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- Herausgeber: Orenda Books
- Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
- Serie: Oslo Detectives
- Sprache: Englisch
The death of a woman whose body was found in an Oslo dumpster has eerie similarities to a cold case in northern Norway, prompting the Oslo Detectives to launch an investigation that soon becomes personal… **Winner of the Riverton Award** **Shortlisted for the Glass Key Award** **Shortlisted for the Martin Beck Award** **Winner of the Brage Literary Award** 'A masterclass in plotting, atmosphere and character that finely balances shocking twists with the coppers' complicated personal lives' The Times 'Dahl has an international reputation for skilfully plotted police procedurals that are drenched in the minutiae of detection. This is a fine example of his talent, featuring two of his most famous detectives … If you have never sampled Dahl, now is the time to try' Daily Mail 'Skilfully orchestrated tension' Barry Forshaw, Independent ____________________ When the body of a woman turns up in a dumpster, scalded and wrapped in plastic, Inspector Frank Frølich is shocked to discover that he knows her … and their recent meetings may hold the clue to her murder. As he begins to learn more about the tragic events surrounding her death, Frølich's colleague Gunnarstranda deals with a disturbingly similar cold case involving the murder of a young girl in northern Norway. An unsettling number of coincidences emerge, and Frølich is forced to look into his own past to find the answers … and to catch the killer before he strikes again. Dark, brooding and utterly chilling, Faithless is a breath-taking and atmospheric page-turner that marks the return of an internationally renowned and award-winning series, from one of the fathers of Nordic Noir. ____________________ 'A chilling novel about betrayal, written in a hard-boiled style' Sunday Times 'Dark, stylish and suspenseful, Faithless is the perfect example of why Nordic Noir has become such a popular genre' Reader's Digest 'If you want your worst fears about what goes on inside a cop's mind confirmed, meet Kjell Ola Dahl's Oslo sleuths, Gunnarstranda and Frølich … impossible to put down' Guardian 'I have read many clever and thrilling crime novels through my life, but often they have nothing to do with real life. If I don't believe in them, they don't impress me. But when Kjell Ola Dahl tells his stories, I believe every single word' Karin Fossum 'Fans of procedurals … will snap this one up' Kirkus Reviews 'A formidable talent' Booklist 'Superb … utterly convincing' Publishers Weekly STARRED REVIEW 'Kjell Ola Dahl's novels are superb. If you haven't read one yet, you need to – right now' William Ryan
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Seitenzahl: 384
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017
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FAITHLESS
KJELL OLA DAHL
Translated from the Norwegian by Don Bartlett
Contents
1
He had to inhale some fresh air, but to buzz down the electric windows he would first have to switch on the ignition. If he switched on the ignition, the headlamps would come on automatically and most probably ruin everything.
He raised his arm and placed the back of his hand against the car window. Rested his head on it. Shot a look at his watch. Still not two o’clock. Studied the detached house at the end of the street for the nth time. The windows shone yellow. No sign of activity.
The phone in his breast pocket vibrated.
He straightened up. Heard the sound of heels clicking on tarmac. In the wing mirror a woman appeared. She was wearing a short jacket and tight jeans. Carrying a shoulder bag. Her shadow shrank as she passed under the street lamp. She was focused on her bag, lifted it to her chest and opened it while walking.
With his eyes fixed on his mirror he sank down in the seat. Trying to make himself small.
When she was level with the car, she stopped.
He slumped down further.
She took something from her bag.
He leaned back so as not to be caught in the mirror.
She crouched down. Looked at her reflection in the mirror. Ran a lipstick over her lips, pressed them together and checked the result. Raised her little finger and removed a smudge in the corner. Stood up.
An eternity passed.
At long last she set off for the house at the end of the street.
She stopped in front of it. Looked around. There was a clang of metal on metal as she opened the wrought-iron gate. The hinges screamed as she closed it behind her.
Slowly, the figure moved towards the front door, which opened as she reached the steps.
Frank Frølich checked his watch. 02.08.
Immediately the door closed behind her, Rindal’s voice was in his earpiece.
‘What was that?’
‘Don’t ask me.’
‘Did she see you?’
‘No idea.’
‘If she saw you, he knows we’re here.’
‘He’s known all the time.’
Silence. Frølich quietly counted to ten.
‘It can’t be a coincidence that she stopped right by your car.’
‘It could be. She checked her appearance and put on lipstick.’
‘Did you get an ID?’
‘Only saw her from the side. Fringe, red hair, thirty plus.’
‘Stay where you are. We’ll contact you.’
The earpiece died. The night was silent again, and the ache in his body returned. All he could do was find a more comfortable position.
*
He woke up to his phone vibrating. It was light outside. His watch showed six o’clock. He had slept for about four hours.
Rindal was in a good mood. The voice in his ear was singing ‘Frère Jacques’.
‘Sorry,’ Frølich yawned, ‘I fell asleep.’
‘We gathered that.’
‘Have I missed anything?’
‘Not a scooby, but things are happening now. You can atone for your sins.’
