He zoomed in further still.
– What is this? he asked, pointing to four small dots under the shoulder.
He magnified the image to show a slight swelling under each of them.
– Needle marks, Norbakk volunteered.
– No doubt about it. What do we make of that?
– She takes drugs, suggested one of the new members of the team, a young man with cheeks pitted with acne scars. He was on loan from Majorstua and was hardly likely to contribute anything to the investigation. When Viken had requested more resources, he had been thinking of quality, not making up the numbers. Now he stood swaying back and forth on the soles of his feet, like a teacher savouring the pleasures of correcting a boy who should have known better.
– Apparently gave it up years ago, he informed him. – And this is on the outside of the arm, nowhere near the larger arteries. In addition, no trace of the usual narcotics in the blood. And as you will remember… He showed a new picture. – Cecilie Davidsen’s upper right arm: three similar pinpricks, five on the thigh. And here, Paulsen: four pricks in the upper left arm, four in each thigh.
– Tranquillisers, the new man from Majorstua corrected himself.
– Precisely, said Viken in an amiable tone. He had no objection to greenhorns, provided they weren’t too green. – Dr Plåterud found traces of the same narcotic as was used on the other victims.
– I’m guessing she was subjected to similar treatment, Norbakk ventured. – Tranquillised a few times before being given the fatal overdose.
– Exactly.
Viken clicked up a new picture.
– Someone has left us a footprint in this mess on the floor. The party concerned was wearing a black sock, one hundred per cent cotton, shoe size 47. We’ve got people examining the fibres to see if there’s anything unusual about them.
– How many black socks are there in this town? was Sigge Helgarsson’s comment.
– That’s for you to find out, Viken grinned. – It’ll keep you busy for a while. We also found plenty of skin cells under the victim’s fingernails. Let’s just hope it wasn’t herself she was scratching.
He clicked on and continued.
– Here is the door jamb she was found propped up against.
He magnified the image and pointed.
– Five deeply scored marks across the woodwork, running downwards almost to the threshold.
The recruit from Majorstua exclaimed: – Like scratch marks from a claw.
– What do you think, Arve? Could this have been made by a bear’s paw?
– Looks like it. Pretty sick stuff…
– I quite agree, Viken said quietly. – Sicker than anything any of us have ever come across before.
He switched off the computer.
– I’ll bet a fiver that the neighbour, Miriam Gaizauskaite, had a visitor last night, even though she says not. She doesn’t sit up of an evening drinking out of two wine glasses, one with and one without lipstick. I want to find out everything we can about her background.
– Sounds like a lot of spadework for me, said Arve Norbakk. – Just so long as I don’t have to go to… where was it, Lithuania? he added with a big grin.
Jarle Frøen spoke.
– What about the actual investigation so far?
– Relax, Mr Prosecutor, Viken said patiently. – We’re about to get on to that right now. Jebsen, you can start.
Nina looked down at her notes.
– I spoke to the newspaper delivery man. Mehmed Faruq, fifty-three years old, originally from Kurdistan. His papers all appear to be in order. Speaks passable Norwegian. I’ve got a list of things he noticed in the course of his morning route, from Carl Berners Place and on down. Three, possibly four cars in Helgesens gate. A couple entering a block. A person getting out of a taxi at Sofienberg Park, right next to the scene of the crime. I traced the taxi driver and he confirms the time. He drove past the same place an hour earlier and on that occasion noticed a cyclist with a child-trailer. We’ll take a closer look at all these, but the most important thing is this: the delivery man encountered a male as he was passing through the gate at the address where the victim lived.
– Not bad, Nina. Description?
– The person in question is thirty to forty years old, well above medium height, powerfully built, wearing dark clothes, a coat or long jacket, dark hair. This was about ten past five. There was a light in the entrance, so the delivery man got a good look.
– The timing agrees with what the neighbour told us, that she heard someone opening the gate at around five. Have a good look at the delivery man, including his alibis for the other times that are of interest to us.
– Apparently he’s just returned from a fortnight in Germany seeing his relatives. Gardermoen airport records confirm that.
– Excellent.
– Some of you may have noted, continued Nina, – an obvious connection with what we have here and witness observations relating to the Paulsen case.
The child-trailer, Norbakk suggested. – You mentioned that a cyclist pulling one of those was seen earlier this morning too.
Nina winked at him.
– No flies on you. It took me a while longer to notice it. We’ve been assuming that Paulsen was transported from the woods to the place where the body was found. A car on a private forest road would have attracted attention. A child-trailer, on the other hand…
Viken noticed that she didn’t seem to mind at all that Arve Norbakk was following her with his droopy eyes.
– But that’s for transporting small children in, he interrupted.
– In the bigger models there’s room for two large children, Nina explained. – And note that this bicycle with the child-trailer was observed right next to the scene of the crime at quarter to four in the morning. Who cycles around with children in the middle of the night?
Sigge Helgarsson woke up.
– Not everyone detaches the trailer every time they go out. Mine is always on, whether the kids are with me or not.
Norbakk offered his support to Nina.
– Hilde Paulsen was 157 centimetres tall and anything but overweight. She was found with her legs doubled up under her. And Anita Elvestrand’s body was partially mutilated.
– My trailer’s down in the garage, said Sigge. – We can check it for size.
Nina smiled brightly.
– I saw it not long ago and took the liberty of trying it out myself. There would definitely be room for a small, lightly built woman inside it.
Viken had a witty comment on the tip of his tongue but at the last moment decided against sharing it.
– You’ve certainly not been wasting your time, Jebsen, he said instead, and almost patted her on the head. – A description of the man at the gate will be released to the media if he has not reported himself to us within, – he glanced at his watch, – precisely five hours from now.
43
AXEL HEARS A phone. He recognises the ringtone but it isn’t his. He searches around the room. The sound is getting closer, but he can’t find where it’s coming from.
He woke with a start and looked around the strange room. It took a few moments for him to realise he was in Rita’s apartment in Tåsen. A few moments more before the memory of what had happened fell over him like an avalanche. He sat upright on the leather sofa. The clock on the wall showed 1.45.
His feet felt cold. He’d thrown his socks away in a rubbish bin in Sofienberg Park. He picked up the phone, turned on the sound. A long list of unanswered calls. Four from Bie, three from Miriam. He called her.
– Where are you, Axel? Why aren’t you answering your phone?
– I needed to sleep for a few hours. Are the police there?
– They’ve been here asking all sorts of questions. After that they rang me twice. Some of them are still out there on the landing. They’ve been in here too, looking all over the place, looking for something. And there’s a man standing guard down in the back yard. I just wish I could wake up soon and all this was only a nightmare.