Closed for Winter

by Jorn Lier Horst

  Tears welled in her eyes when she was alone, but they eased the pressure in her chest and she let them flow. Somehow it felt good to stand in the rain, weeping. She drained herself completely before beginning to think practically. In the boot she found a roll of tape and a number of plastic carrier bags. She opened them and used them to cover the broken window. She also had some dry clothes in the boot. She removed her soaked sweater and changed before starting the car.

  The fluttering of the plastic cover made her dizzy and she was frazzled by the time she reached the house in Stavern. The stony driveway was covered in brown leaves glued to the ground by the rain. As she slammed the car door, another car drove into the driveway. It was her father. He was obviously exhausted, but he smiled when he caught sight of her.

  ‘Just arrived?’ he asked, hugging her. She put her hand on his shoulder and pressed her cheek to his. ‘How are you getting on?’ he asked.

  She shrugged her shoulders and he peered past her to her car. ‘What happened?’

  ‘Break-in,’ she explained, as he examined the damage more closely. ‘I left the car with my computer and camera lying on the seat. There were some East Europeans working nearby.’

  ‘Where did it happen?’

  ‘In Oslo, down at the docks.’

  ‘Have you reported it?’

  She shook her head. ‘I’ll do it online tomorrow. I think I can claim something on my insurance.’

  Line wondered how much he knew about Tommy’s double life. ‘Let’s go inside,’ he said, interrupting her thoughts.

  Line went directly to the bathroom, where she undressed and took a shower, standing in the hot spray for a long time, her thoughts meandering. She and her father had always spoken openly, so they had to be able to discuss Tommy.

  When she finished in the bathroom she pulled on an old jogging suit and put her clothes into the washing machine. Afterwards, they gathered around the table in the living room to eat a casserole Suzanne had prepared. Her father had told her about the break-in.

  ‘What about the book?’ she asked. ‘Do you have a back-up copy?’

  Line shook her head. She had worked on her story for an entire week, and now it was all gone, but that was not the reason for her sadness. When all was said and done, it did not really bother her. The story was fragmentary and she could reconstruct and improve on it. The two years she had spent with Tommy were a different matter; they felt like two wasted years.

  ‘Did you speak to Tommy today?’ her father asked, as though he had read her mind.

  ‘Yes, and we agreed how we’ll go about things,’ she said. ‘He’s going to view a flat tomorrow. Over the weekend, he’ll move in with a friend and stay there until he finds his own place.’

  Suzanne stood up, clearing the table and leaving the two of them to talk.

  ‘I read his statement,’ Wisting said, broaching the unavoidable subject.

  ‘It’s not quite as you think.’

  Leaning back in his chair, Wisting gave her a long look. ‘Do you know what I think?’ I think Tommy did what he thought was right.’

  When she opened her mouth to speak, it sounded like a sigh. ‘I feel as though I’ve betrayed him. He wanted to do some good for once. He wanted to please us.’

  Sitting with them again, Suzanne joined in. ‘What he has done isn’t the reason you’re leaving him,’ she said. ‘It’s because he is the person he is, and you can’t change him.’

  They talked for almost an hour, until Line decided to go to bed. On her way towards the staircase, she stopped at the hallway table, where a pendant-shaped glass ornament lay on top of a bundle of her father’s papers.

  ‘What’s this?’ she asked.

  The light from the wall lamp played on its surface, casting strange patterns on the walls. Her father approached and stood by her side. ‘It’s hope,’ he said.

  ‘Hope?’

  ‘The man who owns it calls it a dreamcatcher,’ he explained, relating how he had found the glass droplet that had been stolen from one of the cottages out at Gusland. ‘He’ll get it back tomorrow.’

  Line replaced it on the table. ‘I don’t think there’s much hope for my belongings,’ she said. She watched the dancing abstract patterns made by the coloured glass before shaking her head. You could have many hopes and dreams for the future, but you could never know what would become of them.

  She switched off the lamp and went to bed.

