by Anne Holt
“Thomas,” his mother said, sounding tense. “Have you been inside Mrs. Helmersen’s?”
The boy nodded gingerly.
“But it was only because Tigerboy ran in there. I didn’t want Mrs. Helmersen to catch him. But she wasn’t at home.”
The boy was no longer so shamefaced. The two policewomen would listen to what he had to say – he could see that from their faces. He smiled triumphantly, exposing a big gap in his upper jaw where his front teeth had recently fallen out.
“Mrs. Helmersen has loads of medicines all over the place,” he lisped earnestly. “More than Grandma. Much more than at … the pharmacist’s shop, even. All over the place. On the table and on the TV and the dresser and everywhere.”
He let go of the cat and took three tentative steps into the living room as he glanced up at his mother.
“We only have a medicine cabinet. With a snake on it. That means that medicine is dangerous. The snake.”
Thomas pulled down the zip on his quilted anorak. Hanne Wilhelmsen hunkered down, resting her elbows on her knees.
“Are you quite sure of that, Thomas? That there’s loads of medicines at Mrs. Helmersen’s?”
“Yes.”
He nodded energetically.
“Are they just in the living room? In the open?”
“Hmmn. Just like …”
He looked over at the TV set and pointed to three sparrows made of art glass.
“Like those birds there. Almost like ornaments, sort of thing.”
Hanne stood up abruptly and approached the boy. She had not touched her tea. She stroked the boy’s head.
“You can become a policeman when you grow up, Thomas. A really good policeman. Thanks for telling us!”
She nodded at Sonja Gråfjell and gave a sign to Silje to come with her. When they had gone all the way down to the courtyard, Hanne tapped in the number for police headquarters on her cellphone. After a brief conversation, she clicked off the call and shook her head despondently.
“Annmari Skar refuses permission to break down the door. She doesn’t see that it’s urgent enough. What does she know about it? As a rule, lawyers have strange notions of what’s urgent.”
She blew her nose into a paper hankie and smeared Mentholatum salve on her lips.
“We need to find this Tussi. And ask nicely for permission. I will get into that apartment. Won’t I, Silje?”
She clapped the young officer between the shoulder-blades.
“Yes, I guess so,” Silje Sørensen said. “It can’t be so difficult to find somebody like Tussi Gruer Helmersen.”
There was exactly one week left until Christmas Eve and the soft breeze might mean that a spell of mild weather was just around the corner.
43
The other guests had finished their evening meal some time ago. At the long table of rough pine in the center of the room, there was a limited selection of food: herbal extract, oatmeal porridge, and fruit. Tussi Gruer Helmersen was on a special diet and could only have potato extract. The cup in front of her was half-full and the contents lukewarm. A huge pile of newspapers lay beside her plate. Mrs. Helmersen put on her glasses, which made her eyes look absurdly large in her narrow face. She took no notice of the staff clearing away the debris from a meal that cost more than the most extravagant hotel buffet. The health farm offered its guests very little food and a great deal of exercise and demanded an exorbitant price for both.
Tussi Helmersen had finished with the readers’ contributions and now turned to the crime reports. The newspapers at dinner time could still offer two or three pages of Ziegler coverage daily. An armed mail-robbery in Stavanger was relegated to roughly half a page well inside the newspapers, and a nasty rape in Enerhaugen only got a passing mention.
Mrs. Helmersen squinted down at Dagbladet:
Well-informed sources … [she mumbled as her finger ran along the lines of text] have confirmed to Dagbladet that Brede Ziegler had strong ties and financial interests in Italy. His ownership interests in Italian investment companies are difficult to follow at present.
Hah!
She peered around in confusion as if looking for a conversation partner. The staff had disappeared. Outside the picture windows she could see three of the guests in the subdued evening light moving toward a forest path at the end of an open meadow. She began to stand up, but changed her mind and read on:
The Chief of Police in Oslo is not willing to comment on rumors that the deceased was involved in money-laundering. Hans Christian Mykland dismisses the issue as speculative.
I should think so!
A young girl entered with a damp cloth in her hand. With little enthusiasm, she let the rag dance along the buffet table, without looking in Mrs. Helmersen’s direction.
From sources in INTERPOL, it has been confirmed to Dagbladet that Mafia killings are often characterized by symbolic acts. These sources do not discount the possibility that the scene of Brede Ziegler’s homicide can be interpreted as a warning to Norwegian police. The Ministry of Justice, in close cooperation with ØKOKRIM, the financial branch of the Norwegian police, has been in the vanguard of several international initiatives to fight the laundering of money originating in criminal activity.
Tussi smiled broadly at the cleaner, who was dressed in clinical white.
“Look at this,” she said, agitated. “The Mafia. That’s what I’ve always said.”
The girl shrugged and shook the cloth into a massive fireplace of coarse granite.
“The import of food. You don’t get away from the Mafia. What do you think about our Crown Prince, young lady?”
“He’s quite nice,” the girl said, taken aback.
“Nice! Don’t you read the newspapers? Norway risks being without a queen! The Crown Prince has been to a bar with homosexuals!”
“Most of the articles are about the women he goes out with,” the girl answered, becoming more enthusiastic about her cleaning.
