Black Seconds (16 page)

Snorrason lifted up Ida's nightie carefully. "I don't like to speculate," he said. "And you know it."

Sejer looked at him urgently. Snorrason began rolling the white nightie up Ida's body. You could tell he had done this several times before. He had his own technique, a special gentleness about his hands. Sejer saw her thin thighs emerge. He saw the bare stomach. She was not wearing any underwear. A sudden nervousness gripped him as her torso was revealed. And there it was. Her chest. It was oddly caved in and slightly discolored. Snorrason placed two fingers on her lower ribs. As he pressed, her entire ribcage gave way.

"She's been subjected to a blow," he said. "Or a kick. But it looks like it was a forceful blow."

Sejer looked at Ida's chest. Fragile like a bird's nest. He was silent.

"Several ribs have been broken. I know even saying it sounds bad, but I wish her skin had broken or that we'd found some external injuries," Snorrason confessed. "Then we would have had a better chance of determining what caused them."

Sejer needed to process this information. The damaged chest was too much for him.

"Whatever hit her did so with great force," Snorrason said. "Something big and heavy. No sharp edges."

Sejer looked at Ida once more. He outlined the damaged area with his eyes and tried to imagine what could have caused this massive blow.

"A very big stone?" he suggested. Snorrason did not reply. "A stick? A boot?"

"Not a stick," the pathologist said. "Something bigger. And not a boot either. That would have left a heel print. Guessing will get you nowhere, Konrad. I need to open her up."

Sejer was silent. Snorrason looked at him. "What are you thinking?" he asked.

"I'm thinking about Helga Joner," Sejer confessed. "About what I'm going to tell her. She will have so many questions."

"Tell it like it is," Snorrason said. "We don't know what happened."

"I'd rather she didn't see Ida's chest," Sejer said.

"You have to let her if she asks," Snorrason said. "And don't forget: she's prepared. I don't mean to sound insensitive, but it could have been worse. It could have been much worse."

Sejer knew the pathologist was right. He merely nodded in reply. He did not know what Helga had imagined in her own mind, but perhaps it was worse than the body lying at his feet. She looked like a sleeping doll. And the nightie, which did not belong to her, was poignant and beautiful in its simplicity. What had happened? Where had she been? He had to go to Helga's house now. Perhaps she was sitting in her chair by the window. Perhaps her eyes were fixed on the telephone. He thought about how scared she was. He thought: She is prepared. But she still lives in uncertainty. A few more minutes, he thought, in screaming uncertainty.

***

The crime scene was carefully secured. They worked on Ida and the area surrounding her body for several hours. Later Sejer and Skarre met up at the office. Finally they had something to work with. Concrete physical evidence, which could be examined and might lead them somewhere. In the midst of everything they felt a kind of relief. They had been waiting for this moment; now they had got past it and they could move on.

"The nightie is made by Calida," Skarre said. "In Switzerland. This country imports large quantities of nightwear and underwear from there. It's available in most shops."

Sejer nodded. "Good work," he said. "Any news from Hamburg?"

"Some." Skarre perched on the desk. "Christine's mother's name is Rita Seidler. She found Ida's last letter and faxed it to us. I've translated it. And made a few corrections so it's easier to understand. Nine-year-olds these days know a lot of English. I didn't know they would be this good," he said.

"Read it to me," Sejer asked him.

"Dear Christine," Skarre read. "Thank you for your letter. Today is Monday and I always watch a program on TV called
Pet Rescue.
There is a team that goes out and saves animals. Today it was about a fat dog. It almost could not walk."

Sejer thought of Kollberg, who almost could not walk, either. He held his breath as he listened because Skarre read so tenderly, and he found the words so charming.

"The people from
Pet Rescue
came to get the dog and the owner got really angry. He said that he could feed it as much as he liked because it was his dog. Then they told him that the dog could die from a heart attack unless it lost weight. So they gave him three weeks. But when they came back, the dog had died."

Skarre paused. Then he continued.

