Death Deserved Read online

  The printer spat out a picture of Jeppe Sørensen in his Danish football strip. Emma hung it beside the front cover of Forever Number One, Sonja Nordstrøm’s book. She’d also found a photo from Jessica Flatebø’s blog, and she placed it beside Sørensen. And finally on the provisional timeline – a picture of Ragnar Ole Theodorsen on stage in front of the other members of the Fabulous Five.

  His name had been released to the media now. The live broadcasts from the subway station entrance had ended, but Nyhetskanalen, the news channel, which was on in Emma’s living room, was transmitting the same images over and over again.

  The phone rang. It was Blix.

  ‘Hi,’ she said, pleased to be speaking to him at last.

  ‘Hi,’ he answered.

  Emma did not understand why he was helping her, especially since Wollan had trumpeted some of the information she’d received in confidence. But she couldn’t bring herself to ask. Didn’t want to spoil anything.

  ‘I spoke to the mushroom ladies,’ she said, to show him she’d discovered what linked the cases. ‘They told me about the music.’

  ‘Did they say anything about the book?’ Blix asked.

  ‘What book?’

  ‘Forever Number One,’ Blix explained. ‘It was in the cabin.’

  ‘Oh,’ was all Emma said, glancing up at the pictures on her wall. ‘Do you have any other leads on her?’

  ‘Not currently.’

  Silence hung between them for a while.

  ‘What do you think’s happened to her?’ she asked.

  ‘I think she’s been killed too. I think she’ll turn up dead somewhere or other very soon. With a message.’

  ‘A message?’

  Blix sighed. ‘I don’t know. What happened today, and yesterday, to some extent seems to be a very clear statement. He’s not afraid to show himself. Some of my colleagues are saying he’s a raving lunatic, and he may well be, on some level. But to me he seems ice cold and calculating. A man with loads of self-confidence.’

  ‘Is that his message, then? That he’s no intention of hiding away?’

  ‘Maybe. But I’m not thinking of that kind of message. More that it’s a new piece of the jigsaw puzzle. One tiny crumb in a long line that he wants us to spot, and follow.’

  There was another pause and Emma looked up at the pictures again. Her gaze flitted from Nordstrøm to her book. Then to the photos of Jeppe Sørensen and Jessica Flatebø. And on to Ragnar Ole Theodorsen, who had been shot, so that he had fallen … down the stairs.

  She studied each image again.

  No, it couldn’t possibly be about that, she thought. But then she retraced her way through the train of thought once more.

  ‘OK, so please don’t interrupt what I’m about to say,’ she ventured. ‘Just listen to the whole of my reasoning. OK?’

  ‘OK.’

  Emma moved closer to her wall of pictures.

  ‘Sonja Nordstrøm disappears,’ she said, pointing at the letters that formed the word ‘ONE’ on the book’s dustcover. ‘The Norwegian media go bananas, and they all follow the developments. And then – bang – Jeppe Sorensen is found on her boat.’

  She moved her finger from ONE to the number seven on his football strip.

  ‘It’s impossible not to link Jeppe’s murder to Sonja Nordstrøm’s disappearance, which is why the whole of Norway’s media attended the press conference yesterday, where a mobile phone suddenly started to ring. It rings long enough for everyone who has ever listened to the radio in the past twenty years to realise the ringtone is “Angel”, the song by the Fabulous Five, composed by Ragnar Ole Theodorsen.’ She paused for breath, certain now of Blix’s full attention. ‘The same song was played from a cabin in the forest to entice someone to stumble upon Jessica Flatebø.’

  She lifted her finger from the number seven to Flatebø’s blog and the logo at the top. Sex Y.

  ‘The following day the frontman in the Fabulous Five is also killed.’ Emma’s finger shifted to the drum kit and the letters that comprised the band’s name.

  ‘It’s a countdown,’ she said.

  ‘What did you say?’

  ‘It’s a bloody countdown.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Just think about it,’ Emma told him. ‘Forever One. Jeppe Sørensen always played with the number seven on his back. Jessica Flatebø was contestant number six in Paradise Hotel, and she played on sex and the number six in every possible context, including in her blog. She’d also been missing for six days before she was found. And the Fabulous Five…’

  Emma did not conclude her hypothesis, certain that Blix had managed to follow her argument.

