Gunnarstranda looked out at the bare trees whizzing past. A couple of kilometres away the tower at Arlanda Airport stood out. A plane was on its way in to land, its tail low. The wheels were out as if to break its fall.
In a way it was sad to say goodbye. Gunnarstranda liked the man at the wheel. Asim Shamoun was open and generous. The day before he had been almost angry when Gunnarstranda insisted on paying for dinner himself, and now he had personally driven the Norwegian policeman from Sødermalm to Arlanda to make sure he left OK.
‘Just one thing,’ Gunnarstranda said as Shamoun came to a halt outside the departure terminal.
Shamoun raised both eyebrows and switched off the CD player.
‘Did Adeler – the official – know you’re the father of Aud Helen’s daughter?’
Shamoun laughed good-naturedly.
Gunnarstranda, who had spent the whole of the previous day in this man’s company, knew the laughter was a front and he probably wouldn’t answer. ‘Come on,’ Gunnarstranda said. ‘Aud Helen arranged this meeting for you. The official must’ve been given an explanation as to why she was bothering to mediate, to organise the meeting?’
‘Aud Helen asked me not to mention Sara,’ Shamoun answered at length.
‘She asked you to keep the relationship between you and your daughter quiet? Why?’
Asim Shamoun shrugged. ‘It wasn’t relevant. We weren’t going to discuss private relationships at the meeting. It was to be exclusively about MacFarrell, my homeland and the occupation.’
‘But she must’ve flagged up a reason to the official? From what I gather, you’d been trying to get a meeting with Adeler for ages and had been told “no” time and time again. Then Aud Helen comes onto the scene. She must’ve said something to him to make him change his mind?’
Shamoun shrugged again. This, clearly, was not something he was comfortable with.
‘What was Aud Helen’s explanation for how she’d been able to arrange this meeting?’
‘Why do you ask?’
‘I don’t know,’ Gunnarstranda admitted openly. He didn’t want to talk about the gut instinct he was feeling right now.
‘She told me to say she and I had met at the Norwegian Embassy in Stockholm when she was on the Standing Committee for Foreign Affairs – and that was how we had got to know each other.’
Gunnarstranda pondered. He couldn’t understand why Vestgård would be so furtive, and he could read in Shamoun’s eyes that the man was uneasy about this as well.
‘Is she ashamed that you’re the father of Sara?’
‘No.’ Shamoun shook his head and held both hands up in defence. ‘I don’t think so. Sara’s over twenty now, and that thought has never struck me – never.’
‘But it’s not common knowledge in Norway that you’re Sara’s father, is it?’
‘No; why would it be? Aud Helen is a free western woman. She has two daughters from different men. I’m one of them, but I belong to Aud Helen’s distant past…’
Gunnarstranda continued to ponder. He couldn’t make this fit. ‘Sorry,’ he said again, ‘but can you imagine any reason at all why she didn’t want Adeler to know the two of you had a past?’
Shamoun shrugged. ‘None. You’d better ask Aud Helen. But she arranged this meeting only with extreme reluctance.’ He smiled apologetically. ‘My apologies, but I don’t like talking behind Aud Helen’s back. That is to say, my impression was that her resistance was tied up with our relationship. She didn’t want Adeler or anyone else to know I was Sara’s father.’
‘But have you experienced this reluctance to admit the relationship between you before?’
Shamoun reacted. ‘Why are you so curious?’
Gunnarstranda was slow to respond. He felt he was onto something important, he felt his trip to Stockholm had finally paid off. ‘Because we’ve pushed Aud Helen from one entrenched position to the other,’ he said. ‘Yesterday she presented a personal statement to the investigators leading the case in which she told them Sara was your child. The fact that you’re Sara’s father has raised her above all suspicion. That’s why it seems entirely illogical that she would insist on keeping the relationship with you hidden.’
Asim laughed. ‘You’re forgetting one thing. I represent Polisario. I’m politically controversial. Aud Helen has a political career to protect.’
