We Are Death

by Douglas Lindsay

  ‘It’s not–’

  ‘You should look at the bigger picture, Professor. This is a chance for you to play a part in how the world is run. In how things happen. Knowledge will open up to you that will make your library seem like a telephone box in a small Dorset town with a few discarded Jeffrey Archer paperbacks on poorly constructed shelves.’

  She looked at him again, but he still wasn’t engaging her. She wondered if he was on some sort of spectrum, but then remembered that he had quite happily looked her in the eye when he’d walked into her office the previous day.

  ‘It’s hard to compete with love,’ said Develin, ‘but you need to consider your alternatives. This is an opportunity presented to only the very few.’

  Finally he moved his head slightly, held her gaze for a moment and then nodded curtly.

  ‘We’ll be in touch.’

  He walked past her towards the car. She watched him for a moment and then realised that she was being abandoned on the Vigeland Bridge.

  ‘What happens now?’ she said to his back. ‘You’re just leaving me here?’

  He didn’t turn, didn’t answer.

  She watched him all the way to the car, watched him get into the back seat. He never turned. The car’s engine had never been switched off. She wondered if the window was about to be wound down and she would be asked what she was waiting for, but as soon as the rear door closed, the car moved off, turned and headed out the park, pedestrians, on pedestrian paths, clearing out of its way.

  ‘I guess you are,’ she said to the disappearing car.

  She watched it until it was out of sight, then looked around. It wasn’t as though she had been deposited in the middle of the jungle or the desert. She was in a European capital which she knew and where most people spoke English, and she had money in her pocket and a credit card.

  All she had to do was make a choice. A love, that like any love might not last, or access to an incredibly powerful and old secret society. One that murdered people when it suited them.

  There wasn’t really a choice to be made.

  42

  Jericho stood on the harbour front in Oslo. He had checked into his hotel, then he and Haynes had briefly, and uncomfortably, visited the British Embassy – which had basically not cared to know about their presence – and then they’d gone their separate ways.

  He was looking out on the water, without really seeing what was in front of him. Behind him the trams passed by, and the ferry passengers, disgorged from the other side of the fjord. On the other side of the tram tracks, Nobel House.

  Third country in a few days. Fourth if he included England. The culture filter had long since descended, of course, possibly even before he reached Switzerland. So, he wasn’t going to embrace Oslo. He wasn’t going to try to see behind the façade, to really look at the people. He would breathe the air, but not taste it. His eyes would be open, but they were focused on this curious case, this wild goose chase. He seemed to have so much trouble concentrating, he didn’t need the further discombobulation of culture shock.

  Oslo looked affluent and new, spread out along the coast, between the hills and the sea, immigrants on street corners the familiar juxtaposition. The harbour was busy, the seafront an eclectic mix of ferries and cargo vessels and private boats. The air was clear but still with the heat of late summer. No sign of autumn.

  Oslo was the kind of place where, in another moment, Jericho could have imagined himself sitting on the decking of a café down by the sea, watching the world go by for the afternoon. Now, however, it was just another stop on the route, perhaps the final one, but potentially no different from Grindelwald and Marrakech.

  And what had he achieved by going to either of them? If this investigation was ever probed by an internal police team looking into the use of public funds, what would their findings be? Were they likely to condone the trips?

  It would mean little to his career if it were to happen, however. He would be long gone.

  Some sort of sixth sense made him turn, and there was Badstuber walking across the tram tracks towards him. They had arranged to meet here, and she was, as expected, arriving at the precise time they had agreed.

  She held out her hand as she approached and he shook it formally.

  ‘Detective Chief Inspector,’ she said.

  He nodded.

  If either of them was pleased to see the other they masked it perfectly.

  ‘My information is that Mr Geyerson is eating alone in a restaurant along the front to our right, named The Edge. And when I say alone, he now has a bodyguard team of six. One stationed on the promenade either side of the restaurant at some fifty paces, two outside the door, two at an adjacent table.’

  Jericho fell in beside her as she began to walk in Geyerson’s direction.

  ‘At least he heeded our advice,’ he said.

  ‘Yes. We must try to ignore his bluster and rudeness and follow what lies beneath it. He may yet lead us to those for whom we search.’

  Jericho caught the scent of her, the light perfume he’d noticed previously. He lowered his eyes.

  *

  ‘This is what I think,’ said Jericho.

  Despite Geyerson’s complete disinterest in them, and the fact that the previous words to leave his mouth were to tell Jericho that this was none of his fucking business, Jericho and Badstuber had both ordered coffee and had not moved from across the table.

  Geyerson raised his eyes from his bowl of chowder, but not quite so far as to meet Jericho’s gaze.

  He looked back at his soup, his shoulders hunched.

  ‘I don’t care what you think.’

  ‘You started climbing just three years ago. The fact that you’ve continued to climb since you summited Kangchenjunga suggests that perhaps you’ve got the bug. But the reason... the reason you started climbing in the first place was because of this remarkable thing you heard.’

  Jericho paused, but Geyerson was giving him nothing. Badstuber didn’t know where Jericho was going, as they hadn’t discussed interview strategy on the short walk along the promenade. She was looking out for the same things as Jericho, however. The twitch in the eye, the mask coming down, the cover.

