Holy Terror (40 page)

A taciturn taxi driver in a dirty white bobble-hat took them to the Walhalla Hotel. He continued to hold out the palm of his hand until he considered that Conor had given him a sufficient gratuity. He even handed back 73 öre, which he obviously considered to be an insult.

‘Asshole,' said Eleanor, vindictively, as he drove away; and both Conor and Magda looked at her in surprise. ‘Well,' she shrugged. ‘You don't stop having opinions, when you grow older.'

The Walhalla had been described by the girl at the Wideroe desk as the ‘finest hotel in Tromso'. It was a bland 1970s building with a wooden-floored lobby and a row of subtly lit alcoves containing painted murals of northern Norway: reindeer, Lapps, the Jostedalsbreen glacier, and the North Cape, the
Nordkapp
, the very extremity of Europe.

There was a Troll Bar with fake icicles and trolls and a Viking Restaurant with a longship and shields. Conor could see guests helping themselves from the
usual
koldtbord
, as well as
fiskebollor
and
lutefisk
– fish marinaded in lye – which he had already decided was a challenge to the palate rather than a meal.

They were checked in by a man in a brown nylon shirt who never smiled. Eleanor went directly to her room for a shower. ‘I'm bushed,' she said, kissing Conor on the cheek. I'll see you in the morning,' she said, tenderly. Conor went along to his own room and unpacked, and then went down to meet Magda in the Troll Bar. He couldn't think of sleeping, not just yet. His head felt as if it were full of broken glass. By the time he got there, Magda was already sitting on one of the hairy reindeer-hide barstools, dressed in a tight black turtleneck sweater and tight black leggings, flirting with a huge muscleman with cropped blond hair and eyes like the arrow slits in a medieval castle.

‘Conor – this is Birger. He's an iron miner.'

Conor shook hands. ‘How's it going, Birger?'

‘Well, sir, winter's coming. Very depressing.'

‘So, what's the answer to that?'

‘Two answers. Women, and
akvavit
'

‘Ha! Ha!' said Magda, and slapped his shoulder.

‘Actually, I don't usually stay for the winter. I go to Italy, to work in the iron mines. The pay's not so good but the weather's warmer.'

‘So what's holding you back this year?'

‘There's a rumor going around that somebody wants a special job done, and that they're prepared to pay three times the going rate, plus a five thousand krone bonus if it's finished on time.'

‘Oh, yes? What special job?'

‘I don't know exactly. Up north.'

They were already 210 miles north of the Arctic Circle, and Conor found the idea of going even further ‘up north' to be almost unimaginable.

‘It's some kind of excavation,' said Birger. ‘They approached another miner I know. They said they were looking for men who didn't have families and who didn't mind taking a risk.'

Conor beckoned to the waitress. ‘What's it to be?
Akvavit
?'

‘Well, no, I'll have a Budweiser if you don't mind.'

‘Make that two,' said Conor. Then he turned to Birger and said, ‘These people… the ones who want this excavation done. Do you have any idea who they are?'

Birger shook his head, but said, ‘My friend said they're new here in Tromso. This is not such a small city, forty thousand people, but the herring people know everything that's happening in the harbor and the canneries; and the teaching people know everything that's happening at the university; and the holy people know everything that's happening at the cathedral. The people who study the Aurora Borealis – well, they're a little bit cuckoo but they know everything that's happening at the place where they keep a watch on the Northern Lights. So you only have to know one of each of them and you know everything that's happening in the whole of Tromso.'

‘Do you think you could ask your friend where I could contact them?'

Birger swallowed his beer, leaving himself with a foam mustache. ‘Why do you want to know? You don't look much like a miner.'

‘Me? No. But I have a lot of experience when it comes to digging.'

‘Ah! Archeologist!'

‘Something like that.'

* * *

Conor and Magda had an early dinner together in the Aurora Restaurant. Candles twinkled on every table in red glass lamps, and a trio played plangent instrumental versions of old Barbra Streisand songs. A fresh-faced young waitress with thick ankles asked Conor if he would like to try
molje
, one of northern Norway's specialties, but it turned out to be fish, liver and cod's roe, and Conor decided against it.

