Authors: Jo Nesbø
More banging. Hard.
‘Alright, alright,’ Harry shouted, walking to the door. He could see the outline of a figure through the wavy glass in the door. It must be one of the neighbours, Harry thought, since they hadn’t used the intercom.
He had just put his hand on the door handle when he felt himself pause. A prickling at the back of his neck. Spots in front of his eyes. Pulse rushing. Rubbish. He opened the door.
It was Ali. Deeply furrowed brow.
‘You promised you would clean out your storeroom in the cellar by today,’ he said.
Harry slapped his forehead with his hand.
‘Shit! Sorry, Ali. I’m a good-for-nothing scatterbrain.’
‘That’s alright, Harry. I can help you if you’ve got time this evening.’
Harry eyed him with surprise. ‘Help me? I can remove what I have
in ten seconds. To be honest, I can’t remember a single thing I’ve got down there, but fine.’
‘They’re valuable items, Harry.’ Ali shook his head. ‘You’re crazy to keep stuff like that down in the cellar.’
‘I don’t know about that. I’m off to Schrøder’s for a bite to eat. I’ll pop by afterwards, Ali.’
Harry closed the door, sank back in the chair and pressed the remote control. The news in sign language. Harry had been on a case when several deaf people had been brought in for questioning and he had learned a couple of the signs. He tried to match the reporter’s gesticulations with the lines that came up. All quiet on the Middle Eastern front. An American was to be court-martialled for fighting for the Taliban. Harry gave up. Schrøder’s menu of the day, a coffee, a smoke, he mused. Down to the cellar and then straight to bed. He took the remote and was about to switch off when he saw the signer point outstretched fingers and raise a thumb at him. That was a sign he remembered. Someone had been shot. Harry automatically thought of Arne Albu, but he had been suffocated. His eyes moved down to the subtitles. He froze in his chair. And frantically started pressing the remote. This was bad – perhaps very bad news. Teletext didn’t say a lot more than the subtitles:
Bank clerk shot in raid. Raider shot a cashier at the Grensen branch of DnB in Oslo this afternoon. Bank clerk’s condition is critical.
Harry went into his bedroom and switched on the computer. The bank robbery was the headline on his home page. He double-clicked:
The branch was closing for the day when a masked raider came in brandishing a gun and ordered the female branch manager to empty the ATM. As this didn’t happen in the time specified, he shot a 34-year-old bank clerk. The state of the wounded woman is said to be critical. PAS Rune Ivarsson says the police have no leads at present and would not comment on suggestions that the raid followed a similar pattern to raids carried out by the man dubbed
the Expeditor. Police informed us this week he had been found dead in d’Ajuda, Brazil.
Could be a coincidence. Of course it could. But it wasn’t. No chance. Harry ran his hand across his face. This was what he had been fearing the whole time. Lev Grette had only held up one bank. The following hold-up had been done by someone else. Someone who was well into their stride now. So well that he prided himself on copying the original Expeditor down to the last gory detail.
Harry tried to derail his train of thought. He didn’t want to brood over any more bank raids now. Or bank staff being shot. Or the consequences of there turning out to be two Expeditors. The risk that he might have to work under Ivarsson and postpone the Ellen case again.
Stop. No more thinking today. Tomorrow.
But his legs still carried him out into the hall where his fingers dialled Weber’s number all on their own. ‘Harry here. Had any luck?’
‘We certainly have.’ Weber sounded surprisingly cheerful. ‘Good boys and girls are always lucky in the end.’
‘News to me,’ Harry said. ‘Let’s have it then.’
‘Beate Lønn rang me from the House of Pain while we were in the bank. She had just started looking at the tapes of the robbery when she saw something interesting. The man was standing close to the Plexiglas over the counter when he was talking. She suggested we check for spit. It was only half an hour after the raid and so there was still a realistic chance of finding something.’
‘And?’ Harry asked impatiently.
‘No spit on the glass.’
Harry groaned.
‘But a micro-drop of condensed breath.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes, indeed.’
‘Someone must have been saying their evening prayers recently. Congratulations, Weber.’
