Katrine nodded. “Is it the body that’s upset your dog?”
“No. He got attacked by a swan when we arrived.”
“Poor thing,” Katrine said, scratching the dog behind one ear. She got a lump in her throat, as if there was something familiar about the trusting look in the dog’s eyes as it gazed up at her.
“Has Krohn explained why he called you specifically?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“I think you should talk to him yourself.”
“OK.”
“Bratt?”
“Yes?”
“Like I said before, Kasparov used to be a police dog. Is it OK if he and I start to look into which direction Finne came from?”
Katrine looked at the trembling dog. “I can have the dog unit here within half an hour. I presume that’s one of the reasons why Kasparov was retired.”
“His hips are worn out,” Larsen said. “But I can carry him if it turns out to be a long way.”
“Really? But don’t dogs’ sense of smell get weaker as they get older?”
“A little,” Larsen said. “Same as human beings.”
Katrine looked at Sung-min Larsen. Was he referring to Ole Winter?
“Get going,” she said, patting Kasparov’s head. “Good hunting.”
And, as if the old dog recognised what she said, its tail, which had been drooping down, started to wag.
Katrine walked around the lake.
Krohn and his assistant both looked pale and cold. A slight but chill north wind had started to blow, the sort that puts a temporary stop to Oslo’s inhabitants’ thoughts of spring.
“I’m afraid you’re going to have to go through everything again, from the start,” Katrine said, taking out her notebook.
Krohn nodded. “It started when Finne came to see me a few days ago. All of a sudden he was just standing there on my terrace. He wanted to tell me he’d killed Rakel Fauke, so I could help him if and when you started to close in on him.”
“And Harry Hole?”
“After the murder he drugged Harry Hole and left him at the scene. He fiddled with the thermostat to make it look like Rakel was killed after Hole arrived there. Finne’s motive was that Harry Hole had shot his son when he was trying to arrest him.”
“Really?” Katrine didn’t know why she didn’t instantly buy this story. “Did Finne tell you how he got inside Rakel Fauke’s house? Seeing as the door was locked from the inside, I mean.”
Krohn shook his head. “The chimney? I have no idea. I’ve seen that man arrive and leave in the most inexplicable ways. I agreed to meet him here because I wanted him to hand himself in to the police.”
Katrine stamped her feet on the ground. “Who do you think shot Finne? And why?”
Krohn shrugged. “A man like Svein Finne, who assaulted children, gets plenty of enemies in prison. He managed to stay alive in there, but I know that several of them who’d been released were just waiting for Finne to get out. Men like that often have access to firearms, sadly, and some of them know how to use them as well.”
“So we’ve got loads of potential suspects, all of whom have served time for serious offences, some of them for murder, is that what you’re saying?”
“That’s what I’m saying, Bratt.”
