The Man in the Window (30 page)

    His eyes scanned the area. Not a soul in sight anywhere. It was obvious - if anyone had wanted to hurt him, they could have finished him off a long time ago. He looked down at his mobile. Tried to memorize the ring tone that had carried in the night air. It had been some distance away, but how far? He slowly raised his thumb and held it over the key that rang the last dialled number. He pressed and stood listening. Soon the muffled tone rang out. Frølich started moving. He followed the sound. Increased the tempo, stopped, held his breath and listened. The sound was closer, but still there was no one around. He loped across the deserted roundabout. A disembodied voice broke the telephone connection and informed him in metallic tones that the person he was ringing was not available at the moment. He glanced down at the mobile and pressed the same key as before. The display showed the number he was ringing. There was the ring tone again. He spotted the line of parked cars. The sound was coming from one of them. The silhouettes of the buildings along the quayside were visible through the rear window of the nearest car. The phone had to be in there. He disconnected. The silence reminded him that he was alone and that what he was doing was wrong. He imagined American films in which cars exploded when an ignition key was turned. He repressed the fantasy and instead saw a stranger putting his phone down on the seat and getting out of the car to meet him. But where was this man now? For a brief instant he considered calling Gunnarstranda, but moved towards the car. He didn't feel the cold now; he was sweating.

    The car was a dark Mercedes with a cut-off ski rack on the roof.
A taxi,
thought Frølich.
Just a metal holder - a taxi with the licence plate removed.
He went to the left to walk in a large circle around the car, which no longer seemed anonymous or abandoned, but large and menacing. He stopped about five metres from the car. When he went alongside, he noticed the side window had been smashed. What he had at first assumed to be ice was the window itself, a white sheet of splintered glass. The front windscreen was also shattered. What he had thought to be bits of ice on the car bonnet were fragments of glass. He walked on a few metres and could see the bonnet clearly. There was something on top. It was too dark to make out the precise shape. He crouched down to see better. Then he realized what it was: a foot. Someone was sitting in the driver's seat. Someone had kicked out the front windscreen and their foot was still there. Frølich straightened up and rang the duty officer at Police HQ.

Chapter 38

A Man and a Woman

    Gunnarstranda asked the driver to pull in by the fence just before the roundabout. As soon as the taxi came to a halt, a uniformed police officer came over and stooped down. Gunnarstranda rolled down the window on his side. 'It's me,' he said to the officer, who nodded and withdrew.

    Gunnarstranda rolled the window up and turned to Tove. 'Once again, I'm very sorry,' he said.

    'Relax,' she said, stifling a yawn. 'It was me who insisted on getting up.' She forced a tired smile when the taxi driver involuntarily looked up into the mirror. 'I mean, I insisted on coming here with you,' she corrected herself and observed the scene on the other side of the roundabout where two police cars were sending blue lightning into the night sky. 'That looks exciting.'

    'It was exciting at any rate,' Gunnarstranda said without emotion, leaning forward between the two front seats and passing the driver a 500 kroner note. 'I get off here, but she's going home,' he said, turning to Tove who shook her head indulgently. 'You old-fashioned man, you.'

    'Thank you for a nice evening,' he said, meeting her eyes.

    She took his hand. 'Thank
you.'
'Well, I'll have to be off,' he said, turning round in the seat and looking out. Another car with a blue flashing light had arrived. 'Yes, it's getting busy here,' he said.

    She squeezed his hand again.

    'Yes, take care then,' he said.

    'You have to open the door first,' she said.

    'Mm, that's right,' he said and looked for the handle. At that moment the driver got out and opened the door from outside.

    Gunnarstranda got out, buttoned up his coat and stood watching the taxi drive away. As he turned, he noticed at least five men look away that instant, some with a smile on their lips.

    Frølich towered over the other four. 'Had I known you had company, I could have waited until morning,' Frølich said with concern.

    Gunnarstranda responded with a grunt.

    'But since it was Richard Ekholt who was killed, I thought you would want to see the crime scene.'

    Two other police officers moved aside as they approached the parked car with smashed windows. A covered body lay on a stretcher on the ground. 'Sure it's Ekholt?'

    'Ninety-nine-point-nine per cent.'

    'And he was strangled?'

    'Looks like it. Someone sitting on the back seat put a nylon rope around his neck and pulled. Ekholt went wild and kicked out the front windscreen and a side window before he died.'

    'The taxi licence plate?'

    Gunnarstranda peered through the smashed glass.

    'It was on the back seat.'

    'Could he have taken it off himself?'

    Frølich shrugged.

