She glanced over at him, looked away again immediately.
– Karsten came in for questioning just before his disappearance. It seems that he knew something about a series of arson attacks in Romerike that spring. Do you know of anyone in his circle at that time who later became involved in criminal activity?
She shook her head, wished he would stop asking her about things like that, that he would lean forward and tell her he believed her. But at the same time, if she was mistaken, she would feel relieved. If she had made up that encounter with Adrian Wilkins in his car, maybe everything else she thought she could remember was also just her imagination. Was it possible not to believe that she had ridden her bike over to Adrian’s to meet him that evening? Not to believe that she was partially to blame for the fact that Karsten was killed? If they didn’t believe her, maybe she wouldn’t have to believe it herself.
At last the questioning was over. The typing ebbed away. Detective Inspector Viken stood up.
– What happens now? Synne managed to say.
He flattened a few wisps of hair on his head, laying them sideways across his glistening scalp.
– We’ll hand a copy of your statement to the legal department at Romerike police station. Then it will be a matter for them whether there is enough to go on here.
Horvath turned round suddenly. – Naturally you’re aware that it is a very serious matter to accuse someone of murder.
– Yes, she mumbled.
– If it turns out that any of what you’ve told us is incorrect, it will reflect very badly on you.
She looked at him questioningly; he stared back at her, and she turned to Viken again.
– Horvath has just lost his closest friend, he said.
– I understand, she replied in a low voice. – I knew him too.
– No one is accusing you of giving false witness here, the inspector continued. – But there is a degree of probable cause required before we start searching for a man who’s somewhere or other out there, or bring him in for questioning.
She noted that phrase somewhere or other out there.
– I know how to find out where he is, she said weakly.
Viken glanced over at Horvath. A slight flutter passed across his lips, as though he was suppressing a smile.
– That’s very kind of you, but I think we can manage that ourselves should it become necessary.
A sliver of sunlight lit the roof of the neighbouring block as she let herself back into her room. She turned on the machine and opened her window to the sounds of the city. The cars along Sognsveien, the distant hum of a building site, three seagulls circling above the lawn and squawking. She listened out for what wasn’t there: the dark tones of a flute from a room further down the corridor.
Dusk was starting to fall as she sat at her desk. The thought was not quite yet a commitment, but she knew she would be doing it. The notes she had made over the past few weeks, the passages in which she had tried to get close to those she had met, Tonje and Priest, Khalid Chadar, Jasmeen, Shahzad. And the fragments of what she thought she could remember from that time but which were mixed in with her own fantasies. All of it would be deleted.
Among the host of things that appeared on her screen, there was one document in particular that attracted her attention. How Karsten died. She had noticed it just before her father rang and told her about the fire. She remembered thinking she would never use a title like that for a document. She selected it, dragged it to the recycle bin. As her fingertip rested on the delete button, she changed her mind. She dragged it out again, opened it.
I am going to write what happened from when Karsten ran off in my car outside Sæter’s house in Nannestad until when he was killed. And what we did with the body.
Synne stood up, the chair fell over behind her. – I didn’t write this, she whimpered. – I can’t have written this. She leaned forward gingerly, touched the mouse as though afraid it might bite her. She scrolled down through the text; it was a couple of pages long. – I didn’t write this, she muttered again, hearing that her voice was more certain this time.
After two weeks I realised Karsten hadn’t been to the cops. He was gone. They thought he’d killed himself. They searched for him for a while. Then they gave up. But he didn’t kill himself. First he went home. Shahzad and some other Pakis were waiting outside for him. Shahzad told Karsten’s sister this. Shahzad tells the sister that he let Karsten go. I don’t trust Shahzad. I thought that prick had killed Karsten. But he hadn’t. Karsten got away. I know that now. And then he went to Adrian’s.
When I get home that evening, Elsa’s door is wide open. That’s weird because Elsa’s away for the weekend and Adrian said he was going to Oslo. I go in. There’s no one there but the light is on in the living room. And in the basement. And in the bathroom upstairs the tap is turned on full. I go back outside. No car there. I see a bicycle. A girl’s bike. It’s hidden behind the garage. But I don’t think any more about that. Maybe someone stole it and hid it there. But now I think about it. Because Karsten came here that evening he ran off from me. Adrian had the house to himself that weekend. Adrian had a visitor. A female visitor. She was thirteen years old. She hid her bike behind the garage. Karsten came here and he found it.
Eight years on, the sister starts writing about that evening. She remembers lying naked on the floor in a basement. Then Karsten comes charging in and finds them there and asks what the hell Adrian is up to. A few minutes later Adrian calls Vemund Randeng. I need you here. Where are you? In the car over near Nebbursvollen. Come alone, don’t talk to anyone. Vemund stops at the entrance to the street. Walks the last few metres. Adrian’s sitting on the bonnet of the car. What’s up? Vemund asks. Adrian is completely calm, speaks without raising his voice. Vemund remembers it after all these years. How Adrian sits on the bonnet of the borrowed Peugeot. Talking that calmly. Seems almost like he’s bored. I’ve got Karsten here. He’s dead. I need you to help me get rid of him.
