Death in Oslo (8 page)

‘Peter, what do you actually mean? That we should leave the whole puzzle to the Americans? Give up our sovereignty and jurisdiction? You can’t be serious!’

‘Of course I don’t mean that,’ Salhus replied. He seemed surprised by her familiarity and hesitated a bit. ‘I mean that . . . I in fact mean the opposite. All our experience – political, professional and for that matter military – means that we have a huge advantage over the Americans in this case.’

Someone knocked on the door and a red light flashed by the door frame.

No one reacted.

‘We are Norwegian,’ Peter Salhus said. ‘We know this country. We know the language. The infrastructure. The geography, the topography. The architecture, the town. We are Norwegian and they are American.’

There was another knock at the door, more agitated this time.

‘We’ve started,’ Salhus continued and shrugged. ‘Things are working. We’re all here, everyone who should be here. The contingency plans work. Staff have been called in. The machinery was started up hours ago, in all the ministries. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Storting are taking responsibility for protocol at the moment. My point is just that—’

He stopped when a round middle-aged woman came into the room. She silently placed a piece of paper in front of the Prime Minister, who made no attempt to read it. Instead, he nodded to Salhus. ‘Carry on,’ he said curtly.

‘My point is that we have to understand what we are dealing with. We can have no illusions that the Americans will be
happy to take instructions in a situation like this. They will overstep the mark, again and again. At the same time, we have to acknowledge that they have qualifications, equipment and intelligence that will be essential for the case. To put it simply, we need them. The most important thing will be to convince them that . . .’ He lifted his glass and looked at it, distracted. The fly had settled on the inside and was attempting to open its wings, feeble and half dead. ‘That they need us just as much,’ he said emphatically, turning the empty glass in his hands. ‘If not, they’ll bulldoze us. And if we are going to achieve mutual understanding and trust, then I think we should stop banging on about words like jurisdiction, territory and sovereignty.’

‘Which is more or less what Vidkun Quisling must have said,’ the Minister of Justice objected, ‘in April 1940.’

The silence that followed was almost deafening. Even the fly had capitulated and lay with its legs in the air at the bottom of the glass. The Prime Minister’s incessant rummaging in his papers stopped abruptly. The Director of Police sat bolt upright in her chair, without leaning back. The Minister of Foreign Affairs, who had barely said a word throughout the meeting, sat petrified, with his mouth open.

‘No,’ Peter Salhus said eventually, and so quietly that the Prime Minister on the other side of the enormous table nearly missed it. ‘It is not. It is not in any way the same.’

He was stiff and slow when he got up.

‘I assume that this meeting is over,’ he said, without looking at the Prime Minister.

Salhus walked over to the door. He held his documents loosely in his hand, and looked at no one. They were all staring at him. As he passed the last chair before the door, the Prime Minister put a conciliatory hand on his arm.

‘Thank you for your efforts so far,’ he said.

Salhus did not reply.

The Prime Minister didn’t take his hand away.

‘You . . . you really admire these FBI people.’

Peter Salhus couldn’t understand what the man wanted. So he didn’t answer.

‘And these Secret Service agents. You really admire them, don’t you?’

‘Admire.’ Peter Salhus said the word slowly to himself, as if he wasn’t quite sure what it meant. Then he reclaimed his arm and looked the Prime Minister straight in the eye.

‘Perhaps, yes.’ He nodded. ‘But first and foremost . . . I fear them. And so should you all.’

He left the government’s secret crisis meeting with the faint smell of decay in his nostrils.

T
he young man at the petrol station was thoroughly pissed off. It was the second year in a row that he had had to work on the 17th of May. OK, so he was only nineteen and the youngest employee, but it just wasn’t fair that he should have to die of boredom at work on a day when practically no one needed petrol. And not many people would come to buy hot dogs either, as the station was too far from the centre of town. They should just close the damn place. If anyone was desperate for fuel, the card-payment-only pumps were still available.

‘Junior’ll do it,’ the boss had boomed when they were arguing about shifts a couple of weeks before.

Junior’ll do it
. As if the boss was his dad or something.

