Chief Inspector Odd Singsaker realized that he’d been too pessimistic when he bought a new bed after his divorce. For some reason he’d assumed he’d be sleeping alone for the rest of his life, so he’d chosen a single bed. It was relatively wide for just one person, but much too narrow to share it with someone else, especially an American homicide detective who slept like a restless snake. This was intolerable if the intention of spending time in bed was to sleep, which was occasionally the case.
It was 2:00 A.M. He’d been awakened by Felicia’s hand on his shoulder. He moved it away, placing it carefully on the duvet. He lay there, listening to her breathing as he thought about the dream that he’d been yanked out of. He’d been arguing with her, the sort of stupid argument that happens only in a dream. He told her that he never listened to music, at least not if he could help it. This had made her unaccountably upset, and she had threatened to leave him and go back to the States. What could he possibly say to that? His clothes were suddenly soaking wet. Sweat dripped from his shirtsleeves.
At exactly that moment Felicia had put her hand on his shoulder and he’d awakened. Relieved. As much because she was not going anywhere as because he was not sweating. His skin felt refreshingly dry. He wondered if this dream held some hidden meaning, but he couldn’t decide what it might be. Long ago, he had admitted to Felicia that he hated music, and she had merely laughed when he explained that music disturbed his thoughts.
“Does that mean that you need to be thinking all the time?” she had asked.
“Yes, I think I do,” he’d replied.
He stared into the dark. Next to him, Felicia turned over, smacking her lips.
I’m afraid of losing her, he thought. That was what the dream meant, nothing more. It was his fear of being abandoned. The thing was that he didn’t yet fully understand why Felicia Stone had stayed in Trondheim after the events of last fall. Why had she chosen him?
It took a long time for him to fall asleep again. And when he did, he was awakened by the phone ringing. He grabbed it from the nightstand.
The alarm clock told him it was 4:03. For a moment he lay still, staring at the bright little display of his cell phone, which was trembling like a lemming in his hand. He saw the name of his boss, Gro Brattberg, who was the head of the Violent Crimes division of the Trondheim police.
Thirty minutes later, Odd Singsaker was standing outside in the snowstorm on Ludvig Daaes Gate, suddenly aware that he was still wearing his pajama top under his coat. The process of getting dressed had gone a bit too swiftly for a distracted chief inspector this morning. Strangely enough, these pajamas were the last Christmas present that he’d gotten from his ex-wife, Anniken, before they’d separated. They were made of heavy flannel and were warm under his winter clothes. He fastened the top button of his coat, hoping that Grongstad, the crime tech who was now approaching from the grove, wouldn’t notice the pajama collar sticking up. Slowly and methodically a team of white-clad techs worked among the trees. They seemed to almost merge with the falling snow as they muttered to one another. The surrounding area had already been secured by uniformed officers.
Grongstad was a self-possessed man who seldom wasted words, never bothering Singsaker or the other detectives with anything they didn’t need to hear. But at the moment he was unusually upset.
“This fucking snowstorm!” he said. “It’s contaminating the whole crime scene. All the good footprints are gone. Such rotten luck that it’s snowing tonight.”
“It often snows this time of year,” said Singsaker drily.
“But why tonight? It’s so rare to have such a fresh crime scene. The body is still warm. And then everything is ruined by the heaviest snowfall of the year.”
“Look at the bright side. If that woman hadn’t been out walking her dog in the middle of the night, we probably wouldn’t have found anything at all until spring. I’m sure you’ll find something.” Then Singsaker added, “But maybe you’ve already found something?”
“Well, yes,” Grongstad replied. “As a matter of fact, a couple of things have caught my attention.” Now he was back in his usual mode. “The footprints have been totally wrecked as far as providing us with any evidence, but they haven’t been completely erased. I’m guessing that we’re talking about a size eight and a half shoe or larger, which makes it highly likely that our perp is a man. We can see where he came from and in which direction he left. It looks like he made a few circuits of the grove before he moved on. What’s interesting is that it seems he entered the grove from the street, where we’re standing, and then left by way of the motorcycle club.” Grongstad pointed toward an opening in the trees about ten yards away from where they stood.
Singsaker was trying hard to get his brain working. It took him a lot longer to wake up in the morning since he’d had brain surgery a year ago.
“So that means he didn’t go back to a parked car,” he said.
“Exactly. Of course he could have arrived by car, but as you point out, he may not have parked it at the edge of the woods, which would seem to be the natural thing to do if you wanted to dump a body.”
“I’m not sure the words natural and dump a body really belong in the same sentence, Grongstad,” said Singsaker. “But I get what you mean.”
“The theory that he arrived on foot is supported by the tire tracks. Or rather, the lack of them. A couple of vehicles have driven by here in the past few hours, and their tracks have also been nearly covered by the snow. But there is no indication that anyone pulled over and parked here around the time that the footprints were made in the woods. If anyone had been trying not to draw attention to themselves, it would have been most natural to pull into the driveway to the motorcycle club, since it’s partially hidden from the road. But there aren’t any tire tracks. Not even old ones. So, we’re not able to ascertain anything definite based on the snow-covered footprints. We don’t even know whether the same person made all the prints. It looks like the perp wandered around in the area. Plus, we have the footprints from our witness. She entered at about the same spot as the perp, and then exited the same way she’d come in. It’s possible that a third person could have been on the scene as well.”
“So theoretically the victim could have come here alone or even with the murderer, and then been killed right here?”
“It’s possible. But in that case, it happened quickly and without much of a fight. So far we haven’t found anything in the blood spatter that can tell us much. They’ve also been largely wrecked by the snow, and we’ve found only small amounts of blood around her throat. The blood could have come from the fatal blow, but it’s also possible that he cut her throat afterward.”
“Wait a minute, Grongstad. What do you mean, ‘afterward’?” Singsaker suddenly shivered. He was reminded of a case he’d investigated last fall, the so-called Palimpsest murders. Several flayed corpses had been involved.
“He removed something from inside her throat. At first we thought he’d simply slashed her neck. But then we found this.” Grongstad opened the briefcase at his feet and took out a plastic bag. Inside was a short pipe-shaped lump of cartilage. Someone had cut it to bits. “We think this is her larynx,” Grongstad went on, “or what’s left of it. Looks like he removed something else. But this is Kittelsen’s domain, of course.”
“Kittelsen. Right,” said Singsaker absentmindedly, pausing to think and chew gently on his tongue. Kittelsen worked in the main lab in the Department of Pathology and Medical Genetics at St. Olav Hospital. He was one of Norway’s grumpiest forensic doctors, but also one of the most meticulous.
“I’m sure Kittelsen will be able to tell us what happened here,” he said. “But not why. What do you make of it all, Grongstad?”
“I’m not sure. We also found this music box. It was on the victim’s stomach. That was why the witness discovered the body. If it hadn’t been playing a tune, she would have walked right past, and the body would now be lying under two feet of snow. Was this a blunder, or was it deliberate? And what does the music box have to do with it?” Grongstad took it out of the briefcase.
Singsaker studied the little ballerina, noticing at once that this was no cheap mass-produced figure. Her hair looked like genuine human hair, and her facial features had been hand-painted, giving the doll personality. A tiny, shy, and yet haughty-looking woman.
“I’ve never heard this tune before,” said Grongstad, winding up the music box. “Do you know it?”
He let go of the key, and the two policemen listened to the melody in silence. Finally, Singsaker shrugged.
“You know me and music, Grongstad,” he said, smiling apologetically.