The door was locked. He switched on the torch and walked round the cabin. A couple of small windows on the sheltered side. He looked round for something to break one of them with. There was a small shed on the other side of the clearing. That was locked too, but the hasp holding the padlock was rusty and loose. He grabbed hold of it, managed to wrench it off, toppled backwards when it eventually gave. He shone the light into the darkness inside, saw a tall pile of logs and pulled one out. The pile started to collapse, something fell from the top of it. He twisted away, was hit by something big and heavy, tried to hurl himself out of the shed.
When he looked inside again, a dark shape was lying on the floor. He kicked at it. It didn’t move. A large, lifeless animal. A bear, he could see now. The eyes were glassy, the jaws open revealing sharp yellow teeth. The animal was stuffed and nailed to a stand. Two of the paws had been cut off. He pushed it to one side and picked up the log that had caused the woodpile to collapse. As he was about to go outside again, he noticed a trailer standing directly inside the door. It was collapsible, a child-trailer. It looked new, he registered as he hung the door back in place.
He broke a window in two places, opened the hasp, crawled inside, stood there and sniffed. Dust and resin, but mostly the odour of rotting food. He shone the torch around. Braided mats on the floor. It looked freshly varnished. Firewood piled in the fireplace. Pictures on two of the walls: a tarn, a sunset between the trees. A door leading into a small kitchen stood half open. A fridge that was closed but not turned on. A couple of cartons of sour milk on the shelves. No sign of any rotting food. By the back door he found a fuse box. It must mean the place had its own generator.
On the table in the main room was a map of the area and an envelope. It contained photos. He took them out, shone his torch on the top one. Miriam walking along a street in town. Next, one of the flat where she lived, taken looking up towards her window. The one after that showed a woman in a dark coat on her way out of a house. The woman was Cecilie Davidsen, the house the villa in Vindern. He flipped quickly through the rest. One of Miriam’s car with two people inside, the Nesodden ferry in the background. Then one of himself getting out of the car. The last one in the pile had been taken in a dark room. He could just make out his own face, in a bed. Next to him Miriam’s dark hair against a pillow. He threw the photos down on to the table.
Beyond the fireplace he found two doors. The nearer led to a bedroom with bunk beds. A cupboard in the corner stacked with woollen blankets. The second door was locked. There was something white lying in front of it. A vest. He straightened it out, recognised it at once, her name with the pink glitter lettering over the chest. It was covered in stiff yellowish patches.
He hurled himself against the locked door. It didn’t move.
– Miriam, he shouted into the gap. Pressed his ear to it and listened. No sound from within.
He took his mobile phone out again, again tried the sergeant’s number. He heard a phone ringing in the kitchen. Grabbing hold of the log he had placed on the table, he crept out, overwhelmed with a feeling he was on the point of being able to put into words. Then something happened behind him, a wave breaking, splintering the darkness and hurling him into a storm of light.
61
NINA JEBSEN OPENED the office door. It was only 7.15. She had had a restless night and woken early. After an hour of tossing and turning she had decided to get up and make better use of the time.
She spat out the day’s first Nicorette. The waste bin hadn’t been emptied and yesterday’s sticky deposits still clung to the plastic liner inside. She punched in her password and logged on. Here we go again, she thought in frustration. With the charge against Glenne dropped, they would now have to go through all the witness statements and documentation again. It reminded her of the snakes and ladders they used to play as children. Just before you reached home, you could trip and slide all the way back down to square one. She tried not to think of how many thousands of pages of documents relating to the case they had amassed thus far. Memories of the visit to the café yesterday afternoon kept coming back to her. This was what had kept her awake in the night. See you later, Arve, she’d said as they stood in front of the garage at the station, sounding more like an invitation than a salutation. He’d stepped closer to her and brushed the backs of his fingers against her cheek. Twice, while looking into her eyes. At that moment she had thought, Now it’s going to happen. Then he said, See you and headed for the garage door, leaving her standing there with her insides on fire. But at the last minute he’d turned round and suggested they go out together again one of these days. Maybe have a drink or two.
Nina picked up a pen and wrote on a memo pad: Arve. Sat there looking at the name. She had always had neat handwriting. It suited his name. She opened a pack of chewing tobacco and navigated to the file on Miriam Gaizauskaite. She recalled something they had talked about yesterday. The victims’ ages. Paulsen fifty-six, Davidsen forty-six, Elvestrand thirty-six. Miriam had turned twenty-six three months earlier. Her stomach rumbled. She’d had no breakfast. In the desk drawer she found an apple and took a bite through the leathery skin. It was mealy inside, but she didn’t care… There was something else too. The first victim had been found in the Oslo marka, the second in Frogner Park, the third outside Miriam’s door. It was as if something was getting closer. She carefully read through Arve’s report again, noting with a smile that he had corrected the mistake she had alerted him to. Lived seven years in Norway, it now read. That first year she’d been at the folk high school near Sandane, in Nordfjord.
She closed the report and looked over the notes she had made herself since starting on the case. There was a vague feeling of having missed something. A piece of information, something she’d heard but not properly understood. She navigated to the report on the visit to the Reinkollen collective, not necessarily expecting to find it there. She heard footsteps out in the corridor and recognised them, spat out the tobacco and pushed the unsightly waste bin out of sight below the table. Arve always came early to work. If you twisted her arm, she would probably have admitted there were other reasons for her getting here before everyone else today, because she was most definitely not a morning person.
His office was a little further down the corridor, meaning he had to pass her door. It was ajar, but to make certain he knew she was there, she kicked at the waste bin and then swore. The steps stopped outside. There was a knock. She swivelled round in her chair.
– Hi, Nina. Having trouble?
– Not really, I just… tripped.
She didn’t say what it was she might have tripped over, sitting there at her desk like that.
– Yesterday was fun, he smiled.
The way he said it made her cheeks glow. He must have noticed. – Really enjoyed it, he added.
– Me too, she managed to say.
She pulled herself together, indicated his hand.
– Cut yourself, Arve?
He turned it over, saw what she was pointing to, on the outside of his wrist.
– Damn, I thought I’d wiped it all off. Had to clean a fuel injector in the car. He winked at her. – Not to worry, I’ll survive.
He looked paler than usual, drawn around the eyes.
– Sleep well? she asked solicitously.
– I wouldn’t say that. Feel as though my phone’s been ringing all night.
– Anything important?
He rubbed his bristly chin. The beard was much darker than the hair, she noticed.