Ellingsen expelled air through his nose and Boe sent me a suspicious glare. ‘Seeing how things were?’
I opened my mouth to answer as a car turned into the narrow street. When the driver became aware of our presence he switched off full beam. For a second, time stood still. Then the two policemen began to walk towards the new arrival, a BMW of the sporty variety as far as I could see, as muscular as it was lowbrow and in an unbelievably indecorous colour, the closest relative to which was orange. Before they had closed in, the driver had opened the door and got out. He was slim, wore a short jacket and was only visible as a silhouette in the distance.
I followed Ellingsen and Boe.
‘Who are you? What are you doing here?’ asked the man with natural authority in his voice.
‘We should ask you the same,’ Boe said, showing his police ID.
‘My name is Langeland and I’m the family’s solicitor.’
‘Which family?’
‘Skarnes. Who did you think?’
Ellingsen looked sheepish. ‘Well, we had to ask, didn’t we.’
‘Not necessarily.’
The two policemen introduced themselves. Langeland looked at me. ‘And this is?’
Ellingsen and Boe turned round in astonishment, as if they had never seen me before.
‘Veum,’ I said. ‘Social services.’
‘Are you responsible for looking after Jan?’
‘He’s in safe hands.’
‘That’s good to hear. Where?’
‘I don’t know if I can divulge that information.’
‘As I said to the policemen here… I’m the family’s solicitor. You can tell me everything.’
‘I’ve learnt that you should say as little as possible to solicitors.’
Boe gave a crooked grin. ‘Perhaps you should take Veum with you for a ride in your car, Langeland. Make him an offer he cannot refuse.’
‘You’ve seen the film, too, have you?’ I said.
‘What is in fact the problem?’ Langeland said.
‘What’s what problem?’
‘What are you doing here?’
‘Perhaps I should ask you that question. Are you expecting to find your client in?’
He sent me a chill look. ‘My client?’
‘Vibecke Skarnes. You’re the family ’s solicitor, didn’t you say?’
‘Yes, I am… Isn’t she in hospital?’
‘In which case wouldn’t it make more sense if you were visiting her there — rather than here?’
Both policemen focused their attention on Langeland as if they shared my view of the matter.
He glowered at us. ‘I came here to see what the situation was. I hadn’t received a report back on what had happened before this evening.’ With a sidelong glance at the policeman, he added, ‘I was working on a case in Kinsarvik, but I understand there is nothing else to be done here.’
‘Never say never,’ I said.
‘And that is supposed to mean?’
I turned to Boe again. ‘I don’t know how much I’m allowed to disclose. To be on the safe side, I’ll leave an assessment of that to our friends here.’
Boe took stock of Langeland. Then he said succinctly: ‘It turns out fru Skarnes has disappeared.’
‘What! Disappeared?’
‘Yes.’
‘From the hospital.’
No one said a word. Boe just nodded in silence.
For a moment, Langeland stood mesmerised. ‘Well, I never!’ He turned to me again. ‘Do you know anything about this?’
‘No more than has already been said.’
An apparently dumbfounded solicitor was such a rare sight that I was distracted for a moment. Then he had himself under control again.
‘Well, I’ll have to go up there myself and find out what could have happened.’ He looked from me back to the policemen. ‘And you?’
Boe gazed at him from under weary eyelids. ‘We’ve been assigned to surveillance duties outside the house. In case she turns up. Veum’s going home to bed.’
I winked at Ellingsen. ‘Yes, if Elling’s here then…’
His face instantly went scarlet. ‘Veum! I’ve warned you!’
‘You have indeed. But has that scared me off? Not yet.’
‘One day I’m going to hit you so hard you’ll…’
‘We’ll be in the papers?’ I looked at the other two. ‘Now I have witnesses anyway. Will you take the case, Langeland?’
‘Alright, alright,’ Boe said, with impatience. ‘Since neither of you has any official reason to be here, I suggest you leave — now!’
‘Fine,’ I said, looking at the dark garden around the house.
‘I’m going to the hospital,’ Langeland said.
I followed him to his car, which stood next to mine, an appropriate demonstration of the difference between our respective monthly salaries. The Mini blushed to its rust stains and pointedly looked away when I came to a stop beside it.
Before getting into his polished chariot, Langeland turned to me once more. ‘Why won’t you say where Jan is?’
‘I certainly will, Langeland. It’s no big deal. He’s staying at the Haukedalen Children’s Centre.’
‘With Hans Haavik?’
‘Yes. Do you know him?’
‘We’re old friends. From university.’
‘Well, in that case you’ll know where he is. But before you go, Langeland…’
‘Yes?’
‘Is there a possibility that Vibecke and Svein Skarnes are not Jan’s biological parents?’
He sent me a hostile glare. ‘Where have you got that from?’
‘Did you catch my line of work? I think I’ve met Jan before, when he was two or three years old. And in a very different home.’
He averted his eyes, looked across the car roof at the two policemen. ‘Well… I can’t see any reason to deny that. But Vibecke and Svein had adopted him. They have full parental rights.’ After some reflection he added: ‘Well, Vibecke, anyway.’
‘Does Jan know, do you think?’
‘That he’s adopted? I doubt it. You’ll have to ask Vibecke about that. Why do you ask?’
‘Well, I… it was just a thought.’
‘OK… I’m off then.’
After a final nod he got into his car, closed the door, started up and reversed out of the side street, so quietly that you could hardly hear the sound of the tyres on the tarmac. I stood watching him before I got into my own car, ill at ease.
Mummy did it, he had said. Which mummy? I wondered.
7
I had an uncomfortable night. Waking up next morning, I could remember fragments of a dream in which the boy sitting on the other side of my kitchen table eating chunks of bread with Norwegian goat cheese was Thomas, and he was suddenly six years old and had Jan’s eyes: expressionless and thus accusing.
I rang Haukedalen and got Haavik on the line. ‘How was it?’
‘He’s up anyway. He and Cecilie are having breakfast.’
‘And the mother… You haven’t heard from her?’
‘Not a peep. Would you like to talk to Cecilie?’
‘I could have a quick word.’
I waited while he went to get her. ‘Hi,’ she said, taking the receiver.
‘Slept well?’
‘No. I had one eye open the whole time. I was worried that if I fell asleep he would try and run away.’
‘But he didn’t?’
‘No. He slept like a log. Really. He had the odd nightmare, was sobbing and thrashing around, but he didn’t wake up. Not even when I sat on the edge of the bed stroking his hair.’
‘And now? Have you got him to say anything?’
‘No. He’s just as distant. If he doesn’t improve, I’m afraid a Child Psychiatry Centre will be the next stop.’
‘Let’s try Marianne one more time. I’ll see if I can get her to come out here. And then I’ll try to find out what’s happened to his mother. Or mothers.’
‘You haven’t checked that out yet? Whether it’s the same boy or not?’
‘No, but it’s top of my list of things to do. Of course, it would have been useful to know whether he himself knows that he’s adopted. But I doubt it. And if he won’t speak anyway, then…’
‘Then it must have been the foster mother he meant?’
‘On the face of it, yes.’
‘Have you told the police what he said, Varg?’