The Final Murder (6 page)

completely took over her life. She walked through the winter slush down Karl Johan in high heels, but also let herself be pictured wearing wellies in the woods. She was always suitably

dressed in the Storting. She adhered to a strict dress code when she participated in debates that were to be televised, but when she took part in programmes that were less important her style had earned her third place in a list of the country’s best-dressed women. She has a real eye for sexy details, the jury said in admiration.

Naturally, she was going to have children. But not yet, she

smiled to the impertinent journalists, and carried on climbing up the ladder of a party that, on good days, gloried in being the country’s leading party (just) in the opinion polls.

As he looked around the sitting room for the third time, Adam felt a twinge of guilt at his own prejudices. His eyes fixed on a beautiful lampshade in milky glass. The glass was held in place by three metal tubes and the whole thing looked a bit like a fifties Bmovie UFO. It was an impressive room. A cream corner sofa

behind a steel and glass table. The chairs were upholstered in an intense orange fabric that was mirrored in small speckles on a huge abstract painting on the opposite wall. All the surfaces were clean. The only ornament in the room was an Alvar Aalto vase on the austere sideboard, where a colourful bunch of tulips was dying of thirst.

The woven-steel magazine rack was overflowing with magazines and tabloid papers. Adam picked up a gossip magazine. Two

divorces, a celebrity anniversary and a singer’s tragic decline into alcoholism graced the front cover.

To the extent that Adam had ever paid attention to Vibeke

Heinerback, he had admired, somewhat reluctantly, her instinctive understanding of people’s need for easy solutions. On the

other hand, he had never detected any real political understanding, or overriding moral conviction. Vibeke Heinerback believed

that petrol prices should be cut and that the country should be ashamed of its care of the elderly. She called for lower taxes and more police. She thought that shopping in Sweden was a justified protest by the Norwegian people; if the politicians chose to have the highest alcohol prices in Europe, it was all they could expect.

He had seen her as simple, superficial and politically savvy. Not well read, he thought, and in one interview she seemed to think that Ayn Rand, who she claimed was her favourite author, was a man.

36

37

jjl III!

I

It must have been the journalist who got it wrong, Adam

thought, as he looked around the sitting room in more detail.

Certainly not Vibeke Heinerback.

He slowly ran his fingers over the book spines in the full

shelves that lined two of the walls, from floor to ceiling. A worn and well-read copy of The Fountainhead stood beside a paperback copy of Atlas Shrugged. An extensive biography of Frank Lloyd Wright, the eccentric architect and author, was in such a sorry state that several of the pages fell out when Adam tried to check the Ex Libris label.

Jens Bj0rneboe and Hamsun, P. O. Enquist, Gtinter Grass and

Don DeLillo, Lu Xun and Hanna Arendt. New and old side by

side, in something that vaguely resembled a system. In order of love, Adam suddenly realized.

‘Look,’ he said to Sigmund Berli, who had just come back in

from the bedroom. ‘She’s got all her favourite books between hip and head level! The books down towards the floor or above are almost untouched.’

He stretched up and pointed to an anthology of Chinese

authors he had never even heard of. Then he hunkered down,

took out a book from the bottom shelf and blew the dust off

before he read out loud:

‘Mircea Eliade.’ He shook his head and put the book back.

‘That’s the sort of thing Johanne’s sister reads. But I would never have guessed that Miss Heinerback did.’

‘There’s a lot of crime here too.’

Sigmund Berli ran his fingers over the shelves closest to the kitchen door. Adam squinted at the titles. They were all there.

The Grand Old Dames of British literature and the arrogant

Americans from the eighties. And here and there a French-sounding name popped up. Judging by the covers, with big cars and

lethal weapons in grey stylized strokes, they had to be from the fifties. She had classics such as Chandler and Hammett in

American presentation copies, alongside an almost complete catalogue of Norwegian crime novels published in the last ten years.

‘Do you think they’re her boyfriend’s books?’ Sigmund asked.

‘He just moved in recently. These have been here for a while.

I wonder why she … Why she never mentioned this.’

‘What? That she read?’