‘I reckon we’ll have the DNA profile in three days. Then we can
start comparing. My guess is we’ll have him before the week’s out.’
‘I hope you’re right.’
‘I am.’
‘Well, thanks for rescuing my appetite.’
Harry switched off and put on his jacket. He was about to leave when he remembered he hadn’t turned off the computer and went back to the bedroom. As he went to press the
SHUT DOWN
button, he saw it. His heart slowed and the blood in his veins thickened. He had an e-mail. Of course he could have shut down the computer anyway. Should have done, there was no urgency. It could be from anyone. There was only one person it could
not
be from. Harry would have loved to be on his way to Schrøder’s right now. Padding down Dovregata, wondering about the old pair of shoes floating between heaven and earth, enjoying the images from his dream about Rakel. That sort of thing. It was too late now, though; his fingers had taken over again. The machine innards whirred. Then the e-mail appeared. It was a long one.
Hi Harry,
Why such a long face? Perhaps you thought you wouldn’t be hearing from me again. Well, life is full of surprises, Harry. Something Arne Albu will have discovered by the time you read this. You and I, we made life unbearable for him, didn’t we? If I’m not much mistaken, I bet his wife has taken the kids and left him. Brutal, isn’t it? Taking a man’s family away from him, especially when you know it’s the most important thing in a person’s life. But he only has himself to blame. Infidelity cannot be punished severely enough, don’t you agree, Harry? Anyway, my little vendetta stops here.
But since you have been dragged into this as an innocent party, perhaps I owe you an explanation. The explanation is relatively simple. I loved Anna. I really did. What she was and what she gave me.
Unfortunately she didn’t love what I gave her. The Big H. The Big Sleep. Did you know she was a pedigree junkie? Life is, as I said, full of surprises. I introduced her to drugs after one of her – let’s not mince
words – failed art exhibitions. And the two of them were made for each other; it was love at first stab. Anna was my client and secret lover for four years. It was impossible to separate the two roles, so to speak.
Confused, Harry? Because you didn’t see any syringe marks when you stripped her, eh? Yes, well, ‘love at first stab’ was just a way of speaking. Anna couldn’t stand syringes, you see. We smoked our heroin out of the silver paper off Cuban chocolate. It’s more expensive than injecting it. On the other hand, Anna got it at wholesale price as long as she was with me. We were – what’s the word? – inseparable. I still have tears in my eyes when I think about those times. She did everything a woman can do for a man: she fucked, fed, watered, amused and consoled me. And begged me. Basically, the only thing she didn’t do was love me. How can that be so bloody difficult, Harry? After all, she loved you and you didn’t do shit for her.
She even managed to love Arne Albu. And there was me thinking he was just a tosser she was milking to pay for junk at market prices, and to get away from me for a while.
But then one May evening I rang her. I’d just done three months for petty offences, and Anna and I hadn’t spoken for a long time. I said we should celebrate. I had taken delivery of the purest stuff in the world from the factory in Chang Rai. I could immediately tell from her voice that something wasn’t right. She said it was over. I asked whether she was referring to H or me, and she replied both. You see, she had started on this work of art which she would be remembered for, she said, and it needed a clear mind. As you know, Anna was an obstinate devil when she set her mind on something, so I would bet you never found any junk in her blood. Right?
Then she told me about this guy, Arne Albu. They had been seeing each other and planned to move in together. First, he had to sort things out with his wife. Heard that one before, Harry? Well, me, too.
Isn’t it strange how your mind can focus when the world is crashing around you? I knew what was required before I put down the phone. Revenge. Primitive? Not at all. Revenge is the thinking man’s reflex, a complex blend of action and consistency no other animal species has so
far succeeded in evolving. Evolutionally speaking, the practice of taking revenge has shown itself to be so effective that only the most vengeful of us have survived. Vengeance or death. It sounds like the title of a western, right, but remember it was the logic of retaliation that created the constitutional state. The enshrined promise of an eye for an eye, the sinner burning in hell or at least dangling from the gallows. Revenge is basically the foundation of civilisation, Harry.
So I sat down that same evening and worked out a plan.
