When It Grows Dark (William Wisting series)

by Jorn Lier Horst

  They waited for him to continue.

  ‘It happened by sheer chance,’ he continued, explaining how Rupert Hansson was on the lookout for a classic car restoration project.

  Jan Bergan enquired about specific details: who owned the barn, how the car could have been there for so long without anyone asking any questions, and what condition it was in.

  Wisting answered as best he could, but refrained from mentioning the bullet holes. Nor did he say anything about how the trail of the night safe robbers had, by some fluke, ended outside the old barn.

  ‘Did you find anything inside the car?’ Jan Bergan asked.

  ‘An old newspaper. A copy of Aftenposten from Monday 17 August 1925.’

  ‘But nothing that could tell you how the car found its way there?’

  ‘I probably know less than you do. Can you tell me what took place when the car disappeared?’

  Jan Bergan glanced across at his mother. The old woman shifted in her seat.

  ‘Martinius started the transport company with his brother in 1922,’ she said. ‘Their father had run a horse and cart business. When the boys were brought in, they invested in motor cars. For a long time they were the only ones who did, and they had a lot of work on their hands. They drove all over Oslo. At their peak, they had three cars and four lorries, and ten employees.’

  Ragna Bergan fell silent, thinking back to a bygone era. Wisting rattled the saucer as he replaced his coffee cup, rousing her from her reverie.

  ‘Then there was this trip to the south of Norway in 1925,’ she sighed. ‘Everything was kept secret. I knew nothing about it until after the consignment vanished.’

  ‘A secret consignment?’

  Ragna Bergan glanced at her son. She seemed tired and worn out, and there was a pleading in her eyes. The son took over.

  ‘It was an assignment for Norges Bank,’ Jan Bergan said. ‘The company was hired to transport cash from the branch in Kristiansand to the head office in Oslo.’

  ‘Jan was only three years old at that time,’ Ragna Bergan said.

  ‘The money was usually transported by train, but the railway workers were on strike. It was important to the bank that the consignment be transported as normal, and so Dad was given the job.’

  Ragna Bergan pushed the cake dish across to Wisting and brushed crumbs from the table.

  ‘It was strike breaking,’ she said. ‘That’s why it all had to be kept secret. No one was to know about that trip. Not even afterwards. It was all hushed up.’

  ‘It was vital that Norges Bank collect the money,’ Jan Bergan said. ‘A lot of notes were in circulation in the districts, but there was a shortage in the capital. They were about to run out. The alternative was to print more banknotes, but that would cause inflation.’

  Wisting, having taken out his notebook, was scribbling down keywords. ‘What happened then?’

  Ragna Bergan clasped her hands on her lap. ‘Marvin was the one who was driving. Martinius’s brother. He never came back.’

  ‘Car, money and driver all disappeared?’

  Ragna Bergan nodded. ‘At first they thought there had been an accident. The arrangement was that the money should be delivered on Thursday afternoon. When he didn’t turn up, we thought he might have had a puncture or something, and been delayed. In those days it wasn’t the same as now, with a phone in nearly every house. He couldn’t just call and tell us he’d been delayed. As time dragged on, we thought something more serious must have happened, that he had driven off the road somewhere. On Saturday morning, Martinius sent one of the drivers to look for him, but it was useless.’

  ‘What about the police?’

  ‘They were brought in on the Friday, but they blamed Marvin.’

  ‘How’s that?’

  ‘They thought he had run off with the money and Martinius and the company were held responsible. According to the contract, they were liable for reinstatement of the consignment. It was more than they were able to pay, and the company went belly-up.’

  ‘Marvin would never have placed Dad in a situation like that,’ Jan Bergan added.

  His mother agreed. ‘The police thought they would find Marvin sooner or later, and that he would turn up when the money ran out. We never saw him again.’

  ‘How much money are we talking about?’

  This time it was the son who answered: ‘Four hundred and fifty thousand kroner, a lot of money at that time. Nowadays it would be more than five million.’

  Wisting did some mental calculations: more than thirty years’ wages.