  ‘But that doesn’t add up,’ Blix said.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘One-seven-six-five. That’s not a countdown.’

  ‘Maybe not. Unless you exclude Sonja Nordstrøm – she’s the only one who hasn’t turned up dead yet. And it all started with her. She fired the starting shot. The first. There was even a starting number hung up in her home. Number one.’

  There was silence at the other end of the line.

  ‘You talked about messages,’ Emma ploughed on. ‘Are there any other connections between the victims apart from the ones the perpetrator has given you?’

  It took time for Blix to answer.

  ‘So you’re saying that the next victim will be someone who has a link to the number four in some way?’ he said, his voice filled with doubt. ‘And then one with number three and number two? And then Sonja Nordstrøm will turn up dead, as forever number one, and then it’s all over? The perpetrator will have reached his target?’

  Emma heard how far-fetched it sounded when he said it aloud.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said with a sigh. ‘It was just a theory.’

  Again the line went quiet. Emma studied the pictures again. It was all a bit too crazy to be correct.

  On the TV she could see, for the third time now, a reporter having a serious conversation with Gard Fosse. The volume was already low, but now she turned the sound off. Her eyes were drawn to the strapline at the foot of the screen: BREAKING NEWS. At the same time she heard her mobile phone ping. An express message from VG Nett’s news service.

  ‘Shit,’ she said.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Are you watching TV?’

  ‘Not right now. What’s going on?’

  Emma walked a few steps closer to the set.

  ‘Calle Seeberg. The radio chat show host, you know? He’s dead.’

  ‘Oh fuck.’

  Emma read the whole of the text running across the screen. ‘It says he collapsed during a live broadcast today,’ she said, looking up at the wall again. The pictures. The numbers.

  ‘Do you know what radio station he worked for?’ she asked as a cold shiver ran through her body.

  ‘No?’

  ‘Radio 4.’

  41

  The Radio 4 studio was located in Lille Grensen, the street running diagonally through Akersgata and Karl Johans gate – only a stone’s throw from Stortinget subway station. It took Blix no more than a couple of minutes to cover the distance from the steps where Ragnar Ole Theodorsen had been shot.

  He met Kovic outside the entrance.

  ‘Why are we here?’ she asked.

  ‘I’m not certain it’s anything important. Just come in with me, and I’ll fill you in later.’

  The receptionist needed no explanation as to why they were there, and the radio station staff didn’t seemed surprised when Blix and Kovic entered the editorial room on the first floor. People just stopped talking. Dried their tears.

  Blix approached the first person he came across, a young man who didn’t look more than twenty. His eyes were bloodshot.

  ‘Who can I talk to?’ Blix asked, showing his ID badge. The young man pointed to a short female in her mid-forties. She was still sobbing when Blix introduced himself.

  ‘Victoria Løke,’ she said. ‘I’m Calle’s producer. Or
at least – I was.’

  Blix introduced Kovic before going on to ask: ‘Do you know what happened to him?’

  She shook her head and shrugged. ‘He just collapsed.’

  ‘All of a sudden?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘No sign beforehand that he was in any pain?’

  ‘He didn’t seem too well earlier,’ Løke said. ‘He was a bit distant, maybe. Unfocused. And just before he died he was speaking more slowly than usual. He seemed short of breath.’

  Kovic looked at Blix with puzzlement in her eyes.

  ‘Who has he been in contact with today?’ he asked.

  ‘Apart from all of us working here, you mean?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Well, there were a couple of guests. A professor of sociology and a parliamentarian. Just a normal working day.’

  Blix nodded. ‘Do you have any surveillance cameras here?’ he asked, hoping there might be footage of Seeberg as he collapsed, or – best of all – just before.

  ‘Not in the editorial room.’

  ‘What about the studio?’

  ‘We’ve got a couple of web cams, but we only use them if we have special guests. Someone who’s going to sing a song, for example, live on air. Then we film it and put it out on the Internet. But we haven’t done any filming today.’

