Where Monsters Dwell (39 page)

Felicia Stone had always been slim. But when she put down the phone after talking to her father, giving him as detailed an account as she could about what had happened that night in Shaun Nevins’s room, she also felt unburdened and light for the first time in years.

Felicia tried to touch the wound on her back where the knife had gone in. But after the stitches had been removed the day before, it no longer itched and she had a hard time locating the tenderness she still felt in the upper part of her torso. So she just sat there thinking about the case she had helped solve. Odd had updated her every day at the hospital with news from both Trondheim and Richmond.

According to the scholars who had begun to decipher the palimpsest of Johannes the priest and the so-called knife parchment that had been in the possession of Jens Dahle, there were indications that Dahle had been inspired by the man who might prove to be the biggest serial killer in Norwegian history. A twisted priest with an excellent knowledge of anatomy. One thing that had made the work with the Johannes palimpsest easier was the availability of X-rays that had been made by Johns Hopkins University in the United States for the curator of the Poe Museum in Richmond. These X-rays were found during a search of the office of John Nevins, who’d had his own very personal reasons for not drawing attention to the
Johannes Book
and its missing knives. Nevins, who was familiar with the discoveries that Bond had already made in cooperation with Gunn Brita Dahle, apparently planned to use the revelations to promote his own academic career, but he had wanted to wait until things had cooled off a bit. He had managed to purloin these X-rays from the Poe Museum at the beginning of the investigation while Reynolds was doing the first interviews of the museum staff. In assessing the investigation done by the Richmond police, this was the one event that bothered Morris and his colleagues the most. In the investigators’ defense, the X-rays had been kept in a poorly secured storeroom and not in Bond’s office. Nevins was the only one who knew where to look. That remained a small yet important oversight. Felicia knew that Laubach had been livid about this, and she expected to hear more about it when she returned.

Now she again picked up the phone and called Morris.

“It’s early,” he said.

She looked at the clock. It was one o’clock, barely seven in the morning in Richmond.

“Did I wake you?” she asked.

“No, I’m already on my second cup of coffee. But I’m actually off this morning. Things have calmed down over here. How’s it going with you?”

“I was released from the hospital today. A day early.”

“So I suppose you’re anxious to come home? Shall we book a flight for you?”

“That’s what I wanted to talk to you about,” she said.

*   *   *

Singsaker rode his bike past the Student Society, across Elgeseter Bridge, and followed Prinsens gate all the way to the hotel. When he got there it was twenty past one. He went inside to the front desk, explained that he wanted to see Felicia Stone, and gave her room number to a male desk clerk who had blond streaks in his hair. He was old enough that these streaks blended freely with a sprinkling of gray. He didn’t bother to type her name into the computer.

“She checked out five minutes ago,” he said. “And left in a taxi.”

“Do you know where she was going?” Singsaker asked.

“No, but she’s American. I assumed she was going to the airport, although she made her own arrangements with the cab company.”

“Damn,” Singsaker said, surprising himself by slamming his fist on the counter.

“If you’ve got some urgent message for her, I’m sure you can catch up with her out at Værnes,” said the desk clerk.

“On my bike?”

*   *   *

Outside the hotel he looked at his cell phone, wondering whether he ought to call her or text. But he decided that if she had really left for home without saying good-bye, there was little he could do about it. He’d just be chasing a dream. And he already had enough dreams, which had had a disturbing tendency to turn into nightmares.

He rode his bike over to the state liquor store on Solsiden and bought two bottles of Rød Aalborg. At the grocery store in the shopping center he found some decent Danish rye bread and whole filets of pickled herring, the kind he liked but seldom ate. He had a whole weekend ahead of him, and he wondered how long he’d be able to hold out before he called Anniken.

*   *   *

Felicia Stone suddenly felt as though she’d done something stupid. The case was over, after all. Why couldn’t she simply let it drop and go home? Was there anything more to find out now?

