Blame The Dead

'There is a – sort of club. Called Student Christian. We help old people and like that.'

'So it was pure chance you drew him?'

'Ja…' she stirred the gear lever around until she found a noise that suited her. 'But why did you-'

But I was determined to keep this interrogation in my hands for a while longer. 'Hasn't he got any family?'

'His wife is dead for ten years. They have no children. His sister lives in Denmark but she is also very old. So…'

We turned a corner and I got slung against the door – which tried to open. I scrambled back into my seat. 'But can't his old employers at ADP do anything? Like get him out of that dump? Have you seen Mrs Smith-Bang?'

'You know her? Yes, I have seen her. But she says she cannot pay more than his pension – and he says he does not want to leave the Home. He likes being with sailors.'

Come to think of it, whyshould Mrs S-B pay any more? She hardly owed a bonus to a crew that had done at least its fair share of running the Skadi into legal history, at whatever speed. And overpaying a star witness can look bad in court.

Then we turned on to the main road and she bollicksed the clutch work and we crossed two lines of fast traffic hoppity-hoppity-hop like a storybook bunny. A white Mercedes swerved around us and vanished ahead in a dying scream of its horn and my nerves.

Kari said seriously, 'I am a better driver with boats.'

I nodded breathlessly and she finally got a question in. 'Why did you come to see him – and bring the whisky?'

'Just as a present. Is that bastard Ruud going to steal it?'

'No. I asked him to, many times. If he did, he could stop Engineer Nygaard drinking very soon."

'And clap hands if you believe in fairies,' I murmured.

'Pardon?'

'Never mind. Just believe I wouldn't have brought the Scotch if I'd known he was an alcoholic.' Wouldn't I, though? Well, it was a moral problem I didn't have to solve right now. 'But you know Nygaard's an important witness in a legal affair?'

'Ja. He was on a boat that burned up.'

'So I'm hardly the first person to come asking questions, right?'

'Ja,'she admitted.

'And did you ever hear of a man called Jonas Steen?'

'Engineer Nygaard said about him. He did not like him.'

'Maybe, but that wasn't why he got murdered.'

'Hva?'she said incredulously.

D'you want to know why women will never rule the world? Because they can't be bothered to read a newspaper to find out if they've taken over the world, that's why. Spread all over the front page, that story had been -and the radio, according to Mrs S-B.

I tried to explain. When I'd finished, she asked carefully, 'But you do not think it was this man Lie who did it?'

'Well…' Come to that, Lie might easily have done it; certainly he was an accessory. 'It's more a question of why it was done. Did Nygaard ever tell you what he told Steen?'

She tried to remember, her forehead crinkling into a small frown. With that fine long hair, firm profile, and fair skin, she was quite a looker. Just too much character behind the blue eyes for me. 'I think he talked about the accident… and the rescue.'

Great. Bloody marvellous. They wouldn't have mentioned the weather, as well? Or pollution or politics or the traffic problem?

'Well,' I growled, 'if you can ever get him to tell you more about what Steen knew, it could help.'

'Why should I help you?'

I kept my temper for about the next five yards. 'Because Steen was murdered because oíit! And another man was murdered because of it ten days ago – a man Steen had been talking to! And Lie himself – oh hell's feathers, never mind, just go on being Christian charitable.'

She was staring at me. Left to itself, the Volkswagen jumped like a terrier and snapped at a passing van. Both of us grabbed at the steering wheel.

When we'd got it back on the leash again, she said, 'Do you mean that Engineer Nygaard may be killed also?'

'I don't know. I really don't.' And I really didn't. 'Maybe they're counting on him doing it to himself. Drop me off at the railway station; I want to pick up my bags.'

In the end, she offered to drive me to the airport as well and I accepted out of sheer devotion to duty. If anybody could get through to Nygaard, she seemed the likeliest -if s he wanted to try. And on her side, I think she was feeling a bit guilty about giving me the heave-ho from his room so promptly.

At intervals when it didn't seem likely to distract her from keeping us alive, I learned that she wasstudying history and English, that her parents lived somewhere farther south, that she wasn't engaged. She didn't learn as much from me; I tried to give the impression that I worked for a big legal firm in London.

At the airport, it turned out that the only way I could get home that night was to fly a local to Oslo, change for Gothenburg in Sweden, then pick up the eleven-thirty-five pm for London. The ticket desk thought I was crazy and ma›be insulting their country; besides, the trouble I was going to to get out of it, but they wrote me out a whole pack of tickets.

Then we had half an hour to wait for the Oslo plane, so she took a coffee while I had a beer – despite her disapproving frown. I honestly don't think the girl could help it any more than Nygaard could, by now, help the opposite approach.

I asked casually, 'Did Nygaard ever talk to you about the collision?'

'No – not truly. I asked him, but he said he cannot remember much.'

'How was he rescued?'

'He was on a… a raft, you call it. For all the night and in the day also. Then a fishing-boat found him. I think it, with the burns…' she tapped her forehead. 'Made him forget, you understand?'

'Yes.' I could also understand what impression he'd make in court. But you aren't supposed to pick your witnesses like casting a movie, though I've known it happen. Kari added, 'That is why he drinks so much now, of course.'

'Uh-huh? And who buys him his booze? You?'

I'd've got less reaction from suggesting we stretch out on the cafeteria table and become just good friends. I said hastily, 'All right, all right – you just keep him clean and tidy. But whodoes buy his whisky and aquavit and so forth?'

Now she was just puzzled. 'Himself, of course. He goes out.'

'I mean who pays for it? I know Norwegian pensions are good, but to stay in his condition he's drinking nearly a bottle a day. Over a hundred kroner; maybe thirty quid a week before he's paid a penny for bed and breakfast.'

'Oh, no.'

'Oh, yes. That's what it costs.'

She looked puzzled. Like most teetotallers, she'd assumed that all it took to become an alcoholic was a couple of secretive gulps before noon. But you have to work at it, although it doesn't seem like work at the time.

She said slowly, 'Perhaps Herr Ruud would know…'

'You could ask. But he seems pretty protective about the old boy.'

']a. They were friends on the ship – how do you say that?'

'Shipmates.'

'In the war. When Herr Ruud lost the leg. And after that he could not be an officer, so…'

The loudspeaker crackled something that could be my flight. I stood up and held out my hand. It got a genuine warm shake, and I got a real smile. She said, 'I am sorry I was – too quick, hasty.'

'Never mind.' I gave her one of my cards – the one with my address and phone but not profession on. 'If he tells you anything about Steen – give me a ring, would you? I'll pay you back.'

She nodded.

I hurried out across the wet tarmac and when I looked back from the top of the plane's steps she was standing out in the drizzle herself, waving rather formally.

The best you could say of the trip home was that nobody found my pistols. I had a three-hour break for dinner in Oslo, then an hour's drinking at Gothenburg. I reached Heathrow just before two in the morning, and bed just after three. And stayed there until eleven the next morning.

Twenty-seven