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Stubo. He sent a Volvo, anonymous and dark blue, with a young man behind the wheel.
    “You’d think this was the Secret Service.” She smiled tightly as she shook Stubo’s hand. “Dark blue Volvos and silent drivers with sunglasses.”
    His laughter was as powerful as the throat it came from. His teeth were white, even, with a glimpse of gold from a molar on the right-hand side.
    “Don’t worry about Oscar. He has a lot to learn.”
    A faint smell of cigars hung in the air, but there were no ashtrays. The desk was unusually big, with orderly folders on one side and a computer that was turned off on the other. A map of Norway hung on the wall behind Stubo’s chair, along with an FBI poster and a picture of a brown horse. It had been taken in the summer in a field of wildflowers. The horse tossed its head as the shutter clicked, its mane standing like a halo around its head, eyes looking straight into the camera.
    “Beautiful horse,” she said, pointing at the photograph. “Yours?”
    “Sabra,” he said and smiled again; this man smiled all the time. “Beautiful animal. Thank you for agreeing to come. I saw you on TV.”
    Johanne wondered how many people had said that to her in the last few days. Typically, Isak was the only one who hadn’t said a word about the incredibly embarrassing episode. But then he never watched television. Johanne’s mother, on the other hand, had called five times in the first half-hour after the show; the answering machine hurled her screeching voice at Johanne as soon as she was inside the door. Johanne didn’t call her back. Which resulted in four more messages, each one more agitated than the last. At work the day after, they had patted her on the shoulder. Some had laughed, others had been extremely put out on her behalf. The woman at the checkout counter in her local supermarket had leaned over to her conspiratorially and whispered so that the whole shop could hear, “I saw you on TV!”
    Viewer figures for News 21 must have been pretty good.
    “You were great,” said Stubo.
    “Great? I barely said anything.”
    “What you said was important. The fact that you left said far more than any of the other . . . people of limited talent managed to utter. Did you read my mail?”
    She gave a brief nod.
    “But I think you’re barking up the wrong tree. I don’t see how I can help you. I’m not exactly . . .”
    “I’ve read your thesis,” he interrupted. “Very interesting. In my profession . . .”
    He looked straight at her and fell silent. His eyes had an apologetic look, as if he was embarrassed about what he actually did.
    “We’re not that good at keeping ourselves up to date. Not unless things are directly relevant to an investigation. Things like this . . .”
    He opened a drawer and pulled out a book. Johanne recognized the cover immediately, with her name in small letters against a bleached winter landscape.
    “I should imagine I’m the only one here who has read it. Shame. It’s very relevant.”
    “To what?”
    Again, a despondent, partly apologetic expression passed over his face.
    “The police profession. To anyone who wants to understand the essence of a crime.”
    “Essence of a crime ? Are you sure you don’t mean the criminal ?”
    “Well noted, professor. Well noted.”
    “I’m not a professor. I’m a university teacher.”
    “Does that matter?”
    “Yes.”
    “Why?”
    “Why . . .”
    “Yes. Does it really matter what I call you? If I call you a professor, it means nothing more than that I know you do research and teach at the university. Which is true, isn’t it? That’s exactly what you do, isn’t it?”
    “Yes, but it’s not right to call yourself . . .”
    “To make more of yourself than you are? To be a bit sloppy with formalities? Is that what you mean?”
    Johanne blinked and took off her glasses. She slowly polished the left lens with the corner of her shirt. She was buying time. The man on the other side of the desk had