‘Yes. I mean, I’ve gone through a pile of interviews today that all gave the impression of a rather uninteresting person. A political animal, true enough, but someone who is more interested in

banal individual issues than in putting things into context. Even in the…’ Adam drew a square in the air before continuing: ‘. .. Boxes, is that what they’re called? The frames with standard questions, she never said anything about… this. When they

asked if she read, she said newspapers. Five newspapers a day and not much time for anything else.’

‘Maybe she read more before. Before she became a politician, I mean. Just didn’t have enough time any more.’

Sigmund had moved out into the kitchen.

‘Wow! Take a look at this.’

The kitchen was a bizarre mix of old and new. The front

angled wall cupboards looked like they were made just after the war. But when Adam opened a door, it glided silently and easily on modern plastic and metal fittings. The sink was enormous, with taps straight out of a 1930s film. The porcelain buttons that showed warm and cold in red and blue calligraphy were unreadable with age. The worktops were dark and matt.

‘Slate,’ Adam said and rapped the stone with his knuckles.

‘She’s obviously restored a lot of the old features and mixed in some new.’

‘Classy,’ Sigmund hesitated. ‘It’s pretty cool, isn’t it?’

‘Yes, and expensive.’

‘How much do they earn in the Storting, d’you reckon?’

‘Not enough,’ Adam said and pinched his nose. ‘When were

the police here?’

‘About seven o’clock this morning. Her boyfriend, he’s called Trond Arnesen, had destroyed any evidence at the scene of the crime. Had thrown up everywhere and moved things around. He

pulled her out of the bed and stuff like that. Have you seen the bedroom?’

‘Mmra.’

Adam moved over to the kitchen window. Dusk was settling in

the east, heavy clouds hung over Lillestr0m in the distance, with the promise of snow during the night. He shifted a curved kitchen table with great care and put his face right up to the window, without touching the glass. He stood like that for a while, lost in his own thoughts, without responding to Sigmund’s comments, which sounded more distant and muffled as his colleague moved around the house.

He looked at the compass on his sophisticated watch. He drew a map in his mind. Then he took a step back, closed one eye and looked at the view again.

If you were to fell the three spruce trees at the bottom of the garden and demolish the small housing development a few hundred metres away, you could see the house where Fiona Helle was

murdered, only a week ago.

There couldn’t be more than one and a half kilometres

between the two places.

‘Is there any chance at all? I mean, that the cases are linked?’

Adam helped himself to a healthy portion of the fried potatoes before reaching for the Heinz bottle.

‘Do you have to have ketchup on absolutely everything?’

‘Do you think there is? A connection?’

‘I’m going now,’ Kristiane shouted from the hall.

‘Shit,’ Johanne exclaimed, and ran to the stairs with Ragnhild in her arms, ‘she’s not asleep.’

Kristiane’s nose was squashed up against the front door. Her red down jacket was zipped up. Her scarf was wound tightly

around her neck and her hat hung down over her eyes. She had her boots on the wrong feet. She was clutching a mitten in each hand. She leant her whole body against the locked door and

announced: ‘I’m going.’

‘Not now, you’re not,’ Johanne called and handed the baby to Adam. ‘It’s too late. It’s past nine o’clock. You were in bed and … Do you want to hold Ragnhild for a while? Isn’t she sweet and funny?’

‘Horrible,’ hissed Kristiane. ‘Horrible child.’

‘Kristiane!’

Adam Stubo’s voice was so sharp that Ragnhild started to cry.

He rocked her in frustration and murmured into the soft blanket that was wrapped round her. Kristiane started to howl. She rocked from foot to foot and banged her forehead against the wood. Her howling changed into desperate, rasping sobs.

‘Daddy,’ she growled in between the sobs. ‘My daddy. I’m

going to my daddy.’

Johanne threw up her hands and turned round to face Adam,

who was standing halfway up the stairs.

‘It might be best,’ she started. ‘I think maybe…’

‘No way,’ Adam stopped her. ‘She’s been with Isak for a week.

So now she’s going to stay with us. It’s important for her to feel included. That she’s part of the family. That…’

The baby had finally stopped crying. Some gunk from her eyes ran down her rosy cheek. Her soft hair stuck to her skull.

