Lethal Investments (16 page)

It was Friday morning. The car was fixed. But there would not be a trip to the cabin this weekend, either. Nor next weekend probably. Nor the weekend after that, probably. It didn’t bear thinking about. He just got irritated. Somewhere further east, over Sweden, there was grey cloud cover. It would bring rain in the course of the day, according to the weather forecast on the news last night. On the desk lay Marketing Manager Svennebye’s statement. The man who didn’t know what his employer was selling. The man who didn’t know how the company could sell anything at all. Because his superior had not done any business deals when they should have done.

Gunnarstranda was smoking. The ash fluttered down on to a glitzy brochure from the same company. The brochure in which an ex-bully boy, convicted for having beaten up a businessman in Hovseter, was enticing potential investors with large capital returns. Trust Software Partners, it said, pay with ready cash. Money in the bank for whom? A group of unknown shareholders? Or Terje Engelsviken? The bankruptcy king with a hungry wallet and a dubious reputation?

The inspector had lots of questions he would like to ask the solicitor with the brass name plate in Kampen. But he wasn’t ready yet. And he may not be the right man to ask them. This might be better left to someone else.

Gunnarstranda blew the ash off Bregård’s face, crushed the cigarette in the ashtray, picked up the phone and dialled a number.

‘Davestuen,’ a voice said, chewing something.

‘Gunnarstranda.’

‘Ah, right,’ the voice continued to chew. Gunnarstranda was irked, gave a measured cough. ‘Software Partners.’

‘Guessed as much.’

Davestuen was still chewing. Slow, wet mastication, like a child playing in mud.

‘Got anything?’

‘Well . . .’

Gunnarstranda put the receiver under his chin to hunt for another cigarette. ‘You’re having breakfast, are you?’ he asked in calibrated courteous tones.

‘Nope,’ Reier said, smacking his lips. ‘I’m coming to terms with withdrawal symptoms. We’ve got a pretty thick file on this Engelsviken.’ He munched on, unruffled.

Gunnarstranda nodded. Wondered about the withdrawal symptoms but let the subject go.

‘Dropped cases,’ Reier slurped. ‘Creditors who have reported the guy for fraud. They reckon that before and during the bankruptcy he was trading with the money owned by companies he headed up.’

Gunnarstranda grunted. ‘What have you got in your gob?’

‘Nicotine.’

The frown on Gunnarstranda’s forehead deepened. Hoping the man would stop. But Davestuen chewed on:

‘Engelsviken emptied the coffers before the bankruptcy, you see? All the cases were dropped for lack of evidence. Everything ended up in a row over dates. Engelsviken could vouch for things having been sold well before legally set deadlines. There’s a pattern here that reeks of hanky-panky, if you want my opinion.’

Gunnarstranda grunted again. He had finally found the cigarette he had been hunting for.

‘But this case is different. Now his firm, which he has called Software Partners, wants to increase the share capital.’

Davestuen went quiet. Gunnarstranda could hear his big hands fumbling with the receiver. The sound of squelching sludge returned.

‘But, you know, this solicitor of theirs, this Brick, has devised a new trick to raise capital. And this is actually a trifle complicated.’

‘How can you eat nicotine?’

‘In chewing gum. Flat bugger. Pretty hard and it does not taste good.’ Davestuen chuckled. ‘Modern chewing tobacco. You remember the old fellas cycling up Markveien with half a bottle of vodka in their back pockets and two slimy rivulets of tobacco dribbling down their chins?’

Gunnarstranda nodded. ‘Yes,’ he mumbled, disorientated, scanning the desk for his lighter.

Davestuen cleared his throat. ‘Now they make chewing gum instead, supposed to satisfy the craving for nicotine. We’re thinking about the environment here, you know.’

‘Right . . .’

‘Protecting the environment!’

‘Yes, yes, but we were talking about the tricks Engelsviken and Co. are getting up to!’

‘OK. Instead of borrowing money, Software Partners go out and ask small businesses to become co-owners, thus increasing their share capital, which in itself ought to be fine. However, it happens in a rather odd way.’

‘Oh?’

Gunnarstranda registered the mounting silence.

‘Great,’ Davestuen burst out. ‘Finished chewing that crap. Anyway, this financing is distinctly fishy.’

