Sohlberg and the Gift (35 page)

~ ~ ~

On his way back home an irresistible impulse began to pull hard at Sohlberg. The yearning began as soon as he drove by and looked up at the sun-drenched Ekeberg cliff. He passed by the bluff whenever he commuted between downtown Oslo and his home. He felt a craving that was especially overpowering on that sunny afternoon of Saint Lucia Day. Sohlberg’s fervent coveting exposed his secret life.

Sohlberg the bigamist. An adulterer operating under the cover of two marriages. He felt guilty about it. But he could not help himself. He almost always caved in to the irresistible impulse—just like so many of the criminals that he arrested. Thus he cheated on his wife Emma almost every time that he passed by the Ekeberg neighborhood on his way home to Emma.

Sometimes the adulterous Sohlberg felt a little less guilt because he blamed the cliff itself.

The Ekeberg—a melancholy bluff overlooking Oslo—had a long history of holding secrets and the dead. Iron Age burial mounds and ancient sacred sites dotted the Ekeberg. Sohlberg felt that the dead exerted unseen influences on the living.

The dead called out to Sohlberg every time that he passed by the storage facilities near the Ekeberg Cliff where he kept the clothes and belongings of his beloved Karoline. In Sohlberg’s mind he was still very much married to his long-dead wife.

Karoline. Dead. For how long now? . . . Six years?

Sohlberg could rarely remember the exact date of her death because she felt so alive to him.

Memories flooded him.

His Karoline. So many happy times. Mountain climbing every summer in Romsdalen valley which is Norway’s Yosemite valley. Then Karoline suddenly gone.

The sickening
shisssh
of the rope going through the carabiner on her harness.

Falling.

Down down down.

Looking straight into his eyes without any surprise or any screaming.

Dead.

An accident.

For unknown reasons she had not properly tied herself into the rope although she was an experienced climber who had climbed Eiger and Mt. Blanc and the Matterhorn. She fell to her death when they had almost reached the summit of the North Face Trollveggen (Troll Wall) of Trollryggen Peak which is the tallest vertical cliff in Europe at 3600 feet.

The Ekeberg Cliff always triggered an irresistible impulse that tightened its stranglehold on Sohlberg’s mind. He worried about caving in to the impulse again on that Saturday afternoon. Sohlberg hated how the impulse would almost always overwhelm him and he would be forced to visit the storage room that he rented near the corner of Ekebergveien and Sandstuveien.

On his secret visits he would open boxes and gaze at and even smell Karoline’s clothes. One of the boxes held her wedding dress which almost always reduced him to despair. Five boxes held pictures that usually cheered him up with the invoked memories of happy days with Karoline.

No. Not now. Tomorrow. Maybe.

Sohlberg arrived home two hours before the rutilant sunset. He was pleasantly surprised at the absence of any obvious surveillance from Leif Noer. Before going up the steps to his home Sohlberg stood in the front yard and enjoyed the soft golden light that bathed the snow and the trees and the house and even himself with a warm and luminous intensity that imbued everything with a magical feeling. The sun’s amber caress was to linger until dusk—a perfect setting for celebrating St. Lucia.

Once inside Solhlberg made himself a hot chocolate in the kitchen and he set himself in his favorite chair in the living room. He opened his Apple laptop and ran several searches of Liv Holm on the Internet. He had to verify whether Christoffer Løvaas had painted an accurate picture of Liv Holm. After all throwing suspicion on someone else was an old but effective tactic of the criminal element.

In less than half an hour Solhlberg was able to call and talk to several of Liv Holm’s law school professors and classmates. The ability to quickly track down witnesses was one thing that Sohlberg loved about Oslo—it was a
very
small town from a business and professional point of view. Everyone knew everyone. Norway was no different than Oslo: a relentless homicide detective in Norway can almost always find someone who knows someone who knows the target of a police inquiry. Sohlberg appreciated the fact that Norway was not a vast country for anonymous living. He was grateful that he did not work in a giant nation like the USA or Brazil or Russia or China or India or Indonesia where a suspect can disappear for decades.

With his curiosity about Liv Holm satisfied Sohlberg next began mulling over the double-puzzle of Astrid Isaksen and the Janne Eide homicide.

Why was Chief Inspector Nygård kicked off the Janne Eide case?

Because he was too smart a detective to be tricked into arresting Jakob Gansum and sending him to an insane asylum as a substitute for Ludvik Helland.

Who is behind Astrid Isaksen and her father?

Answer: unknown.

Who is really paying for Astrid and her aunt to spend four weeks at a luxury hotel?

Answer: unknown.

Who deleted documents from the Janne Eide case files and why?

Answer: unknown.

Who set up Jakob Gansum as a substitute for Ludvik Helland?

Answer: unknown.

