Karen studies the parishioners who, after meeting their obligation, are now rushing toward the car park. There’s not going to be a reception. True, such gatherings have become more common in recent years as a result of foreign influence, but in Doggerian tradition, wakes are held before funerals, which mark the end of the leave-taking. Unsurprisingly, Gertrud Stuub is a traditionalist.

Karen buttons her coat and is wrapping her scarf around her neck when Thorstein and Solveig Byle step out onto the church steps in the company of a tall woman of about thirty-five and two little girls. Karen recognises the children from her visit to the Byles’ house. Only then, their faces had been covered in chocolate and their eyes glued to the TV. Now, they’re neatly dressed in identical blue wool coats and obediently pull on the hats their mother holds out to them. Then Thorstein spots Karen and starts walking toward her with his family in tow. Karen thanks Solveig again for the lunch and shakes hands with their daughter Trine, who is almost as tall as her father and looks remarkably like him. They exchange a few words about how the cold has finally caught up with them, and about how Karen absolutely has to come over for dinner soon.

‘Did you attend the service or are you just here to spy on the funeral guests?’ Byle asks with a smile that fails to entirely hide an undercurrent of disapproval.

Karen is, and will remain, an outsider.

‘Both, actually,’ she replies. ‘I’m meeting Erling Arve here in a bit. Thought I’d hear what he has to say about the Stuubs.’

Byle suddenly looks uncertain, glances over at his wife, daughter and grandchildren, who are now standing a little way apart, wrestling with their scarves and mittens.

‘If you want, I could obviously . . .’

‘There’s no need for you to be there,’ she assures him. ‘I can probably manage a chat with the local priest on my own. But it would be great if we could meet up at the station tomorrow before I leave,’ she adds.

‘Of course. I take it you’re going home for New Year’s, then? Just as well, there’s not a lot to be done here until we have the results of the forensic investigation. Any news on that, by the way?’

‘No, I talked to Sören Larsen yesterday and he says we’re probably not going to hear anything until after the holiday, so I’ll be ringing in the new year at home.’