We Shall Inherit the Wind (19 page)

Ole Rørdal opened the door, greeted me mutely, poked his head out and looked down the staircase I had come up.

‘I’m alone,’ I said. ‘If that was what you were wondering.’

He answered with a dark glare. ‘A journo might have used the opportunity to sneak in, right? The phone hasn’t stopped ringing since I got back. I doubt there’s a paper in the land that hasn’t rung me, plus the TV and radio. I must be the most popular man in Norway today …’

‘Good exposure for your views.’

‘Not like this.’

‘No.’

‘Come in.’ He stepped aside and let me in.

I looked around. Everything was as it had been before. The room was as untidy, but the piles of paper on the shelves were, if possible, even higher. On a small, portable TV the evening’s programme faded as another newsflash was expected. One of the three computers was also on, and a coffee machine with a jug of a murky liquid chugged away on the worktop.

His mobile phone rang on the long, untreated wooden table. He grabbed it, looked to see who it was, cursed and pressed the OFF key. ‘There we go. Can’t get me now. Secret number. So you know who it is …’

I nodded. The country’s biggest newspaper did that, apparently to protect its writers from angry calls.

‘This is – God forgive me for my sins – the worst day of my life, Veum!’

‘You feel it was your fault?’

‘It was my fault he died, yes. And yours …’

‘I went with you because you asked me to, Ole.’

‘Yes, I know. I didn’t mean it like that. But if he’d had the time he needed he would have retreated to a safe distance. But when we caught him off-guard he realised it wouldn’t be possible and he and I crashed into each other and that triggered the explosion.’

He slumped down at the table. The shadow of hair on his shaven skull was darker than when I was here last, his beard was pointing in all directions and his suede shirt hung outside his trousers. ‘This has sent me into a deep depression, Veum. What I feared most has happened. Despite discussing it at length beforehand. Now our cause will be discredited for years. Just wait till you see the headlines tomorrow.
Planned Environmental Terrorism! Environmental Terrorism’s Suicide Bomber!
I’m expecting the worst. But, whatever cause we fight for, it shouldn’t cost you your life!’

I went to the coffee machine, found a clean cup and asked if he wanted any.

‘No, thanks,’ he mumbled. ‘Think I’ve had enough.’

I poured myself a cup, examined the contents with suspicion and sampled it warily. The coffee was bitter and lay on my tongue like ash. With my back to the worktop and cup in hand, I said: ‘So that was what you were arguing about on the quay on Tuesday night?’

He nodded. ‘Yes.’

‘Svenson wanted to blow up the bridge. You go in for more peaceful methods.’

‘You could put it like that, yes.’ He looked up. ‘I’ve had a Christian upbringing, Veum. Consideration for others is important for me. We have to think about the community out there. Folk have to live their lives whether we have wind turbines or not.’

‘You wouldn’t use violence then?’

‘Violence?’ He peered up at me. ‘Only if necessary. In self-defence, for example.’

‘Or to protect your own interests.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Svenson asked me several times if I came from Norcraft. He suspected that you’d been bought.’  

His jaw dropped. ‘Did he say that to you? He was off his chump. I’m not for sale to anyone, I can promise you that.’

‘So, you’ve heard that before?’

‘That was what he used as an argument when we were discussing the bridge.’

‘But you stopped him in time, didn’t you.’

He glowered at me. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I’m still talking about what happened on Wednesday morning. My theory is that it was you who attacked him, tied him up and thus prevented him from doing anything drastic. For that day anyway. Am I right?’

He didn’t answer.

‘Mm, I can even imagine he saw who attacked him. But he refused to say, so as not to compromise the whole organisation. That’s the other variant. But the guilty party in both versions is … you.’

‘I can see you have a fertile imagination,’ he sneered. ‘But I don’t think much of your notion as to how conflicts in ethical organisations are resolved. And just how are you going to prove this?’

‘Prove?’ I queried. ‘I don’t need any proof. I’ve got an eye-witness.’

‘An eye-witness! Who?’

‘Your cousin, Else Mæland.’

‘You’re bluffing!’

‘She spent the night with Svenson.’

‘Yes, but she was back in the cabin well before …’ He angrily broke off. Then he blushed scarlet, and I could see the sinews along his jawbone swelling with anger. ‘Before I got up, I meant to say.’

‘So that was what you meant to say,’ I retorted. I didn’t elaborate. Experience told me that this was one of those tipping points when things could go either way. Either he would see through the bluff or he would crack and admit everything. But he was a hard nut, harder than most.

