Harry Hole Oslo Sequence 10 - Police

the Kalsnes case. Terrible workmanship from start to finish. We let the murderer slip through our fingers and afterwards no one is held to account. And no one holds anyone to account. Foxes in the henhouse, Bjørn.’
    ‘The girl who was found burned in Come As You Are this morning—’
    ‘Anarchy. That’s what it is. Someone has to be held to account. Someone—’
    ‘It was Fia.’
    In the ensuing silence Bjørn heard the bird hoot again, but from somewhere else this time. It must have moved. A thought struck him. That it was another bird. There could be two of them. Two of the same species. Which hooted to each other in the forest.
    ‘Harry’s rape of me.’ Silje looked at Rakel as calmly as if she had just told her the weather forecast.
    ‘Harry raped you?’
    Silje smiled. A fleeting smile, no more than a muscle twitch, an expression that had no time to reach her eyes before it was gone. Along with everything else, steadfastness, indifference. And her eyes, instead of lighting up with a smile, filled with tears.
    My God, Rakel thought, she isn’t lying. She opened her mouth for oxygen and knew with a hundred per cent certainty: the girl might be off her rocker, but she wasn’t lying.
    ‘I was so in love with him, fru Fauke. I thought we were meant for each other. So I went to his office. I had put on make-up. And he misunderstood.’
    Rakel watched as the first tear detached itself from her eyelashes and fell, then it was caught by the soft, young cheek. It rolled down. Moistening the skin. Making it pink. She knew there was some kitchen roll on the worktop behind her, but she didn’t get it. No way.
    ‘Harry doesn’t do misunderstandings,’ Rakel said, surprised by the composure in her voice. ‘Nor rape.’ The composure and the conviction. She wondered how long it would last.
    ‘You’re wrong,’ Silje said, smiling through the tears.
    ‘Am I?’ Rakel felt like smacking a fist into her smug, spoiled face.
    ‘Yes, fru Fauke. Now you’re the one who misunderstands.’
    ‘Say what you have to say and get out.’
    ‘Harry . . .’
    Rakel hated the sound of his name from her mouth with such intensity that she instinctively looked around for something to silence it. A frying pan, a blunt bread knife, gaffer tape, whatever came to hand.
    ‘. . . he thought I went to ask him about coursework. But he misunderstood. I went to seduce him.’
    ‘Do you know what, my girl? I already knew that’s what you did. And now you’re claiming you got what you wanted, but it was still rape? So, what happened? Did you gasp your hot little pseudo-chaste “no, no, no”s until it became one “no” which afterwards you reckoned you meant, and he should have known what you really meant before you did?’
    Rakel could hear how her rhetoric suddenly sounded like the defence counsel’s refrain she had heard so often during rape trials, the refrain Rakel hated with a passion but which lawyers understood and accepted had to be recited. But it wasn’t just rhetoric, it was what she felt, the way it had to be, it couldn’t be any different.
    ‘No,’ Silje said. ‘What I want to tell you is that he didn’t rape me.’
    Rakel blinked. Had to rewind a couple of seconds to be sure she had heard correctly. Didn’t rape.
    ‘I threatened to report him for rape because . . .’ The girl used the knuckle of her first finger to take the tears from her eyes that had filled up again. ‘. . . because he wanted to report me to the board of governors for behaving inappropriately towards him. Which he had every right to do. But I was desperate. I tried to thwart him by accusing him of rape. I’ve been wanting to tell him I’ve had a change of heart and I regret what I’ve done. Tell him it . . . yes, what I did was a crime. Wrongful accusation. Paragraph 168 of the Penal Code. Recommended sentence: eight years.’
    ‘Correct,’ Rakel said.
    ‘Ah, yes.’ Silje smiled through the tears. ‘I forgot you were a lawyer.’
    ‘How do you know?’
    ‘Oh,’ Silje said with a sniffle, ‘I know a lot about Harry’s life. I’ve studied him, you might say. He was my idol, and I was just a stupid girl. I even investigated the police murders for him, thought I could give him a helping hand. Me, a student who knows nothing. I started with a short lecture to explain to him how it all fitted. I wanted to tell Harry Hole how to catch the cop killer.’ Silje produced another forced smile while shaking her head.
    Rakel