She would contact him tomorrow. As early as possible, she decided, as she speeded up across the Ekeberg hillside. In the middle of the bend leading to Gamlebyen, a thought struck her so suddenly that she forgot to check in her mirror before changing lane. A collision with a German camper van was avoided only by the skin of her teeth, and she saw the driver give her the finger.

The tracks in the two gardens had been left deliberately, Selma realized.

There had been no attempt to hide them.

On the contrary.

Every single day in the past ten-to-twelve days had featured the same, bleak weather alternating between rain and frost, between wet snow and sheet ice. The media reported that the orthopaedic department at Ullevål hospital was catastrophically overcrowded, and the newspapers were filled with daily moans about the council’s failure to spread grit on streets and pavements.

The man in the ski boots had left clear footprints. He had chosen to wear distinctive boots: an ordinary bootprint would not have identified him so emphatically in both places. In Vettakollen and Ormsundveien, he had chosen to turn up while the slush was still thick enough to leave a trail, but late enough so that they would freeze fairly rapidly to leave identifiable prints. They were placed in the middle of the driveway in both places as well as distinctly across the lawn.

There had been no intention to stake out the place or steal anything, Selma realized, tenaciously struggling to focus on her driving.

The man in the ski boots wanted to cause fear and alarm.

He was determined to frighten someone, and that someone could not be anyone other than Selma.

To be honest, he had succeeded.

THE BONFIRE

‘To think it’s possible. To think it’s at all possible, Hege. Bloody hell.’

Jan Morell sat on his dark leather settee, squeezing a tennis ball in each hand. He was speaking more quietly than his words might suggest.

‘To tell the truth, this is the most idiotic thing you’ve done in the whole of your twenty-four-year-old life. Why … why didn’t you come …’

His jaw muscles were bulging under his day-old beard, his knuckles white around the dirty yellow balls. The sweat rings in the armpits of his tennis shirt, pale pink with a white stripe across the chest, had dried into dull stains rimmed with salt.

‘Why didn’t you come to me?’ he asked. ‘Haven’t I said that you must always, always, come to me when you’re faced with a problem?’