Holy shit! says Vemund, who isn’t calm at all. Adrian tells him Karsten was going to tell people what we were doing out at Sæter’s place. He was on his way to the police but Adrian got him into the car. He killed Karsten there with a hammer. And Vemund is stupid enough to believe that’s the reason. He peers inside. Karsten in the front seat. Blood everywhere, on the dashboard, on the front windscreen. The hammer in the front seat. The kid sister lying in the back completely out of it.
Vemund hates Karsten. Said lots of times how he was going to kill him. Vemund is all mouth. He could never have done it. But that mouth stayed closed. Every fucking year since then he’s had half a million from Adrian and never said a word about what happened that evening. Not even to that moronic pal of his, Sweaty.
Sweaty picks up Karsten’s kid sister. He ‘finds’ the girl in a wayside ditch nearby. Adrian got Vemund to dump her there. But Sweaty doesn’t know anything about this. He doesn’t ask. Sweaty’s the type of guy who keeps his mouth shut when someone tells him to keep his mouth shut. Vemund’s a little brighter. When he’s asked to help get rid of what’s left of Karsten, he asks questions, but once he starts getting paid, he stops asking.
Later that night they went out to the asphalt plant. Adrian was the one who worked out what to do with the body. Adrian was the one who dumped it down the stone crusher. When the machines were started up again after the Easter break, the body was pulverised along with the stone mass and became part of the asphalt-making process. I got all this out of Vemund earlier this evening. After Easter they had a road-making job up in Eidsvoll. Karsten became part of it. The pictures Vemund took are in your inbox. Some of them are of you.
Synne fumbled with the mouse and finally managed to navigate to her inbox. A folder of pictures had arrived. – I can’t take this, she moaned, but tried to open it all the same. She got an onscreen message: the machine didn’t have the right programme.
She hadn’t eaten for several days, but there was something in her stomach and it was on its way up. Sh
e swallowed it back down. The bike, she thought. Karsten arrived and saw my bike. And then he ran in and down into the basement. She forced herself to read through the whole document once again. How she was lying in the back seat when Karsten was beaten to death with a hammer, how she was dumped in a ditch and Karsten was driven away to an asphalt plant.
She was standing up when her stomach convulsed again. She managed to get to the bathroom, stick her head down the toilet bowl and empty herself.
The time was seven thirty. The policeman, Dan-Levi’s friend, didn’t answer when she rang. She tried the reception, told them who she was trying to get in touch with. His name was Horvath, Roar Horvath. The call was transferred.
– He isn’t in today, said a woman at the other end.
– That’s not so, I was interviewed in his office a few hours ago.
– Well he’s gone home for the day now.
– Then you’ve got to put me through to someone else, a detective inspector. Vik something or other. He was the one who interviewed me.
– Viken?
– I must talk to him.
– You can’t just ring anybody you want here.
– My brother was murdered, Synne shouted. – I’ve found something out.
The woman at the other end breathed a few times.
– I’ll make a note of your number, she said finally.
Viken called ten minutes later.
– Hi, Synne. I got your message.
She was relieved to hear him use her first name. She thought she liked the sound of his voice.
– I found something on my computer.
– Oh yeah?
– It’s a description of what happened when Karsten was killed.
– Did someone send you an email?
– A document’s been put on to my hard disk. I just found it. Somebody else must have written it while I was gone.
She tried to explain. Could hear how crazy it might sound to his ears.
– Are there any signs of a break-in in your room?
She glanced at the door, at the window, shook her head.
– I don’t know how it happened, she groaned. – You have to see it. Someone has described in detail how Adrian Wilkins killed Karsten. Other people are mentioned there too, by name. I don’t know who they are. One of them took me home. They call him Sweaty. It fits, it all fits. You must believe me. Plus I’ve been sent a lot of photos that I can’t access. My machine’s too old. It was a present from my dad for my eighteenth birthday, it’s a Mac. I’ve had these kinds of problems before, not being able to open attachments—
– Now listen, Synne, the inspector interrupted. – We know this has been difficult for you. Do you have someone you can talk to?
– You must believe me, she urged again, but with less conviction this time.
– It isn’t my job to believe things, he said. – We leave that sort of thing to the priests. You’re saying that there is a document on your machine. I don’t doubt that’s true. The question is, how did it get there?
– You don’t believe me, she whimpered. – You think I wrote it myself.
Viken made a coughing noise at the other end. – If you send me an email with the files you found on your computer, we’ll have a look at it.
– Have a look?
– If we decide that further action is necessary we’ll get in touch with you, and in that case you can bring your machine with you. If someone’s been messing about with it, we’ll find out. And if there are pictures in an attachment you can’t open, we’ll sort that out too. But things like that are very time consuming, and we can’t involve our computer people without good reason.
After Viken had ended the call, she remained sitting on her bed, staring straight ahead.
