by Anne Holt
The past, not the present.
Hanne shuddered slightly and continued to write:
Family business bankrupt.
Spouse dead (suicide? consequence of bankruptcy?).
Ousted by Turks.
Son beaten up (almost killed) by people he claimed were Norwegian Pakistanis.
Son as an adult (with the mental age of a child) expresses strong misgivings about Pakistanis/immigrants. Uses derogatory words.
Hanne bit the pen as she read through the list twice more. And then again, searching for whatever conclusions you could reasonably come to from the facts in her possession.
She grabbed another sheet of paper and placed it beside the first:
Politically well to the right.
Gunnar’s use of negative words may be colored/influenced by his mother.
That was, ultimately, all she could conclude.
“Shit!” she said under her breath.
She withdrew the contents of the red folder and quickly located Henrik’s report about the family relationships in Skjoldveien. A grainy copy of the Facebook picture that Henrik had found of Peder Ranvik was attached to the back of it.
Red beret.
The Armed Forces Special Command.
She pulled her laptop closer and entered the nrk.no website. Yesterday evening the theft of C4 from the exercise area in Åmot had once again led the news. Hanne clicked into that day’s news summary, where they had illustrated the story with archive photographs. From a different exercise, in a different place.
But with several uniformed men in red berets.
Without hesitation, she clicked farther into the Internet:
“The Armed Forces Special Command is a flexible, operational special force with rapid-response capability,” she read. “The division supports the police in combating terrorism, for example, at oil and gas installations at sea, ships in Norwegian territorial waters, and land-based establishments.”
Peder Ranvik fought terrorism.
He knew terrorism inside out.
“Henrik,” Hanne said in an undertone. “What would Henrik have thought?”
What if.
Henrik would have thought, What if.
She glanced briefly at her cell phone before dropping the idea of phoning him. Instead she took out the page with facts about Kirsten Ranvik’s life.
The few facts in her possession.
What if Billy T. was right? ran through her mind.
What if his worries about Linus were well founded?
The pen raced over the paper:
What if Linus has actually been recruited into a right-wing extremist group that is behind the terrorism? What if Linus’s watch was in the NCIN offices because he lost it there? What if Kirsten Ranvik has used her position to recruit rootless, ethnic Norwegian boys with diverse experiences of immigrants (Groruddalen)? What if Kirsten, to begin with, was skeptical toward foreigners and, through her family’s tragic fate, has become a right-wing extremist? What if Peder Ranvik shares his mother’s point of view? What if he has had access to
She stopped abruptly and returned to the list of facts about the woman in Korsvoll. It had stated in the newspaper that the terrorists had gained entry to the premises through the basement, a serious breach of security for which the current NCIN management had accepted criticism. Hanne added yet another fact:
They may have had access to the NCIN offices through her sister-in-law, Ranveig Ranvik. Was the old woman tricked?
No. That was completely wrong.
Hanne Wilhelmsen was not a “what if” person. That was not the way she worked. That was not the way you should think or investigate. Anyway, she was not investigating the terrorist case. Or the case about Gunnar Ranvik, either, when she came to think about it. She had been given a temporary appointment by the Oslo Police Chief to find out what had happened to seventeen-year-old Karina Knoph when she vanished without a trace in 1996. A mystery that Henrik Holme was going to solve this very day if good fortune remained with them.
Kirsten Ranvik was certainly not her case.
Billy T. had not returned to Kruses gate following his violent anxiety attack. That was a while ago now. With any luck, he would never come back.
Linus, Billy T., the terrorist bombs, and Kirsten Ranvik—none of these were any of her concern. Closing the laptop, she gathered the papers on which she had scribbled, crumpled them up, and threw them in the wastepaper basket.
Halfway across the floor, she came to a standstill. Hesitantly she drew her phone from the side pocket and stared at it for a moment or two before starting to tap: Silje. With reference to the terrorism, I have a little thought I would like to share with you. Probably nothing, but phone when you can. Hanne W.
It couldn’t hurt to mention it, at least, she thought, heading for the kitchen to find something to eat.
He had not eaten for twenty-four hours. Actually he’d hardly eaten for a couple of months now and had really started to notice the weight dropping off. His strength, too.
Billy T. had given up.
It was no longer possible to blame a bad knee. He was back at work and did exactly what he had to do before returning home to the almost-always-empty apartment. Linus merely checked in now and again, mainly to sleep. Billy T. killed the evenings in front of the TV set and had completely abandoned the idea of getting fit.
The anxiety attack at Hanne’s home had been a turning point. The unfamiliar feeling of losing control entirely still terrified him. He walked around increasingly fearful of another attack, and it seemed as if what little strength he had was used up, keeping his anxiety about the anxiety in check.
It was not the fear of dying that had brought him to this pass.
What had been so awful was that he had been dying.
He was aware then and there, and in front of the fridge in Hanne and Nefis’s apartment, that his heart was in the throes of stopping. Death had made an appearance, extremely unambiguous and imminent, rather than as a menacing possibility. He had heard his heart stall. Felt his brain empty. Sensed his lungs couldn’t cope anymore. Knew that he had only seconds left.