She took out the key ring she carried in her pocket, even though none of the keys fit a single lock on this side of the Atlantic. But on it was a lock pick that had no such geographical limitations. It fit in the lock she was now trying to pick with some difficulty. Patterson was so much better at this. She’d often thought that he could have been as good a criminal as he was a cop. For her part, it took some effort, but eventually she managed to get the lock open. She went in and looked around the room, which was exactly as she’d pictured it. And it reinforced her belief that she was on the right track. There was still something left undone; a loose thread was still left.

*   *   *

He biked slowly across Kirkegata. On the way he passed Dahle’s house. All the curtains were drawn. The kids had moved in with Gunn Brita’s parents, which might be permanent, according to the child welfare authorities. Most probably the house would be sold to cover the inevitable demands for compensation.

There was a lot of investigative work that remained to be done after what had been the bloodiest serial killings in Norway over the past five hundred years. The Norwegian team was using a lot of resources trying to clarify the scope of Jens Dahle’s crimes. The boathouse by the cabin out on
Ø
rland had quickly been dubbed “The Boathouse of Horror” by Vlado Taneski in
Adresseavisen
. In general, the press was doing its best to ignore Jon Vatten’s next to last wish that Jens Dahle not be mythologized.

In the boathouse there was more than sufficient evidence to link Dahle to the murders of both Edvard and Hedda Vatten, as well as to that of his own wife. In addition, skin had been found from at least one other unidentified individual. So Jens Dahle could be labeled a serial killer according to every definition of the term.

The evidence was strong enough to link him to the murder in Virginia as well. Beside the similarity between the murders and the confirmed connection between Gunn Brita Dahle and Efrahim Bond—which provided a motive for the murder—electronic evidence was found verifying Jens Dahle’s travel itinerary. By all accounts he had flown to Washington, D.C., and from there continued in a rental car. He purchased scalpels and other surgical equipment, which he couldn’t bring with him on the plane, at a medical supply company in Washington. The equipment had been ordered in advance by the Science Museum in Trondheim. Dahle was back in Norway in a little less than seventy-two hours. The original check of Dahle’s alibi had been done before anyone in the Trondheim police was aware of the Richmond murder, so they had only concentrated on the weekend of the murder in Trondheim. Dahle’s colleagues, who could not even begin to comprehend what had happened, stated in later interviews that they thought he had been on vacation. Gunn Brita Dahle’s parents stated that he had told his wife he was attending a conference.

His alibi had certainly had its weak points, and a stronger focus on Jens Dahle early in the investigation might have revealed his lies. In that sense, his plan to divert police attention by sending them on a hunt for an insane thrill killer had been successful. The police would never know whether focusing the investigation differently might have saved Vatten’s life.

The evidence that definitively linked Dahle to the murder in the United States appeared the day after he died. During a search of his home, the police found a copy of the
Johannes Book
that Dahle must have had made before he donated it to the Gunnerus Library. They also found an unopened letter in his mailbox. It was sent from the States the same day Dahle returned to Norway. The handwriting on the envelope clearly showed that he’d written it himself and mailed it to his own address. The envelope contained a small piece of human skin that had not completely dried. The police still needed to ascertain with a DNA test whether the skin came from the victim Efrahim Bond, but this was obviously Dahle’s way of keeping a souvenir of that murder. What Dahle had done with the rest of Bond’s skin remained an unsolved mystery.

Nor did the police ever find out why the murder in the Poe Museum seemed sloppier and more disorganized than the one in the book vault, since the only person who could have answered that question was dead. Dahle’s original plan was probably to make the two murders as incomprehensible as possible. By exaggerating the effects and inserting irrational elements, like putting the head in the garbage can, he wanted to divert attention from the fact that the murders were personal.

But when he killed Gunn Brita, he shifted his MO. The murder was more organized in its execution and done in a confined space. Perhaps it was only the unexpected advantage of being able to hide the body in the vault that made him do it that way. As Felicia Stone said one evening at the hospital: Most killers are opportunists. Even the most organized serial killer can change his method if he has something to gain.

