He took his phone. Switched on the torch function again. Shone the light upward.
The tip of her tongue was blue and protruded from between equally blue lips. She was hanging by her neck from a thin rope. She was barefoot, but was wearing jeans and a T-shirt. Like a huge lamp she hung from a supporting beam of what was the access ramp into the upper part of the barn. The rope had cut into the skin of her neck. Her eyes were matt, like two marbles.
This woman would never paddle a kayak again.
If you want to commit suicide you do not boil water in a kettle first.
Someone had done this to her and it couldn’t have been very long ago.
As he shone the torch he seemed to sense that he wasn’t alone. It felt as if someone was standing right behind him.
The axe, he thought. Whoever it was had the axe.
He slowly craned his head round.
No one.
Then he heard something outside. It was the sound of footsteps.
39
Stiffly, he walked back the same way he had come, but misjudged where the opening was, hit his head on a crossbeam, fell on his face, his head reeling, crawled on all fours, still giddy, managed to stand up, but hit his head again, fell, groped his way through the hole in the wall and struggled to his feet. Turned and glanced over his shoulder with every step he took. No one was there. Sweat coursing down him, he ran the last few metres to the tarpaulin, which he hit with full force. It wrapped its arms around him. It enveloped him. He completely lost his senses and grappled with the tarpaulin to find a way out. In the end, he just leaned against it, fell forward and was free.
On his knees on the ground, he hyperventilated. Stood up. Told himself to get a grip.
No one around anywhere.
Were these noises he heard just his imagination? He stood still, listening, but heard only his own panting.
This was nothing to do with him. Nothing he should vex his brain and emotions over. If not doing so was at all possible.
A Volvo estate had driven away from here.
Her car. She had come here in her car. A kettle had been boiling on the hob. How could he find out who had taken her car?
Guri’s phone.
Was it in her pocket?
He was reluctant to go back into the barn. The phone could be in the house anyway.
He hurried back to the farmhouse. Pushed open the door and went in.
He went into the kitchen, telling himself he should leave this to the police. He ignored his inner voice. Stood scanning the room. It couldn’t be here. He repeated the same procedure in the sitting room and the TV room. No phone anywhere. Could it be in a pocket or some other item of clothing? He went into the hall. No outdoor clothes.
He took out his own phone and called. Listened. The phone was ringing, but there wasn’t a sound to be heard in the house.
So it had to be in her jeans pocket. He was on his way through the door when the display showed that someone had received the call.
‘Hello,’ he said.
The someone didn’t reply.
He could clearly hear the sound of a moving car.
‘Who are you?’ he said, with no hope of receiving an answer. All he could hear was the drone of an engine.
Then a sombre voice came through: ‘I’ll find you.’
The line was cut.
For a few seconds he gazed at his phone. His blood froze.
What was that? I’ll find you. The driver of the car had killed her. This individual was now out to get him.
The clock on his phone told him that he had no chance of keeping his appointment with Gunnarstranda. Perhaps it was just as well that Gunnarstranda would be coming here anyway.
After ringing him, he put his phone in his trouser pocket. He looked down at his hands. They were trembling. He couldn’t stay here. He felt a need to move, went out and back to the barn. Stopped in front of the tarpaulin. His feet itched to go in, examine the ramp, search, try to find clues, try to read the crime scene, form a picture of what might have happened. But it wasn’t his job to investigate. Presumably he had destroyed enough clues already, inside the farmhouse.
He stuffed his hands in his pockets and thought about Guri. This lovely woman, so committed to her cause. Now she was gone. Killed by a man as yet unknown. He thought about Ivar Sekkelsten. Where was he right now? What was actually going on?
40
Frank was waiting in exactly the same place when a white Passat with yellow and black stripes swerved into the drive and braked sharply in front of him.
Police District East, he thought. A woman in uniform and a man in civvies stepped out. He recognised the man. They had been on the same course at police college years before. The man had also worked in Oslo. Arnfinn Brede was an arrogant Nordlander with long hair tied into a ponytail, a relic of the time when he worked on crime-crackdown patrols, looking like a rocker. The ponytail was beginning to look a bit thin now. A lack of growth on top had had consequences for the rest of the hirsute embellishment.
Brede must have recognised him as well because he nodded.
Frølich nodded back. ‘In there,’ he said, inclining his head towards the barn.
‘She’s hanging from a beam under the barn ramp.’
Neither of the two made a move.
Frølich decided to take the initiative. He went over to them. Shook hands. ‘Frank Frølich,’ he said to the female officer. ‘I’m a private investigator.’
She curtsied, but caught herself as she did so, mumbled something incomprehensible and turned to Brede. She was young, smooth-skinned, blonde, with her hair also in a ponytail. The dark-blue, short-sleeved uniform shirt revealed a tattooed wreath on her upper arm.
‘A red Volvo V70 was leaving here as I was arriving,’ Frølich said. ‘You should set up a search for it.’