  73

  The two women were asleep when Wisting left for the police station the next morning. It was Saturday, the rain had stopped and the clouds were breaking. The police station was quiet. There were no eager voices or rapid footsteps in the corridors.

  Wisting was keen to learn where the night’s events had taken them. Placing the glass ornament near the edge of his desk, he took hold of the pile of new documents, beginning with the arrest report for Klaus Bang, apprehended at the ferry terminal situated at number 8 Revet, at 02.27 hours.

  The next document was more interesting. Bang’s interview had commenced at three fifteen, and been recorded by Nils Hammer. Wisting skimmed through ten closely written pages, more than he had hoped for. Bang admitted his involvement in the import of ten kilos of cocaine and provided a detailed description of the narcotics network and Rudi Muller’s position within it.

  When he finished, Hammer appeared at the door, looking like he had not had more than a couple of hours’ sleep. ‘Really good,’ Wisting said, waving the papers.

  Nils Hammer took hold of the coloured glass ornament and sat down, cradling it in his lap. ‘It didn’t take much, actually. It was enough to let him know the public prosecutor’s advice was that, if he provided a comprehensive statement, the earlier drugs runs wouldn’t be prosecuted, and he could expect a reduction of four years in his sentence. When he also heard that his Norwegian partner in crime had been nailed for robbery and was only a few cells away, it wasn’t difficult at all.’

  ‘Did he say why he had come to Norway?’

  Hammer tossed the glass ornament from one hand to the other. ‘Haven’t I written that down? He was to meet Rudi Muller to discuss payment and future business.’ The burly detective leaned back in his seat. ‘There are others behind Rudi Muller and Klaus Bang, you know.’

  Wisting nodded. There were always backers. Behind every domino that fell, there was another, each and every time. The largest and most important dominoes generally remained upright. ‘Be careful with that,’ he said.

  ‘Where did you get it?’ Hammer asked. He was about to hold it up towards the light to study it more closely, when it slipped from his fingers and fell. Hammer drew his legs together so that it dropped softly onto his lap. Picking it up again, he returned it to Wisting.

  ‘I brought it back from Lithuania,’ Wisting said, placing it beyond Hammer’s reach. ‘It belongs to Jostein Hammersnes, stolen by Darius and the other Lithuanians.’

  ‘Hammersnes?’ Nils Hammer yawned, propping his feet on the edge of the desktop. ‘The neighbour who ate the hotdog at the Esso station?’

  ‘I’m going out to give it back to him now,’ he said.

  ‘He’ll be delighted, I’m sure,’ Hammer said. ‘Will you be back by twelve? We were talking about having a review of the entire case.’

  Wisting nodded. He looked forward to it. A multitude of thoughts were whirling around in his head.

  Hammer dropped his feet from the desk, stood up and crossed to the door. Wisting remained seated, one single thought penetrating deeply into his consciousness. Oblivious to what his colleague was saying, he began to leaf through the bundle of papers, persuaded that an answer had been there all along.

  74

  A quarter of an hour later his inkling turned into a conviction. He could not find Nils Hammer in his office, but bumped into Benjamin Fjeld in the corridor. ‘Come with me,’ he said.

  ‘Where to?’

  Wisting dropped a pile of papers into his arms. ‘Just come with me. We’ll discuss it in the car.’
/>   ‘Should I bring anything?’

  ‘Do you have handcuffs?’

  Benjamin Fjeld patted his thigh and nodded. ‘Good,’ Wisting said, leading the way to the car in the yard at the rear.

  Once again he drove out towards the craggy coastal landscape that had been the scene of the past week’s events. By the time they reached their destination, he had given Fjeld all the details.

  They followed the path to the cluster of cottages. It had been a bitterly cold night, and in the shaded areas a thin layer of ice remained on the puddles, with patches of frost on the grass.

  Jostein Hammersnes was standing in the doorway when they arrived, two packed travel bags sitting on the ground beside him.

  ‘Going somewhere?’ Wisting asked, nodding towards the luggage.

