Mass had her arm around Eddie’s shoulder. She put her hand against his warm neck; she loved his wonderful soft curly hair and played with it as often as she had the chance, and he never tried to stop her.
“Or,” Eddie continued, “the electric chair. Two thousand volts to the head, with a big wet sponge under the helmet. They can choose how they want to die. What would you choose?”
Eddie looked at his mother and smiled. “I’m curious about everything,” he explained, “and it’s fun finding out about stuff.”
“Death and destruction are hardly fun,” Mass scolded. “Find something else.”
“Did you know,” Eddie continued enthusiastically, “when you’re hanged, everything goes black after seven seconds? It’s an underrated method, I think.”
He finished what he was doing and got up from the chair. He walked heavily across the room, plonked down on the sofa, and picked up the paper. He turned to the crossword on the second-to-last page and started to chew his pencil as he read. He liked the taste. He was well trained after all these years, and he seldom needed to erase anything. When he did, he sniffed it because it smelled sweet. He knew most of the compilers, knew what they were interested in: science, history, geography and politics, the human body. Astronomy. The odd abbreviation and the occasional made-up word that didn’t actually exist. Cheating nonsense, was what he thought then, no fun at all. But now he was stuck. Gas escape, two words, fifteen letters.Was a gas explosion the same as a gas escape? Only twelve letters. Volcano explosion? Sixteen letters. He wrote it down with some uncertainty but soon realized that it had to be wrong. Because that involved magma, which turned to lava when it ran down the mountainside. But where would you find gas? In nature. And presumably in heavy industry. He carried on with the crossword and got the first letter of the second word, which was a “p.” And the last letter was “r.” Then he got an “m” and an “s.” Solar prominence. The great flames on the surface of the sun that can reach for thousands of miles into space. He pondered the next clue: seam. Six letters, the second of which was “u.” Suture. Thread, six letters — that was hard. The first was “c” and the fifth was “u.” Catgut. When he was halfway through the crossword, he decided to keep the rest for later. So he turned to the obituaries. Fredrik was only twenty-two when he chose to leave life. The service will end at the grave. No flowers please. Twenty-two, he thought. He must have had a miserable life. Eddie couldn’t understand why anyone would choose to take their own life, to die when they didn’t need to.
“Don’t forget to take Shiba out,” his mother called from the kitchen, where she was peeling root vegetables. Eddie walked out to the hall to get his jacket and pulled a hat down over his curls. He put a leash on the fat dog and went out into the snow. Before he turned onto the road, he stopped and admired his snow lantern, which was still standing. Every evening after dark, he lifted off the top snowballs and lit a new candle.
Shiba stopped as soon as they were out on the road. She went down on her haunches and did her business. When Eddie tried to make her continue walking, she resisted, but he hauled her over to the mailbox all the same. He opened it and took out the maiclass="underline" two bills, electricity and telephone. Just as he was about to turn around, their neighbor, Ansgar, came out of the house. His cat, Kennedy, slipped out behind him, a dirty, scraggy yellow cat with slit eyes. Eddie didn’t like Ansgar at all, and he didn’t like the horrible cat either. That cat, he often thought to himself. One day, I’m going to lure him inside. And I’m going to boil him in a large pan on the stove until the meat’s falling off the bones. Then I’ll leave the carcass on Ansgar’s step. I’ll hide behind a tree and watch his horror. No doubt there’ll be an uproar, and Ansgar will call the police and the local paper.
“Hi,” Ansgar said merrily. “You walking the dog? I guess it’s good to have something to do; the days must drag when you don’t work.”
Eddie didn’t answer. He started to pull at Shiba’s leash, but she’d sat down and wouldn’t budge.
“There was a job advertised in the paper yesterday,” Ansgar continued. “I don’t know whether you saw it. A maintenance company was looking for people. And I thought of you, you know, because you don’t really need a degree to change a light bulb.”
“They do more than just changing light bulbs,” Eddie muttered. “Anyway, I’m not fit for work; the doctor says so.”
Ansgar grinned. His teeth were small and sharp and rather yellow. “But most people can do something. You clear the snow like a professional. You could clear snow for me as well, if you like,” he added. “I’d pay you.”
Eddie jerked the leash violently, pulling Shiba to her feet, and tramped off down the road without saying a word. When he got back inside, he undid the leash and took off his jacket. Then he went into the kitchen and put the two envelopes down on the table. Mass looked at them despondently and turned back to what she was doing. Eddie sank down onto a chair and Shiba collapsed in the corner and fell asleep.
“She can hardly walk,” Eddie stated. “There’s something wrong with her back legs.”
Mass turned to her son. “I know. I keep meaning to take her to the vet and then I put it off.”
“Well, I think I know what’s going to happen,” Eddie said and put his great hands down on the table.
Now it was Mass’s turn not to answer. She wearily brushed the hair back from her forehead. Eddie got up and went over to Shiba. He lay down on the floor beside her, despite his size. The dog moved uneasily and wanted to get away, but she didn’t have the energy. Eddie edged his hand in under her chest. He could feel her little dog heart beating softly.
10
July 2005
“Take all calls seriously,” Konrad Sejer said. “Write down all the details: names, places, times, cars, and people. And, for that matter, any random suspicions. People who are simply curious or who have a fertile imagination. Divide them up among yourselves and be vigilant. I want to know every little thing. And if you’re in doubt, talk to Skarre; we can’t afford to overlook anything. Put everything else to one side.”
He went over to the map on the wall and pointed. “We are assuming that he got there via one of the three following routes. One: from the parking lot in Geirastadir, down over the fields, presumably along the edge of the woods. Jacob and I will walk that route. It takes fifteen minutes. Route two: he came from Haugane. Again, he might have parked a bit farther away — we’re assuming that he got there by car, even though we probably shouldn’t. It’s a shorter distance and perhaps more likely. The third alternative is, of course, that he walked through Skarven Farm, but that’s unlikely. What’s more, he was carrying a knife. He may have hidden this on his person, but the chances of being seen were greater, considering that eleven people live there.”
He left the map and sat back down at the table. “One of the Polish farm workers said he saw an old red car some way down the road to the farm. On the fourth of July. He had never seen the car before, but it stopped there for a few minutes before it disappeared. He thought that perhaps they’d taken a wrong turn. But the car is clearly of interest. He may have been watching Bonnie and Simon for a few days before he killed them. At some point, he must have seen them disappear into the trailer. God only knows what he thought.”
He looked at the people around him; there were ten of them, seven men and three women. They took notes, listening carefully and with great respect. They met in this room every morning at seven o’clock, when the day’s tasks were assigned. All of them had their own field.