Their food came. She’d ended up with spaghetti bolognese after all.
– Viken asked me to stay in touch with her, Arve reassured her. – I talked to her earlier today. She can call me whenever she likes. If she’s not interested, that’s all we can do, you know that as well as I do.
Nina wrapped spaghetti round her fork and realised that she’d made a mistake. Spaghetti was fine for kids, and a couple who’d known each other for a while. But first time out in a café with a man sitting opposite and watching you? Tacos were the only thing worse, she groaned to herself as she reached for a serviette. Fortunately Arve tactfully lowered his gaze to the rib steak on his own plate.
Once she’d eaten as much of the spaghetti as she thought she could allow herself, it was time to turn the conversation to matters outside the investigation.
– How did you end up in the police, Arve?
He laughed slightly and poured more beer into his glass. He was a guy who could fix car engines, mend things, cut down trees. His hands were broad and thick, with marks and scars he must have got working with machines and tools. She tried to imagine what it would feel like to be touched by them, held tight by them.
– Probably because I figured it was somewhere I could actually do something, he said. – Started studying law, but I always had to get a pal to wake me up during the lectures. Dropped out and spent a couple of years at folk high school, mountain climbing and rafting and camping out in cracks in glaciers. That was probably when it dawned on me that I needed a more active life than just swotting up on points of law. Something more unpredictable. I’ve always been someone who likes doing something. How about you?
She pushed the plate of half-eaten spaghetti to one side. She hadn’t the slightest objection to telling him the story of her life. What it was like to grow up in a high-rise in Fyllingsdalen. The friends who got pregnant as soon as they were done with high school, then moved out of the family apartment and into the block opposite. She’d always known she had to get out of there. Arve carried on eating and listening, didn’t say anything.
– What was that other thing, by the way? he suddenly asked.
– Other thing?
– You said yesterday you’d found one mistake and one omission in my notes about the medical student. You gave me the mistake straight away, I was supposed to get the omission for dessert.
Nina wiped thoroughly around her mouth. Registered that the serviette was still showing signs of tomato sauce.
– You dashed that report off pretty quickly, she said, and risked a teasing smile.
– You’re right, I had to prioritise. Aren’t you going to tell me?
Nina leant back in her chair. She’d managed to change into a light silk blouse she’d bought earlier in the day. It clung tightly across her breasts.
– According to Miriam herself, she doesn’t have a large circle of friends. She’s got two or three close ones, and she has some contact with the Catholic church in Majorstua.
– Well I got all that, didn’t I? Arve protested.
– Yes, but not that she’s been engaged.
His eyebrows shot up.
– Really? Here in Norway?
She gave a triumphant laugh.
– For two years.
– Well, you got me there all right, Nina.
She liked the way he said her name, putting equal stress on both syllables.
– Honestly, he continued, – I’m glad it was you who noticed. There are enough people who like to exploit others’ mistakes. Did she say who to?
– I didn’t ask; that wasn’t the most important thing right then. She said she broke up with him some years ago. I still don’t know whether it’s of any importance at all…
Arve scratched the tip of his chin with two fingers. He sat for a while staring thoughtfully into the air, straight past her.
– It might well be important, Nina, he said at last. – I guess Viken’s not the only one who’s been suffering from tunnel vision these last few days.
57
AXEL STUMBLED THROUGH the park outside the police station where he’d spent most of the last twenty-four hours. He stopped under one of the huge hazels. It was still raining, but not as much as the day before, and the wind had subsided.
He had a large swelling above one eye, and his lower lip was still swollen. He had hardly slept for the past few days, nor washed nor even run a comb through his hair. The bristles on his chin itched, and he could smell the body odour seeping up from his armpits. The physical degeneration felt like a temptation to sink further down into it.
It was dark by the time he slanted across the street to a café on the other side. In a stand outside the door a few last copies of the morning’s papers were still on display. The entire front page of VG carried a picture of a man being restrained by two police officers. The features of the face had been disguised, but anyone who knew him would have been in no doubt about who it was. The caption read: Doctor arrested – suspected of murders.
He needed something to drink. Most of all he needed to empty his bladder. The man behind the bar stopped him as he was on his way to the toilet.
– Are you going to buy something? The toilet is for customers only.
– A cognac.
– Can you pay?
The man gave him a lingering scrutiny. That’s the way it is now, thought Axel. This is the reception you’ll be getting from now on.
– You’ll just have to wait and see, he muttered as he walked into the strong smell of filthy urinal.
Afterwards he took a table in an inner recess of the darkened room. The first glass disappeared in one. It wasn’t cognac, but the colour wasn’t unlike. He signalled to the barman and had a second. For a brief moment waving a credit card had changed his status. He took his time over the third glass. He couldn’t quite come to terms with the thought that at some point or other he would have to get up and leave the place.
His phone vibrated in his jacket pocket. He didn’t know how long he’d been sitting there staring down at the table. It struck him that if he didn’t answer the phone now, he would never answer it again. A distant sense of relief when he saw that it was Rita. She was the only person he could face talking to right now.
– Axel, I don’t believe you. What a pickle you’ve got yourself into now.
He tried to make a joke about pickle but it didn’t work out. Instead she got him to tell her about the last twenty-four hours. Afterwards she said: – What are you going to do now?
He drained his glass.
– Didn’t you say you started working for me twelve years ago, Rita? Not many people know me better than you do.
He fell silent. She said: – I don’t believe for one moment that you… Not for one moment, Axel, do you hear me? But you were incredibly stupid to let yourself get mixed up with that…
Axel interrupted before she could use a word he didn’t want to hear.
– It isn’t her fault. Save the criticism for me.
– She rang yesterday, by the way.
– Miriam?
– Isn’t that who we’re talking about?
– What did she want?
– Apparently she left an envelope behind in the desk drawer in Ola’s office. She said she’d come in and fetch it, but I never saw her.
Axel could feel himself waking up.
– When was this?
– Yesterday afternoon. And then she said something very odd.
– What did she say?
– That if she didn’t turn up, I was to deliver it to you as soon as possible. She said it was important. Seemed really upset.
He checked his unanswered calls. Over thirty of them. Lots from Bie. One from Tom. And directly below it on the list: Miriam. Yesterday evening, 6.55. He called his voicemail. Twenty-three messages. The first was from Bie. Then a journalist from VG. Then several others he didn’t know. He clicked his way through them. On the sixth he heard an indistinct sound, a car engine probably, above it a pop song he’d heard a few times, and someone whistling in the background. He was about to click forward to the next one. Then he heard her voice: Where are we going? Miriam: the name shot through him. An indistinct male voice answered her. Axel couldn’t stay seated; he had to get to his feet. He clamped the phone to one ear, pressed a finger in the other. Miriam’s voice: The cabin? Are you mad? Suddenly the man’s voice was more prominent. What the hell have you got there? Give it to me! Some rustling sounds. Then her scream. Rising and ending in a shout: Axel. Then silence.