Sohlberg and the Gift (45 page)

“Don’t ever manipulate or try to trick me. Don’t ever do it again. Ever.”

“Sohlberg. You have zero evidence. At best you have lots of speculation based on flimsy and circumstantial proof. Look . . . you’re a goody-two-shoes . . . that means you can’t stop yourself from helping people . . . or investigating crimes. You’ll do it again and again. . . . So what if you wound up helping us by helping Astrid Isaksen and her father. . . . Don’t you see? . . . Sometimes you help more than the intended target of your benevolence. And that is good karma.”

Sohlberg stood up and left the calligrapher who returned to painting enigmatic but beautiful characters.

Back in his car Sohlberg smiled as he drove home to his wife. They had a special date that evening thanks to Astrid Isaksen. He looked forward to attending Astrid Isaksen’s invitation to see her at a Saint Lucia celebration.

He turned on the radio and heard the song:

“
Black night is falling in stables and homes. The sun has gone away, the shadows are threatening. Into our dark house enters with lit candles. Sankta Lucia, Sankta Lucia!
”

Sohlberg hummed the song. He was immensely happy over the fact that his meeting with Noer had achieved his ultimate goal—having a powerful politician and her henchman owe him a favor in exchange for his silence. But Sohlberg’s silence was not a permanent silence. His silence could always be retracted.

Quiescence was the card that he had been dealt by circumstance and he meant to play that card very well indeed.

His silence could and would serve a higher purpose in the future. Like the far-sighted explorer who embarks on a long and hazardous journey Sohlberg had cached a favor that he might very well need down the road. He could use the favor to save his own career or to solve another case that cried out for justice. Or he could expose Liselotte Bjørkedal’s betrayal of Kasper Berge—her fellow party member and reputed one-time lover.

~ ~ ~

Later that evening at the Sankta Lucia ceremony Noer’s words reverberated in Sohlberg’s mind.

Sometimes you help more than the intended target of your benevolence.

And that is good karma.

Astrid Isaksen hugged the Sohlbergs after the ceremony. Her radiant smile assured Sohlberg that she was happy living with her father ever since her grandparents had died. Jakob Gansum looked as happy as a man can be when he’s making up for lost time.

The Sohlbergs finally went to sleep at midnight. He woke up less than twenty minutes later and perceived that he had not fully closed the curtains. He parted the thick velvet drapes and as he stood by the window he saw the snow falling.

An enormous winter storm dropped snow all over Europe that night. From Dublin to Oslo the snow fell and fell. Like his dead Karoline the snowflakes fell and disappeared. A vast alabaster dimension covered the world. The immaculate snow fell on the living and the dead. The saints and the sinners. The sane and the insane. The guilty and the innocent and the not so innocent.

THE END.

THE AUTHOR

Jens Amundsen is the pen name of an attorney whose literary anonymity protects him and his clients from the powers that be and want to be.

THE PUBLISHER

Nynorsk Forlag stays true to its roots as an independent publisher bringing the best of Nordic crime novels to the public. From its humble beginnings as an underground press, the company intentionally remains small so as to stay focused on its authors and readers.

[
sample chapter
]

WHITE DEATH IN TROMSØ: AN INSPECTOR SOHLBERG MYSTERY

by

JENS AMUNDSEN

Published simultaneously in the USA and Norway.

Copyright (c) 2011 by Nynorsk Forlag.

Translation copyright (c) 2011 by Nynorsk Forlag.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Chief Inspector Sohlberg investigates a mass grave near Tromsø, the most northern city of Norway, just 1,242 miles from the North Pole. He uncovers more than nine murdered victims in a suspenseful investigation that involves the ultimate threat to Western civilization.

Ch. 1/Én

MORNING OF THE DAY, TUESDAY, JULY 6

Only 1242 miles separate Tromsø from the North Pole. The same amount of miles separate Alaska’s Prudhoe Bay from the North Pole. Tromsø however is much warmer and more hospitable to human life than Prudhoe Bay thanks to the Gulf Current which brings warm waters to Norway all the way from the sunny hot climes of Florida and the Caribbean. But geography like the stars is not at fault for human events.

“I’ve never seen so many bodies,” said Constable Lars Rasch of the Troms politidistrikt. He did not exaggerate. Rasch had never even seen one single homicide victim during his five years as a policeman in the northernmost city of Norway. He stared at the row of frozen bodies buried in the permafrost.

“Look like sardines in a can . . . don’t they Rasch?”

The constable said nothing. Instead he looked in disgust at Per Moen the owner of the fish shack that had become the tomb for nine corpses. Rasch turned his gaze upon the sea. The morning’s storm had washed the sky and the ocean and the islands in depressing shades of gray that seemed to merge into one mournful salute to the dead.

