by Anne Holt
‘Here,’ she said, handing him a long, sharp knife. ‘I used my womanly wiles.’
He slit the envelope open, stuck two fingers into the gaping hole and fished out a document. It consisted of only two pages, and at the top of the first sheet it said LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT in capital letters.
‘It’s a will,’ he said, disappointed and once again completely superfluously, because the secretary was standing right next to him. He turned away irritably and demanded a cup of tea. She nodded stiffly and went into the outer office.
The name of the testator seemed familiar to Kristen Faber, even if he couldn’t quite place it. Niclas Winter was the sole heir. A quick glance suggested an extensive estate, even if phrases such as ‘the entire portfolio’ and ‘all property’ didn’t actually say very much.
The document met all the legal requirements. The pages were numbered and it had been signed by both the testator and two witnesses who did not stand to benefit from the contents. When the solicitor saw the date the will had been drawn up, he frowned for a moment before making a brief note on a Post-it.
The secretary was back with a cup of tea. Irritating, thought Faber. It must have been ready before he even asked. Quickly, he slipped the will back in the envelope and sealed it with a wide strip of sticky tape. He put the yellow Post-it note on the front.
‘Put this in the safe,’ he said. ‘I need to work out what to do with it. Niclas Winter is dead, but he might have heirs.’
‘No,’ said the secretary. ‘It said in the paper that he hasn’t got a single heir. As far as I understood, the state will get the lot.’
‘Right,’ said Kristen Faber, shrugging his shoulders. ‘Well, that’s not such a bad thing. The state bloody well takes enough from most people. But anyway, I think this document ought to be handed over to the State Inheritance Fund. I’ll look into it tomorrow.’
‘Tomorrow you’re in court with a new case,’ she reminded him. ‘Perhaps I could—?’
‘Yes,’ he said curtly. ‘You do it. Ring the inheritance fund and ask what we should do.’
‘Of course,’ she said with a smile. ‘I’ll do it first thing in the morning. Is your tea all right?’
He couldn’t even bring himself to answer.
*
‘Thank you so much for taking the trouble to come all the way out here again,’ she said, smiling uncertainly at the tall police officer. ‘I’ve sent the two older ones across to the neighbour’s, and William is just about to fall asleep. Lukas, poor soul, has slept all day.’
Adam Stubo kicked off his shoes and handed her his jacket, then went into the light, comfortable living room. There were toys and children’s books lying around, and a woollen sweater had been draped over the back of a dining chair to dry, and yet the room gave the impression of being tidy. Very pleasant, thought Adam, noticing the enormous framed child’s drawing hanging above a beige sofa piled high with brightly coloured cushions.
‘Who’s the artist?’ he smiled, nodding at the picture.
‘The middle one,’ she said. ‘Andrea.’
‘How old is she?’
‘Six.’
‘Six? Goodness, she’s talented!’
Astrid waved in the direction of the sofa.
‘Please sit down. Would you like a coffee?’
‘No, thank you. Not this late in the day.’
She glanced at a wall clock above the worktop in the open-plan kitchen. It was just after seven.
‘Water? Something else?’
‘No thanks.’
He moved a couple of cushions before sitting down. There was a faint smell of lemon and freshly baked bread, and the tinder-dry wood was burning brightly in the open fireplace. There was something very special about this home. The atmosphere was somehow more peaceful than he was used to in families with small children, and in spite of the slight untidiness everything seemed to be under control. He looked up when she put a cup of coffee, a jug of milk and a plate of buns in front of them, in spite of the fact that he had said no.
‘This sort of thing isn’t good for me,’ he said, taking one of the buns.
She smiled and went over to a shelf by the window looking out over the garden. When she came back she hesitated for a moment before sitting down next to him on the big, deep sofa. Adam was already halfway through his bun.
‘Absolutely delicious,’ he mumbled with his mouth full. ‘What’s inside?’