Gunnarstranda nodded. He could understand that. Nonetheless, Aud Helen Vestgård was a politician, he thought. She knew Sveinung Adeler well. Sooner or later Adeler would have discovered the past she shared with Shamoun. Sooner or later. Why would she conjure up a different relationship with Shamoun from the truth? This he didn’t understand. There had to be a motive of course. For some reason it suited Vestgård’s purposes that her relationship with the man who represented Polisario remained a secret for as long as possible.
But Asim had assisted him as much as he could.
Gunnarstranda shook his hand and thanked him for the lift and all his help. He got out of the car.
As soon as the door was closed the Arab rhythms began to throb from inside. The car moved off. The music died away. Gunnarstranda turned and went to check in for the flight to Oslo.
4
She was on her way to a lighter, though blurred, surface. Water, she guessed. When the light came closer she was able to distinguish additional features. She wasn’t under water. She could breathe. She felt hands groping her body. In her pockets. These sensations grew weaker. She looked down, beneath her, into the darkness. But she didn’t want to go down and fought to ascend. There. The light and the surface were coming closer and closer.
Something wet hit her in the face and hair. Alcohol! It was strong and it made her cough. He was splashing alcohol over her!
Upright. She was standing upright. Lena just managed to open her eyes. She was leaning against a man. She was in Steffen’s flat. The man was pulling her towards the front door. Her legs gave way. But he held her up. He was strong; the arm holding her upright was like a steel cable.
She was on the stairs, going down. It was easier now. She wanted to fall but couldn’t. The arm holding her was vice-like.
The icy air on her face told her she was outside. Her legs gave way again. When she opened her eyes she saw her own car in the light beneath the street lamps.
She half fell into the car and curled up on the passenger seat. She tried to get out, but the door was slammed shut. Then she had no more energy and leaned her head against the window.
The plan was to find the handle and open the door. But there was no chance.
Her hands hurt and she looked down at her wrists. They were bound with cable ties. Everything was beginning to spin round. She was nauseous. Almost as though she was drunk out of her skull. She swallowed, but the nausea was still there.
When she could finally see without images spinning round, she saw lines of headlights. Cars coming towards them. So he was driving in the opposite direction to the rush-hour traffic, out of town. But it was hard to see, hard to think. Her head and upper body fell against the door every time the car turned. The lights from the oncoming traffic swept over the face of the man behind the wheel. She had seen him before. He had run after her with a gun in his hand.
What did he want?
The nausea was intense. She felt better if she didn’t move.
The windscreen wipers thrashed to and fro.
She raised her hands and aimed at the wheel.
The pain travelled from one temple to the other as his fist hit home.
The glove compartment.
He said something and pulled her into a sitting position by her hair. The brutal fist struck again.
Through the pain she heard the glove-compartment door fall open. The glove compartment was open in the darkness.
She closed her eyes. They stayed closed for a long time. She had no idea how long. Once again she fought to ascend to the surface. It was faster now. The poison was on its way out of her body.
When she opened her
eyes wide there was no oncoming traffic lighting up the driver’s face. The windscreen wipers were no longer working.
The glove compartment.
She leaned forwards, thrust her hands in and screamed with pain as he struck. She closed her eyes and mouth and waited for the next blow. It didn’t come.
But she had her fingers around the pepper spray.
The car wasn’t moving.
A cold gust of air blew into the car as he got out. He was going to come around the car and drag her out. But she had the spray. She braced herself.
The door opened.
She pointed the spray at the man, who knocked it out of her hands.
The next second she was lying on the ground. The snow was soft and cold. She waited for the punches and kicks. But they didn’t come. Slowly she got to her knees.
Car headlamps lit up a narrow path that had been cleared in the snow.
Where was he?
She scoured the darkness.
‘Here,’ the voice said.
She twisted her head in his direction and screamed when she got the pepper spray in her face.
Burning hot spikes pierced her eyes and nose. She screamed so loudly her voice went falsetto.
