The Redbreast (29 page)

45
Sogn. 6 March 2000.

A
FTER WORK
H
ARRY DROVE UP TO THE SHELTERED HOUSING
in Sogn. Sis was waiting for him. She had put on a bit of weight in the last year, but her boyfriend Henrik, who lived further down the corridor, liked her like that, she claimed.

‘But then Henrik is a mongo.’

She usually said that when she had to explain Henrik’s minor idiosyncrasies. She, for her part, was not a mongo. There was obviously an almost invisible though sharp distinction somewhere. And Sis liked to explain to Harry which of the residents were mongos, and those who were only almost.

She told Harry about the usual things: what Henrik had said last week (which could on occasion be quite remarkable), what they had seen on TV, what they had eaten and where they planned to go on holiday. They were always planning holidays. This time it was Hawaii and Harry could only smile at the thought of Sis and Henrik in Hawaiian shirts at the airport in Honolulu.

He asked if she had talked to Dad, and she said he had visited her two days ago.

‘That’s good,’ Harry said.

‘I think he’s forgotten Mum now,’ Sis said. ‘That’s good.’

Harry stayed in his chair for a moment, thinking about what she had said. Then Henrik knocked on the door and said
Hotel Caesar
, a soap opera, was beginning on TV2 in three minutes, so Harry put on his coat and promised to phone soon.

The traffic by the lights at Ullevål Stadium was as sluggish as usual, and he realised too late that he would have to turn right at the ring road because of roadworks. He thought about what Constance Hochner had told him. Uriah had used a middleman, probably a Norwegian. It meant there was someone out there who knew who Uriah was. He had already asked Linda to go through the secret archives to find someone with the nickname ‘the Prince’, but he was fairly sure she wouldn’t find anyone. He had a definite feeling that this man was smarter than the average criminal. If it was true what Andreas Hochner said – that the Prince was a regular customer – it meant that he had managed to build up his own clientele without POT or anyone else finding out. Something like that takes time and requires care, cunning and discipline – none of which were characteristics of the gangsters Harry knew. Of course, he might have had more than his share of good fortune, since he hadn’t been arrested. Or he might have a position which protected him. Constance Hochner had said that he spoke good English. He could be a diplomat, for example – someone who could travel in and out of the country without being stopped at customs.

Harry came off the ring road at Slemdalsveien and drove up towards Holmenkollen.

Should he ask Meirik if he could have Ellen provisionally transferred to POT? Meirik seemed more intent on him counting neo-Nazis and going to social events than chasing wartime ghosts.

Harry had driven right up to her house before he realised where he was. He stopped the car and stared between the trees. It was fifty or so metres to the house from the main road. There was light in the windows on the ground floor.

‘Idiot,’ he said aloud and started at the sound of his own voice. He was about to drive off when he saw the front door open and light fall on the steps. The thought that she might see and recognise his car put him in a state of panic. He slotted the car into reverse so that he could back quietly and discreetly up the hill and out of sight, but he didn’t have his foot hard enough on the accelerator and the engine died. He heard voices. A tall man in a long, dark coat had come out on to the steps. He was talking, but the person he was talking to was hidden by the door. Then he leaned in towards the door opening and Harry could no longer see them.

They’re kissing
, he thought.
I’ve driven up to Holmenkollen to spy on a woman I’ve talked to for fifteen minutes kissing her boyfriend
.

Then the door closed, and the man got into an Audi and drove past him down to the main road.

On his way home Harry wondered how he should punish himself. It had to be something severe, something that would have a deterrent effect for the future. An aerobics class at Focus.

46
Drammen. 7 March 2000.

H
ARRY HAD NEVER UNDERSTOOD EXACTLY WHY
D
RAMMEN
came in for so much criticism. The town wasn’t a beauty, but was it so much uglier than most of the other overgrown villages in Norway? He considered stopping for a cup of coffee at Børsen, but a quick check of his watch revealed that he didn’t have enough time.

Edvard Mosken lived in a red wooden house with a view of the trotting track. An oldish Mercedes estate was parked outside the garage. Mosken himself was standing at the front door. He examined Harry’s ID carefully before saying anything.

