They passed the open door of a room with a splashing sound like that of a running shower coming from within. Harry looked in as they walked by. Two naked men were sitting in a bath with their mouths open as other men, some wearing clothes, stood around urinating on them.
They went through a large room with strobe lighting and Joy Division’s ‘She’s Lost Control’ pounding in the background out of loudspeakers. In the centre of the room was a swing, attached to the ceiling by chains. A man appeared to be flying like Peter Pan as he, with his body outstretched, swung back and forth within a circle of men. They took turns using him, like a joint being passed round.
Harry and the twink entered a corridor with several cubicles, and again the sounds indicated what was happening behind the sliding doors. Two men exited one cubicle and the twink hurried to claim it. Harry followed him in and the twink pushed the door closed. The room measured about two metres by two metres. Without preamble, the twink began unbuttoning Harry’s shirt. ‘Maybe a little cancer isn’t such a bad thing, Catman, you feel more like a jock than a bear now.’
‘Wait,’ Harry said. He put his back to him and reached into his suit pocket. When he turned round, he was holding a wallet in one hand and a phone in the other.
‘You wanted to sell me some cocaine, right?’
The other man smiled. ‘If you pay the price.’
‘Then let’s get the deal done first.’
‘Oh, now that’s more like the old you, Catman. Cokeman.’ He laughed and produced the bag of powder.
Harry accepted the bag and handed him the wallet. ‘Now I’ve received cocaine from you, and you can take out what you’re due for the cocaine from my wallet.’
The twink’s eyes fixed on him dubiously from behind the mask. ‘You’re being awfully meticulous today.’ Then he opened the wallet, peered inside and pulled out two thousand-krone notes.
‘That should do it for now,’ he said, put the wallet back in Harry’s suit pocket and began unbuttoning Harry’s trousers. ‘You want me to suck your bear-dick? Sorry, your
‘No thanks, I’ve got what I wanted,’ Harry said, placing the hand not holding the phone behind the other man’s head as though to caress him, but instead pulling the snake mask off him with a tug.
‘What the fuck, Catman! That’s... yeah, yeah, no big deal for me.’ The twink made to continue opening Harry’s trousers but Harry stopped him and buttoned them up again.
‘Oh, I get it, coke first.’
‘Not exactly,’ Harry said, taking off the beret and his own mask.
‘You’re... blond,’ the twink said in surprise.
‘More importantly,’ Harry said, ‘I’m a policeman who just made an audio and video recording of you selling me cocaine. Which carries a penalty of up to ten years.’
It was impossible to make out in the blue light if the other man’s face went pale, so Harry was unsure the bluff had been successful until he heard the sobbing in his voice.
‘Fuck, I
The twink grabbed the sliding door to get out but Harry held him back.
‘Am I under arrest?’
Something in the twink’s tone of voice and in the way he looked up at him made Harry wonder if the guy was turned on by the predicament.
‘Are you going to... handcuff me?’
‘This isn’t a game—’ Harry pulled a cardholder from the man’s inside pocket — ‘Filip Kessler.’
Filip put his face in his hands and began to cry.
‘However, there is a way we can work this out,’ Harry said.
‘There is?’ Filip looked up with tear-stained cheeks.
‘We can walk out of here now, go someplace nice and quiet, and you can tell me everything you know about Catman. All right?’
Terry Våge checked the time again. Nine thirty-six. No one had tried to contact him. He reread the message he had got on his phone again and arrived at the same conclusion as before, neither the time nor the place had been unambiguous. He had given the guy an extra half-hour as a gesture to the half-hour he used to give himself. But forty minutes was too much. The guy wasn’t coming. A bluff. A practical joke, perhaps. Maybe someone was standing among the tourists on the level below having a good snigger at him now. Laughing at the disgraced, despised charlatan of a journalist. Maybe this was the punishment. He pulled his woollen coat tighter around him and began walking towards the sloping roof. Fuck them, fuck the lot of them!