The general outlines for solving the Astrid Isaksen and Janne Eide mysteries began to emerge in Sohlberg’s mind. The outlines reminded him of the subtle way that outlines of buildings and bridges and roads slowly materialize out of a fog-bound city. But many parts of the actual details were missing or simply not fitting.

Sohlberg’s logic and imagination stretched and twisted as he struggled to solve the baffling twin mysteries. Most homicide detectives would have avoided or quit the challenge. And yet Sohlberg was at his happiest when confronted with a homicide detective’s version of a koan—a series of paradoxical questions that brought about a state of zen-like meditation which ultimately led to the illumination of a solution.

Mystery upon mystery. All is mystery.

Wait. There’s one more mystery. That’s it. The odd phrase that Astrid Isaksen used when she came to visit me. What was it exactly?. . .

Ah yes.

She said, “Then tell me this . . . why was Chief Inspector Nygård kicked off the Janne Eide case? That’s a mighty peculiar turn of events.”

Where have I heard those words before?

That’s a mighty peculiar turn of events. . . .

They sound so familiar.

That’s a mighty peculiar turn of events. . . .

Sohlberg glanced at a bookshelf that held his childhood puzzles. As a youngster and even as an adult Sohlberg had always been fascinated by jigsaw puzzles and Rubik’s cubes (both the 4-row and 5-row models). But his favorites were the impossibly complex wood puzzles that his mother had bought him and still continued buying him for his birthday. He fondly stared at the wood puzzles that came in the shape of spheres and triangles and animals (elephants and giraffes) and famous buildings (the Eiffel Tower) and landmarks (Rock of Gibraltar).

Mystery upon mystery. All is mystery.

Shortly after five o’clock Sohlberg’s meditative state got a sudden and surprise ending: a visibly upset Emma Sohlberg stomped into the living room.

“What’s wrong?”

“I was out shopping. . . .” She bit her lip.

He instantly recognized the sign of her smoldering anger which often choked off her words.

“Yes . . . you went Christmas shopping with Nora Otterstad. What happened?”

“I bought a gift for
your
parents and the store clerk rejected our credit card . . . he said our card was
declined
. . . .Yes . . . declined by the bank.”

“What?”

“Can you imagine what Nora must’ve thought?”

“Who cares what she thinks. What did you find out? Has someone been using our card?”

“Oh. yes. To the tune of seven thousand U.S. dollars.”

“Who? Where?”

“
You
.”

“Me?”

“Yes.”

“For what?”

“A round of D.N.A. tests. . . . Little did I know that all your recent activities over your young mystery visitor . . . all your suspicious sneaking around . . . was because you had to pay for a paternity test at two companies in the United States. So . . . is she your daughter or your lover?”

After 45 minutes Emma Sohlberg understood her husband’s embarrassed explanations. She accepted his apologies and went upstairs to shower and dress for their evening party at the Otterstads. Meanwhile Sohlberg called Dr. Nansen and asked for her assistance the following day. She hesitated but finally agreed when Sohlberg made clear that the patient would not have to leave the Dove Center.

“Is that all I have to do?” she said with barely concealed suspicion.

“Yes. As soon as I text you just call the number I gave you and they will patch you through.”

“Alright. I’ll do it.”

“You’re sure your webcam is working?”

“It’s an Apple. Of course it’s working. Just yesterday I called my mother in Spain. . . . We saw each other on the webcams and had no problems speaking with each other. And she’s all the way down in Malaga.”

“Thank you.”

Fru Sohlberg came down the stairs in a long red dress and said:

“Who was that?”

“My shrink. But forget her. Wow. You’re quite the looker!”

She laughed. They kissed and left for the Saint Lucia festivities at the Otterstad’s home on nearby Malmøya Island.

~ ~ ~

Bright shimmering candles lit all the windows of the Otterstad residence. A row of paper bag luminaries lined the driveway and front steps.

The Otterstads cried “Welcome! Welcome!” as soon as Sohlberg and his wife stepped into the front hallway. “Come on in as the kids are about to start their procession into the living room.”

Sohlberg loved the traditional Nordic celebration of St. Lucia Day and Night which brought back fond memories of large family reunions in which he and his brother and their young cousins dressed in white robes while holding candles and singing Sankta Lucia and other Christmas songs to their grandparents and other elderly family members. He especially loved that part of Lussinatt in the dark winter evenings when he and the other children finished their songs and then handed out sweet saffron buns—lussekatter—to the adults. Bittersweet memories rose in Sohlberg’s mind when he remembered the joy that briefly shined in the dimming eyes of older family members as they received the saffron buns.

The Sohlbergs stood in the back of a crowded living room packed with Otterstad family and friends. Many a “Shhuss!” here and there quieted down the noisy conversation-filled room.