Fear Not

by Anne Holt

  ‘We’re not really allowed to lock him in,’ he said, his voice subdued. ‘At least not without supervision. But this kid would have been long gone if I’d left the door open for one second. He tried to do a runner three times while we were bringing him in from the unit.’

  ‘Has he been there since last Monday?’

  ‘Yes, under supervision. He hasn’t been alone for more than five minutes.’

  The door opened.

  Martin Setre didn’t even look up. He was rocking back and forth on a chair, one foot on the table. The dark boot lay in a small lake of melted snow. The back of the chair was rhythmically hitting the wall, and had already started to leave a mark.

  ‘Pack that in,’ said Knut Bork. ‘Right now. This is DI Silje Sørensen. She wants to talk to you.’

  The boy still didn’t look up. His fingers were playing with a snuff tin, but it didn’t look as if he had anything under his lip. However, the herpes infection was considerably worse.

  ‘Hi,’ said Silje, moving so that she was opposite him. ‘You can say hello to me if you like.’

  She sat down.

  ‘I understand,’ she said, and started to laugh.

  This time the boy did look up, but without meeting her eyes.

  ‘What the fuck are you laughing at?’

  ‘Not at you. At Knut here.’

  She nodded in the direction of her younger colleague, who raised his eyebrows as high as he could before adopting the same indifferent expression once again. He had turned the chair around and was leaning over the back with his arms folded, a thin investigation file dangling from one hand.

  ‘You see,’ said Silje, ‘when he showed me your papers we made a bet. I bet 100 kronor that you would be rocking back and forward on the chair, fiddling with a snuff tin, and that you’d refuse to speak. Then I bet another hundred that you wouldn’t look me in the eye for the first quarter of an hour. It looks as though I’m going to be rich. That’s why I’m laughing.’

  She laughed again.

  The boy took his foot off the table, let the legs of the chair crash to the floor and stared her straight in the eye.

  ‘It hasn’t been quarter of an hour yet,’ he said. ‘You lost.’

  ‘Only partly. It’s 1-1 between Knut and me. What the score will be between you and me remains to be seen.’

  A faint knock on the door made the boy glance in that direction.

  ‘Come in,’ Knut Bork called loudly, and the door opened.

  A woman in her thirties blundered in, heavily overweight and panting, with layers of flapping clothes.

  ‘Sorry I’m a few minutes late,’ she said. ‘Busy day. I’m Andrea Solli, the social worker.’

  She addressed her last remark to Martin and held out her hand. He responded hesitantly with a limp handshake. He didn’t get up.

  ‘Well, that’s the formalities out of the way,’ said Andrea Solli, sitting down on the remaining chair.

  The boy closed his eyes and pretended to yawn. Andrea Solli was Number 62 in the series of social workers, experts, solicitors and lay judges who had played some part in Martin’s life. The very first one had got him to talk. He had told her everything, concluding with an account of how his father had smashed his head against a toilet until he no longer knew whether he was alive or not.

  She had said she believed him, and that everything would be all right.

  Nothing had ever been all right, and a long time ago he had stopped believing a single word they said.

  ‘So you were brought in three days ago,’ said Silje Sørensen. ‘For possession of three and a half grams of hash, it says here. To be perfectly honest, I’m not remotely interested in that. Nor am I particularly interested in your career as a prostitute. Except for …’

  Knut Bork handed her a document from his file.

  ‘… this. It’s a report from when you were brought in on 21 November last year.’

  ‘What? Are you going to start poking around in ancient history?’

  Martin squirmed on his chair.

  ‘It’s six weeks ago, Martin. The police don’t really regard that as ancient history. But actually, it’s not you I’m interested in this time.’

  The boy was leaning forward, batting the snuff tin between his hands across the surface of the desk like an ice-hockey puck.

  ‘It’s Hawre. Hawre Ghani. You know him, don’t you?’

  The puck was travelling faster between his hands.

  ‘Come on, Martin. You were brought in together. It’s clear from the report that you knew one another. I just want—’

  ‘Haven’t seen Hawre for ages,’ the boy said sullenly.