"I know a parrot that can talk. I am trying to teach it new words, but it takes a long time. Mom does not know about it. The parrot is called Henry. It is very irritable and bad-tempered, but it does not bite me. I am going to ask Mom if I can have my own bird. I will pester her forever. In the end she will say yes. Tell me more about your rabbit."

Skarre looked briefly up at Sejer and then returned to the letter. "I am going to be ten years old soon. September tenth. Love, Ida."

He folded the letter. "It's her birthday today," he said solemnly. "Today, September tenth." "Yes, I know," Sejer said.

Skarre put the letter down on the desk. "And Helga?" he said softly. "How did she take it? What did she say?" "Nothing," Sejer said. "She just fainted."

Elsa Marie did not knock. She used her own key to let herself in and stomped into the kitchen. Emil had done his best to mend the door. He was standing by the counter fumbling with a cloth. The crumbs refused to stick to it, he was just moving them around the surface. Finally he swept them away with his bare hands.

"Go for a ride on your bike," his mother ordered him. "This is going to take time."

He no longer protested, exactly as she had predicted. Emil heard the trembling undertone in his mother's voice and it made him nervous. He left the kitchen and grabbed an old coat from a peg in the hallway. He pulled his leather cap over his head. His mother watched him. She looked at the ridiculous leather cap. Her body was very tense and every movement caused her pain. She reminded herself that she was facing an important task. She would become a cleaning machine. She would work her way through his rooms and leave behind a strong smell of Ajax and bleach. It was the whole house this time. The curtains were going to be taken down; the bed linen was going to be washed. Her jaw was clenched. Emil slunk out to the drive and got on his three-wheeler. It would not start. He made some irritable grunting noises and noticed his mother's face in the window. He tried to get angry but did not succeed. It took a lot for Emil to get angry. Finally the engine started coughing. He revved it, a little more than was strictly necessary, and his mother's pale face vanished. He saw the curtain settle back into place.

Emil always kept to a steady speed of forty kilometers an hour. He had nowhere to go, no one to visit. No money in his pocket either. But he had half a tank of gas. He could drive a long way on half a tank, all the way into town and back and perhaps even up to Solberg. The waterfall appealed to him. He decided to drive out to it. He wanted to sit on his three-wheeler and feel the spray from the waterfall on his face. He often did that. It was not a cold day and his coat was warm. Buttoned all the way up. He was wearing brown gloves and thick boots.

Five minutes later he passed the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. He was able to read a few short words, but he did not always understand what they meant. Emil was tired. His mother had been screaming at him for days. "I want you to talk to me!" she demanded. "I don't understand!" And he wanted to. He knew that the words lay somewhere at the back of his head. He could arrange them and line them up in those rows people called sentences. But he was afraid to let them out. He worried that they would come out the wrong way and make everything worse. Things had never looked as bad for him as they did now. The racetrack was on his left. He was constantly being overtaken. He was used to it, used to irate drivers tailing him, beeping at him. He was faster than bicycles, but slower than motorcycles and he took up more space. Everyone was in a hurry these days. Emil never was. He wondered what it was they all had to do. Once he had witnessed a car crash just as it happened. A deafening bang, the sharp sound of metal and steel bending and snapping, glass splintering and raining down on the asphalt. He remembered the silence that followed, and the smell of gas. Through the windshield he had seen a head resting on the steering wheel and blood pouring out onto knees in gray trousers. He drove off when he heard the sirens.

Ahead of him now he could see the exit to Solberg. He began indicating in plenty of time and managed the turn expertly. Further up he needed to turn right again and soon he could see the waterfall. He changed down into second gear and parked in a turnout. Got off the three-wheeler and walked over to the railings. Leaned forward. He liked the deep roar of the water, liked hanging over the railings. "No," he said, out into the air. He felt the vibrations in his chest. He tried to form an "o" with his mouth. A noise that sounded like an owl hooting emerged through the drone of the waterfall. He bent his head and stared into the eddy. He could say anything inside his own head. He could say: "Have you no shame, have you gone completely mad?" Or: "What on earth am I going to do with you?" He heard the words inside his head and the voice was agreeable to listen to, a pleasant male voice. Not his own gruff "No." He thought of his mother, busy rushing around turning drawers and cupboards upside down and inside out. She always asked him endless questions about everything. But his silence protected him. He was made of granite. For fifty years his mother had tried to make contact with him using every possible means, in an attempt to chip away at the granite. She had tried being kind, she had tried ignoring him, and she had tried provoking him with sharp words. But he was silent. He would always be silent.

