‘So you think there’ll be another death?’

‘I do. I think the angels are an important clue. In fact, it was a death that started the whole business for me. Jan Petter Olsen, a former classmate, a friend of Jakob’s and mine, and who was 249also the victim of a so-called accident. Take good note. He was a builder and fell from some scaffolding. That happens of course. Even to experienced builders. But someone could’ve given him a helping hand, couldn’t they.’

‘But what’s his connection with the band? And did he receive a letter?’

‘I don’t know about the second point. You’ll have to ask his widow when you reopen his case. I daren’t. But the connection’s pretty clear. On a very special date – the sixteenth of October, 1975 – he happened to meet with The Harpers at a party. At Johnny’s place. Something happened that evening; something so serious that it blew the eighteen-year-old band to smithereens, and destroyed one marriage and one couple – maybe even more, for all I know; so serious that several of those involved didn’t speak to one another for many years afterwards. In short…’ I gestured to indicate that he could draw his own conclusions.

He looked at me with a fox-like expression. Eva Jensen was sitting straight-backed, as if on needles, her cheeks flushed. ‘In short, what, Veum?’ Vadheim asked cautiously.

I slumped back in my chair. Then I leaned forward, my neck and shoulders aching. I leaned back again, placed my arms on the chair rests and tried to relax my muscles. ‘It’s perhaps not so hard to imagine, Vadheim. Five drunken men. Anita Solheim wasn’t at home – I have no idea why. But her daughters were. Sissel was only four, but Ruth … was thirteen.’

A repressed sigh, like a sob, burst from Eva Jensen’s mouth. No, she mouthed, without a sound emerging.

Vegard Vadheim had turned pale. ‘You mean…’

I nodded.

‘But you don’t know anything, Veum, do you.’

‘They’ve clammed up like oysters, all of them. The ones still 250alive, I mean, and who had to know something. Perhaps if I spoke to Ruth…?’

‘She’s a drug addict you say and lives in Lindås?’

I nodded.

‘She definitely won’t tell us anything. Drug addicts have learned to keep their mouths shut if any questions come from us.’

‘So perhaps I could do you a favour?’

He leaned forward. ‘The advantage with you, Veum, in this particular case, is that you know them all of old. And you have an unofficial angle. I’m prepared to turn a blind eye to the rather unconventional side of this case on this occasion. Is that alright?’

I smiled, eyed the adjacent office and said in quite a loud voice: ‘Muus! Can you hear?’

Irritated, Vadheim continued: ‘That doesn’t mean I’m going to sit on the fence. Now let’s bring them all in. Your good friend, Jakob Aasen, Anita Solheim, Halldis Heggøy … Have you made a note, Eva? Get someone to bring them in for questioning, the whole lot of them.’