The Criminal Forensics Unit laboratory out in Bryn was almost deserted. But two men were bent over a computer screen in the fingerprintlab.
“It’s a match,” Bjørn Holm concluded, and straightened up. “The same prints as the blue-tinted glass in Rakel’s house.”
“Ringdal was there,” Harry said, studying the marks on the glass from the Jealousy.
“Looks that way.”
“Apart from the people coming and going on the night of the murder, no one apart from Rakel had entered or left the house in several weeks. No one.”
“Right. So this Ringdal guy could have been the first one. The one who arrived earlier that evening and then left again.”
Harry nodded. “Of course. He could have paid her an unannounced visit, and drank a glass of water while he asked Rakel if she wanted to carry on working for the Jealousy. She said no, and he left. That would all fit with the recordings. What doesn’t fit is Ringdal saying he can’t remember. Of course you remember if you visited a woman somewhere you find out two days later in the paper was the scene of a murder just hours after you were there.”
“Maybe he’s lying because he doesn’t want to become a suspect. If he was alone with Rakel on the night of the murder, he’d obviously have a lot to explain. And even if he knows he’s innocent, he may be aware that he can’t prove it, and stands to risk both being held in custody and being the subject of unwelcome media attention. You’ll have to confront him with the evidence and see if that jogs his memory.”
“Mm. Unless perhaps we should hold our cards closer to our chest until we’ve got more.”
“Notwe, Harry. This is your thing. Like Ringdal, I’m aiming for a strategy of not getting involved.”
“Sounds like you think he’s innocent.”
“I’ll leave the thinking to you. But I’m on paternity leave, and I’d like to have a job to come back to afterwards.”
Harry nodded. “You’re right, it’s very selfish of me to expect that people who don’t owe me anything should risk everything to help me.”
A subdued whimper came from the pram. Bjørn looked at the time, pulled his sweater up and pulled out a baby’s bottle. He had told Harry about the trick of squeezing the bottle between two rolls of fat under a tight sweater as a way of keeping it at around body temperature.
“Ah, I’ve just realised which musician Ringdal reminds me of,” Harry said as he watched the little boy with his three comically large fair curls suck and chew on the teat. “Paul Simon.”
“PaulFredericSimon?” Bjørn exclaimed. “You just realised?”
“It’s your son’s fault. He looks like Art Garfunkel.”
Harry was expecting Bjørn to look up and say something about that being an insult, but he just sat there with his head bowed, concentrating on the feed. Perhaps he was contemplating where Art Garfunkel was on his barometer of musical taste.
“Thanks again, Bjørn,” Harry said, doing his coat up. “I’d better get going.”
“That thing you said about me not owing you anything,” Bjørn said, without looking up. “That isn’t true.”
“I don’t know what it could be.”
“If it hadn’t been for you, I’d never have met Katrine.”
“Of course you would.”
“You were the one who guided her into my arms. She could see what happened in the relationships you were in, so you represented everything shedidn’twant in a man. And I was as far from you as she could get. So in a way, you were my matchmaker, Harry.” Bjørn looked up with a broad smile and moist eyes.
“Oh, shit,” Harry said. “Is this that famous paternal sensitivity talking?”
“Probably,” Bjørn laughed, and wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. “So what are you going to do now? About Ringdal, I mean.”
“You said you didn’t want to get involved.”
“Right. I don’t want to know.”
“So I’d better get out before there are two people crying here.” Harry looked at his watch. “The two of you, obviously.”
On his way to the car, Harry called Kaja.
