Death By Water (12 page)

Liss remained standing in the middle of the room. The woman didn’t offer her a seat.

– What is this about the photo?

– You took it, Liss stated, as calmly as she could.

– Did I?

– It was sent from your phone to a recipient in Amsterdam.

The woman drew a breath, and Liss readied herself. At any moment some great brute of a husband might turn up and throw her out. Maybe they’d call the police. But she was determined to stay put until she found out why these pictures of Mailin had been taken. A sudden vision of grabbing that bundled baby, threatening to beat its dark little head against the wall unless the woman told her what she knew.

It was as though this threat from some dark and closed place deep down inside her materialised itself, moved through the room and touched something in Judith van Ravens. She picked up the pushchair bag and headed for the door.

– Just going to put her down. Be right back.

Liss imagined her ringing her husband, if he wasn’t at home, or the neighbours, or the emergency number. It didn’t bother her at all. She knew she had come to the right house.

A few moments later, Judith van Ravens was back again.

– You’re right, she blurted out before Liss had a chance to say anything. – I did take that picture, but I don’t see why that gives you any reason at all to come barging in here. My daughter needs changing and feeding very soon, I’ve got hundreds of things to do, I’m expecting guests …

– The woman you took that picture of has gone missing.

Judith van Ravens stared at her. – What do you mean?

Liss took out the
VG
she had pocketed on the way out of the plane, opened it to the page and spread it on the table. Judith van Ravens read, looked at her, read again.

– How do you know that …?

– My sister, Liss answered dully. – It’s my sister that’s gone missing. And before I leave here, you’re going to tell me everything about these pictures. After that I’m going to the police.

– The police? Is that necessary?

– That’s for me to decide, Liss said firmly.

Judith van Ravens stood over by the window. – I haven’t done anything wrong, she said, suddenly sounding like a child who’s been dragged in to see the headmaster. – It’s just that I don’t want my husband to know anything about this.

She glanced across at Liss. – It’s true. I sent some pictures of that woman to Amsterdam, to someone I know.

– Zako.

– You know who he is?

Liss shrugged her shoulders. – Why did you do it?

Judith van Ravens rubbed her hands along her cheeks, pulling her entire face backwards.

– I’ve … known Zako some years. We’re friends.

Liss almost interrupted, but stopped herself.
Zako doesn’t have women
friends, she was going to say, and at the same instant saw him in her mind’s eye, lying on the sofa with vomit round his mouth. She could hear the voice of the policeman named Wouters, the one who was waiting for her to come and tell him what had happened that night.

– Sometimes we speak on the phone, Judith van Ravens continued, – and sometimes when I’m in Amsterdam we meet.

She was slender, a little below medium height, round hips and breasts not too big, even though she was probably breastfeeding. Not a typical Zako woman, Liss thought.

– And your husband’s not supposed to know about this, she noted with a touch of contempt.

– Actually nothing happens when Zako and I meet, Judith van Ravens assured her. – Not much, anyway, she corrected herself, – but my husband doesn’t have to know everything I do. He’s the suspicious type.

– What about the photo?

Judith van Ravens again stroked her cheeks, the movement continuing on up through her lustrous hair. – Zako called a few weeks ago. Asked for a favour. He wanted to surprise someone he knew, just for fun. I suppose that was probably you?

– Keep going.

– I was to take some pictures of a woman without her knowing it. I was given the name and address of an office. Waited outside in the car until she showed up. Followed her to a tram stop. She was with a man … It was a joke!

– When was this?

Judith van Ravens looked to be thinking about it. – Maybe three weeks ago. The end of last month. We flew to Houston the week after.

Three weeks fitted with the date Liss had noted in Zako’s flat.

– How long were you in the USA?

– We came back on Friday evening. I’m still a bit jet-lagged. Judith van Ravens closed her eyes. – I owed him a favour. The disappearance of this woman, your sister, can’t have anything at all to do with those pictures. Zako and I went to the film academy together. He’s strange, and he gets up to some weird things, but he isn’t involved in kidnapping or anything like that.