Offside mirror. A taxi. The car passed, drove to the turnaround, did a U-turn and came back and stopped outside the end house. A white Mercedes. Diesel engine ticking over. The front door opened. The woman rushed towards the car.
The voice in his ear said: ‘Ready, steady, go!’
Frank Frølich waited until the Mercedes had driven away before starting up. Tyres screamed as he swept into the turnaround and did the same U-turn as the taxi. He glanced to the right as he passed the house. A familiar silhouette stood in the window following events. It was Zahid.
He caught up with the taxi and stayed a few metres behind. There was hardly any traffic so early in the morning. The odd lorry, occasional taxis, a few vans.
They went onto the E6, down towards Oslo Centre. The taxi was doing a hundred and twenty.
The phone vibrated again. ‘What’s happening?’
He straightened the mike as he headed into Vålerenga Tunnel. ‘I’m behind him.’
‘Find out who she is and where she lives. No reason to keep a low profile if Zahid saw you.’
Frølich pressed Off. The taxi took the exit in the gap between the two tunnels. He followed suit. As the cars raced side by side in the hairpin bend he could see her profile. Attractive woman. She was chewing gum.
The taxi turned off again, heading up into the tunnel towards Ryenberg and Simensbråten.
It slowed as it entered a residential district, but not by much. A sprightly jogger crossed the road. A girl with wet hair from a morning shower was sauntering along the pavement.
The taxi braked before the speed bumps.
When it finally pulled into the kerb Frølich activated the blue light on the grille of the car. The driver sat stiffly staring in the rearview mirror, panic-stricken. This guy knew he had broken the speed limit. Frølich let him suffer in uncertainty while the woman paid for the ride. When she opened the door he also got out.
‘Would you mind coming with me?’
She stared at him in bemusement.
She was shorter than he had at first thought. An oval face, regular features. Full lips, eyebrows like two brackets resting face down, a little kink a third of the way along. Her expression, because of the gum-chewing, was provocative. She looked from the unmarked car with the blue light to him and back to the car. He opened the rear door. The taxi driver was quick on the uptake and had gone before she reached it.
Her jacket had no pockets and her jeans were so tight that she certainly didn’t have anything in them.
She got in, shoes, no socks. Slim ankles.
Frølich held out an authoritative hand. She looked up at him, still questioningly. ‘Bag,’ he said.
She hesitated at first, as though considering a discussion. She seemed calm, no noticeable nerves. In the end, she took the bag from her shoulder and passed it to him.
He got in behind the wheel. A scent of perfume mixed with chewing gum filled the car.
‘Would you mind showing me some ID?’ Her voice was deep, a little husky.
He flashed the card he had hanging around his neck. ‘Frank Frølich, Violent Crime and Sexual Offences.’
He opened her bag.
‘Would you mind switching off the blue light?’
‘Would you mind being silent until you’re spoken to?’ he retorted.
‘As this is where I live,’ she continued, warily.
He left the light on. The blue flashes rebounded off the brick walls. He emptied the bag’s contents onto the seat beside him. There was mascara and a lipstick, a packet of cigarettes, Kent. A gold lighter.
He found a wallet. Gold Euro card and silver Visa card. They told him she was Veronika Undset, born in 1973. In the photo she had staring eyes and a perm. Her present hairstyle suited her better, unruly with a fringe. Otherwise, the wallet contained a customer loyalty card, a gym membership, two hundred-krone notes and one two-hundred note. No driving licence.
‘What do you do, Veronika?’
‘This and that. Sit in police cars, as you can see.’
He met her eyes in the rearview mirror. Colour: green. She blinked.
‘What do you do for a living?’
‘Businesswoman.’
‘What’s the business?’
‘I run a home-help service.’
‘At night?’
She sighed heavily and looked away. ‘During the day. I’ve been visiting an old friend.’
He tried to catch her eye again, but she wasn’t playing ball.
Two brown pills wrapped in cellophane were under a bunch of keys. ‘What’s this, Veronika?’
‘Voltaren, for muscle pain. I bought it on prescription. I pulled a muscle in the dance class a few weeks ago.’
On prescription. She hadn’t needed to say that.
A bottle of perfume, orange, Lancôme; a packet of chewing gum, recently opened. Extra. On top of a flat restaurant matchbook. The last object was a packet of panty liners – unopened. Once again they exchanged glances in the mirror, and he put the packet back. ‘Sorry,’ she said with a feisty smile. The gooseberry irises flashed beneath the dishevelled fringe.
He flicked up the cover of the matches; several were used. He opened the packet of cigarettes. She had smoked three. If she used matches, why did she walk around with a lighter in her bag?
It was a Zippo. He opened the lid. Flicked it. The flint wheel didn’t spark at all. He smelled the lighter. Not a drop of petrol in it.
But Veronika had stopped chewing. Frølich thought, Getting warmer.
The felt pad that was supposed to cover the petrol case was missing. The cotton that should have been under the pad was also missing. Instead there was crumpled-up greaseproof paper.
Veronika swallowed.
He took his time. Turned around slowly. The glint in her green eyes was gone. She seemed confused.
‘Would you like to tell me what you’ve concealed in the lighter?’
