Harry was back in the sitting room. He placed his
hand over his eyes. Why hadn’t he made the
connection as soon as he saw the picture of Helena
in Beatrice’s room? Mother and daughter. His
mind must have been elsewhere. Probably that was
exactly it – his mind was elsewhere. He saw Rakel
everywhere: on the street in passing women’s
faces, on ten TV channels when he was zapping
around, behind the counter in a café. So why would
he pay any particular attention to seeing her face in
a photograph of a beautiful woman on a wall?
Should he ring Mosken for confirmation of what
Gudbrand Johansen, alias Sindre Fauke, had
written? Did he need to? Not now.
He flicked through the manuscript until he arrived
at the entry for 5 October 1999. There were only a
few pages left. Harry could feel his palms were
sweaty. He felt a trace of the same thing that
Rakel’s father had described when he received
Helena’s letter – a reluctance to be confronted
finally with the inevitable.
Oslo. 5 October 1999.
I’m going to die. After all the things I have been
through it was curious to find out I was to be
given the coup de grâce , as most people are, by a common illness. How will I tell Rakel and Oleg? I
walked up Karl Johans gate and felt how dear
this life, which I have experienced as worthless
ever since Helena’s death, had suddenly become
to me. Not because I don’t yearn to be with you
again, Helena, but because I have neglected my
purpose on earth for so long and now there isn’t
much time left. I walked up the same gravel path
I did on 13 May 1945. The Crown Prince still
hasn’t come out on the balcony to say he
understands. He just understands all the others
in need. I don’t think he will come. I think he has
betrayed us.
Afterwards I fell asleep against a tree and
dreamed a long, strange dream, like a revelation.
And when I awoke, my old companion was awake
too. Daniel is back. And I know what he wants to
do.
The Ford Escort groaned as Harry brutally forced
the gearstick into reverse, first and second gears in
succession. And it roared like a wounded beast
when he pressed the accelerator pedal to the floor
and held it there. A man wearing a festive Østerdal
outfit, on his way over the zebra crossing at the
intersection between Vibes gate and Bogstadveien,
jumped and thus narrowly avoided an almost
perfectly treadless rubber-tyre mark on his
stockinged leg. In Hedgehaugsveien there was a
queue of traffic for the city centre, so Harry drove
down the left-hand side of the road with his hand
on the horn, hoping oncoming cars would have the
sense to swerve out of the way. He had just
manoeuvred his way around the verge outside
Lorry Kafé when a wall of light blue suddenly
filled his entire field of vision. The tram!
It was too late to stop, so Harry jerked the
steering wheel round hard, gave the brake pedal a
little squeeze to straighten the back up and bumped
across the cobblestones until he crashed into the
tram, left side on left side. There was a sharp bang
when the wing mirror disappeared, but the sound
of the door handle being dragged along the side of
the tram was long and piercing.
‘Fuck. Fuck!’
Then he was freed and the wheels spun
themselves out of the tram rails and found a grip on
the tarmac, propelling him towards the next traffic
lights.
Green, green, amber.
He drove off at full throttle, still with one hand
pressed against the centre of the steering wheel in
a vain hope that one paltry car horn would be able
to attract attention at 10.15 on 17 May in the centre
of Oslo. Then he shrieked, jumped on the brakes
and, as the Escort desperately tried to cling to
mother earth, empty cassette cases, packets of
cigarettes and Harry Hole flew forwards. He hit
his head on the wind-screen as the car came to
rest. A cheering crowd of children waving flags
had streamed out onto the zebra crossing in front of
him. Harry rubbed his forehead. The Palace
Gardens were right in front of him and the path up
to the Palace was black with people. From the
open cabriolet in the queue next to him he heard the
radio and the familiar live broadcast which was
the same every year.
‘And now the royal family is waving from the
balcony to the procession of children and the
crowds which have gathered here in the Palace
Square. People are cheering, especially for the
popular Crown Prince, who has returned home
from the USA. He is of course . . .’
Harry let the clutch out, accelerated and headed
for the kerb in front of the gravel path.
99
Oslo. 16 October 1999.
I HAVE STARTED LAUGHING AGAIN. IT IS DANIEL
LAUGHING, of course. I didn’t say that one of the