Harry Hole Oslo Sequence 10 - Police

Oslo to Paris and in the guest book at the Golden Oriole Hotel the same night. Anyone you met who can confirm you were there?’
    Mikael Bellman blinked hard as if to see better. The northern lights in his skin went out. He nodded slowly. ‘The Kalsnes case, yes. That was the day I went for a job interview with Interpol. I could definitely find a few witnesses from that trip. We even went out to a restaurant in the evening.’
    ‘So there’s just the question of where your gun was on that date.’
    ‘At home,’ Mikael Bellman said with total certainty. ‘Locked up. The key was on the key ring I had with me.’
    ‘Can you prove that?’
    ‘Doubt it. You said there were two possible explanations here. Let me guess. The second is that the ballistics boys—’
    ‘Most of them are girls now.’
    ‘—have made a mistake, have mixed up the fatal bullet with one of mine, or something like that.’
    ‘No. The lead bullet in the box in the Evidence Room comes from your gun, Bellman.’
    ‘What do you mean?’
    ‘By what?’
    ‘By saying “the bullet in the box in the Evidence Room” and not “the bullet found in Kalsnes’s skull”.’
    Harry nodded. ‘Now we’re getting warm, Bellman.’
    ‘Getting warm how?’
    ‘The other possibility, the way I see it, is that someone swapped the bullet in the Evidence Room with one from your gun. There is one thing about the bullet that doesn’t add up. It’s crushed in a way that suggests it hit something much harder than flesh and bone.’
    ‘Right. What do you think it hit then?’
    ‘The steel sheet behind the paper target on the firing range in Økern.’
    ‘What on earth would make you believe that?’
    ‘It’s not so much what I believe as what I know, Bellman. I got the ballistics girls to go up there and run a test with your gun. And guess what? The test bullet looked identical to the one in the evidence box.’
    ‘And what made you think of the firing range precisely?’
    ‘Isn’t it obvious? That’s where police officers fire most of the shots that are not meant to hit people.’
    Mikael Bellman slowly shook his head. ‘There’s more. What is it?’
    ‘Well,’ Harry said, taking out his packet of Camel, holding it out to Bellman, who shook his head, ‘I thought about how many burners I know in the police. And do you know what? I could only think of one.’ Harry took the half-smoked cigarette, lit it and took a long, rasping drag. ‘Truls Berntsen. And as chance would have it I’ve spoken to a witness who recently saw you practising together on the range. The bullets drop into a container after they’ve hit the steel plate. It would be simple for someone to take a used bullet after you’d gone.’
    ‘Do you suspect that our mutual colleague Truls Berntsen planted false evidence to incriminate me, Harry?’
    ‘Don’t you?’
    Bellman looked as if he was about to say something, but changed his mind. He shrugged. ‘I don’t know what Berntsen’s up to, Hole. And, to be honest, I don’t think you do, either.’
    ‘Well, I don’t know how honest you are, but I do know the odd fact about Berntsen. And Berntsen knows the odd fact about you too. Isn’t that true?’
    ‘I have an inkling you’re insinuating something, but I have no idea what, Hole.’
    ‘Oh yes, you do. But not much that can be proved, I would assume, so let’s give it a miss. What I’d like to know is what Berntsen is after.’
    ‘Your job, Hole, is to investigate the police murders, not to take advantage of the situation to conduct a personal witch-hunt against me or Truls Berntsen.’
    ‘Is that what I’m doing?’
    ‘It’s no secret that you and I have had our differences, Harry. I suppose you see this as a chance to get your own back.’
    ‘What about you and Berntsen? Any differences there? You’re the one who suspended him on suspicion of corruption.’
    ‘No, that was the Appointments Board. And that misunderstanding is about to be rectified.’
    ‘Oh?’
    ‘In fact, it was my mistake. The money that went into his account came from me.’
    ‘From you?’
    ‘He built the terrace on our house, and I paid him in cash, which he put into his account. But I wanted the money back because of faults in the construction. That was why he didn’t declare the sum to the tax authorities. He didn’t want to pay tax on money that wasn’t his. I sent the information to the Fraud Squad yesterday.’
    ‘Faults in the construction?’
    ‘The concrete base is