‘Hi, Henning.’
Business. Courtesy. False smiles. He decides to play along. He shakes her hand.
‘Hi, Heidi.’
‘Good to have you back.’
‘It’s good to be back.’
‘That’s — eh, that’s good.’
Henning studies her. As always, her eyes radiate earnestness. She is ambitious for herself and for others. He prepares for the speech she has undoubtedly rehearsed:
Henning, you were my boss once. Times have changed. I’m your boss now. And I expect that you blahblahblah.
He is taken aback when it fails to materialise. Instead she surprises him for the second time.
‘I was sorry to hear about — to hear about what happened. I just want to say that if there’s anything you need, if you need more time off, just let me know. Okay?’
Her voice is warm like a rock face on a sunny afternoon. He thanks her for her concern, but for the first time in a long time, he feels an urge to get stuck in.
‘So Iver is going to the press conference?’ he says.
‘Yes, he worked late last night, so he’ll be going straight there.’
‘Who’s Iver?’
Heidi looks at him as if he has just suggested that the earth really is flat.
‘Is this a joke?’
He shakes his head.
‘Iver Gundersen? You don’t know who Iver Gundersen is?’
‘No.’
Heidi suppresses the urge to laugh out loud. She controls herself as if she has just realised that she is talking to a child.
‘We hired Iver from VG Nett last summer.’
‘Aha?’
‘He delivered big stories for them and he has continued to do that here. I know that TV2 are desperate to get him, but so far Iver has been loyal to us.’
‘I see. So you pay him well.’
Heidi looks at him as if he has sworn in church.
‘Eh, that’s not my area, but — ’
Henning nods and pretends to listen to the arguments which follow. He has heard them before. Loyalty. A concept that has worn thin in journalism. If he were being charitable, he might be able to name two reporters he would describe as loyal. The rest are careerists, ready to jump ship every time a fatter pay package is offered, or they are so useless that they couldn’t get a job anywhere else. When a relatively undistinguished VG Nett reporter is poached by a rival on-line publication, and later declines an offer from TV2, it’s bound to be about the money. It’s always about the money.
He registers Heidi expressing the hope that he and Iver will get along. Henning nods and says ‘mm’. He is good at saying ‘mm’.
‘You’ll get to meet each other at the press conference and then you can decide who will be doing what on this story. It’s a frenzied murder.’
‘What happened?’
‘My source tells me the victim was found inside a tent, half buried and stoned to death. I imagine the police have all sorts of theories. It’s obvious to consider foreign cultures.’
Henning nods, but he doesn’t like obvious thoughts.
‘Keep me informed about what you do, please?’ she says. He nods again and looks at the notebook on his desk, still in its wrapper. Brusquely, he rips off the wrapper and tries one of the four pens lying next to it. It doesn’t work. He tries the other three.
Damn.
Chapter 6
It’s not far from Urtegata to Gronland police station, where the press conference is being held. Henning takes his time and strolls through an area which Sture Skipsrud, his editor-in-chief, described as ‘a press Mecca’ when 123news relocated here. Henning thought it was very apt. Nettavisen is there, Dagens N?ringsliv has an ultra- modern office block close by and Mecca features in most flats in the neighbourhood. If you ignore the tarmac and the temperature, you might just as well be in Mogadishu. The aroma of different spices greets him at every corner.
Henning is reminded of the last time he was heading the same way. A man he had interviewed decided to kill himself a few hours later, and both the police and the man’s relatives wanted to know if Henning had said something or had opened old wounds which might have pushed the man over the edge.
Henning remembers him well. Paul Erik Holmen, forty-something. Two million kroner mysteriously went missing from a company Holmen was working for and Henning had more than suggested that the extravagant vacation Holmen had just taken, combined with the renovation of the family’s holiday cabin in Eggedal, might explain the whereabouts of the missing money. His sources were reliable, obviously. Holmen’s guilty conscience and the fear of being locked up got too much for him and consequently Henning found himself in one of the many interview rooms at the police station.
They soon released him, but a couple of jealous reporters thought it was worth a paragraph or two. Fair enough, Henning could appreciate it was newsworthy to some extent even though Holmen would probably have topped himself anyway, but stories like that can be hard to shake off.
Human memory is selective, at best, and plain wrong at worst. When suspicions are raised or planted, it doesn’t take much for speculation to turn into fact and suspicion into a verdict. He has covered many murders where a suspect is brought in for questioning (i.e., arrested), usually from the victim’s close family (i.e., the husband), and all the evidence points to him. Later, the police find the real killer. In the meantime, the media circus has done its utmost to drag up anything in the husband’s past which might cast aspersions on his character. Trial by media.
In the short term, truth is a good friend, but the doubt never goes away. Not among people you don’t know. People remember what they want to remember. Henning suspects someone out there hasn’t forgotten his role in Paul Erik Holmen’s last act, but it doesn’t bother him. He has no problem living with what he did, even though the police gave him a bollocking for trying to do their job.
He is used to that.
Or, at least, he was.
Chapter 7
It feels odd to be back inside the grey building at number 44 Gronlandsleiret again. Once upon a time the police station was practically his second home; even the cleaners used to greet him. Now he tries to make himself as inconspicuous as possible, but is hampered by the burn scars on his face. He is aware that the other reporters are looking at him, but he ignores them. His plan is just to attend, listen to what the police have to say and then go back to the office to write — if, indeed, there is anything to write about.
He freezes the moment he enters the foyer. Nothing could have prepared him for the sight of the woman leaning towards a man who shows every sign of being a reporter. Dark corduroy jacket, suitably arrogant presence, the ‘did-everyone-see-the-scoop-I-pulled-off-yesterday’ expression. He sports designer stubble which makes his face look more sallow than it is. His thinning hair is gelled and swept back. But it’s the woman. Henning had never
