Cockroaches(79)

“Just that powerful men have a tendency to bend laws in their favor. I have no reason to doubt the present government’s integrity, but it hardly increases the chances of an extradition if the man has political influence and an arrest would further delay the whole building program.”

“So what are you doing?”

“Things are moving. We’re waiting for the new extradition agreement to come into effect. Once it’s in place, we wait a little, arrest Klipra and explain to the Thai authorities that the photos were taken after the agreement was signed.”

“And convict him for having sex with minors?”

“Plus a murder perhaps.”

Harry recoiled in his chair.

“Did you imagine you were the only person to link the knife with Klipra, Detective?” Løken said, trying to light his pipe.

“What do you know about the knife?” Harry asked.

“I escorted Tonje Wiig to the motel when she identified the ambassador. I took a couple of photos.”

“While there was a crowd of police officers standing around watching?”

“Well, it’s a very little camera. It can fit in a wristwatch, like this one.” Løken smiled. “You can’t buy them in shops.”

“And then you connected the glass mosaic with Klipra’s house?”

“I’ve been in contact with one of the people involved in the sale of the temple to Klipra, a pongyi at the Mahasi Center in Rangoon. The knife was part of the decorations in the temple and bought by Klipra. According to the monk, these are made in pairs. There should be another knife which is identical.”

“Wait a minute,” Harry said. “If you contacted this monk you must have had an inkling that the knife was in some way connected to Burmese temples.”

Løken shrugged.

“Come on,” Harry said, “you’re not an art historian as well. We had to use a professor just to establish there was a link with a Shan something or other. You suspected Klipra even before you asked.”

Løken burned his fingers and threw the match away, annoyed.

“I had reason to believe the murder could have had something to do with Klipra. You see, I was sitting in the flat opposite Klipra’s place the day the ambassador was murdered.”

“And?”

“Atle Molnes drove around at about seven. At eight he and Klipra left in the ambassador’s car.”

“Are you sure it was them? I’ve seen the car and as with most embassy cars the windows are tinted, almost impenetrable.”

“I saw Klipra through the camera lens when the car arrived. It parked in the garage and there’s a door leading from it into the house, so at first I only saw Klipra getting up and walking to the door. Then I didn’t see anyone for a while until I caught sight of the ambassador walking around the sitting room. Then the car left again, and Klipra had gone.”

“You can’t be sure it was the ambassador.”

“Why not?”

“Because from where you were sitting you would only have seen the bottom half of him, the rest was hidden by the mosaic.”

Løken laughed. “Well, that was more than enough,” he said and finally managed to get the pipe lit. He puffed contentedly. “Because there was only one person who walked around in a bright yellow suit like his.”

In other circumstances Harry might have obliged with a grin, but right now there were too many other things churning around in his head.

“Why haven’t Torhus and the Police Commissioner been informed about this?”

“Who says they haven’t?”

Harry could feel some pressure behind his eyes. The politicians had kept him completely in the dark. He looked around for something to smash.





37


Sunday, January 19


It was getting on for eleven when he got home.

“You have a visitor,” the guard at the gate said.

Harry took the lift up, lay on his back by the pool and listened to the tiny, rhythmical splashes as Runa swam.

“You have to go home,” he said after some time. She didn’t answer, and he got up and walked the whole way down to his flat.


Bjarne Møller stood by the window looking out. It was early evening but already pitch-black. The cold wasn’t going to relinquish its grip in the near future, it seemed. The boys thought it was great fun and came to the table with their fingers frozen and cheeks red while arguing about who had jumped the furthest.

Time went so fast; it wasn’t very long since he held them between his skis and plowed down the hills from Grefsenkollen Ridge. Yesterday he had gone into their bedroom and asked if he should read to them and they just gave him a funny look.

Trine had said he looked tired. Was he? Maybe. There was a lot to think about, more than he had imagined perhaps when he accepted the job as PAS. If it wasn’t reports, meetings and budgets, then one of his officers was banging on the door with a problem Bjarne was unable to solve—a wife who wanted a separation, a mortgage that had grown out of control or nerves that were fraying.