'Now you're here to tell me I was the one who stained your hands. And therefore I owe you a debt.'
Harry didn't answer.
'I agree,' Raskol said. 'Tell me what I owe.'
Harry stopped stroking the duvet. 'Three things. First of all, I need a place to hide until I've got to the bottom of this business.'
Raskol nodded.
'Secondly, I need the key to Anna's flat to check a couple of things.'
'I've already given it back.'
'Not the key with AA on, that's in a drawer in my place, and I can't go there now. And thirdly…'
Harry paused and Raskol scrutinised his face with curiosity.
'If I hear Rakel say anyone has so much as looked askance at them, I will give myself up, put all my cards on the table and finger you as the man behind Arne Albu's murder.'
Raskol gave him an indulgent, friendly smile. As if, on Harry's behalf, he regretted one thing they were both absolutely clear on–the fact that no one would ever succeed in finding any link whatsoever between Raskol and the murder. 'You don't need to worry about Rakel and Oleg, Spiuni. My contact was instructed to call off his artisans the moment we had dealt with Albu. You should be more concerned about the outcome of the trial. My contact says the prospects don't look too rosy. I understand the father's family has certain connections?'
Harry hunched his shoulders.
Raskol pulled out the desk drawer, took the shiny Trioving system key and gave it to Harry. 'Go to the metro station in Grřnland. Go down the first set of stairs and you'll see a woman sitting behind a window by the toilets. You need five kroner to get in. Tell her Harry has arrived, go into the Gents and lock yourself in one of the cubicles. When you hear someone come in whistling "Waltzing Matilda" it means your transport is ready. Good luck, Spiuni.'
* * *
The rain was hammering down so hard there was a fine shower rebounding off the tarmac, and if anyone had taken the time, they would have seen small rainbows in the streetlamps at the bottom of the narrow one-way section of Sofies gate. However, Bjarne Mřller didn't have time. He got out of the car, raised his coat over his head and ran across the street to the front door where Ivarsson, Weber and a man, apparently of Pakistani origin, stood waiting for him.
Mřller shook hands and the dark-skinned man introduced himself as Ali Niazi, Harry's neighbour.
'Waaler will be here as soon as he has cleared up in Slemdal,' Mřller said. 'What have you found?'
'Quite sensational things, I'm afraid,' Ivarsson said. 'The most important thing now is to work out how we're going to tell the press that one of our own police officers—'
'Whoa there,' Mřller rumbled. 'Not so fast. How about a debriefing?'
Ivarsson smiled thinly. 'Come with me.'
The Head of the Robberies Unit led the other three through a low door and down a crooked staircase into the cellar. Mřller contorted his long, thin body as well as he could to avoid touching the ceiling or walls. He didn't like cellars.
Ivarsson's voice was a dull echo between the brick walls. 'As you know, Beate Lřnn received a number of forwarded e-mails from Hole. He maintains he was sent them by a person who confessed to murdering Anna Bethsen. I've been to Police HQ and I read the e-mails an hour ago. To put it bluntly, they are for the most part confused, incomprehensible gibberish. But they do contain information which the writer could not have possessed without intimate knowledge of what went on the night Anna Bethsen died. Even though the information puts Hole in the flat that evening, it also apparently gives him an alibi.'
'Apparently?' Mřller ducked underneath another door frame. Inside, the ceiling was even lower, and he walked bent double while trying not to think that above him were four floors of building materials held together by centuries old wattle and daub. 'What do you mean, Ivarsson? Didn't you say the e-mails contained a confession?'
'First of all, we searched Hole's flat,' Ivarsson said. 'We switched on his computer and opened the mailbox and found all the e-mails he had received. Just as he had made out to Beate Lřnn. In other words, an apparent alibi.'
'I heard that,' Mřller said with obvious irritation. 'Can we get to the point quickly?'
'The point is, of course, the person who sent these e-mails to Harry's computer.'
Mřller heard voices.
'It's round that corner,' the man who introduced himself as Harry's neighbour said.
They came to a halt in front of a storeroom. Two men were crouching behind the wire mesh. One shone a torch on the back of a laptop while reading out a number, which the other noted down. Mřller saw two electric cables running from the wall socket, one to the laptop and the other to a scratched Nokia mobile phone, which in turn was connected to the laptop.