Free The Writing on the Wall by Gunnar Staalesen Page B

obviously a joke. A macabre one but a joke nonetheless. Or also …
    A warning?
    But in that case, from who?
    And why?
    Hardly able to summon the energy, I rewound the tape on the answerphone to hear what glad tidings might be lying in wait there.
    There was only one message: the same digital-sounding organ music as the previous time. ‘Abide With Me’… And now I suspected I knew whose funeral they had in mind.

Eleven
     
     
    BEFORE LEAVING THE OFFICE I called Karin Bjørge, my long-standing girlfriend at the Population Register Department, and asked her whether she had any plans for the evening.
    She had. ‘I promised Eva … She had two tickets for a concert at the Grieg Concert Hall, and I … I think she needs some company.’
    ‘I see.’
    She caught the undertone in my voice and quickly added: ‘But I can certainly change it, if you …’
    ‘No, no, course not. Heavens above!’
    She hesitated. ‘We can meet up tomorrow, can’t we?’
    ‘Course we can! Is it the usual wind orchestra recital?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Well, hope you enjoy it!’
    ‘Thanks.’
    So I went back home by myself after all.
    I checked the front door carefully before letting myself in, went cautiously from room to room, opening the doors fully and turning the lights on before stepping in.
    The flat was as empty as a Scout’s promise twenty years on.
    I rustled up a Veum special: leeks fried with chopped tomatoes, beaten eggs poured over it to make a sort of omelette, a bit ragged at the edges, but it went down a treat
    I made a cup of proper filter coffee and sat watching a TV debate that was about as meaningful as a free number on the Reeperbahn. Then I poured myself a glass of aquavit, put on a Ben Webster CD and went to fetch a book from the pile waiting to be read on my bedside table.
    But I couldn’t concentrate.
    I sat there with a kind of bad conscience, the feeling I’d been so accustomed to during the years I’d worked in Child Welfare. In fact, I should not have been sitting here taking it easy. I ought to have been out on the streets looking for Torild.
    The old boy on the floor below was as quiet as a mouse. He’d been widowed a few years before and since then, all I ever heard from below was now and then the tinkle of a bottle cap when he opened a beer or the sound of the radio on the rare occasions he put it on a bit too loud at six a.m.
    At eleven-thirty there was suddenly a ring at the front door downstairs.
    I went over to the window, opened it carefully and looked out. It was Karin.
    ‘Hi,’ she said, smiling up at me in the darkness. ‘Can I come in?’
    I went down and unlocked the door. She came in and gave me a quick hug. ‘You sounded as though you could do with some company.’
    We went upstairs and she hung up her dark coat in the hall. Underneath, she was wearing smooth black corduroy slacks, a white blouse and a dark-brown suede jacket that emphasised her slim waist. ‘I’ve brought my toothbrush,’ she said with a little smile.
    I kissed her tenderly. ‘A toothbrush and good spirits. That’ll do for anybody.’ A slight hint of red wine lingered over her. ‘Can I get you something to drink?’
    Beaming at me, she returned my kiss full on the mouth. ‘Yes …’
    In the bedroom we slowly undressed one another. I lay her back across the bed, ran my tongue in a gentle line gently down over her belly, carefully parted her labia and kissed her again passionately . She sighed, opened her thighs even wider and devoured me in great mouthfuls as though after a long fast.
    Afterwards she said: ‘Eva and I went out for a glass of wine after the concert. Her husband’s left her for a girl who could easily be their daughter.’
    ‘A cleverer man than me once said: When you get older, and if you’re reasonable, the women you fall for will grow older as you do.’
    She snuggled in under my armpit, kissed me below my ear and said: ‘So that’s why things are so good between us, is it