He coughed quietly behind a closed hand.

‘The five trainers have been everywhere with the national team since Italy. No irregular trips, meetings, flings or anything.’

He raised his eyebrows and paused for a moment.

Jan nodded briefly and made an impatient gesture with his hand.

‘Bottolf Odda was in Italy at the gathering prior to the start of the season,’ Karsten Kvelde continued. ‘He also went to the opening of the cross-country World Cup in Ruka in the last weekend of November, but was in Norway during the competitions in Davos last weekend. It was planned that he should go, and he had a couple of important meetings arranged there, but because of your daughter’s drugs case, he stayed at home.’

‘Anything else out of the ordinary?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Go on.’

‘Astrid Beita, the cook, hasn’t been on any trips since Italy. Normally she just travels during the most important championships. The Olympics and the World Championships. Allowing her to travel to northern Italy was really a sort of … reward. She lives with her husband and two teenage children in Tåsen. Works part-time in a catering company. Her husband’s a plumber, nothing irregular about their finances.’

Again he cleared his throat. Jan Morell had opened the documents case once more. He sorted out the sheets of paper that dealt with the ones Karsten Kvelde had already run through.

‘Knut Vetle Nilssen,’ he read from the next sheet. ‘Born 23 August 1970.’

‘Yes. Unmarried, lives in Maridalen. He’s been on partial sick leave since …’

‘Wait. Is his middle name Vetle?’

‘Yes. That’s usually a Norwegian form of “junior”, isn’t it? Maybe not so common to use it as an adult?’

Jan raised his right hand without taking his eyes off the sheet of paper.

Karsten Kvelde remained dutifully silent as Jan read it.

‘Currently on sick leave,’ he mumbled.

‘Yes. He went with them to Beitostølen, but has been in Oslo since then. He’s worked part-time, roughly fifty per cent, up at the Federation. His sick leave is coded L02, which means “Back symptoms/problems”. Paradoxical for a physiotherapist, perhaps. And a yoga practitioner.’

He allowed himself a little smile, but it disappeared in a flash.

‘Sometimes he has half days,’ he continued. ‘Occasionally he works every second day. He’s treated all the senior skiers, of both sexes, all autumn. Apart from Haakon Holm-Vegge. Haakon preferred someone else.’

‘Apart from Haakon,’ Jan repeated in a murmur. ‘I already knew that.’

Karsten Kvelde waited. Jan went on sitting with the same sheet of paper in his hand. For a long time, before suddenly relegating it to the bottom of the pile, asking: ‘Stian Bach?’

The security consultant smiled.

‘He keeps going the way he started. No sign that he’s been relieved of any duties or reprimanded in any other way for the incident down there. Apart from that the newly appointed doctor, Vibeke Stenshaug, makes his job somewhat easier. There hasn’t been more to do, to put it that way. I can’t find anything unusual about Bach’s finances. He earns one point eight million kroner a year at the Federation.’