The Snowman ( PDFDrive )

Harry had driven to the top of the Holmenkollen Ridge on the west side of town. He had parked his
car at the sports centre, in the large deserted car park, and walked up Holmenkollen. There he had
stood on the viewing promontory beside the ski jump where he and a couple of out-of-season
tourists were peering across at the grandstands grinning emptily on both sides of the landing slope,
the pond at the bottom, which was drained in the winter, and the town stretching out to the fjord. A
view gives perspective. They had no concrete evidence. The Snowman had been so close, it had felt
as if all they had to do was reach out and arrest him. But then he had slipped from their grasp again,
like a wily professional boxer. The inspector felt old, heavy and clumsy. One of the tourists was
looking at him. The weight of his service revolver pulled his coat down on the right-hand side. And
the bodies, where the hell were the bodies? Even buried corpses turned up again. Was he using
acid?
Harry sensed the onset of resignation. No, he bloody didn’t! On the FBI course they had examined
cases where it had taken more than ten years to catch the killer. As a rule, it had been one tiny
random detail, it seemed, that had solved the case. However, what actually cracked it was the fact
that they had never given up, they had gone all fifteen rounds and if the opponent was still standing
they screamed for a return fight.
The afternoon darkness stole upwards from the town beneath, and the lights around him were
slowly being switched on.
They had to start looking where there was light. It was a banal but important procedural rule. Begin
wherever you have a clue. On this occasion it meant beginning with the least likely person you
could imagine and the worst, the craziest idea he had ever had.
Harry sighed, took out his mobile phone and searched back through the list of calls. There weren’t
that many, so it was still there, the very short conversation at Hotel Leon. He pressed OK.
Bosse researcher Oda Paulsen replied at once with the happy, animated voice of someone who
views all incoming calls as an exciting new opportunity. And this time, in a sense, she was right.
21
DAY 18.
The Waiting Room.
IT WAS THE HEEBIE-JEEBIES ROOM. PERHAPS THAT WAS WHY some people called it the
‘waiting room’, as if you were at the dentist’s. Or the ‘antechamber’, as if the heavy door between
the two Studio 1 sofas led to something important or even holy. But on NRK’s floor plan for the
state channel’s buildings in the Marienlyst district of Oslo, it was simply, and boringly, termed
Lounge, Studio 1. Nevertheless, it was the most exciting room Oda Paulsen knew.
Most of the guests taking part in the evening’s edition of Bosse had arrived. As usual, it was the
guests who were least known and who would be appearing for the shortest time who had got there
first. Now they were sitting on one of the sofas, made up, their cheeks flushed with tension as they
chatted, sipped tea or red wine, their eyes inevitably seeking the monitor which gave a full view of
the studio on the other side of the door. There, the audience had been admitted and the TV floor
manager was instructing them on how to clap, laugh and cheer. The screen also showed the host’s
chair and four guests’ chairs, empty, waiting for people, content and entertainment.