Fear Not

‘A punter who pays for sex, and a possible murderer,’ she began, the words coming out in a staccato rhythm. ‘Of the male gender. Going around. Pulling young lads. In the middle of Oslo.’

She swallowed and moistened her lips with her tongue.

‘With a membership badge of the Norwegian Women’s Public Health Association clearly visible on the lapel of his jacket. What the hell is going on? Is he taking the piss or what?’

Knut Bork picked up the drawing and walked over to the notice-board by the window. He pinned it up and took two steps back. He stood there for a while, his head tilted to one side, then he suddenly turned to Silje and nodded.

‘Perhaps that’s exactly what he’s doing, Silje. Perhaps this guy is trying to take the piss.’

***

When the man on the phone said he was from the police, Marcus Koll Junior thought for a confused moment that someone was trying to play a joke on him. When he realized a few seconds later that he was mistaken, he got up and started pacing back and forth across the living room. To begin with he was concentrating so hard on sounding unconcerned that he didn’t grasp what the man was actually saying.

They couldn’t possibly know anything.

It was simply unthinkable, he tried to convince himself.

He stopped by the big windows looking south.

The sloping garden was lit up. Fir trees heavy with snow were an almost fluorescent ice-blue against the dense darkness beyond the fence. Low cloud hid the city and the fjord. From where he was standing, the world beyond his own domain did not exist.

Except on the telephone.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Marcus, trying to put a smile into his voice. ‘I wonder if you could possibly go over that again? The connection isn’t very good.’

‘The information,’ the voice said, clearly impatient. ‘You called us on Monday with information about that series of break-ins.’

A faint puff of wind brought the snow cascading down from the nearest tree. The dry crystals sparkled in the lamplight. Right down at the bottom of the garden stood two tall pine trees with bare, erect trunks and rounded crowns, like soldiers standing to attention on sentry duty.

Marcus tried to absorb the feeling of relief.

He’d been right. Of course they didn’t know anything

There was no cause for alarm.

‘Oh,’ was all he said, swallowing. ‘I don’t think that was me.’

‘Aren’t I speaking to Rolf Slettan?’ said the voice at the other end of the phone. ‘On 2307*****?’

‘No,’ said Marcus, concentrating on breathing calmly. ‘He’s my husband. Rolf. He was the one who called you. My name is Marcus Koll. As I said when I answered the phone.’

There was silence for a couple of seconds.

That brief moment of silent confusion, thought Marcus. Or disgust. Or both. He was used to it, just as everyone grows used to a stigma when they have carried it for long enough. Before little Marcus started school, Marcus Koll Junior had persuaded Dagens N?ringsliv to do a profile on him, pointing out that he was the only gay man with a husband and a child on the list of the hundred wealthiest people in the country. He hoped that little Marcus would be protected by the fact that everyone knew, and didn’t need to whisper. That he wouldn’t need to deal with it all later, when they found out.

It occurred to him several weeks later that not everyone read Dagens N?ringsliv.

‘Oh yes,’ the voice at the other end of the line said eventually. ‘Is… is he at home? Rolf Slettan?’

‘Yes, but he’s just putting our son to bed.’

This time the silence lasted so long that Marcus thought they’d been cut off.

‘Hello?’ he said loudly.

‘Yes,’ said the man. ‘I’m here. Could you ask him to ring me? The information he gave has just been left lying around here, and I’ve got a couple of questions I’d like to-’

‘Is it the number that came up on the display?’ Marcus interrupted.

‘Er… yes, that’s fine. Tell him to ask for Constable Pettersen. Is he likely to ring this evening?’

‘I wouldn’t have thought so,’ said Marcus. ‘We have plans for this evening. But of course, if it’s important I can ask him to call you. In half an hour or so.’

‘That would be great, if you could. There was another break-in last night, and it would be-’

‘Certainly. I’ll tell him.’

He ended the conversation without any further farewell phrases, and put the phone down on the coffee table. It struck him that the room was too dark. He slowly walked around, from one source of light to the next, until the room was so well lit that the view of the garden almost disappeared in the sharp contrast between outside and inside.

Rolf had told him about the tyre tracks by the gate. To begin with Marcus had been surprised, almost annoyed that Rolf was getting so worked up about the fact that someone had pulled into the small area by the side of the road. It wasn’t fenced off, and was a natural place to give way to oncoming traffic. Since the snow had started falling heavily after New Year, he had seen tracks there all the time.

It wasn’t until Rolf had the chance to explain more clearly that Marcus was prepared to discuss the matter. He had to admit that it seemed strange for someone to stay there for a while, as the varying depth of the tracks and the number of cigarette butts seemed to indicate. When Rolf stubbornly maintained that the same car had been parked further up the road while he was examining the tracks by the gate, and had taken off as soon as he showed interest in it, Marcus fell silent.

Rolf’s strong feeling that someone had been watching them fitted all too well with his own growing sense of unease. More and more often he caught himself looking over his shoulder for something, although he didn’t know what it was. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say he was looking for someone. Up to now he hadn’t been able to put his finger on anything concrete, but ever since before Christmas the impression that he had a living shadow had grown stronger and stronger. Only after New Year had he realized that the panic attack that had almost brought him to his knees four days before Christmas, after remaining at bay for many years, was not only due to the pangs of conscience with which he had been wrestling.

It was as if someone were keeping an eye on him.

The problem, as Marcus Koll Junior saw it, was that this surveillance presumably had nothing whatsoever to do with gangs of thieves and a spate of housebreaking.

If someone were spying on him, of course.

‘No,’ he said out loud, and sat down in the armchair again.

It was bound to be his imagination.

It had to be his imagination.

He was easily frightened at the moment, much too easily frightened, and Rolf’s observations could just as easily be linked to a couple of young lovers who had stopped for a cuddle. A kiss and a smoke. Or perhaps a responsible driver who had stopped to answer his mobile.

The doorbell rang.

The babysitter, he thought, and closed his eyes.

It was ten o’clock, and he was really too tired to go out.

In three months and five days it would be ten years since his father’s death.

Marcus Koll opened his eyes, stood up and tugged hard on both his earlobes to perk himself up. The doorbell rang again. As he crossed the living room he decided that 15 April would be the day when all his troubles would come to an end. Despite the fact that the date had lost its original significance, he would still use it as a milestone in his life: 15 April would be the turning point, and everything would be the way it had been before. If he could just get there. The house on the ridge would once again become a fortress; his secure framework around his family, far beyond his father’s dominion.

It was a promise he made to himself, and for some reason it made him feel a little bit better.