Fear Not

She held her breath for so long that Adam wondered if something was wrong.

‘Of course!’ she said suddenly in a loud voice, turning to look at Adam. ‘Let’s assume that my theory is correct. The other murders are perceived as something else. The objective was quite simply…’

She stared at him as if she had only just noticed that he was sitting there.

‘… that they should die,’ she said in surprise. ‘The only objective was that they should die! Death itself was the goal!’

Adam thought it was fairly obvious that a person was murdered because someone wanted them dead, but he kept quiet.

‘They’re sinners,’ said Johanne, waxing almost enthusiastic. ‘And they must be punished for their sins! It doesn’t matter to The 25’ers whether the rest of us can see a link, or whether we even realize a crime lies behind their deaths. The most important thing is that they must die, and then that the murderers – God’s instruments, so to speak – are not subject to our worldly legislation.’

‘Yes,’ Adam ventured tentatively.

‘Only one of these victims is known to the public,’ Johanne went on. ‘Eva Karin Lysgaard. And she was the only one who was murdered in a way that positively cries out for attention. Why would that be, Adam?’

She knelt on the sofa and turned towards him. Her face was glowing. Her eyes were shining, her mouth half- open. She took his hand and squeezed it so hard it almost hurt.

‘Why, Adam?’

‘Because,’ he said. ‘Because…’

‘Because they want us to start digging into her life! The investigation into the murder of Eva Karin Lysgaard is an investigation they wanted to happen, Adam! The whole point was for us to turn her life upside down, just as all murder victims have their lives turned inside out in the hope that something will turn up!’

‘In the hope that something will turn up,’ he repeated quietly. ‘Hang on a minute.’

Johanne followed him with her eyes as he padded into the hallway. She was out of breath, and her palms prickled when he came back and handed her a photograph before sitting down again.

‘Who’s this?’ she asked.

‘I don’t know who she is,’ he said. ‘But this is a copy of a photograph that went astray.’

He told her about the room that had been Eva Karin’s sanctuary at night. About the photograph that had been there the day after the murder, but had disappeared when he went back a couple of days later. When he got to the part about Lukas scrambling across the roof in the January rain, he started to laugh. At the end he took back the photograph and laid it on his knee.

‘Lukas thought she might be his sister,’ he said. ‘But you can tell from both the quality of the picture and the clothes she’s wearing that it’s hardly likely it was taken around 1980. And her hairstyle isn’t exactly typical of the eighties either.’

‘So what do you think?’ said Johanne, without taking her eyes off the photograph.

‘I’ve been wondering whether she might be an unknown aunt rather than sister to Lukas. Eva Karin’s illegitimate sister. That would explain the fact that she looks a bit like Lukas.’

‘Does she? I think she looks like Lill Lindfors.’

Adam grinned. ‘You’re not the only one. Anyway, it won’t be long until we know who she is. Both the Bergen police and NCIS are working on it. If this woman is still alive, we’ll know who she is in a few days. If not sooner.’

‘And where will that lead?’

‘What? Finding out who she is?’

‘Yes. How can you be sure she’s got something to do with the case?’

‘I suppose I can’t be sure,’ Adam said hesitantly. ‘But you have to admit it’s weird that Erik Lysgaard put it away as soon as he had the chance.’

‘Have you asked him about it?’

‘No… It gives me the upper hand if he doesn’t even know I’ve discovered the photograph, and I want to keep it that way.’

In the apartment below the film had reached Knowing Me, Knowing You. The neighbours had turned down the volume at last, but the bass still vibrated through the floor. Johanne took back the photograph.

‘What an exciting face,’ she murmured. ‘Strong, somehow.’

Adam leaned forward and grabbed a handful of crisps. So far he’d managed to resist temptation.

‘Can you move those out of the way, please,’ he mumbled as he crunched away. ‘Crisps are the work of the devil.’

Instead of doing as he asked, she got up and started to walk around the room with the photograph in her hand.

‘Adam,’ she said expressionlessly, almost absent-mindedly. ‘Eva Karin’s murder is different from the others in terms of the method. What else distinguishes this case from the rest?’

‘I… I don’t really know.’

‘There’s reason to believe that all the other victims were gay. Or at any rate that they had a direct link to homosexual or lesbian activities.’

Adam stopped chewing. The crisps suddenly felt like an unappetizing, sticky calorie bomb in his mouth. He picked up a used serviette from the table, spat the revolting, yellowish-brown mass into it and tried to screw it up. A little bit fell on the floor, and he bent down sheepishly to retrieve it.

Johanne took no notice whatsoever. She had stopped by the window. She stood with her back to him for a long time before turning around and pointing at the photograph.

‘Eva Karin is the only heterosexual,’ she said. ‘At least, she’s the only one who is apparently heterosexual.’

‘What do you mean by…? What do you mean by “apparently”?’

‘This,’ said Johanne, holding the photograph up to face him. ‘This is neither Lukas’s nor Eva Karin’s sister. This is the Bishop’s lover.’

There was complete silence in the building. The film must have finished in the apartment below. The wind had dropped. The floor-boards didn’t even creak as she walked back to the sofa and carefully – as if she didn’t want to lose a complex chain of thought – sat down beside him.

‘It’s not possible,’ Adam said eventually. ‘We haven’t heard a single rumour. That kind of thing leads to gossip, Johanne. People talk about that kind of thing. It’s not possible for…’

He grabbed the photograph, a little more roughly than he had intended.

‘In that case, why does she look so much like Lukas?’

‘Pure coincidence. Besides which, both you and no doubt Lukas have studied this photograph so intently to try and find a clue that even the slightest resemblance would strike you. It happens. People look like one another sometimes. For example, you look a lot like-’

‘But if it hasn’t occurred to us that Eva Karin might have been living a double life, then how could The 25’ers know about it? If you’re right about this completely absurd… If you’re right about…’

He swallowed and ran his fingers through his hair in an uncertain, resigned gesture.

‘Nobody knew about it! How can The 25’ers have known about a… a lesbian lover…’

He spat out the words as if they had a bitter taste.

‘… when nobody else knew?’

‘Somebody knew. One person knew.’

‘Who?’

‘Erik Lysgaard. Her husband. He must have known. You don’t live together for forty years without knowing that sort of thing. They must have had… some kind of agreement.’

‘And then he would have… told… he would have… if he had any idea that…’

It almost seemed as if the big man was about to burst into tears. Johanne still hadn’t noticed a thing.

‘He must have told someone,’ she said. ‘Not The 25’ers, obviously, but someone close to them. That’s why they wanted this case investigated, Adam. They wanted us to discover Eva Karin’s… sin. And that’s what we’ve just done.’