Ю Несбё - The Jealousy Man and Other Stories

‘Let’s eat. I asked the kitchen to make some—’

‘No,’ I said, watching as a brown rat scampered across a sloping rock. ‘Let me tell you why I’m here. Brad attacked us in our house.’

‘What did you say?’

‘He took Amy.’

‘What?’ He tried to sound as if he was shocked.

‘And the police won’t — or can’t — do anything about it.’

‘When...?’

‘Three days ago.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me before? Right, problems with the net.’

Colin has many talents but acting isn’t one of them. He made a show of shaking his head as I told him about the nightmare night, in as much detail as Heidi had been willing to share with me. And after that he didn’t have to pretend to be horrified any more.

‘We told the same story to the police,’ I said. ‘But once they realised that the man we were talking about was Colin Lowe’s son they stopped taking notes.’ I took a deep breath. ‘It looks to me as though you already know all this, so I’m assuming they contacted you immediately afterwards.’

‘The police contacted me?’

‘Come on, Colin. I know you too well. And as your lawyer I know all about your connections in the police.’

Colin studied me for a few moments. And, as usual, his assessment was correct.

‘What you’ve got to understand, Will, is that you are my friend, but Brad is my son.’

‘I know that and you’re forgiven, but he has to let Amy go. And you must get them to arrest Brad.’

‘Hang on,’ said Colin. ‘There’s more. The police told me the only evidence they have that it was Brad is that in the course of the evening someone apparently mentioned his name. But that you yourselves did not recognise him. Not recognise a boy who practically grew up with you? Not recognise the body language, the eyes, the voice?’

‘What are you saying, Colin?’

‘I’m saying that when your daughter gets kidnapped you’re desperate. You look and you search until you find something, anything at all. And what you found was the sound of one of the most common names in the city, briefly and in passing. Because it gave you something to hang on to. But I know Brad. God knows he’s no angel, but he didn’t do this, Will.’

‘Then find him. Talk to him!’

‘No one knows where he is, no one has any contact with him. Listen, I’m as worried about Brad as you are for—’

‘Then let the police send out an alert for him,’ I interrupted before he could finish the meaningless sentence.

‘But there’s no proof, not even a suspicion. And they’re the ones saying it, not me. None of us can force them to use resources on a case they don’t believe exists.’

‘Yes, you can!’

‘I can’t, my dear Will. Not even if I wanted to.’

‘Yes. But you don’t want to. You’re afraid Brad’s guilty.’

‘He isn’t guilty.’

‘Then you’re afraid he’ll be found guilty.’

‘Maybe that has something to do with it, yes.’

I punched the concrete wall in despair. ‘The courts are still up and running, Colin. And on my life I swear Brad will get a fair trial. Yes, even if he’s killed her. You hear me?’

‘And I swear on my life that my son is neither a kidnapper nor a murderer, Will. On my life. You hear me?’

I looked out over the sea again. The silent sea that witnessed fates such as ours being played out each second of each day. And twinkled and sparkled just the same.

‘Yes, I hear you,’ I said. ‘You swear on your life.’

Another rat scampered across the wet, sloping rock, the sun catching on its long tail.

Then — without a word or a gesture of farewell — I walked down to the jetty and the boat that waited for me.

That night I drove through the city streets again, looking for Amy or someone who could tell me something. The following day I was back at the police station in Downtown asking for news, asking them to investigate, trying to persuade them that Brad Lowe was behind it. And again all I met was closed doors and deaf ears, and I was finally asked to leave the station.

As I walked across the large car park outside the shopping mall I saw someone leaned up against my car. It was Chief Inspector Gardell.

‘How’s the search going?’ she asked.

I shook my head.

‘Want a tip you didn’t get from me?’

I looked at her. Nodded.

She took a sheet of paper out of a folder and handed it to me.

I studied it. An address, with a name I recognised.

‘This was one of Lowe’s partners,’ I said. ‘You think Amy might be there?’

Gardell shrugged. ‘We’ve had complaints from the neighbours. Drugs, gunshots and partying late into the night. Seems like Brad Lowe and his gang have moved in there.’

‘But you haven’t done anything?’

‘Complaints about noise aren’t a top priority for us right now.’

‘But gunfire and illegal occupation, aren’t those pretty serious?’

‘We’ve had no complaints from the owner. And for all we know the people living in his house have a firearms licence.

I nodded. ‘I’ll get up there and check it.’

‘Not sure I would do that,’ said Gardell.

‘No?’

‘With so many weapons around it’s not advisable just to turn up and ring on the doorbell. At least not alone.’

I looked at her. ‘But you won’t help me.’

Gardell took off her sunglasses and squinted with one eye in the sunlight.

‘You’re not the only one saying that these past few months.’

‘I’m not?’

‘No.’ She handed me the folder. I opened it and flipped through the documents. They were reports. Armed robbery. Causing bodily harm. Grievous bodily harm. Rape. Twenty, maybe thirty of them.

‘And what is the connection?’

‘Brad Lowe and his gang,’ said Gardell. ‘This is just a selection, but I think it might interest you.’

I looked at her again. ‘I think I know what you’re risking by doing this, Chief Inspector. So why are you doing it?’

She sighed. Put the sunglasses on again. ‘Why do we do anything at all in this fucked-up world?’

Then she left.

In the course of that afternoon I spoke to most of those who had signed the complaints in the folder.

The ones I contacted first were those who had been raped. On the assumption that they, or their fathers or brothers, would be most highly motivated and easiest to persuade. But presently I realised that what Gardell had given me was already some kind of shortlist of names of people who not only had good reasons to want revenge but were physically and mentally capable of getting it. At least if they weren’t acting alone.

‘You mean vigilantes?’ said one of those I spoke to.

I savoured the word. It represented everything I was against. At least, in a society in which there was an already functioning judicial system it did. But in the absence of such a thing then it wasn’t vigilante activity as such but the best alternative means of getting justice. That was the way to look at it: not as breaking the law but as a kind of emergency supplement to the law.

I tried to explain this to the person involved, but the legal terms I used might have made it difficult to follow my reasoning.

‘Sounds like vigilantes to me,’ he said. ‘I’m in.’

By that evening I was able to tell Heidi that I had the backing of fifteen grown men. And that one of them had undertaken to provide us with weapons.

I had expected her to be pleased — or at least to snap out of that darkly apathetic mood she’d sunk into since the attack — but instead she just stared at me as though I were a stranger.

‘Find Amy,’ was all she said, and closed the door to our bedroom.

I slept in the living room and heard an animal howling and howling out there in the night, and the dull thuds of exploding grenades that might have been a block away or ten blocks away, it was impossible to tell. I don’t know what kind of animal it was, but it sounded big. I’d heard about the fire in the zoological gardens the previous night and how they had had to release the animals to save them. Good idea, I thought. But if that particular animal was edible... I didn’t have time to complete the thought before I heard a shot and the howling came to an abrupt halt.