Hans Lahlum - The Catalyst Killing

‘I believe you, and it is perfectly understandable that you all thought he was dead. So you started a relationship with his fiancée in the belief that he was gone forever. And you initiated it, didn’t you?’

He nodded.

‘She was very attractive, and her personality shone all the more when she emerged from Falko’s long shadow. Slowly things developed between us. I played the role of sacrificial friend for a long time, but during the spring I began to hint that she needed to build a life without Falko. She dismissed this initially and seemed to think of me purely as a friend. She was cold towards me physically whenever I touched her. She said several times, almost as an apology, that the uncertainty about Falko’s fate made it impossible for her to think of anyone else. Towards the end of April, I thought to myself that never before had I spent so much time talking to a woman and getting so little in return. Then suddenly in the middle of May, things started to move, and then they moved fast. One Tuesday she phoned me to say that she thought I was right, that Falko would not come back alive. On the Thursday she told me that now, in retrospect, she recognized some of the less positive aspects of Falko’s character, and that as he had left us guessing for so long, it was perhaps no bad thing if he didn’t come back. And by the Saturday, when I greeted her with a hug, she was suddenly smouldering…’

A smug grin slipped over his face. For a moment, his eyes became dreamy and unfocused. But then he snapped back into the present again, his face grave once more.

‘So it was me who initiated things in the spring, but by the summer she was far keener than me. And I enjoyed it, believe me. She was my dream woman, in terms of her personality and politics. But the uncertainty about Falko was there all the time, and then it seemed to bother me more than her. She talked about making our relationship public and once even asked if I would move in with her. All of a sudden, it seemed she had no inhibitions. But he’d been like a big brother to me when we grew up, and still was. So I hesitated and asked if we could keep it secret until the second anniversary of his disappearance. She agreed reluctantly.’

I suddenly remembered Patricia’s question, and asked who else had known about the relationship. A sneering smile played on his lips.

‘We assumed that the police security service, and thus also the CIA, knew as a matter of course. You’ll have to ask them yourself when they found out. But I’m guessing it was before we did.’

I did not laugh. He was serious again.

‘I reckoned that Kristine had guessed, but I never mentioned it to her and I don’t think Marie did either. They had been close friends, but seemed to be drifting a bit. I did, however, mention it to Trond. He had shown obvious interest in Marie himself so I thought he had a right to know, in a way. But as I said, our psychologist has a bit of a complex when it comes to women and did not like to be reminded of his numerous failures in that area. So I was sure that he wouldn’t pass it on to anyone.’

I nodded, both to him and myself. The painter’s version was more idealized, but it still fitted with what Trond Ibsen had told me.

I waved him on, but he just looked at me and waited. I could not help asking, even though my pulse still raced whenever I mentioned her name.

‘Miriam Filtvedt Bentsen?’

He shook his head.

‘We had no contact with that class traitor and revisionist. I haven’t spoken to her for over a year, and I don’t think that any of the others have either. Certainly not about that. Of course, we hope that she’ll survive being shot by a Nazi, but otherwise – well, no thank you.’

I pushed on.

‘What about Marie’s father?’

He gave a scornful laugh.

‘On the subject of Nazis… No thank you, absolutely no way. Neither of us wanted to talk to him, and certainly not about this. She commented that we could tell him with a wedding invitation when the time came – and that we could invite him without worrying about whether he would turn up.’

‘Your parents?’

He shook his head with a faint smile.

‘I’ve taken a few too many girlfriends home in my time. My parents told me that they didn’t want to meet any more until I was engaged. Marie wanted to meet them, but I held back. But…’

I looked at him expectantly.

‘But I do think that Falko’s parents might have known about us. We were standing hand in hand on a street corner one warm summer’s day in July, when suddenly we realized that the woman who had passed us was Falko’s mother. We weren’t sure if she had seen us and it didn’t seem natural for any of us to keep in touch any more. We didn’t hear anything from them. Marie took the episode as an argument for us soon to go public, but I was still reluctant.’

‘Then she discovered she was pregnant. When did you find out?’

He started, then shrugged – and now, at last, he became emotional.

‘Believe it or not, only when you told me yesterday. It was more of a shock than it perhaps should have been, given that she wanted us to be open about our relationship. And having played it so cool only weeks earlier, by the early summer she was dynamite – like a wild animal in bed sometimes. The neighbour below me here said with obvious envy that he hoped I would soon find myself a quieter lover.’

The smug charmer’s smile slipped onto his face again. There was something ambiguous about him: sometimes I felt sympathy for him, at other times contempt.

‘But she said she was taking the pill and I was more than happy with the situation, so I chose to believe her. It was a great shock to hear she was pregnant and I was just about to tell you the truth. But then I realized it would leave me in a very vulnerable position if I was suddenly to change my story at such an important juncture.’

It felt like we were getting somewhere now. I noted down that if Anders Pettersen had not known about the pregnancy, he did not really have a motive. But we still only had his word for this.

We sat in silence, both watching and waiting. It felt as if there was a sheet of ice stretching across the table between us. I was the one who finally ventured out onto it.

‘Well, let us move on to the evening that your girlfriend was shot. I do not think it was you who shot her, but there is much to indicate that you have not told me the whole truth about what happened either.’

He looked at me coldly for a second. Then he stepped out onto the ice to meet me.

‘Right on both counts. I was there, and I was there because she had asked me to come. She had called me a couple of hours earlier to say that there was something important she had to discuss with me, but we couldn’t talk about it on the telephone. I was worried that she either wanted to split up or give me an ultimatum to make our relationship official. She suggested that we should meet at the train station after the meeting, but for some reason did not want us to go there together. So she said that she would walk slowly in the direction of the station, and that I should cycle round to meet her there.’

‘Which you did. And you were standing waiting in a side road when she walked by. What did you see?’

He shrugged.

‘Yes, I was standing in the side street. But I didn’t see much, because it was dark. I recognized Marie from the way she walked, but the others who were further back down the road were too far away for me to see much. But then suddenly, to my great shock, I saw Falko in the road opposite.’

The memory of his reaction was clear in Anders Pettersen’s face as he spoke. His eyes opened wide and his voice changed to a whisper.

‘I didn’t even think he was alive – let alone that he would show up. We spotted each other at the same time, and both of us were startled. We stood there staring at each other, and only looked away when Marie hurtled past at full speed. We were both totally bewildered, I guess. Neither of us followed her. Falko disappeared in the opposite direction, and I jumped onto my bike and pedalled home. Then I called her again and again throughout the evening, but there was no reply. I fell asleep fearing for my darling’s life, and woke up to my greatest nightmare.’