‘Ordinary jam,’ she said. ‘Strawberry jam. Here.’
She was holding out a photograph. Confused, he put the rest of the bun down on the plate and wiped his fingers assiduously on his trouser legs before taking the photograph and carefully placing it on his right knee.
The paper was thick and slightly yellowed, and the photograph had been taken at quite close quarters.
‘I hope I’m doing the right thing,’ she said almost inaudibly.
‘You are.’
He studied the picture in detail. Even if the woman wasn’t exactly beautiful, there was something appealing about the young face. She had big eyes, which he guessed were probably blue. She had a lovely smile, with the hint of a dimple in one cheek. One upper front tooth lay slightly on top of the other, and for a moment he frowned, deep in concentration.
‘I feel as if I’ve seen her before,’ he murmured.
Astrid didn’t reply. Instead, she looked at him with her mouth half-open, not breathing, as if she were about to say something, but couldn’t quite bring herself to.
He pre-empted her.
‘She looks a bit like Lukas, doesn’t she?’
She nodded.
‘Lukas thinks she’s his sister,’ she said. ‘That’s why he didn’t want to show you the photo. He wants to find her himself, and he doesn’t want any publicity about this. He thinks the family has had a hard enough time without this being plastered all over the papers. I’m sure he’s thinking mainly of his father, but also his mother’s reputation. And himself, to a certain extent.’
‘A sister,’ Adam said thoughtfully. ‘An unknown sister would definitely fit in with this story, but she’s—’
‘It’s just not possible,’ Astrid interrupted, sitting up very straight.
She sat like a queen beside him, erect and with no support for her back, legs close together.
‘Eva Karin would never have kept the existence of a sister secret from Lukas.’
‘I believe you,’ said Adam, without taking his eyes off the photograph. ‘Because if this woman is still alive, she’s too old to be Lukas’s sister.’
‘Too old? How do you know? There’s no date on the photo, and—’
It was Adam’s turn to interrupt.
‘In fact, we’ve already considered the possibility there might be a child. The story about meeting Jesus when she was sixteen was clearly crucial in Eva Karin’s life. It’s easy to imagine that she might have been pregnant at the time, and that she was saved in that context. The usual practice in those days was for young, unmarried mothers to give up their child for adoption. But …’
He grimaced and shook his head slightly.
‘I’ve formed a pretty good picture of the Bishop over the past few weeks. And I have to say I agree with you. If there was a child from those days, she would presumably have told Lukas. When he was grown up, at least. Today nobody would criticize her in any way. On the contrary, a story like that would back up everything she says … everything she said about abortion.’
Astrid took the photograph and held it up in front of her.
‘The resemblance could be pure coincidence,’ she said. ‘I’ve always thought Lukas looked like Lill Lindfors, and they’re definitely not related.’
‘Lill Lindfors?’ Adam grinned and shook his head as he examined the photograph once more. ‘She looks like her, too,’ he said in surprise. ‘And now you come to mention it, I can see the resemblance with Lukas. A dark-haired, male version of Lill Lindfors.’
‘And you look like Brian Dennehy,’ said Astrid with a smile
. ‘You know, the American actor. Even though I’m sure he’s not your brother.’
‘You’re not the first person to say that,’ grinned Adam, sitting up a little straighter. ‘But he’s a bit fatter than me, don’t you think?’
She didn’t answer. He took another bun.
‘How do you know she’s too old?’ she asked.
‘A woman born in 1962 or 1963 would be …’
He did a quick calculation.
‘Somewhere around forty-six today. Forty-six years old. How old do you think she was when this photograph was taken?’
Astrid held it up once again.
‘I don’t really know,’ she said dubiously. ‘Twenty-three? Twenty-five?’
‘Younger, probably. Perhaps only eighteen. People looked a little bit older in those days when they had a professional portrait taken. Something to do with clothes and hairstyles and so on, I should think. I was born in 1956 and I’d put money on the fact that the woman in that photograph is older than me.’