‘No idea.’ She looked away, through the window.
He pressed the switch that locked the doors and there was a dull click. She gave a start and looked up: ‘Please,’ she said with a heavy sigh. ‘I’m tired and want to go home. It’s not my lighter.’
‘Not your lighter?’ He raised both eyebrows.
She was silent.
‘Whose is it?’
Another resigned sigh.
He repeated the question.
‘Would you believe me if I told you? Would you open the door, let me get out and go home? Would you then go to the house of the relevant person and do the same as you’ve done to me?’ She shook her head in desperation. ‘You’re playing a game I don’t understand, but there’s nothing I can do anyway.’
He coaxed out the greaseproof paper and carefully opened it. It contained several doses.
‘Where did you buy this, Veronika?’
She was silent. Sat with her face averted, her eyes on the street. She didn’t even react when he turned the ignition key.
*
It was ten in the morning when Veronika was summoned once again from her cell. Frølich was standing beside Rindal and watching the TV screen in the interview room. She had been through the mill now: no previous convictions, but thoroughly humiliated anyway. Stand on the line, off with your shoes, list personal possessions and hand them over. Afterwards: sit on the floor of the cell for a few hours, answer questions in the interview room and go back. A minor hell for someone who had been up all night. She must have been absolutely exhausted.
Frølich took a deep breath and strode towards the interview room. He entered.
She was saying nothing. Her face drawn, she stared at the wall.
‘It’s five minutes past ten and Frank Frølich is continuing to interview Veronika Undset,’ he said to the recorder.
Slowly, she lifted her head and met his gaze.
‘You were arrested because you were in possession of several doses of cocaine after leaving Kadir Zahid’s house at 0550 hours. You were observed as you arrived at Zahid’s house at 0208 hours. Did you buy the drugs off Zahid?’
She shook her head.
He raised both eyebrows.
She cleared her throat and said, ‘No’.
‘Who did you buy them off?’
She took a deep breath and grimaced at the very idea that he could even ask the question.
‘The witness didn’t answer the question. You left Zahid’s house at 05.50—’
‘I’ve never bought drugs from anyone,’ she interrupted him angrily. ‘The lighter isn’t mine. I have no idea how it got into my bag and I’ve told you this many times.’
‘Do you really believe this story yourself, deep down?’
‘Why are you tormenting me with this? I haven’t slept for twenty-four hours. I’m worn out. If it’s illegal to walk around with a line of cocaine in your bag, then fine me. You can have the money right now. Just let me go. What you’re doing is utterly out of proportion.’
‘What were you doing at Zahid’s last night?’
She pinched her mouth shut. Made an impatient movement with her body. A lock of hair fell forward creating a dramatic line across her face. He found her good looks unsettling.
‘The witness didn’t answer the question. Veronika Undset, aren’t you going to tell us what you were doing at Zahid’s?’
‘We were talking.’
‘Who was in the house?’
‘Kadir and I.’
‘How long have you known Kadir Zahid?’
‘Many years. We went to school together.’
‘Kadir Zahid usually has a couple of bodyguards around. Weren’t they there?’
She shook her head.
He tilted his head again to provoke a response.
She said: ‘No, we were alone.’
‘Why was he alone, without any bodyguards?’
‘You’ll have to ask him. I have no idea.’
‘But you must have wondered yourself?’
‘No, I didn’t, not then and not now. He and I chatted.’
‘Chatted about what?’
‘That’s private.’
‘Private? You’re aware you’re being questioned by the police, aren’t you?’
‘It was a confidential conversation, and I won’t say a word about it, however much pressure you apply.’
‘You went to see him for a chat at two in the morning?’
‘That’s what I said.’
‘Did you and Zahid go to bed together?’
Her full lips stretched in a caustic smile.
‘Are you going to answer the question?’
‘It’s my business who I go – or don’t go – to bed with.’
‘Could Zahid have put the lighter in your bag without your knowledge?’
She sat looking at him without saying a word.
‘Would you please answer.’
‘The answer’s no. Kadir’s fanatical about drugs and alcohol. He doesn’t even drink beer.’
‘Did you intend to sell on the drugs?’
She bristled with annoyance. ‘No. Can’t you make this easy and say what it is you want? Why are we here?’
‘You were in possession of five grams of cocaine. That’s illegal.’
‘You must have more urgent cases to spend your time on. Go online and you’ll see what the police should be doing now.’
She shifted position and crossed her legs. ‘Have we finished if I admit to having the drugs?’
He trod water. They exchanged glances, and he knew she knew. She sent him a wry smile, and he couldn’t help but admire her style.
The door opened. Emil Yttergjerde poked his head in.
Frølich said: ‘It’s 10.14 and Frølich’s leaving the interview room.’
He walked out.
‘It’s true what she says,’ Yttergjerde said. ‘She runs a firm called Undset AS. Something to do with cleaning. The manager’s called Veronika Undset. Registered in Brønnøysund. She keeps tidy accounts, pays tax, nothing dodgy there.’
‘What the heck’s she doing at Zahid’s in the middle of the night, then?’
Rindal came out of the TV room.
