Blessed Are Those Who Thirst Read online

  But she didn’t fear it. He could do what he wanted. If only he didn’t kill her. It was death she was afraid of. Only death.

  Everything went black because of the excruciating pain. Or was it perhaps because she hadn’t taken a breath? Slowly he released his grip on her mouth, while repeating his instruction to keep quiet. It wasn’t necessary. Her larynx had swollen into an enormous, aching, silent tumor, blocking everything.

  Dear God, don’t let me die. Don’t let me die. Let him finish fast—fast, fast.

  This was her single thought, churning around in her terrified brain like a maelstrom, over and over again.

  He can do whatever he wants, but dear, dear God, don’t let me die.

  The tears came unbidden, a silent trickle as though her eyes were reacting on their own initiative. They were acting automatically without registering that she was not actually crying. Suddenly the man stood up. Her spine protested as it fell into its original position, and she now lay flat on her stomach. But not for long. He grabbed hold of her head, one hand on her right ear, the other in her hair, and dragged her into the living room. The pain was overwhelming, and she tried to scramble after him. He was going too fast, her arms couldn’t manage to keep pace. Her neck stretched behind him in confusion, trying to avoid breaking right off. She blacked out again.

  Dear God. Don’t let me die.

  He didn’t switch on the light. A streetlamp directly outside the window afforded sufficient illumination. In the middle of the living room floor, he let go. Crouching in a fetal position, she began to cry in earnest. Quietly, but accompanied by sobs and shudders. She held her hands in front of her face, in a futile hope that the man would be gone when she removed them.

  All at once he was upon her again. A cloth was forced into her mouth. The dishcloth. The pungent taste almost choked her. She retched violently, but there was no way out for what came up from her stomach. Then she lost consciousness.

  The cloth was gone when she awoke. She was lying in her own bed and felt naked. The man was lying on top of her. She could feel his penis thrusting in and out, but the pain around her ankles was more intense. Her feet were tied to each of the bedposts with something sharp; it felt like steel wire.

  Dear, holy God. Don’t let me die. I’ll never complain about anything ever again.

  She had given up. There was nothing she could do. She tried to scream, but her vocal cords were still immobilized.

  “You’re gorgeous,” he hissed between his teeth. “A beautiful lady like you can’t get through Saturday night without cock!”

  His sweat dripped onto her face, searing her skin, and she twisted her head from side to side to avoid it. In a second he released one of her wrists to deliver a powerful smack on her ear.

  “Lie still!”

  It took time. How long, she had no idea. When he was finished, he remained lying on top of her like a lump of lead. He was panting. She said nothing, did nothing. It was as much as she could do to exist at all.

  He rose slowly and loosened the moorings around her feet. It was steel wire. He must have brought it with him, she thought lethargically. There was nothing like that in her apartment. Although she was now free to move, she remained lying there, apathetic. He turned her onto her stomach. She offered no resistance.

  He climbed on top of her again. For a sluggish second she realized he still had an erection. She couldn’t comprehend how it was ready for use so soon, only a minute after his earlier orgasm.

  He spread her buttocks. Then he took her from behind. She had nothing to say about it. She passed out yet again but managed to repeat her fervent prayer.

  Dear, dear God in heaven. Don’t let me die. I’m only twenty-four years old. Don’t let me die.

  He was gone. She hoped. She was still lying in the same position as when she had fainted, naked, on her stomach. Outside, the sounds of Sunday morning were just beginning to be heard. It was no longer night. A bright May morning was creeping into the room, lending her skin a bluish tinge. She didn’t dare to move so she could see the time on her bedside clock. Not moving a muscle, she kept lying there, listening to her own heartbeats. For three hours. Then she was almost certain. He must have left.

  She stood up stiffly, looking down at her body. Her breasts were hanging lifelessly, as though bewailing her fate, or perhaps they were already dead. Her ankles had swollen enormously. A broad, jagged, bloody wound encircled each of her ankles. Her anus ached fiercely, and there was a throbbing sensation in her vagina reaching far up inside her belly. Calmly and firmly, almost impassive, she threw off the bedclothes. That didn’t take much time, and she attempted to dump them in the garbage. The bin wasn’t large enough, and, sobbing and increasingly enraged, she tried in vain to stuff them into the bag. She had to give up and sat there on the floor, totally shattered, naked and defenseless.

