Beate flushed. 'I've just started studying the video of the bank robbery in Kirkeveien.'

'Any conclusions?'

Her eyes wandered from Ivarsson to Harry and back again. 'Not for the time being.'

'Nothing then,' Ivarsson said. 'Perhaps you would be pleased to know that we have identified nine suspects we've brought in for questioning. And we have a strategy for finally getting something out of Raskol.'

'Raskol?' Harry asked.

'Raskol Baxhet, the king of the sewer rats himself,' Ivarsson said, hooking his fingers into his belt loops. He breathed in and hitched his trousers up with a cheery grin: 'But Beate can probably fill you in on the details later.'

13

Marble

Harry was aware that, on certain matters, he was small-minded. Take Bogstadveien, for example. He didn't like Bogstadveien. He didn't know why; perhaps it was because in this street, paved with gold and oil, the Mount Happy of Happyland, no one smiled. Harry didn't smile himself, but he lived in Bislett, wasn't paid to smile and right now had a few good reasons for not smiling. However, that didn't mean that Harry, in common with most Norwegians, didn't appreciate being smiled at.

Inwardly, Harry tried to excuse the boy behind the counter in the 7-Eleven. He probably hated his job, he probably lived in Bislett, too, and it had started to piss down with rain again.

The pale face with the fiery red pimples cast a bored eye over his police ID card: 'How should I know how long the skip's been outside?'

'Because it's green and it covers half of your view of Bogstadveien,' Harry said.

The boy groaned and put his hands on hips which barely held up his trousers. 'A week. Sort of. Hey, queue of people waiting behind you, you know.'

'Mm. I had a look inside. It's almost empty apart from a few bottles and newspapers. Do you know who ordered it?'

'No.'

'I see you have a surveillance camera over the counter. Looks as if it might just catch the skip?'

'If you say so.'

'If you still have the film from last Friday I would like to see it.'

'Ring tomorrow. Tobben's here.'

'Tobben?'

'Shop manager.'

'I suggest you ring Tobben now and get permission to give me the tape, then I won't detain you any longer.'

'You have a look for it,' he said and the spots went redder. 'I haven't got time to start searching for some video now.'

'Oh,' Harry said without making a move. 'What about after closing time?'

'We're open twenty-four hours,' the boy said, rolling his eyes.

'That was a joke,' Harry said.

'Right. Ha ha,' said the boy with the somnambulant voice. 'You going to buy sumfin or what?'

Harry shook his head and the boy looked past him: 'Till's free.'

Harry sighed and turned to the queue crowding towards the counter. 'The till is not free. I am from Oslo Police.' He held up his ID. 'And this person is arrested for being unable to pronounce th.'

Harry could be small-minded on certain matters. At this particular moment, though, he was extremely pleased with the response. He appreciated being smiled at.

***

But he didn't like the smile which appeared to be part of the professional training of preachers, politicians and undertakers. They smile with their eyes while speaking and it gave herr Sandemann of Sandemann Funeral Directors a sincerity which together with the temperature in the coffin storeroom under Majorstuen church made Harry shudder. He surveyed the locale. Two coffins, a chair, a wreath, a funeral director, a black suit and a comb-over.

'She looks wonderful,' Sandemann said. 'Peaceful. Restful. Dignified. Are you a member of the family?'

'Not exactly.' Harry showed his police card in the hope that sincerity was reserved for closest family. It wasn't.

'Tragic that such a young life should pass on in this way.' Sandemann smiled, pressing his palms together. The funeral director's fingers were unusually thin and crooked.

'I would like to have a look at the clothes the deceased was wearing when she was found,' Harry said. 'At the office they said you had brought them here.'

Sandemann nodded, fetched a white plastic bag and explained that he had done this in case parents or siblings turned up, and he could dispose of them. Harry searched in vain for pockets in the black dress.

'Was there anything specific you were after?' Sandemann asked in an innocent tone of voice as he peered over Harry's shoulder.

'A house key,' Harry said. 'You didn't find anything when you…' He stared at Sandemann's crooked fingers. '…undressed her?'

Sandemann closed his eyes and shook his head. 'The only thing under the skirt was herself. Apart from the picture in the shoe, of course.'

'The picture?'

'Yes. Curious, isn't it? What customs they have. It's still in her shoe.'

Harry lifted a black, high-heeled shoe out of the bag and caught a flash of her in the doorway when he arrived: black dress, black shoes, red mouth.

The picture was a dog-eared photograph of a woman and three children on a beach. It looked like a holiday snap from somewhere in Norway with large, smooth rocks in the water and tall pine trees on the hills in the background.

'Has anyone from her family been here?' Harry asked.

'Only her uncle. Together with one of your colleagues, naturally.'

'Naturally?'

'Yes, I understood he was serving a sentence.'

Harry didn't answer. Sandemann leaned forward and bent his back in such a way that the little head withdrew between his shoulders making him resemble a vulture: 'I wondered what for.' The whisper sounded like a hoarse birdcall: 'Since he won't even be allowed to attend the funeral, I mean.'

Harry cleared his throat. 'May I see her?'

Sandemann seemed disappointed, but gestured civilly with his hand to one of the coffins.

As usual, it struck Harry how a professional job could enhance a corpse. Anna really did seem at peace. He touched her forehead. It was like touching marble.

'What is the necklace?' Harry asked.

'Gold coins,' Sandemann said. 'Her uncle brought it.'

'And what's this?' Harry lifted up a wad of paper held together by a thick, brown elastic band. It was a stack of hundred-kroner notes.

'A custom they have,' Sandemann said.

'Who are these they you keep talking about?'

'Didn't you know?' Sandemann formed his thin, wet lips into a smile. 'She was a gypsy.'

***

All the tables in the canteen at Police HQ were occupied by colleagues in animated conversation. Except for one. Harry walked over to it.

'You'll get to know people by and by,' he said. Beate looked up at him with incomprehension, and he realised they might have more in common than he had thought. He sat down and placed a video cassette in front of him. 'This is taken from the 7-Eleven shop diagonally opposite the bank on the day of the robbery. Plus a recording of the Thursday before. Could you check it for anything interesting?'

'See if the bank robber's on it, you mean?' Beate mumbled with her mouth full of bread and liver paste. Harry studied her packed lunch.

'Well, we can only hope,' he said.

'Of course,' she said and her eyes filled with water as she struggled to swallow the food. 'In 1993, the Kreditkasse in Frogner was held up. The robber had taken plastic bags with the Shell logo on to put the money in, so we checked the surveillance camera at the nearest Shell station. Turned out he had been in to buy bags ten minutes before the job. Wearing the same clothes, but without a mask. We arrested him half an hour later.'