'We, eight years ago?' Harry asked, not thinking.

Beate's face changed colour like traffic lights. She snatched a slice of bread and tried to hide behind it. 'My father,' she muttered.

'I apologise. I didn't mean it like that.'

'It doesn't matter,' came the swift response.

'Your father…'

'Was killed,' she said. 'It's a long time ago now.'

Harry sat listening to the sounds of chewing while studying his hands.

'Why did you take a tape of the week before the robbery?' Beate asked.

'The skip,' Harry said.

'What about it?'

'I rang the skip company and asked. It was ordered on a Thursday by one Stein Sшbstad in Industrigata and delivered to the agreed site directly outside the 7-Eleven the day after. There are two Stein Sшbstads in Oslo and both deny having ordered a skip. My theory is that the robber had it placed there to cut off the view through the window so that the camera won't film him crossing the road as he leaves the bank. If he had been scouting around the 7-Eleven the same day as he had ordered the skip, we might see someone looking into the camera and out of the window towards the bank, checking angles and so on.'

'With a bit of luck. The witness outside the 7-Eleven says the robber was still masked when he crossed the road, so why would he go to all the bother with a skip?'

'The plan might have been to take off the balaclava while crossing the road.' Harry sighed. 'I don't know, I only know there is something about that green skip. It has been there for a week and apart from the odd passer-by throwing refuse in it, no one has used it.'

'OK,' Beate said, taking the video and standing up.

'One more thing,' Harry said. 'What do you know about this Raskol Baxhet?'

'Raskol?' Beate frowned. 'He was a kind of mythical figure until he gave himself up. If the rumours are true, in one way or another he's had a hand in ninety per cent of the bank robberies in Oslo. My guess is he could finger everyone who has committed a bank robbery here over the last twenty years.'

'So that's what Ivarsson is using him for. Where's he banged up?'

Beate thrust a thumb over her shoulder. 'A-Wing over there.'

'In Botsen?'

'Yes. And he's refused to utter a word to any policeman for the duration of his sentence.'

'So what makes Ivarsson think he can succeed?'

'He's finally found something Raskol wants that he can use to negotiate. In Botsen they say it's the only thing Raskol has asked for since he arrived. Permission to go to the funeral of a relative.'

'Really?' Harry said, hoping his face didn't give anything away.

'She'll be buried in two days' time, and Raskol has lodged an urgent plea with the prison governor to be allowed to attend.'

After Beate had gone, Harry remained at the table. The lunch break was over and the canteen was thinning out. It was supposed to be light and snug and was run by a national catering company, so Harry preferred to eat in town. But he suddenly remembered this was where he had danced with Rakel at the Christmas party; it was precisely here he had decided to make a move on her. Or was it vice versa? He could still feel the curve of her back on his hand.

Rakel.

In two days Anna would be buried, and no one had the slightest doubt that she had died by her own hand. He was the only person who had been there and could have contradicted them, but he couldn't remember a thing. So why couldn't he let sleeping dogs lie? He had everything to lose and nothing to gain. If for no other reason, why couldn't he forget the case for their sake, for his and Rakel's?

Harry put his elbows on the table and cradled his face in his hands.

If he had been able to contradict them, would he have done?

At the neighbouring table they turned when they heard the chair scraping on the floor and watched the close-cropped, long-legged policeman with the bad back stride quickly out of the canteen.

14

Luck

The bells over the door rang wildly in the dark, cramped kiosk as the two men came running in. Elmer's Fruit amp;Tobacco shop was one of the last kiosks of its kind with car, hunting and fishing magazines on one wall and soft porn, cigarettes and cigars on the other, and three piles of pools coupons on the counter between sweaty liquorice bars and dry, grey marzipan pigs from the previous Christmas tied in a ribbon.

'Just made it,' said Elmer, a thin, bald man of sixty with a beard and a Nordland accent.

'Wow, that was sudden,' Halvorsen said, brushing the rain off his shoulders.

'Typical Oslo autumn,' the northerner said in his acquired bokmеl. 'Either a drought or a deluge. Twenty Camel?'

Harry nodded and took out his wallet.

'And two scratch cards for the young officer?' Elmer held out the scratch cards to Halvorsen, who gave him a broad smile and quickly pocketed them.

'Is it alright if I light up in here, Elmer?' Harry asked, peering out into the downpour, which was lashing the now deserted pavements outside the dirty window.

'By all means,' Elmer said, giving them their change. 'Poisons and gambling are my bread and butter.'

He bent down and went out through a crooked brown curtain behind which they could hear a coffee machine gurgling.

'Here's the photo,' Harry said. 'I'd just like you to find out who the woman is.'

'Just?' Halvorsen looked at the dog-eared, grainy photograph Harry passed him.

'Start by finding out where the photo was taken,' Harry said and had a severe coughing fit when he tried to hold the smoke in his lungs. 'Looks like a holiday area. If it is, there must be a small grocer's or someone who rents out chalets, that sort of thing. If the family in the photo are regular visitors, someone working there knows who they are. When you know that, leave the rest to me.'

'All of this is because the photo was in the shoe?'

'It's not the usual place to keep photos, is it now?'

Halvorsen shrugged and walked into the street.

'It's not stopping,' Harry said.

'I know, but I have to get home.'

'What for?'

'For something called a life. Nothing that would interest you.'

Harry imitated a smile to show that he understood it was meant to be a witticism. 'Enjoy yourself.'

The bells rang and the door slammed behind Halvorsen. Harry sucked at his cigarette and, while studying Elmer's selection of reading matter, he was struck by how few interests he shared with the average Norwegian man. Was it because he no longer had any? Music, yes, but no one had done anything good in the last ten years, not even his old heroes. Films? If he came out of a cinema nowadays without feeling he had been lobotomised, he counted himself as fortunate. Nothing else. In other words, the only thing he was still interested in was finding people and locking them up. And not even that made his heart beat like before. The spooky thing was, Harry mused, laying a hand on Elmer's cold, smooth counter, that this state didn't bother him in the slightest. The fact that he had capitulated. It simply felt liberating to be older.

The bells rang furiously again.

'I forgot to tell you about the guy we pulled in for illegally possessing a weapon last night,' Halvorsen said. 'Roy Kinnsvik, one of the skinheads in Herbert's Pizza.' He stood in the doorway with the rain dancing around his wet shoes.

'Mm?'

'He was obviously frightened, so I told him to give me something I needed and I would let him off.'

'And?'

'He said he saw Sverre Olsen in Grьnerlшkka the night Ellen was killed.'

'So what? We've got several witnesses who can confirm that.'

'Yes, but this guy saw Olsen sitting and chatting with someone in a car.'

Harry's cigarette fell to the ground. He ignored it.

'Did he know who it was?' he asked slowly.