Sohlberg and the Gift (38 page)

“His favorite is Paulus van der Hugen . . . Antigua passport. Or you can try Carlos Paz . . . a Bolivian passport.”

“Very good.”

“I can’t believe I just did that.”

“Did what?” said a surprised Sohlberg.

“Betray Ludvik.”

“But . . . my dear . . . you . . . you already betrayed so many . . . even yourself.”

Her incredulous eyes rejected his statement.

Sohlberg continued:

“Don’t you see? . . . First you betrayed Mohammed Sidhwa and had him deported to Pakistan where he was tortured until he confessed to the car bomb. According to Pakistani newspapers your old boyfriend is now a demented hunchback . . . a street beggar who’s six inches shorter after the security services broke his spine and mind in their torture chambers.”

A wide-eyed Christoffer Løvaas stared at Sohlberg and then at Liv Holm.

“Second. You betrayed Olan Eide your client . . . by having your lover . . . Ludvik Helland . . . kill his wife . . . Old Man Eide’s daughter. . . .

“Third . . . you betrayed Olan Eide by looting his estate with your fraudulent scheme to have his trusts and foundations invest in fake investment companies that you control.

“Fourth . . . you betrayed Janne Eide by sleeping with her husband and plotting her horrific murder.”

“No. No.”

“Fifth . . . you betrayed Ludvik Helland . . . your partner in crime.

“Stop. Please stop.”

“Look . . . you did what you had to do . . . you turned him in. That will help cut your sentence. Also . . . for what it’s worth . . . I’m sure that you are
not
the one who killed and dismembered Janne Eide. I’m sure it was Ludvik Helland. But it’ll be up to a judge . . . and not me . . . to decide which of you is ultimately going to take the blame for the actual act of murdering Janne Eide. Of course both of you are also on the hook for the conspiracy to falsely accuse and convict the innocent Jakob Gansum for the murder of Janne Eide.”

Liv Holm shrugged.

Sohlberg smiled to hide the contempt that he felt for Christoffer Løvaas and Liv Holm. The two intelligent and well-educated lawyers personified the amoral Empty Suits and Empty Skirts that he loathed. The disgusted detective whipped out his police-issued cell phone and called up Constable Høiness:

“Please come over right now by the main door on Munkedamsveien. Your prisoner is here . . . at the law firm of Johansen Olsson and Mortvedt. The security guard in the lobby will tell you what floor. We’ll wait for you by the elevator doors.”

Sohlberg next dialed Fru Sivertsen and he said:

“I’m glad you’re at home. I apologize . . . I have to impose on you and ask you a special favor because you’re the only person in the department who knows how to do this . . . can you please come over to the Zoo and prepare domestic and Interpol arrest warrants for a Ludvik Helland? . . . Yes . . . a Norwegian citizen . . . he resides at unit number five-five of One Hyde Park . . . in Knightsbridge . . . central London . . . Helland needs to be picked up tonight or before sunrise tomorrow.

“In a few minutes I’m going to call my friend Job Pinkman . . . yes the Superintendent with the Metropolitan Police in London. I’ll explain the situation and ask him to find Helland tonight and put him under surveillance so he won’t escape.

“What? . . . Yes . . . Ludvik Helland is using an alias . . . he uses the alias of Paulus van der Hugen under a passport from Antigua. He also goes by Carlos Paz . . . with a Bolivian passport. Please make sure everyone understands that these aliases and passports may all be legitimate because they have been bought with huge bribes. . . .

“The charge?

“Homicide.

“Victim?

“Janne Eide. Yes . . . . Finally.
We
got him. Also . . . please call Constable Høiness in a half hour because she’s bringing in a co-conspirator of Ludvik Helland. . . . Yes. So please start the paperwork for a Liv Holm. Yes. A Norwegian citizen. . . . Good. Thank you.”

Sohlberg hanged up and kept the cell phone in the inner pocket of his suit jacket. He caught—from the corner of his eye— a dark flash of movement. Sohlberg saw Liv Holm moving her right hand towards her purse.

Does she have a gun?

He immediately grabbed her right wrist and snapped on the handcuffs. He said:

“No more funny business Liv Holm. You are under arrest.”

“Hey! You’re hurting me. I only wanted to put on some lipstick to look decent.”

“Don’t worry. You’ll look fine in your mugshot.”

Chapter 15/Femten

MORNING OF MONDAY, DECEMBER 15,

OR THIRTEEN DAYS AFTER THE DAY

The media firestorm gathered force after an enterprising reporter for
Verdens Gang
broke the story about the arrest of Liv Holm. The story appeared late Sunday evening in the VG website and within minutes the news article instantly got flashed around Oslo through Twitter and other social networking services on the Internet. The news leak was inevitable. The story broke out as soon as the intake jailers processed Liv Holm. As usual some lower level clerks had called their cash-for-a-scoop contacts at newspaper and television outlets. The clever VG reporter went a step further. He ran Liv Holm’s name on Google and bingo—her name came up as the trustee for the Eide fortune.

At 1 A.M. a television crew parked their van with a monstrous satellite dish antennae outside of the Sohlbergs’ front yard thanks to an overzealous reporter from NRK2—the news channel of the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation. The reporter shined a powerful flashlight at the Solhbergs’ bedroom window on the second floor and he directed his bullhorn at the window before yelling out:

“Chief Inspector . . . can you come out and comment on the arrest of Liv Holm in the Janne Eide case?”