‘But how … ? You can’t—’
‘To begin with, there’s the quality of the paper,’ he said, gently holding one corner of the photo. ‘If this woman really was born at the beginning of the sixties, then the picture would have been taken …’
Once again he did a rapid calculation in his head.
‘Around 1980. Is there anything about this photo that suggests it was taken so late?’
Astrid slowly shook her head.
‘No,’ said Adam. ‘I think it was taken somewhere around the early sixties. Perhaps as late as 1965, but no later. Look at the clothes! The hairstyle!’
‘I was born in 1980,’ she said feebly. ‘I don’t know much about fashion in the sixties. But that means this woman … this lady … she must be the same age as Eva Karin!’
‘Yes,’ said Adam, stopping himself as he was about to take another bun. ‘And that means …’
He placed the photograph on his knee again. He leaned forward, examining the facial features. The straight, slender nose. The forehead, high and curved and completely unlined. The cheeks were smooth, and the hair looked as if it could have been painted on her head, in neat waves with a curl over the temple.
‘Could it be a sister?’ he murmured as he straightened up at last. ‘She doesn’t look like Eva Karin, but in a way it could explain the resemblance to Lukas. Sometimes our genes follow a strange, roundabout route, and—’
Astrid was staring at him in horror.
‘A sister? Eva Karin has two siblings, both younger than her. Einar Olav, who must be around forty-five, and Anne Turid, who turned fifty last year – no, the year before. That isn’t her!’
They heard a noise in the hallway. High, childish voices. Someone laughed and the front door banged shut.
Astrid quickly slipped the photograph back in its envelope. She hesitated only for a second before handing it to Adam.
‘Calm down, both of you!’
She didn’t take her eyes off him.
‘Daddy and William are asleep. Quiet, please.’
Adam got up. He headed for the hallway, and was almost bowled over as two children came racing in. They looked at him with curiosity.
‘Who are you?’ asked the younger child.
‘My name is Adam. And you’re Andrea, the new Picasso.’
The girl laughed. ‘No, I put the ears and the feet in the right places.’
‘That’s good,’ said Adam, ruffling her hair. ‘It’s always good to have those in the right place.’
‘Thank you for coming,’ said Astrid.
She was leaning on the door frame, her arms folded. She seemed somehow relieved. Her smile was no longer quite as guarded as it had been when he arrived, and she laughed when the eight-year-old showed her a pretend tattoo covering the whole of her lower arm
‘I’m the one who should be thanking you,’ he said, raising the envelope in a gesture of farewell as he stepped outside.
The door closed behind him and he hurried to the car. Before he had time to start the engine, Astrid came running after him. He rolled down the window and looked up.
‘I thought you might like these,’ she said, handing him a plastic bag containing the rest of the buns. ‘They’re really best eaten fresh, and you seemed to like them.’
He didn’t even manage to say thank you before she was hurrying back up the drive. He sat there for a moment, then opened the bag and took out one of the delicious buns. As he was about to sink his teeth into it, he felt a pang of guilt.
But there was something very special about freshly baked buns.
And the strawberry jam was the best he’d ever tasted.
Shame
Marcus was trying to think about the good things in life. Everything that was beautiful and wonderful and had made his existence worth the effort so far. Everything that had existed before – before the brutal realization that his life was built on a mistake. A misunderstanding.
A theft.
The whole thing was stolen, and it overshadowed everything he was trying to think about and made it impossible to sleep.
Rolf was snoring gently.
Marcus sat up slowly in bed, pausing briefly between movements. Eventually, he was on his feet and padded cautiously towards the bathroom. The door leading from the landing creaked, so his plan was to go through the spa next door to the bedroom. He made it and managed to close the door behind him without waking Rolf.
A faint light was still burning. Little Marcus had his own bathroom, but preferred to use his parents’ if he needed to get up during the night.