  ‘But the actual radio recording, Seeberg’s last broadcast – you must have that?’

  ‘All our broadcasts are stored on hard disk. We send out all our shows as podcasts afterwards, but we haven’t done that this time, of course.’

  ‘Can you show us the studio where he was sitting?’

  She nodded and showed them to an open door. In the studio they saw three chairs around a table. Three microphones and three sets of headphones. Løke indicated the seat behind the computer screen.

  Blix went inside and looked around. A notepad, transmission schedules, two ballpoint pens, a coffee cup and a glass of water. That was all. Scattered on the floor was paraphernalia left behind by the paramedics who had performed CPR. A pair of single-use gloves and the paper packaging that must have been around the sterile equipment.

  ‘Can you close off this room until we’ve examined it more thoroughly?’

  ‘Yes, yes of course.’

  ‘And I’d like to hear that last recording you have of him.’

  Løke nodded and ushered them into her own office, where she sat down and searched through a folder.

  ‘Here it is,’ she said, starting to play a sound file and turning up the volume.

  Calle Seeberg’s well-known voice filled the room. There was something different about him, though. He welcomed the listeners back and told his audience, slowly and in a listless voice, what he wanted to talk about for the next half-hour. Then he tried to introduce Highasakite. He needed three attempts, and laughed it off by saying what an incredibly difficult name it was for a Norwegian band, but there was nothing breezy or cheerful about his words, and he was obviously having breathing difficulties. His chest was wheezy.

  The song began. Løke fast-forwarded until it was finished.

  ‘This is when it happens,’ she said.

  Blix concentrated. Normally Seeberg would have repeated the name of the tune listeners had just heard, but now it sounded as if he was only stuttering, as if he couldn’t get out a single word. Then he began to make a gurgling noise before something hit the table surface with a bang. Followed by the sound of a chair toppling and then the thump of Calle Seeberg’s heavy body as it landed on the floor.

  For a second all was silence and then someone shouted his name. Other sounds filled the room. The patter of feet and chairs being scraped aside. Victoria Løke grimaced as if she couldn’t bear to hear any more.

  ‘Lay him on his back,’ someone said.

  ‘He’s not breathing!’ a woman shrieked. ‘Call an ambulance!’

  Swearing.

  ‘Calle! Can you hear me?’

  ‘We’re still on air.’

  More swearing. Then music began to play. Løke turned down the sound.

  ‘It’s absolutely dreadful,’ she said. ‘Fortunately, I didn’t see it, I only heard it. I ran into the studio when I realised what had happened.’ She shook her head. ‘It’s the worst thing I’ve ever experienced.’

  ‘Did you try to revive him?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ she said indignantly. ‘For ages. We kept going right up until the paramedics arrived.’

  The song continued to play in the background.’

  ‘We’ve heard enough, thank you,’ Blix said.

  ‘He couldn’t breathe,’ Kovic commented when the room was quiet again.

  ‘That’s how it sounded, anyway,’ Blix agreed. ‘Can you show me his workstation?’

  ‘Of course.’

  Løke led them back out into the editorial room and towards a desk partly enclosed by two-metre-high dividers. The desktop was strewn with papers, notepads and cables. Pile upon pile of documents, books and magazines. Two cups of cold coffee. Blix took note of a photograph of a girl who, in the photo at least, couldn’t be more than fourteen years old. He had a similar photo of Iselin on his desk.

  People had bad turns all the time, Blix thought, his thoughts straying to Emma’s countdown theory. Even radio hosts could just drop dead.

  His eyes came to rest on a white envelope with Calle Seeberg’s name handwritten on it. Blix picked it up. Turned it over and saw that Seeberg hadn’t opened it. There was no stamp on the front either. Blix squeezed the envelope. There was something inside it: it felt like a photograph.

  ‘Fan letter?’ Blix asked, turning to Løke.

  ‘Not inconceivable,’ Løke told him. ‘He still gets a lot of fan mail.’

  ‘Physical, though? People don’t just send an email or a text message?’