‘Are you teaching me how to do my job?’ Brede said, looking around. He was wearing a tight-fitting jacket and dark jeans. It wasn’t yet five in the morning, but he smelt of eau de cologne.
‘The ops centre received a message from Oslo. Why did you ring them and not us?’
Frølich’s mind was on other matters. How much time had passed since the car left? How long had he been here? Twenty minutes? Half an hour?
Arnfin Brede seemed impatient. ‘Why did you ring Oslo and not us?’
He had no real wish to apprise these two of Fredrik Andersen’s story. So he shrugged his shoulders.
‘They’re kind of my family,’ he confined himself to saying.
The female officer pushed the tarpaulin aside and peered in.
‘Don’t touch anything,’ Brede barked.
‘Perhaps you’d like to take my statement,’ Frølich said. ‘At least then we’re doing something useful.’
41
Gunnarstranda was the last to arrive. He was driving his own car, a fairly new Prius hybrid, and he appeared exhausted, with dark bags under his eyes and his jaws slowly churning a piece of chewing gum. He made the effort to greet both the SOC officers and Arnfinn Brede before entering the tumbledown barn. Once inside, he was there for a good while, then suddenly appeared beside Frølich, his hands buried deep in his coat pockets.
‘New car?’ Frølich said, to take the edge off the unease that afflicted both of them.
‘How can you know the woman was with Andersen the night he was killed?’
‘She told me.’
‘When?’
‘On the phone last night.’
‘Was this where you were going when I called you?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why didn’t you say so?’
Frølich tried to think up a clever riposte, but failed and said nothing.
‘You know we’re investigating a murder, then you get a tip-off about a witness and you fail to inform me when I ring.’
‘I didn’t know if there was anything in what she said.’
‘So you came here in the middle of the night to find out if there was any point telling the police
about a witness? Do you know it’s a punishable offence to impede a civil servant in the performance of his duties?’
Frank Frølich raised both hands in defence. ‘Listen to what I’m saying. I didn’t know if she was telling the truth or not.’
‘Don’t take that tone with me, Frølich. I haven’t slept a wink and I’ve just driven seventy kilometres to listen to you talking rubbish. If you start messing me about, you’re making a great mistake.’
‘I couldn’t know this would happen,’ Frølich said, indicating the crooked barn with a hand. ‘I came here to talk to her. She said she was frightened. But I had no idea what she was frightened of. She told me on the phone she was with Andersen on the night he died. I told her to contact the police, but she didn’t want to. We agreed to meet here and talk, so I came here to do just that. My plan was to talk to her first and try and persuade her to go with me to talk to you.’
‘What are you up to, Frølich?’
‘I’m not up to anything. Andersen’s dead. The woman in there is dead. What they perhaps have in common is that they were together that night. The most important thing to do now is to clear up where they were and who else they were both in contact with that night.’
‘Why’s that the most important thing?’
‘Because it concerns me to a great degree.’
‘But why, Frølich? What makes you, a private individual, think that you can interfere in police business?’
‘I’m not interfering.’
‘You get a tip-off from a witness in a murder case. You drive in the middle of the night to talk to her. You behave as if you’re doing overtime in the force. But you’re doing this as a private individual. So what are you up to?’
‘You can believe what I’m saying or not, but this isn’t my case,’ he answered and began to move towards the drive.
‘Not so fast,’ Gunnarstranda said.
42
Frølich stopped and turned around slowly. They measured each other up for a few long seconds. It was Gunnarstranda who broke the silence:
‘I’ve got a bone to pick with you, Frølich. We’re trying to track Andersen’s movements during the time before he was killed. We’re aware that he was in a meeting with a publisher in the afternoon. He received a telephone call and broke off the meeting without giving any explanation. Where did he go? No one knows. According to you, though, he appeared in your office in Brugata. He was supposed to return to the publisher, but he didn’t. That evening he and his friends had their monthly get-together, when they play chess and drink beer. Andersen never misses it, but this time he did. He didn’t ring any of his pals to tell them he wasn’t going. You say he chose to spend the evening with a woman from Østfold instead of with his pals. How long did they spend together? No one knows. All we know is that Andersen returned home sometime around midnight and was murdered. And in his pocket we found your business card.’
‘My business card?’
‘Don’t interrupt.’
‘But I never gave the guy my card.’
‘And I want to know what made Andersen break off an important meeting to talk to you. I want to know why he was upset when he received a call about you. And don’t you come with that oath of confidentiality crap to me. So far there’s only one connection between the murder of Fredrik Andersen and the woman in the old barn, and it’s standing in front of me.’
Gunnarstranda’s forefinger poked Frølich in the chest.
‘If you set off my bullshit detector again, you’ll be back to Oslo in my car and in solitary for as long as I say. Have you got that?’
Frølich nodded.
‘Now spit it out.’
