press.'
'Interesting philosophy, Hole.' Hagen checked around to gauge the reaction among the others, but the closed faces told him nothing. 'Well, back to the case.'
'OK,' Harry said. 'We'll continue where we left off, searching for the murder weapon, but the area will be increased to a radius of six blocks. We'll continue questioning witnesses and take a trip round the shops that were closed last night. We won't waste any more time on CCTV footage. Let's wait until we have something specific to look for. Li and Li, you have the address of Robert Karlsen's flat and the search warrant. Gorbitz gate, isn't it?'
Li and Li nodded.
'Check out his office as well. You may find something of interest there. Bring any correspondence and hard disks here from both places so that we can see who he's been in contact with. I have spoken to Kripos, who have contacted Interpol today to find out if there are similar cases in Europe. Halvorsen, you're coming with me to the Salvation Army HQ later. Beate, I would like a few words with you after the meeting. Off you go!'
Scraping of chairs and shuffling of feet.
'One moment, gentlemen!'
Silence. They looked at Gunnar Hagen.
'I can see that some of you are coming to work in ragged jeans and items of clothing advertising what I assume is Valerengen football club. The previous boss may have approved of that, but I do not. The press will be following us with Argus eyes. From tomorrow I want to see clothing which is whole and intact and does not display advertising slogans. The general public is out there and we want to be seen as neutral public servants. And I would ask all of you with the rank of inspector or above to stay behind.'
As the room emptied, Harry and Beate stayed behind.
'I'm going to draw up a document for all inspectors in the unit instructing them to carry weapons, starting next week,' Hagen said.
Harry and Beate both looked at him with incredulity.
'The war is hotting up out there,' Hagen said, raising his chin. 'We have to get used to the idea that weapons will be a necessity in the police force of the future. And then high-ranking officers will have to set an example and show the way. A weapon must not be an unfamiliar item but a normal tool of the trade like a mobile phone or a computer. OK?'
'Well,' Harry said, 'I don't have a firearms licence.'
'I assume you're joking,' Hagen said.
'I missed the test last autumn and had to hand in my gun.'
'I'll issue a licence. I have the authority to do that. You'll find a requisition order in your pigeonhole and you can pick the weapon up. No one will be excluded. Off you go.'
Hagen departed.
'He's out of his mind,' Harry said. 'What the hell do we need guns for?'
'Time to patch our jeans and buy a gun belt then, eh?' Beate said with a glint of amusement in her eyes.
'Mm. I wouldn't mind a peep at the pictures Dagbladet took of Egertorget.'
'Help yourself.' She passed him a yellow folder. 'May I ask you something, Harry?'
'Goes without saying.'
'Why did you do that?'
'Do what?'
'Why did you defend Magnus Skarre? You know he's a racist and you didn't mean one iota of what you said about discrimination. Is it to irritate the new POB? Or make sure you're really unpopular from day one?'
Harry opened the envelope. 'You'll get the photos back later.'
He stood by the window of the Radisson SAS hotel in Holbergs plass looking out over the white, frozen town at the break of day. The buildings were low and modest; it was strange to think this was the capital of one of the richest countries in the world. The Royal Palace was an anonymous yellow construction, a compromise between a pietistic democracy and a penniless monarchy. Through the branches of the naked trees he glimpsed a large balcony. The King must have addressed his subjects from there. He raised an imaginary rifle to his shoulder, closed one eye and took aim. The balcony blurred into two.
He had dreamt about Giorgi.
The first time he had met Giorgi he had been crouching by a whimpering dog. The dog was Tinto, but who was this boy with blue eyes and blond, curly hair? Working together they had managed to get Tinto into a wooden box and carry him to the town vet who lived in a grey tworoom brick house in an overgrown apple orchard down by the river. The vet had diagnosed dental problems and said he was no dentist. Besides, who would pay for an ageing stray which would soon lose the rest of its teeth? It would be better to put it to sleep now to avoid the pain and a slow death by starvation. But then Giorgi had started crying. High-pitched, heart-rending, almost melodic crying. And when the vet had asked why he was crying, Giorgi had said perhaps the dog was Jesus, because his father had told him that Jesus walked among us, was one of the humblest of us, well, maybe even a poor, pathetic dog that no one would give either shelter or food. With a shake of his head, the vet had rung the dentist. After school he and Giorgi had gone back to see a tail-wagging Tinto, and the vet had shown them the fine, black fillings in his mouth.
Although Giorgi was in the class above him, they had played together a few times after that. But it lasted just a few weeks because the summer holidays had begun. And when school started up again in the autumn, Giorgi seemed to have forgotten him. At any rate, he ignored him as though wanting nothing to do with him.
He had forgotten about Tinto, but he never forgot Giorgi. Several years later, though, during the siege, he had come across an emaciated dog in the ruins at the southern end of the town. It had trotted over to him and licked his face. It had lost its leather collar, and it was only when he saw the black fillings that he had realised it was Tinto.
He checked his watch. The bus to take them to the airport would arrive in ten minutes. He grabbed his suitcase, threw a last glance around the room to make sure he hadn't forgotten anything. Paper rustled as he pushed open the door. He looked down the corridor and saw the same newspaper lying outside several of the rooms. The picture of the crime scene on the front page met his eyes. He bent down and picked up the thick newspaper bearing a name in illegible Gothic script.
While he was waiting for the lift, he tried to read, but although some of the words somehow reminded him of German he understood next to nothing. Instead, he flicked through to the pages referred to on the front. At that moment the lift doors opened and he decided to put the large, unwieldy newspaper in the litter bin between the two lifts. But the lift was empty, so he kept it, pressed zero and concentrated on the pictures. His eye was caught by the text beneath one of the pictures. At first he didn't believe what he was reading. But as the lift jolted into action he experienced a sudden realisation with such horrible certainty that he went dizzy for a second and had to support himself on the wall. The newspaper almost fell out of his hand and he didn't see the lift doors opening in front of him.
When, at last, he did look up he was staring into the darkness and he knew he was in the basement and not in reception, which for some strange reason was floor 1 in this country.
He stepped out of the lift and the doors closed behind him. In the dark he sat down and tried to think clearly. Because this upset all his plans. The airport bus left in eight minutes. That was all the time he had to make a decision.
'I'm trying to look at some pictures here,' Harry said in desperation.
Halvorsen peered up from his desk opposite Harry's. 'Be my guest.'
'Stop snapping your fingers then. Why do you do that?'
'This?' Halvorsen looked at his fingers, snapped them and, a little abashed, laughed. 'It's just an old habit.'
'Oh yes?'
'My dad was a fan of Lev Yashin, the Russian goalkeeper in the sixties.'
Harry waited for him to go on.
'My dad wanted me to be the keeper at the Steinkjer club. So when I was small he used to snap his fingers between my eyes. Like this. To harden me, so that I wouldn't be afraid of shots at goal. Apparently, Yashin's father had done the same. If I didn't blink, I got a sugar cube.'
The words were followed by a moment of total silence in the office.