Anxiety attack, Hanne had called it.
Panic disorder, he had found out it was named.
On the Internet only, as he did not dare mention anything to the doctor, when he was there in an effort to prolong his sick leave on the basis of an alleged sore knee. Far from it, when the doctor asked, somewhat concerned, whether everything else was okay, Billy T. had forced out an optimistic smile and reassured her that he was looking forward to resuming work.
The anxiety about another attack made him passive and drained him of initiative. A couple of beers to accompany an episode of something on TV and then straight to bed. And then lying for hours tossing and turning, before sleep finally came upon him at daybreak, coming to his rescue to bring him safely through the hour of the wolf.
Thus the days passed, and still Linus said nothing.
It was half past eleven now, and Billy T. would normally be ravenous. Instead of going to the small canteen for some lunch, he opened his third bottle of Cola Zero that day and surfed apathetically through the online news coverage.
Dagbladet led with a picture of a red backpack.
The police were searching for such a bag, it stated.
It was the subject of a public appeal in connection with the terrorism investigation. Broad and general, and without any specific details.
Billy T. felt all the blood disappear from his head. For a moment, he thought he must have passed out, but he was still sitting upright in the chair. The picture on the screen still showed a red backpack, and the model designation was still Bergans Gaupekollen.
Identical to the one Billy T. had bought for Linus as a confirmation present. Which now lay in Billy T.’s basement storeroom, as he knew, because he had had to move it when he decided to smash the Darth Vader to get rid of the figure for good.
It was specifically a backpack of that type the police were looki
ng for.
When Billy T. registered that they were searching for Linus’s bag, he dashed for the door.
Henrik Holme stood in the doorway with his hands to his ears.
He should have accepted the offer of ear protection. The compressed-air drill made a horrendous racket in itself, and inside a basement room with brick walls, the noise was almost unbearable.
“Here!” the workman in overalls called out, pulling a pair of bright-red ear protectors down over Henrik’s head.
They were efficient.
Exactly as Henrik had been.
It had taken him precisely two weeks to arrive at something that might normally have dragged out for months. Literally two weeks ago, he had realized that Imran Sharif had something to hide. Now he was having a concrete floor opened up to discover if this was where the dog was buried.
Or Karina, to be more specific.
He should not think of her as a dog, and he touched both sides of his nose three times in succession. PDQ.
Admittedly, luck had been on Henrik’s side; he had to concede that. They would have been unlikely to obtain official permission to have the floor taken up: that was something Hanne and Henrik had agreed on at least. The circumstantial evidence was too weak for that. When Henrik nevertheless ventured to ask the house owner if the police could be permitted to destroy his house, to his total amazement, the man was very pleased.
He had bought the house a short time ago, he explained, and wanted to build a rental apartment in the basement. Since the ceiling height was two inches less than the requirements laid down for occupancy, he would have to dig up the floor before he made a start. It came as a very late Christmas present that the police were willing to do the job for him, and at the government’s expense in the bargain. His delight was slightly restrained when he learned that Henrik intended to search for a body. On the other hand, if that were the case, it would be good to get rid of it.
Hanne had organized the money side of things.
She either had a very good hold on the Police Chief, or else Silje Sørensen was so overworked that she had agreed to get peace from everything that did not have to do with the terrorism case. Both of these may well have been true, and just fifteen minutes after she had sent her email request, Hanne had been given the green light to spend up to 50,000 kroner.
Henrik had been here when they made preparations this morning. He had given them instructions about what they were looking for and what they should do if they found anything, and then he headed off to the dentist’s for an appointment arranged some time earlier. Now he was back.
More than half of the largest basement room was dug up. The older of the two workers was using the compressed-air drill, while the younger man was combing through large and small pieces of the broken floor before carrying it out to a dumpster in two buckets.
At present the dumpster contained nothing other than what it should, the guy had informed Henrik on his arrival.
Crushed concrete.
Until now, Henrik had felt excited, almost elated: he had barely slept last night.
It was dangerous to feel so certain.
It had been easy for him to ascertain that Imran had been employed at Eilif Andersens without a break since his apprenticeship. Sadly, order books and accounts were shredded after ten years, so unfortunately the friendly secretary in the sizable building firm could not help him with further information about which of the company’s employees had carried out the work at Midtoddveien 34C in September 1996. For all she knew, it might have been someone who had left long ago. Quite a high turnover, especially among the youngest, she had whispered confidentially with a dissatisfied grimace. Not all of them had the same sense of loyalty as the old boys.
As a matter of fact, Imran was a great guy, she could assure Henrik of that, and was he in trouble? Not at all, he had answered, with a smile, and then gone straight to Hanne Wilhelmsen to get permission to break up a basement floor.
Hanne had been absolutely amenable. In her time, she had gone into action on flimsier grounds than this, she had said.
The grounds seemed increasingly flimsy, Henrik thought despondently when more than three-quarters of the floor had been removed. One of the fellows carried out bucket after bucket of smashed concrete.