I ratcheted the pressure up a notch. ‘You didn’t know that they were an item … Else and Stein?’

‘Of course! They’re … He was young and free. Both of them. What business was it of mine?’  

‘And you know she went back to the boat that night?’

He threw his arms in the air. ‘I saw them, didn’t I!’

‘What did you see?’

‘Her going back.’

‘And …?’

‘And nothing! When I …’ He cast around in the room as if searching for something.

‘Just admit it, Ole. It’ll all come out anyway.’

He took a very deep breath before releasing it. ‘Alright then! What does it matter now? I went on board the boat in the morning, woke up Stein and said I had something to show him. Something we could use in the campaign. He was still dopey and went over to the empty building by the quay with me. Once inside I told him: “I’m sorry, Stein, but you’ve forced me to do this.” And before he could react I hit him over the head, tied him up and left him there, in the old fish hall.’

‘And how long were you planning to leave him there?’

‘Until the survey was over, of course. No longer. But there was all the business with Mons Mæland and then you found him.’

‘You weren’t frightened he would give you away?’

He shook his head. ‘No, I was sure he wouldn’t. He knew as well as I did that it would be the end of our whole organisation. We talked about it the day after, that we would agree to disagree. We made peace, in a way. But then …’

‘Yes, how come this peace didn’t last?’

‘If only I knew the answer to that, Veum! I tried to talk to him earlier in the day. Drove up to Bontveit, where he lives. But I couldn’t see any sign of him or his car. I guessed he had gone to Brennøy to carry out his plan anyway. And when I saw his car on the quay I realised I was right.’

‘I suppose you could say that after what you did on Wednesday he no longer trusted you.’ I noticed the big poster on the wall behind him. ‘Don Quijote and Sancho Panza had split up for good.’

‘I know! That makes me feel all the guiltier, don’t you understand?’

‘Of course … of course I understand. This wasn’t how tilting at
windmills was supposed to end, but if my memory serves me right he also suffered defeats, the sorry figure of the knight errant.’

Ole gawked at me. ‘Who?’

I nodded towards the poster. ‘Don Quixote.’

‘Right …’ He still didn’t seem to know who I meant.

‘Tell me, Ole, this land deal. The case Stein was pursuing against Mons Mæland. Were you involved in that?’

‘No, no. But I thought he had a good case. I supported him to the hilt, hoping it would lead to a postponement of the decision.’

‘Will you carry it on, on his behalf?’

‘Doubt it. I really haven’t thought that far ahead.’

‘It’ll be a case with new protagonists. Have you any idea who could be behind the murder of Mons Mæland?’

‘One thing I can tell you for sure: it has nothing to do with us. Not even Stein was that crazy.’

‘I’ll have to take your word for it. Anyway, he had an alibi, didn’t he?’

‘Yes, he did.’

I left him sitting at the table, sunk in his sombre thoughts. I had a clear sense that it would be a while before we heard any more about NmV and Ole Rørdal, and that from now on the fight against wind power would be left to other players.

I drove home, made myself a simple meal, switched on the television and caught up with the various channels’ presentations of the events on the island. Hamre, Erik Utne and Jarle Glosvik made statements, while Ole brusquely refused to be interviewed. Of course, the latest news was linked with the unsolved murder case, and the report more than implied that Stein Svenson, who as yet was anonymous, could have been connected with that case too, a contention that Hamre parried with the argument that it was far too early in the proceedings to draw any firm conclusions.

It had been a long and eventful day, and I sat slumped in front of the TV as a variety of light entertainment programmes tried, and failed, all of them, to make Friday evening a lively experience. In the end, I switched off the television, poured myself a small glass of aquavit and
took a CD from one of the piles. Duke Ellington’s Blanton-Webster band, as it is known, from 1940–42, played
Jump for Joy
. The notes oozed through my tympanic membranes like cream, although I felt no need to do any jumping myself. We came closer to reality, however, when a few tracks later someone asked the question: ‘What good would it do?’

Before going to bed I rang Karin on her mobile. All I got back was her voicemail telling me that the subscriber had either switched off their phone or was in an area where there was insufficient coverage. I knew the latter was not true. I could accept the first possibility. She often switched off her phone at weekends when she was free and didn’t want to be disturbed. Whether I liked it or not was another matter, but there could have been other reasons for my sleeping so badly that night.

