connected, right from the very first moment. You, of all people, should think about that …’ I shifted my focus down from her face. ‘You with a little baby to take care of.’

  Again our eyes met, hers defiant and moist, mine smouldering with anger.

  ‘Right!’ I stood up. ‘I can’t do much more for you just now, Silje.’

  She didn’t move from the sofa. ‘You’ve done more than enough! Out with you! I never want to see you again! Never!’

  ‘Wonder where I’ve heard that before?’ I mumbled under my breath as I buttoned up my jacket and made for the door. There, I turned and sent her a last glance. Who finds the money when you pay the rent? Did you think that money was heaven sent?

  She was deliberately ignoring me. I shrugged and left.

  Out on the street, the sun’s rays angled over Iladalen. My eyes fell on the church with its famous spire.

  All of a sudden, the doors on both sides of a parked dark grey Volvo swung open. Two men got out and rushed over to me. I knew who they were long before they displayed their badges. They were classic undercover police in leather jackets and jeans, with two-day old stubble on their chins and hair down their necks.

  ‘What was the name?’ one asked.

  ‘Why do you want to know?’

  ‘Show us some ID,’ the other demanded.

  I sighed out loud, rummaged for my driver’s licence and passed it over.

  One studied it closely. The other had his eye held firmly on me.

  ‘Veum? Varg Veum?’

  ‘You can read, I see.’

  ‘Would you mind accompanying us to the police station?’

  ‘Would it make any difference if I refused?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘So, what are we waiting for? Let’s get it over with. The sooner, the better.’

  49

  Inspector Anne-Kristine Bergsjø was sitting behind a large desk with fingertips pressed against each other and a sour glare behind the frameless glasses. Her hair was a little shorter than I remembered it, but her clothes were just as conservative: a plain white blouse, nice blue culottes and a tailored grey jacket. A classic blonde of the competent variety.

  She was wearing a trademark smile with tight lips curled at the corners, almost like a cartoon character. ‘Varg Veum, private eye,’ she said with biting acerbity. ‘I had hoped I would never see you again.’

  ‘That’s a hope I never shared, I’m afraid.’

  She raised her eyebrows sceptically. ‘You didn’t?’

  ‘We had such a cosy time when we last met, didn’t we?’

  ‘No, we didn’t. Unless I’m much mistaken you brought death and destruction last time, too. I hope you’re not on the same mission now.’

  I splayed my hands. ‘To tell the truth, I hadn’t been considering a courtesy visit to the police station, either. It was these colleagues of yours who absolutely insisted.’

  She sighed. ‘You were observed leaving a flat we’re holding under surveillance. Could you first tell me what you were doing there?’

  ‘If you could give me a good reason.’

  She looked at her telephone. ‘Of course we could send you down to the basement and let you mull over the question there for a few hours.’ She looked up again. ‘But it would be so much more enjoyable if we could resolve this in a friendly atmosphere, don’t you think?’

  ‘Over a drink maybe?’

  She forced a wry smile. ‘Coffee?’

  ‘From the machine you have in the building? No, thank you.’

  Her expectant gaze lingered.

  ‘Well, I can’t see any reason not to … I was visiting a woman called Silje Tveiten. She has a child with a former client of mine.’

  She leaned forward. Her eyes were alert and direct, her eyelashes unmoving. ‘Jan Egil Skarnes was a client of yours? When was that?’

  ‘While I was still in social services. Twenty-one years ago.’

  ‘Uhuh. I see.’

  I gave her a rundown of my life with Jan Egil, from when he was three years old until my last sighting of him in court, a good ten years ago, and why I was in Oslo this time.’

  ‘He was going to kill you?’ She looked at me, her eyes disbelieving. ‘She didn’t tell us that.’

  ‘I suppose she didn’t want to add fuel to the fire.’

  ‘Maybe not.’ She looked at me seriously. ‘I’m going to have to give you a warning, Veum.’

  ‘A warning?’

  ‘Or, to be more precise, I have to warn you.’

