‘Yes.’
‘So what’s the hurry? I’m seeing you at two.’
‘That was what I wanted to clarify with you, Bellman.’
‘Clarify?’
‘Before we meet the others. Agreeing on the conditions for me to join the team.’
‘The team?’ Bellman laughed. ‘What are you talking about, Harry?’
‘Do you want me to spell it out for you? You don’t need me to ring Australia and persuade a woman to come here to act as a decoy, you can do that yourself without any bother. What you’re asking for is help.’
‘Harry! Really now…’
‘You look knackered, Bellman. You’ve started to feel it, haven’t you. You’ve felt the pressure escalate since Marit Olsen.’ Harry sat down on the bench beside him. Even then, he was almost ten centimetres taller. ‘Feeding frenzy in the press every sodding day. Impossible to walk past a newspaper stand or switch on the TV without being reminded of the Case. The Case you haven’t solved. The Case your bosses are nagging you about all the time. The Case that requires a press conference a day where the vultures scream questions into each other’s beaks. And now the man you yourself released has vanished into the blue beyond. The vultures swarm in, some of them cackling in Swedish, Danish and even English. I’ve been where you are now, Bellman. Soon they’ll be talking fucking French. For this is the Case you have to solve, Bellman. And the Case has gone stale.’
Bellman didn’t answer, but his jaw muscles were grinding. Kolkka had packed the rope in the sack and came towards them, but Bellman waved him away. The Finn turned and waddled towards the exit like an obedient terrier.
‘What do you want, Harry?’
‘I’m offering you the chance to get this sorted out one on one, instead of at a meeting.’
‘You want me to ask you for help?’
Harry saw Bellman’s complexion redden.
‘What sort of bargaining position do you imagine you’re in, Harry?’
‘Well, I imagine it’s better than it has been for a while.’
‘You’re mistaken there.’
‘Kaja Solness doesn’t want to work for you. Bjorn Holm you’ve already promoted, and if you send him back to being a crime scene officer he’ll be only too pleased. The only person you can hurt now is me, Bellman.’
‘Have you forgotten I can lock you up so that you can’t visit your father before he dies?’
Harry shook his head. ‘There’s no one to visit any more, Bellman.’
Mikael Bellman arched an eyebrow in surprise.
‘They rang from the hospital this morning,’ Harry said. ‘My father went into a coma last night. Dr Abel says he won’t come out of it. Whatever was left unsaid between my father and me will remain unsaid.’
54
Tulip
Bellman looked at Harry in silence. that is, the brown deer-like eyes were directed towards Harry, but his gaze was inverted. Harry knew that a committee meeting was in progress there, a meeting with a lot of dissenting opinions, it seemed. Bellman slowly loosened the strings of the chalk bag hanging around his waist, as if to gain time. Time to think. Then he angrily stuffed the chalk bag in his rucksack.
‘If – and only if – I asked you for help without having anything to pressurise you with,’ he said, ‘why on earth would you do it?’
‘I don’t know.’
Bellman stopped packing and looked up. ‘You don’t know?’
‘Well, it definitely wouldn’t be out of love for you, Bellman.’ Harry breathed in. Fidgeted with a pack of cigarettes. ‘Let’s say that even those who believe themselves to be homeless occasionally discover that they have a home. A place where you could imagine being buried one day. And do you know where I want to be buried, Bellman? In the park in front of Police HQ. Not because I love the police or have been a fan of what is known as esprit de corps. Quite the opposite – I spit on the police officer’s craven loyalty to the force, that incestuous camaraderie that exists only because people think they may need a favour one rainy day. A colleague who can exact vengeance, make a testimony or, if necessary, turn a blind eye for you, I hate all that.’
Harry faced Bellman.
‘But the police is all I have. It’s my tribe. And my job is to clear up murders. Whether it is for Kripos or Crime Squad. Can you grasp something like that, Bellman?’
Mikael Bellman squeezed his lower lip between thumb and first finger.
Harry motioned to the wall. ‘What grade was the climb, Bellman? Seven plus?’
‘Eight minimum. On sight.’
‘That’s tough. And I guess you think this is even tougher. But that’s how it has to be.’
Bellman cleared his throat. ‘Fine. Fine, Harry.’ He pulled the strings of his rucksack tight again. ‘Will you help us?’
Harry put his cigarettes back in his pocket and lowered his head. ‘Of course.’
‘I’ll have to check with your boss to see if it’s alright first.’
‘Save yourself the effort,’ Harry said, getting up. ‘I’ve already informed him I’m working with you lot from now on. See you at two.’
Iska Peller peered out of the window of the two-storey brick building, at the row of identical houses on the other side of the street. It could have been any street in any town in England, but it was the tiny district of Bristol in Sydney, Australia. A cool southerly had picked up. The afternoon heat would release its grip as soon as the sun went down.
She heard a dog bark and the heavy traffic on the motorway two blocks away.
The man and woman in the car opposite had just been relieved; now there were two men. They drank slowly from their paper cups with lids. In their own good time, because there is no reason in the world to hurry when you have an eight-hour shift ahead of you and nothing at all is going to happen. Ratchet down a gear, slow the metabolism, do what the Aborigines do: go into that torpid, dormant state which is their diapause and where they can be for hours on end, days on end if need be. She tried to visualise how these slow coffee drinkers could be of any help if anything really happened.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, trying to repress the tremble in her voice caused by suppressed fury. ‘I would have liked to help you find who killed Charlotte, but what you’re suggesting is utterly out of the question.’ Then her anger gained the upper hand after all. ‘I can’t believe you’re even asking! I’m enough of a decoy here. Ten wild horses couldn’t drag me back to Norway. You’re the police, you get paid to catch that monster, why can’t you be the bait?’
She hung up and threw down the phone. It hit the cushion on the armchair and one of her cats jumped up and darted into the kitchen. She hid her face in her hands and let the tears flow again. Dear Charlotte. Her dear, dear, beloved Charlotte.
She had never been afraid of the dark before, now she thought of nothing else; soon the sun would go down, night would come, it was relentless, returning again and again.
The phone played the opening bars of an Antony and the Johnsons song, and the display lit up on the cushion. She walked over and eyed it. Felt the hairs on her neck rising. The caller’s number started with 47. From Norway again.
She put the phone to her ear.
‘Yeah?’
‘Me again.’
She sighed with relief. Just the policeman.
‘I was wondering, if you don’t want to come here in person, whether we might at least have the use of your name?’
