“Sure thing,” said Isak and slipped into his TT. “See you on Wednesday.”
She stared after him until the car disappeared over the brow of the hill down toward Kringsja.
Isak would never be anything other than a big boy. She had just not realized it soon enough. Before, before Kristiane, she had envied him his quickness, his enthusiasm, his optimism; the childish belief that everything could be fixed. He had built an entire future on boundless self-confidence; Isak started a dot-com company before most people even knew what they were and had had the sense to sell it in time. Now he enjoyed playing around with a computer for a few hours every day, he sailed in regattas half the year, and helped the Salvation Army to look for missing persons in his spare time.
Johanne had fallen in love with the way he embraced the world with laughter, the shrug of his shoulders when things got a bit complicated that made him so different and attractive to her.
And then along came Kristiane. The first years were swallowed up by three heart operations, sleepless nights, and anxiety. When they finally woke up from their first night of uninterrupted sleep, it was too late. They limped on together for another year in some semblance of marriage. A two-week family stay at the National Center for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry in a futile attempt to find a diagnosis for Kristiane had resulted in them separating, if not exactly as friends, at least with a relatively intact mutual respect.
They never found a diagnosis. Kristiane wandered around in her own little world and the doctors shook their heads. Autistic, perhaps, they said, then frowned at the child’s obvious ability to develop emotional attachments and her great need for physical contact. Does it matter? Isak asked. The child is fine and the child is ours and I don’t give a shit what’s wrong with her. He didn’t understand how much it mattered to find a diagnosis. To make arrangements for her. To make it possible for Kristiane to achieve her full potential.
He was so damn irresponsible.
The problem was that he never had accepted that he was the father of a mentally handicapped child.
Isak glanced back in the mirror. Johanne looked older now. Tired. She took everything so seriously. He desperately wanted to suggest that Kristiane could live with him all the time, not just every other week like now. He could see it every time: when he handed Kristiane back after a week, Johanne was in a good mood and rested. When he picked up his daughter the following Sunday, Johanne was gray, drawn, and impatient. And it wasn’t good for Kristiane. Nor was the perpetual round of specialists and self-appointed experts. Surely it wasn’t that important to find out what was wrong with the child. The main thing was that her heart functioned properly, she ate well, and was happy. His daughter was happy. Isak was sure of that.
Johanne had been grown up too long. Before, before Kristiane, it had been attractive. Sexy. Johanne’s ambition. The way she always took everything so seriously. Her plans. Her efficiency. He had fallen head over heels for her mature determination, her admirable progress in her studies, her work at the university.
Then along came Kristiane.
He loved that child. She was his child. There was nothing wrong with Kristiane. She wasn’t like other children, but she was herself. That was all she needed to be. All the specialists’ opinions on what was actually wrong with the child were irrelevant. But not for Johanne. She always had to get to the bottom of everything.
She was so damn responsible.
The problem was that she had never accepted that she was the mother of a mentally handicapped child.
TEN
Detective Inspector Adam Stubo looked like a football player. He was stocky, obviously overweight, and not much more than average height. The extra pounds were evenly distributed over his shoulders, neck, and thighs. His rib cage was bursting out of his white shirt. There were two metal tubes in the pocket above his heart. Before she realized they were cigar cases, Johanne Vik thought that the man actually went around with ammunition in his pocket.
He had sent a car for her. It was the first time that anyone had sent a car for Johanne Vik. She was very uncomfortable about it and had asked him not to. She could take the metro. She could take a taxi. Certainly not, insisted Stubo. He sent a Volvo, anonymous and dark blue, with a young man behind the wheel.
“You’d think this was the Secret Service.” She smiled tightly as she shook Stubo’s hand. “Dark blue Volvos and silent drivers with sunglasses.”
His laughter was as powerful as the throat it came from. His teeth were white, even, with a glimpse of gold from a molar on the right-hand side.
“Don’t worry about Oscar. He has a lot to learn.”
A faint smell of cigars hung in the air, but there were no ashtrays. The desk was unusually big, with orderly folders on one side and a computer that was turned off on the other. A map of Norway hung on the wall behind Stubo’s chair, along with an FBI poster and a picture of a brown horse. It had been taken in the summer in a field of wildflowers. The horse tossed its head as the shutter clicked, its mane standing like a halo around its head, eyes looking straight into the camera.
“Beautiful horse,” she said, pointing at the photograph. “Yours?”
“Sabra,” he said and smiled again; this man smiled all the time. “Beautiful animal. Thank you for agreeing to come. I saw you on TV.”
Johanne wondered how many people had said that to her in the last few days. Typically, Isak was the only one who hadn’t said a word about the incredibly embarrassing episode. But then he never watched television. Johanne’s mother, on the other hand, had called five times in the first half-hour after the show; the answering machine hurled her screeching voice at Johanne as soon as she was inside the door. Johanne didn’t call her back. Which resulted in four more messages, each one more agitated than the last. At work the day after, they had patted her on the shoulder. Some had laughed, others had been extremely put out on her behalf. The woman at the checkout counter in her local supermarket had leaned over to her conspiratorially and whispered so that the whole shop could hear, “I saw you on TV!”
Viewer figures for News 21 must have been pretty good.
“You were great,” said Stubo.
“Great? I barely said anything.”
“What you said was important. The fact that you left said far more than any of the other… people of limited talent managed to utter. Did you read my mail?”
She gave a brief nod.
“But I think you’re barking up the wrong tree. I don’t see how I can help you. I’m not exactly…”
“I’ve read your thesis,” he interrupted. “Very interesting. In my profession…”
He looked straight at her and fell silent. His eyes had an apologetic look, as if he was embarrassed about what he actually did.
“We’re not that good at keeping ourselves up to date. Not unless things are directly relevant to an investigation. Things like this…”
He opened a drawer and pulled out a book. Johanne recognized the cover immediately, with her name in small letters against a bleached winter landscape.
“I should imagine I’m the only one here who has read it. Shame. It’s very relevant.”
“To what?”
Again, a despondent, partly apologetic expression passed over his face.
“The police profession. To anyone who wants to understand the essence of a crime.”
“Essence of a
“Well noted, professor. Well noted.”
“I’m not a professor. I’m a university teacher.”
“Does that matter?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Why…”
