She didn’t even greet him with a hug, just favoured him with one of the formal smiles that he’d had so many of in the past. They soon fell into a natural conversational tone, and his pulse returned to normal. Hakon was used to having his hopes dashed.
The food wasn’t particularly good. He could have done it better himself. The lamb chops had been fried too long before they were put in the casserole; the meat was tough. He recognised the recipe, and knew there was white wine in the sauce. Karen had poured too much in and it was over-dominant and acidic. But the red wine in their glasses was superb. They talked about this and that and about old student friends at inordinate length. Both were on their guard. The conversation flowed easily, but along fairly restricted lines, with Karen choosing the route.
“Have you actually got any further?”
The meal was eaten. The dessert had been more or less a failure as well, a lemon sorbet that had refused to stay set for more than thirty seconds. Hakon had smoothed things over and eaten the cold lemon soup with a smile of apparent appreciation.
“We feel we’re getting somewhere, but we’re light-years away from being able to prove anything. It’s a bit monotonous now. Masses of routine stuff. We’re gathering in everything that might be of any significance at all and then sifting through it to see if there’s anything useful. At the moment we’ve got nothing on Jorgen Lavik, but we reckon we’ll have a better insight into his life in a few days.”
Karen interrupted him by raising her glass. He took rather too big a gulp and coughed involuntarily before he’d finished swallowing. The red wine spattered the tablecloth, and he fumbled desperately for the saltcellar to retrieve the situation. She took his hand and looked into his eyes to reassure him.
“Relax, Hakon. I’ll see to it in the morning. Carry on telling me about progress.”
He put the saltcellar down and apologised several times before continuing.
“If you only knew how tedious it is! Ninety-five percent of the work in a murder case is utterly fruitless. Exploring every possible avenue. I get out of it, thank God-the purely practical side of it, that is. But I have to read it all. So far we’ve interviewed twenty-two witnesses. Twenty-two! Not one of them has had anything to contribute. What little physical evidence we have tells us nothing. The bullet that finished off Hans Olsen comes from a weapon that isn’t even sold in this country. Which doesn’t get us very far. We think we can see a pattern here and there, but it’s as if we can’t find the common denominator, the missing piece that would give us something to work on.”
He tried to rub the salt into the tablecloth with his fingertip, in the hope that the old wives’ remedy would be effective.
“Maybe we’re going at it from completely the wrong angle,” he went on, in a tone of resignation. “We thought we’d come up trumps when the records showed that Lavik was in the cells the very day your client lost his marbles. I was very excited, but the warder remembered the visit in detail, and was able to swear that the lawyer never spoke to anybody other than his own client. He was accompanied, like all other visitors.”
Hakon didn’t want to talk about the case. It was Friday, it had been a long, tiring week, and the wine was beginning to go to his head. He felt more at ease, and a warm glow was spreading through him and slowing his movements. He reached over for her plate, scraped the leftovers carefully onto his own, put both sets of cutlery on top, and was about to get up and take everything out to the kitchen.
That was when it happened. She suddenly stood up and came round the solid pine table, knocking her hip against the rounded corner. It must have been painful, but it didn’t divert her from her purpose. She dropped down into his lap. He sat in helpless silence. His hands were moist and hung like lead weights on the ends of his arms, flaccid and weak; what should he do with them?
His eyes watered with trepidation and desire, and he was even more nervous when she dexterously removed his spectacles. He blinked in confusion, and an involuntary tear ran down his left cheek, small and solitary, but she noticed it, laid her hand on his cheek, and brushed it away with her thumb.
She put her lips to his and kissed him for what seemed an eternity. It was quite different from the light touch at the office; this was a kiss full of promises, desire, and longing. It was the kiss Hakon had fantasised about, yearned for, and always dismissed as nothing more than an idyllic dream. It was exactly as he’d imagined it. Totally different from all the other kisses he’d garnered in fifteen years of bachelor existence. This was the opposite, his reward for having loved one and only one, right from their first meeting at a lecture fourteen years ago. Fourteen years! He could remember it better than yesterday’s lunch meeting. He had come scuttling into the auditorium in the west wing five minutes late, and had taken his place on a folding seat in front of an attractive blonde girl. As he pulled the seat down, he had trapped the girl’s toes-she had been sitting with her feet up. She had cried out in agony, and Hakon had stammered an apology, flinching at the laughter and catcalls from the other students; but when he looked at his victim, he was overcome by a feeling of love from which he would never recover. Through all the years he had said nothing. His patient waiting had been painful and melancholy, seeing Karen’s lovers come and go. This feeling of resignation had led him to believe that women were something he could interest for a month or two, for as long as novelty lent their games in bed some excitement. More than that it could never be. Not with other women.
He remained passive for a few moments, but gradually the endless kiss became mutual. His courage increased, and his hands were no longer so helpless, they felt less heavy, and he stroked her back as he moved his legs slightly to let her sit more comfortably.
They made love for several hours. A wonderfully close, intimate lovemaking, old friends with many years of shared experience who had never touched each other, never in this way. It was like walking through a cherished landscape scarcely recognisable in an unfamiliar season. Known yet unknown, everything where it should be, but in a different light, a landscape both unexplored and strange.
They whispered tender words and confidences, and felt remote from reality. Somewhere far off a tram rattled by. The noise forced its way into the cosy intimacy of the living-room floor, sniffed the dawn, and disappeared again into the distance, like a good friend who wished them well. Karen and Hakon were alone again; she confused, exhausted, and elated; he just very, very happy.
Hanne Wilhelmsen was devoting her Friday evening to entirely different pursuits. She was sitting with Billy T. in an unmarked police car with its lights off, at the roadside up at Grefsenkollen, in the hills northeast of the centre. The road was narrow, and in order not to obstruct what little traffic there was late on a Friday evening, they had parked so far off it that the car was leaning at a rakish angle. Her spine was protesting at having to sit with one buttock a lot lower than the other. She tried to straighten herself up, but couldn’t.
“Here,” said Billy T., reaching over for a jacket on the backseat and handing it to her. “Put that under one side!”
It helped, at least for the time being. They were eating the food she’d brought with them, neatly packed in clingfilm, six slices for Billy T. and two for herself.
“A picnic!”
Billy T. was loudly enthusiastic, and helped himself to coffee from the thermos flask.
“A relaxing Friday evening,” said Hanne, grinning with her mouth full.
They’d been sitting there for three hours. It was their third evening on watch outside the terraced house where Jorgen Lavik lived with his family. The house was brown in colour, uninspiring, but with attractive curtains and a soft warm glow from the windows. The family went to bed late, and they had watched the lights go out around midnight every night so far. Up till now their vigils in the freezing car had been a thankless task. The Lavik family had a relentlessly normal routine. Through the living-room window the blue flicker of a television set could be seen from the children’s programmes till the late evening news. In two rooms on the upper floor which they assumed were the children’s the lights were turned out at about eight o’clock. Only once had someone emerged from the varnished door with its embellishment of geese croaking their welcome in Gothic script. Mrs. Lavik presumably, putting out the rubbish. It had been difficult to see her very clearly, but they’d both got the impression of a slim, stylish woman, well dressed even when just spending the evening at home.
They were bored. Radios and cassette players were forbidden in police cars. The police radio, with its reports of the capital’s Friday night crimes, both major and minor, was not especially entertaining. But the police officers were patient.
It had started snowing. The flakes were large and dry, and the car had been stationary for so long that the snow no longer melted on the bonnet. It was soon completely covered. Billy T. switched on the windscreen wipers
