The subway began to run around half past five, and she had jumped on the first and best of these.

Hege could barely recollect the last time she had taken the subway.

Her mother had often taken her out in Oslo. Usually on Saturdays, from the moment Hege could walk independently. Mother and daughter packed a knapsack with sandwiches and a thermos and ambled hand in hand down to the station, setting off aimlessly. They had criss-crossed the city for hours on end, Hege with her nose pressed so close to the window that she could draw hearts in the condensation from her own hot breath. Only rarely did anyone see them out there, and smile back.

Her mother had stories from all over the place. Fairy tales, fables, stories and anecdotes from the war, when Hege’s great-grandfather had been a saboteur and awarded a medal by King Haakon when all the vileness was over. They travelled eastwards and southwards, Hege and her mum, then west and finally to the north, to Vettakollen and rice pudding and marking on the map where they had travelled that day.

Mum had called their journeys ‘odysseys’.

It wasn’t the same without her.

Hege Chin had been to Bergkrystallen and Vestli, to Tøyen and Lambertseter. To Brynseng and Hasle and Furuset. For nine hours she had followed the daily rhythms of the city. Almost on her own for the first half-hour, crowded carriages during rush hour, cold in the early morning, sleet dispersed by rain in the course of the late morning hours. She had seen grey blocks in Groruddalen and detached houses on the hillside. People rushing here and there, grumpy children in the morning being pushed into nurseries. Stressed teenagers making their way to and from school, while beggars were the only people who sat still. A sudden impulse made Hege hop on to a train to Drammen around noon, but she had got off in Asker and turned back. She had travelled home in the dark, having watched a grey, short pre-Christmas day come and go.

No one had spoken to her.

For long stretches of the day she had stared straight at a picture of herself. The Aftenposten newspaper carried an interview with a Swedish doping expert who found it unbelievable that Hege had somehow ingested Clostebol without her knowledge. He asserted that Norwegian cross-country skiing had a serious credibility problem, and demanded an uncompromising reaction. A photograph of Hege, taken during the press conference on Thursday, was used to illustrate the misery. Splashed on the front page. She looked sombre, but sat with her head held high.

With no tears, which for her was the most important thing.

She graced the front page of every other passenger’s newspaper, and was named in one conversation after another. Nevertheless, she had been left completely in peace. When anyone gave her a second glance over the top of a newspaper, she hid her chin in her scarf, tugged her hat even further down her forehead and looked out of the window.