The Last Pilgrim (39 page)

Where is the fourth attachment?
Bergmann wondered. According to the list of numbered attachments, there should have been a piece of paper with the words “I’m sorry. Kaj.” But the note was missing. He picked up Holt’s ID, which had been fastened to the back of the report with a paper clip. For a moment he held the dry, yellowed document and studied Holt’s photograph. There was a sad look to his face, as if he harbored a great sorrow. Hadn’t Nystrøm told him that there wasn’t a single photo of Holt? Bergmann might have been one of the very few people to ever see this file.

“Where’s the note?” he asked, looking up at Tossmann, who was now seated behind his desk again.

The phone on the desk rang.

“Excuse me,” said Tossmann.

Bergmann got up and went over to the window. The sun was baking the glass roof of the atrium. It was all one big gleaming surface.

“Yes. I see,” said Tossmann to whoever was on the phone. His side of the conversation was monosyllabic, interspersed by murmured grunts.

“Give me five minutes,” Tossmann finally said before putting down the phone.

Bergmann turned around to face him.

“So, how is Fredrik?” asked Tossmann.

“He’s fine,” said Bergmann.

The clock on the wall behind Tossmann ticked toward three o’clock.

“Do you know what happened to the note?” asked Bergmann. “The one from Holt?”

Bergmann held up the report for Tossmann to see.

The inspector sighed heavily. Then he spent several seconds rubbing his eyes. When he opened them again, they looked bloodshot, as if he’d been on a long drinking binge, trying to forget something he didn’t wish to recall.

“According to rumors here at headquarters, the note was sent to Norway. But nobody knows that for sure.”

“To Norway?” said Bergmann.

Tossmann nodded.

“Do you know where in Norway?”

He shook his head. “I’m afraid not.”

“To the police?”

Tossmann threw up his hands. He got up from his chair again with some effort. “Bergmann, I’m sorry, but I have a meeting now.”

Bergmann nodded and quickly jotted down a few key words about the report. Without knowing why, he also wrote down the name of the secretary at the Norwegian legation. Karen Eline Fredriksen. Underneath he wrote, “I’m sorry. Kaj.”

“Peter Waldhorst,” said Bergmann. “Does that name mean anything to you?”

“I’m afraid not.”

“Are you sure?” he insisted.

“My dear Bergmann,” said Tossmann. “Everything I know about this matter is in the papers you’re holding.”

Bergmann nodded.

“Do you think there’s anything in the Säpo archives?”

“About this . . . Waldhorst? Was that his name?”

Bergmann nodded.

“Maybe, if he was in Sweden during the war.” Tossmann shrugged. “I really need to leave now,” he said, glancing at his watch.

“We appreciate your help,” said Bergmann.

“It was nothing. Though I don’t know what use this will be to Fredrik.” Tossmann picked up the document folder and then dropped it in a drawer of the file cabinet under his desk.

No, you wouldn’t understand,
thought Bergmann.

The drive home took longer than he’d anticipated. But it gave him plenty of time to think. Perhaps too much time.

As he walked out of the Statoil gas station in Karlskoga, he stopped abruptly, his hand still grasping the door handle. He was staring at the front page of
Aftonbladet
in the newspaper box outside.

Why would someone send the note to Norway? He’d been pondering this question for the past two and a half hours. There seemed to be only one possibility. And where would that person have sent it?

Just before crossing the border into Norway, he phoned Halgeir Sørvaag.

“Find out whether Kaj Holt had any children,” he said.

“What the hell are you talking about?” said Sørvaag.

“Find out—”

“Do you know what time it is? Do you really think I’m still at work? I’m not as hard up as you are, Tommy.”

Bergmann could hear a TV in the background and was about to respond, but Sørvaag had already hung up.

He looked at the time displayed on the car’s dashboard. Six thirty. How had it gotten so late? He moved into the left lane to pass a truck. Only when he reached a hundred miles per hour did he move back over to the right—just in time too, or he might have ended his days by colliding with an oncoming van.

Right before he reached Ørje, a thought surfaced in his mind. Bergmann veered over to the exit and parked next to a red-painted café near the entrance to the locks. He got out and walked over to the small beach by the lake. Several kids were yelling as they shoved each other off a raft out on the lake. Bergmann watched them, feeling a hint of their joy deep inside him. Sun rays struck the surface of the water at almost ninety degrees. The only disruption was a motorboat cutting through the water at low speed over near the opposite shore.

It all suddenly made sense.

He leafed through his notebook. Page by page, watching the whole case like a film in slow motion, but in reverse. He’d written the name Marius Kolstad at the top of one page and scanned the four or five lines of notes he’d taken beneath it. Key words that he alone would understand:
Krogh fell apart after his wife’s death. Karen
.

Then he skipped ahead until he came to the last page and the scribbled notes from his meeting with Tossmann:
Witness from the Norwegian legation. Karen Eline Fredriksen.
Hadn’t he read somewhere that Krogh’s wife had worked in the Norwegian legation in Stockholm during the war?

He had to go back to his car to think this through. He set the notebook on the passenger seat and got back on the E18. He suddenly had a sense of urgency. After only a couple of minutes he came to a small rest stop and pulled off the highway. He had to stop to think clearly.