    'Purse and money gone,' Frølich said. 'But not the telephone. A mobile under the pedals. The killer may not have seen it.'

    'When did he ring you?'

    'Between twelve and one at night.'

    Gunnarstranda yawned.

    'He talked about his licence number,' Frølich said. 'He said a hundred and ninety five and was killing himself laughing.'

    'A hundred and ninety five?'

    'Yes.'

    'Not nineteen and five?'

    Frølich shook his head.

    'And when did you find his body?'

    'Five minutes before I rang you. At ten to two.'

    Gunnarstranda wandered around the car.

    'Almost had a shock,' Frølich said by way of conversation. 'When a lady answered your phone.'

    Gunnarstranda said nothing.

    'But that's just great. Seemed a nice lady…'

    'Did he appear to be on his own when he rang?' Gunnarstranda interrupted.

    'Ekholt? There was some noise. I thought he must have been in a pub.'

    'He wasn't talking to anyone?'

    'Possible. I had the impression he was holding his hand over the phone, on one occasion anyway.'

    Gunnarstranda nodded and yawned.

    'Was that your lady friend?' Frølich asked with caution. 'The one in the taxi?'

    Gunnarstranda stared up at him with vacant eyes. 'Could he have rung from here?'

    'From the car?' Frølich ruminated. 'I thought I heard several sounds, background noises, music maybe.'

    'But it wasn't a CD player you heard or the car radio?'

    'I have no idea,' Frølich said.

    'How long did it take you to get here?'

    'Forty minutes.' Frølich added as an apology: 'Eva- Britt was at my place. And she was not best pleased when she had to go back home.'

    'I see,' Gunnarstranda said, lost in thought.

    'I waited for about a quarter of an hour in the car without seeing anyone.' After some reflection, he said, 'And I found the body ten minutes later.'

    'If it was Ekholt you spoke to, he was killed between twelve-thirty and one-fifty-five?'

    'That sounds about right, yes.'

    'Tomorrow we have a briefing with Fristad, the public prosecutor,' Gunnarstranda interposed, taking a swift glance at his watch. 'At nine. In six hours' time.' He looked up at the sky. Then watched all the officers busy at the crime scene. 'I'm sure we're in the way here. You should go home and get yourself some shut-eye.'

Chapter 39

Orientation

    Gunnarstranda arrived home at five o'clock in the morning. He slept until half past eight, got up, dressed and began to scrape ice off the car windows at five to nine. The meeting with the public prosecutor, Fristad, was supposed to be in five minutes. He ran through the case in his mind. Fristad was an academic with a childish attitude regarding his own status and therefore always took advantage of the academics' privilege of arriving a quarter of an-hour late.

    Gunnarstranda lit a cigarette while the engine warmed up and the defroster cleared the front windscreen. He tried to go through all the points that had some connection with Ekholt, but realized he couldn't think clearly. Instead he switched on the car radio and heard there was chaos on all roads leading into Oslo because of a demonstration by taxi drivers. He took his mobile from his pocket, rang Fristad's office and warned them he would be late. Soon afterwards he switched off the engine, locked the car door and strolled down to Advokat Dehlis plass to catch the first convenient bus.

    Fristad was seated, as always, and stretched out a welcoming arm to a blue chair by the conference table. Police Inspector Gunnarstranda organized the pile of reports on the table in front of him, put on his rectangular mail-order glasses and began to hold forth in a low voice: 'The murdered man, Reidar Folke Jespersen, was placed in a chair in the shop window of his own antiques business. He was killed in an office behind the shop. His body was stripped naked and dragged across the shop floor and put in the window. The killer had tied red thread around the man's neck. The corpse was discovered by a passing newspaper girl, Helga Krisvik, on Saturday 14th January at six-thirty a.m. She is a housewife, works part-time and has been eliminated from further enquiries.'

    'Suffering from shock?' Fristad was chewing his glasses.

    'We assume so, yes,' Gunnarstranda continued dryly. 'As to the deceased's last movements, we have managed to ascertain the following: Jespersen got up at his usual time on Friday 13th January. He left home at the usual time - but without saying goodbye to his wife who was in the shower. A little later, that is, at approximately nine o'clock, he turned up at a café in Jakob Aalls gate where he drank coffee and mineral water, and read a number of magazines. The owner - Glenn Moseng - had seen him once before, but was unsure when. Folke Jespersen insisted on sitting at the only window table in the café, from which he had a view of the block of apartments where a certain Eyolf Strømsted, who is, or at least
was,
his wife's lover, lived. The owner is not sure when Folke Jespersen left the place, but we know he had been sitting there for a very long time - several hours. At a few minutes after twelve he appears at Arvid Folke Jespersen's flat where Emmanuel Folke Jespersen is also waiting - both of his brothers. A married couple, the Kirkenaers, are also there and they make a formal presentation of their offer to buy the shop owned by the three brothers.'

