Sohlberg and the Gift Read Free

over.”
     
    “But—”
     
    “Look here young lady . . . I can’t give you those things . . . you . . . you have to get them for yourself . . . earn them for yourself. I have no power in those areas. None. I only work on homicides and major crimes.”
     
    “Homicide? Major crimes? That’s all you do?”
     
    ”Yes.”
     
    “Then tell me this . . . why was Chief Inspector Nygård kicked off the Janne Eide case? That’s a mighty peculiar turn of events.”
     
    After a long silence she again said:
     
    “Then tell me this . . . why was Chief Inspector Nygård kicked off the Janne Eide case?”
     
    Sohlberg surprised himself when he abruptly replied:
     
    “I don’t know. . . . I’ll look into it.”
     
    And that was the end of their conversation. She smiled her brilliant perfect teeth at him and left his office as suddenly as she had appeared. The apparition of her youth and beauty beguiled him. In hindsight he should have followed her. But he didn’t because her taunting questions had left him in a daze—as mentally incapacitated as if she had used a stun gun on him with a 3 million volt discharge.
     
    Chief Inspector Harald Sohlberg vaguely remembered the gruesome murder of Janne Eide. The case had been a media sensation three years ago. But the public had felt a sharp letdown with the quick capture of her murderer and his equally speedy plea of insanity. All this had come as a disappointing anticlimax to every tabloid’s promise of an insider’s look at the tawdry lifestyles of the rich and famous. The expected scandal among the wealthy elites never materialized.
     
    The case was closed. As dead and gone as the unfortunate Janne Eide. Nothing more remained to be said or done with the case or at least not until the hark of the visitor’s bewitching herald song:
     
    Then tell me this . . . why was Chief Inspector Nygård kicked off the Janne Eide case?
     
     
     
    ~ ~ ~
     
     
     
    All homicides are the same: a life is cut short.
     
    The clerk disagreed:
     
    “No Chief Inspector. We don’t store all the homicide case files here. I don’t think we have the case file you’re looking for. . . . When did you say the case closed?”
     
    Sohlberg shut his eyes in exasperation. He had to get the case file on the Janne Eide murder. But he was trapped. He could not use his computer account and password to quickly look up any official records or other computerized information on the Eide case.
     
     Except for the morning’s telephone calls to clerks in charge of homicide records Sohlberg knew better than to use his official police-issued cell phone—or his desk phone and computer at work.
     
    Two realities confronted the Police Chief Inspector.
     
    The first reality of his situation was that he would inevitably face questions and then problems from his superiors and colleagues if anyone found out from his official computer or telephone records that he was looking at the Eide homicide. Official policy and procedures clearly dictated that a politiinspektør does not investigate a case without the knowledge or authorization of his superiors.
     
    The second reality was that Sohlberg would have to investigate the case in time-consuming and roundabout ways because of his decision to avoid the computerized information systems of the Norwegian Police Service.
     
    The twin realities forced the Chief Inspector into making an endless round of telephone calls to thirteen administrative clerks that morning. That’s when he discovered to his dismay that all homicide case files are not the same. Nor are homicide case files kept in the same place at the Oslo politidistrikt. These facts bedeviled Sohlberg.
     
    Lousy files . . . they’re impossible to find just when you need them.
     
    With mounting anger he realized that he had absolutely no idea what happens to old case files. Perhaps he had learned about the ultimate destiny of old case files when he was training or maybe just maybe he had heard about