Jo Nesbo - Phantom

‘Goodnight. Sleep well.’

‘Goodnight. And don’t sleep too well, in case-’

‘Goodnight.’

It had been there all the time, but Harry had succeeding in suppressing it. Up until now, up until Cato’s invitation. It was enough, it was impossible to ignore the gnawing now. It had started with the violin fix, that had set it in motion, had released the dogs again. And now they were baying and clawing, barking themselves hoarse and gnashing at his intestines. Harry lay on the bed with his eyes closed, listening to the rain and hoping sleep would come and carry him away.

It didn’t.

He had a phone number in his mobile he had apportioned two letters. AA. Alcoholics Anonymous. Trygve, an AA member and sponsor he had used several times before at critical points. Three years. Why start now, now there was everything to play for and he needed more than ever to be sober? It was madness. He heard a scream outside. Followed by laughter.

At ten past eleven he got up and left. He barely registered the rain splashing down on his skull as he crossed the street to the open door. And this time he didn’t hear the footsteps behind him, for Kurt Cobain’s voice filled his auditory canals, the music like an embrace, and he stepped inside, sat on the stool by the counter and called to the barman.

‘Whis… key. Jim… Beam.’

The barman stopped wiping down the counter, put the cloth beside the corkscrew and lifted the bottle from the mirror shelf. Poured. Set the glass on the counter. Harry placed his forearms either side of the glass and stared into the golden-brown liquid. And for that moment nothing else existed.

Not Nirvana, not Oleg, not Rakel, not Gusto, not Dubai. Not Tord Schultz’s face. Not the figure that muffled the street noise as it came in. Nor the movement behind him. Nor the singing tone of the springs as the blade shot out. Nor the heavy breathing of Sergey Ivanov standing a metre from him with legs together and hands held low.

Sergey looked at the man’s back. He had both arms resting on the counter. It couldn’t be more perfect. The hour had come. His heart was pounding. Pounding wildly with fresh blood, as it had done the first time he had fetched the heroin packages from the cockpit. All fear was gone. Because he knew now, he was alive. He was alive and about to kill the man before him. Take his life, make it part of his own. The very idea of it made him grow; it was as though he had already consumed the enemy’s heart. Now. The movements. Sergey took a deep breath, stepped forward and placed his left hand on Harry’s head. As if in blessing. As if he were going to baptise him.

Sergey Ivanov couldn’t get a hold. Simply could not get a hold. The damn rain had soaked the man’s skull and hair, and the short spikes slipped through his fingers preventing him from snatching his head back. Sergey’s left hand shot forward again, grasped the man’s forehead and pulled it to him as he brought the knife round his throat. The man’s body jerked. Sergey slashed with the knife, felt it make contact, felt it slice through skin. There! The hot jet of blood on his thumb. Not as deep as he expected, but three more heartbeats and it would all be over. He raised his gaze to the mirror to see the fountain. He saw a bared row of teeth and beneath that a gaping wound from which blood was streaming down the front of the shirt. And the man’s eyes. It was that look — a cold, angry predatory glare — that made him realise the job was not yet done.

When Harry had felt the hand on his head he had known instinctively. Known it was not a drunken customer or an old acquaintance, but them. The hand slid off and that gave Harry a tenth of a second to look in the mirror, to see the glint of steel. He already knew where it was heading. Then the hand was around his forehead and jerking him backwards. It was too late to put a hand between throat and blade, so Harry stood on the foot rail and levered himself upwards while squeezing his chin against his chest. He felt no pain as the knife sliced his skin, didn’t feel it until it cut through to the chin and penetrated the sensitive membrane around the bone.

Then he met the other man’s eyes in the mirror. He pulled Harry’s head back towards his own, making them resemble two friends posing for a picture. Harry felt the blade being pressed against his chin and chest, trying to find a way into one of the two neck arteries, and he knew that within a few seconds it would succeed.

Sergey wrapped the whole of his arm around the man’s forehead and jerked with all his might. The man’s head tilted backwards, and in the mirror he saw the blade finally find the gap between chin and chest and slide in. The steel bit into the throat and moved to the right, towards the neck artery, the arteria carotis. Blin! The man had managed to lift his right hand and stick a finger between knife and artery. But Sergey knew the razor-sharp edge would sever a finger. It was just a question of applying enough pressure. He pulled. And pulled.

Harry could feel the pressure from the knife, but knew it wouldn’t make any headway. The highest strength-to-weight ratio of any metal. Nothing cut through titanium, whether it was made in Hong Kong or not. But the guy was strong, soon he would realise that the blade wasn’t biting.

He groped with his free hand in front of him, knocking over his drink, and found something.

It was a T-shaped corkscrew. Of the simplest kind, with a short helix. He grabbed the handle with the point protruding between first and second fingers. Felt panic surge as he heard the knife blade slide over the prosthesis. He forced his eyes down to see in the mirror. See where he should aim. Raised his hand to the side and struck backwards, behind his head.

He noticed the other man’s body stiffen as the tip of the corkscrew perforated the skin on the side of his neck. But it was an innocuous, superficial wound and it didn’t stop him. He was beginning to shift the knife to the left. Harry concentrated. The corkscrew demanded a firm, practised hand. However, a couple of turns was all it needed to penetrate deep into the cork. Harry twisted twice. Felt it slip through the flesh. Bore its way in. Felt soft resistance. The oesophagus. Then he pulled.

It was like pulling the bung from the side of a full barrel of red wine.

Sergey Ivanov was fully conscious and saw the whole process in the mirror as the first heartbeat sent a jet of blood to the right. His brain registered, analysed and formed a conclusion: the man whose throat he was trying to cut had found a main artery with a corkscrew, pulled the vessel from his neck and it was now pumping out his life blood. Sergey had three further thoughts before the second heartbeat came and consciousness went.

He had let down his uncle.

He would never see his beloved Siberia again.

He was going to be buried with a tattoo that lied.

On the third beat of his heart he fell. And by the time the song finished, Sergey Ivanov was dead.

Harry got up from the stool. In the mirror he saw the cut running across his chin. But that wasn’t the worst; there were deep cuts to his throat from which blood was trickling and had already discoloured his entire collar.

The three other customers in the bar had gone. He looked down at the man lying on the floor. Blood was still flowing from the gash in his neck, but it wasn’t pumping. Which meant that his heart had stopped beating and there was no point trying to revive him. And even if there had been life left in him, Harry knew this person would never have revealed who had sent him. Because he saw the tattoos protruding above the shirt. He didn’t know any of the symbols, but he knew they were Russian. Black Corn maybe. They were different from the typically Western tattoo belonging to the barman, who was pressed up against the mirror shelf and staring with pupils so black with shock they seemed to cover the whites of his eyes. Nirvana had faded out and there was total silence. Harry looked at the whiskey glass lying on its side.