by Thomas Enger
10
The house-to-house inquiries among the neighbours on the north side of the street didn’t yield much. Most of them were not at home, but an elderly lady who lived two houses away was sure she had seen a man in a black car visit Nordstrøm on a number of occasions. Her grandchild, who ran a car showroom, drove the same kind of vehicle – a Volkswagen Tiguan. This was the only thing Blix had on his notepad when he returned to the house to meet Ann-Mari Sara.
The crime-scene technician reversed the large delivery van in through the gate and up towards the entrance. While her team kitted themselves out, he related what he and Kovic had observed during their superficial examination of the house.
‘To me, it looks like an abduction,’ he concluded.
Sara answered with a nod before she too donned one of the team’s white, all-encompassing protective suits. She was known for being taciturn, but also thorough, systematic and focused. Blix enjoyed working with her.
His phone rang. It was a number he had stored as ‘Journalist’. As Blix dismissed the call, Kovic arrived back from her own tour of the neighbourhood.
‘We may have something,’ she said with a nod in the direction of the nearest house. ‘There was a car outside Nordstrøm’s house late last night.’
‘What kind of car?’
‘The neighbour I spoke to only heard it – it was after he’d gone to bed. It arrived, the engine ran for a couple of minutes, and then it drove off.’
Blix’s phone rang again. ‘Journalist’. He switched off the ringer and left his phone to vibrate in his pocket.
‘What time?’ he asked.
‘He was watching TV before he went to bed, and says it must have been just after the evening news on NRK.’
‘What does that tell us?’
‘I checked. The news ended at half past ten last night.’
Blix pivoted around, looked towards the gate and saw that two inquisitive onlookers had turned up.
‘Are there any toll booths in the vicinity?’
‘I’ll check that out,’ Kovic said, making a note. ‘Is there anything else for us here?’
‘One thing,’ Blix said.
He ascended the steps and called out to Ann-Mari Sara. She walked towards him, pulling down her mask.
‘There’s a copy of her book lying in the kitchen,’ he said. ‘I need it.’
Sara fixed her eyes on him. ‘You want me to remove it from the crime scene?’
‘I don’t think anyone has smacked her on the head with it,’ Blix answered.
Sara considered this for a second or two. ‘Let me take some photos first,’ she said, as she disappeared into the house again.
The phone in his jacket pocket vibrated again. Blix took it out and saw that he had received a number of messages as well. One of them was from ‘TV-Eckhoff’, wondering whether Blix had made up his mind about that evening’s broadcast. He had. He would be there, but Sonja Nordstrøm might make it difficult.
He was about to send Eckhoff a reply when Ann-Mari Sara reappeared with Nordstrøm’s book in an evidence bag.
‘You could have driven by a bookshop and bought one on your way back,’ she said, handing him the bag.
‘Well, now we’ve saved the force a few kroner,’ Blix said with a smile as he took it from her.
The phone was relentless. ‘Gard Fosse’ this time. With a sigh, Blix slid his thumb towards the right.
‘I hear you’ve initiated a full investigation,’ his boss said.
‘That’s a privilege I still have in this job,’ Blix replied sourly. For once there was no response.
‘Sara has just arrived,’ Blix informed him, glancing again at the gate where he now recognised the face of a journalist from Dagsavisen. ‘Can you send a patrol car here too, to help us keep the rubberneckers away?’
A few seconds elapsed before Fosse answered: ‘I’ll see if we have anyone available,’ he said, before coming up with what Blix knew was the real reason for his call. ‘As far as the press is concerned, I’ll take care of all that.’
Blix smiled. ‘Of course,’ he said, surprised that for once he had managed to keep the irony out of his voice. ‘Was there anything else?’
The phone vibrated again.
‘Keep me up to speed,’ Fosse said, before ending the call.
Blix was left standing with the phone in his hand, flipping through the last few messages. One of them came from a number he hadn’t saved:
Any news about Sonja Nordstrøm? Emma Ramm, news.no
Blix was about to ignore this too, but changed his mind and instead tapped in a speedy reply: Not yet.