  ‘In addition, there were five kilos of gold,’ Jan Bergan continued. ‘The price of gold wasn’t as high as it is now. Its value has multiplied many times over.’

  ‘Was he driving on his own, with such large sums on board?’

  ‘The money was in a locked chest,’ the old woman said. ‘It was no different from being sent by train.’

  ‘What do you believe happened?’

  ‘Martinius thought there must have been a highway robbery.’

  ‘What did the police say to that?’

  ‘I don’t know, but they probably didn’t believe it. There were no highway robbers in Norway by that time.’

  ‘Nobody knew about the consignment,’ Jan Bergan said. ‘Everything was secret, you see, because of the strike.’

  ‘That’s why Martinius thought someone from the bank in Kristiansand must have been behind it, ‘ his mother said. ‘He thought that someone had followed Marvin and forced him off the road.’

  ‘They would most likely have struck earlier,’ Wisting said. ‘Larvik is approximately halfway between Kristiansand and Oslo. That’s a long way for anyone on his tail.’

  The old woman tilted her head, as if he had brought something to her mind. ‘Have you spoken to Ruth and Dagfinn?’

  ‘Dagfinn’s dead, Mum.’

  The woman nodded and apologized. ‘But what about Ruth?’

  ‘Who are Ruth and Dagfinn?’

  ‘Ruth is a cousin of Martinius and Marvin,’ she said quietly. ‘She was married to Dagfinn from Larvik. They lived down there. Marvin stopped and spent the night before he drove on to Kristiansand.’

  Wisting leaned forward and jotted the names in his notebook. ‘He stopped en route?’

  ‘It took more than twenty hours to drive to Kristiansand at that time. He spent the night with Ruth and Dagfinn in Larvik, but also called at a couple of other places to drop off goods. In Kristiansand, he spent the night in a hotel.’

  ‘Did the police talk to Ruth and Dagfinn at that time?’

  ‘Several times,’ she said.

  ‘Did you talk to the police?’

  ‘Yes, of course, but it was Martinius they wanted to speak to.’

  ‘Do you remember the names of any of the investigators?’

  ‘The one in charge was called Michalsen,’ was her swift reply, ‘and there was a young detective who went down to Larvik as well. He had a Swedish name: Gustafsson. He sounded Swedish too, a few words here and there. He lived at Skillebekk, not far from where Martinius had his garage.’

  ‘Do you know if he’s still alive?’

  Ragna Bergan shook her head. ‘Martinius told me he had driven him once in his taxi.’ She fixed her gaze on the framed picture on the table. ‘That must have been some time in the early fifties. He was only a few years older than Martinius and me.’

  Wisting stared down at his notebook. He had underlined the name Ruth. Underlining it yet again, he asked for her surname and added: Skaugen. Ruth Skaugen.

  They sat for another half hour, but nothing of consequence emerged.

  ‘One more thing,’ Wisting said, getting to his feet. ‘Legally, does the car still belong to you?’

  Ragna Bergan and her son exchanged glances. This thought had probably not struck them before.

  ‘Would you consider selling it?’

  ‘We don’t want it,’ Jan Bergan answered. ‘I think I’d like to see it though, wherever it is now.’

/>   His mother rose from the settee and escorted Wisting to the door with her son.

  When he left, he felt he had lifted some of the burden they had been carrying and taken it upon himself. He had been unable to give them answers about what happened nearly sixty years before and, in all likelihood, had stirred up bad memories, but perhaps their minds would be easier in the knowledge that he had assumed that heavy load.

  16

  Wisting clambered into his car, turned the ignition and left the engine idling while he swept the windows clear of snow. Inside again, he headed for the Ringvei motorway.

  After a few hundred metres, he stopped to fill up with petrol. As a woman emerged from a phone kiosk, he followed her with his eye while he filled the tank. She wrapped a scarf around her neck and set off towards one of the nearby apartment blocks.

  After he had paid in the service station, he entered the phone kiosk, picked up the telephone directory and leafed through it to ‘Arne Vikene’. There were two of them, but one had his title listed in smaller letters beneath his name: Police Officer.