The compressed-air drill died.
The ensuing silence resounded, quite literally, and still screamed in Henrik’s ears when he tore off his ear protection.
“There’s something here,” the older worker said, crouching down to the floor.
“Don’t touch,” Henrik said loudly. “Step back from the spot, please.”
He himself came slowly closer. He produced a small camera that he had brought from work. At the edge between the destroyed quarter of the room and the remaining even floor, he hunkered down.
It was hair, he thought. Attached to a skull still partly blanketed in concrete. He took four photographs from different angles, before tugging on vinyl gloves and cautiously using one finger to free some of the wisps.
He blew on it. Underneath the gray dust, the color became visible—the hair was dull and vaguely blue.
“My God!” the older man exclaimed. “You were bloody right. It’s a body.”
“Yes,” Henrik Holme said solemnly: he had never felt so important in all his life.
“The most important thing is that you’re having cake and ice cream, Gunnar. I’ve brought in loads. It would be so exhausting to go into the city with all these restrictions the police have introduced.”
Kirsten Ranvik caressed her son’s cheek.
“But we’ve always gone into the city,” he complained bitterly. “We always watch the children’s parade. And the guardsmen. I’d really like to see the guardsmen, Mom.”
“We’ll have a nice time here watching it on TV. We’ve never done that before, so it’ll be lovely. We’ll have a better view from here, you know. In our own cozy living room. Do they all get these nuts?”
“They all get them,” Gunnar muttered, unappeased, as he looked across at Ingelill.
Her chicks were growing fast. One had inherited its father’s exquisite star on its chest. He was called Little Colonel and would not be sold. The other two were already booked. In less than a week they would be flight-worthy and ready for delivery.
“Beautiful, these pigeons of yours.”
Kirsten had persuaded a pale-gray young bird to sit on her hand.
“What’s this one called?”
“Cher Ami. She’s called after a heroic pigeon from World War I. Cher Ami saved nearly two hundred soldiers and received a medal.”
“Gorgeous.”
She stroked its back with two fingers.
“I want to go to the city center tomorrow, Mom. Please.”
“We’re not going to discuss that issue any further.”
Her voice had taken on the sharp, shrill tone he was so afraid of. Sulky and irritable, he busied himself cleaning the pigeon loft.
“What have you used my pigeons for?” he asked after a while.
“For training.”
“For what?”
Smiling, she put Cher Ami back on a perch under the roof.
“For flying, of course. They need training.”
“But who released them? They came home a very long time after you and Peder, so some other people must have let them go. Who was it?”
He had taken up a stance in the middle of the freshly swept floor and began to rock from side to side, peering obliquely up at the ceiling the whole time.
“Take it easy,” his mother said sternly. “It was some young men. Some really polite, decent young men and they’ve been kind to your pigeons.”
“Why were they allowed to borrow them?”
He could hear that he was whining. His mother did not like his voice when he was so whiny, but he could not understand why anyone else should have anything to do with his pigeons.
“Because racing pigeons are also carrier pigeons, pure and simple. They’ve brought m
essages to me, as they were born to do. You know that. You’re the one who passed the messages to me when the birds came back.”
“But have you and Peder just handed them over, then? Have you hidden them somewhere so that these men can find them? Have they been sitting on their own in their cages, waiting? They get home so late, Mum. They come home so very late.”
“It’s dinnertime now,” his mother said sharply.
“Do the pigeons have something to do with your job, Mom?”
Kirsten Ranvik grabbed the brush and propped it up beside the door. She closed a window and wiped her skirt.
“Yes. They have to do with my job. It’s my job to take care of our country. Working to make sure we can go on celebrating May 17 in the years ahead. Be proud that your pigeons can be used to defend this country of ours.”
“We don’t like Pakkies, Mum.”
“We don’t talk like that, Gunnar. Only idiots talk like that. Come on. It’s dinnertime.”
Her voice had acquired a resonance he had never heard before. It was not loud and stern, like when she was angry, but not friendly and fussing either, as it normally was from day to day. It was exactly as if someone else was speaking, as if a strange lady had been placed inside his mother. Someone who didn’t really like him.
It made him worried, and he decided not to create any more fuss at the moment about being allowed to watch the procession on May 17.
Maybe he could ask again tomorrow morning.
She had to return to police headquarters so early in the morning that it was almost pointless going home. For a moment she considered spending the night on the sofa in her office, but quickly dropped the idea. She wanted to go to her own bed, even if only for a couple of hours. Use her own bathroom. Go home.
Silje Sørensen was busy sorting through the many papers that had landed on her desk in the course of the day. Unfortunately few of them could be filed in the out-tray: she had barely dealt with anything other than the most essential matters.
Not today, either.
However, an ever-so-tiny chink of light had presented itself.
Around five o’clock she had been informed that Hanne Wilhelmsen had found the body of what in all probability would turn out to be a young girl who had vanished without a trace sometime in the nineties. Impressive and gratifying, and this evening in fact the case had displaced everything else and had been the top news story in most media outlets.