“You shouldn’t take it so lightly, young lady.”
Tussi adjusted the lilac woolen turban she was wearing.
“The Crown Prince should have gone into the Army, like his father. Think about it – educating a Crown Prince in America. Soon he might as well go on a study visit to … Pakistan! The boy looks as if he’s more concerned about these groups of immigrants rather than about us, the old folks who built this country.”
“I need to get on with my work,” the girl said sharply.
“Yes, there’s a lot of work still to be done.”
Her hat was sliding steadily down over her eyes. Mrs. Helmersen tugged it much farther back. Her hair came into sight, red at the ends, gray closer to her scalp.
“The phone line for tip-offs,” she muttered as she riffled angrily through the copy of VG. “As if that’s going to help the police in the least.”
She was starving, and rejoiced at the thought of the chocolate she had hidden in her clothes closet. Tonight, on top of that, she would indulge in half a packet of potato crisps.
And an ever-so-tiny dram, just for the sake of her heart. And to celebrate a little. That was something she really deserved.
44
When the idea had first entered her head, she had come up with absolutely no objections. In principle, she was on holiday. She could do whatever she wanted. The journey had taken only eleven hours, though it felt as if she had been away from home for years.
The cold water made her skin contract. On the way out of the bathtub she almost fell over. She grabbed the shower curtain and pulled it down. Bewildered, she had stood holding the cheerful yellow plastic sheet in her hands.
The practical preparations had been undertaken within two hours: ordering the ticket and writing a hastily scribbled message to the home help. Not until she phoned her parents in Izmir to tell them she was not coming home for the holidays did she feel a prick of conscience. She gave an international conference as her excuse. Nefis had never lied to her parents before. Now it felt frighteningly easy. She w
as forty-two years old and a professor of mathematics at the University of Istanbul, but could still feel like a little girl disappointing her mum and dad. When she had turned thirty-five they had given up on the idea of seeing her married. Since she had seven brothers, all with wives who constantly gave birth to children, her parents had eventually learned to live with their little professor. Three times a year she dutifully traveled home to fulfill the role of submissive daughter in the huge house that was always full of people and endless meals. The family celebrated all the Muslim festivals, but more as the bearers of tradition than from any particular religious commitment. Nefis enjoyed being at home: she was happy in the role of only daughter, and aunt to sixteen nieces and five nephews. This was one of Nefis’s lives.
The other was in Istanbul.
She finally put down the shower curtain and left it crumpled behind the toilet. The room was expensive enough not to make any great fuss about the damage. She wrapped a towel around her body and crossed to the window.
From the thirteenth floor of the Oslo Plaza Hotel the city looked like a cobbled-together patchwork. It looked as if the streets had been under water recently; a dank gray veil overlaid everything and made even the neon signs look colorless.
Nefis Özbabacan had two lives.
In Izmir, she was the daughter of the house.
In Istanbul, she was the internationally renowned scholar with her own apartment in the modern part of the city. Friends and acquaintances came from the university milieu, like herself, in addition to a couple of diplomats at foreign embassies. They never asked her why she was unmarried. Since she was used to living two lives, it had been astonishingly uncomplicated to discover a third space in her existence.
She dressed at a leisurely pace.
They had explained to her at the reception desk that this was the last Saturday before Christmas Eve and apparently high season for restaurants. It might be difficult to get hold of a taxi. However, they had found the address for her, no problem. She shuddered a little when she was forced to acknowledge yet again that she had traveled all the way from Istanbul with nothing to go on other than one beautiful night in Verona and the name of a woman who lived in Oslo.
She had just completed her make-up when the phone rang.
Her taxi had arrived.
45
Vilde Veierland Ziegler was listening so intently to the trickling water that she did not catch the waiter’s question. Only when he spoke to her for the third time did she look up in confusion.
“Oh, sorry. I’d rather wait until my associate arrives. By the way …”
The waiter had already turned away.
“Could I have a glass of iced water?”
It was Vilde who had suggested they meet at Blom. The restaurant was a place where they could talk in peace without imminent danger of meeting anyone they knew. The other customers were mainly foreign business people. They had let themselves be tempted by a Norwegian artists’ restaurant that Norwegian artists could no longer afford to patronize. The tables were well spaced out and she had a feeling that someone had turned up the volume on the fountain in the center of the room. The sound of running water was so loud that she could not think clearly.
Claudio was four minutes late. When he sat down, it was as if someone had suddenly turned off the noise of the fountain.
“What is it we’re actually going to talk about?”
“Saying hello would be a good start!”
“Hello.”
He squirmed in his seat and avoided her eye. He was already sweating profusely, even though he did not seem out of breath. When he looked up at last from the yellow damask tablecloth, his gaze was fixed somewhere between her mouth and nose.
“Have you been looking forward to this?”
The waiter appeared with a carafe of iced water. He poured for them both and recommended the sandwich buffet. Vilde ordered two with prawns, without asking Claudio.
“No.”
She drank an entire glass of water and then let the ice cubes clink slowly from side to side.
