Jo Nesbo - The Thirst

‘And hey presto, we’ve got Valentin Gjertsen’s secret identity,’ Berna Lien said, evidently proud and excited on behalf of her department. ‘What do you think, Hole?’

‘I think, fru Lien, that it’s a shame the man who could have identified Valentin is lying in there with his head in the sink and no pulse.’ Harry buttoned his jacket. ‘But thanks for coming.’

Berna Lien looked angrily from Harry to Bjørn, who cleared his throat unhappily. ‘As I understand it, you were face-to-face with Valentin,’ he said.

Harry shook his head. ‘I never saw his new face.’

Bjørn nodded slowly without taking his eyes off Harry. ‘I see. That’s a shame. A great shame.’

‘Mm.’ Harry looked down at the crushed cigarette butt in front of his shoe.

‘OK. Well, we’ll go inside and take a look.’

‘Have fun.’

He watched them go. The press photographers had already gathered outside the cordon, and now the journalists were beginning to arrive as well. Perhaps they knew something, perhaps they didn’t, perhaps they just didn’t dare, but they left Harry alone.

Eight hours.

Eight hours as of tomorrow morning.

Within the space of another day, Valentin might have killed someone else.

Fuck.

‘Bjørn!’ Harry called, just as his colleague took hold of the door handle.

‘Harry,’ Ståle Aune said, standing in the doorway. ‘Bjørn.’

‘Sorry to call so late,’ Harry said. ‘Can we come in?’

‘Of course.’ Aune held the door open and Harry and Bjørn stepped into the Aune family home. A small woman, thinner than her husband but with exactly the same grey-coloured hair, darted out with quick, nimble steps. ‘Harry!’ she sang. ‘I thought it was you, it’s been far too long. How’s Rakel, do they know any more?’

Harry shook his head and let Ingrid peck his cheek. ‘Coffee, or is it too late? Green tea?’

Bjørn and Harry replied yes please and no thanks simultaneously, and Ingrid disappeared into the kitchen.

They went into the living room and sat down on low armchairs. The walls were lined with bookcases, full of everything from travel guides and old atlases to poetry, graphic novels and heavy academic volumes. But mostly novels.

‘You see I’m reading that book you gave me?’ Ståle picked up the thin book that lay open, spine up, on the table beside his armchair, and showed it to Bjørn. ‘Édouard Levé. Suicide . Harry gave it to me for my sixtieth birthday. I suppose he thought it was time.’

Bjørn and Harry laughed. Evidently not entirely convincingly, because Ståle frowned. ‘Is something wrong?’

Harry cleared his throat. ‘Valentin killed another person this evening.’

‘It pains me to hear that,’ Ståle said, and shook his head.

‘And we have no reason to believe that he’s going to stop.’

‘No. No, you haven’t,’ the psychologist agreed.

‘That’s why we’re here, and this is very hard for me, Ståle.’

Ståle Aune sighed. ‘Hallstein Smith isn’t working, and you want me to take over, is that it?’

‘No. We need …’ Harry fell silent when Ingrid came in and put the tea tray down on the coffee table between the silent men. ‘The sound of the oath of confidentiality,’ she said. ‘See you later, Harry. Give Oleg our love and tell him we’re all thinking of Rakel.’

‘We need someone who can identify Valentin Gjertsen,’ Harry said when she’d gone. ‘And the last person alive who we know has seen him …’

Harry didn’t intend it as a dramatic pause to increase the tension, but so that Ståle would get the fraction of a second his brain required to make the rapid, almost unconscious, yet horribly accurate deductions it was capable of. Not that it would make much difference. He was like a boxer in the process of being punched, but who gets a tenth of a second to shift his weight ever so slightly away from the punch instead of meeting it head-on.

‘… is Aurora.’

In the silence that followed Harry could hear the rasping of the side of the book Ståle was still holding as it slid across his fingertips.

‘What are you saying, Harry?’

‘The day Rakel and I got married, while you and Ingrid were there, Valentin paid Aurora a visit at the handball tournament she was taking part in.’

The book hit the carpet with a muffled thud. Ståle blinked uncomprehendingly. ‘She … he …’

Harry waited as he watched it sink in.

‘Did he touch her? Did he hurt her?’

Harry held Ståle’s gaze, but didn’t answer. Saw him piece the information together. Saw him look at the previous three years in a new light. A light that provided answers.

‘Yes,’ Ståle whispered, grimacing in pain. He took his glasses off. ‘Yes, of course he did. How blind I’ve been.’ He stared into space. ‘And how did you find this out?’

‘Aurora came to see me yesterday and told me,’ Harry said.

Ståle Aune’s eyes swung back to Harry as if in slow motion. ‘You … you’ve known since yesterday, and didn’t say anything to me?’

‘She made me promise.’

Ståle Aune’s voice didn’t rise, it sank. ‘A fifteen-year-old girl who’s been assaulted, whom you know perfectly well needs all the help she can get, and you chose to keep it secret?’

‘Yes.’

‘But for God’s sake, Harry, why?’

‘Because Valentin threatened to kill you if she told anyone what had happened.’

‘Me?’ Ståle let slip a sob. ‘ Me ? What does that matter? I’m way past sixty with a dodgy heart, Harry. She’s a young girl with her whole life ahead of her!’

‘You’re the person she loves most in the whole world, and I made her a promise.’

Ståle Aune put his glasses on, then raised a trembling finger towards Harry. ‘Yes, you made her a promise! And you kept that promise as long as it didn’t mean anything to you! But now, now you see that you can use her to solve yet another Harry Hole case, that promise doesn’t mean so much any more.’

Harry didn’t protest.

‘Get out, Harry! You’re no friend of this house, and you’re no longer welcome here.’

‘We’re running out of time, Ståle.’

‘Out, now!’ Ståle Aune had got up.

‘We need her.’

‘I’ll call the police. The real police.’

Harry looked up at him. Saw that there was no point. That they’d have to wait, that this would have to run its course, that they could only hope Ståle Aune would see the bigger picture before morning.

He nodded. Levered himself out of the chair.

‘We’ll see ourselves out,’ he said.

Harry saw Ingrid’s pale, silent face in the doorway as they passed the kitchen.

He put his shoes on in the hall and was about to leave when he heard a thin voice.

‘Harry?’

He turned round and couldn’t see where the voice had come from at first. Then, out of the darkness at the top of the stairs, she stepped into the light. She was wearing striped pyjamas that were far too big for her, possibly her father’s, Harry thought.

‘I’m sorry,’ Harry said. ‘I had to.’

‘I know,’ Aurora said. ‘It says on the Net that the man who died was called Mehmet. And I heard you.’

At that moment Ståle came running out of the living room, waving his arms and with tears streaming from his eyes. ‘Aurora! You’re not to—’ His voice broke.

‘Dad,’ Aurora said, sitting down calmly on the steps above them, ‘I want to help.’

TUESDAY NIGHT

MONA DAA WAS standing by the Monolith, watching Truls Berntsen hurry through the darkness. When they’d arranged to meet in Frognerparken she had suggested a few more discreet, less popular sculptures, seeing as the Monolith was visited by sightseers even at night. But when Truls Berntsen had said ‘What?’ three times she had realised that the Monolith was the only one he was familiar with.