Ю Несбё - Blood on Snow

“Hold this,” I said, pushing the pizza box into the chest of the young guy, who automatically took it.

“Hey!” Brynhildsen shouted over the sound of shrieking metal, and raising the hand holding the pistol at the very second we hit the points. I started moving as the lurching of the train made Brynhildsen fling out his pistol arm in reflex as he tried to keep his balance. I grabbed the pole with both hands and levered myself past it with full force. I was aiming for the point where his eyebrows almost joined up at the top of his nose. I’ve read that a human head weighs about four and a half kilos, which, at a speed of seventy kilometres an hour, gives the sort of force that would take someone better at math than me to work out. When I leaned back again, there was a fine spray of blood coming from Brynhildsen’s broken nose, and his eyes were almost all whites, just a little bit of the irises visible under his eyelids, and he was holding his arms out stiffly from his sides, like a penguin. I could see Brynhildsen was out for the count, but to prevent any potential revival, I grabbed both his hands in mine, so that one of my hands was holding the pistol up his sleeve, making it look like we were doing some sort of folk dance, the two of us. Then I repeated the previous move, seeing as it had had such a successful outcome the first time. I pulled him hard towards me, lowered my head and smashed into his nose. I heard something break that probably wasn’t supposed to break. I let go of him, but not his pistol, and he collapsed in a heap while the other people standing around us gasped and tried to move away.

I spun round and aimed the pistol at the apprentice, as a nasal, studiously disinterested voice over the loudspeaker announced “Majorstua.”

“My stop,” I said.

His eyes were wide open above the pizza box, his mouth gawping so much that in a perverse way it was almost flirtatious. Who knew, maybe in a few years’ time he’d be after me with more experience, better armed. Mind you, years? These youngsters learned all they needed to in three or four months.

The train braked as it pulled into the station. I backed towards the door behind me. All of a sudden we had plenty of space — people were pressed up against the walls staring at us. A baby was babbling to its mother, but otherwise no one made a sound. The train stopped and the doors slid open. I took another step back and stopped in the doorway. If there was anyone behind me trying to get on, they very wisely chose a different door.

“Come on,” I said.

The kid didn’t react.

“Come on,” I said, more emphatically.

He blinked, still not understanding.

“The pizza.”

He took a step forward, listless as a sleep-walker, and handed me the red box. I stepped back onto the platform. I stood there, pointing the pistol straight at the youth to make sure he realised that this was my stop alone. I glanced at Brynhildsen. He was lying flat on the floor, but one shoulder was twitching slightly, like an electric charge in something that was fucked but not quite ready to die.

The doors slid shut.

The kid stared at me from behind the filthy, wintry, salt-streaked windows. The train set off towards Hovseter and environs.

“See you latel, all-a-gatol,” I whispered, lowering the pistol.

I walked home quickly through the darkness, listening for police sirens. As soon as I heard them, I put the pizza box on the steps of a closed bookshop and began to walk back towards the station again. Once the blue lights had passed I turned round and hurried back. The pizza box was sitting untouched on the steps. Like I said, I was looking forward to seeing the look on Corina’s face when she took her first bite.

“You haven’t asked,” she said in the darkness.

“No,” I said.

“Why not?”

“I suppose I’m just not a very inquisitive person.”

“But you must be wondering. Father and son...”

“I assumed you’d tell me whatever you felt like telling me when you felt like it.”

The bed creaked as Corina turned towards me. “What if I never said anything?”

“Then I’d never find out.”

“I don’t get you, Olav. Why did you want to save me? Me? You’re so lovely, and I’m so despicable.”

“You’re not despicable.”

“How would you know? You don’t even want to ask about anything.”

“I know that you’re here with me now. That’s enough for the time being.”

“And later? Say you manage to get Daniel before he gets you. Say we get to Paris. Say we somehow manage to scrape enough money together to survive. You’ll still be wondering who she is, this woman who could be her own stepson’s lover. Because who could ever really trust someone like that? Such a talent for betrayal...”

“Corina,” I said, reaching for the cigarettes. “If you’re worried about what I’m wondering or not wondering, feel free to tell me. All I’m saying is that it’s up to you.”

She bit my upper arm gently. “Are you scared of what I might say, is that it? Are you scared I’ll tell you I’m not the person you’re hoping I might be?”

I fished out a cigarette, but couldn’t find a lighter. “Listen. I’m someone who has chosen to earn their daily bread killing other people. I’m inclined to give people a bit of leeway when it comes to their actions and decisions.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“What?”

“I don’t believe you. I think you’re just trying to hide it.”

“Hide what?”

I heard her gulp. “That you love me.”

I turned towards her.

The moonlight from the window sparkled in her moist eyes.

“You love me, you fool.” She hit me limply on the shoulder. And repeated “You love me, you fool. You love me, you fool,” until her eyes were streaming with tears.

I pulled her to me. Held her until my shoulder felt warm, then cold from her tears. Now I could see the lighter. It was on top of the empty red cardboard box. If I had been in any doubt, I knew now. She liked the CP Special. She liked me.

The day before Christmas Eve.

It had got colder again. That was the end of the mild weather for the time being.

I called the travel agent’s from the phone box on the corner. They told me what plane tickets to Paris would cost. I said I’d call back. Then I phoned the Fisherman.

I said without any preamble that I wanted money for fixing Hoffmann.

“We’re on an open line, Olav.”

“You’re not being bugged,” I said.

“How do you know?”

“Hoffmann pays a guy at the phone company who knows what phones are being bugged. Neither of you is on the list.”

“I’m helping you sort out your problem, Olav. Why should I pay you for that?”

“Because you’ll earn so much from Hoffmann being out of the way that this will be small change.”

A pause. But not a long one.

“How much?”

“Forty thousand.”

“Okay.”

“In cash, to be picked up from the shop first thing tomorrow.”

“Okay.”

“One more thing. I’m not going to risk coming to the shop this evening — Hoffmann’s people are getting a bit too close. Get the van to pick me up round the back of Bislett Stadium at seven o’clock.”

“Okay.”

“You got hold of the coffins and van?”

The Fisherman didn’t answer.

“Sorry,” I said. “I’m used to organising everything myself.”

“Unless there was anything else?”

We hung up. I stood there looking at the phone. The Fisherman had agreed to forty thousand without a word of complaint. I’d have been happy with fifteen. Didn’t the old shyster know that? It didn’t make any sense. Okay, so it didn’t make sense. I’d undersold myself. I should have asked for sixty. Eighty, maybe. But it was too late now; I’d just have to be happy with the fact that I’d actually managed to renegotiate the terms once.