Frølich heaved another sigh and said aloud what they were all thinking: ‘I can’t see the point of this. She knows we’re going to let her go any moment. She’s just biding her time.’
The three of them looked at each other. Yttergjerde said: ‘So what are we going to do?’
Rindal, hands upturned, smiled and said: ‘Let her go.’
2
Frank Frølich stopped in the corridor and yawned. A whole night on his backside in the car had made him stiff and sore. He started at the sight of Lena Stigersand. She had a nasty swelling under her left eye.
‘New missing-persons case,’ she said, passing him a report.
He flicked through the papers. ‘And what about you?’ he said. ‘Fall off your bike or have you got a new boyfriend?’
‘Girl gone missing,’ she continued undeterred, ‘or to be more precise, a young woman from Uganda, the university in Kampala, Makerere. Her name’s Rosalind M’Taya. That’s an M followed by a T, like in Mt Everest. A student at the university’s international summer school. So, smart. It’s probably hard to get in. She checked into the student hall of residence on Wednesday and stayed there two nights. But when her room-mate arrived yesterday, a girl from Pakistan, sorry, young woman, she wasn’t there and she hasn’t been seen since.’
Frank Frølich studied her in silence. ‘Lena,’ he said.
‘The point is she’s missed loads of events on the programme without informing anyone. What I did find out was that she arrived on Tuesday morning on a flight from London, which coincided with a flight from Kampala.’
‘You look dreadful. What happened to your eye?’
‘Eye?’ Lena said in the same casual tone. ‘There’s nothing wrong with my eye. Perhaps you need to go to the optician? You’re the right age.’
Frølich carried on walking to his door. Here he met Emil Yttergjerde. Frankie nodded in the direction of Lena’s erect back. ‘Seen her black eye?’
Emil nodded.
‘She doesn’t want to talk about it.’
Emil grinned. ‘Spanking overload, maybe?’
Frølich mounted a doubtful expression. ‘Lena?’
‘Haven’t you heard? Last Friday. She and Ståle Sender left the pub – together. According to the rumour mill, it’s “absolutely true”.’
‘Lena and Ståle?’ Frølich found that hard to believe, at first anyway.
‘Steely Ståle, you know. Probably warmed up with Blue Velvet. With or without laughing gas.’ Emil grinned and walked on.
Frølich went to his desk. Lena and Ståle Sender? Ståle had been moved – how many times? Now he was checking passports at Gardermoen Airport when he wasn’t harassing asylum-seekers.
An odd couple: Lena was an only child and a Bærum girl who would return bottles of wine at a restaurant if they weren’t the right temperature. Lena spoke refined Norwegian; she was ‘exhausted’ when others were ‘knackered’. Ståle was a working-class boy from Furuset with three interests: cars, watches and cognac – in that order. In his wallet he had a photo of the seventies’ Ford Mustang he kept under a tarpaulin every winter. Twice Ståle had been investigated for violence by the special unit, not including the many other cases that had been hushed up or conveniently forgotten.
Frølich looked down at the report. It was stapled to a pile of photocopies. The missing woman’s application papers to ISS – the international summer school. Rosalind M’Taya studied sciences at the University of Makerere and – as far as he could see – had received impressive grades. Glowing character references from two professors. Letters of invitation from the University of Oslo to a six-week stay at the international school, which boasted extremely competent lecturers. The photo revealed that Rosalind M’Taya was very attractive. She had her hair pinned up on the crown and stylish Afro braids across her scalp. Full lips. Her eyes were doe-like, lashes curled upwards.
A couple of days in Norway and then gone? This was not trafficking. Rosalind was a serious student, not brought in by dubious Eastern Europeans to serve men from a flat in Bygdøy allé.
She lands at Gardermoen. She goes through passport control and customs. Takes either the express train or the airport bus. Definitely not a taxi. She must have received instructions from the summer school. The train is the easiest option. Then she changes to the Metro at the National Theatre and carries on to Blindern. Nice-looking girl and most likely poor, rewarded with an overseas stay. Unsure of herself, maybe abroad for the first time. Clever – no doubt careful too, thorough. What sort of people would she trust? Other Africans? Students on the course?
Rosalind M’Taya disappeared two days after she checked into her hall of residence.
In Oslo there are plenty of Norwegians who have worked in East Africa with Norad and the UN. Perhaps Rosalind had an address with her from home, perhaps she visited someone. Perhaps she was still with them. Perhaps a former missionary was driving her around, showing her the Viking boats or the Vigeland Sculpture Park right now. Perhaps these speculations were simply a waste of time.
Lena with Ståle Sender!
Could that be possible? The posh girl from Bærum in bed with the missing link, a primitive, racist street urchin who got an erection from using live ammo on jobs?
It had been a long night. Should go home, Frølich thought.
*
An hour and a half later he was in Rosalind M’Taya’s student room. Her Pakistani roommate reached up to his chest. Her plait was a work of art, thick and long and black and with a pattern like the climbing rope in the gym. When she smiled she revealed long and irregular teeth. She told him she had never met Rosalind, but the things in the suitcase were hers.