– Zako is dead.

The woman at the window stiffened. The colour drained from the already pale cheeks.

– It was an accident, Liss went on. It felt comforting, saying it like that. Something she might end up believing herself, if she repeated it often enough.

– How …?

Liss sat in one of the chairs by the coffee table.

– Overdose. A mixture of things. He fell asleep, vomited and choked.

Judith van Ravens slumped down into the sofa. – That’s not possible. Zako isn’t like that. He always has control.

Liss didn’t respond. For a few moments they sat in silence. In another room, a mobile phone began to ring. Judith van Ravens didn’t react. Sat hunched forward, legs crossed, staring at the tabletop. Suddenly she said:

– We have to go to the police. It’ll be a nightmare for me, but we have to.

– Why?

She didn’t raise her eyes. – It can’t be coincidental, this business with the pictures. If Zako has got himself mixed up in something or other, and someone has made this look like an accident …

Liss interrupted: – I’m sure you were right when you said it was only meant as a joke.

Judith van Ravens looked up. – Are you?

Liss nodded firmly. – Having spoken to you, it figures.

– Did you two … have a relationship?

Liss ignored the question. – It’s like you say. Zako wanted to surprise me. He didn’t mean any harm. It’s just a coincidence that my sister went missing directly after you took those pictures.

A moment’s relief: regardless of what had happened to Mailin, it wasn’t because of anything she, Liss, had done. It lasted for a few seconds, and then the doubt returned.

– Do you still have those pictures?

Judith van Ravens stood up, went into the next room, came back with a mobile phone.

– I didn’t delete them, she said, and showed Liss the screen. – Had forgotten all about the whole business.

Just then the baby began screaming in the next room.

– So you don’t think there’s any need for me to go to the police?

Liss waited a few seconds before answering. – As far as I know, no one believes Zako’s death was anything but accidental.

S
HE NEEDED TO
walk. Followed Kongs Way down towards town. It had snowed quite a lot, and the pavements hadn’t been cleared. Her thin boots were stiff with cold, and she slipped on icy bumps. Her phone began to ring. She thought of the detective inspector, Wouters. Sooner or later they’re going to find out, Liss. That someone else was there that night. That it was a woman in her mid-twenties, above average height, much too thin, with long reddish hair. No need to send out an alert. Anyone who knew Zako could point her out …

It was Rikke who’d called. Shortly afterwards, a text:
Where are you? Have to talk to you.

It took almost an hour to reach Harald Hardrådes Square. She popped into a kiosk, bought a pack of Marlboros and a bottle of water, lit up the moment she was outside. Further up on Schweigaards Street was the commune where she’d been living just before she left. It probably still existed. Others would have moved in. Catrine still sent her messages at intervals; she’d even been out to Amsterdam to visit a couple of times. Maybe the closest thing to a best friend Liss had had.

She got her phone out to call her. At the moment Catrine was living in student accommodation. She’d also stopped throwing stones and bottles at walls of policemen with helmets and shields. Two years ago she’d started studying political science at Blindern and claimed to have found a better way to display her opposition. For Liss, it hadn’t been enough to move to the other side of town. She’d had to get far away.

When her call wasn’t picked up at once, she put the phone back in her bag, carried on towards Grønlandsleiret, and down to the church. There she stopped. Turned and looked up at the concrete block of the Oslo police headquarters. At the back were the security cells where she’d spent quite a few hours. No feeling worse than the sound of the door closing behind you. Being shut in. No knowing how long for … To the right of the station, the driveway leading up to the prison. What was the sentence for murder? Manslaughter, if they chose to believe her? She would be extradited to appear in court in Holland. Were the sentences longer there? Five years? Ten or fifteen? She might be over forty by the time she got out again … Locked up. Not for a few hours or a night, but for months, years. The only thing that scared her. Not to be able to go out the door when she felt she needed to. Pacing restlessly around in a tiny locked room. Shaking the bars, scratching at the walls. Waiting for the steps in the corridor, the rattling of keys. The appointed hour for exercise. Knowing that this is what it will be like until you’re old. This isn’t about you, Liss, she tried to tell herself. All that matters is to find Mailin. Nothing else is important.