He explained: ‘The way Software Partners acquires capital is not strictly legal. The shares are sold in tranches with a minimum cash investment of something like a hundred thousand and no one sanctions the arrangement. Furthermore, the new owners do not have the usual say in the company because the shares they have bought are B-shares, which provide limited rights. All they receive is a dividend and a kind of entitlement to sell the company’s products.’

Gunnarstranda listened patiently. Familiar ground. The shop-owner Frølich had spoken to in Rådhusgata had banged on about a minimum investment. He had seen some advantages to being able to sell Software Partner products. Gunnarstranda lit up.

‘Legally speaking a grey area,’ his colleague went on. ‘Since parts of this arrangement are not covered in law. This solicitor, Brick, maintains therefore that the potentially obstructive regulations stipulated by the securities law are no longer valid.’

Davestuen paused for a while, coughed again, emitted a sneeze accompanied by tiny chewing sounds. ‘On the other hand, there could be big money in this, as the minimum investment is a hundred thousand. Ten takers would give you a million. Think what fifty would mean, or for that matter a hundred!’

He coughed louder. ‘And it’s this financial side that I think could be the most interesting for us.’

‘Oh?’

The voice in the receiver was lost in a paroxysm of coughing. ‘Christ, this nicotine shit does something to your throat!’

Gunnarstranda stared at the receiver. Bloody hell, there was no end to this man’s physical noises. He blew the ash off the cigarette glow. Took another puff and patiently burned a ring of black scorch marks on the paper around the photograph of ex-bully boy Bregård to pass the time.

Davestuen was back. ‘You see, the money isn’t paid into Software Partners but to a finance company called Partner Finance.’

‘What’s wrong with that?’ asked Gunnarstranda.

‘The problem is that no one can say who owns Partner Finance. So no one knows what happens to the money that has been paid in. What’s even more peculiar is that it transpires that this company has given its address as Guernsey, a so-called tax haven.’

The faint smell of scorched paper merged with the aroma of tobacco in Gunnarstranda’s nostrils. Bregård’s halo of burn marks was half-finished. ‘But this is probably not illegal, is it,’ he said.

‘No, it isn’t,’ Davestuen agreed and explained. The point was that no one he had contacted in the finance market knew about Partner Finance. It was peculiar, to put it mildly. Alarm bells were ringing. The bells that presaged fraud. But to establish whether something illegal had really taken place, more investigation was required.

Gunnarstranda chewed his cheek.

‘For the moment someone is acquiring capital for a firm,’ Reier continued. ‘The new co-owners can sell a new product and everything looks hunky-dory.’

Gunnarstranda let Davestuen finish what he was saying. He added a few more scorch marks. Blew the glow until it was red and clear before breathing in. ‘These new sellers,’ he said and paused to catch Davestuen’s attention.

Davestuen didn’t answer. There weren’t even mastication sounds in the receiver.

‘Are you there?’

‘Yep.’

‘I was just wondering,’ Gunnarstranda proceeded. ‘What would these new sellers be selling?’

‘How do you mean selling?’

‘Well, they pay a sum of money, more than a hundred thousand in readies, to buy the right to sell something, don’t they? What do they sell?’

‘I haven’t found out yet.’

‘Isn’t that odd?’

‘Well . . .’

‘The point is,’ Gunnarstranda interrupted with emotion. ‘The Marketing Manager doesn’t even know what they’re selling.’

‘Oh?’

‘He really doesn’t. His name’s Svennebye. He did the prospectus, the brochures, all the paperwork that we and these speculators have been burdened with. But he hasn’t a clue what he’s selling. Of course he knows it’s about computer software, but why it would be attractive for people in the industry to have an agreement with Software Partners, he doesn’t know. Simply because he doubts very much whether Software Partners have anything new or exciting to sell at all.’

‘What!’

‘It’s true.’ Gunnarstranda smiled. ‘You heard correctly. What’s more, I can tell you that this Marketing Manager has decided to resign. He thinks Engelsviken and Co. are working a scam, and he wants to jump ship before the rats.’

He inhaled and blew out a cloud of blue smoke. Let the information sink in.

‘Hmm,’ Davestuen said at length.

‘Food for thought, eh?’

He poked at Bregård’s head, which still hadn’t quite come away yet.

Davestuen gave a little cough. ‘If that’s the case and Software Partners don’t have any money,’ he summarized, ‘and if at the same time money is coming into the company from the market, then the money’s disappearing somewhere.’

‘Exactly.’

