Harry Hole Oslo Sequence 10 - Police

placed him on the floor of his cell and left the door ajar. The next morning, when they found the body of the man they thought was Valentin, no one was especially surprised. The murder of the unit’s most hated prisoner was more or less expected. It was so obvious they didn’t even consider checking the fingerprints, even less running a DNA test.’
    There was silence around the table. Another customer came in, was about to sit at the neighbouring table, but one glance from Hagen was enough to make him move further away.
    ‘So what you’re saying is that Valentin escaped and is alive and well,’ Beate Lønn said. ‘He was behind the original murders and the police murders. The motive for the latter is revenge on the police in general. And he uses the earlier crime scenes to do it. But what precisely is he exacting revenge for? The police doing their job? In which case not many of us would be left alive.’
    ‘I’m not sure he’s after the police in general,’ Katrine said. ‘The prison warder told me they’d been visited by a policeman at Ila, who spoke to some of the inmates about the murders of the girls at Maridalen and Tryvann. He said he spoke to prisoners in for murder, and rather than ask for information he leaked it. He fingered Valentin as a . . .’ Katrine braced herself. ‘. . . child-fucker.’
    She saw them all, even Beate Lønn, recoil. It was strange how one word could seem stronger than even the worst crime-scene photographs.
    ‘And if that’s not meting out a straight death sentence, then it’s not far off.’
    ‘And the policeman was?’
    ‘The warder I was speaking to couldn’t remember, and his name isn’t recorded anywhere. But you can guess.’
    ‘Erlend Vennesla or Bertil Nilsen,’ Bjørn Holm said.
    ‘A picture is emerging, don’t you think?’ Gunnar Hagen said. ‘This Judas was subjected to the same extreme physical violence as the police officers. Doctor?’
    ‘Yes indeed,’ Aune said. ‘Murderers are creatures of habit who stick to tried and tested methods.’
    ‘But with Judas there was a specific purpose,’ Beate said. ‘To camouflage his escape.’
    ‘If that’s really how it happened,’ Bjørn Holm said. ‘This inmate Katrine has spoken to ain’t exactly the world’s most reliable witness.’
    ‘Well,’ Katrine said, ‘ I believe him.’
    ‘Why?’
    Katrine gave a lopsided grin. ‘What was it Harry used to say? Intuition is only the sum of many small but specific things the brain hasn’t managed to put a name to yet.’
    ‘What about digging up the body and checking?’ Aune asked.
    ‘Guess,’ Katrine said.
    ‘Cremated?’
    ‘Valentin had written a will the week before, in which it said that if he died the body should be cremated as soon as humanly possible.’
    ‘And since then no one’s heard from him,’ Holm said. ‘Until he killed Vennesla and Nilsen.’
    ‘That’s the hypothesis Katrine presented to me, yes,’ Gunnar Hagen said. ‘For now it’s on the thin side and, to put it mildly, bold, but while our investigative unit is struggling to make any headway with other hypotheses, I’d like to give this one a chance. That’s why I’ve gathered you here today. I want you to form a special little unit to follow this – and only this – trail. The rest you leave to the bigger unit. If you accept the assignment, you report to me . . .’ He coughed, loud and brief, like a gunshot. ‘And only to me.’
    ‘Aha,’ Beate said. ‘Does that mean . . .?’
    ‘Yes, it means you’ll be working in total secrecy.’
    ‘Secrecy from whom?’ Bjørn Holm asked.
    ‘Everyone,’ Hagen said. ‘Absolutely everyone except me.’
    Ståle Aune coughed. ‘And who in particular?’
    Hagen rolled a bit of skin on his neck between his thumb and first finger. His eyelids had lowered, making him look like a lizard basking in hot sun.
    ‘Bellman,’ Beate articulated. ‘The Chief of Police.’
    Hagen splayed his palms. ‘I just want results. We were successful with a small, independent group when Harry was with us. But the Chief of Police has put his foot down. He wants one big unit. But the one big unit has run out of ideas, and we have to catch this police killer. If we don’t, all hell will be let loose. Were it to come to a confrontation with the Chief of Police, I would naturally take full and complete responsibility. I would say I hadn’t told you he was unaware of this unit. But I appreciate the position I’m putting you in, so