Instead he chose a plateful of fried Sami reindeer with mashed potato, mountain cranberries and gravy, which was the most appetizing meal he had eaten since he arrived in Norway. Magda had a small salad with eggs and beetroot and yellow cloudberries.

Conor said, ‘I asked the desk clerk for a weather forecast. The temperature tomorrow is supposed to be way up in the threes.'

‘They always say that revenge tastes better when it's cold.'

‘I find it difficult to believe that revenge is all you want out of this. You weren't exactly complimentary about Ramon, after all.'

‘It doesn't matter what I thought about Ramon. Nobody should be allowed to murder him and get away with it. Anyhow, I want the money that I was promised.'

‘And how much was that?'

‘If everything went well, a million.'

‘You know that if I manage to retrieve the money, it'll have to go back to the people who paid it.'

‘One pathetic little million won't make a difference. Or even two pathetic little millions. One for me and one for you. You deserve it, don't you think, after everything that's happened to you? You've lost your home, your job, your freedom.'

She reached across the checkered tablecloth and held his hand. Her fingers were cold, her silver rings colder still. ‘You've even lost your woman.'

They held each other's gaze for a long, long time. Conor wasn't at all sure what it meant; or what he felt about her. But then she smiled and looked away and said, ‘I'd better go to bed. We have some bad men to find in the morning, don't we?'

Breivika Havnegata 22 turned out to be one of half a dozen single-story wooden buildings in a small scrubby industrial park three miles north of the city center, next to a junior school. The children were out in the playground with their woolly hats and gloves, screaming and laughing. Through the birch trees, Conor could see the slate-black water of Tromsoysundet, the fiord that separated Tromso from the mainland. The air was chilly and the sky was a milky pearl.

He walked casually past the front of number 22. Three rental cars were parked outside it, two new Volvo S80s and a Saab GT Turbo. The building's windows were blanked out with pale yellow Venetian blinds, and the only sign on the door was a weathered cardboard notice which obviously told callers that Kjell Bertinussen Silkscreen Printers had moved to Trondheim. He walked on to the next building, Arvid Sveen Foto, and climbed the wooden steps to the front door. As he went inside he glanced back to the entrance to the industrial park, where Eleanor and Magda were waiting in
their own rental car, a dark green Opel.

Eleanor gave him a wave.

Inside the building, a middle-aged woman with elaborate braids and glass-brick eyeglasses greeted him in Norwegian. There was a strong smell of developing fluid around; and through a half-open door, Conor caught sight of a pretty blond girl in another room, working on a digital photo-scanner. In profile she reminded him so much of Lacey that he stopped; and for a moment he was disoriented and didn't hear what the receptionist was saying to him.

‘I'm sorry,' he said. ‘You speak English?'

‘Yes, a little. Yes.'

‘I've been looking for Kjell Bertinussen, the printers.'

‘Before, they were here,' the woman explained, pointing in the direction of the next building. ‘But no more. They have gone. Five, six months. I'm sorry I don't know the telephone number.'

‘Maybe I should go next door and ask them.'

‘Next door they never open.'

‘I'm sorry?'

‘They never open. They come, they go. But they never open.' She made a knocking gesture; and then she shrugged.

‘I see. Do you know what they do? Do you know what they make?'

‘I don't know. I don't know.' She pulled a face to indicate that she didn't like them and she didn't want anything to do with them.

It was then that the pretty blond girl appeared at the door. She had the same clear eyes as Lacey, the
same strong Scandinavian face. She wore a pale blue skinny-ribbed sweater with a silver charm necklace hanging around her neck, and a very short navy blue skirt.

‘Excuse me, do you have a difficulty?' she wanted to know.

‘Hey – nothing really. I was looking for the printers who used to work out of the building next door. Just a few brochures. Nothing special.'

‘Oh, yes?' She looked as if she didn't believe him.

