Axel sat there lost in thought. Cecilie Davidsen was due to be operated on at Ullevål hospital next Wednesday. He wanted to see her one last time before she was admitted. Was it because he had called at her home that she hadn’t come? Forcing his way into her house with this news. He recalled the daughter’s frightened eyes when she opened the door to him.
He shook these thoughts off and wandered out into the corridor. Rita had gone. Inger Beate too. The waiting room was empty. He had an idea and went into Ola’s office. At this moment Ola would be at the helm of a sailing boat on his way across the Pacific. Or diving with his sons on a coral reef off the Fiji islands. Holding on tight to the shell of a giant turtle and being pulled along through the water. He’d be travelling for another six months. When Ola gave the best man’s speech at Axel’s wedding twenty-two years ago, he had said that they each had their own god, he and Axel. He made his offerings to Poseidon, while Axel followed Pan into the forests.
For the time being this was Miriam’s office. He thought he could pick up the faint scent of her, even though she hadn’t been there for two days. He was attending a seminar after the weekend, and Inger Beate would be her supervisor for the last three days of her practical placement. When they’d parted at Frognerseter the previous day, neither of them had said anything. But Axel had made up his mind that it was the last time he would see her.
He sat down at the desk. Her stethoscope was in the middle drawer, and a couple of her textbooks. He opened one of them. She’d written her name in thick blue ink. He sat a while looking at it.
– You must be a very happy man, Axel, he muttered. – You’ve been given the lot. There is no more than this.
Beneath the second book he found a stuffed A4 envelope. She’d written her name on this too with the same pen. It wasn’t sealed, and when he pulled out the flap he saw that it contained a pile of smaller envelopes. He still knew next to nothing about her, and didn’t want to know any more than that either. It was what had enabled him to keep control. It was what made it possible for him to sit there and think that he would never see her again. Let it pass, let her fade away almost to invisibility, and life could go on as before. It was Friday afternoon. He was looking forward to the weekend. Saturday was training with Tom’s football team, and Marlen’s riding lesson. In the afternoon he was planning a trip to Larkollen. Lay up the boat for the winter. Paint the veranda of the summer cabin. He’d try to get Tom to go along with him. Maybe stay overnight, just the two of them. Apart from that, there was nothing that had to be done. Except paint a few skirting boards, he suddenly remembered, and change the fan belt in Bie’s car.
He fumbled down inside the envelope, and was about to pull out the contents when he heard someone calling his name out in the corridor. He threw Miriam’s things back into the drawer.
Solveig Lundwall was standing outside the door of his office.
– Hi, Axel, she said as she saw him approaching, and he could tell straight away that she was still not well.
He let her in, asked how the time in the secure wing had been. It had been painful. She’d been strapped down.
– Really? he exclaimed.
She gave him a dark look.
– Do you think I’m lying, Axel?
– Of course not, I’m just surprised.
She sat there in front of him in her dark blue polo-neck pullover and grey skirt, face a little drawn but nicely made up. It wasn’t easy to imagine her screaming and foaming at the mouth in a restraining bed.
He checked her blood pressure and wrote out a prescription for her.
– These damn pills make me so fat, she complained. – I wish I could do without.
He could understand. Over the last year she’d put on something like ten kilos.
– Do you feel as though you’re in control again, Solveig?
– I’m afraid of going to sleep, because that’s when those thoughts come back.
– That you have to warn people about something?
– I can’t get rid of the thought that something awful is about to happen. There are so many signs.
He ran his hand across his hair.
– But the meaning of signs is dependent on how they’re interpreted, he said.
She sat there staring ahead into space.
– Last night I took the tram from Jernebanetorget. The man sitting beside me was reading VG. All that stuff about the woman eaten by a bear.
– She wasn’t exactly eaten, he reassured her.
– As I was about to get off the tram, this old lady comes over to me. I think she’s blind. Her eyes are as dull as pearls and still she’s staring directly at me, and then she says, You’ve heard it too, I can see it in your eyes, and she hands me a little piece of paper. And I get so scared, despairing too, but mostly scared. You have the power, she whispers before I manage to get off.
Axel could see the pulse beating in her throat.
– What did it say on the piece of paper?
Solveig glanced around the office before answering:
– Rev. 11:7.
He thought for a moment.
– Does it have anything to do with the Bible?
She dug her hand into her bag, drew out a small book and began to flip through it.
– The Book of Revelation.
She found the place and read:
– When they have finished their testimony, the beast that comes up out of the abyss will make war with them, and overcome them and kill them.
– I wish old ladies like that would leave you alone, said Axel. Solveig ignored him.
– I’ve been thinking about it all night. This is a warning, Axel. A number of terrible events are about to take place, and if I, and perhaps a few others, have understood this, then I must deliver a warning. That is what the old woman wanted me to know.
She said it with conviction, and Axel realised he would have to call Ullevål hospital and voice his concern about yet another patient who had been discharged too soon. He knew he ought not to enquire any further. And yet he said:
– Last time you were here… You said you’d seen someone up by Majorstuehuset. Someone who looked like me.
She stared down at the floor. It looked as though she hadn’t understood the question, and he was glad, at once regretting that he had asked it. Then she raised her eyes and looked at him.
– He hasn’t appeared since then, Axel. But he’s coming. Once all the evil has happened, he will return. I shall warn you. You will be the first to know, before all others.
As he was about to lock up the office, the phone rang. Not many people had his direct number. Miriam was one of them. An Oslo number showed up on the display. He picked up the receiver and spoke. A male voice at the other end introduced himself as Hendrik Davidsen, clearly accentuating the d in his first name.
– My wife is a patient of yours, he explained. – She had an appointment earlier today.
– That’s right, Axel said. – Cecilie Davidsen. She never came.
– That’s the reason I’m calling. No one has seen her. Not since yesterday afternoon.
Axel sat down in the chair.
– Really? Wasn’t she supposed to be at the hospital yesterday for an examination?
– Yes. She left the hospital at quarter past four. There’s been no sign of life from her since then. She’s never done anything like this before.
Hendrik Davidsen’s voice was calm and controlled, but Axel heard the break in it as he said ‘sign of life’.
– You’ve informed the police, presumably?
– They’ve sent out a missing persons report on her. Not much else they can do. Not at the moment…
Axel chose not to ask what ‘at the moment’ might mean in a situation like this. He informed Davidsen of his wife’s condition, but he was already familiar with it. Fortunately he made no mention of Axel’s coming to the house with the results of her lab test. But he did ask how his wife had reacted to the news, and Axel was careful not to say anything that might increase his fears. There was still reason to hope that nothing untoward had happened to her. More reason to hope than believe.