by Karin Fossum
‘Not at all. I’m not interested. But she’s blonde with big tits.’
‘Be careful, she might get up to something.’
‘Dad!’ Eva turned and groaned. ‘Don’t add to the worries I’ve already got!’
He stared ruefully at the floor. ‘Sorry. I’m only trying to find out what’s up with you.’
‘Thanks, but I’m in complete control, I really am. Sit down. You ought to keep your legs raised, you’re being careless. Are you using the electric blanket I gave you?’
‘I forget to plug it in. I’m an old man, I can’t remember every little thing. Anyway, I’m always frightened it’s going to short-circuit.’
‘We’ll have to organise a time switch or something.’
‘Have you come into money?’
It went deathly quiet. The first drops of boiling water dripped into the filter and the smell of coffee spread through the kitchen.
‘No,’ she said quietly. ‘But I’m not letting lack of money take all the pleasure out of my life any more.’
‘Ah, you’ve got yourself a printing press! I thought as much.’ He sat down contented. ‘I’d like a Tia Maria as well.’
‘I know.’
‘So you remembered? That today’s the fourth of October?’
‘Yes. I wouldn’t forget this date, I won’t ever forget it. You’ll have a Tia Maria for Mum just as she asked you to.’
‘You don’t need to make it too small, either.’
‘I never do, I know you.’
He got his liqueur, they had their coffee and sat looking out of the window. It wasn’t hard for the two of them to sit in silence, they’d done it so often. Now they gazed at his neighbour’s barn, at the maple tree, which was blood-red and yellow, and they noticed that the bark was loosening from one side of its trunk.
‘He’ll be taking that tree down soon,’ her father said softly. ‘Look. Hardly any branches left on one side.’
‘But it’s beautiful for all that. It’ll be very bare without that tree.’
‘It’s diseased, you know. The tree will die anyway.’
‘Should we cut down big trees just because they’re not perfect any more?’
‘No. But because they’re ill. He’s already planted a replacement, on the left there.’
‘That tiny sprig?’
‘That’s how they begin. They get bigger gradually, but it takes forty to fifty years.’
Eva slurped her coffee and glanced clandestinely at the time. He’d certainly be at home by now, he’d have read her note, perhaps he was talking to his wife about whether they ought to think about selling. No he wasn’t, he’d decide without asking her. But maybe he was phoning a mate for advice about what he could ask for a well-maintained Manta. She hoped he wouldn’t ask her to make an offer. She hadn’t a clue. She could say that she’d need to make some enquiries herself. Perhaps he was washing it at this very moment, and going over it with the vacuum cleaner. Or perhaps he’d read the note, snorted with contempt and thrown it away; possibly the wind had torn it from under the windscreen wiper and he’d never even read it at all. Maybe he was just sitting watching television, a beer at his side and his feet on the table, while his wife minced around telling the boy to be quiet, at least while Dad was watching the news. Or perhaps he’d gone into town with the lads for a bowling session. She thought about all of this and went on sipping her coffee, there were thousands of possible reasons why he might not phone. But there was also a reason why he might: money. She’d find out if he was as greedy as her, and she believed he was. It would be an opportunity to rid himself of something that could link him to the murder as well. Her cup was just on its way to her lips and her gaze was fixed on the dying tree outside, when suddenly the phone rang. Coffee sloshed down her chin as she jumped up.
‘What’s the matter?’ Her father stared at her in astonishment.
‘Your phone’s ringing, I’ll get it.’
She ran to his workroom. She closed the door carefully behind her and had to calm herself down a little before lifting the receiver with a trembling hand. It might not be him. Perhaps it was the home help saying she was ill. Or perhaps it was Emma, or someone with the wrong number.
‘Liland,’ she said quietly.
There was a moment’s silence. His voice sounded uncertain, as if he was scared of being made to look foolish. Or perhaps he sensed danger.
‘Yes, it’s about an Opel Manta. I want to speak to Liland.’
