Tuesday and Wednesday.
Chow Chow.
On Tuesday the temperature in Oslo rose to 29 degrees in the shade and by three o’clock, office workers were already making for the beaches in Huk and Hvervenbukta. The tourists were flocking to open-air restaurants in Aker Brygge and in Frogner Park where, covered in sweat, they snapped obligatory pictures of the Monolith before drifting down to the Fountain in the hope that a breath of wind would send a cooling mist of fine droplets over them.
Off the tourists’ beaten track it was quiet, and what little life there was moved in slow motion. Roadworkers, their torsos bared, leaned over their machines, bricklayers on scaffolding at the building site around the Rikshospital peered down over deserted streets and taxi drivers found places to park in the shade, where they stood in groups discussing the murder in Ullevalsveien. Only in Akersgata were there signs of increased activity. The sensation- seeking rags had released the silly-season news and were greedily milking the latest killing. With many of their colleagues on holiday, the editors were putting everyone to work on the story, from journalism students doing summer jobs to unemployed political commentators. Only the cultural correspondents escaped.
It was still quieter than usual. It may have been because Aftenposten had moved from its position in Akersgata, the street the press traditionally occupied, down towards the centre, to the Post House, Aftenposten House or Post Giro Building. Whatever you called it, it was an unlovely small-town version of a skyscraper pointing up into a blue, cloudless sky. The golden-brown colossus at the top edge of the building site in Bjorvika had been smartened up, but for the time being crime reporter Roger Gjendem had only a view of Plata, the junkies’ market square, and their outdoor shooting gallery behind the sheds where they hoped to meet their brave new world. He occasionally caught himself looking to see if Thomas was down there. But Thomas was in Ullersmo prison serving a sentence for attempting to break into a policeman’s flat last winter. How crazy can you get? Or how desperate? At any rate, Roger would not have to worry that he would suddenly be looking down on his little brother shooting an overdose into his arm.
Aftenposten had not formally appointed a new crime editor. The last one had been offered a financial pay-off as part of downsizing and had accepted it with alacrity and left. Crime was then simply placed under the news coverage umbrella and, in practice, that meant that Roger Gjendem had to step in as the crime editor, but was paid the basic journalist’s salary. He sat behind his desk with his fingers on the keyboard, his eyes on the smiling face of the woman he had scanned in as his screensaver and his mind on the woman who had packed her bags for the third time and left him and his flat in Seilduksgata. He knew that Devi would not come back this time and that it was time to move on. He went into the control panel on his computer and deleted the screensaver. That was a start. He had been working on a heroin case, but he had put it aside. Good, he hated writing about drugs. Devi insisted that it was because of Thomas. Roger tried to shut out both Devi and his little brother so that he could concentrate on the case he was supposed to be writing about.
He was summarising the details of the murder story in Ullevalsveien, enjoying some respite while they were waiting for developments, new evidence or a suspect or two. This would be an easy job. It was a sexy case in every way, with most of the ingredients that any crime reporter could wish for. A young woman of 23, single, shot in the shower room of her own flat, in broad daylight one Friday. The handgun found in the rubbish bin in the flat turns out to be the murder weapon. None of the neighbours has seen anything, no strangers have been observed roaming the area and just one of the neighbours claims to have heard something that could have been a shot. Since there are no signs of a break-in, the police are working on the theory that Camilla Loen let the killer in herself, but there is no- one in her circle of friends and acquaintances who stands out as suspicious and they all have more or less watertight alibis. The fact that Camilla Loen left her work as a graphic designer at Leo Burnett’s at 4.15 to meet two friends in front of Kunstnernes Hus at 6.00 makes it highly unlikely that she would have invited anyone home. It is equally unlikely that anyone would have rung Camilla Loen’s doorbell and sneaked into the apartment block using a false identity as she would have seen them on the video camera at the intercom panel at the entrance.
It was bad enough that the news desk could publish headlines like ‘Psycho Murder’ and ‘Neighbour Tasted Blood’, but two further details leaked out which gave the front pages two more splashes: ‘Camilla Loen’s Finger Severed’ and ‘Red Diamond Star Found Under Eyelid’.
Roger Gjendem began his summary in the present historic in order to give it dramatic emphasis, but he discovered that the material didn’t need it and he deleted everything he had written. He sat for a while with his head in his hands. Then he double-clicked the recycle bin icon on the screen, placed the cursor over ‘Empty the recycle bin’ and hesitated. It was the only picture he had of her. In his flat all vestiges of her had been removed. He had even washed the woollen jumper she used to borrow and which he liked wearing because it smelled of her.
‘Bye-bye,’ he whispered and clicked.
He reread his introduction and decided to change ‘Ullevalsveien’ to ‘Our Saviour’s Cemetery’ – it sounded better. Then he began to write, and this time it flowed.
At 7.00 people were reluctantly making a move homewards from the beaches although the sun was still beating down from a cloudless sky. It turned 8.00 and then 9.00. People wearing sunglasses were still drinking beer outside while the waiters in restaurants without terraces were twiddling their thumbs. It was 9.30, the sun was red over Ullernasen and then it plunged. Unlike the temperature. It was a tropical night and people were returning home from restaurants and bars to lie awake and sweat in their beds.
In Akersgata the deadline was approaching and the editorial staff sat down to discuss the front page for the last time. The police had not made any new announcements. Not that they were holding back information, it was just that four days after the murder it seemed as if they didn’t have anything else to say. On the other hand, silence allowed Gjendem and his colleagues even greater scope for speculation. It was time to be creative.
At roughly the same time in Oppsal the telephone rang in a house with yellow timber cladding and an apple orchard. Beate Lonn stretched out an arm from under the sheet and wondered if her mother, who lived on the floor below, had been woken up by the telephone ringing. Probably.
‘Were you asleep?’ asked a hoarse voice.
‘No,’ Beate said. ‘Is anyone?’
‘Right. I’ve only just woken up.’
Beate sat up in bed.
‘How’s it going?’
‘What can I say? Well, yes, badly, I suppose I can say that.’
Silence. It wasn’t the telephone connection that made Harry’s voice seem distant to Beate.
‘Anything new from Forensics?’
‘Just what you’ve read in the newspapers,’ she said.
‘What newspapers?’
She sighed. ‘Just what you already know. We’ve taken fingerprints and DNA from the flat, but for the moment there doesn’t seem to be a clear link to the murderer.’
‘We don’t know if there was malice aforethought,’ Harry said. ‘Killer.’
‘Killer,’ Beate yawned.
‘Have you found out where the diamond came from?’
‘We’re working on it. The jewellers we’ve talked to say that red diamonds are not unusual, but there’s very little demand for them in Norway. They doubt that the diamond came via Norwegian jewellers. If it came from abroad then that increases the likelihood that the perpetrator is a foreigner.’
‘Mm.’
‘What is it, Harry?’
Harry coughed loudly. ‘Just trying to keep myself up to date.’
‘The last thing I heard was that it wasn’t your case.’
‘It isn’t.’
‘So what do you want?’
‘Well, I woke up because I was having a nightmare.’
‘Do you want me to come and tuck you in?’
‘No.’
New silence.
‘I was dreaming about Camilla Loen. And the diamond you found.’
