Read Online The Hunting Dogs by Jørn Lier Horst - Free Book Online
Authors: Jørn Lier Horst
Ads: Link
maintain a steady voice. ‘No thanks,’ she said.
‘Can we do anything for you? I mean, about what has happened to you . We’ve got people you can talk to in the occupational health service.’
‘No, I’m fine.’
‘Go back to your hotel and try to relax,’ he said. ‘That photo of the dog is bloody
brilliant, by the way, did I tell you? We’ve squeezed it in at the corner of the front
page.’
‘Tiedemann.’
‘What?’
‘Tiedemann. The dog’s called Tiedemann, just like the tobacco.’
16
The coffee machine was a Christmas present from Line, hi-tech and easy to use. All
he had to do was make sure there was enough water in the container, insert a capsule,
and the cup filled at the touch of a button. The aroma was richer than from his old
machine.
He drank a cup of coffee at seven o’clock every morning, with the local paper in front
of him and the news on TV. Today it was ten past seven before the coffee had finished
trickling through the machine. Suzanne was upstairs asleep. Outside, it was still
dark and windy. Raindrops dripped down the windowpane.
He glanced up at the blank television screen, hesitating before lifting the remote
to switch on TV2. The two presenters, one male, one female, on Good Morning Norway
stood at one end of a table with a sheaf of daily newspapers before them. Wisting
curled his hand around his cup without picking it up.
‘ Dagbladet features the murder in Fredrikstad where one of VG ’s reporters was assaulted, as we heard in the news,’ the female presenter said, holding
up the front page, ‘while VG runs with a different story.’
‘That also has to do with a murder case,’ the man explained, ‘but this one is seventeen
years old.’
‘The Cecilia case?’
‘Yes, we all remember that one. Seventeen years ago, a thirty-year-old man was convicted
of kidnapping and murdering Cecilia Linde. Now the case has been referred to the Criminal
Cases Review Commission on the basis of complaints that the police planted a vital
piece of DNA evidence.’
He held up the newspaper’s front-page spread. Planted the crucial evidence was emblazoned in bold letters above a picture of Wisting, together with a smaller
insert of Cecilia Linde. The camera zoomed in.
He liked that photo, aware he looked good in it. It had been taken for a television
programme he had been persuaded to appear on, speaking about his work as a detective
and a case in which the host had been one of the suspects.
‘A serious case,’ the presenter concluded, before moving to one of the business papers.
Wisting was startled when he heard Suzanne’s voice. ‘What’s up now?’
He turned. She was leaning against the doorframe in her dressing gown.
‘I’m just finishing my coffee,’ he said, ‘and then I’ll be off to work.’
‘In the case, I mean.’ She nodded in the direction of the TV.
Wisting wasn’t sure himself. He had no idea how anyone could establish that the cigarette
evidence had been planted, or how such a plant was even possible. The crime technicians
who had searched the intersection at Gumserød had returned with a box full of evidence
bags: empty bottles, chocolate wrappers, plastic beakers, apple cores, everything
you might find at a roadside, among them three cigarette ends. Everything had been
stored at the crime technology lab until Rudolf Haglund had been captured, and had
been sent for analysis in conjunction with a reference sample from the accused. There
hadn’t been anything disquieting about the gathering or handling of the evidence.
He had been responsible for the investigation, and had not even set eyes on the cigarette
butts except in photographs.
‘I trust the Commission. They’ll get to the bottom of it all,’ he said. ‘They’ll send
us a copy of the application and ask for our comments. Then we’ll have a better idea
of what this is all really about.’
Suzanne moved over to the coffee
‘Can we do anything for you? I mean, about what has happened to you . We’ve got people you can talk to in the occupational health service.’
‘No, I’m fine.’
‘Go back to your hotel and try to relax,’ he said. ‘That photo of the dog is bloody
brilliant, by the way, did I tell you? We’ve squeezed it in at the corner of the front
page.’
‘Tiedemann.’
‘What?’
‘Tiedemann. The dog’s called Tiedemann, just like the tobacco.’
16
The coffee machine was a Christmas present from Line, hi-tech and easy to use. All
he had to do was make sure there was enough water in the container, insert a capsule,
and the cup filled at the touch of a button. The aroma was richer than from his old
machine.
He drank a cup of coffee at seven o’clock every morning, with the local paper in front
of him and the news on TV. Today it was ten past seven before the coffee had finished
trickling through the machine. Suzanne was upstairs asleep. Outside, it was still
dark and windy. Raindrops dripped down the windowpane.
He glanced up at the blank television screen, hesitating before lifting the remote
to switch on TV2. The two presenters, one male, one female, on Good Morning Norway
stood at one end of a table with a sheaf of daily newspapers before them. Wisting
curled his hand around his cup without picking it up.
‘ Dagbladet features the murder in Fredrikstad where one of VG ’s reporters was assaulted, as we heard in the news,’ the female presenter said, holding
up the front page, ‘while VG runs with a different story.’
‘That also has to do with a murder case,’ the man explained, ‘but this one is seventeen
years old.’
‘The Cecilia case?’
‘Yes, we all remember that one. Seventeen years ago, a thirty-year-old man was convicted
of kidnapping and murdering Cecilia Linde. Now the case has been referred to the Criminal
Cases Review Commission on the basis of complaints that the police planted a vital
piece of DNA evidence.’
He held up the newspaper’s front-page spread. Planted the crucial evidence was emblazoned in bold letters above a picture of Wisting, together with a smaller
insert of Cecilia Linde. The camera zoomed in.
He liked that photo, aware he looked good in it. It had been taken for a television
programme he had been persuaded to appear on, speaking about his work as a detective
and a case in which the host had been one of the suspects.
‘A serious case,’ the presenter concluded, before moving to one of the business papers.
Wisting was startled when he heard Suzanne’s voice. ‘What’s up now?’
He turned. She was leaning against the doorframe in her dressing gown.
‘I’m just finishing my coffee,’ he said, ‘and then I’ll be off to work.’
‘In the case, I mean.’ She nodded in the direction of the TV.
Wisting wasn’t sure himself. He had no idea how anyone could establish that the cigarette
evidence had been planted, or how such a plant was even possible. The crime technicians
who had searched the intersection at Gumserød had returned with a box full of evidence
bags: empty bottles, chocolate wrappers, plastic beakers, apple cores, everything
you might find at a roadside, among them three cigarette ends. Everything had been
stored at the crime technology lab until Rudolf Haglund had been captured, and had
been sent for analysis in conjunction with a reference sample from the accused. There
hadn’t been anything disquieting about the gathering or handling of the evidence.
He had been responsible for the investigation, and had not even set eyes on the cigarette
butts except in photographs.
‘I trust the Commission. They’ll get to the bottom of it all,’ he said. ‘They’ll send
us a copy of the application and ask for our comments. Then we’ll have a better idea
of what this is all really about.’
Suzanne moved over to the coffee
Similar Books
