Harry Hole Oslo Sequence 10 - Police

here.’
    It was what came after that made Harry swear out loud.
    ‘Looks like he’s been here to pick up his stuff.’
    Harry was standing, arms crossed, in the corridor outside room 406 as Katrine and Bjørn arrived.
    ‘Good shot. Hit the post?’ Katrine asked.
    ‘Missed an open goal,’ Harry said, shaking his head.
    They followed him into the room.
    ‘He came straight here, grabbed all his stuff and was gone.’
    ‘All?’ Bjørn queried.
    ‘All except for two used Q-tips and two tram tickets we found in the waste-paper basket. Plus the stub of this ticket to a football match I have a feeling we won.’
    ‘ We ?’ Bjørn asked, looking around the bog-standard hotel room. ‘Do you mean Vålerenga?’
    ‘Norway. Versus Slovenia, it says.’
    ‘We won,’ Bjørn said. ‘Riise scored in extra time.’
    ‘Sick. How can you men remember things like that?’ Katrine said, shaking her head. ‘I can’t even remember if Brann won the league or were demoted last year.’
    ‘I’m not like that,’ Bjørn objected. ‘I only remember it because it was heading for a draw and then I was called out, and Riise—’
    ‘You remembered it anyway, Rain Man. You—’
    ‘Hey.’ They turned to Harry, who was staring at the ticket. ‘Can you remember what it was for, Bjørn?’
    ‘Eh?’
    ‘The call-out?’
    Bjørn Holm scratched one sideburn. ‘Let’s see, it was early in the evening . . .’
    ‘Never mind,’ Harry said. ‘It was the murder of Erlend Vennesla in Maridalen.’
    ‘Was it?’
    ‘The same evening that Norway was playing at Ullevål Stadium. The date’s here on the ticket. Seven o’clock.’
    ‘Aha,’ Katrine said.
    Bjørn Holm’s face showed a pained expression. ‘Don’t say that, Harry. Please don’t say Valentin Gjertsen was at the match. If he was there—’
    ‘—he can’t be the murderer,’ Katrine finished. ‘And we would very much like him to be, Harry. So please say something encouraging now.’
    ‘OK,’ Harry said. ‘Why wasn’t this ticket in the basket with the Q-tips and the tram tickets? Why did he put it on the desk when he tidied everything else up? Placed it exactly where he knew we’d find it?’
    ‘He’s left his alibi,’ Katrine said.
    ‘He left it for us so that we would stand here like we’re doing now,’ Harry said. ‘Suddenly having doubts, unsure what to do. But this is only a stub. It doesn’t prove he was there. On the contrary, it’s pretty striking that not only was he at a football match, in a stadium where fans don’t tend to remember each other, but also that, inexplicably, he has saved the ticket.’
    ‘The ticket’s got a seat number,’ Katrine said. ‘Perhaps the people sitting next to him and behind him can remember who was there. Or if the seat was unoccupied. I can search for the seat number. Perhaps I’ll find—’
    ‘Do that,’ Harry said. ‘But we’ve been through this before with alleged alibis in the theatre or the cinema. Three or four days pass and people don’t remember a thing about their neighbours.’
    ‘You’re right,’ Katrine said, resigned.
    ‘Internationals,’ Bjørn said.
    ‘What about them?’ Harry asked, heading for the bathroom, his flies already half undone.
    ‘International matches are subject to FIFA rules and regulations,’ Bjørn said. ‘Hooliganism.’
    ‘Of course,’ Harry shouted from behind the bathroom door. ‘Well done, Bjørn!’ Then the door slammed.
    ‘What?’ Katrine shouted. ‘What are you on about?’
    ‘CCTV,’ Bjørn said. ‘FIFA requires match organisers to film the spectators in case there are any disturbances. The ruling came in during the wave of hooliganism in the 1990s to help the police find the troublemakers and charge them. They film the stands throughout the match with high-definition cameras so that they can zoom in and identify every single face. And we’ve got the seating area, row and seat number of where Valentin sat.’
    ‘ Didn’t sit!’ Katrine shouted. ‘He’s not allowed to be on any bloody footage, all right? Or we’ll be back to square one.’
    ‘They may of course have deleted the images,’ Bjørn said. ‘There wasn’t any trouble during the match, and I’m sure the data-archiving directive states how long they’re allowed to keep—’
    ‘The data-archiving directive . . .’
    ‘If the images are stored electronically then all they have to do is press Delete for the files to disappear.’
    ‘Trying to remove files