Anne Holt - 1222

‘Are there two people here who look Arabic?’ he asked. ‘A man and a woman? They can’t possibly have been in the wing. She’s wearing a black headscarf, he’s in a greyish brown jacket and -’

I nodded and he straightened up. His hesitation could be because he was intending to tell me something. It was difficult to tell whether my confirmation of the Arabs’ presence was good or bad news.

He decided not to say anything.

But he still gave me a sign. His eyes bored into mine. He held my gaze for several seconds, and it was impossible to look away. Then he blinked three times, and ran down into the cellar after the others.

I thought I understood what he meant.

Just a few hours later I would be forced to trust that I had interpreted him correctly. I had to take an enormous risk based on one look, but of course I knew nothing of this as I sat there listening to the footsteps of five people disappearing down the stairs.

I was thinking only of Sara, the little pink baby who was no longer alive.

Despite the fact that I have never heard an avalanche in reality, I have a definite idea of what it sounds like. If you spend enough time watching the Discovery Channel at night, as is my habit since my back was destroyed, frequently forcing me to get up at the most ungodly hours, you learn quite a lot about disasters. Including avalanches.

When Kari Thue’s voice sliced through the room, it reminded me of the first warning that an avalanche is on the way. It is often impossible to see anything but a slender and apparently innocent crack in the snow, but the sound is already there, it comes from deep beneath the snow where the mass is already on the move.

‘Where is Roar Hanson? Has anyone seen Steinar Aass? Where has Roar Hanson gone?’

Perhaps it had been a mistake to gather all the guests right at the bottom of the building. Up to then nobody had noticed that the ill-fated priest was missing. People had been preoccupied with themselves and their own affairs all morning. His absence was considerably less striking than that of Cato Hammer. As far as I was aware, Steinar Aass had not struck up a single acquaintance during the trip, and I had quietly assumed that nobody would give the man a thought.

By gathering all the guests in one place, we had made sure they were safe from whatever came in through the snow-blocked main entrance. However, this had made it easier for someone to notice that neither Roar Hanson nor Steinar Aass was there.

Kari Thue was the one who had made the discovery. This emaciated, irritating woman was not only wide awake and full of life, she was also smart and constantly on the lookout for ways to erode Berit, Geir and Johan’s otherwise undisputed leadership.

‘I demand an answer! We all demand to be told! Where are Roar Hanson and Steinar Aass?’

Kari Thue was the almost invisible crack in the snow, just below the top of the mountain. I was still sitting by the door, unable to stop thinking about the baby who came flying through the air and landed on my knee in the crash. Her death had had a greater impact on me than anything else that had happened since Wednesday afternoon. Sara hadn’t even reached her first birthday when she died. I reproached myself for not having told the doctors that she might be injured, despite the fact that she seemed to have suffered no ill effects from the hard collision with the wall in front of me on the train. I had no doubt assumed that her mother would ensure that a thorough examination was carried out, but I knew perfectly well that you should never take anything for granted. In my mind’s eye I suddenly saw her mother, shouting at me on the train. Her despair at having dropped the child was so great that she barely knew what she was saying. I should have…

At the same time, I didn’t know what I could have done, and that depressed me even more.

Kari Thue’s outburst had triggered the avalanche. The noise level was rising. More and more people were talking and asking questions down in Blåstuen, even though there was really nobody to whom these concerns could be addressed. Berit still hadn’t come back up from the cellar, and I didn’t know where Geir and Johan had gone. I pushed my chair slowly towards the accelerating spectacle. I would have much preferred to take cover in the office behind reception, and lock the door.

But I thought about Magnus, who had been tasked with keeping everyone calm down there. It sounded as if he had serious problems.

When he caught sight of me by the stairs leading down to St Paai’s Bar, he got up with some difficulty from a maroon chair and ran across the room. Despite my depression at Sara’s death and the certain knowledge that Kari Thue was going to make things even worse for us all, I had to suppress a smile as he hurried agitatedly towards the stairs. He wasn’t built for running, Magnus Streng. Nor for walking upstairs. It was as if his knees didn’t work properly. They were too loose to work normally when he was walking in a straight line. Instead he turned his legs in rapid semi-circles from the hips. It looked as if he were parodying a speed walker.

‘Here we go again!’

His chest was whistling. He grabbed his throat, coughed and waved his free hand apologetically in the air.

‘Asthma,’ he gasped. ‘Unfortunately I haven’t brought my medication with me. I don’t usually suffer at this time of year.’

‘Sit down,’ I said, pointing to a chair by the table.

‘Yes,’ he said, catching his breath. ‘This is actually… rather unpleasant.’

He tried to moisten his lips before picking up a glass of water someone had left on the table. He emptied it in one draught.

‘She sees everything,’ he groaned. ‘She remembers everything. I’m bloody certain she’d have won the world championship in Memory.’

The noise from downstairs was so obtrusive that I didn’t answer.

While the gang surrounding Mikkel had never been anything more than irritating and cocky, the group that gathered around Kari Thue was much more threatening. It now consisted of something like forty people. Kari Thue herself had climbed up on a table, where she had begun to address her followers like the charismatic leader of some sect.

‘Things are being kept from us,’ she shouted, tucking her thumbs into the straps of the little rucksack; I was beginning to wonder if she kept it on in bed. ‘And I’m asking myself who exactly is making the decisions in this situation, and with what right and authority. We were told that everyone, absolutely everyone, must assemble down here. The insulation packed into the hole in the wall was to be reinforced, they said, and the structure of the staircase checked. But where are Roar Hanson and Steinar Aass? Do they have privileges not extended to the rest of us? Is there some difference between us and them?’

‘What shall we do?’ I whispered to Magnus.

‘I… don’t… really… know.’

He was gasping for breath after every word. I was seriously concerned; his skin was grey and damp, and one hand was clutching the edge of the table so tightly that the knuckles were white.

Berit came running in.

Some people crumble under protracted pressure. Some cling to others and become like children again, needing consolation and reassuring lies. Some become paralysed. Life has taught me that it is more or less impossible to predict how people will react under great stress.

Choosing soldiers is an art, and Berit Tverre was a woman you would want by your side in a war. She stopped dead on the top step of the staircase leading to St Paal’s Bar. During the course of just a few seconds, she had grasped the situation. First of all she crouched down beside Magnus. Without asking him any questions, she took an inhaler out of her pocket and pushed it into his hand.