The Blind Goddess (31 page)

In all there were fourteen investigators on the case now, five of them from the drugs squad. Even if they’d had a hundred, the clock would be ticking just as inexorably towards Monday, the
cruelly short time the three old fogies on the Appeals Committee had foisted on them. The decision had been a harsh one. If the police couldn’t come up with more than they’d mustered so
far, Lavik would be a free man again. Lab reports, postmortem reports, lists of foreign trips, an old boot, unintelligible codes, analyses of Frøstrup’s drugs—everything lay
piled up in the incident room like scraps of a reality with a pattern they recognised but couldn’t assemble in a way that would convince anyone else. A graphological analysis of Van der
Kerch’s fateful death threat hadn’t elicited any clear answers either. They had a few notes from Lavik’s office as a basis for comparison, and a piece of paper on which they had
made him write the same message. He had provided the sample without protest, pale but apparently uncomprehending. The graphologist had been noncommittal. He thought there might be a few
similarities here and there, but had ultimately concluded that no definite resemblance could be established. At the same time he stressed that it didn’t
preclude
the possibility that
it was Lavik who had penned the ominous note. He might have been playing safe by disguising his handwriting. A hook at the top of the
T
and a quaint curl on the
U
could be an
indication of that. But as evidence, it was of no value at all.

She left the main trunk road at Sandefjord. The little holiday town looked less than appealing in the November mist. It was so quiet it seemed to be hibernating, with only a few hardy souls in
winter clothes bracing themselves against the wind and rain gusting in almost horizontally from the sea. The gale was so strong that she had to grip the steering wheel extra tight several times as
the squalls buffeted the car and threatened to blow it into the ditch.

A quarter of an hour later, on a winding, vertiginous country road, she saw the little flag. It was flapping ardently in red, white, and blue as if in stubborn homage to its native land, against
a tree trunk apparently impervious to its agitation. That was no doubt one way to mark a forest track, but somehow she felt it was almost a desecration of the national flag to expose it like that
to the forces of nature, so she stopped off to take it with her into the warm.

She had no difficulty finding her way. There was an inviting glow from the windows, in welcoming contrast to the desolate shuttered cottages nearby.

She hardly recognised her. Karen Borg was dressed in a shabby old tracksuit which made Hanne smile when she saw it. It was blue, with white shoulder inserts that met in a vee on the chest.
She’d had one very similar herself as a child; it had served as playsuit, tracksuit, and even pyjamas before it finally wore out and proved impossible to replace.

On her feet Karen had a pair of threadbare woollen slippers with holes in both heels. Her hair was uncombed and she wore no makeup. The smart, well-dressed lawyer had gone to ground, and Hanne
had to stop herself scanning the room in search of her.

“Sorry about my clothes,” said Karen with a smile, “but part of the freedom of being here is looking like this.”

Hanne was offered coffee, but declined. A glass of fruit juice would be nice, though. They sat for half an hour just chatting, then Hanne was shown round the cottage and duly expressed her
admiration of it. She herself had never had any links with a place in the country; her parents had preferred to holiday abroad. The other children in the street had been envious, but she would much
rather have had a couple of months in the country with a grandmother instead. She only had one grandmother, anyway, an alcoholic failed actress who lived in Copenhagen.

Finally they sat down at the kitchen table. Hanne took out the portable typewriter from its case and prepared to take the statement. They spent four hours on it. In the first three pages Karen
described her client’s mental state, his relationship to his lawyer, and her own interpretation of what he would really have wished. Then followed a five-page account which was in outline the
same as her first one. The papers were neatly signed in the bottom corner of each page and at the foot of the last.

It was well into the afternoon, and Hanne glanced at her watch before hesitantly accepting the offer of a meal. She was ravenous, and calculated that she would have time to eat and be back in
town before eight o’clock.

The food wasn’t very sophisticated: canned reindeer-meatballs in gravy with potatoes and a cucumber salad. The cucumber didn’t go with it, Hanne thought to herself, but it filled her
up.