  ‘It’s too cold out here now the frost has arrived. The cottages here aren’t built for cold weather.’

  ‘I have something belonging to you,’ Wisting said, producing the glass pendant from his jacket pocket.

  There was no sign of the enthusiasm or pleasure Wisting had anticipated. ‘My goodness,’ Hammersnes said, accepting it. ‘How did you get hold of this?’

  ‘I’ve been to Lithuania,’ Wisting explained. ‘The thieves who stole it have confessed, but most of the other stuff they took is gone.’

  Hammersnes weighed the glass ornament in his hand. ‘Thanks,’ he said.

  ‘I’ve something else for you.’

  Wisting took a photograph from his other pocket and held it out. It was from the petrol station where Jostein Hammersnes bought a hotdog before driving to his cottage. The CCTV camera was located approximately in the middle of the premises and showed Hammersnes full-length in front of the counter as he was handed his receipt and change.

  Jostein Hammersnes took hold of the photo, peering at it. His pale features took on a bewildered expression. ‘We’ve talked about this before. It was a dead end, you said. I dropped the receipt somewhere along the path, and you thought for a while that it was the murderer who had lost it.’

  Wisting nodded. ‘We put it aside. But it wasn’t a dead end.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Jostein Hammersnes attempted to return the photograph but Wisting did not take it. ‘It really didn’t have anything to do with the case,’ he said. ‘A dead end.’

  ‘Your shoes,’ Wisting said, tapping the photograph with his forefinger, his fingertip touching the curved logo. ‘Nike Main Draw trainers. That’s the same type of shoe that tramped around in the blood at the crime scene.’

  The hand holding the picture began to shake.

  Wisting’s gaze fell onto the rubber boots Jostein Hammersnes had pulled on outside his trouser legs. ‘Where are those shoes now?’ he asked, taking the photograph back.

  Hammersnes shook his head without answering. His eyes were evasive.

  ‘I think you burned them after hearing the news that the police had secured the killer’s footprints.’ In his mind’s eye Wisting saw the dark smoke rising from the chimney and remembered the foul smell inside the cottage.

  ‘I believe our technicians will be able to obtain fragments of rubber or other remnants, so we already have the evidence we need. All the cottages that were broken into were thoroughly examined. The crime scene examiners almost carpeted the floor with footprint foils. They found the same footprints here as in the blood, but thought the perpetrator was one of the burglars who had been in both places.’

  Jostein Hammersnes cleared his throat, but said nothing. He leaned forward, knees bent, his body swaying rhythmically. His pupils had contracted, and his eyes fluttered to and fro like those of a trapped pine marten. The silence between them was palpable, on the point of fracturing, when it fleetingly appeared that Hammersnes’ eyes saw something behind Wisting.

  Turning around, Wisting looked in the same direction and then glanced back at Jostein Hammersnes. The man standing silent on the verandah swallowed. His gaze involuntarily slanted down towards the two travel bags. One had the logo of a savings bank on the side. The other was a black nylon sports bag.

  Wisting unzipped the sports bag, pulled a blue towel from the top, and drew with it two thousand kroner notes that fell onto the wet grass. Inside the bag were bundles of banknotes, with the muzzle of a revolver protruding.

  Behind him Wisting heard something smash. He wheeled around to see shards of coloured glass scattered across the verandah.

  75

  Thrusting his hands into his pockets, Wisting felt the cold wind against his face. Heavy grey clouds rolled in from sea. Line emerged from the cottage, setting down her luggage at the top of the staircase.

  ‘Will you see to the shutters?’ she asked. ‘I just need to sweep the floors, and then I’m ready.’

  Wisting lifted a shutter into place in front of the large living room window. His mobile phone rang. The display told him the identity of the caller. Thomas Rønningen introduced himself with his full name.

  ‘Congratulations,’ he said. ‘I can’t say I’m surprised at the case being solved, but I’m certainly impressed with the unbelievable investigative work that’s been done. You’ve every reason to be proud.’

