Jo Nesbo - Police

‘You don’t think I’m going to give you this information for nothing, do you, Officer?’

‘My rank is Special Detective. What’s the price? Reduced sentence?’

‘I’m getting out next week. I want fifty thousand kroner.’

Katrine burst into loud, hearty laughter. As hearty as she could make it. And saw the fury stealing into his eyes.

‘I can’t do anything for you then,’ she said, getting up.

‘Thirty thousand,’ he said. ‘I’m skint and when I get out I’ll need a plane ticket to take me a long way away.’

Katrine shook her head. ‘We pay informers only when they have info that casts a whole new light on a case. A big case.’

‘And what if this is one?’

‘Then I would have to talk to my boss about it. But I thought you had something you wanted to tell me. I’m not here to negotiate on something I don’t have.’ She walked to the door and raised her hand to knock.

‘Wait,’ Red Scalp said. His voice was thin. He had drawn the duvet up to his chin. ‘I can tell you something. .’

‘I’ve got nothing for you, I said.’ Katrine knocked on the door.

‘Do you know what this is?’ He held up a copper-coloured instrument that made Katrine’s heart skip a beat. For a nanosecond she had thought it was a gun, but then saw that it was an improvised tattoo machine with a nail sticking out of the end.

‘I’m the tattooist here in this joint,’ he said. ‘A bloody good one too. Do you know how they identified the body they found here as Valentin’s?’

Katrine stared at him. At the small, hate-filled eyes. The thin, wet lips. The red skin glowing under the thinning hair. The tattoo. The demon face.

‘I still haven’t got anything for you, Rico.’

‘You could. .’ He pulled a face.

‘Yes?’

‘If you could unbutton your blouse so that I could see. .’

Katrine looked down in disbelief. ‘You mean. . these?’

As she placed her hands under her breasts she could almost feel the heat radiating out from the man in the bed.

She heard the key rattling in the lock outside.

‘Officer,’ she said loudly without relinquishing Rico Herrem’s gaze, ‘give us a couple more minutes, please.’

She heard the rattling stop, heard him say something and then steps fading into the distance.

The Adam’s apple in front of her looked like a little alien climbing up and down under the skin, trying to get out.

‘Go on,’ she said.

‘Not until. .’

‘Here’s the deal. The blouse stays buttoned. But I’ll squeeze one nipple so that you can see the outline. If what you tell me is good. .’

‘It is!’

‘If you move the deal’s off, OK?’

‘OK.’

‘Right. Let me hear.’

‘I tattooed the demon face on his chest.’

‘Here? In the prison?’

He pulled a sheet of paper out from under the duvet.

Katrine moved towards him.

‘Stop!’

She stopped. Looked at him. Raised her right hand. Groped for the nipple under the thin fabric of her bra. Caught it between forefinger and thumb. Squeezed. Didn’t try to ignore the pain, welcomed it. Stood with her back arched. Knowing that blood was streaming to the nipple, that it was stiffening. Let him see. Heard his breathing accelerate.

He passed her the sheet of paper, and she stepped forward and snatched it. Sat down on the chair.

It was a drawing. She recognised it from the prison warder’s description. Demon face. Drawn out to the sides as if it had hooks attached to the cheeks and forehead. Screaming with pain, screaming to get free.

‘I thought it was a tattoo he’d had for many years before he died,’ she said.

‘I wouldn’t say that exactly.’

‘What do you mean?’ Katrine studied the lines of the drawing.

‘As he got it after he died, I mean.’

She looked up. Saw his eyes still riveted on her blouse. ‘Did you tattoo Valentin after he died? Is that what you’re saying?’

‘Are you deaf, Katrine? Valentin isn’t dead.’

‘But. . who. .?’

‘Two buttons.’

‘What?’

‘Undo two buttons.’

She undid three. Pulled her blouse to the side. Let him see her bra with the outline of the still stiff nipple.

‘Judas.’ His voice was a whisper now, gruff. ‘I tattooed Judas. Valentin had him in his suitcase for three days. Locked in the suitcase, can you imagine!’

‘Judas Johansen?’

‘Everyone thought he’d escaped, but Valentin had killed him and hidden him in the suitcase. No one searches for a man in a suitcase, eh? Valentin had given him such a beating that even I wondered if it really could be Judas. Mincemeat. Could have been anyone. The only thing that was in one piece was the chest where I was supposed to do the tattoo.’

‘Judas Johansen. That was the body they found.’

‘Now I’ve told you, and I’m a dead man too.’

‘But why did he kill Judas?’

‘Valentin was a hated man inside. Because he’d molested girls under ten, of course. Then there was the dentist business. Many people here liked her. The guards did as well. It was just a question of time before he had an accident. An overdose. Made it look like suicide. So he did something about it.’

‘He could have just escaped?’

‘They would have found him. He had to make it seem as if he was dead.’

‘And his pal Judas was. .’

‘Useful. Valentin isn’t like the rest of us, Katrine.’

Katrine ignored his inclusive ‘us’. ‘Why did you want to tell me this? You were an accessory.’

‘I only tattooed a dead man. Besides, you have to catch Valentin.’

‘Why?’

Red Scalp closed his eyes. ‘I’ve been dreaming so much recently, Katrine. He’s coming. Coming back to join the living. But, first of all, he has to get rid of the past. Everyone in his way. Everyone who knows. And I’m one of them. I’m being released next week. You have to catch him. .’

‘. . before he catches you,’ Katrine completed, staring without seeing at the man in front of her. For it was as if it was being played out, the scene Rico had set, where he tattooed the three-day-old body. And it was so unsettling that she was unaware of anything; she neither heard nor saw. Not until she felt a tiny droplet on her neck. Heard his low rattle and looked down. And jumped up from the chair. Stumbled towards the door, her nausea rising.

Anton Mittet woke up.

His heart was pounding wildly, and he was gulping down air.

Blinked for one confused moment before managing to focus.

Looked into the white wall in front of him. He was still sitting on the chair with his head lolling against the wall behind him. He had fallen asleep. Slept on the job.

It had never happened before. He lifted his left hand. It felt as if it weighed twenty kilos. And why was his heart beating as though he had run a half-marathon?

He looked at his watch. A quarter past eleven. He had been asleep for more than an hour! How could it have happened? He felt his heart gradually slowing down. It must have been all the stress over the past few weeks. The shifts, the daily rhythm out of sync. Laura and Mona.

What had woken him? Another noise?

He listened.

Nothing, just a quivering silence. And this vague dreamlike memory that the brain had registered something it found unsettling. It was like when he slept in their house in Drammen down by the river. He knew snarling boat engines raced past outside their open window, but his brain didn’t register anything. A tiny creak of the bedroom door, on the other hand, and he jumped up. Laura claimed this was something he had started doing after the Drammen case, when they had found the young man, René Kalsnes, by the river.

He closed his eyes. Opened them wide again. Jesus, he had fallen asleep again! He got up. Felt so dizzy he had to sit down. Blinked. One hell of a mist, coating his senses.