A single clear voice in her mind: Get out of here! She buried her head in the snow, ate the snow, bored her eyes into the snow.
When she resurfaces, it is not a slow ascent towards light above the water. She simply opens her eyes. They are not ablaze as before; the pain is more like a glow, a throbbing pulse in a smouldering burn.
She sees he has cut the cable ties around her wrists. What does he want?
Why has he cut the ties?
She stands up. She has two legs, two arms and ten claws and she uses them. Kicks at him, scratches him. She falls and he grabs her foot. He drags her across the snow, her jacket rucks up, her bare back scrapes over snow and ice.
She smells salt and seaweed. She hears the beating of waves and she knows what is about to happen.
He pulls her to the edge where the sea awaits.
She kicks out. She knocks him off-balance and he lets go of her, and she rolls downwards. Her head hits the rock face and she has hair in her mouth as she rolls towards the sea that is waiting to swallow her up. Her hands scrabble in panic for a hold and her fingers fasten onto a thin branch to break her fall.
She gasps for breath.
The waves below are licking their lips.
Suddenly the air is knocked out of her lungs and she groans again. Sees the shadow of a boot launching a kick. I’m going to die, she thinks. I’m going to die, but not on my own. She lets go of the branch and makes a grab for the boot with both hands. And gains a hold. She clings to his calf. He shakes his leg, but his calf is all that is holding her to life. He is strong. His foot lifts her off the ground. She clings on. Won’t let go. The next time he can’t raise his foot as high. She uses her body weight to grip tighter.
Her strength is ebbing away.
Then something happens.
She can feel that he has lost control of his body. He keels over. She starts with surprise and hears the heavy body hit rock.
She is slipping towards the sea.
That is when she realises she is no longer slipping. She is lying still and stretching her toes. They met an overhang on the way down, something anyway. She can’t see what.
Where is he?
She can’t see anything. Only hears waves beating against the cliff.
He is down there, below her somewhere. She casts around for a crack, finds one and sinks her fingertips in it. Grips tight and tries to look down the slippery rock face.
Day is slowly dawning. She can make out the shelf her feet are resting on. A small ledge in the cliff, a rugged shelf, the kind children can dive from on hot summer days. She has to go down further and her frozen, numb fingers find another crack in the rock. She isn’t thinking, only acting.
But then gravity wins. Her body starts slipping. Her jacket catches. This time it is her stomach that takes the brunt of it as she slides towards the sea and death. But then her body comes to a halt. Her feet have found another ledge in the wet rock. The spray from the waves soaks her hair and face.
She rests and looks around her.
He is nowhere to be seen.
What happened?
Why did he lose his balance?
Where is he?
She can hear nothing. Stays where she is.
It is getting lighter. But she can’t hear anyone, can’t see anyone.
She is hungry. She is wet, cold and stiff. But she doesn’t want to be swallowed up by the waves.
I don’t want to drown, Lena thinks. I’m going to survive and afterwards I’ll get healthy. I’ll squeeze that bloody tumour in my breast to nothing. I’ll beat it even if I have to suffer shooting pains that are worse than this.
She raises her right leg and searches for a foothold. Now her left leg. Push, slip, stretch upwards.
A clean bill of health, she thinks. First this; afterwards a clean bill of health.
She clings to the rock face, possessed by one sole thought: to heave herself up another half a metre. Her left leg finds a foothold, she puts her weight on her foot, raises herself another half a metre from the waves. Her stiff fingers fumble for the branch that saved her before. But she is exhausted, she has cramp in her forearm, she is losing any feeling in her fingers and she can’t rely on her own strength.
At last she finds the branch and pushes off with both legs. She can feel the centre of gravity in her body shifting. Now the angle is with her. She can let go without sliding back down, but she daren’t let go. She is soaked with sweat in the freezing cold and scrabbles her way back through the snow to her car.
