The Redeemer(75)

'Mm. Did Rikard talk to him?'

'Maybe. Do you want his number?'

'Please.'

'One moment.'

She was gone. She was right. Harry thought about the man getting up from the snow. How it had fallen off him, the limp arms and the blank face, like the zombies rising from graves in Night of the Living Dead.

Harry heard a cough and spun round in his chair. In the office doorway stood Gunnar Hagen and David Eckhoff.

'Are we disturbing?' Hagen asked.

'Come in,' Harry said.

The two men came in and sat down on the other side of the desk.

'We'd like a report,' Hagen said.

Before Harry could ask who he meant by 'we', Martine's voice was back with the number. Harry jotted it down.

'Thank you,' he said. 'Goodnight.'

'I was wondering—'

'I've got to go,' Harry said.

'Uh-huh. Goodnight.'

He put down the receiver.

'We came as fast as we could,' Martine's father said. 'This is awful. What happened?'

Harry looked at Hagen.

'Tell us,' Hagen said.

Harry gave them the bare bones of the failed arrest, described the bullet hitting the car and the chase through the park.

'But if you were so close and had an MP5 with you, why didn't you shoot him?' Hagen asked.

Harry cleared his throat, but waited. He observed Eckhoff.

'Well?' Hagen said with incipient irritation in his voice.

'It was too dark,' Harry said.

Hagen contemplated his inspector before responding. 'So he was out walking at the time you were entering his room. Any idea why a gunman would be outdoors when it's twenty degrees below and the middle of the night?' The POB lowered his voice. 'I assume you have round-theclock protection for Jon Karlsen.'

'Jon?' said David Eckhoff. 'But he's at Ullevål Hospital.'

'I have an officer posted outside his room,' Harry said, hoping his voice gave an impression of the kind of control he wished he had. 'I was about to check everything was alright.'

* * *


The first four notes of 'London Calling' by the Clash reverberated around the bare walls of the corridor in the neurosurgical ward of Ullevål Hospital. A man with flat hair and a dressing gown, walking with a drip on a stand, sent the police guard a reproachful glance as he passed. He was answering his mobile phone, contrary to hospital regulations.

'Stranden.'

'Hole here. Anything to report?'

'Not much. There's an insomniac wandering the corridors. Dodgylooking, but seems harmless enough.'

The man with the drip continued on his rounds with a sniff.

'Anything earlier this evening?'

'Yep. Spurs got trounced by Arsenal at White Hart Lane. And there was a power cut.'

'And the patient?'

'Not a peep.'

'Have you checked everything is OK?'

'Apart from haemorrhoids, everything seemed fine.'

Stranden listened to the ominous silence. 'Just a joke. I'll go and check right away. Stay on the line.'

The room smelt of something sugary. Sweets, he assumed. The light from the corridor swept across the room and went as the door closed behind him, but he could make out a face on the pillow. He went closer. It was quiet in here. Too quiet. As though sound was missing. One sound.

'Karlsen?'

No reaction.

Stranden coughed and repeated the name a bit louder. 'Karlsen.'

It was so quiet that Harry's voice on the phone rang out loud and clear. 'What's up?'

Stranden put the phone to his ear. 'He's sleeping like a baby.'

'Sure?'

Stranden observed the face on the pillow. And realised that was what was bothering him. Karlsen was sleeping like a baby. Grown men tend to make more noise. He leaned over the face to listen to his breathing.

'Hello!' Harry Hole's shout on the mobile phone sounded distant. 'Hello!'





16

Thursday, 18 December. The Refugee.



THE SUN WARMED HIM AND THE SLIGHT BREEZE ACROSS THE sand dunes made the grass ripple and nod in appreciation. He must have been swimming because the towel beneath him was wet. 'Look,' said his mother, pointing. He shaded his eyes and scanned the gleaming, unbelievably blue Adriatic Sea. And there he saw a man wading towards land with a big smile. It was his father. Behind him, Bobo. And Giorgi. A small dog was swimming beside him with its tiny tail upright like a mast. While he was watching them many more rose from the sea. Some he knew very well. Like Giorgi's father. Others were familiar. A face in a doorway in Paris. The features were distorted beyond recognition, into grotesque masks grimacing at him. The sun disappeared behind a cloud and the temperature plummeted. The masks started shouting.

He woke to a searing pain in his side and opened his eyes. He was in Oslo. On the floor under the stairs in an entrance hall. A figure stood over him, mouth open wide, shouting something. He recognised one word which was almost the same as in his own language. Narkoman.

Then the figure, a man in a short leather jacket, took a step back and lifted his foot. The kick hit him on his sore side and he rolled over in pain. There was another man behind the one wearing the jacket, laughing and holding his nose. The leather jacket pointed to the door.