  ‘And Kangchenjunga isn’t exactly the sort of mountain people just climb. Even Everest, people go up there who have only ever been walking in the Mendips. But not Kangchenjunga. It takes a mountaineer. And as a mountain, it still kills a lot of people. You had to practice.’

  A piece of bread broken off and dunked in the soup. Another slurp at the liquid, the noise slightly louder than necessary.

  ‘There are myths around that place, and you heard something that made you believe the myths. And you needed to get to the top. So, what was it? What was it that was at the top of Mount Kangchenjunga that drove you there? That made you train for three years, that made you take up such a gruelling and dangerous sport, one in which you’d never previously shown an interest? Why couldn’t you just pay someone to go there for you?’

  Another piece of bread, this one dragged around the rim of the bowl, as there wasn’t too much liquid remaining.

  Jericho took a drink of coffee, placed the cup back down. Dabbed at his mouth with a napkin, in case any of the copious froth had remained attached to his lips. His eyes never left Geyerson’s face.

  ‘Something was put on top of that mountain in the 1840s,’ he continued.

  The spoon paused in mid-air. They could see the tension in Geyerson’s jaw.

  ‘At the time they thought it was the highest mountain in the world. The most inaccessible place. Somewhere they imagined no ordinary person going. Who knows how many people died in the process...’

  ‘You’re going to blame me for that too?’ snapped Geyerson.

  ‘I’m not blaming you for anything,’ said Jericho. ‘If there really was something hidden at the top of that mountain, it’s not up to me to pass judgement on whether or not anyone should have gone looking for it.’

  ‘How magnanimous of you.
’

  ‘Nevertheless, clearly someone didn’t want you going there, and now the people you went with are dying.’

  ‘That’s what happens,’ said Geyerson, finally looking up. ‘People die. Every fucking day. And obviously, whoever it was who put the bullet in Emerick had no intention of putting one in me. They don’t want me dead, so let’s just see how this plays out.’

  ‘What about Harrow?’

  ‘Firstly, Harrow has been doing some business for me, and no, I’m not telling you what. Secondly, yes, you’re right, chances are Harrow is going to get killed. I don’t care. He’s useless, barely deserves anything else.’

  ‘Have you supplied him with a bodyguard?’ asked Badstuber.

  Geyerson held Jericho’s gaze for a moment, then slowly moved it across to Badstuber.

  ‘He has someone, and I’m paying for him.’

  ‘So you have six people guarding the person you don’t think is in danger, and just one guarding the one who is,’ said Badstuber.

  The jaw worked again, the lips pursed.

  ‘I’m not sure why you’re here,’ said Geyerson directly to Badstuber, ‘as your colleague appears to be the only one with any questions and any sense. Don’t speak to me again, unless it’s to tell me how far down your throat to ram my cock.’

  Jericho reached across the table, grabbing Geyerson by the collar of his shirt. Fingers caught the skin of the neck. Within a second the nearest two guards were upon him, one of them pulling Jericho’s arms back, the other producing a gun and pointing it at Jericho from across the table.

  There were a couple of exclamations from behind them in the restaurant, a few chairs being pushed back, a sudden upsurge of noise.

  ‘Jesus,’ said Geyerson, looking at his men, ‘sit down, don’t be stupid. He’s a police officer, he’s not a threat.’

  Neither of them moved, so he spat out, his voice low, ‘Put the fucking gun away and sit down. And you, let him go. Don’t be an idiot.’

  The gun was holstered. The guard behind Jericho eased the grip on his arms, and then the two of them sat back down at their table, looking uneasily around the room.

  A man appeared beside Geyerson, not looking at all nervous.

  ‘I don’t know what’s going on here, but I’m going to have to ask you to leave. We can’t have this kind of thing...’

  ‘I’ve ordered steak.’

  ‘Obviously you won’t be charged.’

  Geyerson held his gaze for a moment, then reached inside his jacket, produced a great wad of notes, counted out a string of large value Norwegian currency, and handed it over.

  ‘I’m sorry for the trouble, I can assure you that there will be no further disturbances.’

  The man stared at the money, and made the same value judgement of the situation that Geyerson had seen so many men make when presented with one of his pay-offs. Then he made the same decision they always made.

  He turned away and walked back behind the bar, nodding supportively at one of his waitresses, the money in his pocket.

  Geyerson gave the guards another look, checked over his shoulder to make sure those outside hadn’t left their positions, then turned back to Jericho.

  ‘So gallant again, Detective Chief Inspector. If you save her a third time, do you get to keep her?’

  43

  Haynes scrolled down his phone, quickly reading the verses.

  And he delivered them into the hands of the Gibeonites, and they hanged them in the hill before the LORD: and they fell all seven together, and were put to death in the days of harvest, in the first days, in the beginning of barley harvest.

  And Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for her upon the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water dropped upon them out of heaven, and suffered neither the birds of the air to rest on them by day, nor the beasts of the field by night.

