The Leopard

by Jo Nesbo

  ‘Ketchup?’

  ‘Ketchum. Hole-in-the-Wall gang. Hanged in New Mexico Territory in 1901. Standard gallows, they just used too much rope.’

  ‘Oh. How much?’

  ‘Just over two metres.’

  ‘Not more? He must have been a fat lump.’

  ‘Nope. Tells you how easy it is to lose your head, doesn’t it.’

  Gjendem shouted something after him, but Harry didn’t catch it. He crossed the car park north of the lido, continued across the grass and took a left over the bridge to the main gate. The fence was more than two and a half metres high all the way round. Over a hundred kilos. Marit Olsen might have tried, but she did not get over the lido fence unaided.

  On the other side of the bridge, Harry turned left so that he could approach the lido from the opposite angle. He stepped over the orange police cordon and stopped at the top of the slope by a shrub. Harry had forgotten an alarming amount over recent years. But the cases stuck. He could still remember the names of the four boys on the diving tower. The older brother’s distant eyes as he answered Harry’s questions in a monotone. And the hand pointing to the place where they had got in.

  Harry chose his steps carefully, not wishing to destroy possible clues, and bent the shrub to one side. Oslo Parks’ maintenance planned well in advance. If they planned at all. The tear in the fence was still there.

  Harry crouched down and studied the jagged edges of the tear. He could see dark threads. Someone who had not sneaked in, but had forced her way through here. Or was pushed. He looked for other evidence. From the top of the tear hung a long black piece of wool. The tear was so high that the person must have been standing upright to touch the fence at that point. The head. Wool made sense, a woollen hat. Had Marit Olsen been wearing a woollen hat? According to Roger Gjendem, Marit Olsen had left home at a quarter to ten to jog in the park. As usual, he had surmised.

  Harry tried to visualise it. He imagined an abnormally mild evening in the park. He saw a large, sweaty woman jogging. He didn’t see a woollen hat. He couldn’t see anyone else wearing a woollen hat, either. Not because it was cold at any rate. But perhaps so as not to be seen or recognised. Black wool. A balaclava maybe.

  He stepped out of the bushes with care.

  He hadn’t heard them coming.

  One man held a pistol – probably a Steyr, Austrian, semi-automatic. It was pointed at Harry. The man behind it had blond hair, an open mouth with a powerful underbite, and when he emitted a grunt of a laugh, Harry remembered the nickname belonging to Truls Berntsen from Kripos. Beavis. As in Beavis and Butt-Head.

  The second man was short, unusually bow-legged and had his hands in the pockets of a coat that Harry knew concealed a gun and an ID card bearing a Finnish-sounding name. But it was the third man, the one in an elegant grey trench coat, who attracted Harry’s attention. He stood to the side of the other two, but there was something about the gunman and the Finn’s body language, the way they partly addressed Harry, partly this man. As though they were an extension of him, as though this man was actually holding the gun. What struck Harry about the man was not his almost feminine good looks. Nor that his eyelashes were so clearly visible above and below his eyes, incurring suspicions he used make-up. Nor the nose, the chin, the fine shape of his cheeks. Nor that his hair was thick, dark, grey, elegantly cut and a great deal longer than was standard for the force. Nor the many tiny colourless blemishes in the suntanned skin that made him look as if he had been exposed to acid rain. No, what struck Harry was the hatred. The hatred in the eyes that bored into him, a hatred so fierce that Harry seemed to sense it physically, as something white and hard.

  The man was cleaning his teeth with a toothpick. His voice was higher and softer than Harry would have imagined. ‘You’ve trespassed into territory that has been cordoned off for an investigation, Hole.’

  ‘An incontrovertible fact,’ Harry said, looking around him.

  ‘Why?’

  Harry eyed the man, quietly rejecting one potential answer after the other until he realised he simply didn’t have one.

  ‘Since you appear to know me,’ Harry said, ‘who do I have the pleasure of meeting?’

  ‘I doubt it will be much of a pleasure for either of us, Hole. So I suggest you leave the area now and never show your face near a Kripos crime scene again. Is that understood?’

