– They’re doing nothing, she groaned. – Absolutely fuck all.
He didn’t respond, but once he had produced the rolls from earlier on he asked: – What did this guy look like?
She described him. Black curly hair, unkempt. Acne scars on his cheeks, shifty eyes. – I had the feeling he was on something or other.
Viljam poured coffee from a little grey bag into the cafetière. – Quite a lot of Mailin’s patients are. I’ve asked her if it’s safe to have an office without any kind of alarm system. She just shrugs it off.
As he chewed at half a roll with nothing on it, Liss unobtrusively watched his dark blue eyes. He had a heavy growth of beard and still hadn’t shaved. On the other hand, the narrow nose and full lips accentuated the feminine prettiness of the face. Not hard to see why Mailin was attracted to him. Although her sister was more concerned about what lay behind an appearance; she dived down to investigate what was not immediately apparent to the naked eye. Liss, by way of contrast, had always been fascinated by the surface of things, what the masks looked like, not what was hidden behind them. Even so, she too tried to follow her intuition in deciding whether to trust someone or not. As regards Viljam, she still hadn’t made up her mind.
– Did you find what you were looking for in her office?
She didn’t know what she had been looking for. If she told him she’d been looking for Mailin, he might stop asking.
– I spent an evening with my mother, she said instead. – She sits there completely paralysed, can hardly get a word out. She’s wilting in front of our very eyes.
She dragged her fingers through her hair; they stopped at a knot, which she began to twist at.
– I must do something. Anything at all. Go over every single thing Mailin did recently. Go where she went. Just not carry on sitting here waiting.
He didn’t answer, sat there staring at the table.
– What about the thesis she was working on? she asked. – Is it lying around here somewhere?
He drank from his coffee cup. – Her computer is missing. It wasn’t in the car. Not at her office either, nor at the cabin. Doesn’t make sense.
Liss mulled this over.
– What else does she use it for?
– Journals. Everyone who came to her for treatment.
– Presumably she backs it all up?
– Think so. We can see up in her study.
He went ahead of her up the stairs and into the little room with the desk and the couch. A model of a seagull hung from the ceiling, and the draught from the opening door was enough to set the wings in motion.
– She’s very good at organising her work systematically, Viljam remarked. – So the journals aren’t just lying around all over the place. I helped her buy a fireproof safe for her office. She shares it with the other people who work there.
They looked through the drawers without finding anything of interest.
– What are you looking for? Viljam wanted to know.
– Don’t know. I need to see what kind of things she was doing.
As they were about to head back downstairs again, she said: – I just leapt on the plane last Sunday, didn’t have time to pack anything. Can I take a look and see if Mailin has any clothes I could borrow?
Viljam glanced at her. Clearly he now saw for the first time the wet hair and the jacket with its large dark patchy stains from the shoulders and down over the chest. He opened the bedroom door. – The furthest cupboard is hers.
He popped into the bathroom, came back with a towel.
– Sorry for not thinking of it before, he said, and disappeared out.
In the cupboard, Liss found what she was looking for. Put on a clean pair of tights, but the bras were two sizes too large and she gave up on them. Borrowed a couple of pullovers, underwear and a bottle-green cashmere cardigan. Mailin’s trousers were too short in the leg for her, so she pulled her own on again.
– I’ve heard a lot about you, Viljam said when she came down again. – Mailin liked to talk about you.
– Really. So you know the worst?
– Quite the contrary. But the fact that you arrive in Norway without a change of clothes and use her wardrobe as though it was your own fits the picture.
Briefly his face lightened. She was relieved that he took it like that.
– Does she still have the same supervisor? she asked as she forced her feet down into the wet boots. – Is it still Dahlstrøm?
– Dahlstrøm? Do you know him? Viljam asked, and looked surprised.
– I met him when he was at that conference in Amsterdam this summer, with Mailin. I’d like to talk to him. She glanced at her watch. – Actually, I met one of Mailin’s colleague’s at the office. It was her who let me in. Torunn Gabrielsen, do you know her?
– Slightly.
Really it was her other colleague she wanted to ask about. How could Mailin bring herself to share an office with him? She wondered whether Viljam knew that Pål Øvreby and Mailin had once been a couple. The thought filled her with unease, and she couldn’t face asking any more questions.
The sleet had stopped. The streets looked as though they were soaked in oil. She walked aimlessly. Crossed a park. Down a narrow street. There was a café at the end of it. She looked in. Only two customers there, sitting at the back in the half-dark, an elderly couple each with a glass of beer. She picked a table by the window. The view out was on to a factory gate and a roundabout. On the pavement outside, a bush decked with garish Christmas lights. Her phone rang. She jumped. Wouters; the name pounded in her head. They’ve found out. Soon they’d be there to fetch her.
– Liss Bjerke? This is Judith van Ravens.
– How did you get my number?
– My call list. You called me several times before you got here.
Everything connected with Zako had been shoved behind a door. Liss had worked to keep it there. Now that door swung open again and it all came tumbling out. Suddenly she was angry. Why didn’t you delete me from the list? she nearly shouted.
– I’ve been thinking so much, said the voice at the other end.
– And now you’ve got something to tell me?
Judith van Ravens sighed. – I had to find out about it.
– About what?
– This business with the photo of your sister, what Zako was going to do with it… I haven’t been able to sleep since you were here. I called some friends in Amsterdam. The police think Zako’s death was accidental.
– I told you that.
– All the same, perhaps I should tell them about these photos. Don’t you think?
Liss said nothing for a moment. Inside her head, everything was still spinning. The image of Zako on the sofa. Hands washing bottles beneath a tap. Her own hands.
– I don’t think so.
– Why not?
Judith van Ravens’ voice was sharper, as though at any moment the doubt could turn into suspicion.
– I want the police to find my sister. That’s all that matters. If they start getting a lot of confusing information, it’ll take them longer, and by then it might be too late. Surely you can understand that.
She drank the rest of the coffee that had been brought to her table. Had no reason to be sitting there. Had nowhere else to go. Put her hand down into her bag for her cigarettes and touched something else. She lifted out the notebook she’d taken from Mailin’s office. Sat there studying how her sister had written her name inside the cover. Then she wrote her own name, imitating the calligraphy. Mailin had always been able to use her head better than her. Mailin was stronger, had more endurance, but somehow her hands seemed to live in a different world.
Liss.
She sat for a long time and looked at the four letters.
Liss is Mailin’s sister, she wrote. Liss Bjerke.
Liss Bjerke contacts the police. She hasn’t heard from them. Does she know something that might help them find Mailin?