‘Speaking.’ For an instant she was totally overwhelmed by the sound of his voice. ‘So you’re interested?’
‘It’s more you that’s interested. But I thought it was a man.’
‘Does it make any difference?’
‘No, course not. So long as you know what we’re talking about.’
‘Oh, God!’ She gave a small laugh. ‘Why, we’re talking about money, aren’t we? Most things are for sale, if the price is good enough.’ She’d adopted a hearty tone. It was easy.
‘Yeah, yeah, but the price’ll have to be really good.’
‘It will be, provided the car’s as good as it looks.’ Her heart was thumping wildly under her sweater. He sounded sulky; she realised that she couldn’t stand him.
‘The car’s tip-top. Just a tiny oil leak.’
‘OK, that can be fixed. Can I have a look at it?’
‘Course. You can see her tonight if you want. I’ve been over her with the vac and tidied inside. But you must give her a test drive.’
‘I wasn’t exactly going to buy without giving it a test.’
‘It’s not definite I’m going to sell.’
Both were silent, and she listened to the hostility that quivered on the line between them without quite knowing where it came from. As if they’d both hated each other for a long time.
‘It’s ten past seven now. I’ve got a couple of things to take care of first, but could you be in town for half past nine, for example? D’you live in town?’
‘Yes,’ she said curtly.
‘What about – at the bus station?’
‘Fine by me. At half past nine. I’ll see you when you arrive, I’ll be by the kiosk.’
He hung up, she stood for a time listening to the dialling tone. Her father was shouting from the kitchen. She stared at the handset and marvelled at how unaffected he was. As if nothing had happened. That was it. For him it really was over. He’d put it behind him. Now he was interested in money. But she had been, too. She shuddered and went out again, slid behind the kitchen table. Things were happening almost too fast now, she must gather her wits, but her heart was thumping away and she knew she had more colour in her cheeks than usual.
‘Well?’ said her father expectantly. ‘Don’t they want to speak to me?’
‘He had the wrong number.’
‘Oh? That took a long time to find out.’
‘No, he was just talkative. A pleasant sort. Asked if I wanted to buy his car.’
‘Nah. You’d better leave that to others. When you want a new car, you ask Jostein for help.’
‘I’ll remember that.’
She filled her cup and stared out at the maple again. The tear in the bark really was ugly. It resembled nothing so much as a large, suppurating wound.
Chapter 30
SHE WAITED IN the dark. There wasn’t a breeze any more, the wind came in capricious squalls over the roof of the bus station, and her ponytail slapped about her ears, which were freezing now, because her hair wasn’t hanging over them and warming them as it usually did. Her thoughts wandered, here and there, back to the time when they’d been girls. Suddenly she saw her so clearly in her mind’s eye, an image from a summer, perhaps they’d been eleven at the time. Maja was wearing that American bathing costume she’d been so proud of. Her uncle had bought it for her, the uncle who was on a whaler and always came home bearing exciting gifts. Sometimes a little of his bounty even showered down on Eva as well. Boxes of chocolates and American chewing gum. The bathing costume was bright
red and amusingly crinkly. It had elastic criss-crossing it and this made the material crinkle into tiny bubbles. No one else had a swimming costume like it. When Maja came out of the sea, the bubbles were full of water and even bigger, and made her look like a huge raspberry. This was the image she gazed at now, Maja coming out of the water, the water running off and splashing round her feet, her hair even darker because it was wet, wearing the best swimming costume on the entire beach. Again and again Maja comes up from the water. She grins and displays her white teeth, for she knows nothing about the future and how it will all end.
The money was now safely stashed in her father’s cellar. She’d practically slung the tin in a corner, where it looked almost as valueless as it had done in the workroom at the cabin. Her father never went down there, he couldn’t manage the difficult cellar stairs. Nobody else went there either, unless his home help went down for something, but she didn’t think so. Home helps didn’t do either attics or cellars, it said so in their terms and conditions.