‘Here,’ he said, handing the evidence bag with the book to Kovic. ‘You can read it, see if it contains anything of interest to us.’
They headed back to the car and as he clambered inside, another message ticked in from the same number:
Forgot to tell you that her TV was left on. I switched it off. Didn’t touch anything else.
Blix did not answer. But he saved her number. Under ‘Emma’.
11
Blix laid aside his plate, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and logged into the web pages of Worthy Winner, clicking through the various live cameras as he picked a crumb of food from between his teeth with his thumbnail. The slow connection meant it took some time for each video to open.
He found Iselin on a camera out in the garden. She was sitting on a bench with a blanket wrapped around her, staring into space. For a moment Blix thought the image had frozen, but then she raised her hand and rubbed her eyes.
Kovic flopped into her chair beside him.
‘There’s one toll station on Kongsveien and another on Sandstuveien,’ she said.
Blix closed the video feed.
‘I’ve asked for a list of all the vehicles that passed through yesterday evening and during the night,’ Kovic went on. ‘They don’t have photos of the cars, but I’m trying to do a survey of petrol stations and other CCTV footage in the area.’
Blix nodded. Kovic was a self-starter. She was not going to require much supervision, other than the purely practical – where they kept the office supplies and who you had to speak to if the coffee ran out. He wasn’t often so fortunate.
‘Look for a black Volkswagen Tiguan,’ he said. ‘She’s had a visit from someone in that kind of car.’
Gard Fosse appeared at the other end of the room and pointed at them. ‘We’ll have a run-through in my office,’ he called across.
Blix took a deep breath and rose to his feet, followed by Kovic.
Nicolai Wibe was already seated at the conference table in Fosse’s office. He was a well-built man whose background was in undercover surveillance. A couple of years younger than Blix, he had a dishevelled appearance and down-to-earth demeanour. Police lawyer Pia Nøkleby, responsible for the legal aspects of the case, was also at the table.
‘Abelvik will be here shortly,’ Fosse explained, taking a seat behind the wide desk. ‘What do we know?’
Blix took what had become his regular place – at the far end, nearest the door – and glanced up at his boss.
Blix relished his role as investigator. He was capable, and had no ambitions to climb further up the career ladder. Ranks and stripes had never been important to him. Nevertheless it stung him every time he was reminded that Gard Fosse had advanced further than he had.
‘We know that Sonja Nordstrøm did not turn up as arranged at TV 2 earlier today,’ Blix began. ‘A taxi was booked to pick her up at 7.20 a.m., but left after waiting in vain for fifteen minutes.’
He looked at Kovic, who understood and took up the thread.
‘The last person we know of, so far, who was in contact with her, was her publisher, who exchanged a few text messages with her last night: they were discussing their plans for today.’
She glanced down at her notes. ‘Amund Zimmer is his name. He’s coming in later to give a formal statement.’
The police lawyer jotted something down o
n a sheet of paper.
‘Nordstrøm should have been on the radio too,’ Blix continued, ‘and at a press conference at the publishing house. I’ve tried to get hold of Stian Josefson, the journalist who co-wrote the book with her, but he’s not answering his phone.’
Nøkleby nodded.
Wibe shoved a fresh portion of snuff under his upper lip.
‘We’re not getting any signal from her phone,’ he said. ‘So we can’t trace her position.’
‘Where was it last?’ Nøkleby asked.
Wibe shrugged. ‘I’ve set the wheels in motion to obtain historical telecoms data, but we probably won’t have it until tomorrow.’
‘I can take over that bit,’ Kovic offered. ‘I’ve done a lot of work on electronic traces.’
Wibe glanced at Blix, who nodded.
‘Go ahead, then,’ Wibe told Kovic. ‘I’m happy to be shot of it.’
Tine Abelvik appeared at the door. She and Blix had worked together for eight years. An experienced detective, she still allowed herself to become emotionally involved in particular cases. Somehow, Blix thought, that made her better at her job.
