She stared at me with new hope in her eyes. ‘No?’

‘No.’

But as I left I knew that this hope would die too, and she would sink into a darkness that was deeper and more impenetrable than she could have ever imagined in her wildest dreams.

On the way out I met her cat again. It was halfway down the stairs squinting at me with its green eyes, like a landlord on his way to evict an unruly tenant.

Outside, the snow crystals on the ground glistened. There they lay, like falling stars that had been plucked down, stars that had completed their orbits.

On the other side of the fjord lay Bergen, unendingly alluring in its frozen beauty, like an unapproachable princess atop a glass mountain. Unless it was an angel.

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49

The front door wasn’t locked. I went inside without kicking the snow from my shoes. It lay like footprints on the floor behind me.

I had heard the loud voice from outside. Now I stood by the vestry door listening, as though I had turned to ice, or salt, or whatever you turned to in circles such as these.

I hardly recognised Berge Brevik. His voice was louder and shriller than I had ever heard before and it was only his Møre ‘r’s that gave him away.

‘Oh, Lorrd!’ it shrieked through the grey door with an oval, porcelain sign saying VESTRY. ‘Descend from on high and give this Your sinful daughter the succour and support she has requested from You. See her lying here, full of remorse, begging for forgiveness. Drive the evil spirits out of her, You who have all the power, on earth as in heaven, You who drive the rebellious angels back to the fire where they belong, You who command the evil spirits to go whence they came. You have helped me before. Let Your power flow through my hands and down into this unhappy person. Let evil thoughts and cruel acts be driven out of her and take her – when her time is ripe – into Your arms and let her rest in Your embrace – in the light of Your forgiveness, in the sound of Your choir, in…’

Then I heard another voice, hers, whimpering and incomprehensible, like a confused babble, unclear tongues, motherless whelps.385

I placed my hand on the handle and pushed at the door.

This one was unlocked too.

It opened and I stepped into the room.

The office was in twilight, illuminated only by the flickering glow of three candelabra holding three candles each, placed on the standard desk behind them.

Sissel was kneeling on the floor with her hands folded in front of her. Berge Brevik was on his knees opposite her clasping her head between his hands as he stared upwards to the ceiling. The veins on his hands stood out clearly and the sinews in his neck had swollen. Blood was pounding rhythmically in his temples and his skin was ruddy with an inner glow.