‘If the money’s disappearing somewhere,’ Davestuen concluded, ‘it’s a crime.’

Gunnarstranda gave a nod of satisfaction. He liked the edge that had crept into the voice in the receiver.

‘Since Software Partners have not submitted their accounts to the public register as the law requires,’ Reier argued, ‘nothing can be checked in the usual way.’

Gunnarstranda said nothing. He smoked quietly and allowed his colleague to set the pace.

‘That means it’s time for a bit of action.’

Gunnarstranda still said nothing, letting his colleague think aloud.

‘Right,’ decided Davestuen. ‘But we’ll have to talk to this Marketing Manager of yours first. Svennebye, wasn’t it?’

‘Mhm.’

‘By the way, do you know what the worst thing about giving up fags is?’

‘No,’ answered Gunnarstranda, who couldn’t care less.

‘You miss lighting a cigarette when the telephone rings. Taking a piece of chewing gum is not quite the same.’

‘Mm, I can believe that,’ Gunnarstranda answered politely.

‘I take it you still smoke, Gunnarstranda?’

Gunnarstranda chuckled at the tone in Davestuen’s voice.

‘That I do,’ he answered softly and said goodbye. Sat drumming his fingers before repeatedly pressing the cigarette-end in the overflowing ashtray. ‘That I do,’ he reiterated to himself under his breath, and threw away Bregård’s head, which had now come loose from the paper.

At that moment Frølich shoved his large body in through the door.

Gunnarstranda allowed himself the luxury of a self-satisfied expression on his face, then straightened up and glanced at the clock.

‘What’s the matter with you?’

‘Davestuen’s found out why Software Partners locks up its files,’ replied Gunnarstranda gently and placed the tape recorder on the desk.

‘But that’s another matter.’ He wound forward and played the conversation with Marketing Manager Svennebye.

They listened in silence. Gunnarstranda supported his head on his right hand. Occasionally he was unable to resist the temptation of playing with bit of scorched paper. Frølich sat back on the sofa with both hands behind his head and his eyes fixed on a point in the ceiling.

‘Love triangle,’ said the man with the beard after Gunnarstranda had switched off the machine.

‘Love polygon,’ Gunnarstranda corrected. ‘Love was all around, as they say. Our little girl was with Bregård for a while, a while longer with the MD, a while here and a while there, in the end she was with Sigurd Klavestad for a while. Until she was killed. Until Klavestad was slashed.’

The inspector interrupted his reflections and anticipated Frølich: ‘Yes, exactly. And in the midst of all this sits the dirty old man messing everything up! Where the hell does Johansen fit in?’

‘Perhaps he doesn’t fit in at all?’ suggested Frølich.

Gunnarstranda breathed in.
Johansen’s keeping something quiet,
he thought.
Dead certain.
‘Do you know what he reminds me of?’

‘No.’

‘A little boy who’s done something naughty. He’s as happy as hell that he’s pulled the wool over our eyes. Regarding one point. One single bloody point. It makes him feel powerful.’

They sat in silence for a while, until Frølich cleared his throat.

‘This break-in at Software Partners . . .’

‘Yes?’

‘Apparently nothing was stolen.’

‘That’s right.’

‘Apparently nothing was stolen from Reidun, either.’

‘Correct.’

‘Is that a coincidence?’

‘I don’t believe so.’

Gunnarstranda’s fingers galloped up and down the desk edge in impatience. ‘We have lots of good reasons to pursue Software Partners now,’ he said.

Frølich nodded.

‘But we have to take a closer look at this restaurant place, too. Scarlet. I want you to pop by.’

‘Fine,’ Frølich growled. ‘But what now?’

Gunnarstranda lifted the telephone and dialled a number. ‘Terje Engelsviken,’ he said to the voice in his ear. ‘OK,’ he answered when the voice couldn’t help.

‘For a change,’ he grumbled and rang off.

‘Not in, as usual?’

‘At a meeting. Wonder if it’s with himself at home,’ he speculated.

Frank nodded. ‘Not inconceivable.’

‘Then we should be there, so we could have a chat with him.’

‘Would be good. Shame he hasn’t invited us.’

Gunnarstranda smiled and got up. ‘If no one invites us, I think we will be obliged to invite ourselves!’

Engelsviken and Hager had an address in Hoffsjef Løvenskiolds vei.