  ‘No. I believe you.’

  ‘Don’t know anything about Hawre,’ Martin muttered.

  ‘Were you friends?’

  The boy pulled a face.

  ‘Does that mean yes or no?’

  ‘It’s not exactly easy to make friends when you live like I do. I mean, you never get to live in the same place for longer than a few weeks!’

  ‘You’re the one who takes off,’ the social worker interrupted. ‘I realize it’s very difficult for you, but it’s not easy to create—’

  ‘You can sort all that out later,’ Silje broke in. ‘I’m asking you again, Martin. Did you know Hawre well?’

  He carried on playing table hockey without answering.

  ‘You’re blushing. Were you together?’

  ‘What?’

  The sore in his nose had started to bleed. A thin trickle of red zigzagged down the crusty yellow scab covering the area between his left nostril and his upper lip.

  ‘Me and … Hawre? He isn’t even gay, not really. He just needs the money!’

  ‘But you are?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Gay.’

  ‘You’ve no fucking right to ask me that.’

  A siren started howling in the courtyard at the back. Two magpies were sitting on the window ledge outside, staring at them with coal-black eyes and taking no notice of the noise.

  Martin’s eyes narrowed, and his hands finally stopped moving.

  ‘But since you ask, the answer is yes. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.’

  Defiance shone from every inch of his tense body, and this time he was the one holding her gaze.

  ‘I couldn’t agree more,’ said Silje.

  If the boy had been ten kilos heavier, and if the sore on his face had healed, he might have been quite good-looking. Unfortunately his teeth were bad, which was rare for Norwegian children in 2009. When he spoke she could see a grey film of tartar, which still didn’t hide a couple of botched fillings in his front teeth. But his eyes were large and blue, and the long eyelashes curled upwards like a small child’s.

  ‘Can’t you get rid of them?’ he said.

  ‘Who?’

  Martin pointed at the woman and Knut Bork.

  ‘I’m quite happy to leave,’ said Bork. ‘But the social worker has to stay. We’re not allowed to question you unless somebody from social services is present.’

  Without any further discussion he got to his feet. He placed the file next to the report in front of Silje Sørensen, and pushed his chair under the table.

  ‘Ring me when you’ve finished,’ he said. ‘I’ll be in my office.’

  As the door closed behind him, Martin stared nastily at Andrea Solli.

  ‘I don’t need any help from social services,’ he said. ‘You can go as well.’

  Silje got in first.

  ‘Out of the question,’ she said firmly. ‘Forget it. Tell me about you and Hawre instead.’

  Martin had started to lick the sore. The blood from his nose turned pink as it mixed with his saliva, and suddenly a piece of the scab came away.

  ‘Fuck,’ he yelled, grabbing at his mouth.

  Blood was pouring down his face, and Andrea Solli dug out a bundle of Kleenex from her capacious handbag. Martin took three and pressed them against the sore.

  ‘Me and Hawre weren’t togethe
r,’ he said, sounding agitated and revealing that his voice hadn’t completely broken yet. ‘We were just mates.’

  ‘Mates usually have some idea where their mates are,’ said Silje.

  The boy didn’t reply. His eyes were wet, but Silje didn’t know if it was because of the turn the conversation had taken or his sore lip. She wasn’t sure how to proceed. To gain time she opened a half-litre bottle of mineral water and poured three glasses without asking if anyone would like some.

  ‘Hawre’s dead,’ she said.

  At that moment the magpies took off from the window ledge, shouting hoarsely as they disappeared into the darkness over the city. It had stopped snowing at last. It was quarter past four in the afternoon. From the corridor they could hear the rapid footsteps of people hurrying to get home.

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ whispered Martin.

  He dropped the blood-stained tissues on the floor, put his arms on the table and hid his face.

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ he sobbed again.

  ‘When did you last see him, Martin?’

  Silje Sørensen really wanted to put her arms around him. Hold him. Comfort him, as if there were any way of comforting a boy who wasn’t even sixteen years old and had lost any chance of a decent life long ago.

