immediately. And because the man was able to tell them what had happened, and the door to Trude’s empty flat was locked with a security chain from the inside, there was no reason to investigate the matter further. An accident, nothing more. A tragic accident.
On 31 December 2008, one and a half hours before a new year was due to be celebrated, there was no one in the whole world to give Runar Hansen a thought. He had been murdered in a park on 19 November that same year, aged forty-one. After his sister’s death he wasn’t even a vague, drug-addled memory.
Nor did anyone care about Puss-cat on the window ledge.
Synnove Hessel was stroking the immensely fat cat. It settled down on her knee, its purr a low-frequency hum as it breathed in and out. There was something calming about the sound and the cat’s affection as it butted her hands with its head as soon as she stopped stroking it.
‘I’m so pleased to be here,’ she said.
‘No problem,’ said the woman sitting at the other end of the sofa with a bottle of beer in her hand. ‘I wasn’t exactly in the mood for a celebration either.’
The apartment was even more elegant than Marianne’s description the very last time she spoke to Synnove on the telephone. Marianne had spent the afternoon of Saturday 19 December with Tuva on Grefsenkollveien. It had been eight o’clock in the evening, and Marianne had seemed so excited about the long journey. Synnove had tried to hide her disappointment over the fact that they wouldn’t be celebrating Christmas together, but with limited success. A sharp, chilly tone had come between them before the conversation ended.
It struck her that the end of their conversation was the reason why Marianne’s text messages had been so short and impersonal. The first one, anyway.
‘So you’ve checked whether she arrived at the hotel?’ Tuva asked for the third time in less than an hour.
‘Yes. She arrived, checked in, and the bill has been paid. That’s where the trail ends.’ Synnove shuddered and pushed the cat on to the floor. ‘That’s where the trail ends,’ she repeated with a grimace. ‘Sounds like something out of a crime novel.’
The room was not large, but the view from the big windows gave the apartment a feeling of exclusiveness. All the furniture faced the spacious balcony, and from where she was sitting Synnove could look out over the whole of Oslo. She stood up.
‘Shall we go for a walk?’ asked Tuva.
‘What, now? An hour before midnight?’
Synnove was standing by the window. The old apartment blocks had looked terrible from the outside. A gigantic piece of Lego standing on end, slotted into the side of a hill the same height as the building. Only when she walked into the room on the eleventh floor did she understand her friend’s childish delight over the new apartment.
Synnove had never seen Oslo looking so beautiful.
Lights were twinkling everywhere. The city lay before her like a Christmas decoration, a gift from the gods, surrounded by dark ridges and black water. Fireworks exploded against the sky with increasing frequency. Synnove and Tuva had front-row seats for the show that would start in an hour.
‘All right then,’ she said, shrugging her shoulders.
Five minutes later they were on their way up Grefsenasen, the cold biting into their faces. They had dressed warmly, unlike all the people tripping to and from festivities in party clothes and indoor shoes. A gang of boys aged about twelve or thirteen were amusing themselves by throwing firecrackers into a group of young women, who were screaming and jumping around on their stilettos. An elderly man came walking along the pavement with an old, overweight Labrador. He gave the boys a good telling-off; they swore and whooped and ran off down the hill laughing, before disappearing into a closed-up building site by clambering over a three-metre fence.
‘It’s very strange that she hasn’t withdrawn any money,’ puffed Tuva. ‘Are you absolutely sure about that?’
Synnove slowed down. She often forgot that she was fitter than most people.
‘The only thing I’ve been able to check is our joint account. Marianne also has a card for a deposit account that only she has access to. I’ll have to get the bloody police to ask the bank.’
She stopped.
There’s no point, she thought.
They were standing at a fork in the road. Tuva pointed upwards, where a deserted track wound its way up towards the top of Grefsenkollen. Synnove didn’t move.
‘It’s just that I’m so sure she’s dead,’ she whispered.
Ice-cold tears poured down her face.
‘You can’t know that,’ Tuva protested. ‘I mean, she’s only been gone a week! I remember the state you were in when she just took off for France and didn’t get in touch for ages. Marianne is so-’
‘Dead!’ Synnove screamed. ‘Don’t you start as well! Everything was different then. She didn’t want anything to do with me! That’s not how it is now. Can’t you just…?’
Tuva put her arm around her.
‘Sorry. I’m just trying to cheer you up. Maybe we shouldn’t talk about it.’
‘Of course we should talk about it!’
Synnove started to walk. Fast. She increased her speed with every step. Tuva scurried along after her.
‘What else would we talk about?’ Synnove yelled. ‘The weather? I want to talk about that idiotic fucking great-aunt who didn’t even tell anyone that Marianne hadn’t turned up. I want to talk about-’
‘Have you called her?’
Tuva started jogging to keep up.
‘Yes. She just wants to talk to Marianne’s mother, which I can understand perfectly. But the old woman must be…’
She stopped dead. There was an elk standing in the middle of the track.
‘… bloody stupid,’ she snapped. ‘I asked her-’
‘Sssh!’
The elk was no more than twenty or twenty-five metres away from them. The air around its muzzle turned grey as it breathed. Synnove could see that it was a cow, and she glanced cautiously into the forest on either side of the track in case there was a calf nearby. She couldn’t see one, but that didn’t necessarily mean the female was alone.
‘She’s just on her guard,’ Synnove whispered. ‘Don’t move.’
The elk stared at them for almost thirty seconds. She held her head high, ears pricked forward. Tuva hardly dared breathe.
‘I’ve never seen a live elk before,’ she whispered, almost inaudibly.
That shows how little time you spend outdoors, Synnove thought, then she suddenly bellowed and waved her arms. The elk gave a start, turned away and disappeared among the trees with long, graceful strides.
‘Wow,’ said Tuva.
‘That aunt of Marianne’s must be an idiot,’ Synnove said, setting off along the track once more. ‘I asked her why she hadn’t let me know, and she said she didn’t know what my surname was.’
‘Well, that’s actually a good reason,’ called Tuva, who was on the point of abandoning her attempts to keep up. ‘Wait for me! Don’t go so fast!’
Synnove stopped. ‘Number one,’ she said, taking off her glove and holding up a finger, ‘Marianne had written and told her that I make documentaries. And number two, she had told her my name was Synnove. Number three…’
Three fingers were spread in the air.
‘The woman must have access to the fucking Internet somewhere. All she has to do is Google Synnove plus “documentary”, and she’s bound to find out who I am.’
Tuva nodded, although the idea had never occurred to her.
They carried on walking in silence. Behind them the fireworks were increasing in intensity. As they passed the entrance to Trollvann, Tuva started to wonder how much further she could go. She was gasping for breath, and all