***

While Emil Johannes was staring into the roaring waters, Ruth and Sverre Rix sat waiting for Tomme. They had tried reaching him on his cell phone, but there was no reply. Ruth had called both Helge and Bjørn, but he was not with them. Marion was leafing through a photo album displaying pictures of her and Ida. The cat featured in several of the pictures. It had been run over by the school bus and they had found it in a snowdrift. It was flattened, with its own intestines smeared all over it. Now Ida was gone too. There's just me left, Marion thought. She put her finger over the cat and Ida and saw her own face shine white and lonely in the picture. Finally they heard the Opel on the drive. Ruth and Sverre looked at each other.

They heard the sound of the garage door being opened and then shut with a bang. Now he was opening the front door. Then they heard his footsteps; he was not coming into the living room. He hardly ever does these days, Ruth thought. He was becoming more like a lodger who came and went independently of the rest of the family. They got up and followed him upstairs. Marion looked after them for a long time. Then she bent over the album once more.

Sverre Rix knocked on the door to his son's bedroom, then opened it. Tomme had turned on his computer. A series of strange sounds could be heard from the speakers, tiny beeps making up an uneven rhythm, like playful raindrops, Sverre thought. As he and Ruth stepped inside, a deeper sound that pitched itself below the beeps could be heard. For a moment this distracted Sverre. It had started to rain: a light rain for now, but it would soon increase in strength.

"Tomme," he said, looking at his son. "They've found Ida. She's dead."

Tomme, who had been watching them calmly, suddenly looked petrified.

"Where?" he asked quickly. "Where did they find her?"

His father looked at him earnestly. "Oh, where? Some place near Lysejordet. By the roadside. She's dead," he repeated. "Helga has had a breakdown."

"Lysejordet?" Tomme lowered his head. He studied the pattern of the carpet for a while.

"But—how did she die?" he asked quietly. His face was strange, they thought. His voice was alien.

"They don't know yet," his father said. "But they'll find out, obviously. We don't know any details," he added.

Tomme was very pale. He could not think of anything to say at all. No one had ever come into his bedroom to announce a death. Then he remembered his aunt. "And what about Aunt Helga?" he asked.

His father looked at Ruth. "We don't really know yet. They've pumped her full of sedatives," he said.

"We won't be able to talk to her for the time being. Could we sit down for a moment?" Ruth sat down on the bed. Sverre remained standing in the doorway. Tomme turned down the sound on the computer. He squirmed in his chair and felt uncomfortable.

"So now there will be a funeral. I thought you could be a pallbearer," Sverre said. "You and I. Uncle Anders, Tore, and Kristian. And a teacher from the school. Is that okay?"

Tomme nodded automatically. Then he realized what it would involve. He would have to stand up in the church and walk over to Ida's coffin. It would not be very big, he thought. Then he would have to grab a handle and with the others raise the coffin. He would feel the weight of her. If he were at the front, his own head would be very close to Ida's. He would have to walk at the same pace as the others and be careful not to stumble or lose his grip. The coffin would have to be kept level at all times or she might slide from one end to the other. He was not entirely sure how it worked. But the reality of it hit him and an intense churning sensation started in the pit of his stomach.

"Is that okay?" his father repeated.

Tomme nodded again. Then he thought that carrying Ida's coffin to her grave might be a turning point. Because he would see the body disappear into the earth for good. Then perhaps they could finally put all this misery behind them. He nodded once more, looking directly at his father this time.

"Tomme," his father said, returning his gaze, "there's something I have to ask you. Something completely different."

Tomme looked guarded and his young body braced itself. He fiddled with the keyboard.

"You've started seeing Willy again," Sverre said, "and you know we don't approve."