  ‘When did you last see him?’ she repeated.

  ‘I don’t remember,’ he wept.

  ‘This is really important, Martin. Hawre was murdered.’

  The sobs broke off. ‘Murdered?’

  His voice sounded half-suffocated as he lay slumped over the table.

  ‘Yes. And that’s why it’s really, really important that you try to remember.’

  ‘Do you think I murdered Hawre?’

  He wasn’t even angry. Or accusing. Martin Setre simply took it for granted that everybody assumed he was guilty of everything.

  ‘No, absolutely not. I don’t believe for one moment that you murdered your friend.’

  ‘Good,’ he snivelled, slowly sitting up.

  Andrea Solli pointed at the Kleenex. He didn’t touch them.

  ‘Because I wouldn’t do that!’

  ‘Can you try to remember when you last saw him? We can start from 21 November. When you were brought in together. It was a Friday. Can you remember anything about that day?’

  He nodded, almost imperceptibly.

  ‘You were taken into care and driven to the residential unit, it says here. Hawre, on the other hand, managed to do a runner during the journey. Did you see him after that?’

  ‘Yes …’

  He really looked as if he was thinking hard. A deep furrow appeared at the top of his nose.

  ‘I cleared off the following day. We met up … on the Sunday. And on …’

  For the first time he picked up the glass of mineral water.

  ‘Can I have a Coke instead?’ he mumbled.

  ‘Of course. Here.’

  Silje passed him a bottle. He opened it and drank, not bothering with a glass. A grimace of pain passed over his face as the neck of the bottle caught the sore, which was still bleeding.

  ‘We met on the Sunday. I’m quite sure about that, because …’

  He suddenly stopped speaking.

  ‘Because … ?’ said Silje.

  ‘I’m not saying.’

  ‘You have to understand that—’

  ‘I’m not saying anything about that night, OK? It’s not important, anyway, because I saw Hawre the following day.’

  ‘Right,’ said Silje, bringing up the calendar on her mobile. ‘So that would be … Monday 24 November?’

  ‘I don’t know what the fucking date was, but it was the Monday after we were brought in. We were going to …’

  Finally he picked up a tissue and dabbed cautiously at his mouth. Tears still lingered on his eyelashes. He was no longer crying, but his whole body seemed more exhausted than ever, if that were possible.

  ‘We were just going to pick up a couple of blokes, turn a couple of tricks. Then we were going to go and see a film. We needed the money.’

  Silje Sørensen had a pen and paper in front of her. So far she hadn’t written a single word. Now she cautiously picked up the pen, but didn’t touch the paper.

  ‘What film were you going to see?’ she asked, adding quickly: ‘Just so I can check the date.’

  ‘Man of War.’

  She smiled.

  ‘Come on, Martin. Man of War had its premiere just before Christmas.’

  ‘OK, OK. I don’t remember. It’s true. I don’t fucking remember what we were going to see, because we never went in the end.’

  ‘So what did you do?’

  ‘We decided to … we … we needed some cash. We went down to the central station.’

  He caught her eye again, as if seeking confirmation that she understood what he meant. She gave a slight nod, which he interpreted as a yes.

  ‘There were loads of people there. It was packed.’

  ‘What time of day was this?’

  ‘Dunno – afternoon, maybe. Not very late, anyway. We were going to go to the pictures later. We hung out where we usually hang out …’

  ‘And where’s that?’

  ‘By the entrance from Jernbanetorget.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘Nobody came.’

  ‘Nobody? But you said it was—’

  ‘Nobody we were looking for. Nobody who …’

  He was playing with the snuff tin again. She noticed that his fingers were unusually long and slender, almost feminine.

  ‘So we decided to go Oslo City, the shopping centre. But just when we got outside some guy came up and started talking to us in English. Well, American really. I’m not sure. American, I think.’

  ‘I see. And what did he want?’

  ‘The usual,’ Martin said defiantly. ‘But he couldn’t like just say it straight out. He didn’t sort of use the normal … He was creepy. There was something about him.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘I don’t really know. But I didn’t want to go with him. He was …’

  The pause grew so long that Silje asked a question: ‘Do you remember what he looked like?’

