Ю Несбё - The Kingdom

‘He’s a film star.’

Carl smiled wryly. ‘Not about that.’ He knew I was kidding. Carl never understood jealousy, which was one reason he had never managed to read the situations right at the dances at Årtun until it was too late. ‘It’s the official start.’ He sighed. ‘Gilbert called and said he can’t dig the first shovelful after all, something came up. He wouldn’t say what but it’s obviously Kurt Olsen. Fuck him!’

‘Easy now.’

‘Easy? We’ve invited journalists from all over the place. This is a crisis.’ Carl wiped his free hand over his face but managed to say ‘hi’ and smile at a guy I think works in the bank. ‘Can’t you just see the headlines?’ Carl went on once the guy was out of earshot. ‘ Hotel construction delayed owing to murder investigation. Entrepreneur himself chief suspect. ’

‘In the first place they’ve no grounds for writing about either murder or suspects, and in the second the official start is still two days away. Things could well have changed before that.’

‘It needs to happen now , Roy. If we’re going to cancel the opening it’ll have to be this afternoon.’

‘A fishing net that’s set out in the evening usually gets taken up the next morning,’ I said.

‘You’re saying something’s gone wrong?’

‘I’m saying it’s possible the owner is letting it hang there a while longer.’

‘But you said that if they leave the net there for too long the catch gets eaten by the other fish down there.’

‘Exactly,’ I said, and wondered when it was I had started saying ‘exactly’. ‘So that net was probably pulled up this morning. Or maybe the owner is just slow to report it. Stay cool now.’

The SUV carrying the film people swung out onto the main highway as Shannon approached us, her face radiant, a hand held to her chest as though to keep her heart in place.

‘You in love?’ asked Carl.

‘Not at all,’ said Shannon, and Carl roared with laughter as though he’d already put our conversation behind him.

An hour later another familiar vehicle pulled in at the forecourt by the diesel pump and I thought how this day was just getting more and more interesting. I came out from the station as Kurt Olsen climbed out of his Land Rover, and when I saw the angry look on his face I thought at last , here comes an interesting story.

I dipped the sponge in the bucket and pulled up his windscreen wipers.

‘Not necessary,’ he protested, but I’d already splashed soapy water all over the windscreen.

‘You can never have too much visibility,’ I said. ‘Especially now with autumn on the way.’

‘I think I see well enough without your help, Roy.’

‘Don’t say that,’ I said, spreading the dirty water across the glass. ‘Carl called in. He’s going to have to cancel the official opening at some point today.’

‘Today?’ said Kurt Olsen and looked up.

‘Yeah. Damn shame. The school brass band is going to be really disappointed, they’ve been practising. And we bought fifty Norwegian flags – there isn’t a single one left. Absolutely no chance of a last-minute reprieve for the condemned man?’

Kurt Olsen looked down. Spat on the ground.

‘Tell your brother he can go ahead with the opening.’

‘Oh?’

‘Yes,’ Olsen said in a low voice.

‘Have there been developments in the case?’ Apart from my choice of words I was trying not to sound ironic. I splashed on more soapy water.

Olsen straightened up. Coughed. ‘I got a phone call from Åge Fredriksen this morning. He lives out near our cabin and sets his fishing net right outside our boathouse. He’s done it for years.’

‘You don’t say?’ I said, dropping the sponge into the bucket and picking up the squeegee, pretending not to notice Kurt’s penetrating stare.

‘And this morning he caught a queer fish all right. My father’s mobile phone.’

‘Jesus,’ I said. The rubber emitted a low squeal as I drew the squeegee over the glass.

‘Fredriksen thinks the phone’s been lying there in the same place for sixteen years, covered by sludge so the divers who went down looking for Dad that time found nothing. Every time he’s set out his net, it’s brushed over the phone. And when he pulled up the net this morning the bottom rungs of the net just happened to glide in under the clip on the holder so the phone came up with the net.’

‘Quite something,’ I said, tearing a strip off the paper roll and wiping the blade of the squeegee.

‘Quite something is an understatement,’ he said. ‘Sixteen years putting out that net, and the phone gets caught up in it now.’

‘Isn’t that the essence of what they call chaos theory? That sooner or later everything happens, including the most unlikely things?’

‘I’ll accept that. What I’m not buying is the timing. It’s a bit too good to be true.’

He might as well have said: too good for you and Carl .

‘And it doesn’t fit in with the timeline from back then,’ he said. He looked at me and waited.

I knew what he wanted. For me to argue. Say that witnesses can’t always be relied on. Or that the movements of a man in such deep despair that he takes his own life maybe aren’t always the most logical. Or even that base stations themselves can be mistaken. But I resisted the temptation. I held my chin between my index finger and thumb. And nodded slowly. Very slowly. And said: ‘Sure sounds like it. Diesel?’

He looked as if he wanted to hit me.

‘Well,’ I said, ‘at least now you can see the road.’

He slammed the door hard behind him and revved the engine. But then eased off on the pedal, made a calm U-turn and rolled slowly out onto the highway. I knew he was watching me in the mirror and I had to struggle to stop myself giving him a wave.

IT WAS A CURIOUS SIGHT.

A harsh wind was blowing from the north-west and it was raining cats and rabbits, as people say round here. And yet some hundred shivering souls in rain gear were up there on the mountain watching a besuited Carl as he posed with Voss Gilbert wearing his chain of office and his best politician’s smile, both holding spades. The local paper and other press photographers were clicking away and in the background you could just about hear the Årtun school brass band playing ‘Mellom Bakkar og Berg’ between the gusts of wind. With a touch of humour Gilbert was introduced as ‘the new chairman’, although he hardly resented it, all the chairmen since Jo Aas had been referred to in that way. I had nothing special against Voss Gilbert, but he had that bald patch at the front of his head and a second name for his first name, so there was definitely something suspicious about him. But not definite enough to stop him being Os county council chairman. Obviously, though, any future expansion in the size of the county would lead to tougher competition for the hammer of office, and with that hairstyle Gilbert would definitely be struggling.

Carl signalled to Gilbert that he should make the first mark with his spade, since the one he was holding had been decorated for the occasion with ribbons and flowers. So Gilbert did so, smiling to the photographers, evidently unaware that his wet lug of hair now lay plastered across his bald spot in a sort of inadvertent comb-over. Gilbert shouted out some witticism which no one heard but which those around him dutifully laughed at. Everyone clapped and Gilbert hurried over to an assistant holding his inside-out umbrella, and we all marched down the mountainside to the buses that stood parked by the road ready to take us to Fritt Fall where the occasion would be celebrated.

The black-feathered Giovanni strutted nervously between the guests and the legs of the tables as I fetched my drink from the bar where Erik stood scowling at me. I thought of joining Carl who was talking to Willumsen, Jo Aas and Dan Krane, but instead walked over to where Shannon was standing at the betting table with Stanley, Gilbert and Simon Nergard. I gathered they were talking about Bowie and Ziggy Stardust, probably because ‘Starman’ was blasting from the loudspeakers.