Faithless Read online

  Frølich carried on walking to his door. Here he met Emil Yttergjerde. Frankie nodded in the direction of Lena’s erect back. ‘Seen her black eye?’

  Emil nodded.

  ‘She doesn’t want to talk about it.’

  Emil grinned. ‘Spanking overload, maybe?’

  Frølich mounted a doubtful expression. ‘Lena?’

  ‘Haven’t you heard? Last Friday. She and Ståle Sender left the pub – together. According to the rumour mill, it’s “absolutely true”.’

  ‘Lena and Ståle?’ Frølich found that hard to believe, at first anyway.

  ‘Steely Ståle, you know. Probably warmed up with Blue Velvet. With or without laughing gas.’ Emil grinned and walked on.

  Frølich went to his desk. Lena and Ståle Sender? Ståle had been moved – how many times? Now he was checking passports at Gardermoen Airport when he wasn’t harassing asylum-seekers.

  An odd couple: Lena was an only child and a Bærum girl who would return bottles of wine at a restaurant if they weren’t the right temperature. Lena spoke refined Norwegian; she was ‘exhausted’ when others were ‘knackered’. Ståle was a working-class boy from Furuset with three interests: cars, watches and cognac – in that order. In his wallet he had a photo of the seventies’ Ford Mustang he kept under a tarpaulin every winter. Twice Ståle had been investigated for violence by the special unit, not including the many other cases that had been hushed up or conveniently forgotten.

  Frølich looked down at the report. It was stapled to a pile of photocopies. The missing woman’s application papers to ISS – the international summer school. Rosalind M’Taya studied sciences at the University of Makerere and – as far as he could see – had received impressive grades. Glowing character references from two professors. Letters of invitation from the University of Oslo to a six-week stay at the international school, which boasted extremely competent lecturers. The photo revealed that Rosalind M’Taya was very attractive. She had her hair pinned up on the crown and stylish Afro braids across her scalp. Full lips. Her eyes were doe-like, lashes curled upwards.

  A couple of days in Norway and then gone? This was not trafficking. Rosalind was a serious student, not brought in by dubious Eastern Europeans to serve men from a flat in Bygdøy allé.

  She lands at Gardermoen. She goes through passport control and customs. Takes either the express train or the airport bus. Definitely not a taxi. She must have received instructions from the summer school. The train is the easiest option. Then she changes to the Metro at the National Theatre and carries on to Blindern. Nice-looking girl and most likely poor, rewarded with an overseas stay. Unsure of herself, maybe abroad for the first time. Clever – no doubt careful too, thorough. What sort of people would she trust? Other Africans? Students on the course?

  Rosalind M’Taya disappeared two days after she checked into her hall of residence.

  In Oslo there are plenty of Norwegians who have worked in East Africa with Norad and the UN. Perhaps Rosalind had an address with her from home, perhaps she visited someone. Perhaps she was still with them. Perhaps a former missionary was driving her around, showing her the Viking boats or the Vigeland Sculpture Park right now. Perhaps these speculations were simply a waste of time.

  Lena with Ståle Sender!

  Could that be possible? The posh girl from Bærum in bed with the missing link, a primitive, racist street urchin who got an erection from using live ammo on jobs?

  It had been a long night. Should go home, Frølich thought.

  *

  An hour and a half later he was in Rosalind M’Taya’s student room. Her Pakistani roommate reached up to his chest. Her plait was a work of art, thick and long and black and with a pattern like the climbing rope in the gym. When she smiled she revealed long and irregular teeth. She told him she had never met Rosalind, but the things in the suitcase were hers.

  Frølich opened the suitcase. And had his assumptions about her background confirmed. She was poor. Most of the clothes seemed to be home-made. Right at the bottom: some kangas and batik materials. Her jewellery was typically African: big shapes and bright colours.

  He could feel the Pakistani woman was ill at ease. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘I can manage on my own.’

  She left.

