Gavin Lyall - Blame The Dead

And there I let things rest for a bit.

My vision seemed shattered, actually busted like a mirror so that I saw several versions of anything I looked at. Dimly, I knew the man who'd thumped me was staring at me. Then helping up the one with the cut hand. Then picking up something. And then both of them watching me for a while, and finally vanishing behind the snow.

They must have said something, too, but something else inside my head was screaming far too loud for any outside noise to get in.

I stared at my hand, flat on the grass ahead of me, and gradually all the versions of it faded into one. The sounds inside my head localised themselves to just above my right ear, and when I touched it, there was already a solid lump. But no stickiness, thank God.

About then, Draper appeared above me. 'Are you all right?'

'Of course I'm not bloody all right!' I said through clenched teeth. 'And where were you when the world ended?'

'Watching it. You did all right, Major.' He helped me on to my feet, or thereabouts.

I brushedon some of the snow on my jacket, looked around, and found the knife. It had blood on the tip, which was about all we seemed to have achieved; at a guess, that hand would hurt a lot longer than my head would. Should I tell Vik to watch the hospitals for a man with a cut right hand? And have Vik ask why I was carrying the knife on his patch, and why I hadn't told him about the meeting, and why I could be blackmailed into it… Hell, a professional like that would never go near a hospital.

'Well, that wasn't really worth staying up late for, was it?' I said bitterly. 'I hops you didn't get too cold or wet or anything frightful like that?'

'Don't say such things, Major. He had a gun, that's why I didn't come out. He'd've recognised me.'

It took a long time for the message to find an unoccupied brain cell. 'You mean you recognised one ofthem? In that mask?'

'I'd know that voice anywhere. He worked for Herb for a couple of years. Pat Kavanagh, that was.'

The phone woke me.

I'd put myself and my headache to bed with a sleeping pill washed down by Scotch, and now I had that dispersed feeling a drugged hangover gives; it took a long time to find and fit together, more or less, my body, soul, and, more or less, mind. Then I dropped the receiver on the floor and had to grope for it head down, which wasn't a good idea.

'I told you not to wake me,' I gurgled.

'1told them to wake you,' Inspector Vik said.

'What time is it?'

'Nearly ten o'clock. If you want to bea good detective you must first learn to get up in the morning. I am coming to see you, so please stay there.'

'Hell.'

'Did you know there is a town in Norway called Hell? All tourists go to it to send postcards home.'

'Thanks. Now get off the line so I can ring for some coffee.'

'Two cups, if you please.'

He rang off and I got Room Service and ordered coffee for two and a couple of eggs done any way they pleased, I just wasn't up to such mind-bending decisions yet. Oh – and any morning papers in Norwegian, too.

The eggs arrived rather hard-boiled, which wasn't anybody's fault but mine, along with a couple of papers. I didn't understand a word, but I found the Steen story in both. My name included.

Then I had to get out of bed and let Vik in. He was wearing a different suit – dark blue, this time – but which still looked as if he'd slept in it and had a restless night besides. Plus the same overcoat.

I waved my hand at the coffee and left him to it. Halfway through pouring, he caught sight of the papers. 'Do you understand Norwegian?'

'No. It's so's you can read the story to me. Or pay for your own coffee.'

He smiled bleakly and a bit gummily – the cold was still with him – then leaned against the radiator, sipped his coffee, and started reading, 'er… last night there was… er… shot to death Jonas Steen, aged thirty-seven… er, a ship surveyor…'

And so it went on, simple and factual but, even in translation, sounding a little uncertain, like a man unwrapping an unexpected parcel. It obviously wasn't the sort of crime Bergen was used to.

I drank coffee and nibbled various sorts of bread and only listened properly when he said, 'The police are searching for a… er, twenty-two pistol…'

So the boys would now know the Mauser had got away and there wasn't any point in trying to lean on me about it any more. That's all I'd been trying to find out, but I had to look interested right to the end.

When he'd finished he half folded the paper and tossed it on to the bed. 'And now the other one, perhaps?'

'No, thanks.' Then I added quickly, 'Not unless it tells me more about Steen.'

He shrugged and reached for the coffee-pot. 'Nothing much.'

'So – how's it going?'

'It is over.'

I spilled coffee into the saucer and the cup wasn't even half full. 'It's w/tat? Have you caught somebody?'

He shrugged again. 'You might say.'

He stared damply at me for a good long time before saying, 'Henrick Lie. We know him. Not a nice person. He knew Steen already, it seems.'

'How d'you know it was him?'

'He has confessed.'

'Do you believe him?'

'The superintendent believes him.'

'He could change his mind.'

'Which? – but it does not matter. Neither of them ever will.'

I suppose I was still a bit dozy from the alcohol and pill and too much of my thinking was concentrated just above my right ear, but it finally sank in. 'You mean Lie's dead?'

'With a nine-millimetre, through the mouth.' – And on through the back of the head, taking a lot of the head and brain with it and the gun often recoiling clear out of the fast-dying hand and ending up several feet away. The classic pistol suicide, as simple and formal as a cheque. And faked about as often.

After a while, I asked, 'And when did all this happen?'

'He was found at perhaps six o'clock this morning in a car near the Nordnesparken.'

'And I suppose all the fingerprints and powder-stains are in the right places and the handwriting on the confession's the real thing?'

He nodded gently. 'The writing we do not know about yet. But I think it will be right.'

'I bet it will.'

'You know a lot about gunshot suicide.'

'I was sixteen years in the Army.'

'Ah, yes.'

'And so? – what did he say? What about Steen?'

He took out a fistful of soggy Kleenex, selected the driest corner, and blew his nose powerfully. 'It is a secret document until thelikskue – the inquest.'

'For Christ's sake.'

'It is not my decision. But have you toldme everything?'

I didn't have an answer to that, so I said, 'But you aren't going to let it lay, are you? He wasn't in it alone.'

'We have a confession. The superintendent has decided. So, now we need not trouble with your mysteries. You are free, you can go at any time, anywhere. You could even go to Hell.'

1 got up slowly and stiffly – I'd pulled a few muscles taking the count last night – and took a shower, a shave, and a look in the mirror. My face looked slack and my eyes bloodshot.but at least the bump above my ear didn't show unless you were looking for it. I'd rather have that than Kavanagh's hand.

Not that it had stopped him doing some fast thinking and ruthless improvisation, if Lie's 'suicide' had been his idea. That certainly couldn't have been planned ahead, not if they originally counted on implicating me in Steen's death. But once that had fallen through, the suicide had done the next best thing: stopped the police investigation cold in the simplest possible way. Ideas that simply scare the hell out of me, and I don't mean the town.

Draper rang at half past ten, mostly to say goodbye; he was catching the afternoon plane. I told him I expected to catch it myself and his lack of enthusiasm was almost tangible. I think he regarded me as a bad influence. So I asked about Maggie and he said she was probably staying on a while, but he didn't know why. Neither did I.