‘I didn’t call Andersen when he was in a meeting. I’d never seen the man before he turned up at my office. He was waiting on a chair for me outside the door. He told me he was writing a book about Norwegian immigration politics. He reeled off the usual nonsense about people smuggling and cynical financiers. He wanted to commission me for a job to do with the book and gave me an advance of twenty thousand kroner, then left. I considered the assignment and decided against it. So I tried to ring him and ask him to take the money back. I got no further than his voicemail and he didn’t call me back. My interpretation of this was that he chose not to. So I drove to his house to return the money. No one answered the door when I rang. I sat in the car waiting, but he didn’t show up. The only thing that happened was that an elderly lady left the house.’
‘An elderly lady?’
‘Yes, between seventy-five and eighty. His mother or grandmother, for all I know. I didn’t ask her who she was. I drove off, had dinner and shared a couple of bottles of wine with my partner. That night Andersen was killed. It was you who told me when you woke me in the morning and I was curious. You would’ve been, too, if you’d been in my shoes.’
‘Why didn’t you just leave the money in his post box? Why did you wait outside his house for such a long time?’
‘It was a lot of money. I wanted him to know that I wasn’t going to take the assignment. That’s why I wanted to give him the money back face to face.’
‘What was the job he gave you?’ Gunnarstranda said.
‘I can’t see that has any relevance for your investigation.’
‘No relevance?’ Gunnarstranda tossed his head. ‘Could it possibly have anything to do with the lady dangling from the beam over there? Why did she call you in particular and say she’d been with Andersen in the evening?’
‘That,’ Frank Frølich said, ‘I cannot answer.’
‘You’re tripping the bullshit detector, Frølich. If what you’ve said now is true, this case has something to do with your job. You can do your civil duty and tell me what it was.’
‘That job no longer exists.’
‘And why not?’
‘Because it was about a woman Bjørn Thyness ensured was deported from Trandum transit camp at some point over the last two days. I’ve asked Bjørn, but he won’t give me the reason for her deportation or tell me where she was sent. He won’t take my calls.’
This, thought Frank Frølich sadly, was the first time in all the years he had known him that the old fogey was lost for words.
‘Put me in solitary by all means,’ he continued, ‘because I need to sleep. But for the sake of the case you’d better tell me first what you’re charging me with.’
Gunnarstranda drew a deep breath. ‘We haven’t finished yet. Drop by and make a statement any time before four,’ he said, spun on his heel and padded back to his car.
Before he got in, he turned around.
‘Could Andersen have taken a business card when he was in your office?’
Frølich shook his head. ‘I have a couple in my wallet and the rest in a drawer. He never got a card from me.’
‘Any idea who could’ve given him the card?’
He didn’t like lying to Gunnarstranda. So he just splayed his palms and walked to his car.
43
Frank brought his car to a halt behind the T-bird parked in the drive by the house. He switched off the engine, but didn’t make a move. Presumably she was still asleep. The windows were dark. No growling from the dog, either. It was half past seven in the morning. He was fit to drop, but wondered how he was going to break the news. Closing his eyes, he leaned back.
He woke to Matilde banging on the car window.
‘I have to go to work. You need to move your car.’
Her voice was muffled by the glass. She smiled.
He looked at his watch. He had been asleep for three quarters of an hour. The events of the night already seemed like a dream.
He pulled at the release handle and opened the door.
‘What’s the matter?’ She held her hair in place with a hand on either side of her face. There was an expression of unease in her eyes.
‘It’s Guri,’ he said.
Matilde straightened up. Took her phone from her back pocket and tapped in a number. She turned her back on him and he heard the phone r
inging by her ear. Someone answered.
‘Matilde here,’ she said. ‘I won’t be at work today. I’m not feeling well.’
He got out of the car and closed the door.
She put the phone back in her pocket, turned and looked at him.
‘When did you last see her?’ he asked.
‘Tell me what’s happened to her.’
‘Guri’s dead.’
Matilde’s face drained of colour.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, only too aware of his impoverished vocabulary.
She walked ahead of him and inside the house.
The dog was here. It curled up, wagged its tail and wanted him to say hello. He patted it absent-mindedly.
They sat down on the sofa.
The dog settled in front of the wood burner and yawned with a long, creaking sound. It lay watching them from the floor.
It struck Frank that they were about to experience a moment that would etch itself in both their minds whatever happened from now on. And the memory would always be accompanied by the cold resonance that death brings with it.
‘There’s no doubt about what’s happened. I’ve seen her.’
Matilde took a cigarette from the packet of Marlboro she was holding. The packet fell to the floor. The fingers holding the cigarette were trembling. She tried to flick the lighter into life and failed. He took it from her. Her fingers were cold. He rolled the spark wheel and held the flame to her. She seemed small and shrunken as she puffed the cigarette into life.
I have to do it, he told himself. Then let’s see where it leads.
He cleared his throat.
She looked up.
‘Matilde.’
‘Yes?’
‘I have to ask you something.’
‘Not now,’ she said and stubbed out the cigarette in the ashtray. ‘We can talk later.’
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