Karin Fossum - The Murder of Harriet Krohn

He clears up after his modest meal. Afterward he poses in front of the mirror. He relaxes his shoulders, sticks his chin out, and notices that he’s lost three or four kilos. His face is sharper and it suits him. It was from his father that he inherited his wide jaw and his long, straight nose. His blue and gray shirt matches his eyes. One thing at a time, he thinks. Live for the moment. Do all the little things that decent people do. Life is made up of details. Have a proper breakfast and choose something to go on the bread. Gouda and marmalade are his favorites. Shower and shave, get out clean clothes. Run a comb through his thinning hair. Go out and get things done. He puts on his quilted jacket and goes to the car. He avoids looking at the dent, because each time he does he’s filled with a huge despair.

He drives down Blomsgate and then takes the bridge over to the east side of town. He parks outside the Job Center. This district is a planning nightmare: lovely old timber houses have been annihilated by new commercial buildings without any plan or any system at all. But this is his neighborhood, where he grew up. Its untidy character is close to his heart.

He puts twenty kroner into a parking meter, enters the building, and takes a ticket. Number fifty-eight. Forty-nine is being attended to at the counter. He glances at the people who are ahead of him. You can see it right away. These men are unemployed. They’re on Social Security. They’ve lost their self-respect; there’s no hope in their eyes. They read brochures listlessly and avoid looking at one another. This is going to end now, Charlo thinks. I don’t want to be one of them. I want to be part of society. I’m a young man with strong arms and sense enough. It’s important to him now to do things right.

He finds a vacant chair and straightens his back. Here am I, he thinks, Charles Olav Torp, covered in my own crime, clothed from head to foot in that terrible deed. It’s so strange that they can’t see it — that it doesn’t stink or shine out. Can he atone for his misdemeanor by behaving well for the rest of his life? Not as regards the justice system, but in terms of the great eternal reckoning? If there is such a thing. Sometimes he does sense something larger. As he did in Harriet’s kitchen, when he felt someone else take control. He’d assumed a role that was intended for him. He waits half an hour. A tall, lanky man is being served. He’s never killed anyone, Charlo thinks. There’s something natural about the way he leans on the counter, a spontaneity he himself has lost. Just as guilt is manifest in people’s faces, so innocence is visible as a kind of unpretentiousness.

He rolls the ticket in his hand and thinks about Harriet Krohn. A picture immediately springs to his mind. There she is, still lying on her kitchen floor with her face in a pool of blood. Even though the rational part of his brain tells him that, obviously, she’s been taken away. People will have arranged a grave, he thinks. Her beneficiaries. An idea takes shape in his head. At last, number fifty-eight comes up on the display above the counter. He goes over and leans forward. The woman is about his own age, thin and short-haired and with a small, pointed chin. Her glasses are modern, without frames, and have very small lenses. Behind the spectacles, he sees a pair of turquoise-colored eyes. They regard him without enthusiasm.

“I’ve just come to sort things out a bit,” Charlo says, his voice loud and clear. If the others can hear what he’s saying, that’s fine by him. He’s an example they’d do well to follow. “The point is that I’m in receipt of unemployment benefits. Have been for two years.”

She waits for him to continue. Her pupils are completely round, he notices, and life hasn’t been kind to her. Her irises are flecked. He believes in such things. That life’s pain and despair leave their stain in the eyes. Only children have completely clear eyes without any marks or discoloration.

“But now I’ve found a job. At a riding center. As a handyman. It’s not much, not to start with. I’ll have to show them what I can do and make myself indispensable, and then perhaps there’ll be more work in time. That’s the plan, anyway. What do you think?” he says, smiling at her.

“Yes,” she replies, “that sounds like a good tactic.” She smiles back, a quick smile. Asks him for his name and ID number.

She’s the type who needs thawing out; it’s unmistakable. Certain people won’t open up unless you work on them a bit, and he’s good at that. Used to be good. He props his elbows on the counter, rests his chin in his hands, and makes eye contact.

“But it’s only a small job,” he says. “I can’t live off it. I assume you’ll reduce my benefit, but I can’t say exactly what I’ll earn. Not yet. Because I’ve only just begun. Or rather, I’m actually starting today.”

“Then we’ll have to see how things develop,” she says, and searches her screen.

It’s not easy to hide from the authorities: one keystroke and she has all his personal details. Born 1963, address: Blomsgate 20.

“Have you any idea about your pay?”

“There’s talk of a part-time job. But we haven’t discussed an hourly rate.”

She taps away, peering through her glasses.

“You’ll have to inform the Social Security office. The only thing I can suggest is that you bring your wage slips in here,” she says, looking at him.

“I could send them by mail.”

“That’ll do fine.”

She makes the necessary notes. Charlo waits patiently.

“I thought I ought to say something,” he says. “I don’t want problems later on. With the authorities. For fiddling and so forth.”

“I quite agree. We find out about all that anyway. Plenty of people try it on.”

“Don’t know how they dare,” he says calmly, holding her turquoise gaze.

Then he walks tall through the Job Center and out the door.

Now, with his golden mission accomplished, he sets out for a drive. Randomly at first, around the streets. He looks at people and buildings, wanting to make the time pass. So that it will be afternoon, so that he can fetch Julie. He looks at the town’s glitter, enjoying all the lights and the reflections in the river. The headlights coming toward him, white, yellow, or bluish. A Freia chocolate advertisement, a clock on a wall. It’s half past nine. He ends up in Elvegata and follows it into the tunnel and out onto the E134. He follows the road without thinking. Finally it clicks. He’s driving toward Hamsund. The river is on his left, black and cold and swift. Its restless power troubles him. It flows on, unstoppable, the way his life is plowing on to the moment he fears most. The unavoidable moment of truth. There’s so much to be frightened of. Young people have such quick minds. Their sight and hearing are good. They pick up everything, every detail. Like the young girl in the florist’s, so trim and slender in her red sweater. He can’t forget her, and maybe she can’t forget him, either. His silence, his reluctance, his old green parka. He dismisses the thoughts and glances up at the sky. It’s a fine day. He’s finally on an even keel, behaving respectably now. Nobody will be able to pin anything on him — not murder, not Social Security fraud.

He drives to Hamsund church. The graveyard lies quiet and deserted, picturesquely covered in snow and with a special, frosty beauty. He parks and stands for a while, looking around and drawing the fresh air into his lungs. The milky sunshine makes everything glitter like diamonds. Slowly he starts walking among the graves. It’s possible that she only has a wooden cross, he thinks, because it takes time to choose the right stone. It takes time to get it ready; it must be carved and polished and engraved. He looks over his shoulder continually, but he can’t see anyone. It’s too early in the day. He searches around for a long time. Now and then he stops to admire the white medieval church. Recently restored, it’s perhaps the finest in the county. He hunts systematically, reading all the names and pondering all the destinies. Occasionally he finds a young person’s grave. Then he stops and muses, saddened by the thought of the short life. Four years old, thirteen years old. It makes him think of Julie and what it would be like to lose her. It’s beyond his imagination. Julie is so healthy and vital that nothing can touch her.