Punishment aka What Is Mine

Emilie was annoyed. The man could hear them. Even if he wasn’t there, he might have microphones somewhere. Emilie had thought about that a lot. She had seen things like that in movies. She almost didn’t dare to look carefully. To begin with, when she first came here, she had walked around the room looking for something, without knowing exactly what. She found nothing. But you could get microphones that were so small you could fit them in a molar tooth. They were so small that you couldn’t see them. You needed a microscope. Maybe the man was sitting somewhere listening to them and watching them as well. Because you could also get tiny cameras. As small as a nail head, and there were lots of nails in the wall. Emilie had seen a film once, called Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. It was about a slightly mad but rather sweet dad who did all sorts of experiments in the attic. The children touched something they weren’t supposed to touch and shrunk until they were very, very small, like insects. No one could see them. The man could see her. She was sure he had a TV screen and a headset and knew exactly what they were doing.

“Smile,” she whispered.

Sarah started to cry hard again. Emilie put her hand over her mouth.

“You have to smile,” she ordered, and pulled up her lips into a grin. “He’s watching us.”

Sarah twisted out of her grip.

“He said that he was Momm… Mommy’s boy… boyfr…”

Emilie squeezed shut her eyes again and lay down on the bed. There was barely enough room for the two of them. She pushed Sarah away and turned her face to the wall. When she squeezed her eyes shut as hard as she could, it was almost as if there was light in her head. She could see things. She could see Daddy looking for her. He had a flannel shirt on. He was looking for her among the wildflowers at the back of the house; he had a magnifying glass and thought that someone had shrunk her.

Emilie wished that Sarah had never come.

TWENTY-TWO

There was now a sea of flowers to mark the spot where Emilie Selbu’s bag had been found, on the quiet path between two busy roads. Some of the flowers were withering, others were already dead. And in among them all, fresh roses in small plastic containers. Children’s drawings fluttered in the evening breeze.

A group of teenagers cycled by. They were shouting and laughing, but lowered their voices as they cycled around the flowers and letters. A girl of about fourteen put her foot on the ground and stood still for a few seconds before swearing loudly and clearly, then shook her head and pedalled frantically after the others.

The man pulled his hat farther down over his eyes. He slipped his other hand into his trousers. Did he dare get even closer? The thought of standing on the spot, the very place where Emilie was taken, exactly where she was abducted, made his balls burn. He lost his balance and had to press his hip against a tree to stop himself from falling. He groaned and bit his lip.

“What the hell are you doing?”

Two people appeared behind him. They popped up out of nowhere, from behind a dense bush. Surprised, he turned toward them, his penis still in his hand; it went limp between his fingers and he tried to smile.

“Noth… nothing,” he stammered, paralysed.

“He… he’s jerking off, for Christ’s sake!”

It took them two minutes to render him harmless, but they didn’t stop there. When the man dressed in paramilitary gear stumbled into the police station, pushed by a newly established group of neighborhood vigilantes, his right eye was already swollen and blue. His nose was bleeding and it looked as if his arm was broken.

He said nothing, not even when the police asked him if he needed a doctor.

TWENTY-THREE

Are you sure you don’t want to speak English?”

He shook his head. There were a couple of times when he didn’t seem to understand what she said. She repeated herself in different, simpler words. It was hard to say whether it helped. His expression didn’t change. He didn’t say much.

Aksel Seier had ordered a filet mignon and a beer. Johanne was happy with a Caesar salad and a glass of ice water. They were the only guests at The 400 Club, a rural mix between a restaurant and a diner, only seven minutes’ walk from Ocean Avenue. Aksel Seier had walked toward his pickup, then shrugged and gone on foot when Johanne insisted. It was too late for lunch and too early for dinner. The kitchen was working on half steam. Before the food arrived on the table, Johanne had told him all about Alvhild Sofienberg, the old lady who was once so interested in Aksel Seier’s case, but then forced to drop it. And now, many years later, Alvhild wanted to find out why he had been sentenced and then released so suddenly nearly nine years later. Johanne described the futile search for the case documents. And finally, in a kind of casual postscript, she explained her own interest in the case.

The food arrived. Aksel Seier picked up his knife and fork. He ate slowly, taking time to chew. Again, he let his hair fall over his eyes. It must be an old trick; the coarse gray hair became a wall between him and her.

Uninterested, she thought. You seem completely uninterested. Why did you bother to come here with me? Why didn’t you just throw me out? I would have accepted that. Or you might listen to what I’ve got to say and then say thank you and good-bye. You could get up now. You could finish your food, accept a free meal from a past you had hidden and forgotten and then just go. It’s your right. You have used so many years trying to forget. And I’m ruining it all for you. I’m crushing you. Go.

“What do you want me to say?”

Half the meat was still on the plate. Aksel put his knife between the teeth of the fork and drank the rest of his beer. Then he leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest.

I was expecting some enthusiasm, she thought. This is absurd. Here I am thinking I’m an angel, a messenger bringing good tidings. I want… what do I want? Ever since I read your story-from the moment I realized that Alvhild was right-I’ve seen myself in the role of the fairy godmother who would right all wrongs. I would come here and tell you what you already know: that you’re innocent. You are innocent. I want to confirm that for you. I’ve come all the way from Norway and you should be… grateful. Damn it, I want some gratitude.

“I want absolutely nothing,” she said quietly. “If you want, I can go.”

Aksel smiled. His teeth were even and gray and didn’t suit his face. It was as if someone had cut out an old mouth and sewn it somewhere it didn’t belong. But he smiled and put his hands down on the table in front of him.

“I’ve dreamed about what it would be like to have…”

He searched for the right word. Johanne was unsure whether to help him or not. There was a long pause.

“Your name cleared,” she said.

“Exactly. To have my name cleared.”

He looked down at his empty glass. Johanne signalled to the waitress to bring another. She had a thousand questions, but couldn’t think of a single one.

“Why…” she started, without knowing where she was going. “Are you aware of the fact that the media was highly critical of your sentence? Did you know that several journalists mocked the prosecution and the witnesses they brought against you?”

“No.”

The smile had vanished and the lock of hair was about to fall again. But he didn’t seem aggressive nor curious. His voice was completely flat. Maybe it was because he wasn’t used to the language anymore. Maybe he