The Blind Goddess

by Anne Holt

  The chief inspector’s duty was the worst of the lot. But everyone wanted it. The job was usually boring, and intolerably tiring. Sleep was forbidden; a rule most of them broke with a foul, unwashed woollen blanket pulled up over their uniforms. But night duty was well paid. Every legally qualified officer with one year’s service got roughly one duty a month, which put an extra fifty thousand kroner a year in their pay-packets. It was worth it. The big drawback was that the shift began at three o’clock in the afternoon after a full working day, and as soon as it was over at eight the next morning you had to start on a normal working day again. At weekends the duties were divided up into twenty-four-hour shifts, which made them even more lucrative.

  Sand’s predecessor was impatient. Even though the shift, according to the rules, should change at nine, there was an unspoken agreement that the Sunday duty officer could come in an hour later. The person being relieved would always be drumming their heels. As indeed was the blonde female inspector today.

  “Everything you need to know is in the log,” she said. “There’s a copy of the murder case from Friday night on the desk. There’s always a lot to do on this duty. I’ve completed fourteen reports already, and two Clause Eleven decisions.”

  The devil she had. With the best will in the world Håkon Sand couldn’t see that he was any more competent to make decisions about care proceedings than the child care authorities’ own staff. Yet the police always had to sort things out when a juvenile caused bureaucratic inconvenience by needing help outside normal office hours. Two on Saturday, which meant statistically none on Sunday. He could but hope.

  “And it’s full out the back; you’d better make your round as soon as you can,” she added.

  He took the keys, fumbling as he attached them to his belt. The cashbox contained what it should. The number of passport forms was also correct. The log was up to date.

  Formalities completed, he decided to go and collect some fines straight away, now that Sunday morning had laid its cold but calming hand on last night’s revellers. Before going, he flipped through the papers on the desk. He’d heard about the murder on the radio news bulletin. A badly mutilated body had been discovered down by the River Aker. The police had no leads. Empty words, he’d thought. The police always have some leads, it’s just that they’re all too often very scanty.

  The photo file from the scene-of-crime people hadn’t been added yet, of course. But there were a few Polaroids lying loose in the green folder. They were grotesque enough. Håkon never got used to photographs of the dead. He’d seen plenty of them in his five years in the force, the last three attached to Homicide, A.2.11. All suspicious deaths were reported to the police, and entered on the computer under the code “susp.” Suspicious death was a broad concept. He’d seen bodies that were burnt, deaths from exhaust fumes, stab wounds, bullets, drowning, or torture. Even the tragic elderly folk who were only victims of the crime of neglect, found when a neighbour in the flat below noticed an unpleasant odour in the dining room, looked up and saw a damp patch on the ceiling, and rang the police in indignation at the damage—even those poor devils were input as “susp” and had the dubious honour of having their final photographs taken postmortem. Håkon had seen green corpses, blue corpses, red, yellow, and multicoloured corpses, and the pretty pink carbon monoxide bodies whose souls had been able to endure no more of this world’s vale of tears.

  The Polaroids were stronger stuff than most of what he’d seen before, though. He threw them down abruptly. As if to forget them as soon as he could, he grabbed the report of the findings. He carried it over to the uncomfortable “Stressless” posture chair, a cheap imitation-leather version of the flagship model from Ekornes, much too curved in the back, lacking support where the lumbar region needed it most.

  The bare facts had been typed up in a style that could hardly have been more unhelpful. Håkon furrowed his brow in annoyance. They said the admission criteria for the Police Training College were getting steadily higher. Ability in written presentation was obviously not one of them.

  He came to a halt near the end of the page.

  “Present at the scene of the crime was witness Karen Borg. She found the deceased while walking her dog. There was vomit on the body. Witness Borg said it was hers.”

  Borg’s address and occupation confirmed that it was Karen. He ran his fingers through his hair, regretting not having washed it that morning. He decided to phone Karen during the week. With pictures as gruesome as that, the body must have been an awful sight. He absolutely must ring her.

  He replaced the file on the desk and closed it. His eyes dwelt for a moment on the name label at the top left: Sand/Kaldbakken/Wilhelmsen. The case was his, as prosecuting attorney. Kaldbakken was the chief inspector responsible, and Hanne Wilhelmsen the investigating detective.

  It was time to sort out the fines.

  There was a thick bundle of arrest sheets in the little wooden box. A full house. He skimmed quickly through the forms. Mainly drunks. One wife abuser, one obvious mental case who would have to be transferred to Ullevål Hospital later in the day, and a known and wanted criminal. The last three could stay where they were. He would take the drunks in turn. The point of fining them was admittedly rather unclear to him. The majority of the tickets ended up in the nearest litter bin. The few that were paid were charged to the Social Services. A merry-go-round of public money that made a contribution to employment of some sort, but could hardly be regarded as particularly rational.

  One set of arrest forms remained. It had no name on it.

  “What’s this?”

  He turned to the custody officer, an overweight man in his fifties who would never achieve more than the three stripes he had on his shoulders, stripes no one could deny him: they were awarded for age rather than merit. Håkon had realised long ago that the man was a dimwit.

  “A nutter. He was in here when I came on duty. Bastard. Refused to give his name and address.”

  “What’s he done?”

  “Nothing. Found sitting in the road somewhere or other. Covered in blood. You can fine the sod for not giving his name. And for breach of the peace. And for being a scumbag.”

  After five years in the force Sand had learnt to count to ten. He counted to twenty this time. He didn’t want to have a row just because of an imbecile in uniform who couldn’t see that taking a person’s liberty involved a certain responsibility.

  Cell number four. He took a warder with him. The man with no name was awake. He stared at them with a despondent face, and was obviously in some doubt about their intentions. He sat up on the bed stiffly and spoke his first words in police custody.

  “Could I have a drink?”

  The language he spoke was Norwegian and yet at the same time not Norwegian. Håkon couldn’t put his finger on it; it sounded accurate, but there was something not quite right. Could he be a Swede trying to speak Norwegian?

  He was given a drink, of course. Cola, bought by Håkon Sand with his own money. He even got a shower. And a clean T-shirt and trousers. From Sand’s own cupboard in the office. The custody officer’s grumbling at the special treatment grew louder with every item. But Håkon Sand ordered the bloodstained clothes to be put in a bag, explaining as he locked the heavy metal doors behind him:

  “These articles could be important evidence!”

  The young man was certainly taciturn. A searing thirst after many hours in an overheated cell may have loosened his tongue, but it soon became clear that his need to communicate was extremely temporary. Having quenched his thirst, he reverted to silence.

  He was sitting on a hard spindleback chair. Strictly speaking there was only space for two chairs in the eight-square-metre room, which also housed a solid and rather stately double filing cabinet, three rows of ugly painted-steel bookshelves full of ring-binders arranged by colour, and a desk. This was fixed to the wall with metal brackets, so that the desktop was on a slant. That’s how it had been ever since the medical officer had had
the idea of subjecting the staff to an ergonomics therapist. Sloping work desks were supposed to be good for the back. No one understood why, and most of them had found that their spinal problems were exacerbated by all the groping around on the floor for the things that slid off the desk. With an extra chair in the room it was hardly possible to move about without shifting the furniture.

  The office belonged to Hanne Wilhelmsen. She was strikingly attractive, and newly promoted to Inspector. After coming out top of her year from police college, she had spent ten years at Oslo police headquarters marking herself out as a policewoman perfectly designed for an advertising campaign. Everyone spoke well of Hanne Wilhelmsen, a unique achievement in a workplace where ten percent of the day was spent running down your colleagues. She deferred to superiors without being branded an arse-licker, yet was not afraid to voice her opinions. She was loyal to the system, but would put forward suggestions for improvement that were usually sound enough to be implemented. Hanne Wilhelmsen had the intuition that only one in a hundred police officers has, the fingertip sensitivity that tells you when to coax and trick a suspect, and when to threaten and thump the table.

  She was respected and admired, and well deserved it. But even so there was no one in that big grey building who really knew her. She always went to the annual departmental Christmas parties, to the summer party, and to birthday celebrations, was a fantastic dancer, would talk about the job and smile sweetly at everyone, and would go home ten minutes after the first person had left, neither too early nor too late. She never got drunk, and so never made a fool of herself. And no one ever got any closer to knowing her.

  Hanne Wilhelmsen was at ease with herself and the world, but had dug a deep moat between her professional life and her private life. She didn’t have a single friend in the police force. She loved another woman, a defect in this otherwise perfect human being, the public admission of which she was convinced would destroy everything she had spent so many years building up. A swing of her long dark-brown hair was enough to deflect any questions about the slim wedding ring that was the only jewellery she wore. She had been given the ring by her partner when they first moved in together at the age of nineteen. There were rumours, as there always are. But she was so pretty. So womanly. And the female doctor that a friend of someone’s friend vaguely knew, and that others had seen Hanne with several times, was also very beautiful. They were really feminine women. So there couldn’t be any truth in it. Anyway Hanne always wore a skirt the few times she had to dress in uniform, and hardly anyone did that, since trousers were so much more practical. The rumours were just malicious nonsense.

  Thus she lived her life, in the knowledge that what is not confirmed is never regarded as actually true; but this made it even more important for Hanne to perform well in her job than for anyone else in the building. Perfection was her shield. Which was how she wanted it, and since she had absolutely no ambition to elbow her way to the top, but was only interested in doing a good job, there was no jealousy or envy to threaten her defences.

  She smiled now at Håkon, who had seated himself in the extra chair.

  “Don’t you trust me to ask the right questions?”

  “Relax. No worries on that score. But I have a feeling we’re on to something bigger here. As I said, if you don’t mind too much, I’d rather like just to sit in on the interview.

  “It’s not against the rules,” he added quickly.

  He knew she insisted on following the statutory procedures whenever possible, and he respected her for it. It was unusual for a police attorney to attend the questioning of a suspect, but it wasn‘t precluded. He’d done the same before on occasion. Usually to study the technique, but sometimes because he was particularly involved in a case. Normally the police officers didn’t object to the presence of the prosecution staff. On the contrary, provided he kept a low profile and didn’t interfere in the interrogation, most of them seemed quite pleased.

  As if at a given signal, they both turned towards the prisoner. Hanne Wilhelmsen put her right arm on the desk and let her long lacquered nails play on the keys of an old electric typewriter. It was an IBM golf ball machine, very advanced in its time. Now it lacked the e, which was so worn that it produced only a smudged black mark from the ribbon when you hit the key. It didn’t really matter, since it was quite obvious what the smudge should be.

  “It’ll be a long day if you’re just going to sit there and say nothing.”

  Her voice was gentle, almost indulgent.

  “I get paid for this. Chief Inspector Sand gets paid. You on the other hand will just carry on being held here. Sooner or later we might let you go. Wouldn’t you like to make it sooner?”

  For the first time the young man seemed less confident.

  “My name is Han van der Kerch,” he said, after a few minutes’ further silence. “I’m Dutch, but I’m residing in the country legally. I’m a student.”

  Now Håkon Sand had his explanation for the perfect yet not fully idiomatic Norwegian. He remembered his boyhood hero Ard Schenk, remembered himself as a thirteen-year-old thinking that the man spoke an unbelievably good Norwegian for a foreigner. And he remembered reading Gabriel Scott’s Dutchman Jonas, a book he had loved as a child and which had contributed to his later unwavering support for the orange shirts in international football championships.

  “That’s all I’m prepared to say.”

  Once again there was silence. Håkon waited for Hanne Wilhelmsen’s next move. Whatever it might be.

  “Well, that’s okay by me. It’s your choice, and your right. But we’ll be sitting here for some time in that case.”

  She had inserted a sheet of paper in the typewriter, as if she already knew that she would get something to take down.

  “You might as well hear a theory we have.”

  The chair leg scraped on the linoleum as she pushed it back. She offered the Dutchman a cigarette, and lit one herself. The young man seemed grateful. Håkon was less pleased, and leaning back in his chair pushed the door ajar to create a through-draught. The window was already slightly open.

  “We found a body on Friday evening,” said Hanne Wilhelmsen in a soft voice. “It was a bit of a mess. He obviously hadn’t wanted to die. At least not in such a horrible way. There must have been a lot of blood around. You were pretty well covered in it when we found you. We can be a bit slow here in the police sometimes. But we’re still capable of putting two and two together. As a rule we get four, and we think we’ve got four now.”

  She stretched behind her for an ashtray on the bookshelf. It was a tasteless souvenir from southern climes made of brown bottle glass, featuring a faun in the centre wearing an evil grin and sporting an enormous erect phallus. Not exactly Hanne Wilhelmsen’s style, thought Sand.

  “I’ll happily be more explicit.”

  Her voice was sharper now.

  “We’ll have a preliminary analysis of the blood on your clothes tomorrow. Which—if it matches the blood of our faceless friend—will be more than enough to justify keeping you in custody. We can have you in for interrogation whenever we like. Over and over again. A week might pass before you hear from us, then we’ll suddenly turn up again, perhaps after you’ve gone to sleep. We’ll question you for an hour or two, you’ll refuse to say anything, we’ll take you back, and then fetch you out again. It can be rather wearing. For us too, of course, but we can take it in turns. It’s worse for you.”

  Håkon began to doubt whether Hanne deserved her reputation as a stickler for the rules. The method of interrogation she’d outlined was definitely not in the book. He was even more in doubt about the legality of threatening it.

  “You have the right to a solicitor; the State will pay,” he reminded him, as if to compensate for any possible illegality.

  “I don’t want a solicitor!” he exploded.

  He took one last puff on his cigarette before stubbing it out emphatically and saying it again, “I don’t want a solicitor. I’ll be better off withou
t one.”

  He threw a questioning, half-imploring look across at the pack of cigarettes on the table. Hanne Wilhelmsen nodded, and handed him both the cigarettes and the matches.

  “So, you think it was me. Well, you may be right.”

  That was that. The man’s basic needs had been satisfied at last: a shower, some breakfast, a drink, and a couple of cigarettes. Showing all the signs of having talked as much as he was going to, he slid forward in the chair and slumped back with a distant look in his eyes.

  “Okay, then.” Detective Inspector Wilhelmsen seemed fully in command of the situation. “Perhaps I should continue,” she said, starting to turn over the pages of the rather slim file of papers beside the typewriter.

  “So we found this repulsive-looking corpse. He had no documents on him, and his face had gone before him, so to speak, wherever it was he was going. But our man in the patrol car was fairly well acquainted with the drugs scene here in the city. The clothes, body, and hair were sufficient. Revenge killing, he thought. A not unreasonable assumption, it seems to me.”

  She linked her fingers and put her hands behind her head. She massaged her neck with her thumbs as she looked the Dutchman straight in the eyes.