Jo Nesbo - The Leopard

‘Oh?’

‘I should have known as soon as I saw the neon tubes on the ceiling. If they’d been working, the tenant wouldn’t have needed a desk lamp. The switch was connected to something else, some kind of ignition device.’

‘You think so, do you? Well, right, we’ll get some experts in tomorrow morning.’

‘What does it look like inside?’ Holm asked. ‘The room where it started.’

The fireman scrutinised Holm. ‘PSG on the walls and ceiling, son. What do you think it looks like?’

Harry was tired. Tired of being on the receiving end, tired of being afraid, tired of always being too late. But right now most tired of grown men who never tire of playing cock of the walk. Harry spoke in a low voice, so low that the fireman had to lean in to hear.

‘Unless you’re seriously interested in what my forensics officer thinks about the room you’ve just sent umpteen smoke divers into, I suggest you spit out what you know in concise but exhaustive terms. You know there was a guy sitting there planning six or seven murders. Which he carried out. And we’re very interested to know if we can expect to find clues which might help us to stop this very, very bad man. Can you be concise like that?’

The fireman straightened. Coughed. ‘PSG is extremely-’

‘Listen. We’re asking you for the consequences, not the cause.’

The fireman’s face had gone a colour that was not solely due to the heat from the burning PSG. ‘Burned out. Totally burned out. Papers, furniture, computer, the lot.’

‘Thank you, boss,’ Harry said.

The two policemen watched the fireman’s back as he left.

‘My forensics officer?’ Holm repeated, pulling a face as if he had swallowed something nasty.

‘Had to sound like a bit of a boss, too.’

‘Good to outsmart someone when you’ve just been outsmarted yourself, isn’t it?’

Harry nodded and pulled the blanket around him more tightly. ‘He said burned out, didn’t he?’

‘Burned out. How does that feel?’

Harry stared miserably at the smoke still seeping out of the factory windows into the fire service’s searchlights.

‘Like being knobbed in Nydalen,’ he answered, draining the rest of the cold coffee.

Harry drove away from Nydalen, but got no further than the red lights in Uelandsgate before Bjorn Holm rang again.

‘Forensics have done tests on the semen on Adele’s ski pants, and we’ve got a DNA profile.’

‘Already?’ Harry exclaimed.

‘Partial profile. But enough for them to state with 93 per cent certainty that we have a match.’

Harry sat up straight in the seat.

Match. What a wonderful word. Perhaps the day wasn’t a waste after all.

‘Out with it then!’ Harry said.

‘You’ve got to learn to savour dramatic pauses,’ Holm said.

Harry groaned.

‘OK, OK. They found the matching DNA profile with hair from Tony Leike’s hairbrush.’

Harry stared into the distance.

Tony Leike had raped Adele Vetlesen at the cabin.

Harry hadn’t seen it coming. Tony Leike? He couldn’t make it tally. Violent criminal, yes, but to rape a woman who’s come to a cabin with another man? Elias Skog said he’d seen him holding her mouth and pulling her into the toilet. Perhaps it wasn’t a rape when it came to the crunch?

And then – all of a sudden – it did come to the crunch.

Harry saw it, crystal clear.

It wasn’t a rape. And there it was: the motive.

The cars behind hooted. The lights had turned green.

It was a quarter to eight, and the day hadn’t yet adjusted colour and contrast. The grey morning light showed the countryside in a grainy black-and-white version as Harry parked beside the only other car by Lake Voyentangen and ambled down to the jetty. County Officer Skai was standing at the edge with a fishing rod in his hand and a cigarette in the corner of his mouth. Wisps of mist hung in the air like cotton wool around the reeds poking up from the black, oil-smooth water.

‘Hole,’ said Skai without turning. ‘Up early.’

‘Your wife said you were here.’

‘Every morning from seven to eight. Only chance I have to think before the hustle and bustle starts.’

‘What have you caught?’

‘Nothing. But there are pike in the reeds.’

‘Sounds familiar. ’Fraid the hustle and bustle starts a bit earlier today. I’ve come about Tony Leike.’

‘Tony, yes. His grandad’s farm was in Rustad, east of Lake Lyseren.’

‘So you remember him well?’

‘This is a small place, Hole. My father and old Leike were friends, and Tony was here every summer.’

‘What memories do you have of him?’

‘Erm, funny guy. Lots of people liked him. Especially the women. He was pally with the girls, a sort of Elvis type. And managed to surround himself with a lot of mystery. Rumour was he had grown up alone with his unhappy, alcoholic mother until one day she sent him packing because the man she was with didn’t like the boy. But women round here liked him a lot. And he them. That occasionally got him into some trouble.’

‘Like when he cosied up to your daughter?’

Skai flinched as if he had got a bite.

‘Your wife,’ Harry said. ‘I asked her about Tony, and she told me. It was your daughter Tony and a local boy were fighting over that time.’

The policeman shook his head. ‘They weren’t fighting, it was butchery pure and simple. Poor Ole, he’d got it into his head that he and Mia were a couple because he’d fallen in love with her and was allowed to drive Mia and her friend to a dance. He wasn’t a fighter, Ole, he was more the bookish kind. But he went for Tony. Who laid him out flat, drew a knife and… it was pretty nasty, we’re not used to that sort of thing here.’

‘What did he do?’

‘He cut off half his tongue. Put it in his pocket and left. We arrested Tony half an hour later at his grandfather’s, told him the tongue was needed at the operating theatre. Tony said he’d fed it to the crows.’

‘What I wanted to ask was whether you had ever suspected Tony of rape. Then or at any other time.’

Skai spun round.

‘Let me put it this way, Hole. Mia was never the same happy-go-lucky girl again. She still wanted the headcase, of course, but that’s the way girls are at that age. And Ole moved away. Every time the poor kid opened his mouth round here it was a reminder for him and others of the dreadful humiliation. So, yes, I would say that Tony Leike is the violent type. But, no, I don’t think he raped anyone. If so, he would have raped Mia, if I can put it like that.’

‘She…?’

‘They were in the woods behind the dance hall. She didn’t let Tony have his way. And he accepted that.’

‘You’re sure? Sorry I have to ask, but it’s-’

The hook leapt out of the water towards them. It glinted in the first horizontal rays of the sun.

‘That’s fine, Hole. I’m police too, and I know what you’re working on. Mia’s a decent girl and doesn’t lie. Not even in a witness box. You can have the report if you want the details. I would just prefer it if Mia didn’t have to go through all of this again.’

‘That won’t be necessary,’ Harry said. ‘Thank you.’

Harry had informed the detectives assembled in the Odin conference room that the person he had seen under the snowmobile – who had still not been found despite the increased police presence – had Tony Leike’s arthritic fingers. And then recounted his theory. He leaned back and waited for reactions.

The Pelican peered over her glasses at Harry, but seemed to be addressing the whole morning gathering.

‘What do you mean you think Adele was willing? She was screaming for help, for goodness’ sake!’