He didn’t like the cellar.
The complex machinery down here was maintained by a team of specialists. Fritiof Hansen might occasionally change a light bulb or fix a door that had got stuck, but the hotel used external companies for renovations and maintenance. And for the air-conditioning system. The module that collected fresh air from outside was located on the roof and in its own area on the top floor. The plant itself was in the cellar. Over the years it had been augmented in a way that made it into two independent appliances. During the latest phase of modernization it had been recommended that the whole thing be renewed, but this proved too expensive, so a compromise was reached between the hotel and the suppliers: a new, smaller plant was installed to ease the load on the old one. Fritiof Hansen could hear the low, monotone hum before he reached the inner corridor where the locked doors to the machine room were located.
As he walked down the stairs, he wrinkled his nose. It didn’t smell quite the same as the polluted rooms, but here, too, a strange, sweetish smell found its way into his nostrils, combined with damp and dust and the distinctive mustiness of old buildings.
Fritiof Hansen didn’t believe in ghosts. He believed in his brother and in Arbeiderpartiet and the hotel management, who had promised him a job here for as long as he could stand on his own two legs. Over the years he had also begun to believe in himself. Ghosts were invisible. Anything you couldn’t see didn’t exist. And yet he always felt that strange sense of unease as he set off down the long, dark corridors lined with doors leading to rooms which concealed things he recognized, but often didn’t understand.
At the point where the corridor bore to the left, the smell grew stronger. He was getting close to the air-conditioning plants which were in two rooms next door to each other. With each step he took, the unpleasant feeling grew. Perhaps he should go and fetch someone. Edvard was a good lad who was always ready to stop for a chat when he had time.
But Edvard was just a bellboy. Fritiof Hansen was operations manager, with a badge on his chest and the code for every room in the entire building. This was his job, and the receptionist had told him he had an hour to sort out what was going on before the management called in professional help.
As if he wasn’t a professional.
Despite the fact that most things in the cellar were old, the door was locked with a modern card reader. He swiped his card and keyed in the code as steadily as he could.
He opened the door.
The stench hit him with such force that he took a couple of steps backwards. He cupped his hands over his nose before hesitantly moving forward.
He stopped in the doorway of the dark room. His free hand groped for the light switch. When he found it he was almost dazzled by the fluorescent tube which suddenly drenched the room in an unpleasant blue light.
Four metres away, half-hidden behind some kind of machinery that could have been for just about anything, he could see a pair of legs from the knees down. It was difficult to tell whether they belonged to a woman or a man.
Fritiof Hansen had a set evening ritual. Every weekday at 9.35 p.m. he watched CSI on TVNorge. A beer, a small packet of crisps and Crime Scene Investigation before bed. He liked both the Miami and New York versions, but it was Gil Grissom in the original version from Las Vegas who was Fritiof Hansen’s favourite. But Grissom was about to be replaced by that black guy, and Fritiof wasn’t at all sure if he’d bother watching it any more.
Grissom was the best.
Gil Grissom wouldn’t like it if an operations manager at a respectable hotel walked into a crime scene, destroying a whole lot of microscopic evidence that might be there. Fritiof Hansen was quite convinced this was a crime scene. At any rate, the person over by the wall was definitely dead. He remembered an episode where Grissom had established the time of death by studying the development of fly larvae on a pig’s carcass. It had been bad enough on television.
‘Dead as a doornail,’ he muttered, mainly to convince himself. ‘It stinks of death in here.’
Slowly he moved back and closed the door. He checked the lock had clicked into place and set off towards the stairs. Before he got around the corner where the corridor led off at an angle of ninety degrees, he had broken into a run.
‘I was actually thinking about letting him go. But then we found the hash. I needed to interview him properly, and then it struck me that…’
DC Knut Bork handed over a report to Silje Sørensen as they walked across the blue zone in the police station. She stopped as she glanced through the document.
On closer investigation, Martin Setre had turned out to be fifteen years and eleven months old. He had spent the first part of his life with his biological parents. He was already perceived as an unlucky child during his time at nursery. Broken bones. Bruises. Admittedly, he was clumsy at nursery too, but most of his injuries were sustained at home. There was the suggestion of ADHD when a pre-school teacher asked for the boy to be checked out. Before this process could begin, the family had moved. Martin started school in a small community in Østfold. After only six months he was admitted to hospital with stomach pains, which no one could get to the bottom of. During the spring term in his first year the family moved again, after one of the teachers called round unannounced and found the boy locked in a bike shed, his clothing completely inadequate. The teacher informed the authorities, but before the case reached the top of the pile, the family had moved yet again. Martin’s life continued in this way until he was admitted to Ullevål Hospital at the age of eleven with a fractured skull. Fortunately, they had managed to save his life, but actually giving him any kind of life proved more difficult. Since then the boy had been in and out of various institutions and foster homes. The last time he had run away was at Christmas, from a residential youth care unit where he had been placed by the court.
The case against his parents was dropped due to lack of evidence.
‘Ffksk,’ mumbled Silje, looking up again.
‘What?’
‘For fuck’s sake,’ she clarified.
‘You could say that,’ agreed Knut Bork, leading her to an interview room. ‘He’s in here.’
He took out a key and inserted it in the lock.
‘We’re not really allowed to lock him in,’ he said, his voice subdued. ‘At least not without supervision. But this kid would have been long gone if I’d left the door open for one second. He tried to do a runner three times while we were bringing him in from the unit.’
‘Has he been there since last Monday?’
‘Yes, under supervision. He hasn’t been alone for more than five minutes.’
The door opened.
Martin Setre didn’t even look up. He was rocking back and forth on a chair, one foot on the table. The dark boot lay in a small lake of melted snow. The back of the chair was rhythmically hitting the wall, and had already started to leave a mark.
‘Pack that in,’ said Knut Bork. ‘Right now. This is DI Silje Sørensen. She wants to talk to you.’
The boy still didn’t look up. His fingers were playing with a snuff tin, but it didn’t look as if he had anything under his lip. However, the herpes infection was considerably worse.
‘Hi,’ said Silje, moving so that she was opposite him. ‘You can say hello to me if you like.’
She sat down.
‘I understand,’ she said, and started to laugh.
This time the boy did look up, but without meeting her eyes.
‘What the fuck are you laughing at?’
‘Not at you. At Knut here.’
She nodded in the direction of her younger colleague, who raised his eyebrows as high as he could before adopting the same indifferent expression once again. He had turned the chair around and was leaning over the back with his arms folded, a thin investigation file dangling from one hand.