something she needed copying.’
‘And Jan didn’t either, from what I understand?’
‘No. I only saw him a few times. The boy was Svein’s big worry, I can tell you.’
‘In what sense?’
‘Listen herr… Veum, is that right?’
‘Yes.’
‘I don’t have any… any children myself. But I can easily understand… the longing for a child. And I know Svein took it very hard, that he and Vibecke couldn’t have… their own children. So when the opportunity came along, he made a quick decision and said yes. First to the enquiry about whether they wanted to be foster parents, later to the adoption.’
‘And how did it work out?’
‘At first everything seemed to be going well. But it turned out that the tiny boy… he was a time bomb waiting to go off. There were so many strange reactions in that boy, and thinking back to all the incidents Svein told me about… once — well, no point covering it up — a few months ago, he came to the office in the morning and I could see that something was bothering him. In the end, I couldn’t restrain myself. I went into his room — there…’ She tilted her head towards an open door behind her. Through the opening I could make out a large desk and a vacant chair. ‘He told me that Johnny boy had bitten his hand the night before! And I do mean bitten. You should’ve seen the mark! When I was told on Wednesday morning what had happened and heard that… You can imagine what thoughts went through my head, can’t you.’
‘Naturally.’
She looked at me, with insistent eyes now. ‘Could that be what happened, this time as well?’
I met her gaze. Her eyes had a shimmer of green in the blue, like an ice wall in a glacier. ‘To be quite frank, froken Borge, I don’t know. But, yes, it’s certainly a possibility.’
She gave a faint nod, as if she had had her worst fears confirmed.
‘But tell me… He never mentioned anything about… Did you have any impression of what the relationship was like, between him and Vibecke?’
Her face wavered between professionalism and personal feelings. The impeccable shell cracked and the teenage girl she had once been burst through. ‘Not so good, I think,’ she let slip with a tiny sob.
‘And what do you base that on?’
‘The evening in Forde I mentioned just now.’
‘The anniversary dinner?’
‘Yes. We sat in the bar talking, it was more personal than it had ever… Svein and I.’
‘Mm?’
‘It was after Harald had disappeared with, er, well… a woman he met at the bar. And that was precisely why… I mean Harald lives with a really sweet girl, and that was the reason that Svein and I sat talking about… that sort of thing. How some people can never control themselves, and how mortifying it must feel to be… the one who is left on their own after it’s all over, or the one who may have a suspicion that everything is not all as it ought to be…’
I coated my voice with velvet. ‘And that may have been the situation with Svein and Vibecke, too?’
‘Yes. And it… really got to him.’ Instantly there were tears in her eyes, as if this was about her.
‘And his own house was spick and span?’
She glowered at him. ‘What do you mean? Of course it was!’ Her cheeks flared up.
‘Yes, by all means, but… he was away a lot travelling. You said that yourself. And women are in bars everywhere, not only in Forde, aren’t they.’
‘Yes, that’s true, but the way he put it to me… at that time… he was genuinely upset, Veum. He wasn’t like that. Not Svein. I would’ve
… noticed.’ Again the distant look in her eyes, and the small, almost unnoticeable stiffening of the neck, as though she was unconsciously studying herself in a mirror no one else saw.
‘So she had someone else? Was that what he was trying to say?’
‘Trying! He… well…’ All of a sudden her professional superego had taken control again. ‘I can’t see that this has anything to do at all with social services! They were tied to each other through their common responsibility for Jan, and that may have been what bothered him most of all, what would happen to Jan, if Vibecke… left him.’
‘Well, he was a man in his best years. There may have been others who would have proffered a helping hand?’
Mirror-woman made one last appearance, and for a second she sat with closed eyes, as though to keep out all the brutality of the world. On re-opening them, she was a hundred per cent in the here and now. ‘Was there anything else I could help you with, herr Veum?’
‘No, I don’t think so. Not for the moment.’
I had a question on the tip of my tongue, but I let it lie. I had no right to ask it. The question of how far her consolation had gone that anniversary night in Forde last autumn…
16
The time had come. I couldn’t find any more excuses, neither to myself nor to others. There was nothing else to do but eat humble pie and call on the Muus that roared, in the lion’s den, the new Bergen Police Headquarters, built in 1965.
From the telephone box outside the police station I rang Hans Haavik and received confirmation of what I already assumed would happen. He and Marianne Storetvedt had agreed that hospitalisation was the only solution, and Marianne and one of the assistants out there had driven Jan to the Children’s Psychiatric Centre in Haukeland.
‘But how are you, Varg? Can you feel anything after the fall?’
‘Yes, I can but… I’m fine. I’m just a little bruised.’
‘Right, well, hope you’re better soon.’
I thanked him and rang off.
The duty officer informed me that Inspector Muus was in, and I took the lift up to his office, which was on the third floor overlooking Domkirkgate, where the cathedral was situated, and very little else. Muus himself towered up behind his desk, as fierce as a matron at the annual meeting of the missionary society. When I showed my face through the crack of the door, he seemed to be refusing to believe that this could be true. ‘Yes?’ he said brusquely. ‘What is it you require?’
I sent him a disarming smile. ‘I have a confession to make.’
‘You, too?’
‘Yes? Are there more?’
He swept this aside. ‘Spit it out!’
‘The day before yesterday, when we were driving Jan to Haukedalen, he said something to us.’
‘Did he now?’
‘He said: “Mummy did it.”’
He didn’t bat an eyelid. ‘I see. And?’
‘Well… I thought you might like to know.’
‘And that thought took about forty-eight hours to reach base?’
‘There was no one on duty, if I can put it like that,’ I ventured, but it didn’t meet with approval.
‘And what’s the reason for your coming here now with this?’
‘Mm… she’s at large, isn’t she?’
‘You have some idea of where she might be staying?’
For a second my eyes relinquished their hold on his. ‘No, that…’
‘But there’s something you’ve missed, Veum.’ He sent me a triumphant look.
‘Really? And that is…’
‘She’s come forward.’
