In Dust and Ashes

by Anne Holt

  “Yes, of course,” he whispered, as he picked up his bag and padded through to the living room.

  “Are you in a bad mood?” she asked, deadpan. “Let me see!”

  Henrik sat down opposite her at the dining table with his bag on his lap.

  “What’s the point of that swish office of yours if we always sit here in the living room?”

  “You and Nefis are the only ones who think that office is swish. I’m more comfortable in here. Let me see!”

  Extending her hand to him, she waved her fingers impatiently.

  “Here,” he said curtly as he handed her a sheaf of papers. “The quality’s not the best, but you can read the most salient points. I used photo paper to make the images as sharp as possible.”

  “Very dark,” she mumbled.

  “Yes. After all, they’re copies of photographs of a photocopy.”

  However, Hanne had already immersed herself in the bundle. Henrik was left sitting with his hands dangling on his knee, now and again letting his right forefinger touch the left side of his nose and vice versa. No longer annoyed, he did not entirely know what it was he felt – guilt, perhaps. Pangs of conscience.

  It dawned on him all of a sudden that he felt offended.

  “Relax,” Hanne said, as if she were a mind reader. She did not even look up.

  “These papers will stay here with me, and I assume you’ve deleted the photos from your cellphone.”

  “Yes.”

  “No one will find out anything about it. Besides, what you did wasn’t so wrong. No harm done.”

  “But what do you actually want with all this?” he said more sharply than intended. “What on earth was the point of getting me to break a whole pile of regulations just so that you could have a look at a really obvious case of suicide?”

  “It’s not obvious, as I said.”

  For once Henrik felt his face turn pale. The blood drained from his head, and the resulting dizziness forced him to cling to the table.

  “It doesn’t matter!” he said so sharply that Hanne looked up in surprise, pushing her glasses on top of her head. “It doesn’t matter how interesting you might find that flaming bundle of papers, it’s still not our case! The Iselin Havørn case isn’t yours to investigate!”

  “Good heavens,” Hanne said, canting her head to one side.

  “I can’t stand all this!”

  He raised the palms of both hands as if disclaiming all responsibility before he got to his feet.

  “Keep all of it. Don’t ever mention this case to me again, please. I really can’t stand the idea of being in on this.”

  “Sit down.”

  He made a move to leave.

  “Henrik. Please. Sit down. I’m really sorry for sometimes treating you …”

  While she searched for the right words, he wheeled around.

  “Badly?” he suggested. “Disrespectfully? Do you need any more suggestions?”

  Hanne took on the expression he never quite understood. Her face became blank and inscrutable, but there was a glimmer in her eyes, as if she was amused.

  “I think that’s enough,” she said in the end. “Sometimes I treat you badly. Lacking in respect if you like. But you should take it as a compliment. If it means anything, of course. What I think of you.”

  Henrik shook his head dejectedly without uttering a word.

  “I treat you as I do because I always believe we’re on the same page,” Hanne went on. “I think something, and then I automatically believe you think the same thing. That you’re wondering about the same thing as me, that you find the same facts interesting. Significant. I do that because you’re clever, Henrik, and because I can be fairly lacking in consideration. People skills, as you know, are not my strongest suit.”

  She gave a tentative smile, as if she was in fact sincere. Henrik refrained from returning her smile, but did at least continue to stand there.

  “You’re amazingly good on people,” he said. “But only in theory.”

  Now she burst out laughing. Her laughter was so infrequent that he nearly jumped out of his skin. The first time he had heard it, it had brought to mind ice cubes in a glass of squash on a summer’s day. Now it was darker. More natural, in a sense: it was as if he had finally been honored with some totally genuine laughter.

  “You’re right,” she said at last. “I’m best on theory. When I met you nearly two years ago, I thought you were exactly the same as me. Smart up top, but no people skills. I was mistaken. In the first place you’re sharper than me, and secondly you’re something incredibly rare, a real humanitarian. Maybe you’re not always so good in human company, either, but you do like them. You care about them. I only like you and my two girls, Henrik, and I truly hope that my hopeless behavior doesn’t drive you away.”

