41
Tuesday 23 October
VIKEN STOOD ON the top step, breathing unevenly. Not because he was in such bad shape that he was out of breath from climbing a few stairs, but because what he saw was what he had expected to see, and yet so much worse that it left him gasping for air, and the stench from the dead body was almost unendurable.
Nina Jebsen had stopped on the step below him. He had picked her up on the way. An impulse shot through him: shield her from the sight of this. The dead woman – what was left of her – lay with her head twisted to one side, staring towards the stairs they had just ascended, though the eyes were almost caked over with dried blood. Deep rifts, what looked like claw marks, ran from the lower part of the face and down across the shoulder and back. One corner of the mouth had been ripped open, and the tongue lolled through the opening in the cheek.
Viken looked at the constable standing beside the door.
– Is this the neighbour who contacted the switchboard?
The name Miriam Gaizauskaite was written on a sign under the doorbell.
– Yes, she called the emergency number about, – the constable glanced at his watch, – fifty-five minutes ago.
– Technical?
– Not here yet.
Something had struck Viken on the way up. He turned and went downstairs to the floor below.
– Jebsen, he called up to her.
Nina came down the twisting staircase. She was pale and held on to the banister as though afraid the timbers would collapse beneath her at any moment.
Viken pointed to the sign on the door: Anita and Victoria Elvestrand live here.
– The missing woman, she confirmed.
Viken hurried back up again, over the first reaction now. He borrowed the constable’s torch and peered at the floor around the mutilated body. Not much blood; obviously the killing hadn’t been done here. The small amount there was came from the severed legs. He could see the clear imprint of a foot in it.
People were talking as they made their way up the stairs. Viken recognised one of the voices, a crime-scene technician. At the same instant he noticed something on the door and the door jamb. He squatted down and shone his torch. A broad marking across the woodwork, five deep downward scratches.
– What’s the first thing that hits you when you see this, Jebsen?
She squatted down beside him.
– Claws, she said at once. – Marks made by a large paw with claws.
Miriam Gaizauskaite sat on the sofa with her legs curled under her. She was wearing jogging pants and a thick sweater. She sat rocking from side to side and staring in front of her.
– So you didn’t hear anything until you tried to open the door? Viken asked again.
She shook her head.
– Listen, Miriam, Viken began, and noticed that Nina Jebsen was watching him. She was probably not used to hearing him address a witness using their first name. – You called the switchboard at seventeen minutes past five. Can you tell us why you were up and about so early?
She glanced at him, then over at Nina. Her pupils were wide open. Is she on something, or is it just the shock? Viken wondered.
– I … woke up early. Couldn’t sleep. Then I heard someone open the gate, thought it was the paper boy. I got up and went to fetch the paper.
– And you neither saw nor heard anything unusual from the time you went to bed at about twelve until you heard the gate open.
Miriam looked down at the floor.
– I didn’t see anything, didn’t hear anything.
Half an hour later, Viken made a sign to Nina Jebsen: time to wrap it up.
– We don’t know yet who it is lying out there, said Nina, – but we can’t exclude the possibility that it’s your neighbour.
Miriam began to tremble.
– It is her, she said in a low voice.
– Do you think so?
– Something’s very wrong. I’ve had a feeling about it the whole time.
Viken said: – You know her quite well, I gather. I want to ask something of you. It won’t be easy. It isn’t easy for us either, if that’s any comfort. And you can say no if you don’t want to do it.
Miriam released the hold she had around her knees and let her feet drop to the floor. Her phone rang; it was on the coffee table. She picked it up, looked at the display, turned it off.
– It’s all right, she said. Her voice was clearer now. – I’ll identify the body for you.
The two women went out while Viken had a look round inside the flat. When they came back in again, Nina had an arm around Miriam.
– You’re quite certain?
Miriam leaned towards her.
– I recognise the tattoo, she muttered. – On the shoulder. The picture of a naked man.
– Did you have a visitor here yesterday? asked Viken.
Miriam didn’t answer.
– There are two wine glasses out in the kitchen. And one empty and a half-full bottle.
– I didn’t have visitors. I drank it myself over the last couple of days.
– In other words, you like your wine, said Viken. – Did you drink much yesterday evening?
She closed her eyes.
– A bit too much. I must have fallen asleep.
Before leaving the room, Viken went into the sleeping alcove and lifted the duvet and the two blankets that lay on the bed.
42
AT ONE O’CLOCK on Tuesday afternoon, the investigating team gathered in the meeting room. Four new tactical investigators had joined the group. Agnes Finckenhagen was also present, as was Jarle Frøen, the police prosecutor who was the nominal though far from actual leader of the investigation. The room was divided by sliding doors and there were no windows in the part they were sitting in. Already the air was starting to get heavy and close.
Detective Chief Inspector Viken summed up recent developments.
– We won’t get the DNA results today. But there is no doubt that the victim is Anita Elvestrand, the thirty-six year old who was reported missing from her home on Sunday afternoon by her neighbour on the floor above. The same neighbour gave a positive ID of the body.
