Jo Nesbo - The Redeemer

'Oh?'

'One of the passengers came to Oslo two days ago and had a return flight that should have left yesterday, but was postponed until today. Christo Stankic. He never showed up. That's odd because he had a cheap ticket and it isn't valid for other flights. On the list he is given as a Croatian national so I asked Alex to check the national register in Croatia. Now Croatia isn't a member of the EU either, but as they're dead keen to join, they're very cooperative as far as-'

'Come to the point, Halvorsen.'

'Christo Stankic doesn't exist.'

'Interesting.' Harry scratched his chin. 'Although Stankic may not have anything to do with our case.'

'Of course.'

Harry studied the name on the list. Christo Stankic. It was just a name. But a name that would have to be in the passport the airline would ask to see at check-in, as the name was on the passenger list. The same passport that hotels would ask to see.

'I want all the hotel guest lists in all of Oslo checked,' Harry said. 'Let's see if any of them have put up Christo Stankic over the last two days.'

'I'll be on to it right away.'

Harry straightened up and sent Halvorsen a nod he hoped contained what he wanted to say. That he was pleased with him.

'I'm off to my psychologist,' Harry said.

The psychologist, Stale Aune, had his office in the part of the street called Sporveisgata where there was no sporvei, tramline, but its pavements did showcase an interesting selection of walks: the confident, bouncy walk of the keep-fit housewives at the SATS fitness studio, the cautious walk of the guide-dog owners from the Institute for the Blind and the careless gait of the down-at-heel but undeterred clientele from the hospice for drug users.

'So this Robert Karlsen liked girls under the age of consent,' Aune said, having hung his tweed jacket over the back of the chair and forced his double chin down towards his bow tie. 'That can be caused by many things, of course, but I gather he grew up in a pietistic Salvation Army milieu. Is that correct?'

'Yes,' said Harry, looking up at the well-stocked but chaotic bookshelves of his personal professional adviser. 'But isn't it a myth that you become perverted from growing up in closed, strict, religious communities?'

'No,' Aune said. 'Christian sects are over-represented as far as the sexual assault you mention is concerned.'

'Why's that?'

Aune pressed his fingertips together and smacked his lips with glee. 'If one is punished or humiliated in one's childhood or adolescence by, for example, one's parents for exhibiting a natural sexuality, what happens is that one represses this part of one's personality. Normal sexual maturation comes to a grinding halt, and sexual preferences find a deviant outlet, so to speak. At an adult age many try to return to a period in their lives when they were allowed to be natural, to find a release for their sexuality.'

'Like wearing nappies.'

'Yes. Or playing with excrement. I remember a case in California about a senator who-'

Harry coughed.

'Or, at an adult age, they go back to what is known as a core-event,' Aune continued. 'Which is often the last time they were successful in their sexual endeavours, that is, the last time sex worked for them. And it might be a teenage infatuation, or sexual contact of some kind, that went undiscovered or unpunished.'

'Or a sexual assault?'

'Correct. A situation when they were in control and hence felt powerful, the very opposite of humiliation. And so they spend the rest of their lives seeking to recreate that situation.'

'It can't be that easy being a sexual molester then.'

'Indeed not. Many were beaten black and blue for being found with a pornographic magazine in their teens and showing a quite normal, healthy sexuality. But if you wish to maximise the chances of a person becoming a sexual abuser, give him a violent father, an invasive or sexually importunate mother and a milieu in which the truth is suppressed and the lusts of the flesh are rewarded with hellfire.'

Harry's mobile bleeped. He pulled it out and read the text from Halvorsen. A Christo Stankic had stayed at Scandia Hotel by Oslo Central Station the night before the murder.

'What's AA like?' Aune asked. 'Is it helping you to abstain?'

'Well,' Harry said, getting up, 'yes and no.'

A scream jolted him back into reality.

He turned and looked into a pair of saucer eyes and a black hole of an open mouth a few centimetres from his face. The child pressed its nose against the glass partition in Burger King's playroom before falling backwards onto the carpet of red, yellow and blue plastic balls with a whine of glee.

He wiped the remains of ketchup from his mouth, emptied his tray into the bin and rushed out into Karl Johans gate. Tried to huddle up into the thin suit jacket, but the cold was merciless. He decided to buy a new coat as soon as he had got himself a decent room in Scandia Hotel.

Six minutes later he walked through the doors of the hotel lobby and queued up behind a couple who were obviously checking in. The female receptionist cast a fleeting glance at him without any sign of recognition. Then she bent over the new guests' papers while speaking in Norwegian. The woman turned to him. A blonde. Attractive, he noticed. Even if in a plain kind of way. He smiled back. That was as much as he managed. Because he had seen her before. Just a few hours ago. Outside the building in Goteborggata.

Without moving from the spot he inclined his head and put his hands in his jacket pockets. The grip on the gun was firm and reassuring. Taking great care, he raised his head, spotted the mirror behind the receptionist and stared. But the image blurred, became double. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath and opened them again. The tall man gradually came into focus. The shorn skull, the pale skin with the red nose, the hard, pronounced features that were at variance with the sensitive mouth. It was him. The second man in the flat. The policeman. He took stock of the reception area. They were the only people around. And, as though to remove the last shadow of doubt, he heard two familiar words amid all the Norwegian. Christo Stankic. He forced himself to remain calm. How they had managed to trace him he had no idea, but the consequences were beginning to dawn on him.

The blonde woman was given a key by the receptionist, grabbed what looked like a tool case and walked towards the lift. The tall man said something to the receptionist and she made a note. Then the policeman turned round and their eyes met for an instant before he headed for the exit.

The receptionist smiled, articulated a rehearsed, friendly Norwegian phrase and sent him an enquiring look. He asked her if she had a nonsmoking room on the top floor.

'Let me see, sir.' She tapped away on the keyboard.

'Excuse me. The man you were talking with, wasn't he the policeman whose photo has been in the newspapers?'

'I don't know.' She smiled.

'Think it was, he's famous, what's his name again…?'

She glanced down at her notebook. 'Harry Hole. Is he famous?'

'Harry Hole?'

'Yes.'

'Wrong name. I must have made a mistake.'

'I have one free room. If you want it, you'll have to fill in this card and show your passport. How would you like to pay?'

'How much is it?'

She checked the price.

'Sorry,' he smiled. 'Too expensive.'

He left the hotel and went into the railway station, headed for the toilet and locked himself in a cubicle. There he sat, trying to organise his thoughts. They had the name. So he had to find some accommodation where he would not have to show his passport. And Christo Stankic could forget about booking a plane, boat, train or even crossing a national border. What was he going to do? He would have to ring Zagreb and talk to her.