  Dear God. Why couldn’t you let me die instead?

  * * *

  The doorbell rang brutally through the apartment. It cut right through her, and she couldn’t hold back a scream.

  “Kristine?”

  The voice was far, far away, but its anxiety sliced through the two doors.

  “Go away,” she mumbled, with no hope of him hearing.

  “Kristine? Are you there?”

  The voice was louder now and more distressed.

  “GO AWAY!”

  All the strength that hadn’t been there during the night, when she really needed it, gathered itself into a single shriek.

  Immediately afterward, he stood facing her, gasping for breath. He dropped his key ring on the floor.

  “Kristine! My girl!”

  He bent down, putting his arms tenderly around the naked, crumpled body. The man was trembling with fright, and his breath was fluttering like a rabbit’s. She wanted to console him, say something to make it all better again, say everything was fine, nothing had happened. But when she felt the stiff material of his shirt brush against her face, and inhaled his reassuring, familiar male scent, she gave up hope.

  Her giant of a father held her tight, rocking her from side to side like a little child. He knew what had happened. The garbage can with the overflowing bedsheets, the blood around her ankles, her naked, unprotected figure, and the bewildered sobs he had never heard before. He lifted her carefully onto the sofa and wrapped the blanket around her. The coarse woolen fabric probably chafed against her skin, but he didn’t want to let her go to fetch a sheet. Instead he made a sacred vow to himself as he stroked her hair repeatedly.

  But he said nothing.

  MONDAY, MAY 31

  It was difficult to become accustomed to them. The twenty-four-year-old woman sitting facing her, eyes downcast, was Detective Inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen’s forty-second rape victim. She kept count. Rape was the worst crime of all. Killing was something different. Murder she could in a way understand. A crazy, furious moment of violence and volatility, perhaps pent-up aggression going back years. That she could almost wrap her head around. But not rape.

  The victim had brought her father with her. That was not so unusual. A father, a friend, sometimes a partner, though seldom a mother. Oddly enough. Perhaps a mother was too close.

  The man was massive and looked out of place in the narrow chair. He was not actually overweight, simply large. In any case, the extra kilos suited him. He had to be more than six foot three, with a solid appearance, robustly masculine and somewhat ugly. One enormous hand was placed on his daughter’s slender one. They resembled each other in some indefinable way. The woman had a totally different build, almost skinny, although she had inherited her father’s height. However, there was something about the eyes, the same shape, the same color. And with exactly the same expression. A helpless, sorrowful aspect that in fact, surprisingly enough, was more striking in the case of the huge man.

  Detective Inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen felt embarrassed. Rape was something she never got used to. But Hanne was smart, and smart police officers don’t show their feelings. At least not
when they are embarrassed.

  “I have to ask you some questions,” she said softly. “Some of them are not so pleasant. May I proceed?”

  The father squirmed in his seat.

  “She was questioned for several hours yesterday,” he said. “Is it really necessary to go over it all again?”

  “Yes, unfortunately. The report isn’t yet comprehensive.”

  She hesitated imperceptibly.

  “We can wait till tomorrow, but . . .”

  She tugged at her hair.

  “But it’s fairly urgent for us, you understand. It’s vital to be fast in an investigation such as this.”

  “It’s fine.”

  The woman answered for herself this time. Changing position slightly, she braced herself for yet another reiteration of Saturday night.

  “It’s absolutely fine,” she repeated, this time directing herself to her father.

  Now the daughter’s hand comforted her father’s.

  He’s damn well got the worst of it, were the detective inspector’s thoughts as she started on the interview.

  * * *

  “Lunch, Håkon?”

  “No thanks, I’ve eaten already.”

  Hanne Wilhelmsen glanced at the clock.

  “Already? It’s only eleven o’clock!”