The next day stole upon me like a thief with a long face and was as welcome as an alcohol-licensing inspector after midnight. I tried to phone again, but she didn’t answer this time, either. Again I told myself there wasn’t any reason to be concerned.

Before shaving I gingerly removed the plasters and cleaned the cuts from the day before. I applied a new plaster on one of them and looked a great deal more presentable.

After breakfast I got into my car and started the engine. The weather had turned. The clouds hung so low there was a risk of them settling around your neck, the rain lashed against the windscreen and, as I crossed Nordhordland Bridge, a strong gust of wind caught the car, making me force the wheel in the opposite direction to keep a straight course. This was no day for heading off on pleasure trips, but then strictly speaking this wasn’t one.

I left the arterial road at Seim and followed the minor one to Lygra and Feste. The route went through rolling countryside, sometimes through dense forest, sometimes past cultivated fields. At regular intervals Seim Fjord appeared down to the right and you didn’t need much imagination to picture Harald Fairhair sailing in one of his long ships to the King’s Sæheim estate at the end of the fjord more than a thousand years ago. At this moment on a Saturday morning there was no traffic on the fjord, other than a cabin-owner tuning up his outboard motor and a marine research vessel lying still in the middle. Deep in these waters resided a mysterious jellyfish by the name of periphylla periphylla, a reddish-coloured sea creature that had made the old fjord its hunting ground; it had no natural enemies and therefore proliferated. At night, just under the surface of the water, you could see the red flashes it transmitted. During the day it sought the depths and the darkness, as though suffering from a bad conscience.

At Tofting I branched off towards Lygra, the old island community that became part of the mainland in 1973, but where Olav, the so-called saintly king, and other kings held their assembly in olden times. Now they had a newly opened heathland centre all of their own and a view of the oil flame in Mongstad twenty-four hours a day, like so many other places in the region.

The closest village shop was in Feste, so to find where Bjørn Brekkhus lived, I had to ask for help from a passing stranger on the byroad to the white timber church. He was a kindly old boy in wellies and a dark-green sou’wester pulled well down over his forehead. He pointed and explained, and not long after I was turning in by a single-storey detached house that could have been in Bergen, had it not been for
the size of the plot. There were no other cars parked in the drive, but there was a light in the west-facing windows, through which the afternoon sun, if it was out, must have poured into the sitting room. Today the rain was pounding against the windows and the whole house reminded me of a diving bell hauled onto dry land to wait for better times.

I parked the car, opened the door, ducked my head and ran the few metres to the front door, where I found shelter inside a slim porch. I rang the bell and immediately afterwards a woman’s voice answered from the intercom nearby. ‘Who is it?’

‘It’s Veum. Varg Veum. I’d like to have a chat with Bjørn Brekkhus.’

‘He isn’t at home right now.’

‘Is that
fru
Brekkhus?’

‘Yes, it is.’

‘Perhaps we could talk instead?’

‘What’s this about?’

‘Mons Mæland,’ I said loudly. ‘Amongst other things,’ I added, more to myself than
fru
Brekkhus.

After a short pause, she said: ‘Come in.’

The lock buzzed, and the door slowly opened inwards. I waited until it was fully open, then I stepped inside.

The spacious hall was empty, but through an open door I heard a low hum. I looked in that direction and a small woman appeared sitting in a motorised wheelchair. Dressed in everyday clothes, with completely white hair that looked light and downy and her head sticking up, she resembled a baby bird. Her bent nose completed the image.

She stopped in front of me and held out a hand. ‘Lise Brekkhus.’

‘Hello.’

She looked at the rain dripping off my leather jacket with an amused expression. ‘Wet out, is it?’

Good job you don’t have to go out
, I thought. ‘It certainly is.’

I saw her looking at the plaster on my forehead, but she didn’t make any comment.

‘You can hang it up there.’ She pointed to a wardrobe. The hall was
decorated simply, with a copy of an old chart on one wall, a water-colour painting of small, blue-and-purple skerry flowers on the other.

She watched me as I hung up my jacket. Then she adroitly spun her wheelchair round and motioned to me. ‘In here.’

I followed her through the threshold-less doorway to the large sitting room. It was fitted out in timeless simplicity with stylistically matching furniture, bookshelves from IKEA, TV, radio and stereo. The pictures on the wall were of the same kind as those I had seen before, each with a maritime flavour: water-colours of sea birds and skerry flowers, paintings of ferries and fishing smacks. On the coffee table there lay a pile of newspapers and some books with a library binding. One of them laid apart from the rest, with a bookmark poking out from the middle.

