She shrugged again before stepping aside. It made no difference to her. She apparently had nothing better to do.
I followed her through the dark hall and into the living room.
The room was spartan, dominated by chrome-plated tubular steel furniture with black, slightly grubby fabric cushions. In a corner stood a TV and on the floor below it a VCR, surrounded by a fair number of video cases. A rack contained a radio, a twin-deck cassette player and a gaping hole where the CD player should have been. The loose leads behind suggested it had once been there.
From the radio, a commercial station blasted its semi-hysterical ads out over the ether into Gerd Nikolaisen’s living room. She walked across and turned down the sound with a gesture of irritation. As she turned back to face me, she gathered her dressing gown more tightly about her waist, yet not so quickly that I didn’t glimpse her naked breasts.
I remained standing. ‘These girls … Have you any idea what sort of company they keep?’
She nodded towards one of the chairs to indicate that I should sit down and followed me, placing herself on the sofa on the other side of the low table. The tabletop was black Formica, with the same tubular steel frame as the rest of the furniture. ‘Have you any idea … what are you driving at exactly?’
‘I mean … do you know what sort of people they knock about with when they’re in town?’
She took a pack of cigarettes from the table, shook one out, stuck it in her mouth and looked around for something to light it with.
I picked up a barrel-shaped lighter, ignited it and held it towards her. Her thin fingers shook as she leaned forward with the cigarette between them, and I couldn’t help noticing how she’d gnawed the skin raw towards the bottom of the pink nail varnish.
‘Well, I … You can’t keep an eye on everything, especially as I’ve had to bring her up alone the whole time.’
She leaned back in the chair, crossed one leg over the other so that her dressing gown parted and inhaled the smoke so deeply that you’d have thought it might soon start seeping out between her legs. Then slowly it was exhaled the usual way. Through the bluish smoke I could just see her eyes. They were dark-brown, almost black, as though consisting of nothing but pupils.
‘But doesn’t it – scare you when stuff like this with Torild happens?’
There was a faint movement at the corner of her mouth. ‘Astrid can take care of herself. Better than I’ve ever taught her to.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Nothing.’
I sighed. ‘Tell me, shouldn’t Astrid actually have gone to Ulrik School?’
‘Well … she crossed swords with the teacher they had down there, so she was transferred to Nattland, that’s when she was about ten, in Class 5, I think.’
‘So that was when she met Torild and Åsa?’
‘Åsa?’
‘Åsa Furebø.’
‘Oh? Yes, it probably was.’
‘Wasn’t she in the Guides?’
‘In the Guides, Astrid?’ Her upper lip curled up in a crooked grin that revealed her slightly irregular teeth. Then her brow furrowed. ‘No, actually, she did try it for a couple of weeks.’ She leaned forward and flicked the ash into the already overflowing ashtray.
‘But when it came to buying the kit, the shirt and stuff, it was too expensive. Anyway, she wasn’t interested.’
‘So what was she interested in?’
She looked at me, baffled. ‘Well, er … What are girls interested in at that age? For a while she used to go up to the riding centre, but we hadn’t really … Then all she did was walk alongside while the others rode, lent a hand with mucking out the stable a bit then she packed that in as well.’
I sat waiting for her to continue.
‘Apart from that … pop music and films and larking about in the evening.’ With a slightly bitter look she explained: ‘She started going out very early with boys who were …’
‘Who were …?’
‘Well, a good bit older than her! I suppose that’s how she got into – the habit …’
‘Habit?’
‘Yes.’
Every time I asked a new question she looked at me as though I was utterly dense. Now she uncrossed and crossed her legs again, with the result that a bit more of her thigh showed. Yet there was nothing seductive in this shifting of position; it was more like an expression of utter disinterestedness. ‘Me and Astrid … we’re not like mother and daughter to each other, really, more like mates. That’s why she calls me Gerd. Remember, I was so young when I had her.’
‘How young?’
‘Sixteen.’