“I’ve not been looking forward to it. But I have to sort things out. Since Brede can no longer decide everything for me. That’s how it is for you too, isn’t it? Brede’s no longer the one who decides.”
“Listen to me now!”
He wiped his forehead with an immaculate white handkerchief, before looking up at the tip of her nose.
“You should perhaps be a bit more concerned about what Brede has decided. Is it not usual for a widow to respect her husband’s last wishes? Brede wanted me to take over Entré if anything happened to him. That was the way he wanted it.”
Vilde was used to Claudio’s hostility. They had never got on. Eventually a silent pact had arisen between them: they would avoid each other. That was no longer possible. Brede was dead, and Claudio was not only affected by his usual surliness. He was also afraid.
“It suited you nicely that Brede died, then.”
She pierced a prawn with her fork and held it up in front of her mouth.
“So you’d get your hands on all of it. But then we both got a surprise.”
The prawn disappeared between her lips, and she chewed for a long time. Claudio Gagliostro fingered a sprig of dill without showing any sign of hunger.
“Although you think so, Claudio, I’m not stupid. You should know that I’m not going to give away what’s mine. Without so much as a by your leave, I mean.”
“I don’t think you’re stupid.”
He glanced over at two men who had just sat down a few tables away. It was as if he was not quite sure whether he knew them, and could not entirely make up his mind whether it was pleasant to have something else to look at apart from Vilde, who was tucking her hair slowly behind her ears as she ate the prawns one by one, leaving the bread.
“You’re not stupid,” he repeated. “But you can’t run a restaurant. You know absolutely nothing about that. And I still don’t know why you want to talk to me.”
“Just that.”
He did not recognize Vilde. The arrogant smile made her eyes hard. He had never understood why Brede had chosen Vilde. Of course she was pretty, but Brede had always had access to pretty girls. Beautiful, young, and usually stupid. In the beginning, when Brede had just begun to show more than a passing interest in the girl, Claudio had thought that his partner was going through a phase. He was nearing fifty years of age. Since he had never had a mid-life crisis, Claudio had thought that Brede’s relationship with Vilde was nothing other than a symptom of his delayed anxiety about aging. But why they should get married was a mystery. Brede definitely did not want children. Once, late at night, after closing time, when the two partners had partaken of a glass or two in the semi-darkness at the bar, Brede had told him he was sterile. He had got himself fixed, he had said, laughing. The laughter was strange, almost spiteful, as if the man had played a grim joke on his situation and could finally talk about it.
“Exactly.”
Claudio jumped, dropping the lemon slice he had been fingering.
“What?”
“That’s exactly what I wanted to talk to you about. You’re right. I haven’t a clue about running a restaurant. That’s why I want to offer you an arrangement. A settlement, if you like.”
Claudio leaned back in his chair and squinted at Vilde. He really did not recognize her. The few times she had come into the restaurant, she had behaved like a self-conscious young girl. They had barely exchanged a word, but from the little they had spoken, he had concluded that the girl was more or less not up to scratch.
“I’ve talked to my lawyer,” Vilde said, unruffled. “She’s explained it all to me. Since we’re going to be joint owners of Entré, I’m quite dependent on you continuing to run the business. As you say yourself: I don’t have a clue about running a restaurant.”
She contorted her voice into a faint Italian accent. Then she giggled softly, as if all of a sudden she was falling back into an old, memorized role.
“But I want my share of the money. I’ve actually worked hard for that place too. In my own way.”
Again she giggled. Claudio felt puzzled, and was suffused with a sudden rage that made him finally seek direct eye contact. He leaned over the table.
“What do you mean?” he spluttered. “Have you …? I don’t give a flying fuck what you’ve done. What is it you want? Or should I perhaps ask what your lawyer wants?”
Vilde composed her face into demonstratively thoughtful furrows.
“You’re playing games with me,” Claudio snarled. “You’re damn well sitting there playing games with me!”
He stood up so abruptly that the chair toppled. He stood in disarray, staring down at the floor.
“Take it easy,” Vilde said quietly. “I’m not playing games. Sit down.”
He felt as if she had him by the balls, so literally that he held his crotch. Then he picked up the chair and sat down falteringly, snatching a glimpse of the exit.
“I need money,” Vilde said. “And I need it now. According to my lawyer, winding up an estate takes an eternity. Several months, at least. I haven’t time to wait.”
Claudio did not speak. She looked at him, for a long time, as if waiting for him to be the one to cough up a solution to the problem in which they were both entangled.
“My lawyer says that Entré is worth around five million kroner,” she said in the end, with a loud sigh. “That means that I can demand two and a half, if you want it all for yourself. At least.”
“Two and a half …”
He rolled his eyes in agitation and threw out his arms expressively.
“How the hell am I going to come up with—”
“I’ve got a suggestion,” she interrupted. “You give me one and a half million now. For that sum you get two percent of my shares. That means you’re the boss. That gives you fifty-one per cent.”
“One and a half million for two percent? When the whole shebang is worth five? I think you’re—”
She broke in again, angrier now: “We’ll draw up an agreement. In three years, it’s all yours. All my shares are transferred to you. On condition that I get one million more next year, and yet another divided over the next two years. In total three and a half million.”
