Killing Moon полностью

Aune chuckled. ‘You’ve always been adept in the art of flattery, Harry. I was actually quite a useful rower at one time. But what about yourself? You need to eat for God’s sake, or you’ll disappear completely.’

Harry didn’t respond.

‘Ah, I see,’ Aune said. ‘You’re wondering which of us is going to disappear first? That would be me, Harry. This is what I shall die from.’

Harry nodded. ‘What are the doctors saying about...?’

‘About how long I have left? Nothing. Because I don’t ask. The value of staring the truth — and particularly that of your own mortality — in the face is, in my experience, greatly overestimated. And my experience is, as you know, long and deep. At the end of the day, people only want to be comfortable, and for as long as possible, preferably right up to a sudden final curtain. This comes as a partial disappointment to me, of course, to find that in that regard I am no different from anyone else, that I am incapable of dying with the courage and dignity I would wish. But I suppose I lack a good enough reason to die with greater bravura. My wife and daughter cry, and there’s no solace for them in seeing me more afraid of death than necessary, so I avoid grim realities and shy away from the truth instead.’

‘Mm.’

‘Well, OK, I can’t help but read the doctors, by way of what they say and their facial expressions. And judging by that I don’t have much time left. But...’ Aune threw his arms out, smiling with sad eyes. ‘There’s always the hope I’m wrong. After all, I’ve gone through my professional life being more often wrong than right.’

Harry smiled. ‘Maybe.’

‘Maybe. But you understand the way the wind is blowing when they give you a morphine pump, which you administer yourself, without any attendant warnings about overdose.’

‘Mm. So, pain then?’

‘Pain is an interesting interlocutor. But enough about me. Tell me about LA.’

Harry shook his head and thought it must be the jet lag, because his body had begun shaking with laughter.

‘Cut that out,’ Aune said. ‘Death is no laughing matter. Come on, tell me.’

‘Mm. Doctor — patient confidentiality?’

‘Harry, every secret will be taken to the grave here and the clock is ticking, so for the last time, tell me!’

Harry told him. Not everything. Not about what actually happened right before he left, when Bjørn shot himself. Not about Lucille and his own ticking clock. But everything else. About running to escape the memories. About the plan to drink himself to death someplace far away. When he had finished, Harry could see Ståle’s eyes were glazed. Throughout the many murder cases Ståle Aune had assisted the detectives of Crime Squad with, the psychologist’s stamina and powers of concentration when the days were long always impressed Harry. Now he read weariness, pain — and morphine — in his eyes.

‘What about Rakel?’ Aune asked in a weak voice. ‘Do you think about her a lot?’

‘All the time.’

‘The past is never dead. It’s not even past.’

‘That a Paul McCartney quote?’

‘Close,’ Aune smiled. ‘Do you think about her in a good way, or does it just hurt?’

‘It hurts in a good way, I suppose. Or the other way round. Like... well, the booze. The worst are the days I wake up having dreamt about her and for a moment I think she’s still alive, and that what happened is the dream. And then I have to go through the fucking thing all over again.’

‘Remember when you came to me in order to address the drinking, and I asked you if in the periods you were dry you wished that liquor didn’t exist in the world. And you said you wanted liquor to exist, that even though you didn’t want to drink, you wanted another option to be there. The thought of having a drink. That without that everything would be grey and meaningless, and there would be no adversary in the struggle. Is it...?’

‘Yes,’ Harry said. ‘That’s what it’s like with Rakel as well. I’d rather have the wound than not have had her in my life.’

They sat in silence. Harry glanced down at his hands. Around the room. Heard the sounds of a low phone conversation coming from the other bed. Ståle rolled onto his side.

‘I’m a little tired, Harry. Some days are better, but today’s not one of them. Thank you for coming.’

‘How much better?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Good enough that you can work? From here, I mean.’

Aune looked at him in surprise.

Harry pulled his chair closer to the bed.

In the conference room on the sixth floor of Police HQ, Katrine was about to wrap up the morning meeting of the investigative team. There were sixteen people sitting in front of her, eleven from Crime Squad and five from Kripos. Of the sixteen, ten were detectives, four were analysts, and two worked in Krimteknisk, the Forensics Unit. Katrine Bratt had gone through the findings of the Crime Scene Unit and the Forensic Medical Institute’s preliminary post-mortem, showing photos from both. Watched her audience stare at the bright screen while shifting uneasily on hard chairs. The Crime Scene Unit hadn’t found much, something they regarded as a discovery in itself.