‘But you were saying about the habit?’
She looked at me blankly.
‘Oh yes. Well … since we’re practically the same age …’ She paused for a moment, as if waiting for me to protest, but I didn’t say anything. ‘It sometimes happened her boyfriends were my type too … and vice versa.’
‘Hm?’
Quickly she added: ‘Yes. I don’t mean we … you mustn’t think we swapped. But sometimes – situations arose which led to – jealousy, right?’
I put my hand up to my eye and nodded towards hers. ‘These marks you’ve got here … and here …’ I moved my hand to my lower lip. ‘Are they the result of such a – situation?’
She pursed her lips, and her eyes flashed. The hand holding the cigarette was shaking even more now, and before she said anything, she inhaled deeply through her nostrils.
The words slithered out of her mouth like creepy crawlies from under a stone. ‘I came home … yesterday… I’d just been down to hire a video and buy some fags … so they thought they could get in a quick one …’
I waited.
‘I didn’t ring the bell, just let myself in … then, of course, I heard the creaking from her bed right out here on …’ She nodded towards the front door. ‘She was starkers, and he’d just – pulled down his pants. But they were at it like rabbits … Just like rabbits!’
The only sound that could be heard as she breathed was the muffled, but nevertheless relentless, blare of commercials from the radio.
There were tears in her eyes. ‘You’d think they’d have had enough shame not to do it … here in my own flat … when I could come in any moment. But that’s just what he’s like, doesn’t give a shit! And as for her …’
‘What happened then?’ I asked quietly.
‘There was a hell of a row, obviously. I don’t mess about when my back’s up!’
‘No, I’m sure you –’
‘She got dressed like greased lightning, and I haven’t clapped eyes on her since. But him …’ A hurt look came into her eyes. ‘He just let fly, as though I was the one in the wrong … Here … And here … And look at this …’
Abruptly, she opened her dressing gown and pulled it down over her shoulders baring her top half. She had big blue bruises both around and between her breasts.
She looked down at herself. Her small breasts looked rather pathetic. ‘How can I help it if mine aren’t … if I don’t have big boobs like her? If it was lamb he was after, couldn’t he have taken himself off somewhere else?’
‘Who are we talking about, anyway?’
‘Who? Kenneth of course!’
‘What else is he called besides Kenneth?’
‘Kenneth Persen! Do you know him?’
‘No, but … I bumped into him just as I was leaving, the last time I was here.’
‘That’s right …’ She threw up her hand before pulling the dressing gown back round herself.
‘Do you think Astrid could be at his place?’
She looked bitter. ‘Well, good luck to her if she is, that’s what I say …’
‘Do you know where he lives?’
‘What for? Are you going to go and see him?’
I shrugged. ‘It’s Astrid I’d really like to have had a word with right now.’
‘He lives in a dump of a flat in Nedre Nygård. In Jonas Reins Street.’
<
br /> ‘Listen … Astrid and Torild … would it surprise you if I said that they were maybe involved in – prostitution?’
The last spark of life went out in her eyes. ‘No. Nothing can surprise me now … nothing. I think …’
I stood up.
She accompanied me out into the hall. She only managed to raise her eyes as far up as my chest as she said: ‘It did me good to talk to somebody.’
I took out my wallet and handed her one of the visiting cards that only gave my name and office phone number. ‘If you think of anything else, or need to talk to somebody, call this number. If I’m out, you can leave a message.’
‘Thanks,’ she said, looking as though she had to turn the word over in her mouth, unable as she was to remember when she’d used it last.
‘It’s the least I can do,’ I said and left.
Twenty-four
SUDDEN DEATH affects us all. If nothing else, it makes us older.
Randi Furebø also bore the traces of the past few days’ events, if not as visibly as Gerd Nikolaisen. Her firm body seemed somehow to have shrunk. Her shoulders were slightly hunched over, as if she had made a vain attempt to disappear into herself in order to keep reality at bay.