  He emptied the contents of the suitcase onto the bed. And two objects gave him cause for alarm. A full billfold wallet and a well-equipped toiletry bag. She had gone without taking toiletries or hiding her money. The suitcase was full. It was unlikely she had taken a change of clothing with her. The possibility that Rosalind had disappeared of her own free will had shrunk considerably.

  He stood by the window. Looking out on the paths and grass between the tall trees in the park. Saw groups of students of various nationalities. One large group sat in a circle on the grass. An open-air class.

  Suddenly a chill went down his spine and he turned back to the room. It was as though someone had touched his shoulder. There was a loud whining noise. The next second it was gone, and the room filled with sound again: someone was cooking in the student kitchen. A man called something from far away behind a wall and pipes gurgled.

  He shook off the feeling he’d had.

  Outside, he admired the beautiful gardens. When he was a student it was generally assumed that people in the hall of residence had got their rooms by underhand means. Those who lived in what resembled a manor house only a stone’s throw from the university complex were extremely lucky.

  The problem is, he mused, Rosalind M’Taya could have bumped into anyone at all when she went out on Friday. Perhaps she caught the tram to the centre. It was more likely though that she stuck together with students she barely knew – colleagues. So they would have to go around with a photo asking in shops and cafés…

  He wasn’t up to that now. He had to go home and sleep.

  3

  It was five o’clock in the afternoon when his phone woke him. He lay in bed, slightly uncertain as to why he had set the alarm. Then he remembered the party.

  Frankie hadn’t had any contact with Karl Anders Fransgård for several years and was therefore somewhat surprised when he received an invitation to his fortieth birthday party. As teenagers they had been almost inseparable, but they hadn’t seen a great deal of each other since.

  They met at school, brought together by a common interest in model aeroplanes and mechanics. For Christmas Frankie had received a little propeller engine which he filled with naphtha, fixed to his desk and started up with his index finger. Starting a combustion engine like that, adjusting the mix of petrol and air and then letting it run was the height of happiness in those boyhood days. But his friend’s interest in planes went much further than models. He was obsessed with the technical wizardry behind jet engines and propeller power. His bedroom was full of books about model planes, pioneers’ lives and achievements and the history of flying. He also collected old film clips: Roald Amundsen in sealskin clothes waving in front of the Latham flying boat before boarding to search for Umberto Nobile, the Hindenburg airship that caught fire over New York, Charles Lindbergh in his plane, a Curtiss ‘Jenny’ – already in those days Karl Anders’s room was a mini aviation museum.

  Everyone thought Karl Anders would become a pilot, but colour blindness put paid to his dreams.

  The two of them chose different paths. Frankie felt a clammy unease spread down his back whenever thoughts strayed to the incident. But it’s a long time ago, he told himself and got up. He started pacing the room, the way he did when similar thoughts struck him. He walked off his unease.

  On the grapevine he had heard that Karl Anders had trained as an engineer. They bumped into each other a year ago. Karl Anders, wearing a hi-vis vest and a helmet, was inspecting some pipes that had been dug deep in Oslo Centre.

  Frankie had made a witticism out of it: seeing his friend again under the ground and not in the air. They hit the right tone, joked and reminisced for a few minutes, exchanged telephone numbers and concluded, what the
hell, they should have a beer one day.

  Neither of them had actually rung. The times Frølich had happened to think about his friend he presumed they both felt the same way.

  But four weeks ago an invitation landed in his post box.

  Twenty years is a long time. Things get overgrown with moss, disintegrate and disappear. The unease he felt now was because he had been single for too long. It was a strange feeling to turn up at this kind of party alone when he had been invited to ‘bring a partner’. The invitation was printed on exquisite paper and there was even a reference to dress code. Most of the guests would be married couples or living together, and conversations would inevitably revolve around these people’s lives. Children, all the jokes and the linguistic nuggets the little ones came up with, the parents’ problems getting child care, the incompetence of nurseries and the lack of after-school care. Those couples that didn’t have children yet would talk about their trendy holidays and house-renovation plans. The women would blithely chatter away about their partners’ less salubrious sides, snoring, salmon-fishing mania, elk-hunting or football, all put in such a way that Frankie Frølich – because he was a single man – had no chance of making any kind of contribution. On the other hand, it was always fun to meet people from the old days. After a couple of glasses most were good for a few reminiscences.

