by Anne Holt
“Will the organisation collapse now?”
It was the younger one, a man in his thirties, who put the question. His voice was tightly controlled. He was tense, and it showed, despite the fact that he was trying to appear relaxed.
“No, it’ll be fine,” the older man reassured him. “There’s a good solid structure in place. We’ve just hacked off one branch. Pity, in a way, because it was profitable. But it had to be done. There’s too much at stake.”
He threw another stone, with greater force this time, as if to emphasise his point.
“Well, the truth is,” the younger man ventured, “it’s been solid till now, we’ve always been careful, and the police have never got anywhere near us. But two murders are in a different league from our previous activities. However greedy Olsen may have been, I don’t see why we couldn’t simply have paid him off. Hell, it’s given me the jitters!”
The older man got up and stood in front of him. He looked all around, to make sure they were alone. The mist had thickened, and visibility was down to about twenty or thirty metres. There was no one within that radius.
“Now see here,” he hissed. “We’ve always been fully aware of the risks of this business. But we have to pull off a few more operations, so it doesn’t look as if there’s a connection between the supply of drugs and the murders. Then we’ll get out while the going’s good. But that means you’ll have to keep a cool head and not let us down in the next few months. Because you’re the one with the contacts.
“But we have a little spot of bother that might blow up in our faces,” he continued. “Han van der Kerch. How much does he know?”
“Nothing, basically. He knows Roger in Sagene. Not much apart from that. But he’s been part of the team for a year or two now, so he may have picked up a few bits and pieces. He can’t have any knowledge of me. I haven’t been as incredibly stupid as Hansy was, letting one of the runners into our secrets. I’ve stuck to the codes and written messages.”
“All the same, he might be a problem,” the older man persisted. “Your problem.”
He lapsed into a meaningful silence without shifting his gaze from his companion. It was a threatening posture, with one leg on the tree trunk and the other firmly on the ground right in front of the younger man.
“There’s something else you ought to remember. You’re the only one who knows about me, now that Hansy has kicked the bucket. None of the boys lower down in the organisation is aware of my existence. Only you. That makes you rather vulnerable, my friend.”
It was an absolutely blatant threat. The younger man stood up and put his face right up close to the other.
“That goes for you too,” he said coldly.
SUNDAY 11 OCTOBER
Hanne Wilhelmsen had the same relationship with the police force that in her more romantic moments she imagined a fisherman had with the sea. She was indissolubly bound to the police, and couldn’t envisage doing anything else. When she chose to go to police college at the age of twenty, she made a decisive break with the deep-rooted academic traditions of her family. It had been a protest against her professorial parents and thoroughly middle-class background. Her choice of lifestyle was met with deafening silence from the family, apart from a nervous clearing of the throat by her mother at one Sunday lunch. But they seemed to have accepted it with equanimity. Now she was a sort of mascot for them all, the one who had the most entertaining stories at Christmas. It was through her that the family could imagine they were keeping in touch with real life, and she loved her job.
At the same time she feared it. She had begun to notice what was happening to her soul as a result of this daily contact with murder, rape, violence, and abuse. It clung to her like a wet sheet. Even though she had got into the way of taking a shower when she came home from work, she sometimes thought the smell of death stuck fast, like the smell of fish guts on the hands of fishermen. And just as she imagined fishermen scanning the waters for direct or indirect signs of the presence of fish—gulls gathering, schools of whales hunting—almost as a reflex in their bones after generations at sea, that was how she let her subconscious roam over all her cases simultaneously. There was no information that didn’t lead somewhere. The danger lay in the ever-present problem of overwork. Crime in Oslo was growing at a faster rate than the money allocated to police recruitment in the annual budget.
She constantly endeavoured to keep her caseload within a maximum of ten under investigation at any one time, a goal she all too frequently failed to achieve. Green files of differing thicknesses were heaped up in dangerously high and mutually threatening stacks on one side of her desk. Even in the extremely busy period that was now behind her, she had made time to go through them at intervals and try to attach the little A5 sheet bearing the words “Recommend no further action” to the greatest possible number of cases. With feelings of inadequacy and an absolute certainty of the suspect’s guilt, she would go, weighed down with guilt herself, to get the necessary stamp from a police prosecution attorney, code 058, “Not proceeded with for lack of evidence.” So another criminal went free, she had one less case to spend her time on, and she just hoped that she had mostly got her priorities right. The burden was made worse by the fact that she never encountered any resistance from the attorneys. They relied on her and only skimmed through the documents out of a sense of duty before invariably following her recommendations. Hanne knew that the stacks of green files were nightmares for them, too.
It was Sunday, and she had twenty-one files in front of her. She had sorted them according to the severity of the potential penalty. She felt paralysed for a while by an inability to act, but eventually managed to get herself going. None of the cases was a prime candidate for the archives. There were eleven Article 228/229s, assault and grievous bodily harm. Perhaps she should go for a fine on some of them, a legitimate and practical way of getting rid of them.