  “No, of course not,” he said, embarrassed, and felt his face turn bright red.

  He struggled to restrain himself, but his right hand rose of its own accord and tapped his forehead seven times in succession.

  “Please sit down.”

  He obeyed.

  “I’ll try to explain why this case interests me,” she said. “And I hope you can bring yourself to listen. Here.” She pushed a thermos and mug toward him. “Have some tea.”

  Henrik did as she asked, and crooked his fingers around the red-hot mug to keep them under control.

  “Do you know the worst thing about suicide?” she asked.

  “Someone feeling so terrible that they choose to relinquish life. So many people left behind with sorrow, unanswered questions and feelings of guilt.”

  “Yes, true enough,” she dismissed him abruptly, already exhibiting impatience. “Suicide is bloody awful, of course. But entirely from a police officer’s point of view, Henrik? What’s the worst thing about suicide for an investigator?”

  He gave a slight shrug.

  “Finding out whether it is in fact suicide,” he suggested. “Rather than homicide. From that standpoint, this case doesn’t present a particularly great challenge. It’s clear cut.”

  He let go his mug and pointed at the papers in front of him.

  “Why is it clear cut?” she asked.

  Henrik began to count on his fingers. “One: it’s easily explained in terms of the deceased’s difficult personal circumstances. Two: a suicide letter was present. Three: no indication of anything other than yet another tragic suicide.”

  Nodding, Hanne put her left hand on the book, On Suicide.

  “Your points are valid. But at the same time, Henrik …”

  She picked up the book with both hands and stood it on edge. It seemed as if she could not quite make up her mind what she wanted to say: she opened her mouth and then shut it again with an almost inaudible sigh.

  “Suicide is in itself a mystery,” she ventured hesitantly. “As far as I know, we humans are the only species on earth who sometimes choose something in direct contravention of every single theory of evolution: we kill ourselves. Some suicides are … expected? Can we say that? At the very least, not entirely unexpected. Deep depression. Psychosis. Anxiety. Other serious psychological illnesses. At other times, a severe shock or a chronically deteriorating personal situation can make this definitive solution to the problem virtually … understandable. Is it too excessive to use the word ‘understandable’?”

  Hanne leaned forward a little, the thick book still in her hands, and gave him a quizzical, almost pleading, look. Before he got as far as giving her an answer, she added: “I mean, if Nefis were to die …”

  She let go of On Suicide and knocked on the wooden tabletop.

  “… I would be devastated. I’ve gone through it before, losing my life partner, and believe me …”

  Henrik could have sworn that Hanne’s eyes were moist. He hardly dared to breathe.

  “I know what I’m talking about. You never know whether you’ll be able to get through the day. If Nefis died …”

  Once again she knocked hard on the wood.

 
“… my heart would break. I’d be in a dreadful state. But I would never consider taking my own life.”

  “You have a child.”

  “I didn’t have a child when Cecilie died. I freaked out completely. Ran away from everything and everyone. I lived in a convent outside Verona, did you know that?”

  “No.”

  “I did. For months on end. I felt more or less dead, to be honest, but not for one single moment …”

  Her gaze melted away. It looked as if she had fallen asleep with her eyes open. Henrik was about to rise from his chair. It could be an attack of some kind, maybe she needed assistance, but he was only halfway up from his seat when she suddenly continued: “I decided never to take my own life. But if Ida died today, I would follow her without hesitation.”

  Henrik dropped back on to his chair and shoved his hands under his thighs.

  “You don’t know that.”

  “Yes, I do. I know it very well.”

  The old Hanne had returned. She sniffed, rubbed the small of her back, and once again peered at him over the rims of her glasses. Like a head teacher before a promising, but obstinate, pupil.