  ‘Well, received but not completely understood. What about if I can help the police in the form of a tip about how Marit Olsen—’

  ‘The only help you’ve given the police’, the gentle voice interrupted, ‘has been to besmirch its reputation. In my book, you’re a drunk, a lawbreaker and vermin, Hole. So my advice to you is this: crawl back under the stone you came from before someone crushes you with their heel.’

  Harry looked at the man, and his gut instinct and his brain concurred: Take it. Withdraw. You have no ammunition to counter with. Be smart.

  And he really wished he was smart; he would really have appreciated that quality. Harry took out his pack of cigarettes.

  ‘And that someone would be you, would it, Bellman? You are Bellman, aren’t you? The genius who sent the sauna-ape after me?’ Harry nodded towards the Finn. ‘Judging from that attempt, I doubt you would be able to crush … er … er . . .’ Harry struggled feverishly to remember the analogy, but it wouldn’t come. Bloody jet lag.

  Bellman interceded. ‘Piss off now, Hole.’ The POB jerked his thumb behind him. ‘Come on. Hop it.’

  ‘I—’ Harry began.

  ‘That’s it,’ Bellman said with a broad smile. ‘You’re under arrest, Hole.’

  ‘What?!’

  ‘You’ve been told three times to vacate the crime scene and you haven’t complied. Hands behind your back.’

  ‘Now listen here!’ Harry snarled with a niggling feeling that he was a very predictable rat caught in the laboratory maze. ‘I just want—’

  Berntsen, alias Beavis, jogged his arm, knocking the cigarette out of his mouth and onto the wet ground. Harry bent down to pick it up, but got Jussi’s boot in his backside and toppled forwards. He banged his head on the ground and tasted earth and bile. And heard Bellman’s soft voice in his ear.

  ‘Resisting arrest, Hole? I told you to put your hands behind your back, didn’t I? Told you to put them here . . .’

  Bellman placed his hand lightly on Harry’s bottom. Harry breathed hard through his nose without moving. He knew exactly what Bellman was after. Assault on a police officer. Two witnesses. Paragraph 127. Sentence: five years. Game over. And even though this was already as clear as day to Harry, he knew that Bellman would get what he wanted before long. So he concentrated on something else, excluded Beavis’s grunted laugh and Bellman’s eau de cologne from his mind. He thought about her. About Rakel. He put his hands behind his back, on top of Bellman’s hand and turned his head. Now the wind had blown away the fog hanging over them and he could see the slim, white diving tower outlined against the grey sky. Something was dangling aloft, from the platform, a rope perhaps.

  The handcuffs clicked gently into place.

  Bellman stood in the car park by Middelthunsgate watching them as they drove away. The wind was tugging gently at his coat.

  The custody officer was reading the newspaper when he noticed the three men in front of the counter.

  ‘Hi, Tore,’ Harry said. ‘Got a non-smoker with a view?’

  ‘Hi, Harry. Long time no see.’ The officer picked up a key from the cupboard behind him and passed it to Harry. ‘Honeymoon suite.’

  Harry saw the confusion on Tore’s face when Beavis leaned forward, grabbed the key and snarled, ‘He’s the prisoner, you old git.’

  Harry grimaced an apology to Tore as Jussi frisked him and turned up some keys and a wallet.

  ‘Would you mind ringing Gunnar Hagen, Tore? He—’

  Jussi snatched at the handcuffs, cutting into Harry’s skin, and Harry tumbled backwards after the two men heading for the custody block.

  Once th
ey had locked him in the two-and-a-half by one-and-a-half-metre cell, Jussi went back to Tore to sign the papers while Beavis stood outside the barred door, peering in at Harry. Harry could see he had something on his chest and waited. And at last it came, in a voice shaking with suppressed fury.

  ‘How does it feel, eh? You being such a bloody hotshot, catching two serial killers, being on TV and all that? And here you are now, looking at bars from the inside, eh?’

  ‘What are you so angry about, Beavis?’ Harry asked softly and closed his eyes. He could feel the swell in his body as if he had just come ashore after a long voyage.

  ‘I’m not angry. But as far as punks shooting good policemen are concerned, I’m furious with them.’

  ‘Three mistakes in one sentence,’ Harry said, lying down on the cell bed. ‘First of all, it’s “is” not “are”, secondly Inspector Waaler was not a good policeman and thirdly I didn’t shoot him. I pulled off his arm. Here, up by the shoulder.’ Harry demonstrated.