Frølich opened the suitcase. And had his assumptions about her background confirmed. She was poor. Most of the clothes seemed to be home-made. Right at the bottom: some kangas and batik materials. Her jewellery was typically African: big shapes and bright colours.
He could feel the Pakistani woman was ill at ease. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘I can manage on my own.’
She left.
He emptied the contents of the suitcase onto the bed. And two objects gave him cause for alarm. A full billfold wallet and a well-equipped toiletry bag. She had gone without taking toiletries or hiding her money. The suitcase was full. It was unlikely she had taken a change of clothing with her. The possibility that Rosalind had disappeared of her own free will had shrunk considerably.
He stood by the window. Looking out on the paths and grass between the tall trees in the park. Saw groups of students of various nationalities. One large group sat in a circle on the grass. An open-air class.
Suddenly a chill went down his spine and he turned back to the room. It was as though someone had touched his shoulder. There was a loud whining noise. The next second it was gone, and the room filled with sound again: someone was cooking in the student kitchen. A man called something from far away behind a wall and pipes gurgled.
He shook off the feeling he’d had.
Outside, he admired the beautiful gardens. When he was a student it was generally assumed that people in the hall of residence had got their rooms by underhand means. Those who lived in what resembled a manor house only a stone’s throw from the university complex were extremely lucky.
The problem is, he mused, Rosalind M’Taya could have bumped into anyone at all when she went out on Friday. Perhaps she caught the tram to the centre. It was more likely though that she stuck together with students she barely knew – colleagues. So they would have to go around with a photo asking in shops and cafés…
He wasn’t up to that now. He had to go home and sleep.
3
It was five o’clock in the afternoon when his phone woke him. He lay in bed, slightly uncertain as to why he had set the alarm. Then he remembered the party.
Frankie hadn’t had any contact with Karl Anders Fransgård for several years and was therefore somewhat surprised when he received an invitation to his fortieth birthday party. As teenagers they had been almost inseparable, but they hadn’t seen a great deal of each other since.
They met at school, brought together by a common interest in model aeroplanes and mechanics. For Christmas Frankie had received a little propeller engine which he filled with naphtha, fixed to his desk and started up with his index finger. Starting a combustion engine like that, adjusting the mix of petrol and air and then letting it run was the height of happiness in those boyhood days. But his friend’s interest in planes went much further than models. He was obsessed with the technical wizardry behind jet engines and propeller power. His bedroom was full of books about model planes, pioneers’ lives and achievements and the history of flying. He also collected old film clips: Roald Amundsen in sealskin clothes waving in front of the Latham flying boat before boarding to search for Umberto Nobile, the Hindenburg airship that caught fire over New York, Charles Lindbergh in his plane, a Curtiss ‘Jenny’ – already in those days Karl Anders’s room was a mini aviation museum.
Everyone thought Karl Anders would become a pilot, but colour blindness put paid to his dreams.
The two of them chose different paths. Frankie felt a clammy unease spread down his back whenever thoughts strayed to the incident. But it’s a long time ago, he told himself and got up. He started pacing the room, the way he did when similar thoughts struck him. He walked off his unease.
On the grapevine he had heard that Karl Anders had trained as an engineer. They bumped into each other a year ago. Karl Anders, wearing a hi-vis vest and a helmet, was inspecting some pipes that had been dug deep in Oslo Centre.
Frankie had made a witticism out of it: seeing his friend again under the ground and not in the air. They hit the right tone, joked and reminisced for a few minutes, exchanged telephone numbers and concluded, what the hell, they should have a beer one day.
Neither of them had actually rung. The times Frølich had happened to think about his friend he presumed they both felt the same way.
But four weeks ago an invitation landed in his post box.
Twenty years is a long time. Things get overgrown with moss, disintegrate and disappear. The unease he felt now was because he had been single for too long. It was a strange feeling to turn up at this kind of party alone when he had been invited to ‘bring a partner’. The invitation was printed on exquisite paper and there was even a reference to dress code. Most of the guests would be married couples or living together, and conversations would inevitably revolve around these people’s lives. Children, all the jokes and the linguistic nuggets the little ones came up with, the parents’ problems getting child care, the incompetence of nurseries and the lack of after-school care. Those couples that didn’t have children yet would talk about their trendy holidays and house-renovation plans. The women would blithely chatter away about their partners’ less salubrious sides, snoring, salmon-fishing mania, elk-hunting or football, all put in such a way that Frankie Frølich – because he was a single man – had no chance of making any kind of contribution. On the other hand, it was always fun to meet people from the old days. After a couple of glasses most were good for a few reminiscences.
The choice was either to sacrifice an evening for the sake of an old friendship or to sacrifice his dignity. Better to sacrifice a free evening and retain his honour, he had reflected, and fetched the charcoal-grey suit from his wardrobe.
The present was already wrapped and the best possible if it had been for himself: the collected works of Genesis on CD with Peter Gabriel on lead vocals. From Genesis to Revolution, Nursery Cryme, Trespass, Foxtrot, Selling England by the Pound, the live recording from 1973, topped by the double album of all albums: The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. Nearly eight hours of recorded meditative brain massage.
