Harry Hole Oslo Sequence 10 - Police

he was personally in charge of the operation.
    ‘Understood,’ Hagen said. ‘I’ll get going then. My understanding is therefore that the group in the Boiler Room can also resume their work?’
    Mikael Bellman laughed. Hagen wondered what could have caused such a shift in mood. The Police Chief seemed ten years younger, ten kilos lighter and free from the frown he had carried like a deep gash in his forehead since the day he had been appointed.
    ‘Don’t push it, Gunnar. Liking the idea you’ve come up with doesn’t mean I like my subordinates defying my orders.’
    Hagen shrugged, but still tried to capture the Police Chief’s cold, mocking gaze.
    ‘I’m freezing all activity in your group until further notice, Gunnar. Then we’d better have the requisite chat after this operation. And if in the meantime I find out you’ve so much as run one computer search or made a single phone call regarding this case . . .’
    I’m older than him, and I’m a better man, Gunnar Hagen thought, keeping his eyes raised and knowing a mixture of defiance and shame were causing his cheeks to flush.
    It’s just decoration, he reminded himself, the gold braid on a uniform.
    Then he lowered his gaze.
    It was late. Katrine Bratt stared down at the report in front of her. She shouldn’t have done. Beate had just rung to say that Hagen had asked them all to stop their work, direct orders from Bellman. So Katrine should have been at home, lying in bed with a big cup of camomile tea and a man who loved her, or alternatively watching a TV series she loved. Instead of sitting here in the Boiler Room, reading case files and searching for possible flaws, hints of something that didn’t sit right and any vague connections. And this connection was so vague it verged on the inane. Or did it? It had been relatively easy to gain access to the reports on the Anton Mittet murder via the police’s own system. The summarised search of the car had been as detailed as it was soporific. So why had she stopped at this particular sentence? Among all the potential evidence they had removed from Mittet’s car was an ice scraper and a lighter plus some chewing gum stuck to the underside of the driver’s seat.
    The contact information for Anton Mittet’s widow, Laura Mittet, was in the report.
    Katrine hesitated, then dialled the number. The voice of the woman who answered sounded weary, dulled by pills. Katrine introduced herself and asked her question.
    ‘Chewing gum?’ Laura Mittet repeated slowly. ‘No, he never chewed gum. He drank coffee.’
    ‘Was there anyone else who drove the car and chewed—?’
    ‘No one ever drove the car apart from Anton.’
    ‘Thank you,’ Katrine said.

19
    IT WAS EVENING and the kitchen windows in the yellow wooden house in Oppsal where Beate Lønn had just finished her daily conversation with her son were brightly lit. Afterwards she had talked to her mother-in-law and agreed that if the boy still had a temperature and was coughing, they would have to postpone the journey home for a few days. The in-laws would love to have him for a bit longer in Steinkjer. Beate unhooked the plastic leftovers bag in the cupboard under the sink and was putting it in one of the white rubbish bags when the phone rang. It was Katrine, and she didn’t waste any time on pleasantries.
    ‘There was a piece of chewing gum under the driver’s seat in Mittet’s car.’
    ‘Right . . .’
    ‘It was removed, but it hasn’t been sent for DNA testing.’
    ‘I wouldn’t have sent it either if it was under the driver’s seat. It was Mittet’s. Listen, if you tested every single thing you found at a crime scene, the queue would make waiting times—’
    ‘But Ståle was right, Beate! People don’t stick gum under their own dining-room tables. Or in their own cars. According to Mittet’s wife, he didn’t even chew gum. And no one else drove the car except him. I think the person who left the gum was leaning across the driver’s seat when he did it. And according to the report the murderer was sitting in the passenger seat and leaned across Mittet to fasten his hands to the wheel with the ties. The car has been in the river, but according to Bjørn the DNA in the spit can—’
    ‘Yes, I know where you’re going,’ Beate interrupted. ‘You’ll have to ring someone in Bellman’s investigative unit and tell them.’
    ‘But don’t you understand?’ Katrine said. ‘This could lead us straight to the