    Fristad rocked back on the chair behind the desk and drummed the tips of his fingers against each other. 'And what is happening in the shop while all this is going on?'

    'Well, Karsten Jespersen - the murdered man's son - opened the shop at ten. He wasn't on his own. It was a planning day at the kindergarten, so he had his son, Benjamin, with him in the shop. Later Ingrid Jespersen arrived with a pot of coffee and two cups. There were no customers. The two of them sat talking while the little boy played and did drawings until a quarter past eleven.'

    Fristad nodded with closed eyes. 'Has Karsten got the hots for the widow? I mean they're about the same age, aren't they?'

    'They get on well in each other's company; they have a few common interests.'

    'Are they bonking?'

    Gunnarstranda looked up.

    Fristad gave an apologetic smile. 'I read in one of your reports that the victim was impotent. Were the son and the widow bonking?'

    Gunnarstranda, poker-faced: 'I didn't ask.'

    'But do you think so?'

    Gunnarstranda: 'Perhaps we should concentrate on my account of events first?'

    Fristad nodded: 'Right…' he said with emphasis. 'Right.. widow leaves son to sleep with this guy with the crazy name, Streamstead…' 'Strømsted…'

    'Right. And the poor eighty-year-old cuckold sits waiting for the bitch to visit a real man to get her weekly fill..

    Gunnarstranda stared at Fristad as though he were waiting for a phase to pass.

    'Go on,' Fristad said gaily. 'Keep going.'

    'In the meantime Reidar Folke Jespersen joins his brothers…'

    'Yes, right…'

    Gunnarstranda looked up, silent.

    Fristad waved the policeman on.

    'We know that the Kirkensers give their assurance that the Folke Jespersens' life-work will be carried on, and make a concrete offer for the shop, the shop's name and the warehouse - I believe it's called goodwill…'

    'Yes, right, goodwill…'

    'But they don't negotiate at this juncture. The couple make a kind of assessment of the shop's worth and give an overview of their plans before leaving the brothers to their own discussions. That's when Reidar Folke Jespersen is supposed to have been unsympathetic and aggressive.'

    'Why the anger?'

    'I think there was a lot of history. The man should have retired ten to twelve years ago. He lords it over the others; he is the eldest brother. According to one brother, Emmanuel, Reidar perceived the initiative to sell the shop as a conspiracy against himself.'

    'Right… but this business with the wife and lover, could that be a factor?'

    'Well, of course it's possible,' Gunnarstranda conceded. 'According to the brothers and the couple, Reidar Folke Jespersen had been given prior information about the background for the meeting. Well, it's hard to know what exactly annoyed him about the negotiations. We do know however that after leaving the brothers he rang the wife's lover…'

    'Yes, I read that. Pretty strong stuff, eh? The scorned spouse ringing while the two of them are humping away…' Fristad guffawed through moist lips.

    'True. At any rate Folke Jespersen didn't argue or have a row with the wife's lover on the phone. He just asked to speak to his wife and gave her an ultimatum.'

    'No more fucking around, eh,' Fristad said in English.

    'Quite so. At 2.30 p.m. at the latest he rings a young freelance actress by the name of Gro Hege Wyller and brings forward a meeting with her. This change of plan is in itself worthy of note. They had been due to meet on 23rd January, but instead he asks her to come that day, Friday 13th January.'

    'Right - and this was to the tune of
The Way We Were?
'

    'Yes, Gro Hege Wyller dresses up and pretends to be a figure we have to assume is a woman from Folke Jespersen's past. Wyller acts out a play with him - a kind of ritual with improvisation, sherry and Schubert.'

    'No sex?' Fristad asked in English.

    'Never gave it a thought.'

    Fristad grinned. 'Are you a puritan, Gunnarstranda?'

    The police officer sighed. 'Ingrid Jespersen has confirmed that Reidar Folke Jespersen was not - as you yourself pointed out - sexually active. Froken Wyller maintains that Jespersen talked about this without any inhibitions. It is my impression that the old man was finished with these things.'

    'No jar of Viagra in grandad's medicine cabinet?' Fristad gave another moist guffaw.

    Detective Inspector Gunnarstranda took a deep breath.

    'Sorry,' Fristad said.

    'Now I've forgotten where I was,' said Gunnarstranda, irritated.

    'The photo,' Fristad hastened to say. 'Wyller's role model. Who's the woman in the photo?'