*
The party was held in a place in Eiksmarka, just outside Oslo.
He pushed the boat out and took a taxi from Oslo Station. The taxi driver was an Iraqi Kurd whose knowledge of the roads to Bærum was as good as his spoken Norwegian. He couldn’t use satnav either. The man would happily have driven to Drammen or Hønefoss if Frølich hadn’t given him directions from the rear seat. It was as light as day as they turned into the drive where lit torches indicated the location of the party. Couples were making their way in through the door as he clambered out of the car.
Ten minutes later he was standing with a glass of Cava in his hand looking for familiar faces while exchanging platitudes with people he had never met.
‘Karl Anders and I studied together in Trondheim,’ explained a tall, roguish-looking man with a sensitive mouth and combed-back hair. ‘Now we’re almost neighbours!’
A sweet girl with black ringlets said she had worked with Karl Anders before he started at the council. Frølich followed her gaze and spotted his friend at the back of the room. Karl Anders was, as always, dressed in shabby chic, black jeans and suit jacket over a black T-shirt with a profound slogan across his chest.
‘And there we have the main man,’ said the girl with the ringlets, and she beamed as Karl Anders tore himself away and strode towards them.
‘Frankie,’ exclaimed Karl Anders with a smile. ‘Great you could make it. This guy here,’ he said, putting an arm around Frankie’s shoulder, giving him a friendly punch in the side and a pally grin, ‘this is the guy I’ve known longest of everyone here!’
‘Are you the one who had a darkroom in the cellar of the block where you lived?’ asked Ringlets. When Frølich nodded, she added: ‘I’ve heard so many stories about you and that darkroom. Is it true you had a mattress on the floor in case there was a party?’
Frølich sent her a forced smile. He never felt at ease when he was the centre of attention.
‘Sorry,’ said Karl Anders, a little the worse for wear. ‘I have to steal the star.’ With which he pulled Frølich away. He grabbed his old friend around the neck and hugged him.
‘Happy birthday, Karl Anders.’ Finally, he got to read the quote on his friend’s T-shirt: The worst crime is faking it – Kurt Cobain.
‘You’re the only one of the old boys here, Frankie.’
Frølich didn’t answer. He had been counting on his old pals to get through the evening.
‘I didn’t invite any of the others,’ said Karl Anders, his eyes glassy. ‘None of them. Only you. This day’s special for me.’
‘Of course,’ Frølich answered, deflated.
‘This is the start of my new life,’ Karl Anders said. ‘I’m getting rid of the person I don’t want to be. Look,’ he whispered and pointed to a group of women with their backs to them. ‘Women are lovely, Frankie. Women are bloody lovely! But not for me any more,’ he beamed. ‘I’m engaged!’
He stumbled towards the women with his arm around Frølich’s waist.
A woman dressed in a short, tight-fitting black dress turned. Her eyes glinted green in the dim lighting.
‘Veronika,’ Karl Anders said. ‘Say hello to Frankie – my old pal Frank Frølich.’
Frølich shook Veronika Undset’s slim hand.
In a fraction of a second her face underwent a transformation. Her eyes dilated and shone with fear until once again she appeared totally relaxed, with the same knowing gaze he had seen that very morning in the car.
He was so surprised he wasn’t sure his voice would carry.
‘Haven’t we met before?’ she asked in a drawl.
He hesitated for a few seconds. Registered from a distance that her pinned-up hair revealed a wonderful arched neck.
‘You’d better remind me where and when, if so,’ he said, looking into her eyes, and letting go of her hand. ‘But I think I would’ve remembered,’ he added.
She was silent, holding her glass with both hands now and studying the floor.
Karl Anders grabbed her around the waist and drew her to him. They were a good match. A rock-’n’-roll guy and his elegant squeeze.
‘Veronika and I are getting married in April,’ he said. ‘In Rome, and do you know what, Frankie?’
Frølich shook his head.
‘I want you to be our best man.’
Frankie smiled at them. It might have been the Cava or maybe the pressure in the room, but his ears were ringing. He swallowed the rest of the bubbly. Karl Anders produced another glass straight away.
‘Ahem,’ came a loud voice.
Frølich turned. Beside Veronika Undset stood a woman with a cornblonde page cut. ‘Hi,’ she said, holding out a hand. ‘My name’s Janne and we’re sitting next to each other!’ At which she burst into laughter and gave him the feeling the evening was saved.
*
The dining table stretched over two rooms through a wide doorway, splitting the gathering into two halves. Fortunately, Janne and he had seats in the half without the hosts and the toastmaster. Tapas were served from a large buffet and conversation around the table and in the queue was lively. He sat waiting until most people had served themselves. As did Janne, who told him that she was a single mother with a boy of almost nineteen. ‘Got knocked up,’ she grinned when his eyes widened. ‘I was sixteen.’
‘You’re joking.’
She pursed her lips and shook her head.
‘Do you read gossip magazines? That part of my life was like a bad film based on an even worse book. I was working as an au pair in France. He was ten years older than me, had a cool tattoo on his arm and so on. He worked behind a bar in Montpellier – but did a runner when I got pregnant. No, I’m not joking. My story and Kristoffer’s is full of clichés, but we turned out OK.’