  “Yes, but I’ll come with you for a coffee. Keep you company. The canteen or the office?”

  “The office.”

  It struck him as soon as he entered. She had new curtains. They weren’t exactly police regulation. Periwinkle blue with meadow flowers.

  “They’re really nice! How did you manage that?”

  She didn’t reply, instead fetching a bundle of neatly folded material from the cupboard.

  “Sewed some for you as well.”

  He was dumbfounded.

  “It cost only seven kroner a meter. At Ikea. Seven kroner a meter! At any rate, they’re much more appealing, and far cleaner, than those state-issued rags over there!”

  She pointed at a filthy gray curtain, dumped in the wastepaper basket, that seemed embarrassed at being mentioned.

  “Thanks very much!”

  Police Attorney Håkon Sand accepted the pile of material with enthusiasm, immediately spilling his entire cup of coffee over it. A large brown flower bloomed among all the little sprigs of red and pink. With an almost inaudible long-suffering sigh, the female detective inspector reclaimed the curtains.

  “I’ll launder them.”

  “No, not at all, I’ll do it myself!”

  There was a scent of unfamiliar perfume in the office. Unfamiliar, and slightly overpowering. The explanation lay in a slim green folder on the desk between them.

  “By the way, this is our case,” she said, when she had finished cleaning the worst of the coffee damage. She passed him the papers.

  “Rape. Dreadful.”

  “All rapes are dreadful,” the police attorney mumbled. Having read for a few moments, he concurred. It was horrendous.

  “How did she seem?”

  “An all right kind of girl. Rather sweet. Decent in every way. Medical student. Smart. Successful. And very raped.”

  She gave herself a shake.

  “They sit there, timid and helpless, looking at the floor and twiddling their thumbs as though it were their fault. I get so discouraged. I feel even more helpless than they do, sometimes. So I think.”

  “How do you think I feel, then?” Håkon Sand said. “At least you’re a woman. It’s not your fault men commit rape.”

  He dropped the two interview reports regarding the medical student onto the desk.

  “Well, it’s not exactly your fault either, you know.” The detective inspector smiled.

  “No . . . But I feel quite ill at ease when I have to relate to them. Poor girls. But . . .”

  He stretched his arms above his head, yawned and drank the rest of his coffee.

  “But I avoid seeing them, most of the time. The public prosecutor attends to those cases. Fortunately. For me, the girls are merely names on a piece of paper. Have you taken your bike out yet, by the way?”

  Hanne Wilhelmsen smiled broadly as she got to her feet.

  “Come here.” She waved her arm, positioning herself beside the window. “There! The rose-colored one!”

  “Have you got a pink bike?”

  “It’s not pink,” she said, offended. “It’s rose. Or cerise. But certainly not pink.”

  Grinning, Håkon Sand poked her vigorously in the side.

  “A pink Harley-Davidson! The worst thing I’ve ever seen!”

  He looked her up and down.

  “On the other hand, you’re altogether too attractive to be riding a motorbike at all. At the very least, it would have to be a pink one.”

  For the very first time since they had met almost four years previously, he saw Detective Inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen’s cheeks turn bright red. He pointed triumphantly at her face.

  “Pink!”

  The lemonade bottle hit him in the middle of the chest. Fortunately, it was made of plastic.

  * * *

  She couldn’t for the life of her give a particularly detailed description of the rapist. Inside her head, somewhere or other, the picture was absolutely clear, but she couldn’t manage to extract it.

  The police artist was a patient man. Sketching and erasing, he outlined features afresh and suggested a different chin. The woman shook her head, squinting at the portrait, and requested he take a little more off the ears. Nothing helped. It did not resemble him in the least.

  They had been at this for three hours. The artist had to take a new sheet of paper four times, and was about to give up. The drawings were placed in front of her, none of them complete.

  “Which one looks most like him, then?”

  “None of them . . .”

  It was time to give it a rest.