The bus station was the ugliest building Eva knew, a long grey concrete box with empty windows. She’d parked round the back, down by the railway lines, now she leant against the kiosk and looked up at the bridge from where she knew he’d come. He would turn right, disappear behind the bank for a moment and then glide up to the front of the kiosk. He wouldn’t come out and introduce himself, he wasn’t that sort, just remain sitting in the car, push his nose under the windscreen and peer up at her, maybe give a quick nod, a sort of signal that she could come. She’d have to sit next to him with only the gear stick between them. You sat quite close together in a car, she thought, so close that she’d catch his smell, and his voice would be directly in her left ear. That terse, unfriendly voice. She cleared her throat nervously as she formulated her opening line. Maybe one to make the blood freeze in his veins? She rejected the idea and stared at the cars passing regularly with a brief swish over the bridge above. They couldn’t wait to get out of the windswept town. Everyone had an objective, no one strolled about at random, not on an evening like this.
The buses rumbled good-naturedly over by their stops, and people dived into their brightness and warmth. There was something nice about the red buses. The trusty driver bent over his steering wheel, giving a lazy nod each time a few coins jingled into his hand, and the faces behind the windows, autumn-pale with eyes that stared, unseeing. On a bus you were in no-man’s-land, left to your own thoughts, all you did was sit and vibrate in the warmth. All at once she felt the urge to sit at one of those windows, take the bus round the town and see how everyone found their own secure bolt-holes. Instead she stood here getting cold, rubbing herself with icy hands in the gloves that were far too thin, waiting for a murderer. When he suddenly turned the corner, Eva let out all the air she had in her lungs. From then on they filled and emptied in a special rhythm, one that nothing could influence, it was like being inside an iron lung. It was vital to keep concentrating, she mustn’t let it slip, mustn’t say too much, just feel her way cautiously. He was slowing down, she saw him put the car in neutral and lean against the window. His expression was doltish and vaguely sceptical. She opened the door and sat down. He was grasping the gear stick, as if this was a toy he wasn’t going to share with anyone, as if sending out a warning. Then he nodded quickly.
She did up her seat belt. ‘Drive round for a bit, then I’ll have a go afterwards.’
He made no reply, but put the car in gear and drove away across the marked bus lanes. She knew he was waiting for something, as if she should speak first, because she was the one who’d taken the initiative, who wanted a new car.
I’m no bloody coward, Eva thought.
‘So you’re not frightened of picking up strangers on the road?’ she said sweetly.
It was 9.40 on 4 October and Eva’s record was as clean as new-fallen snow.
His left hand rested languidly on the steering wheel, and he never let go of the gear change, that stubby, sporty gear stick, with his right. She sat staring at them. Short, square hands with thick fingers. They were smooth, hairless, the one on the steering wheel was relaxed, the one grasping the gear stick was a pale claw. They were like something she’d seen in Emma’s books, blind, colourless submarine creatures. His thighs were short and fat, and threatened to burst the seams of his jeans, his stomach protruded from his skimpy, ribbed leather jacket. He could have been five months pregnant.
‘So now you want to get yourself a Manta?’ he said jiggling backwards and forwards in his seat.
‘I’m a little sentimental,’ she said tersely. ‘I had one once, but had to sell it. I never got over it.’
I’m sitting right next to him, she thought with astonishment, and I’m talking as if nothing’s happened.
‘So what do you drive now?’
‘An old Ascona,’ she said and smiled. ‘It’s not quite the same.’
‘Too right.’
They were halfway across the bridge now, he indicated left as they came to the main street.
‘Drive out towards Fossen,’ she said, ‘there’s a bit of flat country there where we can speed up a bit.’
‘Oh yes? You want some speed?’
He chuckled and rocked backwards and forwards again; it was a juvenile habit which made him seem unintelligent, primitive, exactly the way she remembered him. She felt old next to him, but presumably they were the same age, possibly he was a couple of years younger. His pot belly didn’t budge when he moved, it appeared to be as hard as stone. His pale face flared up with each street light. A wan face without character, almost expressionless.
