Thomas Enger - Scarred

‘You may be right, so why don’t you tell me? Explain it to me.’

Remi inhales and clutches his head. He massages his temples. Then he looks up at the wall, at the two footprints.

Emilie’s mobile rings. Her eyes automatically seek out the sound.

‘Is that yours?’ Remi asks.

Emilie doesn’t reply.

‘Is that yours?’ he demands to know.

Emilie nods.

Remi walks towards the sound and finds her mobile on the large, black coffee table. He takes it, checks the display and lets it ring. However, she can see that the noise troubles him. With a brusque, panicky movement he blocks the call and tosses the mobile aside.

Then he sits down on a chair. Rubs his fingertips against his temples again. Something glides across his face. An expression or an emotion, Emilie isn’t sure. But she’s quite sure that she doesn’t like what she sees.

Remi tries to think clearly.

It proves to be difficult.

He has only been inside the house once before and he hadn’t planned on doing this. He doesn’t know what he had hoped to get from Emilie. Just something. That she would say she was sorry and mean it, rather than merely say it. That she would understand.

He should have taken some more of the pills he swallowed before he went to Johanne’s flat, then he wouldn’t have been able to feel anything. But now he feels everything. The pain in his hand and in his head. It’s as if the walls are closing in on him and threatening to crush him.

So what’s he going to do now?

What next?

He lifts his head and looks around. His gaze stops on the stuffed reindeer head mounted on the wall. The eyes are dark and shiny. As if the light is still on in them.

‘Do you hunt?’ he asks, looking at Mattis.

Mattis nods reluctantly.

‘Then I guess you keep guns in the house, don’t you?’

Bjarne mutters curses under his breath. Emilie Blomvik still isn’t answering her phone. And worse, she has just blocked his call.

He swears loudly and drives as fast as he can in the direction of the Trafikkmaskinen interchange roundabout to get out of Oslo. While he weaves frantically in and out of the traffic, he finds a white cable, which he plugs into his mobile. He sticks the earplugs into his ears and calls Fredrik Stang again.

‘Did you get hold of Romerike Police?’

‘Yes, they’re despatching a patrol car to the address now.’

‘Just the one car?’

‘Yes, they said that was all they had available.’

Bjarne rolls his eyes.

‘Okay, I’m on my way there now. Have you found out more information about Remi Gulliksen?’

‘Yes, a bit. He was born and grew up in Jessheim, but now lives in a small flat in Tøyen.’

‘Have we sent people over to his address?’

‘We have. Gjerstad has got everyone working on it.’

‘Great.’

‘By the way, Remi was due to be evicted from his flat today.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes, that could have been what set him off.’

‘Hm. Keep me posted.’

‘Will do.’

Some high-risk driving enables Bjarne to get out of Oslo in the rush-hour while he calls Directory Enquiries and asks to be put through to Nordby Nursery. There he learns that Sebastian Blomvik failed to show up today.

Bjarne calls Emilie again, but this time his call is cut off immediately.

‘Damn,’ he says and hits the accelerator.

Emilie Blomvik.

She was his first, his only one. Now, when he thinks about it, he doesn’t know why he loved her, only that he did. He couldn’t explain it. Perhaps it was just that she made him feel loved and valued. He believed that she admired him. That’s what she told him, she praised him, called him nice and good. No one had ever said that to him before.

But he should have known that it couldn’t last. Emilie wasn’t that kind of girl. She got bored easily and hated staying in. She liked going to parties and having fun, while he just wanted her all to himself. At first when the rumours about Markus and her started to circulate, he refused to believe them. He was in denial.

Right until that became impossible.

Emilie was his first, his only one. He could never erase her; no one would ever surpass her. It had started with Emilie and it would finish with Emilie.

The doorbell rings.

He is startled, as are Emilie and Mattis. Both of them are about to cry out, but Remi points the gun at them.

‘Hush,’ he says. ‘Not a sound.’

Bjarne has barely left Oslo when his mobile rings again.

‘Yes?’

It is Ella Sandland.

‘I’ve just spoken to Remi Gulliksen’s mother,’ she says. ‘Remi visited them Tuesday evening. She says he went berserk.’

‘In what way?’

‘He beat up his father.’

An articulated lorry pulls out in front of Bjarne. He sounds the horn and flashes his headlights while he says: ‘Why?’

‘His mother wasn’t sure. It came out of the blue. Remi had knocked over a glass of water and refused to clean it up. And when his father told Remi to apologise, he went crazy.’

‘Just because he knocked over a glass of water?’

The articulated lorry refuses to get out of his way.

‘So it would seem. They don’t sound like the world’s happiest family.’

Bjarne opens the window and places a blue flashing light on the roof, though technically he should have requested permission first. It takes only a few seconds before the lorry pulls over. Bjarne accelerates and sends the driver a long hard stare before he overtakes him. The speedometer is close to 150.

‘We need to send officers over to Remi’s parents’ address,’ he says.

‘I think that’s already happening.’

‘I’m seven or eight minutes away from Jessheim.’

‘Thanks for letting me know.’

Bjarne exits the motorway at Jessheim, turns right at the first roundabout, drives past a bank and across the new roundabout left of the bridge. He continues towards the industrial estate and speeds through more roundabouts and sleeping policemen until he reaches a residential area. He follows the sat nav instructions on the screen and it doesn’t take long before he spots the patrol car from Romerike Police parked outside a red house. Bjarne parks his car alongside the local officers and looks across to Henning.

‘Stay here. And don’t even think about leaving the car—’

He pushes his index finger very close to Henning’s face.

‘Okay.’

Bjarne gets out and introduces himself.

‘It doesn’t look as if anyone is in,’ says one of the officers.

‘Have you rung the doorbell?’

‘Yes. No one came to the door.’

Bjarne checks the windows for signs of movement and listens out for sounds. The house glistens in the sunlight that has broken through the layer of clouds. The garage door is open. A stroller is parked outside. A green garden hose is stretched across the shingle.

‘There!’ Bjarne exclaims.

‘Where?’ the officer asks.

‘The curtain in the small window. It twitched. There’s someone inside.’

‘Then why doesn’t she open the door?’

Bjarne doesn’t reply.

‘I’ll try calling her again,’ he says and takes out his mobile. He lets it ring for a long time.

Finally the call is answered, but he hears only static.

‘Hello?’ Bjarne says.

There is no voice down the other end.

‘This is Detective Inspector Bjarne Brogeland from Oslo Police. Who am I speaking to?’

The silence continues.

At last a dark voice says: ‘Go away.’

Bjarne freezes.

‘Remi?’ he stutters. ‘Is that you?’