Jo Nesbo: Phantom

Hans Christian nodded, and said, ‘I’ll try.’

Harry hesitated. Then he proffered his hand.

They shook.

‘You’re a good man, Hans Christian. I’ve got you saved under H.’ He lifted his mobile phone. ‘You’ve replaced Halvorsen.’

‘Who?’

‘Just a former colleague I hope to see again. I have to go now.’

‘What are you going to do?’

‘Meet Gusto’s murderer.’

Harry rose, turned to the counter and saluted to Rita, who waved back.

Once outside and striding across the road between cars, there was an explosion behind his eyes, and his throat felt as if it would be torn apart. And in Dovregata came the gall. He stood bent double by the wall in the middle of the quiet street and brought up Rita’s bacon, eggs and coffee. Then he straightened and walked on down Hausmanns gate.

In the end it had been a simple decision, despite everything.

I was sitting on a filthy mattress and felt my petrified heart throbbing as I rang. I hoped he would pick up the phone, and I hoped he wouldn’t.

I was about to hang up when he answered, and there was my foster-brother’s voice, lifeless and clear.

‘Stein.’

I have occasionally considered how apt that name is. Stone. An impenetrable surface with a rock-hard centre. Impassive, bleak, heavy. But even rocks have a weak point, a place where a soft blow from a sledgehammer can make them split. In Stein’s case it was easy.

I cleared my throat. ‘It’s Gusto. I know where Irene is.’

I heard light breathing. Stein’s breathing was always light.

He could run and run for hours, needed almost no oxygen. Or a reason to run.

‘Where?’

‘That’s the thing,’ I said. ‘I know where, but it’ll cost you to find out.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I need it.’

It was like a wave of heat. No, of cold. I could feel his hatred. Heard him swallow.

‘How mu-’

‘Five thousand.’

‘Fine.’

‘I mean ten.’

‘You said five.’

Fuck.

‘But it’s urgent,’ I said, even though I knew he was already on his feet.

‘Fine. Where are you?’

‘Hausmanns gate 92. The lock on the door’s broken. Second floor.’

‘I’m on my way. Don’t go anywhere.’

Go anywhere? I took a couple of dog-ends from the ashtray in the sitting room and lit up in the kitchen amid the deafening afternoon silence. Shit, it was so hot in here. Something rustled. I followed the noise. The rat again, scurrying along by the wall.

It came from behind the stove. Had a nice hiding place there.

I smoked dog-end number two.

Then I jumped up.

The stove weighed a bloody ton, until I discovered it had two wheels at the back.

The rathole was bigger than it ought to have been.

Oleg, Oleg, my dear friend. You’re smart, but this particular ruse you learned from me.

I fell on my knees. I was on a high even while working with the wire. My fingers shook so much I felt like biting them off. I could feel I had it, but then I lost it. It had to be violin. Had to be!

Then at long last I got a nibble, and it was a big ’un. I reeled it in. A large, heavy cloth bag. I opened it. It had to be, had to be!

A rubber tube, a spoon, a syringe. And three small transparent packages. The white powder inside was flecked with brown. My heart sang. I was reunited with the only friend and lover I have always been able to rely on.

I stuffed two of the packages in my pocket and opened the third. Now I had enough for a week if I was frugal, I just had to shoot up and vamoose before Stein or anyone else came. I sprinkled some powder onto the spoon, flicked my lighter. I usually added a few drops of lemon, the kind you buy in bottles and people put in tea. The lemon juice prevented the powder from going clumpy and you got all of it in the syringe. But I had neither the lemon nor the patience, now there was only one thing that mattered: getting the shit into my bloodstream.

I wrapped the tube round the top of my arm, put the end between my teeth and pulled. Found a big blue vein. Angled the syringe to give myself the biggest target and reduce the shaking. Because I was shaking. Shaking like hell.

I missed.

Once. Twice. Breathed in. Don’t think too much now, don’t be too keen, don’t panic.

The needle wobbled. I took a stab at the blue worm.

Missed again.

I fought against my despair. Thought I might smoke a bit of it first, to compose myself. But it was the rush I wanted, the kick you get when the whole dose hits the blood, goes straight to the brain, the orgasm, the free fall!

The heat and the sunlight, they were blinding me. I moved to the sitting room, sat in the shadow by the wall. Shit, now I couldn’t even see the sodding vein! Take it easy. I waited for my pupils to dilate. Luckily my forearms were as white as cinema screens. The vein looked like a river on a map of Greenland. Now.

Missed.

I didn’t have the energy for this, felt tears coming. A shoe creaked.

I had been concentrating so hard that I hadn’t heard him come in.

And when I looked up my eyes were so full of tears that shapes were distorted, like in a fricking fairground mirror.

‘Hi, Thief.’

I hadn’t heard anyone call me that for ages.

I blinked away the tears. And the shapes became familiar. Yes, now I recognised everything. Even the gun. It hadn’t been nicked from the rehearsal room by passing burglars, as I had thought.

The weird thing was I wasn’t frightened. Not at all. All of a sudden I was quite calm.

I looked down at the vein again.

‘Don’t do it,’ said the voice.

I studied my hand. It was as steady as a pickpocket’s. This was my chance.

‘I’ll shoot you.’

‘I don’t think so,’ I said. ‘Because then you’ll never find out where Irene is.’

‘Gusto!’

‘I’m doing what I have to do,’ I said and stabbed. Hit the vein. Raised my thumb to press the plunger. ‘So you can do what you have to do.’

The church bells started chiming again.

Harry sat in the shadow by the wall. The light from the street lamp outside fell on the mattresses. He checked his watch. Nine. Three hours to the Bangkok flight. The pains in his neck had suddenly got worse. Like the heat from the sun before it disappears behind a cloud. But soon the sun would be gone; soon he would be out of pain. Harry knew how this had to end. It was as inevitable as his return to Oslo. Just as he knew that the human need for order and cohesion meant he would manipulate his mind into seeing a kind of logic to it. Because the notion that everything is no more than cold chaos, that there is no meaning, is harder to bear than even the worst, though comprehensible, tragedy.

He groped inside his jacket pocket for a pack of cigarettes and felt the knife handle against his fingertips. Had a feeling he should have got rid of it. A curse lay over it. Over him. But it wouldn’t have made any difference; he had been cursed long before the knife appeared. And the curse was worse than any knife; it said that his love was a plague he carried around with him. Just as Asayev had said the knife transmitted the suffering and sickness of its owner to whoever had been stabbed by it, all those who had allowed themselves to be loved by Harry had been made to pay. Had been destroyed, taken from him. Only the ghosts were left. All of them. And soon Rakel and Oleg would be ghosts as well.

He opened the pack and looked inside.

What was it he had imagined? That he would be allowed to escape the curse? That he would be able to flee to the other side of the globe with them and live happily ever after? He was thinking this as he checked his watch again, wondering how late he could leave and still make the flight. This was his selfish, greedy heart he was listening to.