‘I’ll drive out to the aerodrome, and you can drive back. Far enough, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, sure.’
He flexed his right hand to get some air across his sweaty palm and drove even faster. The porky figure in his tight-fitting clothes was reminiscent of a well-filled sausage. He was certainly much stronger than she was, in any case he’d been stronger than Maja. But he’d been sitting on top. She tried to imagine how it would have been if Maja had been quicker and had stabbed him instead, then the two of them would have had a corpse on their hands. It could easily have happened like that, it was strange. Life was so fortuitous.
‘This is the GSi model, in case you’re wondering.’
‘D’you think I’m a complete beginner?’
‘No, no, I was just mentioning it,’ he mumbled. ‘There’s nothing wrong with the engine, let me tell you. Nought to a hundred in ten seconds. She can get close to two hundred, if you’re up for it. But women have a funny way of driving,’ he said jiggling, ‘they let the car decide. Just sort of sit there and get taken along for the ride.’
‘That’s fast enough for me. The seats are good,’ she added.
‘Recaro seats.’
‘Is the sunroof electric?’
‘No, manual. Much better, the electric ones pack up quicker. Cost an arm and a leg to repair. The boot is 490 litres, and has a light. If you’re fannying about with a kid’s buggy, and that.’
‘Well, thank you! Does it drink petrol?’
‘No, no, this here’s just average. It does nought point six. A litre maybe in cities. You’ve got to reckon on that.’
‘I’ve looked at it several times,’ she let drop.
‘Oh? What for?’ Now he sounded suspicious.
‘I had to get some money together first.’
‘Have you got enough, that’s the question.’
‘I have.’
‘You haven’t asked the price.’
‘I haven’t thought about that yet. I’ll make you an offer you won’t be able to refuse.’
‘Wow, you talk like a Mafia boss.’
‘Yup.’
‘I don’t really want to sell it.’
‘No, but you’re greedy like everyone else, so that’ll be all right.’ She wriggled a bit. She could feel the knife, it was pressing into her thigh. I’m no bloody coward, she thought.
‘And this offer of yours,’ he said cl
earing his throat, ‘how big is it?’
‘Wouldn’t you like to know. I’ll drive it first, check under the bonnet and the body, and in daylight too. And I’ll need an AA test, of course.’
‘D’you want a Manta or don’t you?’
‘I thought you said you weren’t going to sell.’
There was silence in the car, which had become hot and humid, the windows were misting up. He turned on the fan to clear them. Eva turned one last time and stared back at the town. The occasional welder’s flame could be seen from the new railway bridge that was under construction. The traffic became sparser and they were approaching the point where the street lighting ended. He went left at the roundabout and continued along the south side of the river. It was less of a torrent up here, but the current was powerful enough. After a few minutes’ silence he suddenly turned to the right. The aerodrome was on their left, while he rolled down a bumpy track and through a small clump of trees, halting on an open piece of ground right down by the river’s edge. Eva felt uncomfortable. There were no people nearby. The engine was still running, it purred softly and dependably, there was no doubting the car was in good condition.
‘Ace fishing spot,’ he said pulling on the handbrake.
‘Ninety-two thousand,’ she put in quickly, ‘is that right? You haven’t wound the clock back?’
‘Christ, is there no limit to your bloody suspicions!’
‘I just think it seems very low. This is a typical bloke’s car, and blokes tend to drive a lot. My Ascona is an ’82 model and it’s done a hundred and sixty.’
‘Well, it’s about time you had a new car, then. Want to take a look at the works?’
‘It’s pitch black outside.’
‘I’ve got a torch.’ He turned off the engine and climbed out of the car.
Eva gathered herself for a moment and opened the door, a terrific gust of wind almost tore it out of her hand. ‘Bloody weather!’
‘It’s called autumn.’ He raised the bonnet and secured it. ‘I admit that the engine’s been cleaned today. You wouldn’t have been able to see anything otherwise.’
Eva moved to his side and stared down at the shiny engine. ‘God, just like the family silver.’