  * * *

  Detective Inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen and Police Attorney Håkon Sand weren’t the only ones who didn’t like rape cases. Chief Inspector Kaldbakken, Hanne Wilhelmsen’s immediate superior, was bloody sick of them too. His equine face reacted as though he had been presented with a bag of spoiled oats and wanted more than anything else to say no, thanks for offering.

  “The sixth in less than a fortnight,” he mumbled. “Though this one here has a slightly different method. The other five are self-inflicted. But not this one.”

  Self-inflicted rapes . . . the description infuriated her. There were more than enough of such cases: girls who had gone home with men who were more or less strangers to them after a liquor-soaked night on the town. Post-party rapes. Rarely did anything come of these cases. One person’s word against another’s. All the same, they were hardly a girl’s own fault. But she chose not to say anything. Not because she was scared of her boss but because she simply couldn’t be bothered.

  “The victim hasn’t been able to help much with a drawing,” she said instead. “And she can’t spot the guy in our archives either. Frustrating.”

  It was true. Not first and foremost because they wouldn’t solve the case. As far as that was concerned, it was in good company. However, the actual modus operandi gave them grounds for disquiet.

  “Men like that don’t give up until they’re caught.”

  Kaldbakken scanned the room without fixing his eyes on anything. Neither of them spoke, but they both sensed a hint of foreboding in the glorious May sunshine that lay enticingly outside the unwashed windows. The skinny man rapped a crooked finger on the folder.

  “This chap could give us a hot time of it this spring,” he declared, extremely concerned. “I’m going to suggest dropping the other five cases. We prioritize this one. Give it top priority, Wilhelmsen. Yes indeed, men like that! Top priority.”

  * * *

  The room was so overheated that even her flimsy worn-out sweater with the Washington Redskins logo emblazoned on the front was too much. She yanked it over her head. The undershirt beneath was wet between her breasts,
and she tugged it a little, to no avail. The window was open wide, but she had to keep the door closed. The cross breeze wouldn’t be a good idea for the modicum of tidiness she had managed to achieve on her desk.

  There wasn’t much she could do. Sure enough, they had found some evidence at the crime scene, a couple of hairs that might belong to the perpetrator, a few bloodstains that probably weren’t his, and some traces of semen that definitely were. With merely a poor sketch, there was little to be gained through the mass media, though they would give it a try. Showing the photographs hadn’t led to anything either.

  It would take time to obtain an analysis of the sparse forensic material. In the meantime, there was little to do other than interview the neighbors to discover whether they had seen or heard anything. That was unlikely. They never had.

  She pressed four buttons on the intercom.

  “Erik?”

  “Yes?”

  “It’s Hanne here. Do you have time to come with me on a little jaunt?”

  Erik did indeed. He was Hanne Wilhelmsen’s puppy dog, the first-year constable with red hair and freckles that covered his face. Three seconds later he presented himself at her door, wagging his tail.

  “Should I get a car?”

  She rose to her feet, smiling broadly, and threw a black crash helmet in his direction. He caught it with an even broader smile.

  “Ace!”

  Hanne Wilhelmsen shook her head.

  “Cool, Erik. Not ace, cool.”

  * * *

  The building was probably from the turn of the century. It was situated in the west end and had been renovated with great care. Quite the opposite of the looming apartment blocks to the east, screeching at each other in lilac and pink and other colors hardly even invented when the buildings were new. This apartment block was pearl gray. The windows and doors had a border of dark blue, and the refurbishment must have been fairly recent.

  Hanne Wilhelmsen parked her bike on the sidewalk. Erik the Red hopped off before her in a flurry of excitement and perspiration.

  “Can we take a detour on the road home?”

  “We’ll see.”

  The doorbell at the entrance had two columns with five names in each. On the first floor lived K. Håverstad, sensible and gender neutral. The precaution hadn’t helped her greatly. On the ground floor, someone must have moved in recently. The corresponding nameplate had not been inserted behind glass in accordance with the regulations like the others, but instead stuck on with a piece of tape. An exotic-sounding name, the only one in the entire block giving any indication of foreign origins. Detective Inspector Wilhelmsen rang the doorbell of the neighbor living across the landing from K. Håverstad.