Jo Nesbo - The Thirst

‘Correct,’ Katrine said. She put her hands on her hips. ‘And it means that we only have to check the alibis of nine per cent.’

‘But the location of your phone doesn’t exactly give you an alibi,’ Skarre said, and looked round for support.

‘You know what I mean,’ Katrine said with a sigh. What was it with this lot? They were here to solve a murder, not suck all the energy out of each other.

‘Krimteknisk,’ she said, and sat down at the front so she wouldn’t have to look at them for a while.

‘Not much,’ Bjørn Holm said, getting to his feet. ‘The lab’s examined the paint left in the wound. It’s pretty specific stuff. We think it’s made of iron filings in a vinegar solution, with added vegetable-based tannic acid from tea. We’ve looked into it, and it could stem from an old Japanese tradition of dying teeth black.’

‘ Ohaguro ,’ Katrine said. ‘The darkness after the sun’s gone down.’

‘Correct,’ Bjørn said, giving her the same appreciative look that he used to when they were having breakfast at a cafe and she would get the better of him for once in the quiz in Aftenposten .

‘Thanks,’ Katrine said, and Bjørn sat down. ‘Then there’s the elephant in the room. What VG is calling “a source” and we call a leak.’

The already quiet room grew even more so.

‘One thing is the damage that’s already been done: now the murderer knows what we know, and can plan accordingly. But what’s worse is that we in this room no longer know if we can trust each other. Which is why I want to ask a very blunt question: who talked to VG ?’

To her surprise she saw a hand in the air.

‘Yes, Truls?’

‘Müller and I spoke to Mona Daa right after the press conference yesterday.’

‘You mean Wyller?’

‘I mean the new guy. Neither of us said anything. But she gave you her card, didn’t she, Müller?’

All eyes turned to look at Wyller, whose face was glowing bright red beneath his blond fringe.

‘Yes … but …’

‘We all know that Mona Daa is VG ’s crime reporter,’ Katrine said. ‘You don’t need a business card to call the paper and get hold of her.’

‘Was it you, Wyller?’ Magnus Skarre asked. ‘Look, all rookies are allowed a certain number of fuck-ups.’

‘I haven’t talked to VG ,’ Wyller said, with desperation in his voice.

‘Berntsen just said that you did,’ Skarre replied. ‘Are you saying that Berntsen’s lying?’

‘No, but—’

‘Out with it!’

‘Look … she said she was allergic to cats, and I said I’ve got a cat.’

‘See, you did talk! What else?’

‘You could be the leak, Skarre.’ The calm, deep voice came from the very back of the room, and everyone turned round. No one had heard him come in. The tall man was more lying than sitting in a chair against the back wall.

‘Speaking of cats,’ Skarre said. ‘Look what it’s just dragged in. I haven’t talked to VG , Hole.’

‘You or anyone else in here could have unconsciously given away a bit too much information to a witness you were talking to. And they could have called the paper and said that they got it directly from the cops. Hence “a source in the police”. Happens all the time.’

‘Sorry, but no one believes that, Hole,’ Skarre snorted.

‘You should,’ Harry said. ‘Because no one here is going to admit to talking to VG , and if you end up thinking you’ve got a mole, your investigation isn’t going to go anywhere.’

‘What’s he doing here?’ Skarre wondered, turning to Katrine.

‘Harry is here to set up a group that’s going to work in parallel to us,’ Katrine said.

‘So far it’s a one-man group,’ Harry said. ‘And I’m here to order some materials. Those nine per cent whose location you don’t know for the time of the murder, can I have a list of them, in order of the length of their most recent sentence?’

‘I can do that,’ Tord said, then paused and looked questioningly at Katrine.

She nodded. ‘What else?’

‘A list of which sex offenders Elise Hermansen helped put away. That’s all.’

‘Noted,’ Katrine said. ‘But seeing as we’ve got you here, any initial thoughts?’

‘Well.’ Harry looked round. ‘I know the forensics officer has found lubricant which probably comes from the murderer, but we can’t rule out the possibility of revenge as the main motive, and anything sexual as a bonus. The fact that the murderer was probably already inside the flat when she got home doesn’t mean that she let him in or that they knew each other. I don’t think I’d have restricted the investigation at such an early stage. But I’m assuming that you’ve already thought of that yourselves.’

Katrine gave a crooked smile. ‘Good to have you back, Harry.’

Possibly the best, possibly the worst, but certainly the most mythologised murder detective in the Oslo Police managed to perform a perfectly acceptable bow from his almost prone position. ‘Thanks, boss.’

‘You meant that,’ Katrine said. She and Harry were standing in the lift.

‘What?’

‘You called me boss.’

‘Of course.’

They got out in the garage and Katrine pressed the key fob. There was a bleep and some lights flashed somewhere in the darkness. Harry had persuaded her that she ought to make use of the car that was automatically at her disposal during a murder case like this one. And then that she ought to drive him home, stopping for coffee at Schrøder’s Restaurant on the way.

‘What’s happened to your taxi driver?’ Katrine asked.

‘Øystein? He got fired.’

‘By you?’

‘Course not. By the taxi firm. There was an incident.’

Katrine nodded. And thought about Øystein Eikeland, the long-haired beanpole with teeth like a junkie’s, a voice like a whiskey drinker, who looked about seventy but was actually one of Harry’s childhood friends. One of only two, according to Harry. The other one was called Tresko, and he was, if possible, an even more bizarre character: an overweight, unpleasant office worker who turned into a Mr Hyde of a poker player at night.

‘What sort of incident?’ Katrine wondered.

‘Do you really want to know?’

‘Not really, but go on.’

‘Øystein doesn’t like panpipes.’

‘No, who does?’

‘So he got a long job driving to Trondheim with this guy who has to go by taxi because he’s terrified of both trains and planes. And the guy has trouble with aggression too, so he’s got this CD with him, panpipe versions of old pop songs that he has to listen to while he’s doing breathing exercises to stop him losing control. What happens is that in the middle of the night, up on the Dovre Plateau, when the panpipe version of “Careless Whisper” comes round for the sixth time, Øystein pulls the CD out, opens the window and chucks it out. That’s when the fisticuffs started.’

‘Fisticuffs is a nice word. And that song’s bad enough in the original.’

‘In the end Øystein managed to kick the guy out of the car.’

‘While it was moving?’

‘No. But in the middle of the plateau, in the middle of the night, twenty kilometres from the nearest house. In his defence, Øystein did point out that it was July, mild weather, and that the guy couldn’t possibly be terrified of walking as well.’

Katrine laughed. ‘And now he’s out of a job? You ought to employ him as your private chauffeur.’

‘I’m trying to get him a job, but Øystein is – to quote his own words – pretty much made for unemployment.’

Schrøder’s Restaurant was, in spite of its name, basically just a bar. The usual early-evening clientele was in place and nodded good-naturedly to Harry without actually saying anything.