  ‘I understand the difference.’

  ‘You’re mixing with the fringes of a nasty group of individuals. They’re dangerous.’

  ‘Dangerous people? What are you talking about? Jan Egil?’

  ‘I’m afraid to say that we’ve observed him several times in what I would call bad company since he was let out on parole. I can tell you in confidence that he’s been very close to being banged up again.’

  ‘Right! On what grounds, if I might ask?’

  She eyed me coldly. ‘Tell me … Do you know that organised crime is on the up in this country, Veum? Especially in the capital.’

  ‘I’ve had an inkling.’

  ‘Whether you’re on the inside or outside does not matter much. You’re part of the set-up anyway. Reports we’ve received from Ullersmo suggest that during his incarceration Jan Egil Skarnes nurtured close links with a very unsavoury bunch based here in Oslo. He’d been on our radar several times before he was released.’

  ‘Before he was released? What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘Mm … It’s not at all unusual for inmates out on leave to be used to carry out jobs. They have a kind of alibi, at least at first. We don’t always check who’s on leave or not when there’s a robbery, someone is beaten up or something even more serious.’

  ‘Murder?’

  ‘That, too. Inside the fraternity, that is. Internal showdowns, quarrels between various factions. Big money’s involved. Drugs. Contraband alcohol. Prostitution. And behind all of this – the backers. Yes, some of them are even under lock and key and steering the whole thing from prison. Ullersmo Executive, as we call it. I could give you a number of names. Others conceal themselves behind respectable façades. Business people, restaurant owners, entrepreneurs. And you won’t find what they earn from this on any tax register, if that’s what you thought.’

  ‘No, I didn’t think that. We’ve got them in Bergen, too, though on a smaller scale.’

  ‘At the moment, Veum. At the moment. Norway is virgin territory for organised crime of this calibre. The worst is yet to come. Mark my words.’

  ‘But … you’re maintaining that Jan Egil is part of this?’

  ‘We have substantiated evidence that he is. In a sense, prison is the best school you can attend.’

  ‘So what shall we do with them? The ones who deserve to be there?’

  She sighed. ‘It’s a weighty issue, Veum. Either they have to invest more in preventive measures, including precautionary surveillance of criminal milieus. Or else we’ll just have to lock them up, chuck the keys and walk away. One of the two options.’

  ‘So, in reality, there’s just one.’

  She smiled weakly. ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘Are you suggesting that the killing of Terje Hammersten was a hit job?’

  ‘It could be. Hammersten was himself a link in the criminal network.’

  ‘He’d left it, my informant tells me. Rumour had it he’d been converted. He was holding the Bible in his hand when he was murdered.’

  ‘Yes, a Bible was found at the crime scene. That’s right. But we stick to what we’ve got on Hamm
ersten in our files, and a good part of that comes from Bergen. If he’d converted today, there would’ve been a lot to pay for from the past. And this criminal fraternity can bear grudges for a long time. Deliberately, so that the punishment is not linked too closely to the actual deeds.’

  I sat pondering what she had just said. Then something clicked. ‘Tell me … You said you were holding this flat in Ildalen under observation, that was why you brought me in.’

  ‘That’s correct.’

  ‘So it wasn’t you following me from Eiriks gate then?’

  ‘Not as far as I know. Do you think you’re being followed?’

  ‘Perhaps.’ I had a sinking feeling in my stomach, a warning sign that something was brewing, something I wasn’t going to like.

  ‘Another reason to look at least twice before crossing the street.’

  ‘So … what would you recommend I do, Anne-Kristine?’

  She showed with the utmost clarity that she did not appreciate my familiar tone. ‘Go back home, Veum. The sooner, the better. Oslo is not a healthy place for you to stay.’

  ‘I found that out a long time ago for myself, but …’

  She breathed in through her nose, raised her head a fraction and peered at me through her shiny glasses. ‘Yes?’

  ‘There’s an old friend I just feel I should visit first.’

  ‘And that is?’