‘Born in 1965? You look older than that, Inspector Hole.’

‘Bad genes.’

‘Bad luck for you.’

‘Well, they let me into eighteen-certificate films when I was fourteen.’

It was impossible to discern whether Edvard Mosken appreciated the joke or not. He motioned for Harry to go in.

‘You live alone?’ Harry asked as Mosken led the way to the sitting room. The flat was clean and well-kept; few personal ornaments and just as exaggeratedly neat as some men like to be when they are allowed to choose for themselves. It reminded Harry of his own flat.

‘Yes. My wife left me after the war.’

‘Left?’

‘Upped sticks. Cleared off. Went on her way.’

‘I see. Children?’

‘I had a son.’

‘Had?’

Edvard Mosken stopped and turned round.

‘Am I not expressing myself clearly, Inspector Hole?’

One white eyebrow was raised, forming a sharp angle on the high, open forehead.

‘No, it’s me,’ Harry said. ‘I have to be spoonfed.’

‘OK. I
have
a son.’

‘Thank you. What did you do before you retired?’

‘I owned a few lorries. Mosken Transport. Sold the business seven years ago.’

‘Did it go well?’

‘Well enough. The buyers kept the name.’

They sat down, each on their own side of the coffee table. Harry knew that there would be no question of coffee. Edvard sat on the sofa, leaning forward with his arms crossed as if to say:
Let’s get this over with
.

‘Where were you on the night of 21 December?’

Harry had decided on the way over to open with this question. By playing the only card he had before Mosken had a chance to sound out the terrain and deduce that they didn’t have anything, Harry could at least hope to flush out a reaction, which might tell him something. If Mosken had anything to hide, that was.

‘Am I under suspicion for anything?’ Mosken asked. His face betrayed no more than mild surprise.

‘It would be good if you could just answer the question, Mosken.’

‘As you wish. I was here.’

‘That was quick.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You didn’t exactly have to think about it.’

Mosken grimaced. It was the kind of grimace where the mouth makes a parody of a smile while the eyes look at you in despair.

‘When you get to be as old as I am, it’s the evenings when you
didn’t
sit on your own that you remember.’

‘Sindre Fauke has given me a list of the Norwegians who were together at the Sennheim training camp. Gudbrand Johansen, Hallgrim Dale, you and Fauke.’

‘You forgot Daniel Gudeson.’

‘Did I? Didn’t he die before the war was over?’

‘Yes, he did.’

‘So, why do you mention his name?’

‘Because he was with us at Sennheim.’

‘My understanding from Fauke was that many Norwegians went through Sennheim, but that you four were the only ones to survive.’

‘That’s right.’

‘So why mention Gudeson in particular?’

Edvard Mosken stared at Harry. Then he shifted his gaze into a void. ‘Because he was with us for such a long time. We thought he would survive. Well, we almost believed Daniel Gudeson was indestructible. He was no ordinary person.’

‘Do you know that Hallgrim Dale is dead?’

Mosken shook his head. ‘You don’t seem very surprised.’

‘Why should I be? Nowadays I’m more surprised to hear who is still alive.’

‘What about if I tell you that he was murdered?’

‘Oh, well, that’s different. Why are you telling me this?’

‘What do you know about Hallgrim Dale?’

‘Nothing. The last time I saw him was in Leningrad. He was suffering from shell-shock.’

‘You didn’t travel back together?’

‘How Dale and the others got home I have no idea. I was wounded in winter 1944 as the result of a grenade thrown from a Russian fighter plane into the trench.’

‘A fighter plane? From a plane?’

Mosken smiled laconically and nodded. ‘When I woke up in the field hospital the retreat was in full swing. Later that summer I ended up in the field hospital in Sinsen School, Oslo. Then came the capitulation.’

‘So you didn’t see any of the others after you were wounded?’

‘Just Sindre. Three years after the war.’

‘After you had served your time?’

‘Yes. We ran into each other in a restaurant.’

‘What do you think about him deserting?’