Three hours later she had proposed fines in seven cases, all involving greater or lesser degrees of violence perpetrated by drunken restaurant customers and churlish doormen. With a certain amount of goodwill two cases could be regarded as adequately investigated, even if more witness statements would undoubtedly have been valuable. Hoping the courts would be able to recognise a criminal when they saw one, she made recommendations to prosecute.
Sunday was a good day for working. No phones, no meetings, and only a few other colleagues to exchange smug words with in mutual admiration for being at work on their free day, without pay or recognition—only the knowledge that Monday would be that much easier.
She heard voices at the rear of the building, and glanced out of the window. A considerable number of press photographers were clustered outside, and she remembered that the minister of justice was coming that day. “Why on a Sunday?” their superintendent had asked grumpily when the notice of the proposed visit arrived from the commissioner’s office. The only response he got was that it was not his concern. Hanne had a shrewd suspicion that the choice of day was not unrelated to the amount of space available in Monday newspapers, since all the major stories would have been hogged by the ubiquitous Sundays. The Monday papers had been getting thinner, and it was that much easier to get into print. The minister’s visit was the result of repeated headlines about the high incidence of unsolved crimes, and he was also going to take the opportunity to discuss with the commissioner the alarming increase in street violence, what the media were fond of calling “unprovoked attacks”—not an accurate description if one had access to the relevant files, which journalists usually did not. So they didn’t realise that the change was not the absence of provocation, but that it was now countered by knives and fists rather than by verbal abuse as in the old days.
Now she had got it down to twelve unsolved cases. She was closer to her target, and felt in a better humour. She selected the thickest of the files.
They weren’t any nearer to finding an answer as to why Ludvig Sandersen had had to be despatched so brutally to what some maintained
was a better place. Hanne hoped for his sake that she was the one who was wrong, and that he was now attired in white and seated on a cloud, indulging himself to the fullest on the greyish-white powder that had made his life on earth such a misery.
They had still not found any link between this case and Olsen’s murder. She had chewed over the idea with Håkon Sand on Friday, and she felt they had enough now to make the connection official. But he had opposed the suggestion, and opted to wait a bit longer. However, she thought the time had come to start examining the two cases together. She pushed the pile of papers away, took her feet off the desk, and let her boots thud to the floor as she rummaged in her bag for her keys, which also fitted the doors of all the other investigators’ offices. The file was with Heidi Rørvik, a few rooms further down the corridor.
There was no sign of anyone in the corridor as she came out. Everything was quiet, as it should be on a Sunday afternoon. But just as she was about to unlock the door of Rørvik’s office, she felt rather than heard footsteps behind her. She swung round, a split second too late. The blow, with an object she couldn’t identify, struck her savagely on the temple. Her head exploded in a violent flash of light and she knew she was already bleeding profusely even before she hit the ground. She had no strength in her muscles, so there was nothing she could do to break her fall. The left side of her forehead smashed to the floor, but she wasn’t aware of it. She had already lost consciousness, momentarily experiencing only an intense feeling of life ebbing away, before she sank into a darkness that obliterated the pain. A gash like a broad, scornful sneer opened up on her brow.
* * *
She was roused by a desperate urge to vomit. She was lying on her stomach with her head twisted at an excruciating angle; the need was so overpowering that it fleetingly outweighed the sensation that her head was going to burst open. She hurt all over. Cautiously exploring with her fingers she realised with a dull sense of surprise that two big bleeding cuts, one on her forehead and the other above her right ear, were no more painful than the deep sharp stab emanating from somewhere inside, deep in the centre of her skull. She lay there fighting against the nausea for several minutes, but finally had to give in. As if by instinct, she found the strength and presence of mind to drag herself up onto her hands and knees, like a baby watching TV, so that she could vomit without swallowing anything. It helped.
She wiped her forehead, but couldn’t prevent the blood running into one eye and obscuring her vision. She made an effort to stand up, but the blue corridor spun round and round, and she had to perform the task in stages. Finally on her feet again, she sagged against the wall, and only then did she start trying to understand what had happened. She couldn’t remember a thing. She was seized by panic. She knew she must be at police headquarters, but had no idea why she was there. Where were the others? She staggered along to her own office and dialled her home number, smearing the telephone with blood in the process. She had to make numerous attempts; it was difficult to find the right buttons. The light from the window was unbearable, like being hit with a hammer behind the eyes.
“Cecilie, come and fetch me. I’m ill.”
She dropped the receiver, and collapsed back into unconsciousness.
* * *
The darkness was comforting. Her head still ached, but where before there had been bleeding wounds, she could feel big soft bandages. The cuts weren’t really painful, and she presumed she must have been given a local anaesthetic. The bed was a metal one, and after touching the bandages she discovered that a saline drip had been inserted into her hand. Hanne was in hospital, and Cecilie was sitting on the edge of the bed.
“It must hurt a lot,” her partner said, smiling as she took hold of the hand that wasn’t attached to the tube.
