Jo Nesbo - The Thirst

‘Torture?’

‘When the Lakotas burned their prisoners of war, they did it gradually, with small pieces of charcoal.’ Steffens carried on to where the blood bags were hanging more densely and there was less light. ‘And when the prisoners couldn’t take any more, they were allowed a break with water and food, so that the torture could last a day or two. That food sometimes included chunks of their own flesh.’

‘Is that true?’

‘Well, as true as any written history. One Lakota warrior called Moon Behind Cloud was famous for drinking every drop of blood from all the enemies he killed. That’s clearly a historical exaggeration seeing as he killed a huge number of people and wouldn’t have survived the excessive drinking. Human blood is poisonous in high doses.’

‘Is it?’

‘You take in more iron than your body can get rid of. But he did drink someone’s blood, I know that much.’ Steffens stopped beside one blood bag. ‘In 1871 my great-great-grandfather was found drained of blood in Moon Behind Cloud’s Lakota camp in Utah, where he’d gone as a missionary. In my grandmother’s diary she wrote that my great-great-grandmother thanked the Lord after the massacre of Lakotas at Wounded Knee in 1890. Speaking of mothers …’

‘Yes?’

‘This blood is your mother’s. Well, it’s mine now.’

‘I thought she was receiving blood?’

‘Your mother has a very rare blood type, Oleg.’

‘Really? I thought she belonged to a fairly common blood group.’

‘Oh, blood’s about so much more than groups , Oleg. Luckily hers is group A, so I can give her ordinary blood from here.’ He held his hands out. ‘Ordinary blood that her body will absorb, and then turn into the golden drops which are Rakel Fauke’s blood. And speaking of Fauke, Oleg Fauke, I didn’t just bring you here to give you a break from sitting at her bedside. I was thinking of asking you if I could take a blood sample to see if you produce the same blood as her?’

‘Me?’ Oleg thought about it. ‘Yes, why not, if it could help someone.’

‘It would help me, believe me. Are you ready?’

‘Here? Now?’

Oleg met Dr Steffens’s gaze. Something made him hesitate, but he didn’t quite know what.

‘OK,’ Oleg said. ‘Help yourself.’

‘Great.’ Steffens put his hand in the right pocket of his white coat and took a step closer to Oleg. He frowned irritably when a cheerful tune rang out from his left pocket.

‘I didn’t think there was a signal down here,’ he muttered as he fished out his phone. Oleg saw the screen light up the doctor’s face, reflecting off his glasses. ‘Hello, it looks like it’s Police HQ.’ He put the phone to his ear. ‘Senior Consultant John Doyle Steffens.’

Oleg heard the buzz of the other voice.

‘No, Inspector Bratt, I haven’t seen Harry Hole today, and I’m fairly sure he isn’t here. This is hardly the only place where people have to switch their phones off, perhaps he’s sitting on a plane?’ Steffens looked at Oleg, who shrugged his shoulders. “ We’ve found him” ? Yes, Bratt, I’ll give him that message if he shows up. Who have you found, out of interest? … Thank you, I am aware of the oath of confidentiality, Bratt, but I thought it might be helpful to Hole if I didn’t have to speak in code. So that he understands what you mean … OK, I’ll just say “ We’ve found him” to Hole when I see him. Have a good day, Bratt.’

Steffens put his phone back in his pocket. Saw that Oleg had rolled up his shirtsleeve. He took him by the arm and led him to the steps of the pool. ‘Thanks, but I just saw on my phone that it’s much later than I thought it was, and I’ve got a patient waiting. We’ll have to take your blood another time, Fauke.’

Sivert Falkeid, head of Delta, was sitting at the back of the rapid response unit’s van, barking out concise orders as they lurched along Trondheimsveien. There was an eight-man team in the vehicle. Well, seven men and one woman. And she wasn’t part of the response unit. No woman ever had been. The entry requirements to join Delta were in theory gender-neutral, but there hadn’t been a single woman among that year’s hundred or so applicants, and in the past there had only been five in total, the last of them in the previous millennium. And none of them had made it through the eye of the needle. But who knows, the woman sitting opposite him looked strong and determined, so perhaps she might stand a chance?

‘So we don’t know if this Dreyer is at home?’ Sivert Falkeid said.

‘Just so we’re clear, this is Valentin Gjertsen, the vampirist.’

‘I’m kidding, Bratt,’ Falkeid smiled. ‘So he hasn’t got a mobile phone we could use to pinpoint his location with?’

‘He may well have, but none that’s registered to Dreyer or Gjertsen. Is that a problem?’

Sivert Falkeid looked at her. They had downloaded plans from the Buildings Department of the City Council, and it looked promising. A 45-square-metre two-room apartment on the second floor, with no back door or cellar access directly from the flat. The plan was to send four men in through the front door, with two outside in case he jumped from the balcony.

‘No problem,’ he said.

‘Good,’ she said. ‘Go in silently?’

His smile widened. He liked her Bergen accent. ‘You’re thinking we should cut a neat hole in the glass on the balcony and wipe our shoes politely before going in?’

‘I was thinking that there’s no reason to waste grenades and smoke when it’s just one man who hopefully isn’t going to be armed, and doesn’t know we’re coming. And quiet and drama-free gets higher marks for style, doesn’t it?’

‘Something like that,’ Falkeid said, checking the GPS and the road ahead of them. ‘But if we blast our way in, the risk of injury is lower, both for us and for him. Nine out of ten people are paralysed by the blast and light when we throw a grenade, no matter how tough they think they are. I think we’ve saved the lives of more suspects than we have our own people by using that tactic. Besides, we’ve got these shock grenades we’d like to use up before they reach their expiry date. And the lads are restless, they need a bit of rock’n’roll. There’ve been too many ballads recently.’

‘You’re joking, aren’t you? You’re not really that macho and childish?’

Falkeid grinned and shrugged.

‘You know what?’ Bratt had leaned closer, moistened her red lips and lowered her voice. ‘I kind of like that.’

Falkeid laughed. He was happily married, but if he hadn’t been, he wouldn’t have turned down a dinner date with Katrine Bratt and a chance to look into those dark, dangerous eyes and listen to those rolling Bergen rr s that sounded like a growling beast of prey.

‘One minute!’ he said loudly, and the seven men lowered their visors in an almost perfectly synchronised movement.

‘A Ruger Redhawk, was that what you said he had?’

‘That’s what Harry Hole said he had in the bar.’

‘Did you hear that, men?’

They nodded. The manufacturer claimed that the plastic in the new visors could stop a 9mm bullet heading for your face, but not one from the larger-calibre Redhawk. And Falkeid thought maybe that was just as well: a false sense of security seemed to have a debilitating effect.

‘And if he resists?’ Bratt said.

Falkeid cleared his throat. ‘Then we shoot him.’

‘Do you have to?’

‘Someone will no doubt come up with an opinion with the benefit of hindsight, but we prefer to be wise in foresight, and shoot people who are contemplating shooting us. Knowing that that’s OK plays an important role in our workplace satisfaction. Looks like we’re here.’