‘I think I understand what it is, but I need more.’
‘What you mean, more?’
‘Do you want to talk about it later?’
Munch walked through to the front of the house, went outside and lit another cigarette. They had moved the police tape further down the street now. Keeping the press at bay for as long as they could. He dreaded reporting the latest developments to Mikkelson. Two dead girls. No suspects. And now another two were missing. There would be hell to pay down at Grønland.
‘I think it’s a Gronsfeld,’ Gabriel said.
‘A what?’
‘A Gronsfeld cipher. A code language. It’s a deviant of Vigenère, but it uses numbers rather than letters. However, I need more. Did you get anything else?’
Munch struggled to concentrate.
‘More? I’m not sure. What would that be?’
‘Letters and numbers. The way Gronsfeld works is that both parties, both the sender and the recipient, possess the same combination of letters and numbers. It makes it impossible for an outsider to crack the code.’
‘I can’t think of anything,’ Munch said, just as Kim walked through the gate. ‘We’ll have to do it later.’
‘OK,’ Gabriel said, and hung up.
‘Anything?’ Munch asked.
Kim shook his head.
‘Most people are out at work at this time, so we’ll do another round in the early evening.’
‘Nothing? Damn, surely somebody must have seen something?’
‘Not so far.’
‘Do it again,’ Munch said.
‘But we’ve just…’
‘I said, do it again.’
The young police officer nodded and walked back out through the gate.
Munch was just about to go back inside the house when Mia called again.
‘Yes?’
He could tell from her voice that they had discovered something.
‘It’s a woman’ was all she said.
‘We have a witness?’
‘A pensioner living right opposite. Trouble sleeping. He looked out of his window, he thinks it was about four o’clock in the morning. Saw someone hanging around a letterbox. So he went outside to check.’
‘Tough pensioner.’
‘Absolutely.’
‘What did he say?’
‘He shouted at her. She ran away.’
‘And he’s quite sure that it was a woman?’
‘He’s a hundred per cent sure. He was only a few metres away from her.’
‘Bloody hell.’
‘I told you so, didn’t I?’ Mia said eagerly. ‘I knew it.’
‘Yes, you told me so. Is he with you now?’
‘We’re bringing him in.’
‘See you at the office in ten minutes?’
‘Sure,’ Mia said, and hung up.
Munch didn’t exactly run, but it wasn’t far short. A woman. He quickly got behind the wheel and drove towards the cordon. There was a sea of flashlights when he passed the huge crowd of journalists and reporters. At least they had something for the vultures.
A woman.
Munch placed the blue flashing light on the roof and drove to the city centre as fast as he could.
III
Chapter 33
Tom-Erik Sørlie, a Norwegian veteran of Afghanistan, was sitting by his living-room window when two police cars pulled up on the road below his house and started putting up barriers. He picked up his binoculars from the coffee table and adjusted the lenses until the officers came into focus. He had listened to the police radio all day, as he always did, and he knew that something had happened. Two little girls had been killed, he believed another two had gone missing and now police had decided to check all the roads going out of Oslo. He adjusted the lenses again. Armed police officers with helmets and machine pistols, Heckler & Koch MP5s – he knew the gun well, had used it many times himself. The armed police officers had finished setting up the checkpoint and were now stopping cars. Fortunately for the drivers, it was early in the day. Most of the traffic was heading into the capital, not out.
He put down the binoculars and turned up the sound of the news. His TV was always on. As was his computer. And the police radio. He liked to keep up. Keep himself informed. It was his way of feeling alive now that he was no longer part of the action.
Lex, his puppy, stirred in its basket before padding over to him. It settled by his feet with its head to one side and its tongue hanging out. The Alsatian wanted to go for a walk. Tom-Erik Sørlie stroked the dog’s head and tried to keep an eye on the screens. A TV2 reporter appeared in front of a camera with a microphone in her hand. A residential development in Skullerud could be seen in the background. Police cordons. A girl had gone missing from there. He had heard the news one hour ago. He got up and grabbed the Alsatian puppy by the collar. Guided it out on the steps, into the garden and attached it to the running line. He did not have the energy to go for a walk now. His head was hurting.
It had grown dark outside before the police took down the barriers in the road. A whole day. Someone in the Department must have written them a blank cheque. He ate his dinner in front of the television. A photofit appeared on the screen. A woman. A witness had seen her in Skullerud. Good luck, Tom-Erik Sørlie thought. It could be anyone. Footage from a press conference. A female public prosecutor. The girls were still missing. No leads. Two murder investigators getting into a car. A bearded man in a beige duffel coat. A woman with long, black hair. Both were sharp-eyed. The man in the duffel coat flapped his hand to make the journalists go away. No comment.
He turned the volume down on the television and got up to make himself a cup of coffee. Was that a noise he heard? Was there someone in the garden? He put on his shoes and went outside. The Alsatian was no longer attached to the running line.
‘Lex?’
He walked around the house to the back garden and had a shock when he saw the apple tree.
Someone had killed his dog and hanged it by its neck from a skipping rope.
Chapter 34
Mia Krüger crossed the road and started walking up Tøyengata. She found a lozenge in her pocket and tried to ignore the newspaper headlines. She passed yet another kiosk which had her life on display. MYSTERY WOMAN: STILL NO LEADS. The photofit of the woman seen by the pensioner was on the front page. There was nothing wrong with the photofit. Just like there was nothing wrong with the witness observation. The only problem was that it could be anyone. Nine hundred phone calls, and that was just on day one. People thought it was their neighbour, their workmate, their niece, someone they had seen queuing for a ferry the day before. The switchboard at Police Headquarters had been jammed; they had had to shut it down, take a break. Rumour had it that waiting time to get through had been up to two hours. HAVE YOU SEEN KAROLINE OR ANDREA? New front pages, big photographs of the girls, blown up as if to mock her. You can’t do your job. This is your responsibility. If those girls die, it’ll be your fault.
And what was all that blood about? Mia Krüger didn’t understand it. It made no sense. It didn’t fit with the other evidence. They had tested the blood; it belonged to neither of the girls. It wasn’t even human. It came from a pig. The killer was taunting them, that was what she was doing. Or he. Mia Krüger was starting to have doubts. Something didn’t add up. With the woman seen in Skullerud. With the photofit. She got the feeling the whole thing was a game. Look how easy it all is for me. I can do whatever I want.
I win. You lose.
Mia tightened her jacket around her and crossed the street again. They had nothing on the white Citro‘n. Nothing from the list of previous offenders. Ludvig and Curry had reviewed the Hønefoss case in detail – one of the offices in Mariboesgate was covered from floor to ceiling with photographs and notes – but, despite their efforts, they hadn’t discovered anything so far. After all, there had been nearly eight hundred and sixty staff members at the hospital where the baby had been taken. Not to mention everyone with easy access: patients, visitors, relatives. It all added up to thousands of potential suspects. Nor had the surveillance cameras picked up anything. There had been no cameras in the maternity unit itself in those days, only near the exit. Mia remembered watching hours of recordings without success. Nothing. Crates of interviews and statements. Doctors, nurses, patients, physiotherapists, social workers, relatives, receptionists, cleaners… she had personally spoken to nearly a hundred people. Everyone had been equally upset. How could it happen? How could someone just walk into a maternity unit and walk out with a baby without being challenged? She remembered how high-ranking officers at Police Headquarters had jumped for joy when the young Swede had ‘confessed’ and then killed himself. They couldn’t shelve the case fast enough. Brush it under the carpet. A blot on the force. It was a question of moving on.