  Beavis’s mouth opened and shut, but nothing emerged.

  Harry closed his eyes again.

  13

  Office

  THE NEXT TIME HARRY OPENED HIS EYES, HE HAD BEEN lying in the cell for two hours, and Gunnar Hagen was standing outside struggling to open the door with the key.

  ‘Sorry, Harry, I was in a meeting.’

  ‘Suited me fine, boss,’ Harry said, stretching on the bed with a yawn. ‘Am I being released?’

  ‘I spoke to the police lawyer, who said it was OK. Custody is detention, not a punishment. I heard two Kripos men brought you in. What happened?’

  ‘I’m hoping you can tell me.’

  ‘I can tell you?’

  ‘Ever since I landed in Oslo I’ve been followed by Kripos.’

  ‘Kripos?’

  Harry sat up and ran a hand through the brush-like bristles on his head. ‘They tracked me down to Rikshospital. They arrested me on a formality. What’s going on, boss?’

  Hagen raised his chin and stroked the skin over his larynx. ‘Hell, I should have anticipated this.’

  ‘Anticipated what?’

  ‘That it would leak out that we were trying to run you to earth. That Bellman would try to stop us.’

  ‘A few main clauses would be nice.’

  ‘It’s pretty complicated, as I told you. It’s all about cuts and rationalisation in the force. About jurisdiction. The old fight, Crime Squad versus Kripos. Whether there are enough resources for two specialist branches with parallel expertise in a small country. The discussion flared up when Kripos got a new second in command, one Mikael Bellman.’

  ‘Tell me about him.’

  ‘Bellman? Police College, brief period of service in Norway before washing up in Europol in The Hague. Came back to Kripos a wonder boy, ready to move upwards and onwards. Nothing but grief from day one when he wanted to employ an ex-colleague from Interpol, a foreigner.’

  ‘Not Finnish, by any chance, was he?’

  Hagen nodded. ‘Jussi Kolkka. Police training in Finland, but has none of the formal qualifications required for police status in Norway. The trade union went ballistic. The solution was, of course, that Kolkka would be temporarily employed on an exchange. Bellman’s next initiative was to make it clear that the rules should be interpreted in such a way that on bigger murder investigations Kripos would decide whether it was their case or the police district’s, not vice versa.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And that is quite unacceptable, goes without saying. We have the country’s largest murder unit here at Police HQ, we decide which cases we take within the Oslo district, what we need help with and where we request Kripos to take control. Kripos was established to offer their know-how to police districts running murder cases, but Bellman has, at the drop of a hat, endowed the department with his emperor status. The Ministry of Justice was drawn into the matter. And they soon saw their chance to do what we have managed to keep a lid on for so long: to centralise murder investigations so that there is one centre of expertise. They don’t give two hoots about our arguments concerning the dangers of standardisation and inbreeding, the importance of local knowledge and the spread of skills, recruitment and—’

  ‘Thank you, you’re preaching to the converted.’

  Hagen held up a hand. ‘Fine, but the Ministry of Justice is working now on an appointment . . .’

  ‘And … ?’

  ‘They say they’re going to be pragmatic. It’s all about exploiting scarce resources in the most cost-effective way. If Kripos can show that they achieve their best results by being unencumbered by police districts—’

  ‘—then all the power goes to Kripos HQ in Bryn,’ Harry said. ‘Big office for Bellman and bye-bye Crime Squad.’

  Hagen hunched his shoulders. ‘Something of that nature. When Charlotte Lolles was found dead behind the Datsun and we saw the similarities with the girl murdered in the cellar of the new building, there was a head-on collision. Kripos said that even though the bodies were found in Oslo, a double murder is a matter for Kripos, not Oslo Police District, and started their own independent investigation. They’ve realised that the battle for the ministry’s support will stand or fall on this case.’

  ‘So it’s just a question of solving the case before Kripos?’

  ‘As I said, it’s complicated. Kripos refuses to share info with us even though they’ve made no headway. Instead they went to the ministry. The Chief Constable here received a call to say that the ministry would like to see Kripos being allowed to run this case until they’ve made up their mind about how to allocate areas of responsibility in the future.’

