The Writing on the Wall Read Free Page B

the door. ‘Well, perhaps we can …’
    ‘Yes.’
    Randi Furebø held the door open, and he walked in ahead of me.
    ‘Can you fetch her? We can talk to him down here.’ He ushered me into a door on the right. I entered a little TV room with a worn leather suite, family pictures on the walls, a bookshelf with a rather random collection of books and a small fireplace with a log basket and a pile of newspapers beside it. It felt cool and airless, with a slight hint of whitewash.
    After hanging up his jacket out in the hall Furebø followed me in.
    I turned to face him. ‘So does that mean you’re a journalist as well?’
    ‘No, I work in graphics. In other words, I’m involved in how the newspaper looks.’
    ‘I see. You’re the one who makes conflicts into wars and collisions into catastrophes, at least where the presentation’s concerned?’
    His look suggested he’d heard this one a thousand times before. ‘Wrong,’ he said sharply. What he reminded me of most was a football trainer meeting the press in the dressing room just after his team has lost the cup. ‘Those choices are made a few rungs higher up the ladder.’
    ‘By people like Holger Skagestøl perhaps?’
    ‘For example.’
    Someone cleared their throat at the door, and Randi Furebø pushed her daughter in front of her into the room. ‘Here we are – this is the man who’d like to talk to you, Åsa.’ She shook off her mother’s arm without speaking.
    I smiled and put out my hand. ‘Hello, Åsa! The name’s Varg. Varg Veum.’ *
    Trond Furebø stifled a snort.
    She shook my hand correctly but almost without any strength in her grip. ‘Hello.’
    She stood there in front of me, looking nonplussed. She had taken off her leather jacket, and the white blouse did its best to camouflage the shape of her young breasts.
    I took a step sideways and glanced down at the sofa, but no one suggested we should sit down.
    Furebø looked at the clock, and his wife said: ‘Yes, supper’s ready.’
    ‘It won’t take long. You know what it’s about, don’t you, Åsa?’
    She nodded.
    ‘Your friend Torild. She’s been absent from home since last Thursday. Have you any idea where she might be?’
    She shook her head. ‘No’.
    ‘No idea at all?’
    She shook her head again but this time without a word.
    ‘Is she friendly with some boy or has she a boyfriend she doesn’t want her parents to know about?’
    She looked down. ‘No.’
    ‘Are you sure?’
    She raised her eyes again. ‘Nobody she’s told me about anyway!’
    ‘Quite sure about that, are you?’
    ‘Look here, Veum,’ Furebø broke in, ‘if we’re going to repeat every single question at least twice, this is going to take an awful long time!’
    ‘Perhaps you two could just go up and start, if you’re in such a hurry. Start supper, I mean.’
    His face darkened. ‘Like I said outside, Veum! You had two choices!’
    ‘It’s in the oven,’ said his wife reassuringly.
    He shot her a look of irritation but said nothing.
    ‘That’s OK, Åsa. I believe what you say. Just tell me, though … Have you and Torild spent much time together recently?’
    She glanced sideways. ‘No more than usual.’
    ‘And what does that mean?’
    ‘Oh, a few evenings a week.’
    ‘And what do you two do then?’
    ‘Oh… Sit at home talking. Go into town to see a film. Stuff like that.’
    ‘Stuff like that. What else?’
    ‘Oh … Go for a hamburger maybe. If we have any money.’ A veiled glance at her father. ‘Just walk around and check things out, look in clothes shops, record shops, places like that.’
    ‘Down town, in other words?’
    ‘Sure. There’s nothing going on up here!’
    ‘Just the two of you?’
    ‘No, there are almost always some other girls too.’
    ‘Who, for instance?’
    ‘Oh, various people we know, girls from our class or some we know from before, from Guides and stuff.’
    ‘Are you a Guide?’
    ‘Not any more.’
    ‘Nor am I, a Scout I mean.’
    She looked