“Hey Rasch . . . how soon can you move the stiffs out? . . . I need to have a place to store my stock out here. It’ll cost me a fortune if I have to move my inventory elsewhere. . . . I imagine I’ll be compensated for my building getting torn apart to get these popsicles out of here . . . no?”

Rasch grunted. He had always heard and now knew for a fact that Moen was a man obsessed by one thing only—the bottom line.

“Look . . . we’ll discuss this later.”

“No. Now. Let’s talk now. I don’t want your people ripping up my land when they dig up the stiffs. I swear I’ll sue the police if you don’t put everything back to the way it used to be. This might just ruin my fishing operations if you keep blocking me from access to my land and fish shack and dock.

“Rasch . . . don’t you understand?

“I need this shack to keep my fish cold in the permafrost below . . . I can’t afford refrigeration. My great-grandfather found this spot . . . and now you’re going to ruin me! . . . I swear I’ll sue for millions and get you fired if I’m not allowed back in tomorrow.”

“Do whatever you need to do. But right now you need to leave this crime scene.”

“Hey Rasch you little jerk . . . ever since you joined the police you’ve been acting like you’re a real big man in town. I remember when you went to school with my little brother and he used to beat the daylights out of you.”

“Are you leaving or not?”

“Alright . . . alright. Save the tough guy looks for someone else.”

Rasch sighed as soon as he was alone. He knew that he too would soon have to leave the area that he had cordoned off in police tape. Forensics promised him they’d be over to start processing the shack within the hour. He wanted to but decided against ripping up the rest of the wood floor planks that he and Moen had pulled up.

One of the corpses caught Rasch’s attention. A large white towel covered a barefoot man. The blood-soaked frozen-stiff towel read:

WELCOME TO TROMSØ!

Constable Rasch could not help thinking that Tromsø had turned out not to have been all that hospitable or welcoming to the nine bodies that he had found shot point-blank in the back of the head and buried quite unceremoniously under Moen’s fish shack in a remote location on the island of Reinøya.

“Let’s see,” said Rasch to himself, “if I can get the old city slicker out here.”

The constable took out his cell phone and dialed his boss who was at headquarters just 30 miles south of him. While Rasch dialed he noticed what appeared to be a square booklet next to one of the bodies.

~ ~ ~

“What . . . nine bodies?” said Chief Inspector Fredrik Waldemar Hvoslef of the Troms politidistrikt. “Shot in the head? . . . Are you sure?”

“Yes,” said Constable Rasch while he stared at the nine corpses. “All of the bodies have one hole in the back of the head . . . and big exit wounds in the front or the top of their heads.”

“Arrange for the autopsies . . . call in forensic services to help you.”

“I already did. Aren’t you coming?”

“I . . . I can’t,” said Chief Inspector Hvoslef. He did not like leaving his comfortable and warm offices at 122 Grønnegata in downtown Tromsø. Nor did he want to travel on a small boat to the crime scene because he easily got seasick. In fact Hvoslef a transplant from Oslo rarely left the small island of Tromsøya where most of the city was located.

“You can’t?”

Hvoslef could almost hear the contempt on the other side of the telephone call. The constable seemed to ignore the fact that Tromsø sits 186 miles
north
of the Arctic Circle. In Hvoslef’s mind this cruel geographical fact meant that he faced imminent death year-round if he left the city limits to venture into the Arctic wastelands. Even during the summer months Chief Inspector Hvoself felt threatened by the vast empty wilderness that surrounded him.

“Sir . . . I think you need to come out here. I found a passport and an Interpol badge next to one of the bodies.”

“What?”

“Yes . . . the pictures on the badge and passport match the dead man’s face perfectly.”

“Where’s the passport from?”

“Russia.”

Chief Inspector Hvoslef realized that he’d have to venture out of his warm safety zone. He absolutely hated the outdoors with a passion especially in the Arctic police district that he had been assigned to three years ago. He was obsessed with the idea of his freezing to death in the Land of White Death. But he had no choice.

“Sir? . . . Can you hear me?”

“Yes! . . . I’ll be over there.”

~ ~ ~

“I told you not to get involved.”

“It’s done. Besides . . . I had to. What do you think? . . . That I could just walk away?”

“Yes.”

“That’s not me.”

“Since when are you . . . a poaching thief . . . such a moral and upstanding citizen?”

“Enough.”

“You steal cod and halibut and salmon . . . other men’s catch for a living. I told you to stay away from Moen’s place. He’s always suspected you.”

“Stop.”

“This will bring us trouble. Big trouble.”