  ‘Old. Expensive clothes. Quite fat.’

  ‘What do you mean by old?’

  ‘At least forty. Disgusting. Asking and digging, kind of. I don’t like old men. Twenty-five is OK. Not much older, anyway. But Hawre needed the money more than me, so he went off with this guy.’ He stared at the Coke bottle. ‘He was wearing the kind of clothes that show how rich you are. Know what I mean?’

  Silje knew exactly what he meant. She was the wealthiest DI in the country, having inherited a fortune when she turned eighteen. It didn’t really make any difference to her. When she applied to the police training academy she deliberately moved downmarket. But now she was so used to it that she bought her clothes at H&M. But she knew just what he meant, and nodded.

  ‘And then?’

  He looked up. His eyes frightened her; his despair over his friend’s death had turned into sheer apathy. He shrugged his shoulders and mumbled something she couldn’t catch.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I don’t remember much more about that day.’

  ‘But you haven’t seen Hawre since then.’

  His tongue couldn’t stay away from the sore. Instead of answering, he shook his head.

  The preliminary post-mortem report showed that Hawre Ghani probably died between the 18th and 25th of November. Martin Setre had seen Hawre on 24 November when he went off with an unknown sex client.

  ‘You have to help me,’ said Silje.

  He remained silent.

  ‘I need a drawing of the man Hawre went with,’ she said. ‘Can you help me with that?’

  ‘OK,’ he said eventually. ‘If I can have something to eat first.’

  ‘Of course you can. What would you like?’

  For the first time she saw the hint of a smile on his damaged face.

  ‘Steak and onions and loads of fr
ied potatoes,’ he said. ‘I’m starving.’

  *

  Adam Stubo tried to drown out the rumbling of his stomach by coughing. Only an hour ago he had eaten an apple and a banana, but his belly already felt empty. On New Year’s Eve he had stepped on the bathroom scales for the first time in two years. The number shining up at him from the display had three figures, and it frightened him. Since there was no space for exercise in his packed agenda, he needed to cut down on food. He had secretly joined an Internet diet club, which immediately and mercilessly informed him that his daily intake was over 4,000 calories. Getting it down to 1,800 was sheer hell.

  He still had three chocolate bars in the drawer of his desk. He opened it and looked at the striped wrappers. It wouldn’t be the end of the world if he had half a piece. Admittedly, he had looked up the number of calories in chocolate on the Internet calculator the other day, and had resolved never to touch the bloody stuff again. But he was so hungry that he wasn’t thinking clearly.

  The telephone rang.

  ‘Adam Stubo,’ he said more pleasantly than usual, deeply grateful for the interruption.

  ‘It’s Sigmund.’

  Sigmund Berli had been Adam’s friend and closest colleague for almost ten years. He was far from the sharpest knife in the drawer, but he worked hard and was totally loyal. Sigmund voted for Fremskrittspartiet, supported Vålerenga and ate ready meals seven days a week since splitting up with his wife about a year ago. What little free time he had he devoted to his two sons, whom he adored. Sigmund Berli was Adam’s anchor in the sea of humanity, and he was grateful for precisely that. With increasing frequency he would find himself sitting through a dinner with Johanne’s friends and colleagues from the university without saying a word. Telling them anything about how real life was lived in this country was usually pointless. He preferred Sigmund Berli and his broad generalizations; at least they were based on a life lived among ordinary people.

  ‘We’ve found a bloody great pile of poison-pen letters,’ said Sigmund.

  ‘Are you still in Bergen?’

  ‘Yes. In a safe in the Bishop’s office.’

  ‘You’re in a safe in the Bishop’s office?’

  ‘Ha bloody ha. The letters. There was a safe in her office that we only found out about a few days ago. The secretary had a code, but it turned out to be wrong. So we got somebody from the firm who supplied the safe to come out and look at it. And there was a pile of shit in there, if I can put it that way.’