Part 18 (1/2)

'We're a couple of old bachelors, you and me. Irretrievably.'

'Don't know about irretrievably. And you're married, after all.'

'Have been.'

'I've had so little time. Though sometimes I think this way takes up more time. All this b.l.o.o.d.y what's it called? courting. Unless you take the very simplest way out.'

He wanted some coffee anyhow.

'You keep the place in order, I see,' he said, out in the kitchen.

'I keep it in order and I cook dinner every day. I'm living kind of . . . under a gla.s.s dome. Palpating people's bellies and groins but not talking to them. I've given up reading about the case, too.'

'No need to bother. There's nothing new. You've read about Ivo Maertens, have you?'

'No.'

'He turned up at his home. His parents phoned. He came home on the first of July. It wasn't him. He'd had a tiff with the girl in Gothenburg and they'd parted. He had no idea who it was she had with her in the tent. Nor have we.'

'What was the tiff about?'

'There was a major rock concert in Gothenburg. Ivo Maertens and Sabine Vestdijk were staying at the camping site in Lngedrag and made contact with someone who wanted to sell them tickets. Black market, but at a reasonable price. Ivo didn't believe it. He was sure they'd be cheated, that the tickets weren't valid and they would never get in with them. So he didn't want to. So they fell out and he started sulking. I think he's pig-headed. She went to the concert. He doesn't know who she was with, whether it was the person selling the tickets or someone else. Ivo never saw who it was. But he thought it was a man. She didn't come back that night. He got d.a.m.ned worried by the morning and thought of going to the police. He went and asked at reception if they'd seen her and he asked in the tents next to theirs. However, she did come in the end. Out of another tent. That was the end between them. He was so furious, he packed up his things and left. He hitched home and that took a few days. He knew nothing about what had happened when he got back to Leiden. There they received him as if he had been resurrected from the dead. He doesn't know what plans she had when they parted in Lngedrag. But there had been no talk about the mountains, ever. So it seems as if that was the other man's idea. Sagittarius's.'

'Sagittarius? Had he shot someone?'

'Not as far as we know. The only thing of his we found in an old bag was a notebook. It had a sign of the zodiac on it: Sagittarius. That's really the only thing we think we know about him.'

'Why?'

'The notebook was bought here, from the general store in Byvngen. You can see that from the price tag. They had all the signs of the zodiac to choose from. So why should he have chosen one other than his own? They remember him. Though not that he bought a notebook. There were lots of people there on the day before Midsummer Eve. We've been able to trace Sabine Vestdijk and him all the way from Lngedrag, because they stayed at camping sites all the way up. In that big tent. There's been such a hullabaloo in the papers, people have phoned in. They arrived in Byvngen the day before Midsummer Eve and rented a room there for the first time. That was at the Three Pines. In her name only. The landlady doesn't remember if they said he was her husband. Anyhow, Sabine went to bed in the middle of the afternoon and he went to the chemist's. The a.s.sistant there remembers him. She thought he was good-looking. Though unpleasant. She reckoned he was a druggie. He had a headband and looked a bit sloppy, she thought. Though you never know. That depends on her own standards, and in the store they said nothing about his appearance except that he had quite long hair. He kept on saying he wanted Saridon. He couldn't understand that all strong drugs are on prescription. I don't think the a.s.sistant had much English, either, and he only spoke English. ”Painkiller,” he kept saying, over and over again. At first she didn't understand. She noted the word ”killer” and thought he was unpleasant. I think Sabine Vestdijk was feeling ill and needed a painkiller.'

'Period pains.'

'Yes, if they can be that bad. I don't know.'

'Young women can have very severe period pains.'

'Anyhow he drifted around the place. It's not definite that he bought the notebook himself. The a.s.sistant in the store can't remember his doing so. She remembers him because he spoke English. She doesn't know any English, she's an older woman, so she had to go and get help. That's how she remembered what the man wanted beer. Nothing else. The store manager who helped her remembers the same he bought only beer. So who bought the notebook? There were crowds of people the day before Mid-summer Eve, but no other customer spoke English. We don't even know if it was Sagittarius who wrote the telephone number in it. Norwegian. He was extremely careful with it anyhow, and hid the notebook under a plastic-covered piece of cardboard at the bottom of the bag. I got quite excited about that. But the number was to a small self-service store in a backwater on the coast above Brnnysund. They know nothing about him there. And I think that's true. There were some Norwegians at the Three Pines that night and they've been questioned, too, of course, but they didn't even know where the place was. Hard to say whether they were lying. But they weren't people who'd normally have anything to do with long-haired youths in ragged, grubby jeans. They were a teacher couple from Namsos and a vet from Steinkjer. The poor girl never got any painkillers, but may have drunk some vodka, since there was an empty bottle in the room. Koskenkorva.'

'What about the powder you showed me?'

ke looked embarra.s.sed.

'I had the same thought about him as the chemist's a.s.sistant had. But when they a.n.a.lysed the powder, it turned out to be mostly acetylsalicylic acid. Caffeine, too, and cola seeds. Same as in Coca-Cola.'

's.e.m.e.n colae,' said Birger. 'But I don't recognise that mixture.'

'No stronger than aspirin, anyhow. That was all she had taken. They had gone in the morning left without paying. Probably very early. No one knows what they got up to in the morning. Eventually she appeared at Lill-Ola Lennartsson's. The man went shopping at the store. He actually asked about a mountain. But I'm beginning to think they had simply driven the wrong way, for it wasn't a mountain anywhere around here.'

'Which was it then?'

'Starhill. That isn't here. Meanwhile she's at Lill-Ola's. So it's possible Lill-Ola thought she was alone. In that case, it wasn't all that strange that he flannelled around and lent her a tent and so on. He's quite a one for the ladies. They say he's so b.l.o.o.d.y cheeky, he goes in to lone wives in rented cabins when their husbands are out fis.h.i.+ng at night. I don't know.'