  Arne Viken responded at once, dismissing Wisting’s apologies for calling him at home.

  ‘Thanks for your fax,’ Wisting went on, saying that he had spoken to the widow of the man who owned the veteran car.

  ‘Is she willing to sell the car?’

  ‘Yes, but I’m afraid I already have a buyer.’

  ‘That’s okay. It’ll be splendid to see it back on the road.’

  ‘There was another thing I was wondering. You’ve worked in the Oslo police for a long time. Do you know an investigator called Gustafsson who lived in Skillebekk?’

  ‘The Swede, yes. I worked with him in the sixties. He’s retired now. Has been for years, but drops into the police station for pensioner meetings. What do you want with him?’

  ‘There were some unusual circumstances surrounding the disappearance of the car. They suspected a company employee of misappropriating both the car and its cargo. Gustafsson investigated the case.’

  ‘Aha, I see. He was widowed before he retired from the force. I think he still lives in Skillebekk, though. Ragnar Gustafsson. If you don’t get hold of him, I can track him down through the personnel office.’

  Wisting thanked Arne Viken for his assistance and thumbed through the phone book to find Ragnar Gustafsson. He inserted another couple of coins and dialled the number. He was on the verge of hanging up when a hoarse voice answered: ‘Yes, hello?’

  ‘Am I speaking to Ragnar Gustafsson?’

  ‘Who’s asking?’

  Wisting explained who he was and that he worked for the Larvik police. ‘It’s about a cash consignment transported by Kristiania Haulage Company that disappeared in 1925. Do you remember the case?’

  ‘Yes, what about it?’

  ‘I’ve found the car.’

  Gustafsson’s breathing grew more laboured. ‘Where?’

  ‘Hidden in a barn. I have a witness statement to the effect that it was wheeled in one summer’s night in 1925. It’s been there ever since.’

  ‘And the driver?’

  A tractor had started to clear the snow from the parking area in front of the phone box. Wisting raised his voice.

  ‘I’ve no information about him. Neither him nor the money, but everything points to an ambush. There are two bullet holes in the car.’

  ‘That just deepens the mystery,’ Gustafsson said.

  A coin dropped into the prepayment box. ‘I’m in Oslo just now. Could I meet you?’

  ‘Gabels gate 9B. Ground floor.’

  Expressing his thanks, Wisting wound up the conversation and got back into his car. He found the address in the road atlas and manoeuvred his way towards the city centre. Half an hour later, he was seated in front of a huge tiled Swedish stove in Ragnar Gustafsson’s dining room.

  The former detective had become an old man, with hollow cheeks and liver spots on his hands. His eyes had taken on a milky haze.

  Wisting explained how chance circumstances had led to the car being found.

  ‘It had to happen sooner or later.’ Ragnar Gustafsson clenched the fist that was resting on the table. Loose skin tightened across his knuckles.

  ‘You investigated the case. Did the police have a theory about what happened?’

  Gustafsson opened and closed his hand as he thought.

  ‘The police inspector’s conclusion was that the driver had run off with both the car and the money. Strictly speaking, there were no grounds for believing anything else. You see, there was a railway dispute. All transport to and from Oslo was affected. The bank authorities were dependent on the supply of banknotes from the regions to ensure enough notes in circulation. That was why it was decided to convey the cash by car.’

  Wisting already knew this, but let the old man talk. It might help with the recall of details.

  ‘We weren’t dealing with a regular consignment that anyone could plan to ambush. On the contrary, really. The job could be regarded as strike breaking, and so it was carried out in secrecy. There were only a few people who knew. The brother, whom the driver ran the transport company with, the managers at the bank in Oslo and a few trusted employees in Kristiansand. If anyone had the idea of enriching himself through it, it had to be someone on the inside. The most obvious person was the driver who had a case containing several hundred thousand kroner on the back seat of his car. It was easy to arrive at the conclusion that the temptation became too great.’

