Free The Devil's Star by Jo Nesbø Page A

stood in the doorway at the top, waiting as Harry came panting up the stairs. The man had a large tousled mane of hair, a black beard on a burgundy-red face and a matching tunic-like garment covering him from neck down to sandal-clad feet.
    ‘It’s good you could come so quickly,’ he said, holding out his paw.
    A paw it was in fact, the hand was so large that it completely enclosed Harry’s when the man introduced himself as Wilhelm Barli.
    Harry gave his name and tried to withdraw his hand. He didn’t like physical contact with men, and this handshake belonged more in the category of embrace. However, Wilhelm held on to him as if for his life.
    ‘Lisbeth has gone,’ he whispered. His voice was surprisingly clear.
    ‘Yes, we received the message. Shall we go inside?’
    ‘Yes, come in.’
    Wilhelm went ahead of Harry. It was only an attic flat, but while Camilla Loen’s flat was small and furnished in a strictly minimalist style, this one was large and the decoration was lavish and flashy, like a pastiche of new classicism. However, it was exaggerated to the point that it almost tipped over into being the backdrop for a toga party. Instead of normal sofas and chairs there were reclining arrangements in a sort of Hollywood version of Ancient Rome, and the wooden beams were clad in plaster to form Doric or Corinthian columns. Harry had never grasped the difference, but he did recognise the plaster relief that had been laid directly on the white wall in the hallway. His mother had taken him and Sis to a museum in Copenhagen when they were small and there they had seen Bertel Thorvaldsen’s Jason and the Golden Fleece . The flat had clearly just been done up. Harry noticed newly painted wood and bits of masking tape and could smell the blissful aroma of solvents.
    In the sitting room there was a low table set for two. Harry followed Barli up the staircase and out onto a large, tiled roof terrace looking down onto the central area that was enclosed on four sides by connecting apartment buildings. The outside setting was contemporary Norwegian. There were three charred cutlets smoking on the grill.
    ‘It gets so warm here in the afternoon in these attic flats,’ Barli apologised, pointing to a white plastic baroque chair.
    ‘So I’ve been finding out,’ Harry said, walking over to the edge and looking down into the central area.
    Generally heights didn’t bother him, but after longish spells of drinking relatively modest heights could suddenly make him feel dizzy. Fifteen metres beneath him he saw two ageing bikes, and a white sheet hanging from a rotary clothes dryer and flapping in the wind. He had to look up again smartish.
    Facing them across the courtyard, on a balcony with wrought-iron railings, two neighbours raised bottles of beer to him in greeting. Half of the table in front of them was covered in brown bottles. Harry nodded in return. He wondered how it could be that it was windy down in the yard but not up here.
    ‘A glass of red wine?’
    Barli had already begun to pour himself a glass from the half-empty bottle. Harry noticed that Barli’s hand was shaking. Domaine La Bastide Sy he read on the label. The name was even longer but agitated fingers had torn the rest off.
    Harry sat down. ‘Thanks, but I don’t drink when I’m on duty.’
    Barli grimaced and quickly put the bottle back down on the table.
    ‘Of course not, I apologise, I’m just beside myself with worry. I shouldn’t be drinking either in this situation.’
    As he put his glass to his mouth and drank, wine dribbled down the front of his tunic where a red stain began to grow.
    Harry looked at his watch so that Barli would appreciate that he would have to be fairly brief.
    ‘She was only supposed to be nipping down to the shop to buy some potato salad to go with the chops,’ Barli gasped. ‘Only two hours ago she was sitting where you are now.’
    Harry adjusted his sunglasses. ‘Your wife’s been missing for two