‘I was wondering if the people next door might be able to tell me where they've gone.'

‘Not them. They won't tell you anything.'

‘Oh, no?'

‘They won't speak to anybody. We try to be friendly when they first come here. We take them cakes and coffee. They tell us,
vuff!
stay away. That's a polite translation. They told us to mind our own business.'

‘That's too bad. Maybe they'll talk to me.'

‘I don't think so. I don't know what they're doing in there, but they don't want anybody to know what it is.'

‘Any ideas?'

The girl came up to the counter. She had a small pattern of pale freckles across the bridge of her nose, and Conor could see that she had been biting her fingernails.

‘It's some kind of research. I think biological. When they first start I can see inside their laboratory from my window at the back but now it's all covered up. I see monkeys in cages. White rats, too. Even a dog once. Then one night when I am working late
there is a big, big panic. I can see them run around and I can hear them shout. After a while comes a van and parks very close to the door but I see them carry out a man on a stretcher. Maybe he's dead, maybe not. I can't tell for sure and I think it's more wisdom not to ask.'

‘Anything else?'

‘Yes … they are very busy this week. Cars and vans coming and going. Big boxes and cases and lights, too, like they make movies with. I try to make a joke about the noise to one of the men, but they don't joke, those people. Whatever it is they're doing, it's very serious.'

Conor produced his ID picture of Dennis Evelyn Branch. ‘You seen anybody who looks like this?'

She frowned at it and shook her head. ‘No. But they're all different people, and sometimes they hide their faces with the scarf or the ski-mask. There is also one person in a wheelchair. Always covered with a blanket. Not a big person, maybe a child or a woman.'

A woman? Conor thought about the woman in Dennis Evelyn Branch's apartment in Oslo, who had never been seen, but who had been heard shouting. He put the photo back in his wallet. ‘Can I ask you something? Can I ask you when these people finish up at night?'

‘Very late, mostly. Once we have an urgent job here and we don't finish till midnight. They are still there when we leave. And they start very early, too. They're always here before I am. Always.'

‘Given a guess, what do you think they're actually doing in there?'

‘You're not looking for Kjell Bertinussen, are you?' she challenged him. ‘You're interested only in them.'

Conor didn't say anything, but he gave her his reply with his eyes.

‘Well,' she said, ‘you can find out what they're doing in there very easily.'

‘Oh, yes? And how would I do that?'

She went back to her desk and took out a small brown envelope. She dropped it into the palm of his hand. Inside was the key to a five-lever deadlock.

‘Ivar Bertinussen gives it to me, when he goes. You know, in case the pipes burst, or somebody wants to look at the building.'

‘And you're prepared to give this to me? How do you know I'm not a thief?'

She smiled. ‘You're not a thief. You have a good man's face.'

‘Tell me your name,' said Conor.

‘Ola Bergsmo.'

‘Well, Ola Bergsmo, I want to let you know that you may have done the whole world a very great service by giving me this key.'

‘I don't like them, those men, that's all. And I think that they are making experiments on animals. I hate people who make animals suffer. I believe in kindness to every living creature. I am a vegetarian, and I never wear a fur coat, only natural fiber.'

Conor thought of the reindeer he had eaten for last night's supper. ‘Glad to hear it,' he told her. ‘These days, most people don't believe in anything.'

* * *

That night, Conor drove out to Breivika Havnegata shortly after 10 p.m. and parked in the shadow of the school bicycle shed. The lights at number 22 were still shining through the Venetian blinds, and the three cars were still parked outside.

The temperature was only 1 degree, and after half an hour most of the warmth inside the Opel had dissipated. Conor couldn't run the engine in case somebody heard it, or saw the exhaust fumes billowing out.

At eight minutes to eleven, a man in a black hooded windbreaker came out of the building, hurried down the steps, climbed into the Saab Turbo and drove quickly away, its tires squealing, heading in the direction of Terminalveien. Conor wiped the condensation off the inside of the windshield. Maybe the rest of them would be leaving soon. He felt as if he would never be warm again.