Love and Other Lies

by Ben McPherson

  “Oh please.” Jo laughed. “The police here are way too reasonable to harass you. And look . . .”

  He passed me his phone. A newspaper front page. They had used a studio picture we had taken last spring: Elsa, Vee, Franklin on my shoulders, and at the front, looking straight down the barrel of the lens, Licia. In stark red text were the words:

  Korrupsjon eller inkompetanse?

  Elsa was laughing. “They put us on the front page of Posten?”

  I said, “Does that mean what I think . . . ?”

  “Corruption or incompetence,” Jo translated. “Three major police errors that cost us our daughter. You really are taking the fight to the police, Cal. You didn’t know they were doing this?”

  The crazy euphoria of the moment. I handed the phone to Elsa. She stared at it, eyes shining.

  Then Edvard was there in front of us.

  “I thought I sent you to get beer,” said Jo. “Go get these people some beer.”

  But Edvard simply stood there.

  “What is it, kjære?” said Jo. “Ed?”

  “I’ve been suspended.”

  And as we were staring at Edvard in disbelief, and as Jo was reaching out to comfort him, the phone in Elsa’s hand began to ring.

  “It’s Tvist,” she said. She passed me the phone.

  I pressed answer. I raised the phone to my ear. I heard Tvist’s voice say, “You and your wife will meet me at headquarters.”

  Thirty-Three

  A modest corporate space at the end of the main office. Two blue plastic chairs waiting in front of the large white desk. We sat down, holding hands.

  “Keep the faith,” whispered Elsa.

  “Yes,” I said. “Keep the faith.”

  Tvist approaching from the far end of the office.

  “No interrogation room?” I said as he reached us.

  “The prosecutors have asked for the helicopter footage to be admitted into evidence. The Andersens have offered no objection. Well done.”

  We had expected anger, but Tvist looked tired. The past year had aged him. His shoulders curved forward; patches of puckered flesh gathered beneath his lower eyelids.

  He opened a drawer, placed a typed sheet on the desk. A transcript of my broadcast. Then he reached across and switched on the recorder.

  “Perhaps you wish to formalize your very serious accusations.”

  That strange solemnity as he looked from me to Elsa; that sense that he expected us to fill the silence.

  “Edvard is not my source,” I said.

  “Edvard . . . is not the reason you are here.”

  We said nothing. Tvist sat drumming his fingers. Eventually he said, “I’m compelled to ask you how you came by your footage.”

  I looked at Elsa. She gave a tiny shake of the head.

  I turned to Tvist. “No.”

  He gave a sharp, fleeting smile. “There are some dangerous people in our safe little country. It is my job to protect your family from those people. Agreed?”

  That smile again.

  Elsa glanced at me. Was he threatening us? It sounded nothing like a threat. I wondered how protective he would feel when he saw the front page of Posten.

  “All respect, but this is not a difference of opinion.” Elsa’s voice, her fury barely contained.

  “No?”

  “Your tactical unit’s boat sank; your armed officers hid in their car. These are hard truths, not opinions.”

  “Well, we could argue for hours about the difference between a fact and a truth and an opinion. But by making his ‘truths’ public, your husband has done the very thing that he is accusing my officers of.” He turned to me. “When you put your needs before the needs of the nation you make my job difficult. There can be reasons why we do not wish your facts to emerge.”

  “And then,” said Elsa, “you will smile and tell him that he’s welcome here, and that in time he will learn how things work, and that for the sake of the country he should keep his foreign mouth shut, because his story could have consequences that he does not fully understand.”

  Tvist laughed. “Your husband is clearly not the only satirist in the family.”

  Elsa scowled.

  Tvist turned to me. “There is one unsettling consequence to your posting the material. The video has traveled widely. Been widely seen. A viral hit.”

  Another pause.

  Tvist pressed his fingertips against his forehead. “Cal, Elsa . . .” He turned to us each in turn. He seemed genuinely to be struggling to find the words. “We have for a long time assumed that your daughter was on the island. That Licia was the girl in the blue dress.”