'You've had to listen to an awful lot of s.h.i.+t.'

'Yes, I've heard quite enough about Lill-Ola Lennartsson. He was the one who said he saw you crossing the road and going into the forest. Up by the Lobber.'

'Then he's insane.'

'He may have seen someone else, of course. And thought it was you. But I think he said it because I had his boiler room searched. He realised you had tipped me off.'

'I find it hard to believe . . .'

'You're nice, Birger, that's what you are. But wait that's not all. He said I began to persecute him afterwards. Searching his cellar and house. That I was protecting you. He's lying, the b.l.o.o.d.y creep. But they believe him.'

It had gone quiet, the turntable whirling round, but Birger couldn't bring himself to choose another record. He was so disgusted, he didn't want to hear any more, but nevertheless said: 'So they really do think I went up to the Lobber?'

'No, they don't. They don't think anything. They're trying to work without any presumptions. And I think they've got nowhere with your things, boots or whatever it was. You would have heard from them again. You mustn't take it so hard that there's been so much questioning. Lill-Ola. His wife. She may have been up there wanting to see what he was up to. She's not unaware of his little peccadilloes. They've questioned Dan Ulander and Annie Raft and the whole Starhill lot. Yvonne and her men. They've turned over every stone in the village. But they did believe one thing, and that was that he had mentioned seeing you. That he said it to me at the very first interrogation. They think I thought it absurd because I'd been with you, and that I thought we'd been in contact all the time. But they think I couldn't know that, not for sure, and that I ought to have included his statement in the records. Even if it wasn't believable.'

'So that's why they've taken you off the case?'

'Yes. I've made a formal error, they say. However foolish I thought his statement was, I should have taken it down. But it doesn't exist! And they don't believe that. Recently I've been thinking I was going crazy. That s.h.i.+t! That shady b.a.s.t.a.r.d! He burnt a whole load of Three Towers boots. He was afraid the police would come snooping into the house. They must have been stolen goods, for there's no such delivery in his account books. He has no delivery note, no invoice, nothing. And he sold them incredibly cheaply. Almost everyone in the village bought some. That doesn't exactly make the investigation any easier. And they believe him.'

'What about the capercaillies? Why did he burn those? He's paid his dues and has shooting rights for small game. Surely there was nothing to be afraid of there?'

'I don't know. It's conceivable they've got somewhere with that, but I've heard nothing about it. They're looking for sleeping-bag feathers.'

ke wasn't looking at Birger as he spoke. He was gazing over in the direction of the big window facing the garden, but there was nothing to see except reflections in the gla.s.s. He was gazing at nothing, looking inwards at winding marshland paths disappearing into the night mist. He could see people moving around the Area. He could see them appearing and disappearing from his gaze, which was no gaze, but grinding thoughts.

He was obsessed. He was following the paths in the marshlands and along the highways from the village as Birger each day followed the whorls in the latticework of the veranda. He had been taken off the case, but all his energy was still going into it. To no purpose.

Dan was lying on her bed as she came in. He was alone in the room and lay half turned to the wall, naked, the light from the window reflected in his brownish skin, which looked slightly moist. He was holding his p.e.n.i.s and moving his wrist and lower arm. She started backing out, but he had already noticed she was there.

'What are you doing?' she said, hearing herself laughing what was not a real laugh.

'Masturbating,' he said in a not entirely clear voice. Annie sank to her knees and slipped the papers and books to the floor, trying to do so as quietly as she could. Then she didn't know what to do. She picked up a bundle of papers and a few diaries, then put them under the bed. She could hear his breathing had got faster. He made a movement and the bed creaked, then it was quite quiet.

Her mouth filled with saliva, making her swallow, but she went on pus.h.i.+ng the diaries in towards the wall. He had got up off the bed. When she had finished and had to get up, he was standing in the doorway wiping himself on a towel. Confusedly, she thought that it belonged in the kitchen.

'You mustn't disturb me when I'm thinking about you,' he said. She pretended to straighten the shawl she had used as a tablecloth as she tried to find something to say. All she could think of was, He's more natural than I am. He would laugh if he knew how I feel. How dramatically I take everything. She hurriedly slapped shut the notebook lying on the table and when she turned round, he had gone.

In the last few days, Dan and she had made love several times in the hayloft above the barn. The hay was dry and sharp and p.r.i.c.kled through the material of her blouse. Afterwards she had wanted to stay there in that scent of summer. She would have liked to fall asleep there, but the smell was not really all that pleasant. It was old hay.

He wanted them to do it in the room at night as well, but she didn't want to because of Mia. She couldn't rely on her being asleep. It rustled up there occasionally. Mia played with her dolls in the dark, whispering to them.

Annie had hidden in the hayloft when the journalists had come. She had heard them walking past with Petrus, and she heard him telling them about keeping goats and breeding sheep. She was the one they wanted to meet. They wanted her to tell them what the slashed tent by the Lobber had looked like and how much she had seen of the bodies. Instead Petrus had told them all about how to make cheese when there is no electricity.

They stayed for a long time and now and again she heard their voices. To pa.s.s the time, she had taken the opportunity to look for the box for her diaphragm, which she had lost in the hay. Stirring up dust and chaff, she rummaged around, and soon felt a hard edge. It wasn't the box, but a white plastic medicine jar. A tranquilliser. Prescribed for Barbro Torbjornsson, and almost empty.

She went on searching for her box and found it, as well as a nailfile and a small hotel soap container. The contents of a sponge bag must have fallen into the hay. She showed the things to Dan and he took them. She said she was feeling dispirited.