She was wearing the same brown skirt but this time with a black blouse and a grey and white cardigan tightly buttoned up in front. Instinctively, but unnecessarily, she adjusted her short-cropped dark hair as she scrutinised me. ‘Veum?’
‘Yes. I’m sorry, but I’d like another word with Åsa …’
‘She’s at school,’ she said coolly. ‘Besides, I really thought …’
‘Yes?’
‘That it was the police who were looking into this case now.’
‘Of course it is. I’m just making a few background enquiries.’
‘And whose background is that, may I ask? Shouldn’t it be Torild’s family you’re visiting?’
‘Perhaps not so soon – afterwards. Maybe the people they sometimes used to go about with instead …’
A hint of curiosity appeared in the brown eyes. ‘The people … You don’t mean …? Does it have to do with …?’ She glanced down the hill, where the Fantoft stave church had stood before it was burnt down.
‘Perhaps I could come in for a moment …’
She looked at me doubtfully as though I’d been a Jehovah’s Witness and she was not sure how she would get rid of me again. She stood aside, with a slightly irritated look. ‘You can hang your coat up in here.’
This time I was allowed upstairs. The living room was simple and stylish with parquet floors, green plants at the windows, shelves containing books and discreet ornaments and a slightly formal-looking piece of furniture in red and mahogany which proved very comfortable to sit on. On one of the walls hung a set of family photographs, including a photo of what looked like the first day at school, showing Åsa beaming optimistically at the photographer as though no ill could ever befall her.
I looked at the clock. ‘What time are you expecting Åsa home?’
‘Trond was supposed to be fetching her. We have to keep a special eye on her just now. Otherwise, I’m afraid … this thing with Torild has obviously affected her a lot.’
‘Of course it has. I’d rather thought she might have stayed at home.’
‘Well, we – and her too actually! – decided it was best to carry on as usual, to go to school as though it was just an ordinary day and behave as though nothing had happened …’
‘Yes. Not a bad idea, I’m sure.’
She seemed like a woman in full control of the situation, so I came straight to the point. ‘Listen, Mrs Furebø, when I first started working on this case … I quite quickly stumbled upon circles where it looks as though there was a certain amount of – prostitution with young girls.’
She paled visibly. ‘Not Åsa!’ she exclaimed loudly. ‘Absolutely not!’
‘No, there’s nothing I’ve found that points to that …’
‘Oh!’ She let out a sigh of relief. ‘But why did you … say it as though …’
‘But there’s everything to suggest that Torild was involved, and she and Åsa were best friends …’
‘Yes, were! But I had the impression they were a lot less so, that they spent a lot less time together than – before. Åsa would never…’
‘There was that episode with the leather jacket.’
She looked at me slightly surprised. ‘Leather ja –. Yes, but … it was a real shock for us, of course, that Åsa was involved in pilfering …’
‘Pilfering?’
‘All right, shoplifting, if that’s what you want to call it! But from that to … Anyway, that matter’s over and done with now!’
I ran my hand over my forehead. ‘Let’s hope so.’
‘Yes, well it is. But what are you getting at actually?’
‘Er … according to what you say, Åsa and Torild were spending a lot less time together than before.’
‘Yes, Åsa didn’t say much – loyalty’s always been important in our family but I did understand that Torild … that she was skipping school a lot, that she had other girlfriends, and boyfriends – well, boys who were a good bit older than her, from what I gather… In other words … she moved in other circles.’
‘But Åsa went into town too sometimes, didn’t she?’
‘Course she did. What century are you living in, Veum? It’s no good keeping them locked in, however much one would like to!’
‘But as recently as last year, at Whitsuntide, they were on a Guides trip together.’
‘Yes, they were – but that was when they were still …’
‘Then they suddenly dropped out, the pair of them. That was very sudden, wasn’t it? That they stopped going, I mean?’