She trudged up to the entrance to the police headquarters. What would you have said, Mailin? She tried to conjure up her sister’s voice.
No one can make your choices for you, Liss
. That wasn’t much help. She tried again.
I don’t want you to get hurt, Liss. There is nothing in the world I care about more than you.

She pulled at the heavy door. Didn’t budge. It’s a sign, she thought, they won’t let you in. But the one beside it slid open and she stepped into the large hallway.

A girl about her own age in a Securitas uniform in the security booth. Two thin, pale braids hanging over the collar of her shirt. She looked as if she’d learnt to put make-up on in a children’s theatre.

– Can I help you? she said sullenly.

Liss peered up at the galleries around the hall. Different departments looked to be colour coded in red, blue and yellow.

– I’m here because of my sister. She’s gone missing.

– Okay, said the blonde without altering her facial expression. – You want to report a missing person?

Liss shook her head. – You’ve been looking for her for four days.

She didn’t want to tell any more to this creature slouched there chewing gum. – The detectives in charge of the case probably want to talk to me.

– What is your sister’s name?

– Mailin. Mailin Synnøve Bjerke.

– Sit down over there and wait.

A couple of minutes later, Liss was summoned back to the counter.

– None of the detectives can talk to you at the moment. Write your name and telephone number on this piece of paper and they’ll get in touch with you.

T
HE TAXI DRIVER
handed Liss’s credit card back to her. She’d been living on it for a while now. Wasn’t sure how much more she could squeeze out of it; didn’t want to find out. She stepped out into the slushy snow. The weather had turned milder during the night. She’d spent most of it in the hotel room in Parkveien looking out the window at the rain.

She stepped experimentally through the puddles in the driveway. It was something like four years since she’d last been there.

Almost as soon as she rang, the door was cautiously opened. Tage’s head appeared.

– Liss, he exclaimed, and put his hand to his forehead. He had grown a beard since she last saw him, short and grey. There was hardly a wisp of hair left on his head. And the eyes seemed smaller behind the round spectacles. She felt almost relieved to see him. Perhaps because it wasn’t her mother who had opened the door.

For a moment it looked as though he was going to embrace her, but fortunately he decided against it.

– What in the world? But come in, come in. He shouted back into the house: – Ragnhild!

Tage still pronounced her name in that strange Swedish way. They had never got used to it. She remembered what she thought that day fifteen years ago, the first time he came to their house: a person who says Mother’s name in such a weird way is definitely not going to be allowed to move into our house. But thinking that hadn’t helped.

Tage got no answer and called out again, adding this time: – It’s Liss.

Liss heard a sound from the living room. The next moment her mother was standing in the doorway, her face drawn and without make-up. She gasped, but her eyes looked far away.

– Liss, she murmured, and stayed where she was.

Liss kicked off her boots, crossed the threshold, into the hallway. Had decided in advance to give Mother a hug, but that didn’t happen.

– You’re here. Mother took hold of her arm, as though to reassure herself her eyes were not deceiving her. – There, you see, Tage, she came.

– I never said she wouldn’t, Tage protested as he looked around. – Where are your things?

– What things?

– Suitcase, or bag.

– I just left.

– Okay then, Tage noted. He was an assistant professor in sociology, unless he’d finally got the chair he’d applied for hundreds of times. He always noted things before he permitted himself to have an opinion on them.

They sat in the living room. Not much was said. Liss reeled off something about not being able to sit calmly and wait in Amsterdam. Her mother contented herself with a nod, but was hardly listening. Seemed even more remote now than when Liss had arrived. She must have taken some tranquillisers. It wasn’t like her; she never touched medicines. But now her eyelids were heavy and her pupils small.