‘Sorry,’ she said, sitting down. ‘I got hold of the daughter, Liselotte. She lives in London. She doesn’t seem to have much to do with her mother. They spoke on the phone last week, but nothing was said that could help us at all.’
Abelvik leafed through her notebook.
‘Then I talked to the ex-husband. He’s not been in contact with Nordstrøm for ages. But he suggested that we check her summer cottage on Hvaler. She was in the habit of going there from time to time. I’ve asked the local police out there to check it.’
‘Good,’ Fosse said, with a nod.
‘What else do we have?’ Nøkleby asked.
Kovic gave an account of the door-to-door inquiries, mentioning the car that had seemingly left Nordstrøm’s driveway at half past ten the previous night, but she was interrupted by the phone on Fosse’s desk.
‘I’ve asked Ann-Mari Sara to phone in,’ he explained, putting the phone on loudspeaker.
‘What do you have for us?’ he asked.
‘I don’t think she left the house of her own free will,’ Sara answered in her northern accent. ‘There are signs of a struggle in the outer hallway, and her toothbrush hasn’t been packed either. Her toiletry bag is in a cabinet in the bathroom. Her passport is lying in a drawer in the kitchen, and her handbag is in the living room; her purse and car keys are still in it.’
Blix’s phone vibrated on the table in front of him. A call from ‘Emma’. He snatched it up and stuffed it into his pocket to muffle its noise.
‘Have you found Nordstrøm’s mobile phone?’ he asked.
‘It’s not here,’ Sara said. ‘And there’s a rug missing.’
Fosse leaned towards the phone. ‘A rug?’
‘We can see that there was a rug on the floor in the hallway,’ Sara informed him. ‘Large enough to carry someone away in.’
‘To move a body?’ Wibe suggested.
‘Yes, but we haven’t found traces of physical violence. There’s no blood here.’
‘Could it have been on the rug?’
‘Yes, I guess so, but from experience, lethal violence would have produced traceable spatter.’
‘Anything else?’ Fosse demanded.
‘A man’s been here,’ Sara replied. ‘There’s semen on the bed sheets.’
‘Recent?’
‘Impossible to say. It could be from several men, for that matter. We won’t know until it’s analysed, but there could be a link with the wine glasses.’
‘Explain.’
‘There are two wine glasses and an empty bottle in the kitchen. She had a visitor.’
‘Fingerprints?’
‘Secured from both, but I won’t have an answer for you on that today.’
‘OK, then,’ Fosse said, lifting his hand to the phone. ‘We’ll let you go on with your work.’
‘One more thing,’ Ann-Mari Sara said. ‘Something I don’t like.’
Fosse sat, his hand hovering over the phone, and raised his eyes to Blix. Neither of them was used to Sara expressing personal views.
‘There’s a starting number taped to the TV set.’
‘A starting number?’ Kovic queried.
Blix frowned. He hadn’t noticed it either. Their rapid examination of the house had focused on searching for signs of life – or the opposite.
‘It’s from when Nordstrøm was running the Stockholm Marathon,’ Sara went on. ‘Her starting number was one.’
Silence filled the room for a second or two.
‘How do you interpret that?’ Blix asked.
‘It’s not easy to say,’ Sara ventured. ‘But it’s a bizarre thing to do. It seems to me like someone was leaving a marker.’
‘A message, is that what you’re thinking?’ Wibe probed. ‘To us?’
‘I don’t know,’ Sara answered. ‘But a starting number indicates that something is about to start, doesn’t it? Or it could mean the alternative – that something is over and done with, that you’ve reached your goal.’
No one said anything for a while.
‘In any case,’ Sara said, ‘it’s wrong of me to speculate. But now at least you know about it.’
Blix racked his brains to think what it might mean. A starting number, added to the possibility that something had happened to such a high-profile personality as Sonja Nordstrøm, made him sit bolt upright, impatient to get cracking. It had been a long time since he had felt such enthusiasm. He had missed the feeling.