  “And that’s what I mean when I say that some suicides can be understandable. Someone loses a child. Or you face total social ruin.”

  “Exactly,” Henrik said. “Just as Iselin Havørn did. Or … as she had just done.”

  “She was not ruined.”

  “What?”

  “That’s precisely my point, Henrik! You really must listen to what I’m saying! Iselin Havørn was unmasked as the blogger, Tyrfing. That led to a great deal of awkwardness, as I’ve said before. But for Iselin that exposure certainly didn’t involve social ruin. On the contrary, you might say. The traditional press has been hard on her, and the chorus of condemnation from pundits has been resounding. No more than expected. When Fjordman, Anders Behring Breivik’s great role model and inspiration, fled abroad with his tail between his legs after 22 July, Tyrfing seized her chance and rose in all her majesty.”

  Hanne’s eyes narrowed.

  “Tyrfing was more capable than him. More knowledgeable. Wrote better, even though she could have done with a basic course in grammar and spelling. In point of fact, she’d been active for a number of years, but prior to the tragedy that summer, few people had heard of either Fjordman or Tyrfing. She hurt many people, Henrik. Only a few days after that gruesome Friday, she began to receive public attention for spreading ideas that had cost seventy-seven people their lives. It’s not strange in the least that so much revulsion has been directed at her now.”

  Henrik opened his mouth to say something.

  “But have you followed the comments?” Hanne continued abruptly. “Have you delved into all those online sites where Tyrfing was purveyor to the royal court of anti-Islamic articles and analyses? We’re no longer talking about the occasional website run by loonies. We’re talking about popular, professionally edited online newspapers, and we’re talking about loads of them. Before she seems to have taken her own life, Iselin Havørn was being acclaimed like a queen. To her own folk, Henrik, she was more distinguished than anyone as a result of being unmasked! She was supported and praised and applauded. When she died, she became a martyr. The greatest savior since Jesus, that’s the impression you get.”

  “Yes, I suppose so, but–”

  “Have you learned nothing from the May 17 terrorist attack? Didn’t you see Kirsten Ranvik during the trial we’ve just stopped attending? The woman was behind seven fucking bombs that killed a total of forty-five totally innocent people, but in court she sat there smiling. She was smirking, Henrik! Immaculately dressed and with that damned smile–”

  “Kirsten Ranvik was mad.”

  “She was found to be of sound mind by the court psychiatrists.”

  “In my eyes, someone like that is completely off their rocker, no matter what the psychiatrists think. Iselin Havørn, on the other hand, was not mad in the slightest. She ran a major business and led a quiet, normal life into the bargain.”

  “Didn’t Kirsten Ranvik also live an apparently quiet and normal life? With a halfwit of a son and a job as a librarian?”

  Henrik fretted over the use of the word ‘halfwit’ but – once bitten twice shy – said nothing.

  “The only difference between Kirsten Ranvik and Iselin Havørn,” Hanne ploughed on angrily, “is that Ranvik threatened violence. She began to kill for ‘the cause’.”

  Her cheeks were flushed, and she used both arms to draw ostentatious, invisible quote marks.

  “Incidentally, they’re both very similar. They have exactly the same opinions. They’re equally dangerous. And more important than anything else: they’re so completely convinced that they’re right. People like that don’t take their own lives, Henrik. They don’t kill themselves!”

  She slammed the flat of her hand on the table six times over to emphasize her words. Henrik sat bolt upright and felt his narrow shoulders lift.

  He had never seen her behave like this.

  Occasionally he had felt Hanne to be dismissive, cold and contemptuous. Warm and loving to her daughter, and measured and punctilious as a witness in court. She could be grouchy, almost misanthropic. Sarcastic or attentive, encouraging and sometimes verging on enthusiastically complimentary. He had even seen touches of frustration, but only once or twice.

  Never before had he seen her so furious.

  She was speaking to him far too loudly, and he noticed that her words were accompanied by a fine spray of saliva.

