‘We’ve found a bloody great pile of poison-pen letters,’ said Sigmund.
‘Are you still in Bergen?’
‘Yes. In a safe in the Bishop’s office.’
‘You’re in a safe in the Bishop’s office?’
‘Ha bloody ha. The letters. There was a safe in her office that we only found out about a few days ago. The secretary had a code, but it turned out to be wrong. So we got somebody from the firm who supplied the safe to come out and look at it. And there was a pile of shit in there, if I can put it that way.’
‘What’s it about?’
‘Guess.’
‘No games, Sigmund.’
‘The usual homophobic crap.’ Adam could clearly hear that Sigmund was smiling at the other end of the phone. ‘What else?’
‘Are we talking about e-mails?’ Adam asked. ‘Or ordinary letters? Anonymous?’
‘A bit of both. Most are print-outs of e-mails, and the majority are anonymous, but there’s the odd one that uses their full name. It’s mostly complete garbage, Adam. Filth, no more and no less. And do you know what I’ve never understood?’
Quite a lot, Adam thought.
‘Why anyone gets so worked up about what people do in bed. My boy’s ice-hockey trainer is gay. Terrific bloke. Tough and masculine with the lads, but incredibly nice. Comes to every training session, unlike that idiot they had before, even though he had a wife and four kids. Some of the other parents started complaining when this bloke came out in the paper, but you should have seen old Sigmund go!’
His laughter crackled down the phone.
‘I showed them what was what, and no mistake! You can’t compare an ordinary gay bloke with a bloody paedophile. He’s a friend for life now. We’ve had a beer together a few times, and he’s sound. Fantastic on the ice, too. Used to be in the national junior team until it all got too much. Bunch of homophobes, that’s what they are.’
Adam listened with mounting surprise. His eyes were still fixed on the striped chocolate bars.
‘What are you doing with the letters?’ he said absently.
Sigmund was munching on something.
‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Just had to get something inside me. They have top-notch cinnamon buns here in Bergen.’
The drawer containing the chocolate bars slammed shut before Sigmund continued.
‘We’ve got one of the IT guys working on her computer. Looking for the addresses and so on. And, of course, the letters will be examined as well. I wonder why she saved them all? Nothing was ever reported.’
‘Most people in the public eye get that kind of thing all the time. At least if they have controversial opinions. Not many make a fuss about it. After all, it can just make things worse. Johanne’s working on a project that-’
‘And how is my favourite girl?’ Sigmund interrupted.
Adam’s colleague had been steadfastly in love with Johanne for several years, and that clearly hadn’t changed. It normally blossomed only in the form of sheer delight every time he saw or spoke to her. After a few drinks he might come out with clumsy compliments and the odd unwelcome fumble. On one occasion Johanne had slapped him hard across the face when he had grabbed her breast after getting roaring drunk on his hosts’ cognac. For some bizarre reason she still seemed to like him, somehow.
‘Fine,’ said Adam. ‘Call round some time.’
‘Great! What about this weekend? That would fit in really well-’
‘Ring me when you’ve got something new,’ Adam broke in. ‘Got to go. Bye.’
Just as he was about to end the call he heard Sigmund’s electronically distorted voice: ‘Hang on! Don’t go.’
Adam put the phone to his ear again.
‘What is it?’
‘I just wanted to say that not all the letters are about gay stuff.’
‘No?’
‘Some are about abortion.’
‘Abortion?’
‘Yes, the Bishop was pretty fanatical about it, you know.’
‘But what are they writing? And more to the point, who’s writing?’
Sigmund had finally finished eating.
‘It’s all a bit of a mixture. Anyway, those letters aren’t as aggressive. More kind of bitter. There’s one from a woman who wishes she’d never been born. Her mother was raped, and because she was so young at the time, she didn’t dare say anything until it was too late. Everything went wrong for the kid from the day she was born.’
‘Hm. A person who complains to the Bishop about the fact that she actually exists?’
‘Yep.’
‘But what did she actually want?’
‘She wanted to try to convince the Bishop that abortion can be justified. Something along those lines. I don’t really know. A lot of the letters are from total nut jobs, Adam. I agree with you – I don’t think we should take too much notice of them. But since we haven’t got much else to go on, we need to have a closer look at them. Are you coming up here soon?’
Adam clamped the phone between his head and shoulder. Opened the drawer, grabbed one of the chocolate bars and tore off the wrapper.
‘Not until next week, probably. But we’ll talk before then. Bye.’
He put down the phone and broke the bar into four pieces. Slowly he began to eat. He let every piece lie on his tongue for ages, sucking rather than chewing. When he had finished one piece, he picked up the next. It took him five minutes to enjoy every last bit, and he finished off by licking his fingers clean.
His mood improved. His blood sugar rose and he felt clear-headed. When he realized a few seconds later that he had just consumed 216 empty calories he was so upset that he grabbed his coat and switched off the light. It was Wednesday 7 January, and seven days on starvation rations was enough for this time.
He would allow himself a decent dinner, anyway.
Rage
At around dinner time on 9 January the doorbell rang at a grey-painted house on Hystadveien in Sandefjord.
Synnøve Hessel was lying on the sofa. She was in a state somewhere between sleep and reality, in a haze of melancholy dreams. She couldn’t sleep at night. The darkest hours felt both interminable and wasted. She couldn’t search for Marianne when everyone else was asleep and everything was closed, but at the same time it was impossible to get any rest. The days just got worse and worse. From time to time she dozed off, as she had now.
There wasn’t much else to do.
Their joint bank account hadn’t been touched. Synnøve hadn’t yet managed to gain access to Marianne’s account. She had contacted every hospital in Norway, but without success. There were no more friends to ring. Even the most casual acquaintances and distant relatives had been asked if they had heard anything from Marianne since 19 December. Two days ago Synnøve had gathered her courage and finally phoned her in-laws. The last time she heard from them had been a terrible letter they had sent when it became clear that Marianne was going to leave her husband to move in with a woman. The call had been a waste of time. As soon as Marianne’s mother had realized who was calling she launched into a venomous, two-minute tirade before slamming the phone down. Synnøve didn’t even have time to tell her why she was calling.
And Marianne was still missing.
Synnøve had hardly eaten for a week and a half. She had spent the days after Marianne’s disappearance searching for her. At night she went for long, long walks with the dogs. Now she didn’t even have the energy for that. For the last two days they had had to make do with the dog run in the garden. Yesterday evening she had forgotten to feed them. When she suddenly remembered, it was two o’clock in the morning. Her tears had frightened the alpha male, who had whimpered and paced around, demanding lots of attention before he was prepared to touch his food. In the end Synnøve had crawled into one of the kennels and fallen asleep there with Kaja in her arms. She had woken up stiff with cold half an hour later.
The doorbell rang again.