– What about next of kin? asked Finckenhagen.
Viken nodded to Arve Norbakk.
– Parents dead, the sergeant informed them. – She has a sister living in Spain and a brother who is an oil worker out on the Gullfaks rig. They have been contacted, but neither of them has any imminent plans to come over.
Viken resumed.
– The neighbour’s name is Miriam Gaizauskaite, a Lithuanian citizen. She is studying medicine here in Oslo. We’ll come back to her. I’ve had pictures sent over from the pathology lab; let’s take a look at those first.
He clicked his way to the file on the computer.
– Jebsen and I were there and saw this abomination. Strong stuff, I warn you … One great advantage in your favour: the pictures don’t smell.
Sigge Helgarsson seemed to be about to make a comment, but instead tipped back on his chair and said nothing.
Viken pulled down the screen.
– As you will note immediately, the victim exhibits distinctive injuries to the face, neck and down the back.
He clicked through a series of pictures of the ravaged body.
– As you will also note, these wounds are similar to those we have seen on the other recent murder victims. Here, however, is what is left of the lower body. Both legs have been severed, directly below the hip joint.
– For fuck’s sake, Helgarsson exclaimed.
– Precisely, Sigge, Viken observed. – I couldn’t have put it better myself.
He showed an enlarged image of one of the stumps.
– Does this look like a leg that has been bitten off by an animal?
– It’s been sawn off, Norbakk said.
– Dr Plåterud’s conclusion precisely. So we are dealing with a perpetrator who goes further each time in the mutilation of his victims. This is a well-known featu
re of this type of crime.
Viken clicked on, stopped at a picture of an arm, zoomed in. A tattoo of a muscular naked male body appeared.
– I would ask female members of the gathering to avert their eyes, he suggested, after debating with himself how far it was permissible to joke about such things under the circumstances. – It was, by the way, the tattoo that the neighbour recognised.
He zoomed in further still.
– What is this? he asked, pointing to four small dots under the shoulder.
He magnified the image to show a slight swelling under each of them.
– Needle marks, Norbakk volunteered.
– No doubt about it. What do we make of that?
– She takes drugs, suggested one of the new members of the team, a young man with cheeks pitted with acne scars. He was on loan from Majorstua and was hardly likely to contribute anything to the investigation. When Viken had requested more resources, he had been thinking of quality, not making up the numbers. Now he stood swaying back and forth on the soles of his feet, like a teacher savouring the pleasures of correcting a boy who should have known better.
– Apparently gave it up years ago, he informed him. – And this is on the outside of the arm, nowhere near the larger arteries. In addition, no trace of the usual narcotics in the blood. And as you will remember … He showed a new picture. – Cecilie Davidsen’s upper right arm: three similar pinpricks, five on the thigh. And here, Paulsen: four pricks in the upper left arm, four in each thigh.
– Tranquillisers, the new man from Majorstua corrected himself.
– Precisely, said Viken in an amiable tone. He had no objection to greenhorns, provided they weren’t too green. – Dr Plåterud found traces of the same narcotic as was used on the other victims.
– I’m guessing she was subjected to similar treatment, Norbakk ventured. – Tranquillised a few times before being given the fatal overdose.
– Exactly.
Viken clicked up a new picture.
– Someone has left us a footprint in this mess on the floor. The party concerned was wearing a black sock, one hundred per cent cotton, shoe size 47. We’ve got people examining the fibres to see if there’s anything unusual about them.
– How many black socks are there in this town? was Sigge Helgarsson’s comment.
– That’s for you to find out, Viken grinned. – It’ll keep you busy for a while. We also found plenty of skin cells under the victim’s fingernails. Let’s just hope it wasn’t herself she was scratching.
He clicked on and continued.
– Here is the door jamb she was found propped up against.
He magnified the image and pointed.
– Five deeply scored marks across the woodwork, running downwards almost to the threshold.
The recruit from Majorstua exclaimed: – Like scratch marks from a claw.
– What do you think, Arve? Could this have been made by a bear’s paw?
– Looks like it. Pretty sick stuff …
– I quite agree, Viken said quietly. – Sicker than anything any of us have ever come across before.
He switched off the computer.
– I’ll bet a fiver that the neighbour, Miriam Gaizauskaite, had a visitor last night, even though she says not. She doesn’t sit up of an evening drinking out of two wine glasses, one with and one without lipstick. I want to find out everything we can about her background.
– Sounds like a lot of spadework for me, said Arve Norbakk. – Just so long as I don’t have to go to … where was it, Lithuania? he added with a big grin.
Jarle Frøen spoke.
– What about the actual investigation so far?
– Relax, Mr Prosecutor, Viken said patiently. – We’re about to get on to that right now. Jebsen, you can start.
Nina looked down at her notes.