  Almost as if she were gasping for breath.

  “I think it’s not been terribly good for you, studying these right-wing extremists for such a long time,” he said cautiously, adding a tentative pause.

  When she did not object, he added: “It’s not an entirely unknown phenomenon, you know. Police officers who work on public morality and deviant behavior sometimes have to … take a break from it. Especially the ones investigating child abuse. The cases eat them up, they–”

  “Don’t lecture me on the effects of police work,” she broke in sharply.

  “No, of course not,” he said hastily, swallowing.

  It felt as if his Adam’s apple had become enlarged again. To double its original size.

  “All the same, maybe you should realize that you might harbor prejudices, just the same as everyone else,” he nevertheless plucked up the courage to say. “To be honest, you have a tendency to regard right-wing extremists as nothing else. People with no capacity for shame. Lacking the ability to show remorse. Depressed. Suicidal, for that matter.”

  “Not at all.”

  “You seem remarkably sure of yourself. On very thin grounds. It’s not really like you. And since it’s true that you’ve just had an overdose of right-wing extr–”

  “Drop it.”

  “But how do you explain the suicide letter?” he insisted. “It’s handwritten, and the preliminary handwriting analysis concludes that it’s genuine. That is to say, written by Iselin Havørn.”

  Hanne poured more tea and took time to screw the lid back on the thermos. She lifted her steaming mug without drinking from it.

  “I hate suicide letters,” she said.

  “Eh … why’s that?”

  “Because those damned letters make us draw rapid conclusions. Because all killers who use suicide as their method, know that’s what we do, of course. Because there’s barely a murder disguised as suicide where a false letter isn’t found.”

  “But this one is genuine!”

  “Do you think so?”

  “It doesn’t matter what I think, the handwriting specialists–”

  Hanne raised one hand, and he quickly shut up. She leafed through the bundles of paper he had given her, and located the photograph of the suicide letter.

  “To hell with handwriting analyses,” she said, pushing it toward him. “By now this …”

  She glanced down at one of the other pages.

  “Amanda Foss,” she read. �
�By now this Amanda Foss has had this case file in her office since Thursday, but I’m willing to bet that she hasn’t gone to the bother of reading this letter. It took me three minutes. I mean really read it, Henrik. Do it, now.”

  Henrik had already read it twice before.

  “Why?” he asked without looking at the letter.

  “Because until now it’s just been treated as a document, as a piece of evidence in the case. But try to read it as text, Henrik, as a written expression of a person’s thoughts.”

  “Why?” he said again.

  “Because I’m convinced that a smart guy will see the same as me.”

  “Which is what?”

  “Which is that this letter was probably not written by Iselin Havørn at all. It doesn’t matter what all the handwriting specialists in the world might say. It’s bogus. And if it’s been forged, then we’re not faced with a suicide, but a–”

  Now her smile was broad and encouraging, and he knew what he had to do.

  “A homicide,” he completed, with a note of resignation. “If the letter is a forgery, then Iselin Havørn was probably murdered.”

  Jonas Abrahamsen never received visitors.

  He had not even gone to the bother of fitting a doorbell. If, contrary to all expectation, anyone should turn up, something that had only happened once before in the two years he had lived there, he would be able to see them from the kitchen window long before they arrived at the door. Besides, the track from the narrow asphalt road was still deserted. The sound of car tires on the gravel could be heard through the drafty walls.

  Now someone was knocking even though Jonas had not heard or seen anything.

  He was standing bare-chested after taking a shower in the makeshift set-up he had built in the old dining room. The coffee was ready – he had made a full pot. It was only a couple of hours since he had arrived home from Linköping. The trip had gone well, even though the return journey had been made with an empty truck. Jonas was not keen on driving empty trucks. It was a waste of diesel, and the old girl was less stable on the road. Now he sipped scalding-hot coffee while he considered whether or not to open the door. It was five o’clock and dark outside, and he needed to sit in peace in his own home.