  The choice was either to sacrifice an evening for the sake of an old friendship or to sacrifice his dignity. Better to sacrifice a free evening and retain his honour, he had reflected, and fetched the charcoal-grey suit from his wardrobe.

  The present was already wrapped and the best possible if it had been for himself: the collected works of Genesis on CD with Peter Gabriel on lead vocals. From Genesis to Revolution, Nursery Cryme, Trespass, Foxtrot, Selling England by the Pound, the live recording from 1973, topped by the double album of all albums: The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. Nearly eight hours of recorded meditative brain massage.

  *

  The party was held in a place in Eiksmarka, just outside Oslo.

  He pushed the boat out and took a taxi from Oslo Station. The taxi driver was an Iraqi Kurd whose knowledge of the roads to Bærum was as good as his spoken Norwegian. He couldn’t use satnav either. The man would happily have driven to Drammen or Hønefoss if Frølich hadn’t given him directions from the rear seat. It was as light as day as they turned into the drive where lit torches indicated the location of the party. Couples were making their way in through the door as he clambered out of the car.

  Ten minutes later he was standing with a glass of Cava in his hand looking for familiar faces while exchanging platitudes with people he had never met.

  ‘Karl Anders and I studied together in Trondheim,’ explained a tall, roguish-looking man with a sensitive mouth and combed-back hair. ‘Now we’re almost neighbours!’

  A sweet girl with black ringlets said she had worked with Karl Anders before he started at the council. Frølich followed her gaze and spotted his friend at the back of the room. Karl Anders was, as always, dressed in shabby chic, black jeans and suit jacket over a black T-shirt with a profound slogan across his chest.

  ‘And there we have the main man,’ said the girl with the ringlets, and she beamed as Karl Anders tore himself away and strode towards them.

  ‘Frankie,’ exclaimed Karl Anders with a smile. ‘Great you could make it. This guy here,’ he said, putting an arm around Frankie’s shoulder, giving him a friendly punch in the side and a pally grin, ‘this is the guy I’ve known longest of everyone here!’

  ‘Are you the one who had a darkroom in the cellar of the block where you lived?’ asked Ringlets. When Frølich nodded, she added: ‘I’ve heard so many stories about you and that darkroom. Is it true you had a mattress on the floor in case there was a party?’

  Frølich sent her a forced smile. He never felt at ease when he was the centre of attention.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Karl Anders, a little the worse for wear. ‘I have to steal the star.’ With which he pulled Frølich away. He grabbed his old friend around the neck and hugged him.

  ‘Happy birthday, Karl Anders.’ Finally, he got to read the quote on his friend’s T-shirt: The worst crime is faking it – Kurt Cobain.

  ‘You’re the only one of the old boys here, Frankie.’

  Frølich didn’t answer. He had been counting on his old pals to get through the evening.

  ‘I didn’t invite any of the others,’ said Karl Anders, his eyes glassy. ‘None of them. Only you. This day’s special for me.’

  ‘Of course,’ Frølich answered, deflated.

  ‘This is the start of my new life,’ Karl Anders said. ‘I’m getting rid of the person I don’t want to be. Look,’ he whispered and pointed to a group of women with their backs to them. ‘Women are lovely, Frankie. Women are bloody lovely! But not for me any more,’ he beamed. ‘I’m engaged!’

  He stumbled towards the women with his arm around Frølich’s waist.

  A woman dressed in a short, tight-fitting black dress turned. Her eyes glinted green in the dim lighting.

  ‘Veronika,’ Karl Anders said. ‘Say hello to Frankie – my old pal Frank Frølich.’

  Frølich shook Veronika Undset’s slim hand.

  In a fraction of a second her face underwent a transformation. Her eyes dilated and shone with fear until once again she appeared totally relaxed, with the same knowing gaze he had seen that very morning in the car.

  He was so surprised he wasn’t sure his voice would carry.

  ‘Haven’t we met before?’ she asked in a drawl.

