Punishment aka What Is Mine

“Potassium chloride. Which separates into potassium and chloride in the blood.”

Johanne frowned.

“Wouldn’t there be traces of chloride then?”

Adam looked like he was about to take another Danish. Then he brushed his hands and folded them behind his head.

“I’m not sure if I understand it entirely, but the point is that the level of chlorides in the body is higher than the level of potassium.”

Adam closed his eyes to think. Then he opened them again, leant forward, and started to draw with his finger on the glass table.

“I might not get all the figures exactly right, but at least they illustrate what I’m getting at. Let’s say that your level of potassium is three of some measure or another.”

“Okay. Three measures potassium.”

“Then your chloride level is actually a hundred. This can rise to one hundred and five without it being dangerous or remarkable. A similar increase from three to eight measures of potassium would, on the other hand, kill a person. This really is the recipe for the perfect murder.”

“Which explains why he had to abduct the children,” said Johanne. “He had to take them somewhere where he could drug them with Valium and then inject them in the temple.”

“If that’s what he did.”

“Mmm. If that’s what he did. When will we find out more?”

“The pathologist will look at Sarah first, tomorrow morning. We’re going to do what we can to avoid opening Kim’s grave.”

They both looked at the bedroom. The door was ajar.

“If that’s the case, we certainly know more about the murderer,” said Johanne.

“How exactly?”

“We know that he has access to potassium.”

“But we all do.”

“But you said only a few pharmacies actually stock it.”

“Of course we’ll question all the pharmacists in the country. The pathologist reckoned that an order of potassium is unusual enough to be remembered. But the murderer may have bought it abroad. God knows he’s careful enough. And then there’s the problem with the hospitals. Intensive care units have potassium on hand. And there are a good number of intensive care units in Norway.”

“But we also know more,” said Johanne slowly. “We know that not only is the murderer an intelligent man, he also knows about a method that only a handful of doctors would…”

Adam interrupted, “The pathologist was really shaken. He must be around sixty-five and he said he had never thought about killing people in this way before. Never. And he’s a pathologist!”

He raised himself slightly from the sofa and hunted in his back pocket for the printout that Sigmund Berli had scribbled on. It was torn and would not lie flat on the table.

“Which makes our gynecologist more interesting again,” he said thoughtfully, and pointed at the doctor’s name. “And the nurse for that matter. Except that she’s a woman. But it knocks out…”

“We’re not looking for a woman,” said Johanne. “And it’s not likely to be a doctor.”

Adam glanced up and asked, “What makes you so sure?”

“This new information mustn’t make us forget what we’ve worked out already,” she said firmly. “We’re still talking about a damaged person. A psychopath or someone with clearly psychopathic tendencies. I think we’re looking for a man with a string of broken relationships behind him. Also in terms of his education, he has possibly studied at a university, but is unable to complete a course given the obligations and efforts required to do that. He may well be intelligent, possibly very intelligent, and can therefore benefit from any knowledge he does pick up. A world of information has opened up on the Internet in recent years. You can find everything from recipes for bombs to suicide clubs; it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if there’s a Web site somewhere about unusual murder methods. For that matter, our man might be smart enough to have worked it out himself, based on information from the countless medical Web sites. He’s definitely intelligent. But he has never managed to get an official qualification. How long does it take to train to be a nurse now? Four years? I reckon it would be more or less impossible for this man to complete something like that.”

“But why the precision?”

“With the potassium, you mean?”

“Yes. Why such an… advanced murder method? He could have strangled them, shot them, drowned them for that matter!”

“Control,” said Johanne. “Arrogance. He wants to prove he’s better than anyone else. Remember, this is a man who feels he’s been wronged. Deeply wronged. Not just by one person or one event. He’s built up an arsenal of defeats to be avenged. To manage to kill children without us even discovering how it’s…”

“Grandpa,” said a thin little voice.

It frightened Johanne that she hadn’t heard the boy. He was already out in the room, with a teddy bear under his arm. His T-shirt had a big spot of ketchup on it, but Adam had refused the offer of borrowing some of Kristiane’s old pajamas. The top of the boy’s diaper was sagging well below his belly button and an unmistakable smell made Johanne get up and guide him over to the bathroom. For some reason she hoped that Adam would not follow. Amund was unusually trusting. When she sat down on the toilet seat and took off his diaper, he gave a big smile.

“Jojonne” he said, and stroked her cheek with his chubby hand.

Adam had left a bag with nonperfumed soap, three diapers, and a pacifier in the bathroom.

You assumed that the boy would sleep here, she thought. Taking pajamas might have been a bit obvious. But three diapers?

“Grandpa is an old fox,” she said, and lifted the boy up into the sink.

“Not wash bottom now,” said Amund with determination, and kicked his legs. “Not wash.”

“Yes,” said Johanne. “You’ve got poop there. Away with the poop.”

She wiped his bottom with a cloth. Amund laughed.

“Not wash,” he said, and hiccuped when she turned on the tap and let the warm water run over his skin.

“You have to be all clean and beautiful; then you’ll sleep well.”

“Bulances are white,” said Amund. “Not red.”

“You’re right, Amund. Ambulances are white.”

“Bulances,” he said.

“Smart boy.”

The boy snuggled into the towel.

“No more sleep,” he said and laughed.

“I don’t think so,” said Adam from the doorway. “Come here; Grandpa’ll put you back to bed. Thank you, Johanne.”

It didn’t work. Half an hour later, Adam emerged from the bedroom with the child in his arms.

“He’ll fall asleep here,” he said half-apologetically, and then gave the boy a dark look. Amund just smiled and pushed his pacifier in.

“He’ll just have to lie in my lap.”

The little boy almost disappeared in his grandfather’s arms. The tip of his nose was just visible over a green blanket. His eyes closed after only a few minutes and his regular sucking quieted. Adam pulled the blanket away from his face. His dark hair looked nearly black against Adam’s white shirt. The child’s eyelashes were wet and so long that they meshed together.

“Children,” said Johanne quietly, unable to take her eyes off Amund. “I can’t help thinking that the children are the key to understanding this case. At first I thought it was something to do with the murderer’s own childhood. Full of loss. A sense of loss linked to his childhood. And perhaps…”

She breathed in and out deeply.

“Maybe I’m right. But there’s something more. There’s something to do with these children. Even though they are not his. It’s as if…”

She got lost in her train of thought.