“Sorry my Love,” said a furious Sohlberg to his wife as he put on a coat over his pyjamas. “But this jerk takes the prize.”

“Calm down! . . . Whatever you do please don’t hit him or say anything you’re going to regret later on.”

Fru Sohlberg’s warning weighed on Sohlberg as he flew in a rage down the stairs. He was about to open the front door and push the reporter into the snow when an inspired thought came to his mind. Sohlberg almost laughed at how easily he would get rid of the reporter. Better yet he would induce a massive headache for someone who richly deserved to be harassed by a wild pack of reporters ravenous to feed on anything and anyone for the ever-hungry never-ending news cycle.

“Hei,” said Sohlberg as he blinked at the camera’s lights. “I can’t comment on any arrest or case. But . . . I suggest you contact Inspector Ivar Thorsen at his home . . . he was in charge of the Janne Eide case and as far as I know he is still in charge of it. . . . Now . . . if you don’t mind . . . good night!”

A cranky and sleep-deprived Sohlberg woke up four hours later at 6 A.M. He had been kept awake until 4 A.M. by reporters who called him on the landline for his home phone and on his personal and police-issued cell phones. He had repeated his Ivar Thorsen suggestion to each of the callers. He had also given them Thorsen’s home address until he finally got fed up and simply turned off all phones.

“Did you get any sleep?” said Sohlberg as he got ready to pop in the shower.

Fru Sohlberg’s weary smile sufficed as an answer.

“I’m sorry about this media circus.”

“It’s part of the job. I’m just grateful I’m a nurse. I don’t see how you can handle all those people.”

“Well . . . they’re not all bad. Most are pretty decent. Remember Hege Egeland? Her reporting in Brussels helped me get the tips that led to the arrest of the killer of those two Somali women in the waterfront.”

“Just be careful.”

The blistering shower put Sohlberg in a better mood. He dressed and turned on all of the phones and hurried downstairs to make breakfast for his wife. While he waited for Fru Sohlberg he opened his laptop and began reading
Aftenposten
and
Dagsavisen
and
Verdens Gang
and other newspapers on the Internet. Almost all articles reporting on the arrest of Liv Holm carried this headline or a slight variation:

JANNE EIDE CASE RE-OPENED WITH ARREST OF TRUSTEE OF EIDE FORTUNE.

Regardless of the headlines none of the articles mentioned Jakob Gansum or Ludvik Helland. No article even hinted at the explosive bomb that was about to shatter the Grønland police station and the courts over the fact that an innocent man had been sent to the insane asylum in lieu of the real killer—Ludvik Helland.

Sohlberg’s police-issued cell phone rang. The sound startled him after the silent respite. The London number on the screen sent chills up and down his entire body.

“We got him,” said Superintendent Pinkman. “The Interpol warrant got here less than three minutes ago and just in the nick of time . . . I’m glad we had him under surveillance or he may’ve taken off.”

“How close was he to leaving?”

“Your boy had his travel bags packed up . . . seems he got rattled and was preparing for a quick trip to the Caribbean. He had a boarding pass printed out for a private Gulfstream G 200 flight . . . to Bermuda then Antigua . . . he scheduled the trip on his Netjets timeshare plan.”

“Why was he so ready to fly away? . . . What got him itching for a sudden trip?”

“He called Liv Holm all night long . . . she wouldn’t answer her mobile. Of course she couldn’t answer from jail. When he first saw us he thought we were coming to give him bad news about Liv Holm having a serious accident or a heart attack or stroke. Then the true reality of his difficulty sank in.”

“See if you can get him to talk . . . let him think she’s pointing the finger at him.”

“Of course. Don’t they always?”

Sohlberg returned to reading the news. Ten minutes later his blood pressure jumped sky high when someone pounded on his front door. The doorbell rang incessantly. He shot out to the front door and opened it and started shouting:

“You stupid—”

“What’s the matter with you?” yelled Ivar Thorsen. “Why call me names?”

A shocked and speechless Sohlberg could only motion Thorsen to come inside. His loathsome adversary was the last person Sohlberg expected to see at his doorstep that morning.

Thorsen’s eyes narrowed in anger. “Why did you—”

“Sorry. I thought you were one of those crazy reporters. They’ve been bothering us all night.”

“Same with me. They woke Mama up. She’s furious!”

A reluctant Sohlberg showed Thorsen to the living room. He studied Thorsen closely while they sat on opposite sofa chairs by the fireplace. At first Sohlberg thought that Ivar Thorsen shook from the frigid morning temperatures. It then dawned on Sohlberg that a horrific anxiety had a death-like grip over the haggard Thorsen. Sweat in appalling quantities streamed down Thorsen’s ashen face. The black circles under Thorsen’s panic-stricken eyes accentuated the cadaverous aura that emanated from the wan detective.

For a moment Sohlberg felt sorry for Thorsen. He wondered if he had gone overboard in sending the howling pack of reporters to hunt down Thorsen for details in the Liv Holm arrest. Sohlberg knew that he had to break the news to Thorsen—news that would unravel and ultimately end Ivar Thorsen’s career as a detective: