1222

by Anne Holt

  ‘You can have the dog room.’

  ‘The dog room?’ Severin repeated enquiringly.

  ‘Yes. How many of you are there?’

  ‘Four.’

  ‘OK. We have a room that’s been used to keep a dog in up to now. It was thoroughly cleaned this morning. It still smells of shit and maybe slightly of blood, but it is clean. It’s usually the staff dining room. You can have that room.’

  ‘How many entrances are there?’

  ‘One. One door. The window is blocked by snow.’

  ‘That’s no good. We need —’

  ‘Take it or leave it. Both you and those with you out there are welcome into this hotel on the same conditions as everyone else here. I would never have agreed to give you special treatment if Hanne hadn’t asked. I can’t offer you anything but the dog room.’

  I looked at Severin and nodded imperceptibly.

  ‘You can lock the door,’ Berit went on. ‘It can be locked from the inside. There are several keys, but I will keep those. That means I can come in at any time. I will make sure you are provided with food and water. That’s what I can offer you.’

  ‘That’s probably the best solution,’ I interjected.

  ‘I assume you don’t want anyone to see you,’ said Berit. ‘Just as before. Therefore it would be best if you take the opportunity right away. We have gathered all the guests in a different part of the hotel. You can go down into the cellar without being seen.’

  Severin realized he wasn’t going to get any further. He nodded and opened the door. Three men came in. They were wearing layer upon layer of clothing, and their faces were completely covered by goggles, scarves and hats. None of them seemed to want to take anything off. They were all carrying rucksacks, apparently just as heavy as Severin’s. If one of them had turned up carrying nothing, that would have given away the difference between him and the others. If one rucksack had been noticeably lighter than the rest, there would be reason to assume that it at least didn’t contain weapons. Given the way the four men were dressed and equipped, it was impossible to say who was doing the guarding and who was being guarded.

  Severin looked enquiringly at Berit, who moved quickly towards the stairs, waving the new arrivals to follow her.

  Halfway across the room he stopped dead and turned around.

  ‘Hanne,’ he said.

  I moved over to him and allowed him to lean over me. When he began to speak his mouth was so close that the words tickled my earlobe.

  ‘Are there two people here who look Arabic?’ he asked. ‘A man and a woman? They can’t possibly have been in the wing. She’s wearing a black headscarf, he’s in a greyish brown jacket and —’

  I nodded and he straightened up. His hesitation could be because he was intending to tell me something. It was difficult to tell whether my confirmation of the Arabs’ presence was good or bad news.

  He decided not to say anything.

  But he still gave me a sign. His eyes bored into mine. He held my gaze for several seconds, and it was impossible to look away. Then he blinked three times, and ran down into the cellar after the others.

  I thought I understood what he meant.

  Just a few hours later I would be forced to trust that I had interpreted him correctly. I had to take an enormous risk based on one look, but of course I knew nothing of this as I sat there listening to the footsteps of five people disappearing down the stairs.

  I was thinking only of Sara, the little pink baby who was no longer alive.

  iv

  Despite the fact that I have never heard an avalanche in reality, I have a definite idea of what it sounds like. If you spend enough time watching the Discovery Channel at night, as is my habit since my back was destroyed, frequently forcing me to get up at the most ungodly hours, you learn quite a lot about disasters. Including avalanches.

  When Kari Thue’s voice sliced through the room, it reminded me of the first warning that an avalanche is on the way. It is often impossible to see anything but a slender and apparently innocent crack in the snow, but the sound is already there, it comes from deep beneath the snow where the mass is already on the move.

  ‘Where is Roar Hanson? Has anyone seen Steinar Aass? Where has Roar Hanson gone?’

  Perhaps it had been a mistake to gather all the guests right at the bottom of the building. Up to then nobody had noticed that the ill-fated priest was missing. People had been preoccupied with themselves and their own affairs all morning. His absence was considerably less striking than that of Cato Hammer. As far as I was aware, Steinar Aass had not struck up a single acquaintance during the trip, and I had quietly assumed that nobody would give the man a thought.

  By gathering all the guests in one place, we had made sure they were safe from whatever came in through the snow-blocked main entrance. However, this had made it easier for someone to notice that neither Roar Hanson nor Steinar Aass was there.

  Kari Thue was the one who had made the discovery. This emaciated, irritating woman was not only wide awake and full of life, she was also smart and constantly on the lookout for ways to erode Berit, Geir and Johan’s otherwise undisputed leadership.

  ‘I demand an answer! We all demand to be told! Where are Roar Hanson and Steinar Aass?’

  Kari Thue was the almost invisible crack in the snow, just below the top of the mountain. I was still sitting by the door, unable to stop thinking about the baby who came flying through the air and landed on my knee in the crash. Her death had had a greater impact on me than anything else that had happened since Wednesday afternoon. Sara hadn’t even reached her first birthday when she died. I reproached myself for not having told the doctors that she might be injured, despite the fact that she seemed to have suffered no ill effects from the hard collision with the wall in front of me on the train. I had no doubt assumed that her mother would ensure that a thorough examination was carried out, but I knew perfectly well that you should never take anything for granted. In my mind’s eye I suddenly saw her mother, shouting at me on the train. Her despair at having dropped the child was so great that she barely knew what she was saying. I should have ...

  At the same time, I didn’t know what I could have done, and that depressed me even more.

  Kari Thue’s outburst had triggered the avalanche. The noise level was rising. More and more people were talking and asking questions down in Blåstuen, even though there was really nobody to whom these concerns could be addressed. Berit still hadn’t come back up from the cellar, and I didn’t know where Geir and Johan had gone. I pushed my chair slowly towards the accelerating spectacle. I would have much preferred to take cover in the office behind reception, and lock the door.

  But I thought about Magnus, who had been tasked with keeping everyone calm down there. It sounded as if he had serious problems.

  When he caught sight of me by the stairs leading down to St Paai’s Bar, he got up with some difficulty from a maroon chair and ran across the room. Despite my depression at Sara’s death and the certain knowledge that Kari Thue was going to make things even worse for us all, I had to suppress a smile as he hurried agitatedly towards the stairs. He wasn’t built for running, Magnus Streng. Nor for walking upstairs. It was as if his knees didn’t work properly. They were too loose to work normally when he was walking in a straight line. Instead he turned his legs in rapid semi-circles from the hips. It looked as if he were parodying a speed walker.

  ‘Here we go again!’

  His chest was whistling. He grabbed his throat, coughed and waved his free hand apologetically in the air.

  ‘Asthma,’ he gasped. ‘Unfortunately I haven’t brought my medication with me. I don’t usually suffer at this time of year.’

  ‘Sit down,’ I said, pointing to a chair by the table.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, catching his breath. ‘This is actually ... rather unpleasant.’

  He tried to moisten his lips before picking up a glass of water someone had left on the table. He emptied it in one draught.
<
br />   ‘She sees everything,’ he groaned. ‘She remembers everything. I’m bloody certain she’d have won the world championship in Memory.’

  The noise from downstairs was so obtrusive that I didn’t answer.

  While the gang surrounding Mikkel had never been anything more than irritating and cocky, the group that gathered around Kari Thue was much more threatening. It now consisted of something like forty people. Kari Thue herself had climbed up on a table, where she had begun to address her followers like the charismatic leader of some sect.

  ‘Things are being kept from us,’ she shouted, tucking her thumbs into the straps of the little rucksack; I was beginning to wonder if she kept it on in bed. ‘And I’m asking myself who exactly is making the decisions in this situation, and with what right and authority. We were told that everyone, absolutely everyone, must assemble down here. The insulation packed into the hole in the wall was to be reinforced, they said, and the structure of the staircase checked. But where are Roar Hanson and Steinar Aass? Do they have privileges not extended to the rest of us? Is there some difference between us and them?’

  ‘What shall we do?’ I whispered to Magnus.

  ‘I ... don’t ... really ... know.’

  He was gasping for breath after every word. I was seriously concerned; his skin was grey and damp, and one hand was clutching the edge of the table so tightly that the knuckles were white.

  Berit came running in.

  Some people crumble under protracted pressure. Some cling to others and become like children again, needing consolation and reassuring lies. Some become paralysed. Life has taught me that it is more or less impossible to predict how people will react under great stress.

  Choosing soldiers is an art, and Berit Tverre was a woman you would want by your side in a war. She stopped dead on the top step of the staircase leading to St Paal’s Bar. During the course of just a few seconds, she had grasped the situation. First of all she crouched down beside Magnus. Without asking him any questions, she took an inhaler out of her pocket and pushed it into his hand.

  ‘Bricanyl,’ she murmured. ‘I have asthma too. Deep, calm breaths.’

  I will never forget Magnus Streng’s face as he greedily swallowed air containing the healing micro-particles. He cupped his hands around the rocket-shaped inhaler. His eyes were gratefully fixed on Berit’s face. Big, heavy tears slowly trickled from his eyelashes and ran down towards the corners of his mouth. He gave the dosage dispenser one more turn and inhaled deeply.

  Once Berit could see that Magnus had the situation under control, she raised both hands and shouted down to the agitated crowd.

  ‘Roar Hanson is dead,’ she almost bellowed. ‘And so is Steinar Aass. Sit down. Sit down!’

  There was complete silence. It seemed as if the weather gods themselves had had a shock; the monotonous roar from outside seemed more distant and subdued. Berit walked quickly down the short staircase and cut across St Paal’s Bar. She stopped by the wide opening leading into Blåstuen, where the doors were folded right back so that both rooms formed one big space. Kari Thue was still standing on the table. Most of the others were looking embarrassed, searching for somewhere to sit. The dog owners had settled in one corner, where the three surviving dogs seemed to be getting on well. I couldn’t see Muffe’s owner anywhere, but a number of people were hidden from me behind the walls between the two rooms. Some were also sitting in Jøkulsalen. The double doors leading into this area were open, so that everyone could hear what was said. Adrian and Veronica must be in there, because I couldn’t see them.

  ‘Get down from there,’ Berit hissed at Kari Thue. ‘I will not have you treating my furniture like this. Down! Down!’

  She could have been talking to a disobedient dog.

  ‘What’s happened to Roar and Steinar?’ said Kari Thue, without showing any sign of obeying.

  ‘As I said, they’re both dead. Steinar Aass got the idiotic idea that he could make his way down from the mountain by himself. He froze to death. Roar Hanson ... He’s dead too. There isn’t much you can do about that.’

  ‘How did he die?’

  I had to strain to hear what they were saying. For the first time since the accident I regretted not asking for a ramp from the lobby down to the communal areas.

  ‘Will you come down from there!’

  Berit was trying to grab hold of Kari Thue’s arm. Mikkel, who was sitting at the other end of the room, got to his feet hesitantly. It looked as if he hadn’t quite decided what he was going to do. He eased his way slowly between tables and chairs before suddenly speeding up. When he reached Kari Thue, he stopped and put his hands on his hips.

  ‘Do as the lady says. Get down.’

  ‘First I want to know what’s happened.’

  ‘You’ve already been told what you need to know,’ said Berit.

  ‘No. You lied to us before. I want to know the truth about Roar Hanson, and I want to know right now.’

  ‘You look absolutely ridiculous,’ said Mikkel. ‘Stop making such a fuss. Get down. This lady here is in charge, OK!’

  Kari Thue looked at him as if he were something she had dug out of the bathroom plughole.

  ‘I seem to remember that you agreed with me.’

  Mikkel had his back to me, but I could make a guess at his facial expression from his posture. His head tilted slowly backwards at an angle, and he made his shoulders look broader by raising them.

  ‘Bitch,’ he hissed all of a sudden, waving his hand in the air as if to ward off some annoying insect.

  He turned around and sauntered indifferently away, mumbling something I couldn’t hear. When a couple of his friends stood up to follow him, he snapped at them to stay where they were. I expected him to walk past Magnus and me without a word. To my surprise he sat down on the stairs in front of me, on the bottom step.

  ‘Bitch,’ he said, without looking at us.

  Kari Thue clearly believed that she was leading the battle. In a way she was. With renewed self-confidence she gazed out over the assembled crowd before turning to Berit once more.

  ‘It can hardly be a coincidence if two members of the church commission die within the course of just a few hours. You have already confirmed that Cato Hammer was murdered, although of course you did try to pull the wool over our eyes with regard to his death as well. Which, incidentally, is a fundamental infringement of my rights, and the rights of everyone here. We are snowed in on the mountain under extreme circumstances. Each and every one of us has the right to make decisions in order to save our own lives.’

  She was speaking on each inhalation and exhalation. This made the brief pause even more dramatic.

  ‘Within the boundaries of the law, of course. I must remind you that we are not on board a ship. You are not the captain. None of the maritime rules of hierarchy apply here.’

  She stabbed her index finger at Berit’s shoulder and took a step back.

  ‘I am not aware of any laws that give you the right to make decisions on behalf of all of us,’ Kari Thue went on. ‘Quite the reverse. In the absence of either the police or some other authority, it is up to us to find the best solutions to help us survive. And therefore I demand to be given the information necessary to enable me to take care of myself. I would say that ...’

  ‘Mikkel,’ I whispered.

  He half turned and ran a casual hand over the handkerchief tied around his head.

  ‘What?’ he mumbled.

  ‘Help me down. Down the stairs.’

  ‘I would say,’ said Kari Thue more loudly, ‘that with the current mortality rate in this place, information about what people are actually dying of is to be considered absolutely vital.’

  Instead of easing the chair down the three steps, Mikkel simply picked up the chair with me in it, and carried me down before gently placing me on the floor, with no sign of exertion whatsoever. The boy really was as strong as he looked.

  ‘Thanks,’ I whispered.

  He didn’t answer.
>
  ‘What did Roar Hanson die of?’ Kari Thue shouted accusingly at Berit.

  ‘You’re right,’ I shouted back as I moved closer to the crowd.

  Kari Thue jumped, quite literally. She reminded me of a squirrel, a nervous, quick, alert creature who nevertheless hadn’t had the sense to take in enough food. Berit looked at me, slightly confused. I would have liked to have told her what I was thinking.

  ‘You’re absolutely right,’ I repeated instead. ‘You all have the right to know what people are dying of up here.’

  I stopped my chair three or four metres from the doorway leading into Blåstuen. I put the brakes on and placed my hands on my lap.

  ‘Steinar Aass froze to death,’ I said loudly. ‘As Berit has just told you. As far as Roar Hanson is concerned, all the indications are that he was murdered last night.’

  The woman with the knitting, who I had eventually realized was one of the lay members of the church commission, burst into tears. She raised the half-finished knitting to her face and sobbed. A man leaned over to console her. The sound of murmuring grew louder, and after just a few seconds everybody was talking over the top of one another. Kari Thue looked as if she didn’t really know what to do. It was as if the confirmation that she was right was so unexpected that she had lost her balance, rhetorically at least.

  ‘I was right,’ she said, talking to the air; no one was listening.

  ‘And what are you going to do about it?’ I asked her.

  ‘What did he die ... How was he murdered?’

  Neither of us was talking particularly loudly any more. This was a conversation between the two of us, as I had hoped. But people were starting to shush one another. They wanted to hear.

  ‘We don’t really know,’ I replied. ‘But he was stabbed with some kind of object.’

  ‘A knife?’

  I noticed she was blinking more rapidly now. Whether this was a sign of insecurity or of something quite different and even more desirable, I couldn’t say.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘Not with a knife. So what are you going to do? Now you’ve got the information you thought you had a right to?’