Gunnarstranda sat in the passenger seat quietly gazing out of the window. Examining the bare branches of the birch trees, the dirty grey patches of ground between the ochre remains of last year’s foliage by the roadside. (Spring is always dirty grey and mucky at first.)

At last the car started the laborious climb over Uller Ridge. Bare trees with bare branches here, too. Posh areas don’t look much without the colour afforded by grass and leaves. Largely uninterested, Gunnarstranda surveyed the towering residences in the shadows of large leafless deciduous trees, black bark against blue sky.

Engelsviken’s house was not at the top. Though not at the bottom, either. It was an edifice that gave the impression of something other than frugality.

Frank Frølich parked in front of one of the three garage doors facing the road. Gunnarstranda sat studying the design of the house. Chocolate brown with white window frames, a hipped roof covered with blue glass tiles that glinted in the sun. Panoramic glass panes reflected the views to the south and west. A magnificent hillside garden in front of the cellar wall set off the rocks from the house down to a lawn at street level. Now, so early in the year, you could only see the spongy winter-green growth and occasional dry twigs that would explode into life once summer was here.

The still yellowish lawn beneath the house was part of a landscape design in which large shrubs were planted between a few fruit trees. He recognized the red twigs of Tartar dogwood and the characteristic horny bark of a few forsythia bushes where the yellow flowers had formed full buds but had not yet blossomed. Between branches they caught glimpses of a narrow path made with quarry dust.

No shortage of work here, he thought. A park-like area, developed and maintained by a trained workforce, not an Oslo West lady with a hand-weeder.

The black wrought-iron gate screamed on rusty hinges behind them as they slogged their way through the shingle up to the house.

The entrance at the back was not particularly interesting and did not live up to the house front facing the street. An ordinary bare step of expanded metal led to a standard teak brown door. Gunnarstranda pressed a button in the mouth of a bronze lion’s head.

Not a sound to be heard. Either there was no bell or they had been fortunate with their insulation. No one came, so he pressed again.

Oceans of time passed.

At last. The door was opened slowly by a smiling girl with obvious oriental features. ‘Morning?’ she queried in a thick voice.

Dressed in a servant’s uniform. Short, black skirt and matching blouse with a white pinafore. The girl mustered a tentative smile. Her hair was collected in a bun at the back. A few strands had slipped out of the bun and hung down beside her ears.

Gunnarstranda left the conversation to Frølich. His eyes above the beard were fixed on the girl’s breasts. His voice asked after Engelsviken. No answer. ‘Engelsviken,’ Frølich repeated, in frustration.

The girl stared from one to the other. Then slammed the door.

Gunnarstranda looked from the door to Frølich, who raised his hand to the lion’s head and kept his finger on the bell.

Time passed.

At last the door was opened again. Same girl. But with a different expression now. There was fear in her eyes.

‘Nobody home!’ she stuttered. ‘Nobody!’

And, with that, slammed the door again.

‘Did you notice?’ asked Frølich.

‘Notice what?’

‘The buttons!’

Gunnarstranda didn’t understand.

‘When she opened the door first her blouse was buttoned up wrongly.’

‘I thought you were ogling her tits!’

‘The second time it was done up properly.’

‘How the maid dresses has got nothing to do with us!’

Frølich turned and stepped down. ‘That depends on whether she’s alone or not,’ he said.

On the road a grey Mercedes was flashing a yellow indicator and wanted to go into the garage where the police vehicle was parked. A silver saloon from the exclusive range. An irritated honk on the horn followed by flashing headlights told them the driver was waiting.

The car door opened. An elegant, dark-haired lady placed one foot on the ground and leaned out of the vehicle, eyeing Gunnarstranda. Her face was semi-hidden by her round mirror sunglasses. Some wisps of her long hair were blown into her mouth. As she stroked them away, she looked very attractive.

The inspector realized who she was. Hand outstretched, he went over to introduce himself. ‘Sonja Hager, I presume,’ he chuckled.

‘You’re blocking my drive!’

Disdainful tone.

Gunnarstranda waved to Frølich, who was back in the car. He reversed.

‘We have a few questions,’ the policeman said, as amiable as before, ‘but please do park first.’

The lady got back into her car. Seconds later the middle garage door opened. The Mercedes engine raced as it covered the few metres into the gap between the polished body of a low-slung sports car and a more unassuming Japanese model.