  He hesitated for a few seconds. Registered from a distance that her pinned-up hair revealed a wonderful arched neck.

  ‘You’d better remind me where and when, if so,’ he said, looking into her eyes, and letting go of her hand. ‘But I think I would’ve remembered,’ he added.

  She was silent, holding her glass with both hands now and studying the floor.

  Karl Anders grabbed her around the waist and drew her to him. They were a good match. A rock-’n’-roll guy and his elegant squeeze.

  ‘Veronika and I are getting married in April,’ he said. ‘In Rome, and do you know what, Frankie?’

  Frølich shook his head.

  ‘I want you to be our best man.’

  Frankie smiled at them. It might have been the Cava or maybe the pressure in the room, but his ears were ringing. He swallowed the rest of the bubbly. Karl Anders produced another glass straight away.

  ‘Ahem,’ came a loud voice.

  Frølich turned. Beside Veronika Undset stood a woman with a cornblonde page cut. ‘Hi,’ she said, holding out a hand. ‘My name’s Janne and we’re sitting next to each other!’ At which she burst into laughter and gave him the feeling the evening was saved.

  *

  The dining table stretched over two rooms through a wide doorway, splitting the gathering into two halves. Fortunately, Janne and he had seats in the half without the hosts and the toastmaster. Tapas were served from a large buffet and conversation around the table and in the queue was lively. He sat waiting until most people had served themselves. As did Janne, who told him that she was a single mother with a boy of almost nineteen. ‘Got knocked up,’ she grinned when his eyes widened. ‘I was sixteen.’

  ‘You’re joking.’

  She pursed her lips and shook her head.

  ‘Do you read gossip magazines? That part of my life was like a bad film based on an even worse book. I was working as an au pair in France. He was ten years older than me, had a cool tattoo on his arm and so on. He worked behind a bar in Montpellier – but did a runner when I got pregnant. No, I’m not joking. My story and Kristoffer’s is full of clichés, but we turned out OK.’

  They clinked glasses. Her grey eyes shone as her full lips broke into a smile, which revealed a slightly irregular left canine and beguiled him.

  ‘Kristoffer’s my son.’

  They just managed to serve themselves before the toastmaster at the other end of the table stood
up and reeled off a few well-prepared quips that sent waves of chuckles through the guests. Frankie had entertained the thought for a few seconds that he ought to pluck up courage and say a few words as none of his peers was present. However, he reasoned, if Karl Anders chose to ignore a large section of his past it would be impolite of him to protest. Had he wanted me to talk about the old days he would have asked. So he decided to let it go. After the toastmaster had finished welcoming them the buzz of conversation resumed.

  ‘Aren’t you going to ask what I do?’ she asked.

  ‘I was thinking of starting at the other end,’ he said deftly, ‘by asking you what your favourite meal was.’

  ‘Waffles and champagne,’ she grinned. ‘The first thing you learn about wines in France is that champagne goes with everything.’ She blinked. ‘Champagne is to women what milk is to babies. Next question.’

  ‘Would you miss your job if you were on a desert island?’

  ‘Depends what there was to do on the island,’ she parried. ‘Where is it?’

  ‘If I was allowed to choose, in the Caribbean,’ he replied.

  ‘Is this where I say I love going on holiday to Greece?’

  ‘If that’s true, yes.’

  The toastmaster rose to his feet and tapped a fork against his glass.

  ‘Khao Lak,’ she whispered quickly. ‘My dream destination in Thailand. By the way, I’m an accountant. But I’m not as dry or as rigid as the myths suggest.’

  Frankie hardly noticed time pass. Janne said she knew Veronika from school, in Nadderud. Veronika had moved to Bærum from somewhere in the East End of Oslo. Janne had lost a few years in her education because of her son and finished upper secondary at the age of twenty-four. She and Veronika were the same age and had found common ground in their frustration with the childishness of the other students. Since then they had stuck together and now it was Janne who took care of her friend’s accounts.

  ‘Why did Veronika go to school several years after the others? You had to struggle with bringing up a child, but…’