After checking in for his flight and going through security control, he went straight to the men's toilets. He stood at the end of the line of white bowls, unbuttoned and sprayed the white urinal blocks at the bottom of the bowl. He closed his eyes and concentrated on the sweet smell of paradichlorobenzene and the lemon fragrance enhancer from J & J Chemicals. The connecting line to freedom had one stop left. He rolled the name on his tongue. Os-lo.
3
Sunday, 14 December. The Bite.
IN THE RED ZONE ON THE SIXTH FLOOR OF POLICE HQ, THE concrete and glass colossus with the largest concentration of police in Norway, Harry sat back in his chair in room 605. This was the office that Halvorsen – the young policeman Harry shared the ten square metres with – liked to call the Clearing House. And that Harry, when Halvorsen had to be taken down a peg or two, called In-House Training.
But at this moment Harry was on his own, staring at the wall where the window might have been if the Clearing House had such a thing.
It was Sunday; he had written the report and could go home. So why didn't he? Through the imaginary window he saw the fenced-off harbour in Bjørvika where fresh snow lay like confetti on the green, red and blue containers. The case was solved. Per Holmen, a young heroin addict, had had enough of life and had taken his final shot inside a container. From a gun. No external signs of violence; the gun down by his side. As far as the undercover boys knew, Per Holmen did not owe any money. When dealers execute junkies with debts, they don't usually try to camouflage it as something else. Quite the contrary. A cut-and-dried case of suicide then. So why waste the evening ferreting round a grim, wind-blown container terminal where all he would find was more sorrow and grief?
Harry looked at his woollen coat hanging on the hatstand. The small hip flask in the inside pocket was full. And untouched since he went to the vinmonopol in October, bought a bottle of his worst enemy, Jim Beam, and filled his flask before emptying the rest down the sink. Since then he had carried the poison on him, a bit like the way Nazis kept cyanide pills in the soles of their shoes. Why bother with such a stupid idea? He didn't know. He didn't have to know. It worked.
Harry looked at the clock. Soon be eleven. At home he had a much used espresso machine and a DVD he had put by for just such an evening as this. All About Eve, Mankiewicz's 1950 masterpiece with Bette Davis and George Sanders.
He took an internal reading. And knew it was going to be the harbour.
Harry had turned up the lapels of his coat and stood with his back to the north wind that blew right through the tall fence in front of him and formed snowdrifts around the containers on the inside. The harbour area and the large, empty expanses looked like a desert at night.
The enclosed container terminal was illuminated, but the lamp posts swayed in the gusting wind and the metal boxes piled up in twos or threes cast shadows over the streets. The particular one Harry had his eye on was red and something of a colour clash with the orange police tape. But it was a great refuge on a December night in Oslo, with almost identical measurements and the same level of comfort as the security cells in the custody block at Police HQ.
The report by the Crime Scene Unit – though it was hardly a unit, numbering one detective and one technician – said the container had stood empty for a while. Unlocked. The site watchman had explained that they didn't bother much about locking empty containers as the area was fenced off and, furthermore, under surveillance. Nevertheless a drug addict had got in. Per Holmen, he supposed, had been one of the many who had hung out around Bjørvika, which was a mere stone's throw from the junkies' supermarket in Plata. Perhaps the watchman had turned a blind eye to them using the containers as accommodation? Perhaps he knew that in so doing they had saved the odd life or two?
There was no lock on the container, but there was a big, fat padlock on the gate in the fence. Harry regretted that he hadn't rung from HQ to say he was coming. If there were any guards here, he couldn't see any.
Harry checked his watch. Deliberated and surveyed the top of the fence. He was in good shape. Better than for a long time. He hadn't touched alcohol since the catastrophe last summer, and he had been training on a regular basis in the police gym. More than regular. Before the snow came, he had broken Tom Waaler's old steeplechase record in Økern. A few days later Halvorsen had cautiously asked if all the training had anything to do with Rakel. Because his impression was that they weren't seeing each other any more. Harry had explained to the young officer in a curt yet clear way that they might share an office but not a private life. Halvorsen had shrugged, asked who else Harry talked to and had his assumption confirmed when Harry got up and marched out of room 605.