  Gripping the phone between his shoulder and chin, Wisting thanked him as he hoisted the second shutter into place. Line waved at him from inside the living room.

  ‘I understand you were the one who interviewed them and got the confessions,’ Rønningen continued.

  Wisting mumbled something about it being almost by chance it had turned out that way. Thomas Rønningen made some observations about police work and about what had emerged in the media, as Wisting raised the final shutter. The resolution had been what it almost always was once they knew it: simple.

  Jostein Hammersnes had arrived at the cottage in the late evening to discover there had been a break-in. While he was stomping around in the ransacked interior of his cottage, he heard something sounding like gunshots. He grabbed the poker from the companion set in the hearth and headed over to Thomas Rønningen’s cottage. There too the burglars had struck. He went inside to take a closer look at the damage and, while he was there, a bloody, masked man had come lurching in, a revolver in one hand and a bag in the other. In his panic Hammersnes hit him over the head, first once, then twice. Then a third time as the injured man staggered to his feet.

  The bag that fell from the masked man’s grasp was open. Hammersnes saw the money inside and left with both the revolver and the bag.

  ‘This whole case fascinates me,’ Rønningen said. ‘How a number of events interact and create a kind of chain reaction. What impresses me most though, is how you got the two murderers to confess.’

  Wisting moved the phone from his shoulder to his hand and looked out to sea, following a cargo ship with his eyes. He knew he was good at conducting interviews: it came from years of experience, but there was something else he did not hesitate to call intuition.

  He recognised it in colleagues too. Some had a talent, while others never became truly expert. Some simply knew which questions would set the conversation going, and could adapt to the person they were interviewing. Others might learn the techniques, attend training courses, study video footage, even become competent, but never more than that.

  It never ceased to fascinate him how different police officers conducted themselves in an interview room. What the successful ones had in common was creativity, perseverance, a sense of logic, genuine curiosity. And intuition.

  Wisting understood that a lie was the easiest way out of trouble for the majority of people, and so his aim was always to persuade the other person there was no possibility of lying his way out of his predicament. When the interviewee realised that telling the truth would bring relief, the battle was won.

  ‘It’s something like what you do in your programme,’ he said. ‘You usually persuade your guests to tell you more than they intended.’

  ‘Interesting that you see it like that,’ Rønningen said. ‘I was thinking of having crime as my next theme, and hope
d you would be a guest.’

  Wisting opened his mouth to answer but Rønningen went on: ‘It’s going to be quite different from the usual, with me, the programme host, first feared to be the murder victim, but later regarded as a suspect, and you, the investigator, getting to the truth.’

  Thomas Rønningen babbled on enthusiastically. ‘I’d like to make a programme where the viewers are left with the thought that we could all commit crimes, just like Hammersnes. My God, I knew the man! We were neighbours. He was a quiet, unassuming IT guy. God knows what got into him, but on that evening he became a murderer and a thief.’

  It was a good idea, Wisting thought, and might possibly make people reflect a little on what turned someone into a criminal.

  ‘What do you think?’ Thomas Rønningen asked.

  Wisting skirted around the cottage, pushing the shutters firmly shut. ‘I think it could be brilliant,’ he said, ‘but you’ll need to find someone else.’

  ‘But you are the whole concept,’ Rønningen protested. ‘It wouldn’t be the same without you.’

  ‘All the same, it’ll have to be without me.’

  Line emerged from the cottage, and Wisting drew the conversation to a close. He made it clear his decision was final, but thanked him anyway.

  ‘What was that about?’ Line asked.

  Wisting shook his head. ‘Nothing,’ he said with a smile. ‘Just some final pieces of the puzzle.’

  Closing the door, Line locked it behind her. Wisting watched her as she turned the key and slid the bolts into place. The wind had turned, and was now blowing from the east.

  When she was ready, he lifted her large bag and put his arm around her shoulder, leading her along the path away from the sea. He was already looking forward to their return, after winter.