  It struck me that perhaps for once he was not manipulating us; that there was a reason for his solemnity.

  “As a result of the video you posted, another father has contacted us, claiming that it is his daughter in the film.”

  “It’s Licia,” I said. “Elsa spoke to her.”

  “Before she arrived at the island,” said Tvist.

  “We had texts,” said Elsa.

  “From a phone that was not on the island. It isn’t Licia in the footage.”

  The impact of those words: so gentle at first, yet so firm, like an arm clamping around my neck. We had spent a year believing . . .

  “This man is a Chechen. He lives in London. He had no idea that his older daughter was in Norway, let alone that she was on the island. You will see she looked a little like Licia.” He opened a drawer, slid a picture across the surface of the desk. Elsa and I looked at each other. I picked it up.

  “This girl was not known to us,” said Tvist. “No records. Perhaps she came looking for a better life.”

  The picture had been taken in winter. Blond hair, plaited, worn under a fur hat that covered her ears. Red cheeks, a warm smile. A beautiful child, but not our child.

  “From a distance one might indeed think this girl was your daughter. She was also fifteen.”

  Elsa took the picture from my hand. “Is this the girl whose body we were shown?”

  “We have no record of that.”

  She laughed, a bitter, angry sound in that neutral white room.

  “Mistakes were made on that day. However . . .” Tvist pinched the bridge of his nose. “This girl’s name is Maria Krikk. My best guess is that Maria traveled unaccompanied, without papers. Disappeared from the radar. There are many such children seeking sanctuary here. Her father and sister have not seen her for eighteen months.”

  “She has a sister?”

  “A year younger than your Viktoria.”

  “If she was living here illegally,” I said, “why go to Garden Island?”

  “Maybe she was an idealist? A feminist? Who knows?”

  “Makes no sense.”

  “To this day we have no concrete evidence that your daughter was ever on the island.”

  “There’s her dress,” said Elsa. “Which you failed to find.”

  “You are right to point out our mistake.” He looked up, addressed himself to me. “We have searched the island extensively since then. The dress does not make your case. No further evidence has emerged.”

  “Just like you found no evidence of an organization,” said Elsa.

  “Listen, please, to what I’m saying to you. Maria Krikk is a better fit than Licia Curtis.”

  Desperation in Elsa’s eyes. “Search again. Please.”

  That same patient smile. “There is nothing more.”

  I said, “You have the print from Licia’s shoe on the police boat.”

  “A similar shoe. Yes. But we have no such prints on the grass, or on the path, or in any of the other places you might expect.”

  “It was dry,” I said.

  “Precisely. Doesn’t mean she wasn’t there, but we can’t say that she was. Look . . .” He leaned across his desk. “What I am about to say violates another family’s right to privacy. I need an assurance that you will not publish what I am about to tell you, nor indeed will you discuss it outside this r
oom. Either of you. Do you understand me?”

  Elsa nodded. I nodded.

  “All right. You have a right to know this, I think. Maria is unusual among the victims in that she was struck by three bullets. Her body was found in the water near the boat dock on the island. The first of those bullet holes matches the hole in the shoulder of her dress. From the first bullet fired, before she escaped from the main house and ran. We believe she removed the dress before she entered the water. As you know, we could find no trace of anything that could be said with certainty to be Licia’s DNA.”

  I looked across at Elsa. A thought began to grow in me. The most exciting, dangerous thought, only Elsa had not seen it yet.

  I said, “You found this other girl’s DNA?”

  “I cannot speak to you about procedure that does not relate to your case. But I may tell you that Maria is our best fit and you may read what you will between the lines . . .” He let his voice trail off, watching us to make sure we understood.

  “This is wrong,” Elsa was saying. “You’re giving up on Licia.”

  “Love, I don’t think that’s what he’s saying.” Hope was coursing through me. “Elsa, if Licia wasn’t on the island—”

  “We can’t, Cal,” she said. “We can’t let ourselves believe that she’s alive. Because every time, that hope turns to nothing.”

