The man gave him a long, hard look. Eventually the answer seemed to pass muster. At least Frølich was unable to detect any scepticism in the other’s eyes when he said: ‘She moved in first. The brother came a few years afterwards.’
‘Can you remember what year it was when she moved in?’
The man shook his head.
‘Try.’
‘It must be a good ten years ago. Must be.’
‘And she lived on her own at first?’
The man shook his head. ‘There were a number of chaps, of course, particularly one, before the brother came to live here.’
‘Chaps?’
‘Yes, well, she’s a good-looking girl and there have been men, you know, but there was one who lasted quite a long time. I don’t think he lived here; he just stayed here for stints. I remember because I was a bit doubtful. He was one of our new countrymen, you know. He went off, thank God. At first we thought Jonny had given him the heave-ho, but Jonny was her brother, wasn’t he?’
‘One of our new countrymen?’
‘Yes, not a Negro, more like a Turk or a Slav. Slightly rounded head and long nose. Can’t remember what his name was, though. Something with an I… or was it an A… Ika? Aka? Nope.’ He shook his head. ‘Time passes; we get older.’
The information wasn’t a lot of use. Frank Frølich was being a policeman now. He had a job to do. Elisabeth Faremo, ex-lover, long bones. No resonance in his head, no fever, no disturbing images, no crackling flames. He pinched his arm and felt pain.
It was still early morning as he crossed Mosseveien driving towards Fiskvollbukta and Mastemyr. The journey to Askim took three-quarters of an hour. He was driving against the rush-hour traffic and the late-winter sunrise. He passed Fossum Bridge and the motorway construction site. When he turned off the roundabout on Europaveien, down towards the station and into Askim town centre he found the tattoo studio right in front of him. It was next to the offices of Lilleng Frisør in a solitary yellow building beside the railway crossing gates which divided the small town into two. On the other side of the railway line, opposite the beginning of the pedestrian area, there was a cafeteria which looked like a red military barracks.
The tattoo shop hadn’t opened yet. Frank Frølich decided to go for a walk around the town. He wandered through the pedestrian zone and turned right along a winding road which finally ended in a crossroads with traffic lights. Large square buildings dominated the landscape. This town could have been anywhere – flat land broken up by barrack architecture and special offers on groceries. But behind it he could glimpse greater ambitions: adventure pools, a manufacturing plant – the old Viking factories which had, as usual, been converted into a shopping centre.
As Frank Frølich was strolling over the railway lines on his way back, ten minutes later, he heard the familiar roar of a Harley in the bend by the station.
The man was a rotund, jovial type with long curly hair. Frølich showed him the photograph of Elisabeth Faremo, but he didn’t recognize her. Then he gave him the bookmark with the design of Elisabeth’s tattoo on. Which he did recognize.
22
Frølich had taken up a horizontal position on the sofa and was studying the ceiling yet again – a black mark beside the lamp. Might have been a fly. But it wasn’t moving. It was something else. He had stared at the ceiling from this position at least a million times, seen the mark and thought: perhaps it’s a fly. But not even this time could he be bothered to get up and find out what it actually was.
He lay on his back mulling things over. You know she had a tattoo done in Askim four to five years ago. What else? You don’t know what it represents or why she did it. The tattooist who had injected the ink into her skin had been supplied with a design and didn’t know what it symbolized. So he was no further forward: the man remembered the design, but not her face.
Frølich realized he was fumbling around at the edges of a puzzle, unable to make the pieces fit any longer. He would have to try another corner. But which one?
What set the whole business rolling? That one night, the murder in Loenga, the arrests based on the tip-off.
Question: Who tipped them off?
Answer: Merethe Sandmo.
Question: Why?
Answer: Not a glimmer. A mystery. It might have happened because Merethe Sandmo had first been with Elisabeth’s brother, then had gone off with Vidar Ballo. So there may have been some unknown factor in the group, an internal force driving these two events: Merethe Sandmo moving from one man to another and contacting the police when the three of them become responsible for a murder. However, when she blows the whistle, why does she give them only three names instead of all four?
Only one person could give him the answer to that: Merethe Sandmo.
And Merethe Sandmo worked as a waitress.
Frank Frølich, lying on the sofa and contemplating the black mark beside the lamp, knew he would be heading for the city centre.
He looked for a shirt and tie. When he had blown the dust off his suit, he realized he should have had it cleaned a couple of years ago. He left it in the wardrobe and instead chose a pair of dark linen trousers and matching jacket. Posing in front of the mirror, he mused: a little hair gel and he might make the grade.
He took the only taxi parked at the Ryen rank. The driver was reading Verdens Gang and was visibly startled when Frølich opened the door.
To the city centre, he said, and left the cab in front of Bliss, whose existence was announced by a flashing pink neon light on the wall. For a weekday, it was too early to go out. The doorman wasn’t in position yet, and apart from him there was only a single customer in the room. The customer was trying to strike up a conversation with the woman serving him. She was an exaggerated solarium-brown colour and had her hair in Rasta dreadlocks. Apart from a green mini-skirt and red fishnet stockings, she wore nothing. She must have been in her late twenties – a nicely compact stomach beneath her breasts.
Frølich sat down at a table in the corner. A poster said the show was due to start at nine. The text was illustrated with the regulation picture of a stripper climaxing, wrapped around a fireman’s pole.
The woman in the fishnet tights came over to his table and asked him what he wanted. Her nipples were the colour of chocolate mousse. Frank Frølich didn’t know where to look.
The befuddled man at the bar scowled; he obviously didn’t like any competition for the lady’s attentions.
Frølich decided to focus on her eyes, which shone like tram lights out of her solarium-tanned skin. He ordered a large beer and asked if he could speak to Merethe.
‘Merethe who?’
‘Sandmo.’
‘She’s left.’
Frølich determined to make the most of the opportunity: ‘Left?’
‘Yes. Stupid really. She was making good money here.’
‘Where’s she working now?’
‘In Greece. A club in Athens or somewhere like that. She got a good job. I was just a little jealous of her, working in Greece, wasn’t I? It’s warmer down there now than it is here in the summer.’
‘Damn!’ Frølich could feel himself getting into the role. ‘I’d have known where I was with her, if she’d said she was going to Greece, just to work… Left a long time ago, did she?’
‘About a week ago. Wait a moment – I’ll just get your beer.’
She crossed the floor like a ballerina, her breasts doing a jig as she swung round for a glass to draw his beer. The man at the bar was having difficulty balancing on the stool.
He reminds me of myself, Frølich thought glumly.
‘Do you know Merethe well?’ he asked, when the woman came back with his beer.
‘No, I’m a friend of Vidar’s, Vidar Ballo.’
‘Poor Merethe. I feel so sorry for the girl.’
‘And I know Jonny’s sister,’ Frølich said. ‘Elisabeth Faremo.’