I made it simple.
I ordered a key for Anna’s flat from Trioving. I won’t tell you how. After you left her flat, I went in. Anna had already gone to bed. She, a Beretta M92 and I had a long, enlightening chat. I asked her to find something she had been given by Arne Albu – a card, a letter, a business card, anything. The plan was to leave it on her body to help you connect the murder with him, but all she had was a photograph of his family at their chalet, which she had taken from his album. I guessed that might be a touch too cryptic and you might need a little more help. So I had an idea. Signor Beretta persuaded her to tell me how to get into Albu’s chalet. The key was in the outside lamp.
After shooting her – I won’t go into detail as it was a disappointing anticlimax (no sign of fear or regret) – I put the picture in her shoe and immediately left for Larkollen. I planted – as I am sure you have realised by now – Anna’s spare key in the chalet. I thought about glueing it to the inside of the cistern in the toilet, that’s my favourite place, where Michael hid the gun in
The Godfather.
But you probably wouldn’t have had the imagination to search there and there was no point anyway. So I put it in the bedside-table drawer. Easy, wasn’t it?
The stage was thus set, and you and the other marionettes could make your entrances. Hope, by the way, you weren’t offended by the little nudges I gave you on the way. The intellectual level of you policemen is not exactly unnerving. Unnervingly high, that is.
I take my leave here. Thank you for the company and the help. It has been a pleasure working with you, Harry.
S
2
MN
A
POLICE CAR WAS PARKED BY THE DOOR TO
H
ARRY’S
apartment building and another blocked the Dovregata entrance to Sofies gate.
Tom Waaler had given instructions not to use sirens or blue lights.
Over the walkie-talkie, he checked everyone was in position and received quick-fire, crackly confirmation by return. The word from Ivarsson was that the blue sheet – the arrest document and search warrant – from the police solicitor had arrived exactly forty minutes ago. Waaler had said quite clearly he didn’t want the Delta group, he would lead the party himself and already had the people he needed on standby. Ivarsson had not made any fuss.
Tom Waaler rubbed his hands. Partly because of the icy-cold wind sweeping down the street from Bislett stadium, but mostly out of glee. Making arrests was the best part of the job. He had already realised that when he was small, and he and Joakim had lain in wait in their parents’ orchard on autumn evenings for the riff-raff from the housing co-op on an apple-scrumping raid. And they came. Usually eight to ten of them in the gang. It made no difference how many there were, however, because it was total mayhem when he and
Joakim shone their torches and yelled through their home-made megaphones. They followed the same principles as wolves hunting reindeer: they picked out the smallest and weakest. But it was the arrest – the cornering of the prey – which fascinated Tom, the punishment which appealed to Joakim, whose creativity in this area had advanced so far that Tom occasionally had to stop him. Not because Tom felt any sympathy for the thieves, but because, unlike Joakim, he could keep a clear head and assess the consequences. Tom often thought it was not chance that brought him and Joakim together as it had. He was now a deputy judge on the Oslo Law Court circuit with a glittering career beckoning.
When Tom applied to join the police force, what had attracted him was the thought of
arrests
. Tom’s father had wanted him to study medicine, or theology as
he
had done. Tom achieved the best grades in his school, so why a policeman? It was important for your self-esteem to have a decent education, his father had said, and told him about his elder brother who worked in an ironmonger’s selling screws and hating everyone because he felt he wasn’t as good as they were.
Tom had listened to the admonitions with the wry smile he knew his father loathed. What his father worried about wasn’t Tom’s self-esteem, it was what the neighbours and relatives thought about his only son becoming a ‘mere’ policeman. His father had never understood that you could hate people even though you were better than they were.
Because
you were better.
He checked his watch. Thirteen minutes past six. He pressed one of the bells on the ground floor.
‘Hello,’ said a woman’s voice.
‘It’s the police,’ Waaler said. ‘Could you open up for us?’
‘How do I know you’re the police?’
A Paki, Waaler thought, and asked her to take a peep out of the window at the police cars. The lock buzzed.
‘And stay indoors,’ he said to the intercom.