Anita had Wollan on loudspeaker. She came out to Emma with the phone in her hand.
‘Nobody here is willing to say much right now,’ Wollan reported. ‘But it is the pastor who is dead.’
Emma was longing to ask if Wollan was sure this time, but managed to hold back.
‘It’s like a war zone here,’ Wollan continued, and then provided an animated description of large-scale activity, with police dogs, patrol cars and helicopters in the air. Wollan reckoned there were at least twenty-five uniformed officers in the neighbourhood.196
‘We’ll publish the name as soon as we know that the family have been informed,’ Anita instructed.
‘I’ll keep you posted,’ Wollan said.
With that, the conversation ended.
Emma took out her own phone. She didn’t know where Blix was, but assumed he was being kept in the loop.
Hans Fredrik Hansteen = number 3? she wrote in a text message.
While she waited for an answer, she embarked on an article in which she recounted Hansteen’s purported role in the perpetrator’s project. But how did this fit into the bigger picture? she thought. Sonja Nordstrøm had not turned up or been found as yet, but Emma was certain the athletics star who had written an autobiography called Forever Number One, was indeed number one in Dahlmann’s countdown. Which meant he planned another victim before that.
Her phone rang, interrupting her thoughts. Blix’s name flashed at her.
‘Is it the pastor?’ she asked, without even saying hello. ‘Is he number three?’
‘Yes, it is,’ said Blix. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t call you right away. But you don’t need to worry anymore.’
‘Have his next of kin been notified?’
‘They have, yes,’ he said. ‘We’re going to issue a public bulletin stating that Dahlmann is a wanted man sometime this afternoon.’
‘We?’ she repeated. ‘Does that mean you’re back on the case?’
‘Yes, but Fosse’s still the one who’ll make the statement,’ he said. ‘He’s taken me back on sufferance.’
‘Do you have any theories about who’ll be the next victim?’ she asked.
‘Not yet.’
Opening the folder in which she’d collected references to Mona Kleven, Emma explained how she’d found her name.
‘The woman with nine lives?’ Blix asked.
‘She died last Friday,’ Emma told him. ‘Fell in front of a subway train. It was reported as an accident.’197
At the other end she heard someone shout for Blix.
‘I’ll look into it,’ he said. ‘I have to run.’