Phantom(40)

‘Perhaps we’d better get you registered,’ Bellman said, nodding to the guard.

Tord Schultz slowly shook his head. ‘I’d rather this meeting remained confidential.’

‘Rules state that everyone should be registered, but I can reassure you that the information stays here at Police HQ.’ Bellman signalled to the Securitas guard.

In the lift on the way up, Schultz stroked his finger over the name on the sticker the guard had printed and told him to wear on his lapel.

‘Anything wrong?’ Bellman asked.

‘Not at all,’ Tord said. But he continued rubbing, hoping he could erase his name.

Bellman’s office was surprisingly small.

‘Size doesn’t matter,’ Bellman said in a tone suggesting he was used to the reaction. ‘Great things have been accomplished from here.’ He pointed to a picture on the wall. ‘Lars Axelsen, head of what was the Robberies Unit. Smashed the Tveita gang in the nineties.’

He motioned Tord to sit down. Took out a notebook, met Tord’s glare and put it away again.

‘Well?’ he said.

Tord inhaled. And talked. He started with the divorce. He needed that. Needed to start with the why. Then he moved on to the when and where. Then to who and how. And in the end he talked about the burner.

Throughout the narration Bellman sat leaning forward, following carefully. Only when Tord talked about the burner did his face lose its concentrated, though professional, expression. After the initial surprise a red hue suffused the white pigment stains. It was a strange sight, as though a flame had been lit on the inside. He lost eye contact with Bellman, who was staring bitterly at the wall behind him, perhaps at the picture of Lars Axelsen.

After Tord had finished, Bellman sighed and raised his head.

Tord noticed there was a new look to his eyes. Hard and defiant.

‘I apologise,’ the section head said. ‘On behalf of myself, my profession and the police force. I apologise for not having disposed of the bedbug.’

Bellman must have been saying that to himself, Tord thought, and not to him, a pilot who had been smuggling eight kilos of heroin a week.

‘I appreciate that you’re concerned,’ Bellman said. ‘I wish I could say you have nothing to fear. But bitter experience tells me that when this kind of corruption is exposed it goes down a lot further than one individual.’

‘I understand.’

‘Have you told anyone else about this?’

‘No.’

‘Does anyone know you are here and talking to me?’

‘No, no one.’

‘No one at all?’

Tord looked at him. Smiled wryly without saying what he was thinking: who was there to tell?

‘OK,’ Bellman said. ‘This is an important, serious and extremely delicate matter you’ve brought to my attention. I’ll have to proceed very warily so as not to warn those who must not be warned. That means I’ll have to take the matter higher. You know, I ought to put you on remand for what you have told me, but imprisonment now could expose both you and us. So until the situation has been clarified you should go home and stay there. Do you understand? Don’t tell anyone about this meeting, don’t go outdoors, don’t open the door to strangers, don’t answer phone calls from unfamiliar numbers.’

Tord nodded slowly. ‘How long will it take?’

‘Three days max.’

‘Roger that.’

Bellman appeared to be about to say something, but stopped and hesitated before finally deciding.

‘This is something I’ve never been able to understand,’ he said. ‘That some people are willing to destroy the lives of others for money. Well, perhaps if you’re a poor Afghan peasant … But a Norwegian with the salary of a chief pilot …’

Tord Schultz met his eyes. He had prepared himself for this; it almost felt like relief when it came.

‘Nevertheless, coming here of your own free will and laying your cards on the table is brave. I know what you’re risking. Life won’t be easy from now on, Schultz.’

With that, the head of Orgkrim stood up and proffered his hand. And the same thought went through Tord’s mind as when he had seen him approaching in reception: Mikael Bellman was the perfect height for a fighter pilot.

* * *

As Tord Schultz was leaving Police HQ, Harry Hole was ringing Rakel’s doorbell. She opened up, wearing a dressing gown and narrow slits for eyes. She yawned.

‘I’ll look better later in the day,’ she said.

‘Nice that one of us will,’ Harry said, stepping inside.

‘Good luck,’ she said, standing in front of the living-room table piled with documents. ‘It’s all there. Case reports. Photos. Newspaper cuttings. Witness statements. He’s thorough. I have to go to work.’