He placed his hand on the kitten. Its vertebrae felt like tiny bumps under its fur. No one knows I’m here, he remembered. No one would know where to look. He was sure he could hear footsteps in the living room. He was also convinced he could hear noises coming from the room that lay furthest away and which used to be Jon’s. As if Jon had been sleeping in there all along and was now waking up, and the whole thing had been a nightmare. Of course he hadn’t drowned himself. It all seemed incomprehensible to Reilly. Jon sank to the bottom, he thought, and we just watched. We rowed away. We went to bed. We lied to Ingerid. We’re second-class citizens.
Suddenly his door opened. Light from the living room poured in. Axel was standing in the doorway. Reilly clutched the revolver inside his sleeping bag.
‘I was just wondering,’ Axel said. ‘If someone were to give you a million. Would you bite the head off a viper?’
‘A live viper?’
‘Very much alive.’
‘Of course not. Why do you ask? Have you completely lost the plot?’
‘Just wanted to know if you had balls. You don’t,’ he declared.
Then he left. Floorboards creaked as he walked away. Reilly noticed that Axel hadn’t shut the door completely so he carefully shifted the kitten and wriggled out of the sleeping bag to close it. Axel had planted an image in his head, and it was unbearable. He had a taste of rot in his mouth and a feeling of nausea in his throat and stomach, as though a headless snake was squirming down there. He crept back inside the sleeping bag. He deliberately did not zip it up but lay there alert, waiting. It was getting stormy outside, the wind went through the wooden cabin with a violent, compelling force. The door opened a second time. Axel entered.
‘I forgot something,’ he said. ‘That bloody tooth of mine has started to hurt again. You don’t happen to have some paracetamol?’
Reilly hoisted himself up on one elbow.
‘No,’ he said.
‘Or some Pinex? Ibuprofen? Paralgin?’
Reilly shook his head. He did not understand where Axel was going with this. He’s summoning up his courage, he thought. The third time he’ll strike. He’ll wait until dawn, and then he’ll come. But I can wait, I can stay awake, and I have six bullets in the chambers.
When Axel had left for the second time, Reilly leaned over the edge of the bed and retrieved his bag. He took out the Koran, which was at the bottom, found a box of matches in the drawer of the bedside table and lit the paraffin lamp. He began to read. After a while he started to calm down. The text settled him. His life acquired a sense of direction. The kitten lay snuggled against the wall, purring. The wind took hold, nature surrendered and the door was opened for the third time. Reilly dropped the Koran and fumbled for the revolver.
‘What about the tip of your little finger,’ Axel asked. ‘Would you sacrifice the tip of your little finger for a million?’
Reilly groaned. ‘You’ve got to stop bothering me.’
‘You still don’t have the balls,’ Axel said. ‘And you’re not greedy either. How are you going to manage?’
‘Are you worried about me?’ Reilly asked.
Axel was now halfway across the threshold. Reilly could not see his right hand. Perhaps he was holding the knife. Any moment now he might leap across the room. It would only take him a few seconds.
‘Don’t stay up reading for too long,’ Axel said gruffly. ‘The light is bad. You’ll damage your eyes. My mum told me so.’
‘What else did your mum tell you?’ Reilly asked.
‘To always think the worst of people. Here you are, my best friend, reading the Koran. With your kitten asleep by your side. An image like that is just too good to be true. What do you say, Reilly? Is it true?’
‘Go to bed,’ Reilly growled.
‘Why do you still have all your clothes on when you’re in your sleeping bag?’ Axel wanted to know.
‘Because it’s chilly in here.’
‘Don’t forget your evening prayers. Allah is great, or whatever you say?’
‘Are you scared of the dark?’ Reilly asked. ‘Since you keep running back to my room?’
Axel made no reply. Instead he calmly retired. Reilly heard his footsteps crossing the floor. He heard a door slamming. And a murmur from the woods rose out of the silence at Dead Water.
CHAPTER 32
Sejer suggested to Frank Robert that the two of them might like to share a beer. Frank Robert immediately ran to the kitchen and sat in front of the fridge. Sejer opened a can and poured half its contents into the dog’s bowl before sitting in his chair by the window. He heard the dog slurp beer in the kitchen and remembered that it was rather overweight, especially around its stomach. However, he was unsure whether this was due to the beer or to all the leftovers it got. His train of thought was interrupted by the doorbell ringing. Jacob Skarre was standing outside. He was neither flushed nor out of breath.
‘You took the lift,’ Sejer remarked.
‘You live on the thirteenth floor,’ Skarre protested.
He shrugged.
‘It’s late, I know,’ he said. ‘Tell me if it’s a bad time, and I’ll be off at once. I just happened to be in your neck of the woods.’
Sejer beckoned him inside. ‘Don’t go,’ he said. ‘It’s fine. Come in. We can have a whisky, and you can leave your car here.’
They each settled down with a glass. Skarre took in the view of the gleaming river deep below. A goods train slowly glided into the station. From the thirteenth floor it looked like a Märklin toy train.
‘You’ve got a wonderful view,’ he commented.
‘Yes,’ Sejer said. ‘Every evening I sit here and look down on people.’
‘You’ve never looked down on anyone,’ Skarre said.
He tasted his whisky. It was room temperature.
‘I went to see Ingerid Moreno today,’ Skarre said. ‘She told me about Jon. About what his life had been like. He was born two months premature. When they examined him, they discovered he had only one kidney. When he was five, he developed allergies to grass pollen and a range of foods. When he was nine, he went straight over the handlebars of his bicycle and sustained minor brain damage which resulted in epilepsy. He grew out of that eventually, but he was on medication for years. When he was thirteen, he got cerebrospinal meningitis and very nearly died. And when he was sixteen, he suffered acute appendicitis which led to peritonitis. He underwent surgery at the last minute. Nature was clearly determined to torment him from the start.’
‘What about Frimann?’ Sejer asked. ‘What did you discover about him?’
‘He has distinguished himself his whole life,’ Skarre said. ‘First at school and later in the army. Clever. Popular. Ambitious. When it comes to Philip Reilly, the picture becomes more blurred. Not a shining light at school. Rather introverted and passive. A series of casual jobs which he performs adequately, but not terribly well. He gets high a lot. His current job as a hospital porter is in jeopardy after several incidents of carelessness. And there is something else I’ve noticed, a little oddity, which might have no significance whatsoever. Reilly, Van Chau and Moreno are all only children, and they all grew up completely or partially without a father.’