Pierced (36 page)

‘What is it?’ Henning asks.

‘We’ve just had a call from Geilo Police. A body has been found at the foot of Hallingskarvet. From the description, it’s likely to be that of Thorleif Brenden.’

Henning goes home and lies down on his sofa. He stares at the ceiling and thinks about Elisabeth Haaland, of the news awaiting her – if she hasn’t been told already. And he feels for the children, only eight and four years old. A difficult time lies ahead of them.

Henning checks the time on his mobile. It’s too soon, he thinks, to write anything about Brenden except the fact that a body has been found. It will take a couple of hours to confirm Brenden’s identity. Then the police will inform his next of kin, and, out of respect for the bereaved, reporters should really leave family and friends alone for a couple of days. But very few members of the Norwegian media care about that these days.

You should seriously consider a change of career
, he tells himself,
given how much you loathe your own profession
. There is hardly any decency left among reporters. But deep down Henning knows he is exactly like them when he smells a good story. Is this really the kind of person he wants to be? Is this truly how he wants to feel?

That’s the problem. He doesn’t know what he wants.

In the tender infancy of his journalistic career he had an idea – or it may have been more of a fantasy – where he would position himself in the same place in the city for six months, say, and look out for people who repeated the same actions every day. He wasn’t interested in people commuting to and from work, but those who went there just to have somewhere to go. He would seek out those who avoided eye contact, who hid themselves away, who preferred walking close to the wall rather than the kerb. Henning believed that they each had a story that needed telling. Something had made them like this. Something unique to each of them.

But he never found the time. There was always a new story, always something of greater urgency. And before Henning returned to work, after Jonas’s death, he had himself turned into someone who walks in the shadows.

Perhaps I’ll find my way back one day
, Henning thinks.
When everything is over.

A sudden flash of inspiration makes him sit up. Before he has thought it through, he is on the phone to Iver.

‘What’s happening?’ Iver asks, answering after just a few rings. ‘I’ve managed to get some headphones and a remote control,’ he adds, happily, before Henning has time to say anything. ‘At least I can make calls now.’

‘Don’t do it.’

‘Eh?’

‘I don’t want you to talk to anyone. Especially not the media. Has anyone called you today?’

‘Why would they do that?’

Henning tells him about the coma article and the discovery of Brenden’s body.

‘Many people know that you’re in hospital,’ he continues. ‘And several reporters will probably check how you are, maybe not today, but definitely tomorrow when everyone is back at work. The thing is, I don’t want anyone knowing that you’ve regained consciousness yet. If the people who killed Brenden are aware that he sent you an email, and if they also check up on you and discover that you’re in a coma, then they may believe that Brenden’s email was never received. We can buy ourselves some time.’

‘Okay,’ Iver says. ‘I get it.’

‘You need to tell Nora.’

‘I’ll try.’

The stab wound sends spasms of pain from his shoulder and down his arm even though he cleaned the cut with whatever he could find and applied a makeshift bandage. There is an agonising pounding coming from the point of entry. Perhaps it has already become infected, Ørjan Mjønes thinks, since he feels feverish all over. The knife was unlikely to be sterile.

The public telephone rings at eleven o’clock exactly, just as it did three days ago. Mjønes steps inside and picks up the receiver with his left hand.

‘Hello,’ he says. At the same moment the throbbing in his shoulder escalates.

‘Is everything taken care of?’

‘Yes,’ Mjønes says, clenching his teeth. The pain feels like flames brushing his forehead.

‘And you’re quite sure of that?’

‘Yes. There are no loose ends this time.’

The handset is filled with white noise for a few seconds.

‘Good.’

‘Which means only one item is outstanding,’ Mjønes says. ‘But there has been a change of plan. I want the balance paid into my bank account.’

Silence. Mjønes wipes the sweat away with the same hand that is holding the handset.

‘Why?’

‘I have my reasons.’

There is silence again.

‘Okay.’

‘I have a bank account in Sw—’

‘Not on the telephone,’ Langbein cuts him off. ‘We need to meet.’

