Ю Несбё - Macbeth

Andrianov blinked in his confusion. Why did it feel as if he was lying in a bog? What had he taken?

‘Don’t point that gun at me!’ Macbeth shouted. ‘Don’t...’

Something told Andrianov that he shouldn’t reach for the gun on the floor. The man in front of him wouldn’t shoot him if he sat still. But it didn’t help. Perhaps all the hours, days, years as a bodyguard had created an instinct, a reaction which was no longer steered by will, to protect without a thought for your own life . Or perhaps that was just how he was and why he had applied to work in this branch of service.

Andrianov reached out for the gun, and his life and reasoning were interrupted by a bullet that bored through his forehead, brain and the back of the chair and didn’t stop until it met the wall with the golden-thread wallpaper that Lady had bought for a minor fortune in Paris. The explosion sent a convulsion through his colleague’s body, but he never managed to regain consciousness before he too got a bullet through the forehead.

Duff made for the door as the first shot went off.

But Lady held him back. ‘He said you—’

A second shot rang out, and Duff freed himself from her grasp. Ripped open the door and charged in. And stood in the middle of the floor looking around. Two men, each in a chair with a third eye in his forehead.

‘Norse Riders,’ Macbeth said, putting the smoking gun back in its holster. ‘Sweno’s behind this.’

There was shouting and banging on the corridor door.

‘Let them in,’ Macbeth said.

Duff did as he was told.

‘What’s going on?’ Malcolm gasped, out of breath. ‘Heavens above, are they...? Who...?’

‘Me,’ said Macbeth.

‘They pulled their guns,’ Duff said.

Malcolm’s eyes jumped in bewilderment from Duff back to Macbeth. ‘On you? Why?’

‘Because I was going to arrest them,’ Macbeth said.

‘What for?’ Lennox asked.

‘Murder.’

‘Sir,’ Duff said, looking at Malcolm, ‘I’m afraid we have bad news.’

He could see Malcolm’s eyes narrowing behind the square glasses as he leaned forward like a boxer bracing himself for the punch he wouldn’t see yet sensed was on its way. Everyone turned to the figure that had appeared in the doorway to the next room.

‘Chief Commissioner Duncan is dead,’ Lady said. ‘Stabbed with a knife while he was sleeping.’

The last sentence made Duff automatically turn towards Macbeth. Not because it said anything he didn’t already know, but because it was an echo of the same sentence uttered early one morning in an orphanage so many years ago.

Their eyes met for a brief instant before both of them looked away.

The morning Chief Commissioner Duncan was found dead in bed at Inverness Casino was the second time in its history that Lady had immediately ordered the building to be cleared of customers and a CLOSED sign to be hung up outside.

Caithness arrived with everyone she could muster from Forensics and they closed the whole of the first floor.

The other officers who had stayed the night gathered around the roulette table in the empty gaming room.

Duff looked at Deputy Chief Commissioner Malcolm sitting at the end of the makeshift conference table. He had taken off his glasses, perhaps to clean them, at least that was what he was doing as he stared fixedly at the green felt, as though answers to all the questions lay there. Malcolm was the highest-ranking officer present, and Duff had occasionally wondered whether the reason he walked with such a stoop was that Malcolm, a bureaucrat surrounded by people with practical police experience, felt he was on such thin ice that he automatically leaned forward to catch any advice, any whispered hints. And perhaps Malcolm’s wan complexion was not down to the previous night’s drinking but the fact that he had suddenly become acting chief commissioner.

Malcolm breathed on his glasses and kept cleaning them. He didn’t look up. As though he didn’t dare meet the gazes directed at him, colleagues waiting for him to speak.

Duff was perhaps too harsh. Everyone knew that in chiselling out Duncan’s programme Malcolm had been both the chisel and the hammer. But could he lead them? The others had years of experience leading their respective units, while Malcolm had spent days running two stooped paces behind Duncan like a kind of overpaid assistant.

‘Gentlemen,’ Malcolm said, staring at the green felt. ‘A great man has left us. And at this juncture that’s all I intend to say about Duncan.’ He put on his glasses, raised his head and studied those around the table. ‘As chief commissioner he would not have allowed us to sink into sentimentality and despair at such a pass, he would have demanded that we did what we’re employed to do: find the guilty party, or parties, and put them under lock and key. Tears and commemorative words will have to come afterwards. At this meeting let’s plan and coordinate what to do first. The next meeting will be at HQ at six this evening. I suggest the first thing you do after this meeting is to ring your wives and so on—’

Malcolm’s gaze landed on Duff, but Duff couldn’t work out if there was any intentional subtext.

‘—and say you’re unlikely to be home for a while.’ He paused for a moment. ‘Because first of all you’re going to arrest the person who took Chief Commissioner Duncan from us.’ Long pause. ‘Duff, you’ve got the Homicide Unit. I want an interim report for the meeting in an hour, including whatever Caithness and her team have or haven’t found at the crime scene.’

‘Right.’

‘Lennox, I want a full background check on the bodyguards and details of their movements before the murder. Where they were, who they spoke to, what they bought, any changes in their bank accounts, some tough questioning of family and friends. Requisition any resources you need.’

‘Thank you, sir.’

‘Macbeth, you’ve already contributed a lot to this case, but I need more. See if Organised Crime can link this with the big players, those who would profit most from getting rid of Duncan.’

‘Isn’t it pretty obvious?’ Macbeth said. ‘We’ve dumped Sweno’s dope in the river, killed two and arrested half the Norse Riders. This is Sweno’s revenge, and—’

‘It’s not obvious,’ Malcolm said.

The others stared at the deputy chief commissioner in surprise.

‘Sweno has everything to gain by Duncan continuing his project.’ Malcolm tapped on some gambling chips that had been left on the cloth after the hasty evacuation. ‘What was Duncan’s first promise to this town? He was going to arrest Hecate. And now, with the Norse Riders down for the count, Duncan would have focused all the police resources on precisely that. And if Duncan had succeeded what would he have done?’

‘He would have cleaned up the market for Sweno so that he could make a comeback,’ Lennox said.

‘Quite honestly,’ Macbeth said, ‘do you really think a vindictive Sweno would think that rationally?’ Malcolm raised an eyebrow a fraction. ‘A man from the working classes, with no education or any other help, who has run one of the most profitable businesses in this town for more than thirty years. Could he be financially rational? Is he capable of putting aside a thirst for revenge when he can see what’s good for business?’

‘OK,’ Duff said. ‘Hecate’s the one with the most to gain from Duncan’s removal, so you assume he’s behind this.’ He was looking at Malcolm.

‘I’m not assuming anything, but Duncan’s extreme prioritisation of the hunt for Hecate has been, as we know, much debated, and from Hecate’s point of view anyone who succeeds Duncan would be preferable.’