Mosken shrugged. ‘He must have had his reasons. At least he took sides at a time when no one knew how the war would end. That’s more than you can say about most Norwegian men.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘There was a saying during the war:
Those who decide late will always decide right
. At Christmas in 1943 we could see that our front was moving backwards, but we had no real idea how bad it was. Anyway, no one could accuse Sindre of changing like a weather-vane. Unlike those at home who sat on their backsides during the war and suddenly rushed to join the Resistance in the last months. We used to call them the “latter-day saints’’. A few of them today swell the ranks of those who make public statements about the Norwegians’ heroic efforts for the right side.’

‘Is there anyone in particular you’re thinking about?’

‘Of course you always think about the odd person who has been given the shining hero treatment afterwards. It’s not that important, though.’

‘What about Gudbrand Johansen? Do you remember him?’

‘Of course. He saved my life at the end there. He . . .’

Mosken bit his lower lip. As if he had already said too much, Harry wondered.

‘What happened to him?’

‘Gudbrand? Damned if I know.The grenade ...Gudbrand, Hallgrim Dale and I were in the trench when it came bouncing across the ice and hit Dale on the helmet. I can only remember that Gudbrand was closest to it when it exploded. I came out of the coma later and no one could tell me what had happened to Gudbrand or Dale.’

‘What do you mean? Had they disappeared?’

Mosken’s eyes searched for the window.

‘This happened the same day the Russians launched their full offensive. It was chaotic, to put it mildly. Our trenches had long since passed into Russian hands when I woke up and the regiment had been transferred. If Gudbrand survived, he would probably have ended up in the
Nordland
regiment field hospital, in the Northern Sector. The same would be true of Dale if he had been wounded. I suppose I must have been there too, but when I woke up I was somewhere else.’

‘Gudbrand Johansen’s name isn’t in the Civil Register.’

Mosken shrugged. ‘So he must have been killed by the grenade. That was what I assumed.’

‘And you’ve never tried to trace him?’

Mosken shook his head.

Harry looked around for something, anything, that might suggest Mosken had coffee in the house – a coffee pot, a coffee cup. There was a photograph of a woman in a gold frame on the hearth.

‘Are you bitter about what happened to you and the other Eastern Front soldiers after the war?’

‘As far as the punishment goes, no. I’m a realist. People had to be brought to justice because it was a political necessity. I had lost a war. I’m not complaining.’

Edvard Mosken suddenly laughed – it sounded like a magpie’s cackle. Harry had no idea why he had laughed. Then Mosken became serious again.

‘What smarted was being labelled a traitor. But I console myself with the fact that we know that we defended our country with our lives.’

‘Your political views at that time . . .’

‘If they are the same today?’

Harry nodded, and Mosken said with a dry smile, ‘That’s an easy question to answer, Inspector. No. I was wrong. Simple as that.’

‘You haven’t had any contact with neo-Nazis since?’

‘God forbid – no! There was a meeting in Hokksund a few years ago and one of the idiots rang me up to ask if I would go and talk about the war. I think they called themselves “Blood and Honour”. Something like that.’

Mosken leaned across the coffee table. On one corner there was a pile of magazines, neatly stacked and aligned with the edge.

‘What is POT actually looking for? Are you trying to monitor the neo-Nazis? If that’s the case, you’ve come to the wrong place.’

Harry was unsure how much to tell him at this point. His answer was honest enough though.

‘I don’t really know what we’re looking for.’

‘That sounds like the POT I know.’

He laughed his magpie cackle again. It was an unpleasant, high-pitched sound.

Harry later concluded it must have been the combination of the scornful laugh and the fact that he wasn’t offered any coffee that made him ask the next question in the way that he did.

‘How do you think it must have been for your son to grow up with an ex-Nazi as a father? Do you think that’s why Edvard Mosken Jr is doing time for a drugs offence?’

Harry regretted it the second he saw the anger and pain in the old man’s eyes. He knew that he could have found out what he wanted without hitting beneath the belt.

‘The trial was a farce!’ Mosken fizzed. ‘The defence lawyer they gave my son is the grandson of the judge who sentenced me after the war. They’re punishing my child to hide their own shame at what they did during the war. I —’