They clinked glasses. Her grey eyes shone as her full lips broke into a smile, which revealed a slightly irregular left canine and beguiled him.
‘Kristoffer’s my son.’
They just managed to serve themselves before the toastmaster at the other end of the table stood up and reeled off a few well-prepared quips that sent waves of chuckles through the guests. Frankie had entertained the thought for a few seconds that he ought to pluck up courage and say a few words as none of his peers was present. However, he reasoned, if Karl Anders chose to ignore a large section of his past it would be impolite of him to protest. Had he wanted me to talk about the old days he would have asked. So he decided to let it go. After the toastmaster had finished welcoming them the buzz of conversation resumed.
‘Aren’t you going to ask what I do?’ she asked.
‘I was thinking of starting at the other end,’ he said deftly, ‘by asking you what your favourite meal was.’
‘Waffles and champagne,’ she grinned. ‘The first thing you learn about wines in France is that champagne goes with everything.’ She blinked. ‘Champagne is to women what milk is to babies. Next question.’
‘Would you miss your job if you were on a desert island?’
‘Depends what there was to do on the island,’ she parried. ‘Where is it?’
‘If I was allowed to choose, in the Caribbean,’ he replied.
‘Is this where I say I love going on holiday to Greece?’
‘If that’s true, yes.’
The toastmaster rose to his feet and tapped a fork against his glass.
‘Khao Lak,’ she whispered quickly. ‘My dream destination in Thailand. By the way, I’m an accountant. But I’m not as dry or as rigid as the myths suggest.’
Frankie hardly noticed time pass. Janne said she knew Veronika from school, in Nadderud. Veronika had moved to Bærum from somewhere in the East End of Oslo. Janne had lost a few years in her education because of her son and finished upper secondary at the age of twenty-four. She and Veronika were the same age and had found common ground in their frustration with the childishness of the other students. Since then they had stuck together and now it was Janne who took care of her friend’s accounts.
‘Why did Veronika go to school several years after the others? You had to struggle with bringing up a child, but…’
‘Don’t we all have something to struggle with?’ she rejoined. ‘What about you and the darkroom I’ve heard so much about? I’m dying to hear the real story.’
The real story, he thought, and fell into a reverie.
‘What is it?’
‘Nothing.’
‘I can see there’s something.’
‘Do you remember the Chinese Politburo once blamed the cultural revolution on the so-called Gang of Four?’ Frølich asked. ‘They as good as rewrote history, airbrushed them off photos and so on. You saw a long row of prominent politicians and holes where the four had been standing.’
‘What’s that got to do with your darkroom? Were you airbrushing photos?’
Frankie took his glass. ‘I’m just not sure how comfortable it is to be the sole witness of Birthday Boy’s younger days.’
It was midnight by the time the dinner was over. He and Janne sat on a sofa drinking liqueur coffees. Gradually there was more liqueur than coffee. The music got louder, but no one was dancing. People sat around in groups chatting. It was only when some started leaving that Frankie realised he had spent the whole evening with Janne and had barely exchanged a word with anyone else.
She blinked when he said as much. ‘Bit late to do anything about that now,’ she said. ‘People are leaving.’
‘I should ring for a taxi too,’ he said.
‘We can split it.’
They behaved like a married couple. When she kicked off her party shoes for boots he stood holding her bag. They said goodbye to the hosts together. Veronika Undset hugged her friend, turned to Frølich and gave him a hug too.
It was three in the morning when he held open the rear door of the taxi. ‘I knew it,’ she said, climbing in. He closed the door, walked around the car and got in on the opposite side. ‘I knew you were a gentleman,’ she said, and giggled as they exchanged glances. ‘Or is that your seduction move – opening doors for women?’
‘Høvik,’ he said to the driver, who started the engine. ‘Høvik first,’ he added guiltily.
Frankie leaned back. Breathed out. It was over. It had been a nice evening. Now he was in a taxi with an attractive woman.
The driver didn’t spare the horses. When the taxi made a sudden turn, Janne moved with the centrifugal force into the crook of Frankie’s arm. ‘Oh, dear,’ she whispered, laughing at herself and glancing up. He tentatively tasted her lips.
Silence fell over the subdued half-light on the rear seat. When they finally decided to come up for air, she withdrew to her corner.
The taxi approached Høvik Church.
She grabbed his hand. ‘I don’t want things to go too fast,’ she said when he found her grey eyes in the semi-darkness.
She cleared her throat. ‘Besides, Kristoffer’s at home.’
‘You don’t need to make excuses,’ he said. ‘I can invite you out.’
She slipped back into his arms. ‘Will you?’
‘I get off here,’ she said to the driver, later.
‘What about—?’
She shook her head. ‘Can’t you ring me?’
The taxi stopped. They had arrived. Frankie looked out at a wire fence around an older detached property.
‘So this is where you live,’ he said, looking at her.
She leaned forward and kissed him lightly. Seconds later she was outside and ran in without a backward glance.