Mjønes frowns. Why? So that Langbein can shoot him dead and so avoid paying the 2.5 million kroner he owes him?

Mjønes makes it a rule never to ask his employers about their motives. He takes on a job, and he sees it through, mostly without getting his own hands dirty. But now that he thinks about this particular assignment, his curiosity is aroused, especially since Langbein hadn’t been in touch since newspapers the world over commemorated the anniversary of 9/11. Prior to that date, he and Langbein regularly did business, but for much lower fees.

If you don’t take the job then you become the job.

So Langbein would have had me killed
, Mjønes considers,
if I hadn’t agreed to do this job. Or was this his plan all along? Get me to kill Pulli and send someone after me later? It might explain why it was so easy for me to push the price up from 2 to 3 million
, he thinks, a sum which even to begin with was considerably higher than is usual for this line of work. Perhaps he is walking right into a trap. Given his knowledge of Langbein’s previous operations, it’s not unthinkable even though he doesn’t know who Langbein is or who he works for.

‘We’re not going to do that,’ Mjønes says. ‘I’ll contact you the way you contact me. The advert will appear sometime tomorrow morning, and the numbers you’ll need will be in it. If the money hasn’t reached my bank account by Tuesday, I’ll charge interest.’

‘Are you in a hurry?’

‘Yes . . . or . . . no.’

‘You’re not thinking of disappearing, are you?’

Mjønes hesitates.

‘Oh, no,’ he lies.

Henning can’t sleep that night. In addition to Pulli’s nineteen minutes, another question is vexing him, so he sends a text message to Frode Olsvik early the next morning asking for a few minutes of his time as soon as possible. The reply arrives immediately:
I have five minutes in Stockfleths by the Courthouse at 8.30 a.m.

Henning agrees with Heidi Kjus that he will come into the office a little later and squashes himself in with all the other morning-rush-hour commuters on the number 11 tram to the Courthouse. In Stockfleths he orders a double espresso and takes a seat by a window while he waits for the lawyer. A few minutes past 8.30 a.m. Olsvik appears, but rather than go up to the till to order, he nods to the waiter behind the counter who returns his greeting with a smile.

Olsvik manoeuvres his large body into a chair by the table and holds out his hand to Henning.

‘Thank you for agreeing to meet with me at such short notice.’

‘Not at all.’

In the course of the next minute, Henning learns that Olsvik has been informed about what has happened both to Pulli and to Brenden and that police are looking for the hit man who was probably paid generously for arranging Pulli’s death.

‘How can I help you, Juul?’ Olsvik says and straightens one of his braces. Henning takes a breath‚ but decides to hold off sharing his suspicions about the clock on Pulli’s mobile. He needs to test his hypothesis first.

‘In the past couple of years, no one had more to do with Pulli than you. I would bet that you knew him better than most.’

‘I suppose you could say that.’

‘Did he make any enemies during the time he spent in prison?’

A patronising expression spreads across Olsvik’s face. Henning braces himself for a lecture.

‘My relationship with my client is purely professional, Juul. Our conversations mainly revolved around his case. And my client is still entitled to a duty of confidentiality even though he is dead.’

‘Even though he was killed?’

‘Even though he was killed. Especially if the person asking the question is a reporter.’

‘Even though it was you who tipped off Tore Pulli that I was back at work?’

Olsvik looks at Henning as a cup of steaming hot coffee is placed in front of him.

‘Thank you,’ he says, looking up at the waiter. ‘Put it on the company account, would you?’

‘Sure.’

Olsvik waits until the waiter is out of hearing range. Then he pins his eyes on Henning. ‘What are you talking about, Juul?’

‘The only people to visit Tore while he was inside were you, Geir Grønningen and Veronica Nansen. And I know that neither of them told Tore that I had returned to
123news.
’

Olsvik smiles wearily. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, Juul. There are many ways to get information in a prison even if you don’t have visitors every day or access to the Internet. The inmates speak to the prison guards and with other inmates, and they’re entitled to make twenty minutes’ worth of telephone calls every week.’