5
She rested her head against the wall as the hot water cascaded over her shoulders. The water formed her hair into a wet, heavy plait and ran down her back as she breathed through her open mouth and tried to place her body where the jets from the showerhead were strongest. She couldn’t get enough hot water. It was steaming, but she turned the temperature up higher and it was almost painful as the water worked on her grazes, cuts and stiff muscles. She had no idea how long she had been in the shower. The only thing that had any meaning was letting the water soothe the pain and run and wash away the grime that had accumulated in her mind. She opened her eyes and glimpsed her red skin through the steam and thought: Is it possible to burn yourself without feeling the pain? She answered the question herself. No. She was repeating this answer when the telephone rang. She let it ring, fleetingly wondering who might be ringing her now, today. Who is missing me? She turned up the temperature and clenched her teeth so as not to scream, until she could no longer stand it and rotated the dial the opposite way. Freezing cold water streamed down over her body, but she felt no shock, she could only confirm that the water was cold. She lifted her face and let the cold water run, determined that it would make all the sensation in her skin disappear entirely. It didn’t happen though. Instead she began to tremble. This is no good, she thought, and turned off the water. She gasped for breath as though she had given everything in a final sprint. She stood like this, leaning against the glass partition, until her breathing was normal. Then she got out of the cubicle and examined her body in the mirror. A cut over one eye. That could be explained. Worse was the cut over her ear. She had grazes over her stomach and hips, and red bruising over her shoulder blades. Slowly and carefully she rubbed in some cream.
What had actually happened early today? He had waited for her in the flat, hit her over the head and splashed alcohol over her. Why?
Presumably to make her seem drunk, get her down the stairs and…?
He had been waiting for her, it struck her. He had been waiting in Steffen’s flat.
She sat on the edge of the bath and was rubbing in cream when the phone rang again.
She got up. Put down the jar of cream. Went out of the bathroom and over to the unrelenting telephone. She lifted the receiver.
/> ‘Gunnarstranda.’
‘Just a mo,’ Lena said quickly.
‘Yes?’
Lena collected her thoughts. ‘You’re back from Stockholm?’
‘Just this minute. Thought I’d have a chat with you, sift through the important details of the trip instead of writing an essay.’
‘We can do a bit of sifting now.’
‘Rindal rang and told me about the child Vestgård had with Shamoun. So I broached the subject. And I got quite a surprising answer. According to Shamoun, Vestgård had told him not to mention to Adeler that they’d had a child together.’
Lena could feel how sick she was getting of this woman’s intrigues.
‘I reckon she’s up to jiggery-pokery again,’ Gunnarstranda said.
Lena didn’t answer.
‘Why are you at home?’
‘Overslept,’ Lena said quickly. ‘Fell on the piste last night.’ She regretted her words at once. This was the excuse she had been going to use later.
Gunnarstranda was silent for too long. Of course the old fox scented something or other.
‘What was that again?’ Gunnarstranda asked at last.
‘Hm?’ Lena said artlessly.
‘The stuff about the piste.’
‘We can talk about it later,’ Lena said hurriedly. ‘I’m on my way now. Bye.’ She rang off.
She didn’t go to work at once. She went into the bathroom and then to bed.
When she threw back the duvet it was because she had given up on her resolution to get a bit of shuteye. But her watch said something else. She thought she had been in bed for ten minutes. Actually she had slept for two hours. She looked at herself in the mirror. That’s the first time you’ve slept with your eyes open, she said.
Steffen asked me what time it was. He gave me the key and told me to go in and get it. Someone had been waiting for me in the flat. Why?
6
She found a parking spot on the corner of Hausmanns gate and waited. Stared intently at the front entrance of Dagens Næringsliv. Half an hour passed before a Highways Authority vehicle drove slowly past and stopped. The man behind the wheel waved a hand as if to chase her away. In the end he made the effort to get out of his van. The man had a little soul patch and carried a ticket machine in his belt as if it were a revolver. She opened the door and showed him her ID card. ‘Police.’
The Ice Swimmer Page 21