  ‘The bullet holes suggest an ambush,’ said Wisting. ‘The location and direction of the shots point to the driver being hit.’

  Ragnar Gustafsson placed one hand over the other and rubbed them together. ‘His name was Marvin. It is comingback to me. The driver’s name was Marvin Bergan. He ran the transport company with his brother.’

  Wisting took out his notebook and told him that he had paid a visit to the widow of that brother, Martinius Bergan.

  ‘She told me that the driver made a few stops on the trip down. Could anyone have worked out where he was going and what he was doing, and then lain in wait for him on the way back?’

  ‘That’s a possibility.’ Gustafsson bit his lower lip and stared at a point on the wall. Almost a minute ticked past. Wisting was reluctant to break the silence.

  ‘Now it’s coming back.’ Gustafsson tapped his forehead with his finger. ‘The cogs turn slowly these days, I’m afraid, but I remember that he delivered machine parts to the iron foundry in Drammen and some documents to the landowner at Bærums Verk. I talked to both the landowner and the foreman at the iron foundry, but what turned out to be of interest was the time he had spent down in your stamping ground in Larvik.’

  A light appeared in Gustafsson’s weary eyes. It was as if he was making fresh discoveries in his memory.

  ‘He had an overnight stay with a family on his way to the south coast. He had intended to stop there on the way back too, but that didn’t happen.’

  ‘With Ruth and Dagfinn Skaugen?’

  Ragnar Gustafsson pointed his forefinger at Wisting and jabbed it in the air to emphasise that these were the right names. ‘I went down there to talk to them. A few of the relatives were gathered. Some neighbours and workers were there too. I interviewed them all over three days.’

  ‘What did you learn?’

  ‘Nothing. Marvin Bergan arrived in the afternoon. It was a hot summer’s day. They had sat in the garden until late evening. Bergan had been given the use of a bedroom belonging to one of the children in the house. He drove on the next morning. He said that he was to pick up a consignment in Kristiansand, but didn’t mention what it was.’

  Leaning back, Wisting tried to envisage the people gathered around the table in the garden on that warm summer evening in 1925. Could Marvin Bergan have let slip to anyone what sort of mission he was on?

  ‘Do you know where the case notes are kept today?’

  Ragnar Gustafsson pulled a face, as if this was a difficult question. ‘We packed up all the papers aft
er six months. I haven’t seen them since then. They were stored in the basement at the police station in Victoria terrasse. Then the war came, and in the fifties most of them disappeared when the archives were destroyed in a fire. If you’re lucky, it could be that the case files were transferred to the State Archives before that. You won’t find any answers in those old papers. They only contain all the blind alleys.’

  ‘What would you have done,’ Wisting asked, ‘if you were to take up the investigation again?’

  Another gleam appeared in the old man’s misty eyes.

  ‘I would retrace the route he took, and check every single person he met on the way to Kristiansand. Four hundred and fifty thousand kroner vanished into thin air that day. That’s a lot of money. Money that must have left traces in a person’s life, either for good or ill.’

  17

  Wisting arrived home an hour before he was due on night shift. The twins were asleep, and Ingrid sat reading a book. He gave her a kiss before going through to see Thomas and Line. A really special atmosphere filled a room where two children slept. Their breathing was regular, and their faces peaceful and calm.

  When he returned to the living room, Ingrid laid her book aside and he told her what he had discovered.

  ‘What are you going to do now?’ she asked.

  ‘I’ll have to write a report about my findings, and hand it to Ove Dokken.’

  ‘What will happen after that?’

  ‘That’ll be up to him, but they’re so busy with the night safe robbery that it’ll probably be put aside. The case has been in abeyance for almost sixty years. It won’t do any harm to let it lie for a while longer.’

  Before he headed back to work, he drank two cups of coffee in the forlorn hope that they would pick him up. At the station, he only ever managed half a cup before driving out on patrol. Friday nights were always hectic with a lot of restaurant disturbances, especially now during the Christmas party season. Not until after three were they able to drive back to the police station, having dealt with a fight in a taxi queue.