    'Her name's Amalie Bruun, but her relationship with Folke Jespersen is not entirely clear.'

    'But I suppose he must have been in love with her once upon a time?'

    'The relationship isn't clear.' Gunnarstranda, wearied, took off his glasses.

    'Right, yes, well, on to the taxi murder. I assume that is the next line of investigation, isn't it? Frank Frølich's somewhat dramatic nocturnal ramble through Bjørvika.'

    Gunnarstranda stared blankly at the papers on the table.

    'No,' he said. 'Let's take one thing at a time. Before Wyller comes to the dead man's office, Folke Jespersen rings his solicitor and asks her to revoke his will.'

    'Is that relevant?' asked a strained Fristad.

    'It's relevant to the extent that Jespersen is now focused on his own death for reasons yet to be clarified.'

    'But what effect does the revoking of the will have on the beneficiaries?'

    Gunnarstranda raised a hand to restrain the other man. 'Just a minute,' he said. 'Dr Grethe Lauritsen, who is the cancer specialist at Ullevål Hospital, says Folke Jespersen rang her that day. He was given the results of some tests and discovered that he had malignant cancer, which the pathologists confirmed, by the way.'

    'Do you think that was why he revoked the will?'

    'We don't know why. But we do know that very little time passed between his phone call to Ullevål Hospital and then to his solicitor.'

    'But what are the consequences of his revoking the will?'

    'There are hardly any consequences at all because he didn't make a new will. According to the solicitor - and I have read the voided will myself - the man's last wishes were simply a division of goods, who would get what
after
the inheritance had been split along financial lines. We know Karsten Jespersen was interested in a specific wardrobe, but I find it hard to believe he would kill his father for the wardrobe.'

    'Odd,' Fristad concluded. 'Bloody odd,' he repeated, gazing at the table.

    'There are two big mysteries concerning the man's last hours,' Gunnarstranda said. 'And they are the calls to Wyller and to the solicitor.'

    'But if he had found out he was going to die?'

    'Then he should have come up with a new will if he had gone to the trouble of cancelling the first. But he didn't.'

    Fristad brushed his jacket sleeve with his hand. 'Fine, go on.'

    Gunnarstranda breathed in. 'As will become evident, Gro Hege Wyller's statement is central. Richard Ekholt lives in the same block as Wyller…'

    'Lived,' corrected Fristad.

    'I know he's dead,' Gunnarstranda said in a low, menacing voice. 'Would you stop interrupting me?'

    Fristad opened his palms and said nothing.

    'Well, Ekholt was an acquaintance of Wyller's and apparently interested in her - but they didn't start a relationship. Ekholt drove Wyller to Ensj
ø
. Here he tried to force her to have sex with him in the car, but failed - according to her.'

    'Do you believe that?'

    'I can't see why she would make up the story. She ran off and found the key to the warehouse in a post box on the wall; this was a regular arrangement. She unlocked the door and got to Folke Jespersen's office at 5.15 p.m. She performed this… this assignment of hers… and rang for a taxi just over an hour later. It arrived at 6.42. We have a print-out of that. When they got into the car, Wyller noticed that Ekholt was still sitting in his car parked outside the building. He must have been waiting for her the whole time. But she left in Folke Jespersen's taxi. She says she consciously avoided Ekholt because of the brutal incident that had taken place before.'

    'Right…' Fristad waved Gunnarstranda on.

    'Ekholt followed the taxi taking them to town. Wyller says she noticed his taxi when she was dropped outside her bed-sit. She also says that Ekholt followed Folke Jespersen's taxi home.'

    Gunnarstranda stood up and went over to the Imsdal spring-Water dispenser next to the mirror. 'My mouth has gone dry,' he mumbled, releasing water into a plastic beaker.

    'And everyone agrees that Folke Jespersen went home in the taxi - and it stopped outside his house in Thomas Heftyes gate at 7.15?'

    Gunnarstranda drank another beaker of water and stared thoughtfully at the bottom. 'Everyone agrees.'

    'And this man from the woods was waiting for him - Jonny Stokmo?'

    'Yes.'

    'He's an old friend of ours, isn't he?'

    'Yes, he is. Two convictions: one for receiving stolen goods and one for selling contraband.'

    'What was the unsettled score about?

    Gunnarstranda sat down again. 'Frølich questioned Stokmo. But Stokmo was vague and evasive about the outstanding issues between him and the dead man. The only thing Stokmo would say was that money came into the picture. We do know that they talked before Folke Jespersen went upstairs to his flat.'

    'But you've spoken to the son?'