‘I thought all telephone conversations were monitored?’

‘In theory, yes. But no one listens in to every word that is said. They do spot checks, primarily to determine if any communication relating to drug smuggling or similar is taking place. And I regret to have to tell you, Juul, but no alarm bells would start ringing if someone, in an aside, happens to mention that you’re back at work. People have more important things to worry about.’

Feeling a tad humbled, Henning has to admit that the lawyer is probably right.

‘Do you know if the prison keeps a record of which numbers an inmate has called?’ he says, trying to shake off his embarrassment.

‘I imagine that they log outgoing calls. And Tore might have tried to get someone on the outside to help him by calling or writing a letter. He is not the first inmate to believe he was unfairly convicted. Some write to the press, others to private detectives.’

‘So you and Tore never discussed if a third party might be able to help him?’

‘I really can’t tell you what I did or did not discuss with my client—’

‘Please, Olsvik,’ Henning interrupts him. ‘I know you have attorney–client privileges and rules to observe, but we’re not talking about information that is sensitive to your client’s case. And I’m asking you because I’m still trying to help him – even though he is dead.’

‘And you can do that by finding out how Tore knew that you were working again?’

Henning hesitates for a second. ‘Among other things.’

‘You have to explain the logic in this to me.’

Henning takes a deep breath. ‘In parallel with working on Tore’s case, I’m also trying to find out what happened on the day my son died. Tore claimed that he . . .’

A thought occurs to Henning that almost takes his breath away. Pulli contacted him in the hope that Henning could help exonerate him. The bait was the truth of what happened the day that Jonas died.

What if that was the reason Pulli had to die?

‘Pulli claimed what?’ Olsvik asks him.

‘That he knew something about the fire in my flat,’ Henning says, distracted.

‘And you think that your son’s death relates to Pulli’s?’

‘Yes. Or . . . I . . . I don’t know,’ Henning admits without looking up.

He remembers what Elisabeth Haaland told him about their burglar alarm packing up on a Sunday. That must have been the day after Pulli called me, Henning concludes, since he met the fire investigator Erling Ophus on a Saturday. In which case, someone must have acted with extreme speed. First they would have to identify someone who could get close to Tore Pulli, a job that would surely require time and research, then they would need to get hold of the surveillance equipment for Brenden’s flat – on a Saturday – and install it when the Brenden family left the house the next day.

Henning shakes his head. There wouldn’t be enough time.

‘I know nothing about this,’ Olsvik says. ‘I haven’t heard anything.’

Henning nods slowly. But the thought refuses to go away. And there is another option, he thinks, which Olsvik also touched on. That Pulli had been in contact with someone else regarding the same subject before he called Henning.

I need to get hold of those call logs
, Henning says to himself.

Normally it takes the police five to six weeks to get an answer when they send off a fingerprint to Kripos. But after locating Thorleif Brenden’s car in Kirkegaten and successfully lifting a fingerprint from the armrest on the passenger side, Brogeland persuaded forensic scientist Ann-Mari Sara to convince her bosses to give the sample top priority and run it through AFIS, the Automated Fingerprint Identification System. It took only ten or twelve seconds before she got a hit. And after the result had been checked manually, there was no doubt that the fingerprint belonged to a man called Ørjan Mjønes.

Brogeland remembers Mjønes from his plain-clothes days. His name also appeared on the long list Nøkleby gave them after Elisabeth Haaland had described ‘Furio’ – the man who pretended to interview her.

It really is ridiculous, Brogeland thinks, that so few staff within the police force have access to the Indicia database where all information about everyone – obtained both officially and unofficially – is collected and stored. If you have a description of a person and if information about someone with similar features has previously been entered, everything relating to them – including any criminal record – appears in a matter of seconds. In some cases the level of information stored about the person includes the smallest details. All mapping of East Europeans, for example, in connection with Project Borderless is being entered into Indicia.