The tracks by the portico were still quite clear. Rolf tried to hold his mobile at the same distance from the ground as he took another picture. He could upload them on to the computer and enlarge the pictures in order to compare them. As he was putting the phone in his pocket, he caught sight of a cigarette butt. It must have been covered by the snow, but had now become visible in one of his footprints. He bent down and scraped gently at the impression left by his boot. Another butt appeared. And another. When he examined the first one in the dim light of a street lamp, it told him nothing. He couldn’t even read the brand.
Three cigarettes. Rolf had given up smoking many years ago, but still remembered that it took about seven minutes to smoke a cigarette. Seven times three was twenty-one. If the driver had been chain-smoking, the car had been here for almost half an hour.
The police thought the burglars might be from Eastern Europe. In the newspaper they had said that people should keep their eyes open; this gang or gangs clearly undertook a considerable amount of preliminary investigation before they struck. The cigarette butts could be valuable evidence.
He carefully placed them in one of the black bags he kept in the pockets of all his jackets for picking up dog shit. Then he put the bag in his pocket and set off towards the house. He would ring the police immediately.
The answerphone cut out, but she had no idea why. Perhaps one of the children had pressed some button or other. At any rate, she hadn’t heard the whole of Adam’s message. When she heard footsteps on the stairs she stiffened, before a familiar voice called: ‘It’s me. I’m home.’
‘So I see,’ she said with a smile, stroking his cheek as he kissed her gently. ‘Weren’t you going back to Bergen?’
‘Yes. I’ve already been there. But as there a number of things I can work on just as easily from Oslo, I caught an afternoon flight home. I’ll stay here for this week, I think.’
‘Excellent! Are you hungry?’
‘I’ve eaten. Didn’t you get my message?’
‘No, there’s something wrong with the phone.’
Adam pulled off his tie, after fumbling with the knot for so long that Johanne offered to help.
‘The person who invented this ridiculous item of clothing should be shot,’ he muttered. ‘What on earth is all this?’
He frowned at the piles of documents and books, journals and loose sheets of paper lying around her on the sofa and almost covering the coffee table completely. Johanne was sitting cross-legged in the middle of it all with her reading glasses perched on her nose and a large glass of steaming hot tea in her hand.
‘I’m getting into hatred,’ she smiled. ‘I’m reading about hatred.’
‘Good God,’ he groaned. ‘As if I don’t get enough of that kind of thing at work. What are you drinking?’
‘Tea. Two parts Lady Grey and one part Chinese Pu-erh. There’s more in the Thermos in the kitchen if you’d like some.’
He took off his shoes and went to fetch a cup.
Johanne closed her eyes. The inexplicable anxiety and unease were still there, but spending a chaotic afternoon with the children had helped. Ragnhild, who would be five on 21 January and hardly talked about anything else, had arranged a practice birthday for all her dolls and teddy bears. During dinner Johanne and Kristiane had acquired hats, made from Ragnhild’s knickers covered in Hannah Montana stickers. Kristiane had given a long lecture about the movement of the planets around the sun, concluding with the announcement that she was going to be an astronaut when she grew up. Since Kristiane’s perception of time could be difficult to understand, and as she rarely showed any interest in things that might happen more than a couple of days in the future, Johanne had delightedly dug out all the books from her own childhood, when she had had exactly the same dream.
When the children were in bed, her unease had come back. In order to keep it in check, she had decided to work.
‘Tell me all about it,’ said Adam, flopping down into an armchair.
He held the cup of tea up to his face, letting the steam cover his skin like a moist film.
‘About what?’
‘About hatred.’
‘I should think you know more about it than I do.’
‘Don’t joke. I’m interested. What are you up to?’
He took a sip from his cup. The blend of tea was fresh and light, with a slightly acidic scent.
‘I was thinking,’ she said slowly, then paused. ‘I was thinking of approaching the concept of hatred from the outside. From the inside, too, of course, but in order to say anything meaningful about hate crime I think we have to delve deeply into the concept itself. With all this money that’s suddenly raining down on us…’
She looked up as if it really was.
‘… I can bring in that girl I mentioned, for example.’
‘Girl?’
‘Charlotte Holm. She specializes in the history of ideas. She’s the one I told you about, the one who wrote… this.’
She glanced around quickly before picking up a booklet.
‘Love and Hatred: A Conceptual Historical Analysis,’ Adam read slowly.
‘Exciting,’ she said, tossing the booklet aside. ‘I’ve spoken to her, and she’s probably going to start working with me in February.’
‘So how many of you will that make?’ asked Adam with a frown, as if the thought of a bunch of researchers using taxpayers’ money to immerse themselves in hatred made him deeply sceptical.
‘Four. Probably. It’ll be cool. I’ve always worked alone, more or less. And this…’
She picked up a piece of paper in one hand and waved the other hand at the rest of the papers surrounding her.
‘This is all legal hatred. Verbal hatred that is protected by the concept of freedom of speech. Since malicious comments against minorities correspond to a significant extent with what is clearly hate crime, I think it’s interesting to see how it all hangs together. Where the boundaries are.’
‘What boundaries?’
‘The boundaries for what is covered by freedom of speech.’
‘But isn’t that almost everything?’
‘Unfortunately, yes.’
‘Unfortunately? Surely we should thank God for the fact that we can say more or less anything we like in this country!’
‘Of course. But listen…’
She tucked her feet underneath her. He looked at her. When he got home he had just wanted to fall into bed, even though it wasn’t even ten o’clock. He was still tired after a day that had been much too long and not particularly productive, but he no longer had any desire to sleep. Over the years he and Johanne had fallen into a pattern where most of their life together revolved around his work, her concerns and the children. When he saw her like this, sitting amidst a sea of paper without even mentioning the children, he remembered in a flash what it had been like to be intensely in love with her.
‘Freedom of speech goes a long way,’ she said, searching for an article among the chaos. ‘As it should. But as you know, it has some limitations. The most interesting comes under paragraph 135a in the penal code. I don’t want to bore you with too much legal stuff, but I just want to-’
‘You never bore me. Never.’
‘I’m sure I do.’
‘Not at the moment, anyway.’
A fleeting smile, and she went on. ‘A few people have been convicted for overstepping the law. Very few. The issue – or perhaps I should say the question of priorities – relates to freedom of speech. And judging by everything I have here…’