  ‘Langeland, the solicitor. Jens Langeland.’

  50

  Twilight had begun to fall as I got off the Holmenkollen line train at Besserud, and after a bit of a search, but without falling into any traps set for me, I found Jens Langeland’s huge detached house in Dr. Holms vei. A solid brick wall separated the property from the passing peasantry, and the lock mechanism on the gate was so complicated to work that I considered shimmying over instead.

  The house stood screened against prying eyes by thick, well-established elm trees. The architectural style was a strange mixture of national romanticism and functionalism, rustic red with vast flat surfaces. From the plot, the view was beyond what money could buy, at least for all those of us who didn’t have millions handy in our inside pockets, a dizzying drop to the fjord below.

  I followed the gravel path to the solid, green front door, pressed the bell and announced my arrival.

  The woman who opened was small, nimble and of Asian origin. She was wearing a plain turquoise dress of shiny material. She smiled gently and said in a somewhat sing-song voice: ‘Yes? How can I help you?’

  ‘Is herr Langeland at home?’

  ‘One moment,’ she said, and tried to close the door, but I had been in fancy areas like this before and already had my foot in the door. I pushed the door firmly and stepped inside; she was powerless to prevent me.

  She glared at me, and for a second or two it went through my head that, for all I knew, she could do kung fu and karate, with dreadful consequences. I said quickly: ‘I’ll wait here.’

  She stood still for a second. Then she turned her back on me with no other comment than a chill smile. I watched her cross the spacious hallway and start ascending the stairs to the first floor with springy steps and small, firm buttocks.

  Not long afterwards she came back down, followed by Jens Langeland. He cast a glance at me from the top of the stairs and frowned, then, still a good distance away, called: ‘Veum?’

  ‘Correct.’

  ‘What on earth are you doing here?’ he asked, crossing the floor.

  ‘I’m sure, with a moment’s thought, you know.’

  He gave a routine nod, as if in court. ‘Jan Egil.’

  ‘Jan Egil,’ I said.

  ‘Let’s go into my study,’ he said, pointing west with a sweep of his hand. ‘Lin can take your coat.’

  Lin took my padded jacket with a deep bow, placed it elegantly over her arm and carried it to a wardrobe as if expediting a royal cape.

  Before we got as far as the study, we were interrupted by a woman’s voice from the top of the stairs. ‘What’s this about, Jens?’

  We both looked in her direction. She was standing on the landing, slim and graceful in a short black skirt and light grey silk blouse with a black print, like the casual brushstrokes of a bewitched artist. She had very nice legs, and her hair was arranged in a studied casual fashion, steel grey with dark streaks.

  ‘Business, my dear,’ said Langeland. ‘This way,’ he said to me with an imperious gesture.

  But it was too late. I had recognised her.

  My eyes held hers, even from this distance. ‘Vibecke … Skarnes?’ I said with a conscious pause before her surname.

  She continued to descend without speaking.

  ‘My wife,’ said Jens Langeland, quite superfluously.

  It was twenty years since I had last seen her, and the only time close up had been that late afternoon when I had met her at Langeland’s place in Ole Irgens vei.

  ‘Haven’t we met before?’ she asked, searching my face.

  ‘Yes, in Bergen the time your first husband … died. I was in social services and …’

  ‘Oh, yes, I remember you now,’ she interrupted. She shook my hand. ‘Vibecke Langeland.’

  ‘Varg Veum.’

  ‘Pleased to meet you,’ came the toneless response. She was still something of an everyday beauty, with attractive regular features and a lovely smile. But her eyes were pensive and distant, and time had drawn two bitter furrows on each side of her mouth. She stroked her steely grey hair with a graceful movement. ‘What is it you wish to discuss with my husband?’

  ‘It’s ….’

  ‘Is it about Johnny boy?’

  ‘Yes, I can’t …’

  ‘Then I want to be present as well!’