  Haynes was in the Vigeland Museum. That he and Jericho had split up was more because Jericho had not wanted to descend too heavy-handedly upon Geyerson, and he’d felt uncomfortable asking Badstuber not to join them. Easier to give orders to Haynes, albeit the orders hadn’t amounted to much. Little more than see what you can figure out, and meet you at the hotel at six.

  He hadn’t expected Haynes to figure anything out. Oslo might not have been London or New York, but neither was it a one-set-of-traffic-lights town, no dark corners, nothing lurking in the shadows.

  An hour earlier, Haynes had found himself in his Clarion Hotel room looking through a guide book to the city, wondering if he was going to be reduced to sightseeing for the afternoon.

  He’d looked through the attractions of the city – the Opera House and the Viking Ship Museum, Akershus Fortress and the National Gallery – thinking he ought to stay away, at least, from the area where Jericho had said he’d be meeting Badstuber. He didn’t want to casually bump into them, as it would look anything but casual.

  He spotted some photographs from the Vigeland museum, the building which largely contained plaster casts of the iron works exhibited permanently in the neighbouring Frogner Park. Endless nudes, men, women and children in all sorts of strange poses, coupled with bizarre caricatures, people fighting great beasts. It was curious but hadn’t quite grabbed his attention, until he noticed a small photograph of one of the less significant exhibits.

  A wall-mounted carving of a row of seven hanged men, a woman beneath them. An illustration of the story of Rizpah, protecting the bodies of her children from wild beasts. 2 Samuel, 21:9-10.

  Seven hanged men. This really could be a coincidence, he’d thought. There must be images of hanged men everywhere. They had received six hanged men cards the previous winter. The seventh card had been a death card. Ultimately the number of people who’d been murdered was far greater than seven.

  Yes, they had come to Oslo for a reason, but it felt a great stretch to think that it was because of this. Yet, what else did he have to do that afternoon?

  And so, half an hour and a short tram ride later, he was in the museum, looking at the small engraving of the seven hanged men – one of the first things to see when walking round – and hoping that he was suddenly going to see some significance in it.

  He read through the relevant Biblical passage once more, then slipped his phone back in his pocket.

  Seven hanged men. Was there something else in the image? The birds and beasts attacking, the image of Rizpah fighting them off, the landscape in the background, the darkened sky, the faces of the damned?

  He stood staring at it for a few minutes. What was he doing? What possible connection could this have to their case? So, there were some hanged men. Were they to chase after every ancient story involving hanged men? How many more could he find in Oslo? How many thousands more if he was to make the effort to search for the same thing around Europe? Had he even considered looking for a hanged man motif in Paris when they were there?

  ‘Fuck it,’ he muttered, then turned away and walked through to the next room, intent on quickly walking through the museum to see if there was anything else that might connect to the investigation.

  He felt frustrated and foolish. What exactly was he achieving? He was little more than a tourist, and meanwhile Leighton was missing. He was completely and utterly impotent.

  In the next room his attention was once again grabbed, this time by a great scene depicting the descent into Hell. The sullen, judgmental Satan in the middle of it all, as men and women were cast into damnation. Although Haynes had never seen it before, it felt familiar enough, being similar to so many others.

  ‘There’s nothing for me here,’ he muttered quietly to himself, shaking his head. He walked through to the next room, a small narrow room of busts, and barely stopped to look.

  Feeling agitated, wishing for something to happen.

  Into the next room, giant sculptures of people, again nothing leaping out at him in the way he so desperately needed.

  At that moment, behind him around the corner and no more than fif
ty yards away, the door opened and a woman walked into the museum. She stood for a second, taking in the dark surroundings and the light in the small reception cubicle directly in front of her, then closed the door behind her.

  She approached the desk, the attendant looking up rather unhelpfully, as though two visitors in a quarter of an hour represented some sort of unexpected bedlam.

  ‘Sorry, do you speak English?’ asked Leighton.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘I wonder if there might be a phone I can use? A public phone, perhaps, or I can pay to use–’

  The shake of the head cut her off.

  ‘No, I’m afraid that would not be possible.’

  ‘But–’

  ‘We do not have phones for public use. We used to, of course, but nowadays everyone carries their own phone.’

  She uttered this line with a tone of admonition, as though telling Leighton off for being the only person in the whole of Norway to have come out that day without her mobile.

  Leighton hesitated a second, contemplated making an appeal to use the phone sitting on the desk at the receptionist’s right hand, then turned quickly and walked from the building.

  Outside, the door closed behind her, she paused for a moment, looking out over the grass and the trees, the dog walkers and the runners and the mothers with babies, then she started walking towards the city centre.

  Walking quickly through the exhibition of Vigeland’s work, Haynes was already at the large room devoted to the plaster casts that had served as models for the monumental fountain in the park. He walked through, almost into the next room, before he stopped himself.

  There was too much in this room to just walk past, dismissing it all. So many intricate sculptures and panels on the wall. He couldn’t be half-hearted about it. If it was possible that this was of some significance, he had to take the time to look at it all properly.

  And so he slowed down, letting some of the tension go through the clenching of his fists, and then he methodically moved from panel to panel.

  There was the circle of life, there were babies and there were skeletons, but there were no more hanged men.