WHEN THE DEVIL HOLDS
THE CANDLE
Karin Fossum made her literary debut in Norway in 1974. The author of poetry, short stories and one non-crime novel, it is with her Inspector Sejer mysteries that Fossum has won the greatest acclaim. Awarded the Glass Key for the best Nordic crime novel, Don't Look Back was the first to be translated into English, followed by He Who Fears the Wolf. The Sejer mysteries are currently published in sixteen languages.
ALSO BY KARIN FOSSUM
Don't Look Back
He Who Fears the Wolf
Calling Out For You
Karin Fossum
W H E N THE
DEVIL H O L D S
THE CANDLE
Translated from the
Norwegian by Felicity David
Copyright © J.W. Cappelens Forlag, A.S. 1998
English translation copyright © Felicity David 2004
First published in Great Britain in 2004 by
The Harvill Press Vintage
With thanks to Terje Ringstad and Tor Buxrud
If you had never existed, you wouldn't have read this.
And it wouldn't have made any difference. And when you no longer exist, it will be as if you had never read this. It makes no difference. But now, as you are reading , something happens: it eats up a few seconds of your time, like a tiny gnawing animal furry with letters, blocking the path between you and your next minute. You will never get it back.
Undisturbed, i t chews on the micro - organisms of time. It never gets its fill.
Nor do you.
– Tor Ulven
C H A P T E R 1
The courthouse. September 4, 4 p.m.
Jacob Skarre glanced at his watch. His shift was over. He slipped a book out of his inside jacket pocket and read the poem on the first page. It's like playing Virtual Reality, he thought. Poof! – and you're in a different landscape. The door to the corridor stood open, and suddenly he was aware that someone was watching him. Whoever it was was just beyond what he could see with his excellent peripheral vision. A vibration, light as a feather, barely perceptible, finally reached him. He closed his book.
"Can I help you?"
This woman didn't move, just stood there staring at him with an odd expression. Skarre looked at her tense face and thought that she seemed familiar. She was no longer young, maybe about 60, wearing a coat and dark boots. A scarf around her neck. Enough of the pattern was discernible under her chin. The design seemed a sharp contrast to what she most likely possessed in the way of speed and elegance: racehorses with jockeys in colourful silks against a dark blue background. She had a wide, heavy face that was elongated by a prominent chin. Her eyebrows were dark and had grown almost together. She was clutching a handbag against her stomach. But most noticeable of all was her gaze. In that pale face her eyes were blazing. They fixed him with a tremendous force and he could not escape them. Then he remembered who she was. What an odd coincidence, he thought, and waited in suspense. He sat there as if riveted by the probing silence. Any moment now she was going to say something momentous.
"It has to do with a missing person," was what she said.
Her voice was rough. A rusty tool creaking into motion after a long repose. Behind her white forehead burned a fire. Skarre could see the flickering glow in her irises. He was trying not to make assumptions, but obviously she was in some way possessed. Gradually it came to him what sort of person he was dealing with. In his mind he rehearsed the day's reports, but he could not recall whether any patients had been listed as missing from the psychiatric institutes in the district. She was breathing hard, as if it had cost her immeasurable effort to come here. But she had made up her mind, and at last had been driven by something. Skarre wondered how she had made it past the reception area and Mrs Brenningen's eagle eye, coming straight to his office without anyone stopping her.
"Who is it that's missing?" he asked in a friendly voice.
She kept staring at him. He met her gaze with the same force to see if she would flinch. Her expression turned to one of confusion.
"I know where he is."
Skarre was startled. "So you know where he is?
He's not missing, then?"
"He probably won't live much longer," she said. Her thin lips began to quiver.
"Who are we talking about?" Skarre said. And then, because he guessed who it might be. "Do you mean your husband?"
"Yes. My husband."
She nodded resolutely. Stood there, straight- backed and unmoving, her handbag still pressed to her stomach. Skarre leaned back in his chair.
"Your husband is sick, and you're worried about him. Is he old?"
It was an inappropriate question. Life is life, as long as a person is alive and means something, maybe everything, to another being. He regretted the question and picked up his pen from the desk, twirling it between his fingers.
"He's almost like a child," she said sadly. He was surprised at her response. What was she really talking about? The man was sick, possibly dying. And senile, it occurred to him. Regressing to his childhood. At the same time Skarre had a strange feeling that she was trying to tell him something else. Her coat was threadbare at the lapels, and the middle button had been sewn on rather badly, creating a fold in the fabric. Why am I noticing these things? he thought.
"Do you live far from here?" He glanced at his watch. Perhaps she could afford a taxi.
She straightened her shoulders. "Prim Oscars gate 17." She enunciated the street name with crisp consonants. "I didn't mean to bother you," she said. Skarre stood up. "Do you need help getting home?" She was still staring into his eyes. As if there was in them something that she wanted to take away with her. A glow, a memory of something very much alive, which the young officer was. Skarre had a weird sensation, the sort of thing that happens only rarely, when the body reacts on impulse. He lowered his gaze and saw that the short blond hairs on his arms were standing on end. At the same moment the woman turned slowly around and walked to the door. She took short, awkward steps, as if she were trying to hide something. He went back to his chair. It was 4.03 p. m. For his amusement, he scribbled a few notes on his pad.