‘Ryen,’ he said to the driver, who put the car into gear. ‘Back the same way and then right through the town.’
4
Sunday was setting out to be another boiling hot day. The sun would bake down from a blue sky, animals would doze in the shade, too lethargic to stand up and graze. The gravel road was already dusty. It was so quiet you could actually hear the sun burning and sweat running – a silence that was only broken by occasional words stealing between the tree trunks, fragments of conversations between people who couldn’t be bothered to do any more than talk.
Gunnarstranda had another week left of his holiday. It was ten o’clock and he was strolling between the post box and his cabin. He had the Aftenposten tucked under his arm and was enjoying the start of a new day.
He hadn’t lit a cigarette for two whole months. Instead he had worked his way through an impressive pile of nicotine gum. He started the day with one piece, continued at a steady rate and consumed several packets a week. Tove thought he looked weird when he chewed, so he would put the chewing gum under his lip like a nicotine pouch.
They had been at the cabin for two weeks. Gunnarstranda had lived his life with Guinness and gardening without giving work a single thought. But once the thought struck him, that was it. Work filled his consciousness the way a sponge absorbs water in a bathtub.
He went into the cabin, lifted the cellar lid, took a can of Guinness and hurried on to the stoop with a glass in his hand.
Tove found him there with the cool glass pressed against his forehead.
‘What are you thinking about?’
‘Mustafa Rindal,’ he said. ‘Tomorrow’s Monday and there’s only a week left.’
‘Don’t call him Mustafa. It’s so patronising.’ She showed him the bunch of flowers she had picked. Red sticky catchfly, white lady’s bedstraw and meadow buttercups.
‘But that’s his name.’
She went inside looking for a vase, without answering. On her return she put the bunch in and rearranged a flower here and there.
‘They got married,’ he said, sipping the beer.
‘Who did?’
‘Rindal and the engineer who works for Kripos. Leyla. Long, dark hair, much younger.’ When Tove nodded, he continued: ‘She’s from Syria. As she’s a Muslim they did it Muslim-style, but he had to become a Muslim as well. He converted in the mosque in Åkebergveien. When you convert you have to take a Muslim name, and he chose Mustafa, so he’s called Mustafa Rindal.’
‘But you don’t need to call him that.’
‘He received that name at the conversion, upon his encounter with Allah.’
‘Upon his encounter with Allah? Remember you have colleagues who are Muslims from birth. They don’t think this is comical. We both know you don’t like Rindal and you think it’s humorous that you have a Muslim boss, but the conversion he went through was because he loves this woman. And in your heart of hearts you know that’s a wonderful act of devotion. Rindal knows, of course, that you’re all grinning behind his back. He knew that before he converted too. Rindal sacrificed himself for love. What are you laughing at?’
Gunnarstranda whinnied, and repeated: ‘Sacrificed himself for love? Hel-lo? This is Rindal we’re talking about.’
She was about to answer when he got up suddenly.
‘What is it?’
Gunnarstranda raised a finger to his mouth. ‘Listen,’ he whispered.
Tove pricked up her ears. After a while she arched her eyebrows.
‘The buzzing noise.’ Gunnarstranda pointed under the terrace roof.
A handful of bees were whizzing around.
They exchanged glances. She opened her eyes wide and hurried in.
Gunnarstranda stood watching the bees. He knew the buzz. This was scouts looking for a new house and they had chosen the terrace roof of the cabin. He couldn’t allow that.
Scouts on the lookout for a house meant a swarm of bees.
He strode down to the hives. Where was the swarm? It was always close to the hives. He gave a start of alarm when he saw it. This was the queen on her travels. The fat old lady had managed to fly to the closest tree, the ancient oak. But she hadn’t chosen a branch. No, she had clung to the bark, making the swarm long and large, like an excrescence of the tree trunk, a tumour. He walked back to fetch his straw hat, a bee smoker and a white sheet.
Tove stayed in safety behind the windows. She didn’t like bees. She didn’t like insects in general. Some education was required, but it would have fallen on deaf ears anyway. Bees in a swarm don’t sting. They are preoccupied with very different things. He must have said that at least fifty times. She hadn’t taken it in, however.
He spread the sheet in front of the tree. Then he held the straw hat under the fattest part of the swarm and swept them in, turning it as quick as a flash. Face down. Tens of thousands of bees flew into the air, but they were harmless enough. They just wanted to be with their queen. Gunnarstranda found a stick and lifted the hat he had placed on the sheet. One by one the bees crawled in under it. He stood watching the swarm. So he had caught the queen. He lit the bee smoker and used a broom and the smoke to hurry the stragglers. When they were all with the old lady, he tied the sheet around the hat and put it in the shade. It was important to find a new home for the swarm now. He would have to knock together a new hive.
5
Yes, the woman behind the bar was pretty certain. You couldn’t be mistaken. She was such a good-looking woman. Black, wasn’t she; and her hair: It was braided and pinned up and in place. She must have spent hours on her hairstyle. ‘She was just so attractive!’
A bite, Frølich thought contentedly. A bite on his first attempt. This is my day. Lady Luck is smiling on me.