Another theory was that while Jens Dahle had actually enjoyed killing Bond, he wanted to get the murder of his spouse over with as swiftly and efficiently as possible. Some people thought that this could be a sign that somewhere deep inside, Dahle the sociopath had some measure of human feeling. Singsaker did not share this opinion.

The police would probably never find out what had made Jens Dahle into a monster. Despite rumors in his hometown that the fire at the Krangsås farm perhaps was not as accidental as originally believed, there was no concrete proof that he’d had an unhappy childhood or was abused in any way. None of the statements from people who had known him as a child indicated that he’d had any of the problems or behavioral issues that often mark a serial killer. He didn’t wet the bed, he didn’t torture animals, and he was never caught starting fires or committing vandalism. Once he was apparently caught shoplifting a comic book at the local co-op. That was the only criminal situation in which he’d ever been involved, and it was never reported, since the owner of the shop thought he was a nice boy. Jens Dahle never teased girls, and no one had suspected him of spying or peeping through windows in the town. He never threatened anyone, and nobody had ever seen him in a fight. The only thing the police gleaned from the interviews with people from
Ø
rland where he grew up was that he was a quiet boy who kept mostly to himself, and often seemed lost in his own thoughts. In his youth it was well-known that Jens Dahle would rather lie around in his room reading books and comics than go to a party or spend time with girls. People his own age had seen him as a harmless, intelligent, but rather strange boy.

*   *   *

Singsaker wondered how long it would take until he could ride his bike past Dahle’s house without imagining his naked torso and the mask of human skin that had been torn off, revealing two eyes that stared into a world so different from his own—a world that had been shaped inside Dahle without anyone ever knowing.

The sight of Jon Vatten’s house a bit farther up the street didn’t really put Singsaker in a better mood. When he turned into the back courtyard of his own building to enter his own staircase and apartment, his plan was to forget about the herring and go to bed with an open bottle of aquavit on the nightstand and some sentimental movie on the TV.

But it didn’t work out that way.

*   *   *

Felicia panicked when she heard the key in the door. Again she got that nauseating feeling she’d done something stupid. Was it a good idea to do it this way? Could she have ruined everything before it even began? It was too late for such thoughts now. All she could do was follow her plan. She hurried into the bedroom and lay down on the bed. She had to laugh at herself as she unbuttoned the top two buttons of her blouse. This is so dumb, she thought. What if it doesn’t work? No, it has to work. I’ve been waiting fourteen years for this.

When she saw him come into the bedroom with a bottle of aquavit in each hand and his shirt already unbuttoned, she knew that it would be all right. She hadn’t done anything stupid; it was the only right thing to do. There was still a loose thread left in the case, and here he was, standing in front of her and saying exactly what she had hoped.

She got up from the bed, went over to him, and put a finger to his lips. Took the bottles out of his hands and set them down. Then she undressed him. He lay down on his back and watched as she took off her clothes. At last there was nothing to see but her black hair and white skin. She crept next to him and kissed him on the lips. From there she moved down to his shoulders and chest. She lingered a long time in the navel region before she finally reached the spot she was aiming for. He was ready to burst, and burst way too soon.

“It was, it was…” he stammered afterward, but didn’t manage to finish.

“You have no idea what it was,” she said. “But someday I might tell you.”

He looked at her as she sat on the bed beside him.

“One day I hope you will,” he said.

“And I hope you’ve saved a little ammunition,” she said. “That was actually something I
had
to do. What comes next is something I
want
.”

“You need to remember that I’m getting older,” he said with a smile. “But if we take our time, anything is possible.”

*   *   *

An hour later they were sitting in bed watching a rerun of
Grey’s Anatomy.
They were still naked. She rested her head on his shoulder, and her long black hair covered his chest like a cape. She sighed with satisfaction. Sometime in the future she would describe the hour that had just passed as weightless, and explain that afterward gravity had taken on a new form. What he remembered best was that it was the first time it felt like the wound in his head was completely healed.