I said gently: ‘She…’

She nodded: ‘…died.’

‘And your father?’

‘He took it hard, needless to say.’

‘Started drinking?’

‘Imagine that … No, no he didn’t. He was convinced that everything was God’s will and never raised a fist to the heavens in protest. But … he was never the same again. I can’t remember seeing him smile from that day on. But I promised myself then … well.’

There was a silence between us. I understood her better now. She came from a dark landscape and you can have serious problems when you finally come into the light. She came from a region where sexuality was the game whose rules you never learned and therefore it was all the more likely that she would fall foul of them in later life. She didn’t know her own strength or the weakness of others. Such conflicts had often ended in death before too, but if this were the case here, what had happened to Johnny was an isolated incident and had nothing to do with Harry Kløve or Arild Hjellstad. But what about the pictures of angels?

‘So you’re quite bitter about your father?’

‘Bitter?’ She let the word hang in the air as though she wanted to choose a different one.

‘A bitterness that in a way has developed to include all men?’

‘You might say that,’ she smiled brutally. ‘I like to see you all dangling there, squirming on the hook. And then I let you go, but you’re mortally wounded.’

‘But some come back for more perhaps?’264

She shrugged. ‘Maybe.’

‘Johnny Solheim.’

She snorted. ‘I hardly knew him. I’d only met him a few times. But I meet so many men. He’d started imagining things.’

‘Yes, so you said. And I can see why. I myself might’ve started imagining things. But on Saturday night you saw nothing of him after your little guest appearance on the dance floor…’

Now she appeared embarrassed. ‘I still had the show in my head. I didn’t mean to … But who I am after a performance and for as long as I’m in the public eye is a persona. Normally I’m…’

‘Quite different. I’m beginning to understand. It sounds like a stressful life. Like trying to maintain a conversation while someone in the room keeps turning the light on and off. I can imagine that from time to time it gets you into difficult situations, ones you can’t quite control.’

She shrugged. ‘Not so many, when it comes down to it. Most people understand a knee in the right place. Feel free to try.’

‘No, thank you. I think I’ll pass. But this other woman you also are. Would she be strong enough to commit murder?’

‘You don’t mean…?’

‘She wouldn’t send pictures of angels to people she doesn’t like, would she?’

‘Angels? What on earth are you prattling on about?’

Her surprise seemed genuine, but which of the two personalities I was actually talking to, I wasn’t sure. The other one might not have been so surprised.