'Jesus Christ,' he whispered.

Gregor leapt out into the water and he waded after the dog. It was ten metres into the water, but it didn't even come up to his knees. He stared down at a pair of shoes. Hand-sewn, Italian. Harry shone the torch into the water where the light was reflected back from bare, bluish-white legs, sticking up like two pale tombstones.

Harry's shouts were carried on the wind and drowned instantly in the crashing of the waves. But the torch he dropped, to be swallowed up by the water, remained on the sandy bottom and shone for almost twenty-four hours. When the little boy who found it the following summer ran with it to his father, the salt water had corroded the black casing and neither of them connected a Maglite with the grotesque discovery of a corpse. The previous year it had been in all the papers, but in the summer sun that seemed an eternity away.

PART V

32

David Hasselhoff

The morning light stood like a white pillar through a tear in the sky and cast what Tom Waaler called 'Jesus Light' onto the fjord. A number of similar pictures had hung on the walls at home. He strode over the plastic ribbon cordoning off the crime scene. Those who thought they knew him would have said it was his nature to jump over, rather than duck under. They were right about the latter, but not the former. Tom Waaler doubted that anyone knew him. And he intended it to stay that way.

He raised a digital camera to the steel-blue lenses of his Police sunglasses, of which he had a dozen pairs at home. A return favour from an appreciative customer. As indeed the camera was, too. The frame captured the hole in the ground and the body beside it. It was wearing black trousers and a shirt which had once been white, but was now brown from the clay and sand.

'Another photo for your private collection?' It was Weber.

'This was new,' Waaler said without looking up. 'I like creative murderers. Have you identified the man?'

'Arne Albu. Forty-two years old. Married, three children. Seems to have a fair bit of money. He owns a chalet just behind here.'

'Did anyone see or hear anything?'

'They're making door-to-door inquiries now. But you can see for yourself how deserted it is here.'

'Someone at the hotel over there perhaps?' Waaler pointed towards a large yellow wooden building at the end of the beach.

'Doubt it,' Weber said. 'There won't be anyone staying at this time of the year.'

'Who found the body?'

'Anonymous call from a telephone box in Moss. To the Moss police.'

'The murderer?'

'Don't think so. He said he saw a pair of legs sticking up when he was taking his dog for a walk.'

'Have they got the conversation on tape?'

Weber shook his head. 'He didn't ring the emergency number.'

'What do you make of this?' Waaler motioned towards the corpse.

'The doctors still have to send in their report, but to me it looks like he was buried alive. No external signs of violence, but blood in the nose and mouth and burst blood vessels in the eyes suggest a large accumulation of blood in the head. In addition, we found sand deep in his throat, which means he must have been breathing when he was buried.'

'I see. Anything else?'

'The dog was tied to the railing outside his chalet up there. Great big, ugly Rottweiler. In surprisingly good shape. The door wasn't locked. No signs of a struggle inside the chalet, either.'

'In other words, they marched in, threatened him with guns, tied up the dog, dug a hole for him and asked him if he would mind jumping in.'

'If there were several of them.'

'Big Rottweiler, one-and-a-half-metre-deep hole. I think we can take that as read, Weber.'

Weber didn't react. He had never had a problem working with Waaler. The man was a talented investigator, one of the few; his results spoke for themselves. But that didn't mean Weber had to like him. Although dislike wasn't perhaps the right word. It was something else, something which made you think of Spot the Difference pictures. You couldn't quite put your finger on what it was, but there was something that disquieted you. Disquieted, that was the word.

***

Waaler crouched down beside the body. He knew Weber didn't like him. That was fine by him. Weber was an older police officer working in Forensics, who was going nowhere, who could not conceivably affect Waaler's career or life in any way. He was, to cut a long story short, not someone he needed to like him.

'Who identified him?'

'A few of the locals popped by,' Weber answered. 'The owner of the grocery shop recognised him. We got hold of his wife in Oslo and brought her out here. She's confirmed it's Arne Albu.'

'And where is she now?'

'In the chalet.'

'Has anyone questioned her?'

Weber shrugged.

'I like being the first on the scene,' Waaler said, leaning forward and snapping a close-up of the face.

'Moss police district has the case. We've just been called in to assist.'

'We have the experience,' Waaler said. 'Has anyone politely explained that to the country clods?'

'A couple of us have in fact investigated murder before,' a voice behind them said. Waaler peered up at a smiling man in a black leather police jacket. The epaulettes bore one star and gold edges.

'No offence taken,' the inspector laughed. 'I'm Paul Sшrensen. You must be Inspector Waaler.'

Waaler briefly acknowledged him and ignored Sшrensen's moves to shake hands. He didn't like physical contact with men he didn't know. Nor with men he did know, for that matter. It was another matter with women. As long as he was in control, anyway. And he was.

'You haven't investigated anything like this before, Sшrensen,' Waaler said, prising open one of the dead man's eyelids and revealing a blood-red eyeball. 'This isn't a pub stabbing or a drunken misadventure. That's why you called us in, isn't it?'

'This doesn't look like anything local, no,' Sшrensen said.

'I suggest you and the boys stick around here and keep watch while I go and have a word with the corpse's wife.'

Sшrensen laughed as if Waaler had told a good joke, but stopped when he saw Waaler's raised eyebrows over the Police sunglasses. Tom Waaler stood up and began to walk to the police cordon. He counted slowly to three, then he shouted without turning: 'And move that police car. I see you've parked in the turnaround, Sшrensen. Forensics will be looking for tyre tracks from the murderer's car. Thanking you.'

He didn't need to turn to know the smile had been wiped off Sшrensen's jolly face. And that the crime scene had just been taken over by Oslo police district.

***

'Fru Albu?' Waaler enquired as he entered the living room. He had decided he wanted this over as quickly as possible. He had a lunch date with a promising young girl, and he intended to keep it.

Vigdis Albu looked up from the photo album she was flicking through. 'Yes?'

Waaler liked what he saw. The meticulously maintained body, the confident way she was sitting, the studied TV hostess-style casualness and the third button of her blouse undone. He also liked what he heard. The soft voice simply made for the special words he liked his women to say. And he liked the mouth he already hoped he would hear the words come out of.

'Inspector Tom Waaler,' he said, taking a seat opposite her. 'I understand what a shock this must have been for you. It is, of course, a clichй, and I doubt it has any significance for you at this time, but I would like to extend my sympathy to you. I have also lost someone very close to me.'