Satellite People (3 page)

‘If you want to understand my brother, be it as a businessman or a person, you have to understand that he has always been a player, since he was a little boy,’ Magdalena Schelderup
added, out of the blue.

She continued without hesitation when I asked her to expand on this.

‘Ever since he was a youth, Magdalon has played with money and people, the business, his private life; in fact, his entire existence became nothing but a great game. My brother often
played with high stakes. If you were to say that he sometimes played crooked, I would not contradict you. Magdalon played to the gallery out there to gain recognition. But most of all, he simply
played to win and to get whatever he wanted. Be it money, houses or women,’ she concluded, with a bitter smile.

Magdalena Schelderup sat in silence for a while, lost in thought, smoking yet another cigarette. Then she continued, at a slower pace.

‘You may perhaps hear from others, both inside and outside the firm, that my brother was a man with a head for money, but not for people. That is what people who do not know him or
understand him often say. Magdalon’s greatest gift was in fact that he had a finely honed ability to understand all kinds of people. He was exceptionally good at seeing other people’s
strengths and weaknesses, and could often predict exactly how they would react in various situations. But he only used this to his own advantage. I can understand that others might at times think
of him as cold and heartless in his dealings with other people, including his own family. But there is actually a difference between being inconsiderate and not understanding when one should be
considerate, if one bothered at all about other people.’

I gave a thoughtful nod, and followed this up with a question about his familial relations in general. His sister hesitated, and then said that perhaps his wife and children would know more
about that than she did. From her place at the table, she judged her brother’s third marriage, which had also been the longest, to be the ‘least unhappy’. The transition from the
first to the second, and the second to the third had both been difficult periods. Her brother had without a doubt expected more of his two sons, but his expectations were not easily matched. It
seemed that his daughter was the child he appreciated most, but that might also be because she was the youngest and still lived at home.

As far as Magdalon Schelderup’s inheritance was concerned, his sister claimed to know very little. Her annual share of the profits from her parents’ companies was secured for the
rest of her life, no matter who now inherited the companies. It did not really matter much to her. She already had more money in the bank than she could use in a lifetime, and she had no one to
leave it to.

She did not say it in so many words, but I understood what she meant. She, for her part, had no possible financial motive for her brother’s murder.

This sounded logical enough. And she seemed to be so relaxed when she said it that I almost struck her from the list of suspects. However, I did note with interest that she lived only a short
distance away, and that she had been at home alone in her flat on both Friday and Saturday. The deceased Magdalon Schelderup’s sister had known him longer than anyone else round the table,
and in practice had had the opportunity both to puncture the tyres on his car and to put powdered nuts in his food.

V

From the deceased’s sister, I moved on to his widow, having first made sure that she was in a fit state to be questioned. There was still not a tear to be seen on her
cheeks.

Sandra Schelderup was a relatively slight, dark-haired woman, with a straight back and a determined face which gave the impression of a strong personality and will. She stated her age as
forty-five. With regard to her background, she informed me briefly that she had grown up on a smallholding in one of the rural communities outside Trondheim, that she had trained as a stenographer,
and had met her husband when she came to work as his secretary nearly twenty years ago. The marriage had been a happy one, despite the age difference, and his death had been very unexpected.

She claimed to know nothing about her husband’s telephone call to the police the day before, or the fact that the tyres on his car had been slashed. She had, however, noticed that her
husband had been obviously worried of late. He had been more alert, and had carefully checked that all the doors were locked in the evening. Some weeks ago, he had taken an old revolver from his
collection and stowed it in his jacket pocket whenever he went out. At home, it often lay on his desk during the day, and she had seen it on the bedside table in the evening and morning.

But he had said nothing as to why he was worried. He was old-school, a man who would rather not discuss his troubles with his wife and children. She had taken the gun as a sign that her husband
was getting old and anxious, but following his murder it was of course natural to see this in another light. And in autumn the year before, he had decided to buy three dogs to guard the house, he
who had never shown any interest whatsoever in animals before.