Two boys of about ten came running in. They were wearing maroon band uniforms, black hats and white patent-leather bandoliers. They had obviously left their drums somewhere and were fencing energetically with their sticks.

‘En garde,’ one of them shouted and made a hit.

‘Ow! That hurt!’

The smaller of the two dropped his drumsticks and clutched his shoulder.

‘Stop making such a racket,’ the assistant said. ‘You going to buy anything, or what?’

Without saying anything, the two boys rushed over to the freezer. It was a bit too high for them. One of them used the shelf with chocolates on it as a ladder.

‘Cornetto,’ screamed the other.

‘Leave it out.’ The assistant hit the counter.

The cheeky bugger who had climbed on the shelf was an Asian.

They could camouflage themselves in band uniforms and national costumes if that was what they wanted. They were still bloody foreigners. It was really pathetic the way they tried to Norwegianify themselves. Earlier that day a whole flock of little black kids had come in. They’d chatted and made a noise and took over the whole shop, as if they were at home in Tamil-land or Africa or wherever they came from. And they didn’t buy much. But they were all wearing 17th of May ribbons. Great red, white and blue ribbons on their jacket collars and Salvation Army coats. Grinning and laughing and ruining the national day for everyone else.

‘Hey, you!’

The assistant came out from behind the counter and went over to the boys. He took hold of the Paki by the scruff of the neck.

‘Drop the ice-cream.’

‘I’m going to pay for it! I was going to pay!’

‘Drop the bloody ice cream!’

‘Ow, that hurts!’

His voice wasn’t as cocky now. The assistant could have sworn the kid was about to cry. He let go.

‘Hi.’

A man came in. He stood for a moment looking askance at the two boys. The assistant mumbled hello.

‘Sorry to park right up by the window,’ the man said and nodded towards a blue Ford on the other side of the glass. ‘I didn’t see the sign until I was out of the car. I just want some mineral water, so . . .’

The assistant lifted his chin in the direction of the fridge and returned to his place behind the counter. The younger
of the boys, his blond hair curling out from under his hat, slapped a fifty-krone note down in front of him.

‘Two ice creams,’ he hissed through gritted teeth. ‘Two Cornettos, you creep.’

The man from the Ford came up behind him. The boy took his change without a word and turned away. Then he held one of the ice creams out towards his friend, who had sought refuge by the door.

‘Dickhead!
’ they chorused as the door closed behind them.

‘Three mineral waters,’ the man said.

‘You paying by card?’ the assistant asked, curtly.

‘No. Here.’

The man took his change from the one-hundred-kroner note and stuffed it in his pocket.

The assistant glanced over at the car. It was parked so the driver’s seat was right up by the window, less than a metre away. He thought he saw someone in the passenger seat, a thigh, and a hand that reached out for something. There was a woman in the back, sleeping. Her head was leant against the window. Her jacket had somehow got caught around her shoulders and it made the angle of her neck look unnatural. The skin on her neck was almost as red as the jacket.

‘Bye, thank you,’ said the man. He pulled his cap down over his forehead and disappeared out the door.

Bloody 17th of May. It was almost four o’clock. At least his shift would be finished soon, if the boss bothered to turn up, that is. You never knew. What a crap day.

He took his time, dropped the sausage into a roll, then covered it with prawn mayonnaise, relish and loads of mustard before wolfing it down.

It was his ninth hot dog since the morning, and it didn’t taste good.

‘T
he palace is just up there,’ Ambassador George A. Wells said, and nodded towards the park on the other side of Drammensveien. ‘And it’s not just a monument, they actually live there. The royal family. Nice people. Very nice people.’The men looked quite similar, standing as they were with their backs to the room, looking out over the street behind the fortifications that surrounded the triangular building. They might easily be mistaken for brothers. The ambassador had to put up with his wife nagging him daily about losing some of the extra pounds round his stomach. But the two men standing in front of the window of the American Embassy in Oslo, watching the Norwegian people celebrate in all their finery on the other side of the aggressive metal barriers, both took their food and golf very seriously. And they both looked good on it. George Wells was nearly seventy, but was still blessed with thick silver hair. His guest was younger and had the same thick hair, though not as well groomed. They both had their hands in their pockets. Their jackets had been abandoned long ago.

