Thomas Enger - Scarred

Instead of sitting down at his computer, he walks over to the national news desk where he finds the fax that was sent to them along with every other newspaper late last night and locates Kåre Hjeltland. The news editor’s gaze is focused on a PC screen a few workstations away. His hair stands straight up as usual and he looks as if he slept at the office and hasn’t had time to shower before new stories appeared and demanded his undivided attention.

‘Do you have two minutes, Kåre?’ Henning says and stops in front of him. Hjeltland registers Henning’s arrival, nods, bashes the keyboard hard for thirty seconds before he gets up so abruptly that his chair rolls several metres backwards.

‘What is it?’ he asks.

Henning waits until Hjeltland’s eyes stop flitting.

‘You know it’s a stitch-up, don’t you?’

Hjeltland folds his arms across his chest and looks at him for a few seconds.

‘The whole case against Trine bears all the hallmarks,’ Henning continues. ‘Ever since yesterday morning VG has been drip-feeding stories to its readers, stories it couldn’t possibly have written in just one day. It must have known about this for a while and planned it carefully.’

Hjeltland gives Henning a baffled look.

‘Yes, and so what?’

‘So what? Don’t you think it’s just a little bit suspicious?’

‘No, not at all. We would have done exactly the same if a big story like this had landed in our lap.’

‘It doesn’t worry you that the story was deliberately leaked to Norway’s biggest newspaper, and that Trine wasn’t even offered the opportunity to respond to the allegations before the first articles went to print?’

Hjeltland is about to say something, but Henning has no intention of letting him get a word in yet.

‘And don’t tell me that VG didn’t try because that’s bullshit. It’s had every opportunity to confront Trine before it started this smear campaign against her, precisely because it’s known about it for a long time. It’s obvious what VG wants. And the rest of the media will blindly follow its lead while doing everything they can to come up with their own take on the story.’

‘But—’

‘I haven’t seen a single article that tries to defend Trine or examines the story from her point of view. No, that’s not true, I saw a two-liner saying one of her Junior Ministers is one hundred per cent behind his boss. No one has yet managed to establish what exactly happened in that hotel room.’

‘But she’s refusing to say anything,’ Hjeltland protests. ‘What do you want us to do, Henning? Not cover the story?’

‘No, but it has got completely out of hand. Trine might well be guilty of the things she’s accused of, but that’s exactly why it would have been refreshing to see a newspaper or a TV channel take a step backwards and assess the story from a balanced point of view. Or at least acknowledge that there could be more to it.’

‘Did you read the press release he issued last night?’

Henning shows him the two fax sheets he is holding in his hands.

‘Your sister is a powerful woman, Henning. She exploited her position to pressure a young man into having sex with her.’

‘She might well have done, but all the media care about now is that Trine resigns and that she apologises. It doesn’t matter what she says or what she did because no one is going to believe her. Especially not now when the press has dug up all kinds of dirt on her.’

Hjeltland scratches his head. Then he looks at Henning with editorial disapproval.

‘I understand how you must be feeling, Henning, since it’s your sister who’s being hounded, but—’

‘It’s got nothing to do with Trine being my sister,’ Henning says with an unexpected touch of anger in his voice. ‘It’s about how history repeats itself whenever a public figure is alleged to have done something wrong. We go for the jugular straightaway, and I can see it in people’s faces – also here in our office – when yet another story is revealed that supports the impression that has already been created. It’s a mixture of indignation and glee, and it’s not just here, Kåre, I’ve seen it in every editorial office I’ve ever worked in. It makes me sick.’

Henning is aware that the blood is rushing to his head. Around them other staff members have noticed his outburst, but they keep their distance. Henning doesn’t care about them; instead he makes a second attempt to get his point across and tries hard not to sound emotional or angry.

‘Besides, Trine has been on sick leave. Not all that long ago. Doesn’t anyone think that perhaps this is more than she can cope with?’

Even though he keeps his voice low, his words are explosive and he can see the effect on Hjeltland’s face. The muscles tighten like wire.

‘So what do you think we ought to do, Henning?’

‘Investigate the allegations,’ he says. ‘Rather than just repeat them.’

Hjeltland emits a sigh from the depths of his chest.

‘You know very well we don’t have the resources, Henning. And our circulation figures, they’ve gone completely through—’

‘And you wouldn’t want to ruin that, would you? You’d rather bank on the story being true?’

‘No, but right now we have to produce a story based on the information currently available to us.’

Henning can feel a fuse burning behind his eyes, but he knows continuing this discussion is pointless. So he shakes his head and says: ‘I’m going out. I can’t stand being here.’

‘Where are you going?’ Hjeltland calls after him.

‘Jessheim.’

The sound of footsteps wakes up Trine Juul-Osmundsen. At first she is startled and wonders where she is before she remembers it could be one of her bodyguards who might have gone outside for some fresh air. But she doesn’t recognise the noise. It’s a small, hard stomping not made by shoes.

She sits up on the sofa bed in the living room and instantly feels the pounding in her head. Even getting to a sitting position is enough to make her nauseous. She groans and touches her temples. She screws up her eyes and sees the empty bottle of St Hallvard’s in front of her. Her stomach churns at the sight. Nevertheless she gets up and opens the curtains. A grey hare hops away. It was sitting on the hilltop, Tissetoppen, as they used to call the little mound on the side of the cabin that overlooks the sea where Henning used to go for a pee in the evening before they climbed into the bunk beds in the narrow bedroom.

The light outside is sharp and hurts her head. Her mouth is filled with dry cotton wool and the taste of cigarettes lingers on her tongue. Her laptop is open on the dining table. Last night, in between shots of liqueur, she tried to reconstruct her movements on 9 October. She remembered how she sneaked out of Hotel Caledonien and got into a car that was waiting at the goods entrance, a car that took her straight to Kjevik Airport. How she arrived at a different hotel an hour and a half later. The run she went for that same evening to rid herself of some of the anxiety that was coursing around her body at the thought of what she was going to do the next day. Trine even looked up her running profile on a street map, just to assure herself that her memory was correct.

She also tried to find a name and face among all her enemies, but she couldn’t think of a single one. Or, that is to say, the more she drank, the more potential candidates sprang to mind, but not one of them struck her as more plausible than the others. None of them is capable of gambling with such high stakes. It made her wonder if perhaps several colleagues have ganged up on her.

Trine groans and opens the door to let in the sea air. She walks outside in the clothes she fell asleep in. She is tempted to stick two fingers down her throat, so she won’t have to spend the rest of the day recovering from her hangover. On Tissetoppen she has to take a step to the side when a gust of wind almost knocks her over while she looks for the hare. It would appear to be hiding.