Was that really what happened? Did Carl Oscar Krogh kill Kaj Holt in Stockholm and then send his future wife to his apartment to reassure the Stockholm police that Holt was suicidal? Bergmann paged through his notebook until he found what he’d written down about his interview with Bente Bull-Krogh. He’d jotted down her cell number in the margin on one of the pages. Bergmann stuck a cigarette in his mouth, got out of the car, and sat down on a bench in the rest area. A few raindrops landed on his forehead. He lit the cigarette and tapped in the phone number, tipping his head back to see where the raindrops were coming from. Above him the sky was as blue as it had been all day.

The only thing that didn’t fit was why Krogh should have played such a big role in the investigation of Holt’s death. Had he really been such a coldhearted bastard?

Wait a minute,
he thought as he watched a lumber truck rush past and disappear. For a long time there were no other vehicles on the road.

He put his cell back in his pocket.

Better not give Bente Krogh any leads. He wasn’t sure what to do next. But before he did anything else, he needed to find out whether Karen Eline Fredriksen was indeed the same person as Karen Krogh.

Bergmann looked at his watch. He also needed to know whether Holt had had any children. He cursed Sørvaag, but couldn’t really blame him for not wanting to search for people who might not even exist, especially after work hours. He could phone Nystrøm, of course, and find out the answer at once, but he was reluctant to do that. He’d already told Nystrøm too much. He knew what direction Bergmann was going in and could easily put two and two together. But Torgeir Moberg wouldn’t get the connection, at least not right away. Bergmann got out Moberg’s business card, which he’d paper-clipped to one of the pages in his notebook. First he called his office number. Moberg seemed like the type who might still be working at this hour, even on a nice summer evening.

Just as he was about to give up, someone answered.

“Moberg?” said Bergmann.

“I’d be more curious to know who
you
are,” said the voice on the line. Bergmann knew it was him.

“This is Bergmann, from the police—”

Moberg interrupted him with a sigh.

“I thought we were done, Bergmann. But all right, fire away . . .”

“Just one question,” he said. “About Kaj . . .”

“Holt,” said Moberg, finishing his sentence for him.

“One simple question. I’m just trying to complete the picture of Holt.” He could hear from his own voice that he wasn’t the best liar, but it would have to do.

“Yes?” Moberg sounded as if he wanted to underscore that he thought this was all a waste of time.

“Did Holt have any children? And do you know whether his wife is still alive?”

Moberg snorted.

“Yes to the first question. One child, as far as I know. No to the second. But listen here, Bergmann, don’t tell me that you’re spending any more time on this.”

“A son or daughter?”

“Surely that doesn’t make any difference. The child couldn’t have been more than a toddler when Holt died.”

“I’d really appreciate it if you’d answer the question,” said Bergmann.

“A daughter,” said Moberg.

“Do you have any idea—”

“Have I ever met her? Talked to her? No,” said Moberg.

For a moment neither of them spoke.

“Thank you very much,” Bergmann said.

He could just picture Moberg sitting in his office, thinking he was some total incompetent off on some wild goose chase. So be it.

“I suppose you’d like to know her name too?” said Moberg.

“That would be great.”

“Vera,” said Moberg. “Whether she’s still using Holt as her last name, you’ll have to find out for yourself.”

Bergmann thanked him again, then paused before hanging up. He wanted to give Moberg the opportunity to ask why he was suddenly so interested in whether Holt had any children. But Moberg merely grunted and wished him good evening before hanging up.

Vera Holt,
thought Bergmann. He needed to find Vera Holt.

How long would it take him to drive to Oslo? Another hour at most. He could have called the officer on duty and asked him to do a computer search, but he decided it could wait.

His key card to get into the police garage wasn’t working. Bergmann reluctantly pressed the buzzer, feeling this was requiring unnecessary effort on his part.

He sat dozing in his car for a full five minutes before he was abruptly awakened by a patrol car turning on its siren as it drove out of the garage. He felt momentarily disoriented, unsure why he was sitting outside the garage in an unmarked police car. When he finally got to the seventh floor, he found it nearly deserted. Only a couple of fools were still sitting at their desks, thinking they could save the city from perdition. Bergmann looked at his watch and noted that he was one of them. He consoled himself with the thought that it was only 9:15—and he had a better view from his office than Claes Tossmann did from his in Stockholm.

His first search in the National Registry was simple enough. Karen Krogh had died about a year ago. And her maiden name had indeed been Karen Eline Fredriksen, born November 24, 1917. She was still married to Krogh when she died on February 25, 2002. No matter how much he wanted to deny it, Bergmann had to accept that it was no coincidence that Krogh’s future wife was the person who had turned up from the Norwegian legation when Holt was found dead. He told himself to pay close attention. Was he in the process of building a house of cards based on flimsy suppositions he’d simply made up? He needed to find out whether Karen Krogh had ever said anything about Holt, anything that would give him reason to believe that things were not as they appeared regarding his death. And the daughter, Bente Bull-Krogh, must have been closest to her, at least among those who were still alive.

Bergmann took out Bente’s number, but again changed his mind about calling her. He decided instead to show up at her place unannounced in the morning. If he wasn’t mistaken, Bente was keeping something from him, so it would be better not to give her any warning. But the first thing he had to do was clear his mind. He couldn’t understand why Krogh would be involved in Holt’s death, only to make a lot of noise about it in the following years. Very few people would be coldhearted enough to put on such a performance. Bergmann got out a Post-It notepad and wrote himself a reminder to call the psychologist Rune Flatanger, who worked for Kripo’s profiling group.