She performed another pirouette with the wheelchair. ‘Can I offer you anything? Coffee? Tea?’

‘Yes, please. So long as you’re going to have something yourself, then …’

‘I like having company,’ she said. ‘But I think I’ll go for tea at this time of day.’

‘Then I’ll have the same.’

Pleased, she nodded, swung towards the doorway again and disappeared in the direction of what I assumed was the kitchen before I had a chance to ask if I could help. I sat alone in the sitting room with the slightly uncomfortable feeling that a confirmee might have had visiting the local priest for the first time and finding only the priest’s wife at home. What on earth were we going to talk about?

It was conspicuously quiet outside. No agricultural machinery at work. A small freighter sailed past down in Lurosen fjord, but so far away that all you could hear was a low chug. Some herring gulls were flapping their wings and wailing in the strong wind as the white-crested waves snapped at them from below.

There were some binoculars on the window sill. I looked across the sound towards the island of Radøy. Over Lurøy I glimpsed the steeple on the rebuilt prairie church by the Immigration Centre in Sletta, but the angle was wrong for Mons and Ranveig’s cabin. Even with the binoculars it would be impossible to see.  

Lise Brekkhus trundled back in. She had attached a tray to one arm of the chair. On the tray there was a teapot, two large cups, a bowl of sugar and a little dish of dry biscuits. On a separate plate there were some slices of lemon. Effortlessly, she placed everything on the coffee table. All I did was move the cup closer after she had poured the tea, take a slice of lemon and some sugar and stir it with the teaspoon.

When everything was ready and we were sitting there with a cup of tea in our hands like two members of the parish council in the process of setting up their own faction, she addressed me with an air of curiosity. ‘What was it actually you wanted to talk to me about?’

‘In fact, I wanted to speak to your husband.’

‘Yes, but you said you could talk to me instead.’

‘Yes, I did, you’re right.’ I carefully tasted the tea. It was dark, strong and good. ‘I don’t know how much your husband has told you.’

‘As little as possible, as usual,’ she said lightly, though with a touch of acid.

‘Did he mention my name?’

‘The name was Veum? Varg Veum? Was it?’ She grinned. ‘Funny name.’ As I didn’t respond, other than with a nod, she continued: ‘No, he didn’t.’

‘Then I’d better introduce myself. I’m a private investigator.’

‘Detective?’

‘Yes, I prefer investigator though. It sounds less dramatic.’

She nodded and motioned for me to continue.

‘I was invited over there by a friend …’ I nodded towards Radøy. ‘Last Monday, by Ranveig Mæland. It was my job to try to trace her husband, Mons, who had disappeared. Your husband was present.’

She sent me a chilly look. ‘Yes, I know. Ranveig slept in our guest room on the Sunday night. Bjørn and Mons were old friends. We knew Lea too. Before I became …’ She made a gesture towards her thin legs. ‘Like this.’

‘What …?’

She sighed. ‘It’s a form of muscular atrophy. It’s been gradual, it
started over thirty years ago, but I’ve always known it would end like this. In a wheelchair.’

‘How long have you …?’

‘The last fifteen years. Now you didn’t come here to talk about me, did you.’

‘No, sorry. But … well, enough of this. I was asked to locate Mæland, and I did, for that matter. I’m sure you’ve heard about it.’

‘Yes, it was dreadful. I couldn’t sleep the following night. He was crucified, in a way.’

‘Yes, it was a shocking experience for all of us there.’

‘Did you actually find him?’

‘I can’t say I did, no. In fact, that was his brother-in-law, I found out subsequently. Lars Rørdal, if the name means anything to you.’

‘Yes, it does. Lea’s brother, isn’t he?’

‘Yes. Do you remember when Lea went missing?’

She seemed almost indignant. ‘Do I remember? We were there … Well, I wouldn’t say we were bosom pals – Bjørn and Mons were – but at any rate we met a couple of times a year. The boys were huge fishing fans, you know, so there were often extravagant fish suppers on the menu to use up some of the catch. We’ve eaten fish six days a week ever since, and everything is freshly caught, if I might say so. By Bjørn, of course,’ she added. I waited, and she picked up the thread again. ‘Lea … Yes, it was terrible. But … that was sixteen – seventeen years ago, wasn’t it?’

‘Sixteen.’

Her eyes glazed over. ‘I was already beginning to get so weak then that I wouldn’t go out any more, but I hadn’t got this then.’ She tapped the wheelchair. ‘I hadn’t seen her for more than a year, I think, so … It had an awful impact on us, of course, and Bjørn was deeply involved. In the investigation, I mean.’