‘The royal family appears to be less well protected than we are,’ the guest said, and pointed towards the park around the palace. ‘Anyone can walk right up to the palace.’

‘Not only can, but do. The endless parade they have every year to mark the seventeenth of May passes right under the balcony where the royals stand waving to the crowd. There’s never been a problem. But then they . . .’ he gave a wan smile
and ran his fingers through his hair, ‘are a bit more popular than us.’

Neither of the men said anything for a while. They looked down at the street, where it was difficult to tell whether people were coming or going. Suddenly, and at the same time, they both caught sight of a little boy with an American flag. He was probably about five or six years old and was wearing dark blue trousers and a bright red V-neck sweater with a white T-shirt underneath. He stopped and looked up. There was no way that he could see them; he was too far away, and the smoked windows made it impossible to see in. He smiled all the same and timidly waved his flag. His mother turned round and grabbed him by the arm, irritated. The boy carried on waving until he was out of sight.

‘He can get away with that because he’s little,’ the ambassador said. ‘He’s a sweet little Afro-American boy, so he’s allowed to wave the Star-Spangled Banner on the Norwegian national day. Won’t be like that in a few years’ time.’

Silence again. The guest seemed to be fascinated by what was going on down on the street and remained standing at the window. The ambassador showed no sign of wanting to sit down either. A large group of young people came storming down from the Nobel Institute. They were singing so loudly and out of tune that it penetrated even through the reinforced glass. One of the girls was around eighteen and was so drunk that she had to be supported by two friends. One had his left hand cupped around her breast, which didn’t seem to bother her in the slightest. Coming towards them was a primary-school class, walking hand-in-hand in a crocodile. The front pair, two girls with blonde plaits, burst out crying when one of the youths roared in their faces. The furious parents came rushing over. A young man in blue overalls poured beer all over the angriest father.

A police car was trying to force its way through the crowd.
It had to give up halfway and stop. Two of the youths sat down on the bonnet. One girl insisted on kissing the policeman who got out of the car to sort things out. Several others ran over. A whole flock of girls in red overalls badgered the uniformed policeman for a kiss.

‘What is this?’ the guest mumbled. ‘What kind of a country is this?’

‘Strictly speaking, you should have known that,’ the ambassador responded, ‘before sending Madam President here. On a day like this.’

The guest gave an audible sigh, almost demonstrative. He went over to a table where mineral water and glasses were set out on a silver tray. He lifted one of the bottles and looked sidelong at the ambassador.

‘Go ahead. Please, help yourself.’

The ambassador also appeared to have had enough of the Norwegian people. He picked up a remote control and pushed a button. The curtains closed.

‘I apologise for making that comment, Warren.’

The ambassador sat down. His movements were heavier now, as if the day so far had already been too long and his age was becoming a burden.

‘That’s fine,’ Warren Scifford assured him. ‘And in any case, you’re right. I should have known. The point is that I do know. I know everything there is to read or hear about this place. You know the procedures, George. You know how we work.’

He held a bottle of Farris mineral water at arm’s length and looked at the label with suspicion. Then he shrugged and poured himself a glass.

‘We’ve been working on it for two months,’ he said. ‘And in fact we thought it was a great idea when Madam President first suggested Norway as the destination of her first overseas visit. An . . .’ he lifted his glass in a silent cheers, ‘an excellent idea. And you, of course, know why.’

The ambassador said nothing.

‘We have a scale,’ Warren Scifford continued. ‘Completely unofficial, naturally, but still fairly serious. With the exception of a handful of Pacific states where there are only a few thousand friendly inhabitants and the only threat to the President would be an unexpected tsunami . . .’ he took a sip of water, swallowed and wiped his mouth with his shirt sleeve, ‘Norway is the safest country to visit in the world. Last time . . .’ He shook his head slightly. ‘President Clinton behaved like he was on some scout trip in Little Rock when he was here. That was before your time, and before . . .’ He suddenly rubbed his temples.