Anne Holt: Fear Not

‘Don’t do that,’ her grandmother said gently. ‘Be a good girl for Granny and stop making that noise.’

‘Some people think fish is delicious,’ said Ragnhild. ‘And some fish think people are delicious. That’s only fair. Sharks, for example. Do sharks celebrate Christmas Eve, Daddy? Do they have little girls for dinner before they open their presents?’

She laughed uproariously.

‘It isn’t only sharks that eat people,’ said Kristiane.

As usual her little sister’s sense of humour had completely passed her by. Miraculously, she seemed untouched by the events of Saturday, apart from the odd sniffle and a blocked nose. It was more difficult to say how the whole thing might have affected her mentally. So far she hadn’t said a single word about any of it. The only minor change Johanne thought she perceived was that in the four days since her sister’s wedding Kristiane repeated texts learned by heart for longer periods than usual. Characteristically, Adam was looking at things from a positive point of view: the child was also in a phase where she asked more questions, reasoned more. She was curious, not merely repetitive.

‘Many species of fish have a varied diet,’ she said slowly, her gaze fixed on some distant point. ‘Under the right conditions they would feed extensively on human flesh, given the opportunity.’

‘I think we could talk about something a little more pleasant,’ said her grandmother. ‘Now, what are you really, really hoping to find among your presents after dinner?’

‘You know perfectly well, Granny. We gave you our lists ages ago. That dead man they pulled out of the harbour at the weekend, that night when Mummy got so cross with me because I-’

‘Granny’s right,’ Johanne said quickly when Adam didn’t notice the pleading look she had given him. ‘It’s Christmas Eve and I think we could talk about something-’

‘He’d been in the water for a really, really long time,’ said Kristiane, swallowing before she piled more food on to her fork. ‘It was in the paper. That means you swell up. Like a great big balloon. This is because the human body is made of salt, and draws the water surrounding it. This is called osmosis. When two fluids with different osmotic pressures, or salt balance, are separated by a thin membrane, for example the cell walls in a human being, the water seeps through in order to even out…’

Her grandmother had turned noticeably paler. Her grandfather’s mouth was hanging open, and he closed it with an audible smack.

‘That kid,’ he grinned. ‘You’re quite a girl, Kristiane.’

‘Most impressive,’ said Adam calmly, wiping his mouth with a large white serviette. ‘But your grandmother and your mother are absolutely right. Death isn’t exactly a topic-’

‘Hang on, Adam,’ his father-in-law broke in. ‘Does that mean a human corpse swells up even more in fresh water than it does in the sea?’

‘What’s a corpse, Mummy?’

Ragnhild had picked up the cod’s head from her father’s plate. She slipped it over her nose, peering out through the empty eye sockets.

‘Booooo!’ she said, laughing. ‘What’s a corpse?’

‘A corpse is a dead person,’ said Kristiane. ‘And when dead people are in the sea for a long time they get eaten. By crabs and fish.’

‘And sharks,’ her little sister interjected. ‘Mostly sharks.’

‘Had the corpse been eaten?’ asked her grandfather with obvious interest. ‘It didn’t mention that in the paper. Is this one of your cases? Tell us all about it, Adam! As I understood from Aftenposten today, they still haven’t identified the body.’

‘No, it’s a case for the Oslo police, and all I know is what’s been in the paper. As you know I work for NCIS.’ He gave his father-in-law a strained smile. ‘We rarely help the Oslo police with anything other than technical matters. And circulating information on missing persons. International co-operation. That kind of thing. As I’ve told you several times in the past, in fact. Time for a change of subject, OK?’

Adam got up decisively and started clearing the table.

Silence fell. Only the sound of plates and cutlery being loaded into the dishwasher mingled with the muted voices of the Sølvguttene boys’ choir on television in the apartment below. The remains of the fish made Johanne feel slightly sick as she scraped the plates into the bin.

As usual she had gone to buy the spare ribs at the last minute. When she got to the butcher’s at ten o’clock that morning, they had already sold out. Nobody had any knowledge of the order she could swear she had phoned through two weeks earlier. The staff were full of apologies and expressed the greatest sympathy for the unfortunate situation that had arisen, but they had sold out of ribs. The owner couldn’t help coming out with a faint reproach: Christmas dinner should be purchased in good time, well before Christmas Eve itself. The thought of serving her mother cheap ribs from Rimi or Maxi on Christmas Eve had seemed even more alien than the idea of serving cod.

‘I should have bought that cheap pork from Rimi and sworn blind it came from Strøm-Larsen,’ she whispered to Adam as she put the last plate in the dishwasher. ‘She’s hardly eaten a thing!’

‘That’s her loss,’ he whispered back. ‘Calm down.’

‘Could we perhaps open a window?’ her mother suddenly said in a loud voice. ‘Of course, I’m not criticising the cod, it’s tasty and nutritious, but, after all, the smell of freshly cooked spare ribs is the smell of Christmas itself.’

‘Well, we’ll soon have the smell of coffee,’ Adam said cheerfully. ‘We’ll have coffee with the dessert, shall we?’

The choir had reached ‘Härlig är jorden’ in the apartment downstairs. Ragnhild joined in, and ran over to the TV to switch it on.

‘No TV, Ragnhild!’

Johanne tried to smile as she looked across from the open-plan kitchen.

‘We don’t watch TV on Christmas Eve, you know that. And definitely not while we’re eating.’

‘Personally, I think it’s an excellent idea,’ her mother protested. ‘After all, this meal is far too early in any case. It’s so lovely to watch Sølvguttene first. Those wonderful voices bring so much of Christmas. Boy sopranos are the most beautiful sound I can think of. Come along, Ragnhild, Granny will help you find the right channel.’

A red wine glass fell on the kitchen floor with a crash.

‘Nothing to worry about, everything’s fine!’ Adam shouted with a laugh.

Johanne dashed to the bathroom.

‘The soul weighs twenty-one grams,’ Kristiane announced.

‘Does it indeed?’

Her grandfather filled his schnapps glass to the brim for the fifth time.

‘Yes,’ Kristiane said seriously. ‘When you die, you become twenty-one grams lighter. You can’t see it. Can’t see can’t be can’t see can’t be.’

‘See it?’

‘The soul. You can’t see it leaving.’

‘Kristiane,’ Adam said from the kitchen. ‘I really mean it this time. Enough. We are not having any more talk about death and destruction. Besides which, that stuff about the weight of the soul is just nonsense. There’s no such thing as a soul in any case. It’s just a religious concept. Would you like some tea and honey with your pudding?’

‘Dam-di-rum-ram,’ Kristiane said in a monotone.

‘Oh no…’ Johanne was back from the bathroom. She crouched down beside her daughter. ‘Look at me, Kristiane. Look at me.’

She gently cupped the girl’s chin.

‘Adam asked if you wanted tea with honey. Would you like that?’

‘Dam-di-rum-ram.’

‘I don’t think it’s a very good idea to give the child tea when she’s in that… state. Come to Granny and we’ll listen to those clever boys. Come here, sweetheart.’