Blood on Snow: A Novel Part 7

CHAPTER 14.

"You haven't asked," she said in the darkness.

"No," I said.

"Why not?"

"I suppose I'm just not a very inquisitive person."

"But you must be wondering. Father and son..."

"I a.s.sumed you'd tell me whatever you felt like telling me when you felt like it."

The bed creaked as Corina turned towards me. "What if I never said anything?"

"Then I'd never find out."

"I don't get you, Olav. Why did you want to save me? Me? You're so lovely, and I'm so despicable."

"You're not despicable."

"How would you know? You don't even want to ask about anything."

"I know that you're here with me now. That's enough for the time being."

"And later? Say you manage to get Daniel before he gets you. Say we get to Paris. Say we somehow manage to sc.r.a.pe enough money together to survive. You'll still be wondering who she is, this woman who could be her own stepson's lover. Because who could ever really trust someone like that? Such a talent for betrayal..."

"Corina," I said, reaching for the cigarettes. "If you're worried about what I'm wondering or not wondering, feel free to tell me. All I'm saying is that it's up to you."

She bit my upper arm gently. "Are you scared of what I might say, is that it? Are you scared I'll tell you I'm not the person you're hoping I might be?"

I fished out a cigarette, but couldn't find a lighter. "Listen. I'm someone who has chosen to earn their daily bread killing other people. I'm inclined to give people a bit of leeway when it comes to their actions and decisions."

"I don't believe you."

"What?"

"I don't believe you. I think you're just trying to hide it."

"Hide what?"

I heard her gulp. "That you love me."

I turned towards her.

The moonlight from the window sparkled in her moist eyes.

"You love me, you fool." She hit me limply on the shoulder. And repeated "You love me, you fool. You love me, you fool," until her eyes were streaming with tears.

I pulled her to me. Held her until my shoulder felt warm, then cold from her tears. Now I could see the lighter. It was on top of the empty red cardboard box. If I had been in any doubt, I knew now. She liked the CP Special. She liked me.

CHAPTER 15.

The day before Christmas Eve.

It had got colder again. That was the end of the mild weather for the time being.

I called the travel agent's from the phone box on the corner. They told me what plane tickets to Paris would cost. I said I'd call back. Then I phoned the Fisherman.

I said without any preamble that I wanted money for fixing Hoffmann.

"We're on an open line, Olav."

"You're not being bugged," I said.

"How do you know?"

"Hoffmann pays a guy at the phone company who knows what phones are being bugged. Neither of you is on the list."

"I'm helping you sort out your problem, Olav. Why should I pay you for that?"

"Because you'll earn so much from Hoffmann being out of the way that this will be small change."

A pause. But not a long one.

"How much?"

"Forty thousand."

"Okay."

"In cash, to be picked up from the shop first thing tomorrow."

"Okay."

"One more thing. I'm not going to risk coming to the shop this evening-Hoffmann's people are getting a bit too close. Get the van to pick me up round the back of Bislett Stadium at seven o'clock."

"Okay."

"You got hold of the coffins and van?"

The Fisherman didn't answer.

"Sorry," I said. "I'm used to organising everything myself."

"Unless there was anything else?"

We hung up. I stood there looking at the phone. The Fisherman had agreed to forty thousand without a word of complaint. I'd have been happy with fifteen. Didn't the old shyster know that? It didn't make any sense. Okay, so it didn't make sense. I'd undersold myself. I should have asked for sixty. Eighty, maybe. But it was too late now; I'd just have to be happy with the fact that I'd actually managed to renegotiate the terms once.

As a rule I get nervous more than twenty-four hours before a job. And then I get less and less nervous as I start to count down the hours.

It was the same this time.

I stopped by the travel agent's and booked the Paris tickets. They recommended a small hotel in Montmartre. Reasonably priced, but cosy and romantic, the woman behind the counter said.

"Great," I said.

"A Christmas present?" The woman smiled as she typed in the booking under a name that was close to mine, but not quite the same. Not yet. I'd correct it just before we set off. She had her own name on a badge on the front of the pear-green jacket that was evidently the agency's uniform. Heavy make-up. Nicotine stains on her teeth. Suntan. Maybe subsidised trips to the sun were part of the job. I said I'd be back the following morning to pay in full.

I went out onto the street. Looked left and right. Longing for darkness.

On my way home I realised I was mimicking her. Maria.

Was. That. It.

"We can buy what you need in Paris," I said to Corina, who seemed considerably more nervous than I was.

By six o'clock I had dismantled, cleaned and oiled my pistol and put it back together. Filled the magazine. I showered and changed in the bathroom. Thought through what was about to happen. Thought that I'd have to make sure Klein was never behind me. I put my black suit on. Then sat down in the armchair. I was sweating. Corina was freezing.

"Good luck," she said.

"Thanks," I said, then got up and left.

CHAPTER 16.

I stamped my feet on the slope in the darkness behind the old skating and football stadium.

It had said in the Evening Post that it was going to be really cold that night and over the next few days, and that the record was bound to be broken now.

The black van pulled up at the edge of the pavement at exactly seven o'clock. Not a minute before, and not a minute after. I took that as a good sign.

I opened the back door and jumped in. Klein and the Dane were each sitting on a white coffin. They were both wearing black suits, white s.h.i.+rts and ties, as I had requested. The Dane welcomed me with some funny remark in his guttural grunt of a language, but Klein just glared. I sat down on the third coffin and banged on the window of the driver's cab. This evening's chauffeur was the young guy who had noticed me when I first went into the fishmonger's.

The road up to Ris Church wound through quiet residential streets. I couldn't see them, but I knew what they were like.

I sniffed. Had the Fisherman used one of his own delivery vans? If he had, I hoped for his sake that he had put a fake number plate on it.

"Where's the van from?" I asked.

"It was parked in Ekeberg," the Dane said. "The Fisherman asked us to find something suitable for a funeral." He laughed out loud. "'Suitable for a funeral.'"

I dropped my follow-up question about why it stank of fish. I'd just realised that it was them. I remembered that I too had smelled of fish after my visit to the back room.

"How does it feel?" Klein suddenly asked. "Getting ready to fix your own boss?"

I knew that the less Klein and I said to each other, the better. "Don't know."

"Course you do. Well?"

"Forget it."

"No."

I could see that Klein wasn't going to let it go.

"First, Hoffmann isn't my boss. Second, I don't feel anything."

"Of course he's your boss!" I could hear the anger as a low rumble in his voice.

"If you say so."

"Why would he not be your boss?"

"It's not important."

"Come on, man. You want us to save your a.r.s.e tonight, how about giving us"-he rubbed his thumb and forefinger together-"something in return?"

The van turned sharply and we slid around on the slippery coffin lids.

"Hoffmann paid for my services per unit," I said. "And that makes him my customer. Apart from that-"

"Customer?" Klein repeated. "And Mao was a unit?"

"If Mao was someone I fixed, then Mao was a unit. I'm sorry if that was someone you had an emotional attachment to."