As for the inheritance, Sandra Schelderup knew little more than what was written about it in the newspapers: that it was possibly worth several hundred million kroner in money, shares and
property. She could find the name of the lawyers’ firm that helped her husband in legal matters, but she claimed to know nothing about the content of his will. Her husband had routinely kept
his estate separate in all his three marriages. When the matter had been raised on a couple of occasions, he had simply promised his last wife that she would be well looked after for the rest of
her life, and would inherit at least two million from him.

The business had dominated Magdalon Schelderup’s life more than anything else, and early on in the marriage he had made it clear that she should not worry herself about it. And so she had
done as he advised. She added that it was possible that her daughter might know a little more about it than she did, but otherwise, one would have to ask the business manager.

When at home, Magdalon Schelderup had generally stayed in his combined office and library on the first floor, or in his bedroom, which was next door. His wife added that her husband slept at
irregular times, and she had therefore preferred to have her own room, on the floor above. He could come and go as he pleased, as he had for all the years she had known him, she said, with a
fleeting smile.

It all seemed to be rather undramatic so far. His wife’s description reinforced the picture of Magdalon Schelderup as a wilful man, but also the idea that he had been worried about a
possible threat to his life in recent months. Her tone became sharper, however, when in conclusion I asked if she thought that it might have been one of those present who had killed her
husband.

‘Well, that is obvious!’ was her terse reply.

Then she added swiftly, in a more passionate voice: ‘And I can promise you that it was neither me nor my daughter. But as far as the others are concerned, I would not exclude any of them
right now.’

When I asked whether that meant that she would not exclude even her two stepsons from the list of possible murderers, she replied promptly: ‘Especially not them!’

A shadow passed over her face when she said this, fuelling my suspicions that the relationship between those closest to the deceased was not the best. I concluded my conversation with the
deceased’s widow there for the moment. I was now extremely curious to know what his children thought, both about her and about his death.

VI

Fredrik Schelderup proved from the outset to bear very little resemblance to his dead father, either physically or mentally. He was thirty-eight years old, above average height,
with dark hair and a pleasant appearance, as well as a friendly demeanour. The spare tyres around his middle and the redness of his cheeks sparked a suspicion that Schelderup Junior generally
enjoyed far livelier gatherings than this one.

The conversation that followed did nothing to detract from this theory, and Fredrik spoke in a light, breezy tone. He opened by saying, without any encouragement, that he was more like his dead
mother and had always felt very different from his father. His contact with his father had in recent years been ‘correct and formal’, if ‘rather sporadic and not particularly
heartfelt’ on either part. Fredrik Schelderup explained that he had tried to put as much distance as possible between himself and his father and the business, and that was why he perhaps
might seem to be unaffected by his father’s death. Which, indeed, was the case.

His death had been totally unexpected for Fredrik Schelderup as well, who had no suspicions as to who might have put the powdered nuts in his father’s food. He had been raised with a
complete ban on anything that might resemble a nut, and had once, as a twelve-year-old, had his pocket money suspended for month because he had eaten a peanut on his way up the drive. He had since
then respected the ban – to this very day. Fredrik Schelderup had come to the Sunday supper in his newest Mercedes, and had spent the last week either at or near to his home in the exclusive
suburb of Bygdøy. He lived alone, but had a new girlfriend who had been with him every day last week. ‘And some nights too,’ he added, with a saucy wink.