  ‘Most people, perhaps. A few are still old-fashioned.’

  Blix turned over the envelope again. No sender’s name on the reverse.

  ‘It arrived by courier earlier today,’ a woman at the desk opposite volunteered.

  Blix lifted his head to look at her. A woman in her mid-twenties wearing a headset.

  ‘How long ago was that?’ Blix asked.

  ‘Er, a couple of hours, maybe. No, wait. It’s less than that. I’d just been out on a job when I heard the courier say he had an envelope to deliver to Calle Seeberg. I brought it up with me from reception.’

  Blix’s brow furrowed. He opened the envelope and took out the photo.

  And gasped.

  It was a number four.

  In grey tones and black and white. The number four was in the middle, with a white circle around it. On the sides of the photo, grey squares. It looked like a still from the countdown at the start of an old, silent film.

  ‘Where did the courier come from?’ he asked, aware at once of a slight quiver in his voice.

  The woman shrugged. ‘I don’t think he was wearing a uniform,’ she said. ‘You’ll have to ask at reception.’

  ‘What did he look like?’ he went on. ‘What was he wearing?’

  The woman gave this some thought. ‘A black rain jacket,’ she said at last.

  Blix glanced at Kovic.

  ‘And a grey cap. I didn’t see him very well, because he had a hood pulled over his head.’

  ‘Over a cap?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Blix peered down at the picture with the number four on it, regretting that he wasn’t wearing gloves.

  ‘Thanks,’ he said, nodding at the woman with the headset and returning the photo to the envelope.

  He turned to face Kovic. ‘I think Calle Seeberg is another number in a sequence,’ he said, recognising that she was brimming with questions.

  Before she had a chance to say anything, he addressed himself to Løke again. ‘The CCTV footage from reception,’ he said. ‘I need to see it. Right now.’

  42

  Blix approached Abelvik as she sat at her desk with damp hair, eating a sandwich.

  ‘Have you s
een Fosse?’ Blix asked. ‘He’s not in his office.’

  ‘I think he’s gone to the gym,’ Abelvik said, her mouth full of cheese.

  ‘Now?’ Blix asked, looking at the time. ‘With all that’s going on?’

  Giving a shrug, Abelvik swallowed and took another bite.

  ‘Do you have an address for Dahlmann yet?’ Blix asked.

  ‘Not yet. But I’m going to phone his best pal in just a minute.’

  She glanced down at her wristwatch. ‘He’s on a flight back from Amsterdam,’ she added.

  ‘OK, great.’

  Blix took the lift down to the basement gym, where he found Gard Fosse on one of the three treadmills. It looked as if he’d been working out for a while: perspiration was running down his blotchy face.

  ‘Blasted doctors,’ Fosse said as Blix approached. ‘Insisting we have to exercise to prolong our lives. I’m sure it does the exact opposite. It can’t possibly be good for you to keep doing this sort of stuff.’

  Fosse was dressed in a pair of tight-fitting shorts and a white singlet. His paunch wobbled beneath the flimsy material, and his feet were dragging wearily on the rough treadmill belt. He had covered a distance of 4.78 kilometres and it had taken him twenty-six minutes to do so.

  ‘How’s it going with the new girl?’ Fosse asked.

  ‘Kovic is doing well,’ Blix replied. ‘Do you know that Calle Seeberg is dead?’

  ‘The radio chat show guy?’ Fosse panted.

  Blix nodded and Fosse shook his head, grabbing the towel draped over the treadmill display and wiping his face.

  ‘He collapsed in the studio.’

  ‘And so?’

  Blix moved closer and showed the picture he’d brought with him.

  ‘This is Walter Georg Dahlmann, caught on a CCTV camera in the Radio 4 building just this morning,’ he said.

  Fosse went on running for a few more seconds, then abruptly stopped the rollers with a swipe of his hand, as if the alarm button in the centre of the control panel were an insect he intended to kill. With the sound of the rollers fading away, Fosse’s frantic breathing sounded even louder.

  ‘He delivered an envelope with this photograph inside, for Calle Seeberg’s attention,’ Blix continued, holding out the number four.