Even in the dimness Marcus looked terrible. He gave a start when he saw himself in the mirror. The dark shadows under his eyes were turning into thick folds of flesh, and his skin was so pale it looked almost blue. He was getting heavier and heavier, and hadn’t kept to his New Year resolution for even one of the fifteen days of 2009 that had passed so far. His own body odour made him recoil: night sweat, unwashed pyjamas and fear. He turned away from the ghostly reflection and went out on to the landing.
The door to little Marcus’s room was ajar. Marcus could move more easily out here. The house could fall down around the boy’s ears at this time of night, and he still wouldn’t wake up. Marcus stood in the doorway, watching the sleeping child.
The room rested in the faint blue chilly glow of the night light above the bed, a spaceship on its way through the galaxy. The shelves along one wall were packed with books and toys, and the computer monitor glimmered with stars on a screensaver the boy himself had downloaded. The shabby teddy bear Marcus still had to have with him in bed in order to get to sleep lay helpless on the floor. It had lost one eye long ago. The other stared blindly up at the ceiling. Marcus tiptoed across the floor without treading on any of the numerous items lying around, and picked up the bear. He held it to his nose for a moment, inhaling the smell of everything that meant something.
Silently, he bent over his son, placed Freddie in the crook of his arm and adjusted the covers. The child grunted, smacked his lips and suddenly turned over, hugging the bear tightly.
An almost irresistible urge to crawl into bed with him overcame Marcus so suddenly that he gasped for breath. He wanted to be strong again. He wanted to be the daddy who comforted his son when he was occasionally woken by a nightmare and needed him. He wanted to lie down with his arm around little Marcus, quietly telling him stories about the olden days or outer space. The boy would snuggle up close and smile, his hair tickling Marcus’s nose. There would be nobody in the whole world except the two of them, just like it had been before Rolf came, before they became three.
The way it had been before the terrible thing crept up on him.
Slowly, he backed out of the room.
He had no idea what he was going to do.
Not with his life, and not with the nights. Not with this night. The darkness grinned scornfully at him out of the corners, and he could feel his pulse rate increasing. Quickly, he began to move towards the stairs. He woul
d go down to his study. Close the door. Watch TV. Switch on all the lights and pretend it was daytime.
He stopped himself just as he was about to slam the door behind him when he finally arrived safely in his study. Breathlessly, he smacked the panel that controlled the lighting. Nothing happened. He pulled himself together and pressed all the sensors firmly with one finger. At last the room was bathed in light, and the television came on. It was pre-programmed to NRK, which was showing Dansefot Jukeboks. He picked up the remote from his desk and turned down the sound, then switched over to CNN. He sank down on the broad, heavy desk chair and leaned his head back. His stomach ulcer was painful and he had a bitter, acrid taste in his mouth. Pain radiated from below his breastbone, and his whole body hurt. His mind was racing, and he was so frightened that his bladder felt full to bursting, even though he’d been less than half an hour ago.
This was no kind of life any more.
Suddenly, he sat up straight and found the key to the heavy corner cupboard that had come with the house. As time went by he had learned to like the Kurbits-style painting, which at first he had thought bizarre and somewhat vulgar. It helped that the cupboard was eighteenth-century, in excellent condition and worth a fortune. Now it was as if the ranks of fat, grotesque flowers were reaching out to grasp him as he put the antique key in the lock and turned it.
Inside were five small drawers. He opened the top one. There lay the tablets he had never mentioned to Rolf. It hadn’t been necessary. Both these and the box in his office had remained untouched for many years. He tipped them into the palm of his hand and went back to his chair, where he let them trickle on to the calf-skin desk mat.
He still didn’t know if drugs lost their effect once the use-by date had passed. Hardly. At least, not completely. If he took the lot, it would probably do the job. He placed one tablet experimentally on his tongue.
The taste was the same. Insipid, slightly salty.
Things would be better for little Marcus if he wasn’t around any more.