‘Yes, perhaps it was. But they’d grown out of it. Both Åsa and …’
‘You went to visit them at their camp …’
‘Did we? … Yes, perhaps so, we usually did … if it wasn’t too far away, that is.’
‘And you didn’t notice anything about the girls then to indicate that they would so suddenly …’
‘Notice anything? I really can’t remember.’
‘It was yourself and Torild’s father who visited them …’
Her expression hardened. ‘Is there anything unusual about that?’
‘No, I …’
‘Trond was on a hiking trip over Folgefonna Glacier at Whit, and Sidsel was just not feeling too great that day. You’re surely not suggesting that … Where did you find out all this, anyway?’
Before I managed to reply, she continued. ‘Sidsel and Holger and Trond and I, we’ve been close friends for – for nearly twenty years now. We’ve been on holidays together, we’ve spent several weeks on the same sailing boat, we’ve taken saunas together, we’ve been the closest of friends without it ever occurring to us, even for a moment, that we might, that there might be anything … Is there something wrong with that?’ She looked at me accusingly.
‘Of course not! Did I – ?’
‘But nowadays, everything is so fixated on sex that two close friends, such as Holger and I, can’t even drive up to Radøy and visit our girls at Guides camp without people starting to talk behind our backs. Because it’s certainly not from Sidsel that you got this, and if it is …
‘No, no. I assure you it’s not –’
‘Listen, Mr Private Investigator! You’re probably used to spending your mornings on visits to women who’ll go to bed with you, if you just turn on that charming smile of yours –’
‘Now, now …’
‘But me, I wouldn’t look twice at somebody like you, even if you paraded about and posed right here on the carpet in nothing but your swimming trunks!’ She broke off her own tirade as though suddenly overhearing herself and, with bright red roses on her cheeks, tried to shrug it off with a false-sounding laugh.
‘There wouldn’t be much cause to carry on like that, I agree.’
‘Well, let’s say no more about it. But let me tell
you this, Mr Veum … if it’s a family on the verge of breakdown you’re looking for, take a trip up to Furudalen. It was that relationship that broke down, not the one between Trond and me, even though we’re obviously the first to regret it. I mean, everything’s changed now. I can still meet Sidsel, and Trond and Holger work together, don’t they? But we four, we can never do anything together again, and I miss that, I really do.’
‘You don’t work?’
‘No, and I don’t miss it either! But good friends I do miss.’
I nodded. ‘Have you talked to any of them since Torild was found?’
‘Yes, I called as soon as I heard and spoke to both of them. It was Holger who answered the phone, he’d – just popped in … But what can you say? To lose a child, can there be anything worse? They’re so young, still developing, and you’ve looked after them for such a long time, with all your love and affection, then suddenly – they’re not there any more!’
She glanced anxiously at the clock. ‘The way I see it, you just can’t imagine it until it happens to you personally. They must be going through hell. I only hope …’
‘What?’
‘That the guilty party is arrested, of course!’
‘Naturally. Åsa never mentioned the names of any of these friends of Torild’s, did she?’
She shook her head gently. ‘Not that I recall.’
She accompanied me sadly down to the front door.
At the top of Birkelundsbakken I encountered a white Mercedes on its way down. I caught a glimpse of Trond Furebø at the wheel. On the seat beside him sat Åsa.
For a moment I wondered whether I should turn round and drive back after them but soon decided that the family was scarcely ready for yet another visit from someone who, strictly speaking, no longer had anything to do with the case.
I turned right and headed towards Sædalen instead.
Twenty-five
SORROW BECAME SIDSEL SKAGESTØL. A kind of serene beauty had permeated her features, and she almost seemed taller, as if straightening her back against the harsh wind that was blowing.
I followed her into the large sitting room.
It was curiously silent in there. No radio, TV or CD-player was on, and the house was so far from the main thoroughfares that not even the distant roar of the traffic could be heard up here. It was as though she had decided not to let anything upset her contemplation of the situation she suddenly found herself in.
The Writing on the Wall Page 13