– I spoke to the newspaper delivery man. Mehmed Faruq, fifty-three years old, originally from Kurdistan. His papers all appear to be in order. Speaks passable Norwegian. I’ve got a list of things he noticed in the course of his morning route, from Carl Berners Place and on down. Three, possibly four cars in Helgesens gate. A couple entering a block. A person getting out of a taxi at Sofienberg Park, right next to the scene of the crime. I traced the taxi driver and he confirms the time. He drove past the same place an hour earlier and on that occasion noticed a cyclist with a child-trailer. We’ll take a closer look at all these, but the most important thing is this: the delivery man encountered a male as he was passing through the gate at the address where the victim lived.
– Not bad, Nina. Description?
– The person in question is thirty to forty years old, well above medium height, powerfully built, wearing dark clothes, a coat or long jacket, dark hair. This was about ten past five. There was a light in the entrance, so the delivery man got a good look.
– The timing agrees with what the neighbour told us, that she heard someone opening the gate at around five. Have a good look at the delivery man, including his alibis for the other times that are of interest to us.
– Apparently he’s just returned from a fortnight in Germany seeing his relatives. Gardermoen airport records confirm that.
– Excellent.
– Some of you may have noted, continued Nina, – an obvious connection with what we have here and witness observations relating to the Paulsen case.
The child-trailer, Norbakk suggested. – You mentioned that a cyclist pulling one of those was seen earlier this morning too.
Nina winked at him.
– No flies on you. It took me a while longer to notice it. We’ve been assuming that Paulsen was transported from the woods to the place where the body was found. A car on a private forest road would have attracted attention. A child-trailer, on the other hand …
Viken noticed that she didn’t seem to mind at all that Arve Norbakk was following her with his droopy eyes.
– But that’s for transporting small children in, he interrupted.
– In the bigger models there’s room for two large children, Nina explained. – And note that this bicycle with the child-trailer was observed right next to the scene of the crime at quarter to four in the morning. Who cycles around with children in the middle of the night?
Sigge Helgarsson woke up.
– Not everyone detaches the trailer every time they go out. Mine is always on, whether the kids are with me or not.
Norbakk offered his support to Nina.
– Hilde Paulsen was 157 centimetres tall and anything but overweight. She was found with her legs doubled up under her. And Anita Elvestrand’s body was partially mutilated.
– My trailer’s down in the garage, said Sigge. – We can check it for size.
Nina smiled brightly.
– I saw it not long ago and took the liberty of trying it out myself. There would definitely be room for a small, lightly built woman inside it.
Viken had a witty comment on the tip of his tongue but at the last moment decided against sharing it.
– You’ve certainly not been wasting your time, Jebsen, he said instead, and almost patted her on the head. – A description of the man at the gate will be released to the media if he has not reported himself to us within, – he glanced at his watch, – precisely five hours from now.
43
AXEL HEARS A phone. He recognises the ringtone but it isn’t his. He searches around the room. The sound is getting closer, but he can’t find where it’s coming from.
He woke with a start and looked around the strange room. It took a few moments for him to realise he was in Rita’s apartment in Tåsen. A few moments more before the memory of what had happened fell over him like an avalanche. He sat upright on the leather sofa. The clock on the wall showed 1.45.
His feet felt cold. He’d thrown his socks away in a rubbish bin in Sofienberg Park. He picked up the phone, turned on the sound. A long list of unanswered calls. Four from Bie, three from Miriam. He called her.
– Where
are you, Axel? Why aren’t you answering your phone?
– I needed to sleep for a few hours. Are the police there?
– They’ve been here asking all sorts of questions. After that they rang me twice. Some of them are still out there on the landing. They’ve been in here too, looking all over the place, looking for something. And there’s a man standing guard down in the back yard. I just wish I could wake up soon and all this was only a nightmare.
– The woman lying there, was it your neighbour?
He could hear she was crying. Couldn’t think of anything to say to comfort her.
– What did you tell them?
She didn’t reply at once.
– You didn’t tell them I’d been there?
– No, Axel, please … but they rang just now and asked if I’d seen a man who went out the gate early this morning. The description fitted you.
– The delivery man. He saw me.
– You’ve got to go and talk to them, Axel. Straight away.
He called Bie.
– Axel, she cried. – Are you trying to kill me? Have you any idea how many times I’ve called you? Rita says you’re not well but she has no idea where you are. I was just about to start ringing round the hospitals.
– The hospitals? Pull yourself together, Bie.
– You’re the one who needs to pull himself together, she screamed. – Don’t you know how worried I’ve been?
He tried to breathe calmly.
– Listen to me, Bie. Don’t interrupt. Something’s happened. I can’t tell you everything yet. I’ll talk to you when I get home. I’m not sick, do you hear me, I am not sick. There’s something I have to sort out first.
– But where are you?
– With friends. They’re helping me.
– Can’t you come now? she pleaded, her voice suddenly small and frail.
– Brede, he said suddenly. – I must find Brede.
– Brede? Does this have something to do with him? She sounded almost relieved.
– I have to find him. Then I’ll come home.
After ending the call, he sat thinking for a while. This idea about Brede was something that had just occurred to him. He couldn’t tell her the truth. Not yet. He slumped down into the sofa again.
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