12
The Nordstrøm case was the leading item on the news channel’s four o’clock bulletin. A journalist stood outside the house reporting live.
Emma tucked her feet under herself as she curled up on the sofa, annoyed that she had neglected to take photos either outside or inside while she was up there. The thought quite simply hadn’t entered her head. Maybe because there hadn’t been any famous people to snap, as she was used to. Anita might even have dared to publish images of the interior of the house, at least if the police confirmed that no crime had actually taken place there. But so far they were being unforthcoming, according to the TV reporter.
The phone rang. It was him. The policeman.
‘It’s Emma,’ she said, a touch too eagerly.
‘Alexander Blix. You messaged me?’
‘Yes, thanks for phoning back. We met at Sonja Nordstrøm’s earlier today.’
‘Yes, I remember.’
‘I just wondered if there had been any developments in the case?’
‘Nothing conclusive.’
Emma picked up a pen and flipped off the top with her front teeth. ‘How are you organising the investigation?’ she asked.
‘You have to speak to Police Superintendent Gard Fosse. He’s the one dealing with the press.’
‘But you returned my call,’ Emma protested.
‘I thought you might have something more to tell me,’ Blix mumbled, clearing his throat. ‘Something that you’d remembered?’
‘Oh, I see,’ she said, slightly disappointed. She needed something she could use for her story. ‘What do you get out of the starting number?’ she asked. ‘Is it some sort of message?’
‘It’s too early to have a clear idea about anything,’ Blix answered.
‘I expect you’ve had time to form a more exhaustive impression of what happened than me. I only popped my head round the door.’
He did not respond to that. Instead he asked:
‘Did you touch anything while you were inside the house?’
‘No,’ she replied. ‘Nothing except the TV remote control.’
‘Right,’ he said.
There was a short silence.
‘I see you’ve interviewed Stian Josefson,’ he said, clearing his voice again. ‘Do you happen to know where he is?’
Emma was astounded that Blix had actually read her article.
‘No,’ she replied. ‘I
didn’t interview him face-to-face.’
‘You wrote that he had spoken to Nordstrøm yesterday.’
Emma moved the phone to her other ear. The seriousness in the policeman’s tone made her wary.
‘Yes?’ she answered.
‘You don’t mention whether that was by phone or at her home. Did he say?’
Emma thought through the conversation, feeling foolish. That was a question she should have asked Josefson. ‘No,’ she replied, embarrassed. ‘He broke off the conversation before we were finished,’ she added. ‘Is he a suspect?’
‘We’re charting Nordstrøm’s movements in the past twenty-four hours,’ the investigator continued.
‘Can I quote you on that?’ she asked.
‘You need to speak to Gard Fosse about that sort of thing,’ Blix told her.
‘Fine,’ she said.
‘I can give you his direct number,’ the investigator added. Emma thanked him; that would make things easier. ‘You don’t have to tell him you got it from me,’ Blix went on.
‘Is there anything in particular I should ask him about?’ she queried, in the hope that the policeman would give her something more.
Emma sensed some hesitation before he said:
‘You can ask him if Sonja Nordstrøm might have been kidnapped.’
13
Blix left police headquarters at 7.25 p.m., four hours after things had started to come to the boil in the department. Gard Fosse was standing in front of the main entrance, basking in the glow of a camera lamp. His grave expression hid what Blix knew was enjoyment.
The news that Sonja Nordstrøm may have been kidnapped had been given huge publicity within a short space of time. Nordstrøm had been world champion thirteen times in various middle and long distances. The international news agencies had started to phone in around five o’clock. Pia Nøkleby had been forced to send out a press release, but it hadn’t been enough to keep the sports and crime journalists at bay.
The afternoon and evening had passed, and the detectives were no further forward. They had talked to people close to Nordstrøm and those she discussed in her book, but that hadn’t produced any leads. The only one they hadn’t tracked down was Stian Josefson, the man who had penned Nordstrøm’s story.
