‘… is a kind of worried scepticism about confined spaces,’ he went on as he headed for the drinks cabinet. ‘But it’s not really just an aversion. Most of us are capable of feeling that, with heights and tunnels and enclosed cupboards. For Klaus, we’re talking about sheer panic. Really deep, destructive anxiety. I never saw it at its worst, because he always went around … in a state of readiness? Isn’t that what the psychologists call it? Always plan a few moves ahead, to avoid placing yourself in a position where you could be locked in.’

‘He’s been to Mount Everest. How did he manage that without being able to sleep in a tent?’

A brief little guffaw, an appreciative glance over his shoulder as he poured the whisky.

‘Smart thinking! He managed without one. He got Bergans to make a special tent for him, with two transparent walls. Which was a bit of a challenge, as far as I understood. To obtain the same extreme qualities as the professional tents, in transparent material. But it worked. And he managed it.’

‘Do you mean that quite literally? That he would have preferred to die?’

‘Yes. Or to be honest, it would have killed him. After a while, at least. But where the hell are you going with all this?’

Selma did not answer. She was still perched on the edge of the settee, her back ramrod straight. She felt the heat from her hand penetrate through her trousers. Wrote out a mental index card and filed it away in the right place.

‘Selma?’

‘Now it’s important that you’re exact, Jan. Do you seriously mean that Morten Karlshaug could have died from being locked inside somewhere?’

‘Yes, I really do think so. I mean, I’ve never seen him completely shut in anywhere, but we hung about together for years. He was always the one who had to know where all the doors were situated. Windows. Escape routes. On cabin trips and building sites, school basements and all the other places that young hooligans might think of going into in the seventies.’

Again Selma was a million miles away.

This time Jan let her be. She suddenly realized that he was studying her.

‘You’ve formed a theory,’ he said slowly. ‘What’s it based on, and what on earth does it have to do with a photograph in my office?’

‘Arnulf Selhus,’ she said in a loud voice. ‘What’s his greatest nightmare?’

Jan’s face closed down again.

‘No idea,’ he muttered. ‘But he’s acquired a gaggle of children through three marriages. Five or six, I think. Losing them is probably his worst fear, just as much as for you and me.’

‘But apart from death?’

‘Don’t know, as I said. I no longer know him.’

‘You did at one time. Both when you were young, and ten years ago when you got a job for him as Finance Director at the NCCSF. Did the break with Arnulf come before or after you put in a good word for him?’