– He doesn’t believe me, she murmured. – They’re never going to believe me.
She sat for a long time looking out into the gathering dusk. Then abruptly she stood up and woke her machine, printed out the document she had found, put it in her jacket pocket and went out.
She climbed the steps and rang the bell. While she waited, she looked around. She’d left her bike round the side of the garage that time. Was that something Adrian had told her to do, or had it been her own idea? The bike mustn’t be visible from the road, no one was to know she was there to see him.
Now a car was parked there. It looked like the one Adrian had taken her to at the petrol station a few days earlier. She seemed to remember him saying it was a rental he was just returning.
The door was opened. Elsa’s eyes were red rimmed, as though she’d been crying. Without thinking, Synne leaned her head against the dark red velour pullover, not knowing whether she was offering comfort or asking for it. Elsa pulled her into the entry and wrapped her arms around her.
– Are you feeling better now?
Synne couldn’t give any answer to that.
– I heard you had some kind of attack. When there was the fire up in Erleveien.
Synne pulled away. – Did he tell you that?
Elsa looked into her eyes. – We have a lot to talk about, Synne.
She went ahead into the living room.
– How is the writing coming along?
Synne was offered the same as last time, what Elsa called her three-year tea.
– I’m not going to be writing any more, she said.
Elsa looked at her without saying anything.
– I don’t just mean this story, but writing any more at all.
– You’re saying you don’t want to be a writer after all? You who always thought it was the only thing you could really do?
Still Synne didn’t know if she could say a single word of what she had come to say. – All this business of writing about life has been an excuse for not living, she said instead.
– So Karsten’s story isn’t going to be written after all? The story of what happened to him?
– Not by me.
– But by someone else?
Synne shrugged. – What did Adrian tell you? she managed to ask at last.
Elsa took a sip from her cup, looked at her for a long time before answering.
– I am the only person who really knows him. She turned, looked out the window. – Adrian is too stubborn to feel regret. Too strong. Too clear headed. He’s got everything it takes to be a leader. I’ve always known that. From the day he was born I knew it. Even before that. I’ve done what I could to smooth his path, but the power of life finds its own course. It forces a way of its own, in whatever direction it chooses.
Synne couldn’t work out where she was going with this, but didn’t interrupt.
– When I got up this morning, I knew that this was going to be a fateful day. I sat here like this and looked out of the window. The clouds flew off at a furious pace. There was something both lovely and unpleasant about that sky. I often see in the clouds what the day has in store for me. Not only did they fly away, they looked to be flying away from me in whichever direction I looked.
Synne lifted her cup to her lips. The tea smelled even more acrid than last time, like the bark of a tree, and it tasted even worse.
– I skipped breakfast and walked out in the bright spring morning, Elsa went on. – The kind of morning in which there’s a meaning behind everything you experience. Something you have to deal with, something you must break with. There is a time for everything, Synne, and a day like this shows you what it is time for. Everyone I met was telling me that, even though they had no idea themselves what was happening. A flock of children from a nursery school, little bodies warmly wrapped up and with rucksacks on their backs. Two women of my own age shepherding them along. That reminded me of Adrian too. The Adrian I went for walks with, looked after, cared for, cooked for. His first pair of shoes is still in a box up in the loft. Sometimes I take them out, run my finger over the cracked leather, smell them.
What did he tell you about that evening? Synne wanted to ask again, but still she couldn’t bring herself to interrupt
.
– I went up to the tarot room. Laid the cards for myself. Was going to lay Adrian’s too, but started with mine, because his life and mine are connected in a way no outsider could ever understand. The five of wands came up. The card of inner turmoil. Risk of irrational behaviour. The five of swords. A difficult card. But also one that points towards the solution to an old problem. What you don’t want to see, Elsa, I said to myself. What you see all the time without seeing. Open your eyes to what you know. But the sword is double edged. It can cut the hand that holds it.
She leaned back in her chair. Synne summoned all the strength she had.
– Adrian told me what he did to Karsten.
Elsa closed her eyes. – One day you’ll be a mother yourself, Synne. Maybe you’ll have a son. Then you’ll know that no matter what happens, you will support him. If something’s about to go wrong, if something threatens him, you will do anything at all. You have no idea what you are capable of, because there is nothing stronger than these forces.
It dawned on Synne exactly what it was she was saying.
– You knew, she burst out. – You knew he killed Karsten.
– Did I know? Just like you, I hid all thoughts of that evening away.
– But I was thirteen years old, Synne protested.
Silence descended on them.
– Long before the first time Karsten came here, I knew that he would appear in Adrian’s life, Elsa said at length. – I saw it every time I laid Adrian’s cards. What threatened was approaching closer and closer. After Karsten disappeared, the cards changed too. But now it’s back again.
– Do you know why I’ve come here? Synne asked.
Elsa sighed heavily. – You want me to talk to him, persuade him to hand himself in.
It was more clearly expressed than Synne herself had dared to think.
– But I can’t do that, I’m sure you understand.
Fireraiser Page 48