Gunnarstranda waited by the unmarked dark police car and held open the rear door for her.

‘Wouldn’t you prefer to come inside?’ she asked with a hasty glance at the house. Gunnarstranda followed her eyes. A figure could be discerned behind the large expanse of glass. Looked like a man. At any rate someone taller than the uniformed maid.

He looked into Sonja Hager’s eyes. The next moment, when he looked back at the window, there was no one to be seen upstairs.

‘We’ve just come from the house,’ he said with a friendly smile. ‘No one at home, I’m afraid.’

He pronounced the last word with extra stress. ‘Take a seat in here.’

He closed the car door after her, gathered his coat around him and entered from the other side.

‘I believe you’ve met before, haven’t you?’ Gunnarstranda said, motioning to the back of the head behind the wheel. ‘Frank Frølich.’ The woman didn’t respond. She was clutching her bag and staring coldly out of the window.

‘He asked you whether you knew if there was anyone Reidun Rosendal was particularly attached to.’

‘We all knew her a bit,’ she answered offhand.

‘Are you aware of any men she had a more intimate relationship with?’

‘Øyvind,’ she said in the same curt manner. ‘That is to say, I didn’t know, but I was informed this was the case by your colleague.’

‘No one else apart from Bregård?’

‘No.’

‘You two were close?’

‘Not that I was aware of.’

‘We’ve been told you were.’

‘You shouldn’t listen to everything you’re told.’

‘Reidun was an attractive woman, wasn’t she?’

‘Certainly.’

‘No cold sweats or pats on the bottom?’

‘I beg your pardon.’

Gunnarstranda held her arm. ‘Six months at the same workplace and you can’t remember anyone who had a crush on her?’

She looked down her nose at the policeman’s hand. Gunnarstranda didn’t let go. ‘Tasty morsel . . . no appeal for the boys?’

‘Let’s stop beating about the bush, shall we,’ she said, ice cold.

The detective agreed, and became serious.

‘Let me make the following quite clear: I don’t know how often Reidun chose to make herself available. Or with whom. And I don’t want to know. That’s not what interests me.’

The door shut with a bang. They sat and watched her stomp towards the house. Not very easy. High heels are not practical on shingle. Especially not uphill.

‘Temperamental,’ Frølich mumbled.

Gunnarstranda grunted.

‘What do we do?’

Gunnarstranda was quiet. ‘I’m not sure,’ he said at length.

Frølich whistled. ‘Look right!’

Gunnarstranda observed a male figure standing with a woman behind one of the large window panes staring down at them. The woman was wearing Sonja Hager’s elegant outfit. The man was the same person he had seen a few minutes ago. A grey-clad gentleman with slightly glittery suit trousers.

‘I suppose we knew that,’ the man at the wheel confirmed. ‘We knew he was at home.’

Gunnarstranda sat thinking. ‘There’s only one pattern I can see here for the time being,’ he concluded. ‘And that is that those two are floating in money. While all the evidence suggests that they shouldn’t be.’

‘Floating,’ he mumbled after a while. ‘Swimming in it!’

He smiled to himself. ‘Swimmers treading water knowing there is a jellyfish nearby. It might be to the right, to the left, or just beneath them. They don’t know where. They can smell the danger and are kicking out. Move! Fast!’

Frølich started the car.

Gunnarstranda leaned back. Looked at his watch. Gone four. So it would be evening before he had finished the day’s routines. ‘Now we’ll see,’ he said, ‘whether this panic will bear fruit. I wonder why this snob doesn’t want to talk to us.’

‘Let’s imagine for the sake of argument it’s true that Software Partners is a scam, as we believe,’ came the voice from the front seat. ‘Suppose that Bregård and Engelsviken got together after we had a word with Bregård in the fitness room. Suppose also that this Brick received a few telephone calls from Davestuen at Fraud Squad.’

Gunnarstranda listened, thinking.

‘It’s no wonder Engelsviken is keeping well away from us,’ Frølich continued.

‘Well,’ Gunnarstranda objected, only half in agreement. ‘This scam of theirs should be able to withstand a bit of nibbling at the edges from the cops. Engelsviken has experience of this kind of thing . . .’

He paused. ‘Perhaps the jellyfish is beginning to tickle their feet.’

He felt his lips forming into a smile.
That is, if it wasn’t the smoke from the bonfire we were forever walking round and stoking up
, he thought, crossing his legs.