Suddenly she blinked her eyes, reluctantly, as if she had just woken up from a long, deep sleep. She pulled a face so you could see her gums.

‘… That this is her sister,’ he finished quietly, and his lips brushed the child’s skin. ‘Kristiane must stay here. She can go to Isak’s again in a few days.’

‘Daddy! I want to go to my daddy!

Adam descended into the small porch that they had on the

ground floor. He could feel the underfloor heating burning

through his woollen socks. He was worried that the electricians had done something wrong when they were doing up the house.

God knows when he would get time to check it. He carefully gave the baby back to Johanna.

‘Here comes Tiddly the Wriggling Tadpole,’ he said and threwT

Kristiane over his shoulder in a fireman’s lift, before marching back up the stairs.

‘Don’t,’ giggled Kristiane, against her will, as he pulled one of her boots off and planted it in a flowerpot. ‘Don’t!’

‘This will grow into a boot flower in a week or two. And this one…’

He threw the other boot into the wastepaper basket.

‘Haven’t got any use for this one,’ he said, and manoeuvred her into a firm hold. ‘Tadpoles don’t need shoes.’

He kicked open the door to her bedroom with a bang. Then he

pulled off her clothes quick as a flash. Fortunately she still had her pyjamas on underneath.

‘Quick,’ he puffed. ‘Or the troll will sweat to death. I’m going to start counting now.’

‘Don’t,’ shrieked Kristiane with delight and buried herself

under the duvet.

‘One,’ he started. ‘Two, three. The magic is working now.

Tiddly the Tadpole is fast asleep.’

Then he pulled the door to and shrugged his shoulders.

‘There!’

Johanne stood with a blank face and Ragnhild over her shoulder.

‘That’s

what we usually do when you’re not here,’ he excused

himself. ‘Fast and effective. Do you think there’s a connection?

Between Fiona Helle’s and Vibeke Heinerback’s murders?’

‘That’s how you put the girl to bed?’

Johanne looked at him in disbelief.

‘So what! Forget it! She’s asleep now. Magic. Come on.’

He padded into the sitting room and started to clear the dinner table. Leftovers were scraped into the bin, apart from the fried potatoes, which he ate as he cleared. The grease ran down his fingers and when he tried to pour himself more wine the bottle

nearly slid out of his hand.

‘Ooops … do you want any? You don’t need to worry any more, you know. I’m sure a small glass won’t hurt Ragnhild.’

‘No thanks. Actually…’

Gently, she lay Ragnhild down in her cot, which Adam had

eventually agreed could be moved in and out of the sitting room, depending on where they were themselves. It was by the end of the sofa now.

‘Maybe a small glass,’ she said, and sat down at the empty table.

‘Can you wipe the table with the cloth, please?’

With an everyday, almost casual expression on her face, she

grabbed the papers that Adam had thrown down when he came

home. It was a thin file. This time there were no pictures. A couple of police reports, two handwritten memorandums and a

map of L0renskog with a red cross over Vibeke Heinerback’s

address were stapled together. Johanne couldn’t see if there was any system to it.

‘I see that you haven’t much to go on here, either.’

‘The murder was only discovered this morning.’

‘And you’ve censored the file. Did you want to spare me the

photographs?’

‘No.’

He seemed to be sincere, and sat down and scratched his head.

‘They haven’t made enough copies yet,’ he added, yawning. ‘But you’re not missing anything. Horrible sight. Especially the …’

‘Enough, thank you.’ She shook her head and put up her hand.

‘You gave me enough details on the phone. And there are certainly similarities. Brutal murders. Both bodies have been mutilated.’

Adam knitted his browrs. He cocked his head and his mouth

moved, as if he wanted to say something, but didn’t know quite what.

‘Mutilated,’ he repeated in the end. ‘Cutting out someone’s

tongue definitely qualifies as mutilation. But Vibeke

Heinerback…’

Again, his expression was one of doubt. He narrowed his eyes, blinked and almost imperceptibly shook his head, as if the scenario of a killer on a deadly hunt for female celebrities was too

much to take in. He glanced over at the cot.