Jo Nesbo - The Son

The customer turned to Fidel. There was something strangely remote in his smiling eyes when he repeated: ‘Punishing undesirable behaviour is my job.’

‘Good.’

‘Why is that cage empty?’ The customer pointed to an enclosure near the dogs.

‘I used to have two males. If I had put them in the same cage, one of them would have ended up dead.’

Fidel took out a bunch of keys. ‘Come and have a look at the puppies, they have their own cage over there-’

‘Before you do that, tell me something. .’

‘Yes?’

‘Is it desirable behaviour to let a dog bite a young girl in the face?’

Fidel stopped in his tracks. ‘Eh?’

‘Is it desirable behaviour to use dogs to bite off a girl’s face when she tries to escape slavery, or should it be punished?’

‘Listen, the dog is just acting on instinct and you can’t blame it just because-’

‘I’m not talking about the dog. The owners. Should they be punished, in your opinion?’

Fidel looked closely at his customer. Could he be a cop after all? ‘Well, if such an accident did happen, then-’

‘I doubt it was an accident. Afterwards, the owner cut the girl’s throat and dumped her body in the forest.’

Fidel gripped the Mauser harder. ‘I don’t know anything about that.’

‘But I do. The owner’s name was Hugo Nestor.’

‘Listen, do you want a dog or not?’ Fidel raised the barrel of his rifle — which up until now had been pointing at the ground — a few inches.

‘He bought the dog from you. He has bought several dogs from you. Because you sell dogs that can be used for such purposes.’

‘What would you know about that?’

‘A lot. For twelve years I sat in a cage listening to people tell me stories. Ever wondered what it’s like to sit in a cage?’

‘Listen-’

‘You can try it now.’

Fidel didn’t have time to get the rifle in place before the other man had locked him in a hold from behind and was pressing his arms so tightly against his body that the air left Fidel with a hiss. The kennel owner barely registered the frantic barking as he was picked up. The other man leaned back as he lifted Fidel and threw him in a large arc over his head. But when Fidel hit the ground neck and shoulders first, the guy threw himself so that he landed on top of Fidel. Fidel gasped for air as he struggled to free himself. But he stopped abruptly when he stared into the muzzle of a gun.

Four minutes later Fidel was staring at the retreating back of the man who looked as if he was walking on water as he crossed the moor in the fog. Fidel’s fingers were gripping the meshed fence next to the big padlock. He was locked in the empty cage. In the next cage, Ghostbuster had lain down and was watching him lazily. The man had filled the bowl in Fidel’s cage with water and left him four boxes of Raw dog food. And he had taken his mobile, his keys and his wallet. Fidel started to scream. And the white devils responded with howling and barking. From an enclosure built so deep into the forest that no one could hear or see them.

Fuck!

The man had gone. A strange silence descended. A bird screeched. Then Fidel heard the first drops of rain hit the corrugated-iron roof.

When Simon stepped out of the lift and into Homicide’s office at 8.08 on Monday morning, he had three things on his mind. That Else had been bathing her eyes in the en suite bathroom earlier, completely unaware that Simon had been watching her from the bedroom. That he had possibly given Kari too much work to do on a Sunday. And that he hated the office layout, especially after one of Else’s friends who was an architect had told him that it was a myth that open-plan offices save floor space per employee, that noise issues meant that so many meeting rooms and buffer zones had to be created that any gain was eaten up by the additional expenditure.

He went over to Kari’s desk.

‘You’re in early,’ he said.

A rather bleary face looked up. ‘Good morning to you too, Simon Kefas.’

‘Thank you. Found anything?’

Kari leaned back in her chair. Even though she was yawning, Simon thought he detected a certain satisfaction behind her expression.

‘First I looked for a connection between Iversen and Farrisen. Nothing. Then I looked up Sonny Lofthus’s convictions and any other potential suspects. Lofthus was convicted of the murder of an unidentified, possibly Vietnamese girl who died from a drug overdose, and at first the police had suspected Kalle Farrisen. But Lofthus was also doing time for another killing. That of Oliver Jovic, a drug dealer, a Kosovo Serb who was trying to butt into the market when he was found in Stensparken with a glass bottle of Coke down his throat.’

Simon pulled a face. ‘They slashed his throat?’

‘No, that’s not what I meant. A bottle of Coke had been rammed down his throat.’

‘Down his throat?’

‘The bottle neck first. Easier that way. Pushed right down so that the bottom presses against the back of the teeth.’

‘How do you know. .?’

‘I saw the photos. The Drug Squad thought it was a message to show potential competitors what would happen if you try to bite off more than you can chew in the coke market.’ She looked up quickly at Simon and added: ‘Coke bottle as in Coca-Cola.’

‘Yes, thank you, I get it.’

‘The police launched an investigation, but got nowhere. The case was never actually abandoned, but very little happened until Sonny Lofthus was arrested for the murder of the Asian girl. He confessed to murdering Jovic as well. In the interview records he states that he and Jovic had met in the park to settle a debt, that Lofthus didn’t have enough money and that Jovic had threatened him with a gun. Lofthus had attacked him and floored him. I guess the police thought it sounded reasonable, given that Lofthus used to wrestle.’

‘Hm.’

‘The interesting thing is that the police lifted a fingerprint from the bottle.’

‘And?’

‘And it didn’t belong to Lofthus.’

Simon nodded. ‘And how did Lofthus explain that?’

‘He said he’d found the empty bottle in a nearby bin. That junkies like him do this all the time to get the deposits on them back.’

‘But?’

‘Junkies don’t collect recyclables. It would take too long to get together enough money for that day’s fix. And the report stated that the fingerprint was a thumb and that it had been lifted from the bottom of the bottle.’

Simon could see where she was going with this, but didn’t want to spoil it by beating her to it.

‘I mean, who puts their thumb on the bottom of a bottle when they drink from it? If, however, you were forcing a bottle down someone’s throat. .’

‘And you don’t think the police considered that at the time?’

Kari shrugged. ‘I don’t think the police ever prioritise drug hits. They hadn’t found a match for the thumbprint in the database. So when someone offers them a confession to a case they’ve had lying around for a while. .’

‘Then they say thank you very much, mark the case as solved and move on?’

‘That’s how you work, isn’t it?’

Simon sighed. You . He had read in the newspapers that the police’s reputation among the public was starting to rise after the last few years’ scandals, but the force was only slightly more popular than the railways. You . He imagined she was thanking her lucky stars that she already had one foot out of this open-plan office.

‘So Sonny Lofthus was convicted of two murders, but in both cases suspicion pointed to drug dealers. Are you saying that he’s a professional scapegoat?’

‘Wouldn’t you?’

‘Perhaps. But there still isn’t anything that links him to either Farrisen or Agnete Iversen.’