  “But if she really wasn’t there . . .”

  We locked eyes. I could see that the thought terrified her.

  I said, “Breathe, love.”

  “We had an independent witness confirm Maria’s identity,” Tvist was saying.

  Elsa’s eyes were locked onto mine. “Who?”

  Tvist exhaled heavily. “Understand that I’m obliged to protect that witness’s identity.”

  Elsa turned. She was staring very intently at Tvist.

  “Why?” she said. “Why are you obliged?”

  “Please understand what I’m saying to you.”

  “Oh. You mean it’s a child,” said Elsa quietly. She gave a little half laugh. She turned from Tvist to me. “He means Arno. That Arno confirmed her identity.”

  “Did he?” I turned to Tvist.

  That warm, sympathetic smile. “You must respect my procedures, but again you may read between the lines.”

  Elsa couldn’t quite let it go. “How would a person who doesn’t speak confirm or deny anything?”

  “By pointing and by nodding,” said Tvist very simply. “Cal, Elsa, I know this doesn’t bring your daughter back,” he said. “But it’s something to hold on to, no?”

  Elsa, though, was in shock.

  We sat on a bench on the dirty path that led down from the police station. The air was thick with barbecue smoke.

  “Jesus fuck, Cal.”

  “But this could be good, love. This could be really good.”

  “We’ve spent a year believing she was a hero. When all the time it was Maria who saved Arno.”

  “I know. But if she’s alive, Elsa . . .” I was struggling to contain my elation. “If she’s alive, then we don’t need Licia to be a hero. We just need to find her and bring her home. And we need to tell Vee.”

  “Please don’t.”

  “She has a right to know.”

  “Know what? That her sister is not a hero? That we have no idea where she is?”

  “Elsa,” I said, “can’t we please find the good in what Tvist just told us? Because what he’s telling us is that she could be alive.”

  “Cal,” she said, “the police have had a year to find her. And they’re nowhere. We’re nowhere. We’re all starting from scratch.”

  Vee was awake when we got home. She accepted the news about Licia, asked us very few questions. I made martinis. Vee sat with us on the dirty gray planter at the back of the apartment as Elsa scrolled through Twitter and I looked out over the hills in silence.

  “Are we ever going to go home, Dad?” Vee said at last. I turned. The set of her jaw was heartbreakingly adult. “Or did this place just kind of become our home?”

  “I don’t know, Vee.”

  “Rhetorical question.” She got to her feet, stood looking at me.

  “What, love?”

  “I was so sure it was her in the helicopter footage.”

  “Everyone was.”

  “People need to see it, though, right?”

  “They do.”

  “Okay. Night, Dad. Mum.” She leaned across and kissed me, nodded a good night to Elsa. “Don’t stay up late, Mum,” she said as she headed for bed.

  Elsa watched Vee go. When we heard the tap running in the bathroom, Elsa said, “I keep trying to find reasons not to go back to the courtroom tomorrow. For Vee’s sake, I know we have to. But the truth is we’ve spent a year fighting the wrong battles. Making enemies of the wrong people. Did you see what you get when you drop Tvist’s name into Google these days?”

  She reached for her phone, unlocked it with her thumb, handed it to me.

  That image of Licia with the gun. Someone had Photoshopped Tvist’s head on the left side of the card, as if Licia had him in her sights. Underneath were the words:

  THIS IS WHAT THE #ARYAN #RESISTANCE LOOKS LIKE

  I said, “So weird, the way this thing mutates and mutates.”

  She nodded. “It’s the opposite of what it was when it started. The opposite of who Licia is. But it’s an exact encapsulation of what those men believe. Pretty white girl taking out the country’s first black police chief. Fuck, Cal. Our daughter became a white supremacist meme.”

  She picked up her glass, drained it.

  “My love,” I said.

  “I can’t stand the way all this hatred seems to seep into my soul. I don’t have the stomach for it. I want us to go home, and we can’t. So I guess we stay here and we pick ourselves up off the floor and we set about finding Licia. All over again.”

