the boss. You're only a witness.'
Sejer raised his hand in apology.
'The first thing I want you to do,' said the artist, 'is to forget the man's face.'
Sejer looked at him in surprise.
'Forget the details. Close your eyes. Try to see his figure in front of you and concentrate on what kind of impression he makes. What kind of signals is this person sending? He comes walking towards you down the street in broad daylight, and for some reason you notice him. Why?'
'He seemed so tense. So full of something.'
Sejer shut his eyes as requested and visualised the man. Now the face was merely a bright, hazy patch in his memory. 'His steps were quick and firm. His shoulders hunched. A mixture of fear and determination. Panic lurking just below the surface. So afraid that he didn't dare glance up and look at anyone, even for an instant. Not exactly a professional bank robber. He was too desperate.'
The artist nodded and made a note at the bottom of the page.
'Try to describe his body, the way he moved as he walked along.'
'His body hardly moved at all. Tiny, choppy movements. No swinging of his arms, no swaying or limping. Straight ahead. Stiff-legged. Stiff across the shoulders.'
'Think about the proportions,' the artist continued. 'His arms and legs in relation to his torso. The size of his head. The length of his neck. The size of his feet.'
'His arms and legs weren't out of the ordinary. Rather on the short side. He had one hand inside his bag, and the other in his pocket. A short, thick neck. Not very big feet. Smaller than mine, and I take a size 44. He was wearing loose clothing, but his body gave the impression of being muscular in a bulging sort of way.'
More nods. The pencil touched the paper for the first time, and Sejer heard the stroke of graphite on the page. It was just a draft sketch, but it gave the figure a trembling, lifelike quality, something in motion.
'His shoulders? Wide or narrow?'
'Wide. Rounded. The kind you get from lifting weights. Not like mine,' he added.
'Oh, yours are very wide.'
'But they don't bulge like his. They're more flat and bony, you know.'
They both laughed at this. The artist, whose name was Riste but went under the nickname Sketches, was short and pudgy and bald, with small oval glasses and long thin fingers.
'His head?'
'Big. Round. Big cheeks, but not exactly dumpling-shaped. A rounded chin. Not sharp or firm. No cleft or anything like that.'
'How did his head sit on his body? If you understand what I mean by that.'
'Kind of sunk between his shoulders. His head jutted forward from his body. Like a sulking child.'
'Excellent. That's significant,' he said. 'What about his hairline?'
'Is that important?'
'Yes, it is. A person's hairline establishes a lot about his face. Take a look at your own face. You have a nearly perfect hairline. Straight and even across your forehead, with a nice arc at the temples. And your hair is of the same thickness all along it. That's quite rare.'
'Really?' He shook his head. Vanity was not one of his sins, not any more at any rate, and the last thing he paid attention to was his hairline. He paused to think.
'Curving, not straight. Maybe a little pointed towards the middle of his forehead. His hair was cut short, that's why I saw it so clearly.'
This slow method of approaching the actual facial features made the man's appearance clearer than ever. The police artist certainly knew his job. Fascinated, Sejer stared at the piece of paper and saw a figure gradually emerge, like a print in a darkroom.
'Now his hair.'
He kept on sketching lightly so that new strokes were constantly added on top or on the sides. He didn't use an eraser. The dozens of thin lines gave substance to the figure.
'Thick and curly, almost like an Afro. It grew straight up from his skull, but it was cut very short. Like mine.'
He ran his hand over his hair, which was short and bristly, like a brush.
'The colour?'
'Blond. Possibly very light-coloured, but I'm a rather unclear about that. Some hair looks extremely fair in certain situations, you know, but it can look dark when it's wet. It all depends on the amount of light. I'm not quite sure. Maybe close to your hair colour.'
'Mine?' Sketches looked up. 'But I don't have any hair.'
'No, but the way your hair used to look.'
'How would you know what my hair was like?'
Sejer hesitated. He didn't know if he had offended the man or simply sounded stupid.
'I don't know,' he replied. 'I'm just guessing.'
'Well, you guessed right. My hair is – I mean was – light blond. You're very observant.'
'The sketch is starting to look like him.'
'Now we come to the eyes.'
'That will be harder. L didn't see them. He was walking along with his eyes fixed on the ground, and inside the bank he stood with his back partly turned.'
'That's a shame. But the teller saw them, and it's her turn next.'
'It's worse than a shame. It's a disaster that I didn't stay in that bank a little longer. I'm old enough to take my intuitions seriously.'
'Well, you can't do everything right all the time. What about his nose?'
'Short, and quite wide. Also a little African-looking.'
'His mouth?'
'A small, pouting mouth.'
'Eyebrows?'
'Darker than his hair. Straight. Wide. Almost joined in the middle.'
'Cheekbones?'
'They didn't stand out. His face was too full.'
'Any distinguishing marks on his skin?'
'Nothing at all. Nice smooth complexion. No beard or stubble that I could see. No shadow on his upper lip. Freshly shaven.'
'Or not much of a beard to start with. Anything distinctive about his clothes?'
'Not that I remember. Well, yes, there was one thing.'
'What's that?'
'His clothes didn't look as though they belonged to him. It wasn't the way he would normally dress. They seemed old-fashioned.'
'Most likely he's changed clothes by now. His shoes?'
'Brown shoes with laces.'
'And his hands?'
'I didn't see them, as I told you. If they match the rest of his body, they would be stubby and round.'
'And his age, Konrad?'
'Between 19 and… 25.'
He had to close his eyes again in order to block out the artist.
'Height?'
'Quite a bit shorter than me.'
'Everybody is shorter than you,' Sketches said dryly.
'Maybe one metre 70.'
'Weight?'
'He was powerfully built. Over 80 kilos, I'd say. You haven't asked me about his ears,' Sejer said.
'What were his ears like?'
