5
Frank Frølich was left sitting with his lips twisted into a small ironic smile. It sounded odd to hear his boss calling him Frankie. It was what most people called him, though. Boys in the street had soon realized that Frankie was cooler than Frank and sounded best when apple scrumping or at football training. The nickname had followed him ever since. But Gunnarstranda was slow to pick up on things like that. ‘Right, Frølich?’ was more the tone. ‘What do you reckon, Frølich?’
With a feigned cough and fidgety fingers. It almost sounded a bit comical. Hearing this aloof old hothead with the gimlet eyes call him Frankie.
He packed away the papers and followed Gunnarstranda, who had stridden off across the road, stopped and was gazing upwards. Then he turned and crossed the street quickly again. Studying the façade of the building.
Frank squinted up as well. Was taken by surprise, as always, at the beauty of the cornices and sculptures on these old apartment buildings. One was newer than the others. Square window panes with no ornamentation.
‘There,’ Gunnarstranda pointed. ‘That block has the right view. Let’s go to the top floor.’
Upon reaching the top floor at last, they were both panting. On the landing outside the front doors the light had gone, so the name plates were barely legible. Two flats, but only one was occupied. The second door was partially concealed by cardboard boxes and rubbish piled up against the wall. Frank stooped and read the name engraved in the blackened brass:
‘Arvid Johansen.’
‘Cops?’ mumbled the old man who opened up. ‘Thought it wouldn’t be long before you lot were on my back!’
They entered a cramped and poorly ventilated flat. A heavy stench of smoke, dust and something reminiscent of stale fish offal met their nostrils. Large dust balls had collected in the corner of the hallway. A variety of stains adorned the lino floor, which was unwashed and sticky underfoot.
The well-built old grunter, once a hulk of a man, had an erect bearing, but his legs were stiff and his breathing crackled with asthma. His hair was grey, short and thick. Beneath his eyes and chin hung deep bags of wrinkled skin. His reddened right eye gleamed at them; a blood vessel must have burst.
He shuffled ahead into the little sitting room and sat down on a worn, grey wing chair by the window. At the other end of the room there was a small TV and a video recorder.
The TV picture showed a woman sucking dick while emitting moaning noises. It took Frank a while for his brain to cut in and inform him what was going on.
By then Johansen had already raised the remote control and frozen the picture on the screen, put down the remote and grabbed a roll-up from the ashtray on the table. The cigarette had not gone out, so he puffed it into life and took a drag, which was followed by a lengthy bout of coughing. His throat gurgled. After the fit had finally subsided he spat into a handkerchief and stared up expectantly at Gunnarstranda, who had ensconced himself by the window. Frank looked around the room. Bare walls. Floor heaving with porn magazines. Glossy paper strewn with nude women. Faces of tarts with their tongues sticking out. Such as there, on the sitting room table, a large centrefold of a naked girl with a Father Christmas cap on her head and a yellow banana up her crotch. Two strong masculine hands forcing her legs apart.
‘That’d be something to keep out the winter cold!’
Johansen had followed Frank’s gaze. His mouth laughed behind a clenched fist. The laughter degenerated into coughing.
Gunnarstranda stared out of the window until the man was breathing normally again. ‘Come here, Johansen,’ he ordered without turning. The man in the chair obeyed. Gunnarstranda’s little head reached up to the middle of his chest.
‘The flat down there, at an angle to us, in the pink block with the curtains drawn.’
‘That’s where she lived, that is.’
Johansen had sat down again. ‘Our young filly.’ He winked at Frank. ‘Pert pear-shaped tits, the type that bounce around!’
He illustrated with his hands. ‘High buttocks. Rounded, and ginger pussy hair.’
The hand with the cigarette shook. The man wheezed, got up and, standing next to Gunnarstranda, pointed. ‘That’s where she lived,’ he pointed with rasping breath. ‘That’s the very one.’
The grunter started to pace to and fro, stiff-legged, across the floor.
Frank tried to avoid looking at the bloodshot eye. It flashed like a brake light every time the old man turned on his heel.
‘You’ve got to find a young bloke,’ the man gasped, ‘mid-twenties, no special characteristics, but long, black hair which he keeps in a pony tail. They like that, girls do.’
He stared up at the ceiling before sitting back down. His cigarette was out, but he lit it with an ancient, peeling lighter. It wouldn’t light at first. The two policemen watched him struggling to retain control of his fingers with every flick. At last it caught. He blew out smoke and went on:
‘I watched ’em all night. The nitty-gritty.’
Frank looked up. Met Gunnarstranda’s eyes.
‘She was a little rose, you know, she knew what we old boys like.’
He gave a moist grin. Winked at Gunnarstranda.
‘What did you see?’ Gunnarstranda asked.
‘What did I see?’
The old boy’s breathing crackled. ‘What d’you think I saw?’
He raised his right hand and made a circle with his thumb and forefinger. Then he began to poke his left forefinger in and out of the hole. An amusing sight. The old man laughed, got into difficulties and had to hold his fist in front of his mouth to curb the asthmatic fit of laughter that exploded into the room.
Frank drifted over to the window as well, and opened it an inch or two. Put his face in the current of air that entered. For a moment all was quiet. The noise of traffic outside mixed with the sounds of Johansen’s asthmatic rattle.
‘They had all the lights on,’ the crackling voice continued. ‘Curtains were open, so I just sat here enjoying myself while she lay on her back down there waggling her tits!’
It went quiet again. All that could be heard was the old man in the chair leaning forward and stubbing out his cigarette.
‘Gratis and for nothing.’
A dark expression had formed between the man’s wrinkles. ‘Buggered if I can understand why he…’ came a new tone from the chair.
Frank stared at him. The muggy offal smell was not so strong now and a pained air was visible on the man’s drawn face. He was searching for words. Hidden behind his hands. ‘I can’t get my head round why he had to croak her afterwards!’
The skin on his hands was coarse and lined.
‘How did he kill her?’
Gunnarstranda’s voice cut through the silence even though the intonation was friendly, no more than curious.
Johansen twitched. ‘How? I don’t care so long as you get ’im.’
The little pain there had been in his voice was gone. His eyes were cold, like when he opened his front door.
‘You haven’t answered my question! How did he kill her?’
‘He stabbed her, for fuck’s sake!’
The silence in the room became palpable.
‘Who did this crazy thing, me or him?’
Gunnarstranda went up close. ‘How?’ he repeated in a low voice.
Johansen didn’t answer. He just glared back at the gimlet eyes of the short, balding detective in front of him.
Frank tried to read the expression on Johansen’s face. Was it fear or just defiance?
Then Gunnarstranda went round the table, apparently having backed down. Sat on the sofa and began to study the magazines without another word. ‘What taste you have, Johansen!’
The derision in his intonation was unmistakable.
The old man didn’t turn, hadn’t even stirred in his chair. His eyes looked straight ahead, were fixed on a point on the wall.