  Langeland threw his hands in the air in frustration. ‘I suggest then that we go up to the living room,’ he said. ‘It’s cosier there after all.’ He turned to the Asian woman who had stood in attendance in the background like a shadow. ‘Lin? Could you brew us up a pot of tea, please?’

  ‘As you wish, herr Langeland,’ Lin said, swifly withdrawing.

  On one wall in the hallway there was a stuffed elk head. ‘Did you shoot it?’ I asked Langeland as we passed beneath.

  He shook his head. ‘Came with the house. None of the heirs wanted it.’

  Despite being on the losing side in both court cases I had witnessed, Jens Langeland had had a meteoric career in the last decade, which his des res on Holmenkollen Ridge confirmed. His lean figure was unchanged, but his hair had suffered deep inroads and the strains of grey were stronger, and there was an air of fatigue about his face that I could not recall having seen before. Then again he was one of the most popular defence counsels in the country and appeared in the newspapers as often as the Prime Minister.

  The living room we entered could have held the whole of my Bergen flat, and I would still have had room for a little garden outside. The parquet floor was only partly covered with very exclusive furniture arranged in a variety of formations. The bookcases were in classic empire style, and behind the glass fronts there was hardly a paperback to be seen. Broad windows revealed a dusk landscape with scattered gleaming lights and Oslo fjord lying like a blue-black silk drape casually discarded between Nesodden and Bærum. Far beneath, we saw an aeroplane taking off from Fornebu, as soundless as in a silent movie. It was only later that the faint echo of jet engines at full throttle reached us.

  Vibecke Langeland led us to a small coffee table, also in classical style, burgundy and dark brown, and so polished that we could see our reflections in the wood. ‘Sit down, Veum,’ she said, indicating one of the four high-backed chairs. On the same finger as the thin wedding ring she wore a diamond ring, two distant relatives, one rich and one poor, out promenading. A plain jewel, vaguely triangular-shaped, set in a precious stone at least as exclusive, hung from a gold chain around her neck, from the very spot where her pulse was throbbing.

  We sat down; she with her elegant legs slanting to the left, Langeland sitting in a more casual f
ashion, or as far as it was possible in such a chair, with his long legs sticking out at the side of the table. I felt as if I were being interviewed for the vacant gardener’s post.

  ‘That was a surprise,’ I said casually, essaying a tiny smile.

  Langeland eyed me in silence.

  Vibecke said: ‘Oh, you mean us two? I can explain that.’

  ‘Vibecke,’ Langeland said.

  ‘Of course, of course … We have nothing to be ashamed of, have we.’ She patted him affectionately on the knee. Then she turned her gaze back to me. ‘Jens and I have known each other, well, ever since university. We were also together for a while then, in fact.’

  ‘Yes, I seem to remember someone saying.’

  ‘But then, well, we wandered apart for a few years. I got together with Svein, and then all the disastrous events came at once. But in 1984, when Jens came back from Førde after all the happenings there, and looked me up to tell me everything, …’ She smiled sweetly. ‘Zing went the strings of my heart! Since then it has been just us two.’

  I glanced at Langeland. ‘That was how it was?’

  He put on an expression of indifference. ‘Does it matter? Has it got anything to do with you? I assume you did not come here, unannounced and uninvited, to delve into our private lives?’

  ‘No, the cause is of course, yet again … what do you call him? Johnny boy?’

  It was Vibecke who answered. ‘For me he will never be anything else. They started calling him … the other name in Sunnfjord.’

  ‘Have you ever met him?’

  She recoiled in surprise. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘No, I mean, naturally enough, have you met him since … 1974?’

  She slowly shook her head, as though remonstrating to a small child. ‘No. Never. You have to understand. He …’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Well, after what happened at that time. I ended up in jail, Veum, don’t forget that! Had it not been for Jens then …’ Her face had suddenly cracked, it was open now. Sheer despair was written all over it.

  ‘So …’

  ‘Veum!’ Langeland sat up erect in his chair. ‘What the hell is all this? She told you she hasn’t seen the boy since he was six and a half years old. Everything that has happened since then is … history to her.’