  Harry shook his head slowly. ‘It’s beginning to sink in. You all got desperate . . .’

  ‘I wouldn’t use that word.’

  ‘Desperate enough to dig up the old serial-killer hunter, Hole. An outsider no longer on the payroll, who could investigate the matter on the q.t. That was why I couldn’t say anything to anyone.’

  Hagen sighed. ‘Bellman found out anyway, obviously. And stuck a tail on you.’

  ‘To see whether you seemed to be complying with the ministry’s request. To catch me in flagrante delicto reading old reports or questioning old witnesses.’

  ‘Or even more effective: to disqualify you from the game. Bellman knows one single mistake would be enough to have you suspended, one single beer while on duty, one single breach of service rules.’

  ‘Mm. Or resisting arrest. He’s thinking of taking the case further, the prick.’

  ‘I’ll talk to him. He’ll drop it when I tell him you don’t want the case anyway. We don’t dump police officers in the shit when there’s no point.’ Hagen glanced at his watch. ‘I’ve got work waiting for me. Let’s get you out.’

  They walked out of the custody block, across the car park and stopped at the entrance to Police HQ, a tower of concrete and steel presiding over the park. Beside them, attached to Police HQ by an underground culvert, stood the old grey walls of Botsen, Oslo District Prison. Beneath them, the area of Grønland stretched down to the fjord and harbour. The facades were winter-pale and filthy as though ash had rained down on them. The cranes by the harbour stood like gallows outlined against the sky.

  ‘Not a pretty sight, eh?’

  ‘No,’ Harry said, breathing in.

  ‘But there’s something about this town nonetheless.’

  Harry nodded. ‘There is that.’

  They stood there for a while, rocking back on their heels, hands in pockets.

  ‘Chilly,’ Harry said.

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘S’pose not, but my thermostat is still set to Hong Kong temperatures.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘You’ve got a cup of coffee waiting for you upstairs, have you?’ Harry motioned to the sixth floor. ‘Or was it work? The Marit Olsen case?’

  Hagen didn’t answer.

  ‘Mm,’ Harry said. ‘So Bellman and Kripos have got that, too.’

  Harry received the odd me
asured nod on his way through the corridors of the red zone on the sixth floor. A legend in the building he might have been, but he had never been a popular man.

  They passed an office door on which someone had glued an A4 piece of paper saying ‘I SEE DEAD PEOPLE’.

  Hagen cleared his throat. ‘I had to let Magnus Skarre take over your office. Everywhere else is bursting at the seams.’

  ‘No worries,’ Harry said.

  They each took their paper cup of the infamous percolated coffee from the kitchenette.

  Inside Hagen’s office Harry settled in the chair facing the POB’s desk, where he had sat so many times.

  ‘You’ve still got it, I see,’ Harry said, pointing with his head to the memento on the desk that, at first sight, resembled a white exclamation mark. It was a stuffed little finger. Harry knew it had once belonged to a Japanese Second World War commander. In retreat, the commander had cut off his finger in front of his men to apologise for not being able to return and pick up their dead. Hagen loved to use the story when he was teaching middle management about leadership.

  ‘And you still haven’t.’ Hagen nodded towards the hand, minus middle finger, Harry was using to hold the paper cup.

  Harry conceded the point and drank. The coffee hadn’t changed, either. Liquefied tarmac.

  Harry grimaced. ‘I need a team of three.’

  Hagen drank slowly and put down the cup. ‘Not more?’

  ‘You always ask that. You know I don’t work with large teams of detectives.’

  ‘In that case I won’t complain. Fewer people means less chance of Kripos and the Ministry of Justice catching wind of our investigations into the double murder.’

  ‘Triple murder,’ Harry said with a yawn.

  ‘Hold on, we don’t know if Marit Olsen—’

  ‘Woman alone at night, abducted, murdered in an unconventional manner. The third time in little old Oslo. Triple. Believe me. But however many there are of us, you can take it from me that we will take bloody good care that our paths don’t cross those of Kripos.’

  ‘Yes,’ Hagen said. ‘I do know that. That’s why it’s a condition that if the investigation were to be brought to light, it has nothing to do with Crime Squad.’