“I was very frightened when I found you,” she continued. “But everything’s all right. I’ve seen your X-rays myself, and there’s no fracture. You’ve had a severe concussion. The wounds looked rather ugly, but they’ve been stitched and they’ll soon heal up.”
Hanne began to cry.
“I don’t remember anything, Cecilie,” she whispered.
“Slight amnesia, that’s all. Loss of memory,” Cecilie added with a smile. “It’s quite normal. Don’t worry, you just lie here for two or three days, then you can have a lovely couple of weeks off sick. I’ll look after you.”
Hanne was still crying. Cecilie bent over her, carefully, very carefully, and rested her face against the bandaged head so that her mouth was level with Hanne’s ear.
“That scar on your forehead will be terribly sexy,” she murmured. “Terribly, terribly sexy.”
MONDAY 12 OCTOBER
It’s not bloody good enough!”
Håkon Sand only swore when he was really furious.
“If we can’t damned well be safe even in the office! And on a flaming Sunday as well!”
He spat out the words, accusations of incompetence, without knowing who to blame. He stood in the middle of the room and stamped his foot in time with his own outbursts.
“What the hell’s the point of locked doors and security precautions when anyone can attack us whenever they like!”
The superintendent in charge of A 2.11, a stoical man in his fifties, listened to his ranting apparently unmoved. He said nothing until Håkon had calmed down.
“It’s impossible to try and pin this on a particular individual. We’re not a fortress, nor do we want to be. In a building with a staff of almost two thousand, anyone could have followed an employee through the staff entrance at the rear. It would simply be a matter of timing. You could just hide behind a tree near the church and walk in immediately after somebody who had a pass. You’ve probably held the door open yourself for someone following you, whether you’ve known them or not.”
Håkon didn’t reply, which the superintendent correctly took as an admission.
“And in principle anyone could easily hide in the building while it’s open, in the toilets or whatever. It’s easy to get back out again. Rather than trying to discover how, we should be asking ourselves why.”
“It’s bloody obvious why,” Håkon raged. “This case, for God’s sake. This case! The file’s disappeared from Hanne’s office. Not a disaster in itself, because we’ve got several copies, but someone’s definitely trying to find out how much we know.”
He cut himself short and looked at the clock. His outburst of rage was abating.
“I must dash. I’ve got to see the commissioner at nine. Do me a favour: ring the hospital and ask whether Hanne can receive visitors. Leave a note in my room as soon as you know.”
* * *
Lady Justitia was magnificent. She stood some thirty centimetres high on the huge desk, the oxidised bronze redolent of considerable age. The blindfold round the eyes was almost entirely green, the sword in her right hand a reddish colour. But the flat bases of the two weighing pans were completely shiny. Håkon could see they were real scales, swaying slightly in the current of air created by his entry into the room. He couldn’t restrain himself from touching the statue.
“Gorgeous, isn’t she?”
The uniformed woman behind the huge desk was stating a fact rather than asking a question.
“Had it from my father as a birthday present last week. It stood in his office all his working life. I’ve admired it ever since I was a little girl. It was bought in the USA, in the late 1890s. By my great-grandfather. It may be valuable. Very attractive anyway.”
She was Oslo’s first female police commissioner. Her predecessor in the post, a fine upstanding man from Bergen, had been controversial and perpetually at odds with his staff. But he’d had an integrity and energy that had been lacking in the history of the force when he’d taken on the job seven years previously. He’d bequeathed a much better organisation than the one he’d inherited, but it had cost him dearly. Both he and his family were relieved when he retired, a little early, but with his honour intact.
The forty-five-year-old woman who
now sat in the commissioner’s chair was of a different calibre altogether. Håkon couldn’t bear her. She was an arty-farty northerner from Trøndelag, more devious than anyone he’d ever met. She’d been manoeuvering herself towards the top position throughout her police career: keeping in with all the right people, going to all the right parties, and sipping drinks with the right colleagues at prosecution service meetings. Her husband worked in the Ministry of Justice. That had done her no harm either.
But she was undoubtedly very capable. If the old commissioner hadn’t elected to retire as soon as he could, she would have taken up an intermediate post, that of public prosecutor. Håkon didn’t know which would have been worse.
He made his report as factually as he could, but not in every detail. After a few seconds’ thought he decided it would be wrong not to tell his most senior boss about the unofficial connection they’d made between the two murders. But he kept it brief. To his annoyance she grasped everything immediately, put a few pertinent questions, nodded at his conclusions, and finally gave her approval to the work he’d done so far. She asked to be kept fully informed, preferably in writing. Then she added:
“Don’t speculate too much, Håkon. Get one murder out of the way at a time. The Sandersen case is in the bag. The technical evidence will support a conviction. Don’t look for phantoms where there aren’t any. You can regard that as an order.”
“Strictly speaking it’s really the public prosecutor who’s my boss on investigatory matters,” he parried.
In response, he was simply dismissed. As he was about to get up, he asked:
“Why does she have a blindfold over her eyes?”
He inclined his head towards the Goddess of Justice standing on her empty desk, attended only by two telephones.