  “My poor tired horse,” I said.

  She leaned in to me. “Promise me you won’t have me euthanized.”

  I knew I should ask her about the gun, but I could not. Because when we laughed our laughter felt very close to tears. And so we sat for the longest time, arms around each other, watching as the sky turned from gold to the deepest red.

  Thirty-Four

  The prosecutor was playing the video in short segments, taking the court through the timeline, reading from her notes: the names of the dead; the manner of each death. Elsa looked weary. Vee was alert, desperate to know what other people thought of the footage.

  We could see whose children the prosecutor was talking about simply from looking at their backs. A small group would stiffen in anticipation. The Andersens would stare at the mothers and the fathers, the brothers and the sisters, of the children they had cut down. The family would clasp each other tightly, sit stock-still while the prosecutor read out her text. No one cried; no one was willing to hand the Andersens that victory.

  The brothers showed neither pleasure nor shame; their eyes were unblinking and clear. In the face of such cruelty, the families’ quiet courage was almost too much to bear.

  When the helicopter crossed the fjord, when the screen showed the tactical unit foundering in their red rubber boat, people murmured. The chief judge sat with her hand across her mouth. Here and there people laughed in outrage, an eerie sound in this solemn place. When the boat turned around the laughter increased.

  The Andersen brothers looked out across the rows of seats, at the survivors and the families of the victims, taking in the shock and the laughter. Then John Andersen turned to Paul Andersen, and the brothers laughed too, as if joining in a shared joke.

  The laughter among the families stopped. Only the brothers were laughing now, hard and cold and cruel.

  Vee leaned in. “Dad, is this making people feel worse?”

  I pulled her to me. “People have a right to know the truth. You did a good thing.”

  The courtroom was silent but for the rustling of clothes and the catching of breath. The camera was above the shower blo
ck, silently looking down, while inside nineteen children were murdered.

  When I looked up it was into the face of Paul Andersen. He made sure he had my attention, then gave the smallest of nods. He turned and said something to his brother, who laughed.

  It was our turn.

  They were staring hard at Vee, trying to lock onto her gaze.

  “Eyes on the screen, Vee.”

  Elsa took Vee’s right hand; I took her left.

  There was the girl who matched Licia’s description, down at the cliff’s edge on Garden Island.

  Vee leaned in to me. “Strange, once you know it’s not her.”

  “Very.”

  It wasn’t Licia, and didn’t feel like Licia now. Hard to believe we could have thought it was.

  I looked across at Elsa. She nodded. She was thinking the same thing. And so we emptied our faces of expression and kept our eyes on the screen. All the while I felt the eyes of the Andersen brothers boring into ours, trying to take pleasure in a pain that we no longer felt, because the girl on-screen was another family’s missing daughter. You could feel the hope in this girl, in the way she stood, could feel through the screen the certainty that she was being rescued, that she was saved.

  A terrifying cosmic joke. There would be no rescue.

  You saw it as the camera drew away. You felt the melting away of certainty, as if the breath were gone from the girl’s body. You saw beside her the other children who were to die with her, and the boy Arno who would survive but would never speak of it, and you saw in those children that same lack of hope as you saw in the girl. You saw the grown man in a torn T-shirt pushing through the children, deciding they were lost, but that he might yet be saved.

  I felt Vee gripping my hand.

  “Vee, are you okay?” I said as quietly as I could.

  “The picture is wrong.”

  The blue of the dress was off. Too bright, too saturated. The rock beside the girl was too red. The grass beyond too green. Everything felt miscalibrated, over-intense.

  “It’s the colors, Vee.”

  “No. It’s something else.”

  She looked about her. “Vee, eyes on the screen.” But the brothers were no longer trying to lock eyes with her. They were staring at the screen, that same hungry look on their faces. The man in the T-shirt dropped out of shot as the camera outpaced him, racing along the path that led toward the cabins. They were curious, I guessed, to see the moment of their victim’s death.