‘. . Dad?’
‘Why isn’t it possible?’
‘Because. .’ Bjørn said, staring at Harry as though he wasn’t there.
‘Yes?’
‘Because she’s already dead.’
41
It was a quiet morning in Vestre Cemetery. All that could be heard was the distant hum of traffic in Sørkedalsveien and the clatter of the trams conveying people to the city centre.
‘Roar Midtstuen, yes,’ Harry said, striding between the gravestones. ‘How many years has he actually been with you?’
‘No one knows,’ Bjørn said, struggling to keep up. ‘Since the dawn of time.’
‘And his daughter died in a car accident?’
‘Last summer. It’s sick. It just can’t be right. They’ve only got the first part of the DNA code. There’s still a ten, fifteen per cent chance it’s someone else’s DNA, perhaps someone-’ He almost walked into Harry, who had come to a sudden halt.
‘Well,’ Harry said, sinking to his knees and sticking his fingers into the earth by the gravestone bearing Fia Midtstuen’s name, ‘that chance just plummeted to zero.’ He raised his hand and sprinkled freshly dug soil between his fingers. ‘He dug up the body, transported it to Come As You Are. And set fire to it.’
‘F. .’
Harry heard the tears in his colleague’s voice. Avoided looking at him. Left him in peace. Waited. Closed his eyes, listened. A bird sang a — to human ears — meaningless song. The carefree, whistling wind nudged the clouds along. A metro train rattled westwards. Time went, but did it have anywhere to go any more? Harry opened his eyes again. Coughed.
‘We’d better ask them to dig up the coffin and have this confirmed before we contact the father.’
‘I’ll do that.’
‘Bjørn,’ Harry said, ‘this is better. This wasn’t a young girl burned alive. OK?’
‘Sorry, I’m just exhausted. And Roar was in a bad enough state before, so I. .’ He threw up his arms in desperation.
‘That’s fine,’ Harry said, getting up.
‘Where are you going?’
Harry looked to the north, to the road and the metro. The clouds were drifting towards him. A northerly. And there it was again. The sensation that he knew something he didn’t know yet, something down there in the murky depths inside him, but it would not float to the surface.
‘I have to take care of something.’
‘Where?’
‘Just something I’ve put off for too long.’
‘Right. By the way, there was something I was wondering about.’
Harry glanced at his watch and nodded.
‘When you spoke to Bellman yesterday what did he think could have happened to the bullet?’
‘He had no idea.’
‘What about you? You usually have at least one hypothesis.’
‘Mm. I’ve got to be off.’
‘Harry?’
‘Yes?’
‘Don’t. .’ Bjørn gave a sheepish smile. ‘Don’t do anything stupid.’
Katrine Bratt leaned back in her chair and looked at the screen. Bjørn Holm had just rung to say they had found the father, a Midtstuen who had investigated the murder of Kalsnes, but the reason they hadn’t found him among the police officers with young daughters was that his daughter was already dead. And as that meant Katrine was temporarily unemployed she had looked at her search history from the day before. They hadn’t had any hits for Mikael Bellman and René Kalsnes. When she had looked for a list of the people most frequently connected with Mikael Bellman, three names stood out. First was Ulla Bellman. Then came Truls Berntsen. And in third place, Isabelle Skøyen. It was no surprise that his wife came first, nor was it strange that the Councillor for Social Affairs, his superior, should come third.
But she was taken aback by Truls Berntsen.
For the simple reason that there was an internal note directed from Fraud Squad to the Police Chief, written right there in Police HQ. There was a cash sum that Truls Berntsen refused to account for, and they had asked for permission to start an investigation into possible corruption.
She couldn’t find an answer, so she supposed that Bellman must have given a verbal response.
What she found strange was that the Chief of Police and an apparently corrupt policeman had rung and exchanged texts so often, used credit cards at the same places and at the same times, travelled at the same time by plane and train, checked into the same hotel on the same date and had been in the same firing range. When Harry had told her to run a thorough check on Bellman, she discovered that Bellman had been watching gay porn online. Could Truls Berntsen be his lover?
Katrine sat looking at the screen.
So what? It didn’t have to mean anything.
She knew Harry had met Bellman the previous night, in Valle Hovin. And confronted him with the discovery of his bullet. And before leaving Harry had mumbled something about a feeling he knew who had switched the bullet in the Evidence Room. To her enquiry, Harry had only answered ‘The Shadow’.
Katrine widened her search to include more of the past.
She read through the results.
Bellman and Berntsen were inseparable throughout their careers. Which had clearly started at Stovner Police Station after they had left Police College.
She got up a list of other employees during that period.
Her eyes ran down the screen. Stopped at one name. Dialled a number starting with 55.
‘And high time too, frøken Bratt,’ the voice sang, and she felt so liberated to hear genuine Bergen dialect again. ‘You were supposed to have been here for a physical examination some time ago!’
‘Hans-’
‘Dr Hans, thank you very much. Please be so kind as to remove your top, Bratt.’
‘Pack it in,’ she warned him, with a smile on her lips.
‘May I ask you not to confuse medical expertise with unwanted sexual attentions in the workplace, Bratt?’
‘Someone told me you were back on the beat.’
‘Yep. And where are you at this minute?’
‘In Oslo. By the way, I can see from a list here that you worked at Stovner Police Station at the same time as Mikael Bellman and Truls Berntsen.’
‘That was straight after Police College, and only because of a woman, Bratt. The nightmare with the knockers — have I told you about her?’
‘Probably.’
‘But when it was all over with her, it was over with Oslo as well.’ He burst into song. ‘Vestland, Vestland über alles-’
‘Hans! When you worked with-’
‘No one worked with those two boys, Katrine. You either worked for them or you worked against them.’
‘Truls Berntsen has been suspended.’
‘And high time too. He’s beaten someone up again, I assume?’
‘Beaten up? Did he beat up prisoners?’
‘Worse than that. He beat up police officers.’
Katrine felt the hairs on her arms stand on end. ‘Oh? Who did he beat up?’
‘Everyone who tried it on with Bellman’s wife. Beavis Berntsen was head over heels in love with them both.’
‘What did he use?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘When he beat them up.’
‘How should I know? Something hard, I suppose. At least it looked like that when that young Nordlander was stupid enough to dance too close to fru Bellman at the Christmas dinner.’
‘Which Nordlander?’
‘His name was. . let me see. . something with R. Yes, Runar. It was Runar. Runar. . let me see now. . Runar. .’
Come on, Katrine thought, as her fingers automatically scampered across the keyboard.
‘Sorry, Katrine, it’s a long time ago. Perhaps if you take off your top?’
‘Tempting,’ Katrine said. ‘But I’ve found it without your help. There was only one Runar at Stovner at that time. Bye, Hans-’
‘Wait! A little mammogram doesn’t have to-’
‘Have to run, sicko.’
She rang off. Pressed Enter. Let the search engine work while she stared at the surname. There was something familiar about it. Where had she heard it? She closed her eyes, mumbling the name to herself. It was so unusual it couldn’t be chance. She opened her eyes. The result was in. There was a lot. Enough. Medical records. Admission to hospital for drug addiction. The correspondence between the head of a detox clinic in Oslo and the Police Chief. Pure, innocent, blue eyes looking at her. She suddenly knew where she had seen them before.