Jo Nesbo - The Thirst

It was as if the wind suddenly eased. And Harry heard another sound. High-pitched. Laughter.

‘Harry. You came out to play again.’

‘You shouldn’t give up until the game turns in your favour. Put the gun down.’

‘You found me. How did you know I’d be sitting outside the shack and not inside?’

‘Because I know you, Valentin. You thought I’d look in the most obvious place first, so you sat down outside where you could dispatch one last soul.’

‘Fellow travellers.’ Valentin coughed wetly. ‘We’re twin souls, so our souls ought to be in the same place, Harry.’

‘Put the gun down now, or I’ll shoot.’

‘I often think about my mother, Harry. Do you?’

Harry saw the back of Valentin’s head rock back and forth in the darkness. It was suddenly lit up by another flash of light. More raindrops. Big and heavy this time, not torn by the wind. They were in the eye of the storm.

‘I think of her because she’s the only person I’ve ever hated more than myself, Harry. I’m trying to lay waste to more than she did, but I don’t know if that’s possible. She destroyed me.’

‘And more isn’t possible? Where’s Marte Ruud?’

‘No, more isn’t possible. Because I’m unique, Harry. You and I, we aren’t like them. We’re unique.’

‘Sorry to disappoint you, Valentin, but I’m not unique. Where is she?’

‘Two bits of bad news, Harry. One. You can forget the little red-haired girl. Two. Yes, you are unique.’ More laughter. ‘It’s not a nice thought, is it? You take refuge in normality, in the averageness of the herd, and think you’ll find a sense of belonging there, something that’s your true self. But the real you is sitting here now, Harry. Wondering whether or not you’re going to kill me. And you use these girls, Aurora, Marte, to fuel your delicious hatred. Because now it’s your turn to decide if someone should live or die, and you’re enjoying it. You’re enjoying being God. You’ve dreamt of being me. You’ve been waiting for your turn to be a vampire. You recognise the thirst – just admit it, Harry. And one day you too will drink.’

‘I’m not you,’ Harry said, and swallowed. He heard the roaring in his head. Felt a fresh gust of wind. A new, shattered raindrop against the hand that was holding the pistol. That was that. They would soon be out of the calm eye.

‘You’re like me,’ Valentin said. ‘And that’s why you’re also being fooled. You and me, we think we’re clever bastards, but we all get fooled in the end, Harry.’

‘Not—’

Valentin spun round and Harry had time to see the long barrel point towards him before he squeezed the trigger of the Glock. Once, twice. Another flash lit up the forest and Harry saw Valentin’s body: just like the lightning, it was frozen in a jagged shape against the sky. His eyes were bulging, his mouth was open, and the front of his shirt dyed red with blood. In his right hand he was holding a broken branch which was pointing at Harry. Then he fell.

Harry got to his feet and went over to Valentin, who was on his knees with his torso slumped against one of the trees, staring into space. He was dead.

Harry aimed the pistol at Valentin’s chest and fired again. A crack of thunder swallowed the sound of the shot.

Three shots.

Not because it made any sense, but because that was what music was like, that was how the story went. There should be three.

Something was approaching; it sounded like thundering hooves against the ground, pushing the air ahead of it and making the trees bend.

Then came the rain.

WEDNESDAY NIGHT

HARRY WAS SITTING at smith’s kitchen table with a cup of tea in his hands and a towel around his neck. Rainwater was dripping onto the floor from his clothes. The wind was still howling and the rain was hammering against the windowpanes, making the police cars outside in the yard look like distorted UFOs with their revolving blue lights. It was as if all the water had slowed down slightly in the air currents. Moon. It smelt of moon.

Harry concluded that Hallstein Smith – who was sitting opposite him – was still in shock. His pupils were dilated, his expression apathetic.

‘You’re quite sure …’

‘Yes, he’s completely dead now, Hallstein,’ Harry said. ‘But it’s by no means certain that I’d be alive now if you hadn’t taken his revolver with you when you left him.’

‘I don’t know why I did that, I thought he was dead,’ Smith whispered in a metallic, robotic voice, and stared down at the table where he had laid the long-barrelled revolver beside the pistol he had wounded Valentin with. ‘I thought I hit him in the middle of the chest.’

‘You did,’ Harry said. Moon. That was what the astronauts had reported. That the moon smelt of burnt gunpowder. The smell was partly coming from the pistol Harry was carrying inside his jacket, but mostly from the Glock on the table. Harry picked up Valentin’s red revolver. Sniffed the barrel. That too smelt of powder, but not as much. Katrine came into the kitchen with rain dripping from her black hair. ‘The crime-scene team are down with Gjertsen now.’

She looked at the revolver.

‘It’s been fired,’ Harry said.

‘No, no,’ Smith whispered, mechanically shaking his head. ‘He only pointed it at me.’

‘Not now,’ Harry said, looking at Katrine. ‘The smell of powder hangs around for days.’

‘Marte Ruud?’ Katrine said. ‘Do you think …?’

‘I shot first.’ Smith raised his glassy eyes. ‘I shot Valentin. And now he’s dead.’

Harry leaned forward and put a hand on his shoulder. ‘And that’s why you’re alive, Hallstein.’

Smith nodded slowly.

Harry signalled to Katrine with his eyes that she should look after Hallstein, and stood up. ‘I’m going down to the barn.’

‘No further than that,’ Katrine said. ‘They’re going to want to talk to you.’

Harry ran from the farmhouse down to the barn, but all the same he was soaked again by the time he reached the office. He sat down at the desk and let his eyes roam around the room. He stopped at the drawing of the man with bat’s wings. It radiated more loneliness than any actual eeriness. Possibly because it seemed so familiar. Harry closed his eyes.

He needed a drink. He thrust the thought aside and opened his eyes again. The picture on the computer screen in front of him was split in two, one window for each security camera. Using the mouse, he moved the cursor over to the clock, wound back to the minutes before midnight, which was roughly the time Smith had called. After twenty seconds or so a shape slid into shot in front of the gate. Valentin. He came from the left. From the main road. Bus? Taxi? He had a white key ready, unlocked the gate and sneaked in. The gate closed behind him, but the latch didn’t click. Fifteen to twenty seconds later Harry saw Valentin on the other image with the empty stalls and scales. Valentin came close to losing his balance on the metal weighing platform, and the dial behind him whirred and showed that this monster who had killed so many people, some of them with his bare hands, weighed just seventy-four kilos, twenty-two kilos less than Harry. Then Valentin walked towards the camera, it was as if he was staring straight into the lens, yet still didn’t see it. Before he disappeared from view Harry saw him put his hand into his deep coat pocket. All Harry could see in the picture now were the empty stalls, the scales and the top part of Valentin’s shadow. Harry reconstructed those seconds, he remembered every word of his phone conversation with Hallstein Smith. The rest of the day and the hours at Katrine’s were completely gone, but those seconds had been riveted into place. It had always been like that, whenever he drank his private brain took on a Teflon coating, while his police brain retained its layer of adhesive, as if one part wanted to forget and the other had to remember. Internal Investigations were going to have to transcribe a very long interview report if they wanted to include all the details he could remember.