Karen put on an enormous yellow raincoat and high green rubber boots to accompany Hanne to the car. They talked about the surroundings for a moment before Karen impulsively gave Hanne a hug and
wished her good luck. Hanne grinned and in return wished her an enjoyable holiday.

She started the car, put on the heater and Bruce Springsteen at full blast, and bumped off down the rough track. Karen stood and waved, and Hanne could see the yellow figure getting steadily
smaller in the mirror, until it disappeared out of sight as she rounded a bend. That, she thought to herself with a broad smile, that is Håkon’s great love. She felt certain of it.

SATURDAY 28 NOVEMBER

H
ave you heard the one about the bloke who went to the brothel without any money?”

“Yeah, yeah,” the others groaned, and the joker subsided mutely into his chair and sulkily finished off his red wine. It was the fourth dirty joke he’d tried, with minimal
response. His silence didn’t last long. He poured himself another drink, puffed out his chest, and tried again.

“Do you know what girls say when they have a really great . . .”

“Yes, we do,” the other five cried in chorus, and again the comedian was forced to shut up.

Hanne leant across the table and kissed him on the cheek.

“Can’t you give these jokes a rest, Gunnar? They’re really not that funny when you’ve heard them before.”

She smiled and ruffled his hair. They’d known each other for thirteen years. He was as mild as milk, thicker than a hunk of bread, and the most considerate guy she knew. In the company of
Hanne and Cecilie’s other friends he could never hold his own, but he seemed to belong, his hostesses loved him, and he almost counted as part of the furniture. He was the nearest thing they
had to a good, old-fashioned friend of the family. He had the apartment next to theirs, and it always looked a tip. He had no taste, didn’t bother much about cleaning, and found it a lot more
agreeable to luxuriate in one of his neighbours’ soft armchairs than to spend an evening in his own scruffy pad. He called in at least twice a week, and was literally a self-invited guest at
all their dinner parties.

Despite the tiresome Gunnar and his jokes, it had turned into a splendid evening. For the first time since the discovery of the mutilated faceless corpse by the River Aker that wet September
evening, Hanne felt relaxed. It was half past eleven now, and the case had been a pale forgotten spectre for the last two hours. It might have been the alcohol that had such a benevolent effect.
After nearly two months of total abstinence five glasses of red wine was enough to make her pleasantly light-headed and seductively charming. Cecilie’s persistent leg contact under the table
had tempted her to try to break up the party, but she hadn’t succeeded. Anyway, she was enjoying herself. Then the telephone rang.

“It’s for you, Hanne,” Cecilie called from the corridor.

Hanne tripped over her own feet as she got up from the table, giggled, and went to see who was daring to call at nearly midnight on a Saturday night. She closed the living-room door behind her
and was sober enough to recognise the dejected expression on her partner’s face. Cecilie put her left hand over the mouthpiece.

“It’s work. I’ll be bloody mad if you go out now.”

With a look of anticipatory reproach she passed Hanne the phone.

“Would you believe we’ve caught the bugger, Hanne?!”

It was Billy T. She rubbed the bridge of her nose in an attempt to clear her head, but without discernible effect.

“What bugger? Who’ve you caught?”

“The boot man, of course! Bull’s-eye! Shit scared, plain as a pikestaff. That’s how it looks to us.”

It couldn’t be true. It was difficult to believe. The case hadn’t just gone down the pan, it was flushed away and into the sewers. And now this. The breakthrough perhaps. A living
person, actually involved, and under arrest. Someone who could give them some real information. Someone they could grab by the balls. Someone who could bring Lavik down into the same sludge the
police had been wallowing in. An informant. Exactly what they needed.

She shook her head and asked if he could come and fetch her. Driving herself was out of the question.

“I’ll be there in five minutes.”

“Make it a quarter of an hour. I’ll have to have a quick shower first.”

Fourteen minutes later she kissed her friends good-bye and asked them to keep the party going until she got back. Cecilie went with her to the door, and was offered a parting hug, but drew
back.

“I sometimes hate this job of yours,” she said in a serious voice. “Not often, but sometimes.”

