Jo Nesbo - The Redbreast

'I wouldn't call it a conversion. Most of the volunteers thought mainly of Norway and little of politics. The turning point for me came when I realised I was fighting another country's war. In fact, it was that simple. And actually it was no better fighting for the Russians. In June 1944 I had unloading duties on the quay in Tallinn, where I managed to sneak on board a Swedish Red Cross boat. I buried myself in the coke hold and hid there for three days. I had carbon monoxide poisoning, but I recovered in Stockholm. From there I travelled to the Norwegian border where I crossed on my own. It was August by then.'

'Why on your own?'

'The few people I had contact with in Sweden didn't trust me; my story was a little too fantastic. That was fine, though. I didn't trust anyone, either.'

He laughed aloud again.

'So I lay low and coped in my own way. The border-crossing itself was child's play. Believe me, going from Sweden to Norway during the war was considerably less dangerous than picking up food rations in Leningrad. More coffee?'

'Please. Why didn't you simply stay in Sweden?'

'Good question. And one which I've asked myself many times.'

He ran a hand across his thin white hair.

'I was obsessed by the thought of revenge, you see. I was young, and when you're young you tend to have this delusion about the ideals of justice, you think it is something we humans are born with. I was a young man with internal conflicts when I was at the Eastern Front, and I behaved like a shit to many of my comrades. Despite that, or precisely because of it, I swore I would avenge all those who had sacrificed their lives for the lies they had fed us back home. And I would take revenge for my own ruined life which I thought would never be whole again. All I wanted was to settle a score with all those who had really betrayed our country. Nowadays psychologists would probably call it war psychosis and have me locked up immediately. Instead I went to Oslo, not knowing anyone or having a place to stay, carrying papers that would have me shot on the spot as a deserter. The day I arrived in Oslo by lorry I went up to Nordmarka. I slept under some spruce branches and ate nothing but berries for three days before they found me.’

‘The Resistance people?'

'I understand from Even Juul that he told you the rest.'

'Yes.' Harry fidgeted with the mug. The killings. It was an incomprehensible action which meeting the man had not made any more comprehensible. It had been there all the time, at the front of his brain, ever since Harry saw Fauke standing there smiling in the doorway and he shook his hand. This man executed his parents and two brothers.

'I know what you're thinking,' Fauke said. 'But I was a soldier who had been given orders to kill. If I hadn't been given the orders, I wouldn't have done it. But this I do know: my family were among the ranks of those who cheated our country.'

Fauke looked straight at Harry. His hands round the coffee mug were no longer shaking.

'You're wondering why I killed them all when my orders were to kill only one,' he said. 'The problem was they didn't say which one. They left it to me to be the judge of life or death. And I couldn't do it. So I killed them all. There was a guy at the front we called the redbreast. Like the bird, the robin redbreast. He had taught me that killing with the bayonet was the most humane method. The carotid artery runs from the heart to the brain and when you sever the link, the brain receives no oxygen and the victim is instantly brain-dead. The heart pumps three, maybe four times, but then it stops beating. The problem is that it is difficult. Gudbrand-that was his name-was a master of his art, but I struggled with my mother for what seemed an age and only managed to cause her flesh wounds. In the end I had to shoot her.' Harry's mouth was dry. 'I see,' he said.

The meaningless words hung in the air. Harry shoved the coffee mug across the table and pulled out a notebook from his leather jacket. 'Perhaps we could talk about the men you were with in Sennheim?' Sindre Fauke stood up immediately.

'I apologise, Inspector. I hadn't intended to present it so coldly and brutally. Let me just explain to you before we go on: I am not a brutal man. This is only my way of dealing with things. I needn't have told you about it, but I did so because I cannot afford to duck the issue. That is also why I'm writing this book. I have to go through it every time the topic is brought up, explicitly or implicitly. To be absolutely sure that I am not hiding from it. The day I hide, fear will have won its first battle. I don't know why it's like this. A psychologist could probably explain it.'

He sighed.

'But now I've said all I'm going to say on the matter. Which is probably already too much. More coffee?’

‘No, thank you,' Harry said.

Fauke sat down again. He supported his chin on clenched fists.

'OK. Sennheim. The hard kernel of the Norwegians. In fact, a mere five people, including me. And one of them, Daniel Gudeson, died the same night I deserted. So, four then: Edvard Mosken, Hallgrim Dale, Gudbrand Johansen and me. The only one I've seen since the war is Edvard Mosken, our section leader. That was the summer of 1945. He was given three years for treason. I don't even know if the others survived. But let me tell you what I know about them.'

Harry turned over a fresh page in his notebook.

POT. 3 March 2000.

G-u-d-b-r-a-n-d J-o-h-a-n-s-e-n. Harry typed the letters with his index ringers. A country boy. According to Fauke, a nice, somewhat feeble character, whose idol and big-brother surrogate was Daniel Gudeson, who was shot during the night watch. Harry pressed enter and the program started.

He stared in the direction of the wall. At the wall. At a small picture of Sis. She was pulling a face; she always did when she was being photographed. One summer holiday many years ago. The shadow of the photographer was on her white T-shirt. Mum.

A little peep from the PC signalled that the search was over and he focused on the computer screen again.

The national registration office had two Gudbrand Johansens registered, but the birth dates showed they were under sixty. Sindre Fauke had spelled the names for him, so it was unlikely he had got them wrong. That could only mean either Johansen had changed his name, or he lived abroad, or he was dead.

Harry tried the next one. The section leader from Mjondalen. The one with small children back home. E-d-v-a-r-d M-o-s-k-e-n. Disowned by his family because he had gone to the front. Double click on search.

The ceiling lights suddenly came on. Harry turned round.

'You should switch on the lights when you're working late.' Kurt Meirik stood in the doorway with his finger on the switch. He came in and perched on the edge of the table.

'What have you found out?'

'That we're looking for a man well over seventy. Who probably fought at the front.'

I mean about these neo-Nazis and Independence Day.'

'Oh.' There was a new peep from the PC. I haven't had time to look into that yet, Meirik.'

There were two Edvard Moskens on the screen. One was born in 1942, the other in 1921.

'We're having a department party next Saturday,' Meirik said.

'I've got the invitation in my pigeon-hole.' Harry double-clicked on 1921 and the address of the older Mosken came up. He lived in Drammen.

'Personnel said you hadn't responded yet. I just wanted to make sure you were coming.’

‘Why's that?'

Harry tapped Edvard Mosken's ID number into Criminal Records. 'We like people to get to know each other across departmental boundaries. I haven't even seen you in the canteen once yet.’

‘I'm quite happy here in the office.'

No hits. He brought up the Central National Register for everyone who'd had formal dealings with the police for any reason. Not necessarily prosecuted-they might, for instance, have been arrested, reported or themselves been a victim of a criminal act.