Jo Nesbo - The Redeemer

He had read the newspapers today. It was unreal although he knew all the details, as if it were all about someone else and not Robert.

The door opened. Outside stood a tall, blonde woman in a military-green pilot's jacket. Her mouth was narrow and bloodless, her eyes hard, neutral, and her features expressionless. Behind her stood a red-haired, squat man with a round, boyish countenance and the type of grin that seems to be etched into some people's faces. They greet all news with it, good or bad.

'Who are you?' asked the woman.

'Jon Karlsen.' When he saw the woman's eyes become even harder he went on. 'I'm Robert's brother.'

'My apologies,' the woman said in a monotone, coming into the room and proffering her hand. 'Toril Li, police officer with Crime Squad.' Her hand was bone hard, but warm. 'This is Police Officer Ola Li.'

The man nodded and Jon returned the nod.

'We're sorry about what happened,' the woman said. 'But since this is a murder case, we have to seal off this room.'

Jon continued nodding while his eyes found their way back to the photo on the wall.

'I'm afraid that means we have to…'

'Oh, yes, of course,' Jon said. 'Sorry, I'm not quite with it.'

'Entirely understandable,' Toril Li replied with a smile. Not a broad, heartfelt smile, but a small, friendly one, appropriate for the situation. Jon was thinking that the police must have experience of this kind of thing, working with murders and so on. Like priests. Like his father.

'Have you touched anything?' she asked.

'Touched? No, why would I do that? I've been sitting in the chair.'

Jon got up and, without knowing why, pulled the knife out of the desk, folded it and put it in his pocket.

'It's all yours,' he said, leaving the room. The door was closed quietly behind him. He had reached the stairs when he realised it was an idiotic thing to do, to walk off with the knife, and he turned to take it back. Outside the closed door, he heard the woman's voice laughing: 'My goodness, what a shock that gave me! He's the spitting image of his brother. At first I thought I was seeing a ghost.'

'They don't look at all similar,' said the man.

'You've only seen a photo…'

A terrible thought struck Jon.

SK-655 to Zagreb took off from Gardemoen Airport, at 10.40 on the dot, banked left over Lake Hurdal and set a course south towards the navigation tower in Aalborg, Denmark. Since it was an unusually cold day the atmospheric layer known as the tropopause had sunk so low that the McDonnell Douglas MD-81 was already climbing through it when they were over central Oslo. And since planes in the tropopause leave vapour trails in the sky, he would have seen – if he had looked up from where he was standing and shivering by the phone boxes in Jernbanetorget – the plane he had a ticket for in the pocket of his camel-hair coat.

He had left his bag in a luggage locker in Oslo Central Station. Now he needed a hotel room. And he had to complete the job. And that meant he had to have a gun. But how to get hold of one in a town where you don't have a single contact?

He listened to the woman in directory enquiries explaining in singsong Scandinavian English that there were seventeen entries in the Oslo telephone book for people under the name of Jon Karlsen and she was afraid that she could not give him all of them. However, yes, she could give him the number for the Salvation Army.

The lady at Salvation Army Headquarters said they had a Jon Karlsen, but he was not at work today. He told her he wanted to send him a Christmas present. Did she have his home address?

'Let me see. Goteborggata 4, post number 0566. Nice that someone is thinking about him, poor thing.'

'Poor thing?'

'Yes, his brother was shot dead yesterday.'

'Brother?'

'Yes, in Egertorget. It's in today's paper.'

He thanked her for her help and hung up.

Something touched him on the shoulder and he whirled round.

It was the paper cup that explained what the young man wanted. True, the denim jacket was a little grubby, but he was clean-shaven, had a modern hairstyle, substantial clothes and an open, alert gaze. The young man said something, but when he demonstrated with a shrug that he didn't speak Norwegian, the young man broke into perfect English:

'I'm Kristoffer. I need money for a room tonight. Or else I'll freeze to death.'

It sounded like something he had learned on a marketing course, a brief and concise message plus his name to add an effective emotional immediacy. The request came with a broad smile.

He shook his head and made to go, but the beggar stood in front of him with the cup. 'Come on, mister. Haven't you ever had to sleep rough, frozen, dreading the night?'

'As a matter of fact I have.' For one crazy moment he felt like telling him he had hidden in a water-filled foxhole for four days waiting for a Serbian tank.

'Then you know what I'm talking about, mister.'

He answered with a slow nod. Stuffed his hand in his pocket, took out a note and gave it to Kristoffer without looking. 'You'll sleep rough anyway, won't you?'

Kristoffer pocketed the money, nodded and said with an apologetic smile: 'Have to prioritise my medicine, mister.'

'Where do you usually sleep?'

'Down there.' The junkie pointed and he followed the long, slim forefinger with the trim nail. 'Container terminal. They're going to build an opera house there in the summer.' Kristoffer flashed another broad smile. 'And I love opera.'

'Isn't it a bit cold there now?'

'Tonight it might have to be the Salvation Army. They always have a free bed in the Hostel.'

'Do they?' He studied the boy. He looked well groomed, and his smile revealed a set of shining white, even teeth. Nevertheless he smelt decay. As he listened he thought he could hear the crunching of a thousand jaws, of flesh being consumed from inside.

Wednesday, 17 December. The Croat.

Halvorsen sat patiently behind the steering wheel waiting for a car with a Bergen number plate in front of him. Its wheels spun round on the ice as the driver pressed the accelerator to the floor. Harry was talking to Beate on his mobile phone.

'What do you mean?' Harry shouted to drown the noise of the racing engine.

'It doesn't look like it's the same person in these two pictures,' Beate repeated.

'It's the same woolly hat, same raincoat and same neckerchief. It must be the same person, mustn't it?'

She didn't answer.

'Beate?'

'The faces are unclear. There's something strange. I'm not quite sure what. Maybe something to do with the light.'

'Mm. Do you think we're on a wild goose chase?'

'I don't know. His position in front of Karlsen tallies with the technical evidence. What's all that noise?'

'Bambi on ice. See you.'

'Hang on!'

Harry hung on.

'There's one more thing,' Beate said. 'I looked at the other pictures, from the day before.'

'Yeah?'

'I can't see any faces that match, but there is one small detail. There's a man wearing a yellowish coat, maybe a camel-hair coat. He's got a scarf…'

'Mm. A neckerchief, you mean?'

'No, it looks like an ordinary woollen scarf, but it's tied in the same way as he – or they – ties the neckerchief. The right-hand side sticks up from the knot. Have you seen it?'

'No.'

'I've never seen anyone tie a scarf in that way before,' Beate said.

'Email me the pictures and I'll have a look.'

The first thing Harry did on getting back to the office was to print out Beate's pictures.

When he went to the print room to collect them Gunnar Hagen was already there.

Harry nodded, and the two men stood in silence watching the grey machine spitting out sheet after sheet.

'Anything new?' Hagen asked at length.