“Who was it who sat all alone night after night in that godforsaken place in Nordfjord when you were on duty? Who had limitless patience for four years with your evening and night duties
at Ullevål Hospital?”

“You,” said Cecilie reluctantly, but with a conciliatory smile. And she let herself be hugged after all.

“He’s as unblemished as a newborn babe. Not even a bloody traffic offence.”

He was drumming his grubby fingers on the sheet of paper, which could have been the criminal record of the prime minister. Absolutely blank.

“And now,” said Billy T., a grin spreading over his face, “with this clean sheet, let’s see how convincing a story he can damn well come up with to explain why he
brandishes a gun at the police on the street and why he’s sitting there quivering like a piece of wet cod.”

Good point. A lot could be gleaned from reactions on arrest. The innocent were frightened of course, but it was always a controllable fear, an emotion that could be held in check by reminding
themselves that since it was all a misunderstanding it would soon be cleared up. It never took more than a quarter of an hour to calm the innocent. According to Billy T. this miscreant was still
scared to death even after two hours.

There was no sense in starting an interrogation that night. She herself wasn’t sober, and the wait would do the suspect no harm. He’d been charged with threatening the police, which
was quite enough to hold him till Monday.

“How did you find him?”

“It wasn’t me, it was Leif and Ole. Talk about luck. You wouldn’t believe it.”

“Try me!”

“There’s this bloke we’ve had under surveillance for some time. Never got anything on him. He’s a medical student, very well behaved. Lives a nice and respectable life in
Røa, in nice respectable low-rise housing. Drives a car that’s a bit too nice and respectable, and surrounds himself with anything but respectable ladies. But nice. The surveillance
team were pretty sure he had an interesting little consignment in his apartment, so our boys decided to take a look. Jackpot. They found four grams, plus a decent bit of hash. Ole realised
he’d be home later than he’d told his wife, because a full search of the apartment would take men and time. The guy had no phone, amazingly enough, so Ole went to the next-door
neighbour, a chap of about thirty. Born 1961, to be precise.”

His fingers were drumming again on the printout from the police database.

“Well, it may be disconcerting to have the police ringing your doorbell at half past nine on a Saturday evening, but not so devastating that you’re paralysed with terror and slam the
door in the officer’s face.”

Hanne thought privately it wasn’t in the least surprising that someone should slam the door in Ole Andresen’s face. He had hair down to his waist, which he boasted he washed once a
fortnight, “even if it wasn’t dirty.” It was parted in the middle, like an ageing hippie, and between the curtains of hair projected an unbelievably large and pimply nose above a
beard which would have been the envy of Karl Marx. Not unreasonable to be afraid, she thought, but maintained a diplomatic silence.

“It was the stupidest thing he could have done. Ole rang the bell a second time, and the poor bloke had to open up. It was a pity he gained a few minutes to himself in the flat, but the
amazing thing was that when he eventually opened the door . . .”

Billy T. was roaring with laughter, becoming increasingly hysterical, until Hanne began to chuckle herself, even without yet being able to share the joke. Billy T. pulled himself together.

“When he eventually opened up, he had his hands in the air!”

He collapsed with laughter again. This time Hanne joined in.

“He had his hands in the air, like in a film, and before Ole could say anything at all—he’d only held up his police ID—the guy was standing with his feet apart and his
hands against the wall. Ole had no idea what was going on, but has been in the business long enough to realise it was something suspicious. And there in the shoe rack was the missing boot. Ole
pulled out my stencil and compared it. It was a direct hit. The guy just stood against the wall with his palms glued to the wallpaper.”

They both choked with mirth till the tears ran.

“And Ole simply wanted to use the telephone!”

Perhaps it wasn’t as funny as all that, but it was the middle of the night, and they were relieved. Bloody relieved.

“Here’s what they found in his flat,” said Billy, bending his ungainly body to pick up a bag at his feet.

A small-calibre pistol fell onto the table, followed by a well-worn boot, size ten.

“Well, it’s not really enough to reduce him to such a complete state of the jitters,” said Hanne with satisfaction. “He must have something else for us.”