Fredrik Schelderup struck me as being very unlike his father. When I asked what else he had done in his life so far, he quipped: ‘As little as possible, while I wait to inherit from my
father.’ He went on to say that he had taken his university entrance exam and then studied a bit at the business school and university, but that he infinitely preferred the life of a student
at the weekend to that during the week. He had stopped studying without any qualifications and had subsequently never been able to decide what he wanted to do. And fortunately, there was no real
need to, either. While waiting for the anticipated substantial inheritance from his father, he had lived well on a more modest inheritance from his mother, and some income from various short-term
jobs. Fredrik Schelderup jokingly remarked that he had loved driving ever since he was a boy – fast cars and beautiful women. In an even jollier aside, he added that when a beautiful woman
asked him what his star sign was, he normally replied ‘the dollar sign’ – and then set about proving it. Otherwise his daily consumption was generally modest, ‘certainly on
weekdays’. He was waiting to fulfil his wish of seeing more of ‘the world and its bars’ until he got his inheritance.

When asked about how much he expected to inherit, Fredrik Schelderup was almost serious for a moment. He replied that he hoped he would get a third of his father’s fortune, and it was
reported in the papers that his total wealth was valued at more than 100 million. But he did not dare assume that he would get any more than the 200,000 kroner he had claim to as one of the heirs.
He had been looking forward to receiving his inheritance for many years, but was in no way in any kind of financial straits and had not asked his father for money for years – knowing that
should he ask, he was unlikely to get anything other than sarcasm in return.

Over the years, Magdalon Schelderup had repeatedly expressed his disappointment in his eldest son’s lack of initiative and business acumen. The son was no longer hurt by this and had, on a
couple of occasions, responded by expressing his disappointment in his father’s treatment of his first two wives and their sons. The conversation had usually stopped there.

Fredrik Schelderup was again earnest for a moment when I asked about his dead mother. She had been four years younger than Magdalon Schelderup and had been a great beauty with many admirers,
when, at the age of twenty-three, she said yes to his proposal of marriage. More than once in her later years she had told her son that Magdalon Schelderup had married her simply because it was the
only way he could get her into bed – which apparently became an obsession from the first time they met. She had won over Magdalon Schelderup, but in doing so had lost herself, she often said
with increasing bitterness.

Fredrik was the only child from a deeply unhappy marriage, which ended in a bitter divorce just before the war. Fredrik’s mother was a Christian and had very much enjoyed being ‘the
Queen of Gulleråsen’ at Schelderup Hall. She was strongly opposed to divorce, but her husband had found someone else and eventually threw his first wife out of the house, ‘almost
physically’. Fredrik had stayed with his father for several years after the divorce, ‘for reasons of pure ease’, but had then suddenly found it ‘more comfortable’ to
move into his own flat once he had finished school. His mother did not suffer financially, but she never really recovered from the divorce. Nicotine and alcohol had both contributed to a permanent
deterioration in her health, and she died of liver failure at the age of forty-nine.

With regard to his relationship with other members of the family, Fredrik Schelderup now declared that he liked his father’s second wife marginally more than the third, but that he had
never had much contact with either of them. In terms of the rest of the family, he tended generally to have the warmest feelings for his eleven-year-younger half-brother. They had grown closer when
his brother entered puberty and had himself become the child of divorced parents. But any contact was still sporadic. They were very different, and his brother had ‘been sensible enough to
realize that I was not a good role model’ when he was about to come of age. Fredrik Schelderup’s relationship with his twenty-year-younger half-sister had always been distant. However,
he did say that for someone her age, she appeared to be a remarkably determined and enterprising young lady.

A hint of seriousness returned once again to Fredrik Schelderup’s otherwise jocular expression when he said this. And when he had left the room, I sat and ruminated on whether I had also
seen a hint of respect or fear when I looked in his eye.

VII

Leonard Schelderup was an intense, gum-chewing man of twenty-seven, about half a head shorter than me. He appeared to glide into the room, with the classic light step and lithe
body of a long-distance runner. He had managed to regain some composure by the time he came in for questioning, two hours after the murder, but was clearly still deeply affected by the drama in the
dining room. He admitted as much himself and started by apologizing for his confused behaviour. He then added that the day’s events really were quite extraordinary, and that he felt
particularly exposed.