‘She was never found, though …’

‘No, she wasn’t. But everyone thought she had drowned. After a few years she was declared dead. There are rules and regulations for that kind of thing …’  

‘Yes, there are indeed. Did your husband ever talk about the case?’

She looked pensive. ‘He did, yes. My goodness, it’s so long ago, and we were friends, as I said. But Lea … She wasn’t easy. But I can’t say … At that time my mind was on myself and my own fate.’

‘Yes, I can imagine.’

‘I’d finally been diagnosed, even though the symptoms had been obvious for many years already.’

‘And then Mæland re-married …’

‘Yes.’ Her lips became thinner. ‘Ranveig. Bit too fast for some people’s taste. It didn’t matter to Bjørn. He was there just as often as before.’

‘There?’

‘Yes, across the sound, in their cabin. Even if Mons worked in property and was really an entrepreneur he wasn’t much of a handyman, according to Bjørn. So he often went out to their cabin and helped them with practical things, even when they weren’t there or it was just Lea …’

I waited. I had a hunch there was more coming.

‘Private investigator, did you say? You uncover a lot of dirt then?’

‘Now and then, yes. But I don’t do matrimonials, for example. I’m a social worker by profession and I used to work in the social services.’

She leaned back and scrutinised me carefully. ‘Why don’t you do matrimonial cases?’

I shrugged. ‘Maybe because I want a peaceful life. Most cases of that kind have two sides. Very often three.’

‘Don’t all cases? Sleaze, property deals and so on?’

‘Yes, but then there are more people involved. More people are cheated then, too. Not just one or two.’

‘Hm.’ She didn’t seem convinced. ‘Well, I can tell you, Veum, that I have no trouble seeing things from the other side.’

‘I’m not sure I understand.’

‘No?’ She sneered. ‘The investigator is not one of the sharpest knives in the drawer after all …’

‘It’s quite a while since I’ve been whetted.’

‘Well … let me put it like this … When you’re in my shoes you have to be honest, both to yourself and to others, if you’re going to survive.’  

She paused. Again I waited. Then she continued: ‘There are no feelings left in this old body of mine. I don’t have a lot to offer a man. I have …’ She looked away. ‘Books. TV. The radio. Newspapers … Bjørn religiously goes to the library and borrows stuff for me. Comes back with huge piles. Not everything’s to my liking, but I read virtually everything anyway. I’m sure I could do you a talk, if you were interested. About literature, I mean. As far as the physical side goes … Well, I have nothing to offer, as I said.’

I intimated that I understood. I wasn’t entirely without talent.

‘He might have gone after other women … I would completely understand that …’

‘Is it your impression that he has?’

‘He’s never said anything, but in a way it has been understood and … We know the ways of the world. Learn to read the signs. You become even more sensitive when you’re like me, almost immobile.’

‘I think you’re coping very well,’ I said, indicating the teapot and the cups.

‘Round the home, yes. Brewing a cup of tea or coffee. You can do that too, can’t you?’ The acid tone was back.

‘So let me ask you straight out. Are you suggesting that your husband … that he went behind his old friend’s back?’

Again she leaned backward and fixed me with a sharp look over the bridge of her nose. ‘Yes. For example.’ Then she leaned forward and eye-balled me. ‘But I know nothing.’

Yet again she changed position. This time she straightened up and looked through the window, where the rain was beating down as relentlessly as before. Her gaze went in the same direction that mine had a little earlier – to a cabin that was not visible. Then she whispered: ‘Sometimes I saw his boat until it vanished, into the inlet there. When he came home and I asked where he’d been, he would say, fishing in the fjord. And he always had fish with him. He always had fish.’

‘But …’

‘He’d always been attracted by Lea. It wasn’t hard to see. I think. With her background. She came from a proper Low Church background in
Gulen – yes, you know yourself. Lars Rørdal is one thing. His parents were even worse. Real puritans. Running away and marrying Mons … I think that made her in Bjørn’s eyes an angel, descended from heaven. And I’ll admit it. She was as beautiful as any of God’s angels. Long, blonde hair barely cut since she was confirmed; clean-cut, attractive face, but, as I said, not easy. It was as though … I don’t know … as if she had expended all her energy detaching herself from the religious milieu on the island. I think, no, I know, there was a passion in Lea that made her both strong and … dangerous.’

‘Dangerous? Do you mean with reference to the children?’