The Human Flies (K2 and Patricia series) by Hans Olav Lahlum Page A

likely to live to see the morning. Ten days after the accident, the newspapers carried a small notice that her condition was no longer critical, but the damage would probably be permanent. That was the last thing that anyone wrote about Patricia Louise I. E. Borchmann.
    I later heard from my mother that Patricia was paralysed from the waist down and had been taken out of school. Her father in his despair sought advice from a number of leading doctors, and in pure desperation also took her to see an old healer in Lillehammer and a younger healer in Snåsa. There was no chance of a recovery, so Patricia would have to live with the prospect of deterioration looming over her for the rest of her life. After that I had heard nothing more of either her or her father. Until he called early on the morning of 6 April 1968 to offer some unexpected help in solving the murder.
    The facade of 104–8 Erling Skjalgsson’s Street, where Ragnar Borchmann had both his home and business empire, was just as impressive as I recalled from my visits as a boy. The enormous building went by the name of ‘the White House’ among friends and acquaintances, because of its colour. The three separate houses had been joined by Ragnar Borchmann’s paternal grandfather, who now stood on a plinth in the cavernous hallway outside his grandson’s office. It struck me that entering the Borchmann household was like going back in time to the 1930s.
    Professor Borchmann’s secretary showed me the quickest way to the director’s office. The staircase, with its twenty-three steps, was almost as long as I remembered from childhood. And when I reached the top, Ragnar Borchmann was by and large almost the same as well. There was a sombreness to him that I did not recognize from before, but his back was as straight, his hair and beard as black, his handshake as firm and his voice as powerful as I remembered.
    ‘Welcome, and once again congratulations on your recent promotion. I am absolutely certain that you will rise to this challenge. Now, shall I call you Kolbjørn or Detective Inspector Kristiansen?’
    I assured him that I would take it as a compliment if he chose to call me Kolbjørn, but to be on the safe side, I would continue to call him ‘Professor Borchmann’. He smiled, but did not object.
    ‘First of all, I must apologize if I have lured you here under false pretences, but it was with the best of intentions. Sadly, I have nothing to contribute myself. I of course met Harald Olesen on and off over the past few decades, but saw less of him more recently. If you have not done so already, you should talk to Supreme Court Justice Jesper Christopher Haraldsen regarding the war years and Party Secretary Haavard Linde about politics and the party. But other than that, I am afraid I am of very little use to the case.’
    I had not yet got as far as talking to either of the grand gentlemen mentioned, but he was absolutely right that I should contact them. So it was still a mystery as to why I was sitting here. Borchmann saw the confusion on my face and carried on hastily.
    ‘I am aware that this is both unorthodox and somewhat irregular, but it is Patricia and not me you should be talking to.’
    My confusion was in no way diminished by his next comment – in the form of a totally unexpected question.
    ‘Have you ever met a person whose thoughts are constantly one step ahead, faster and more profound than your own? It is a fascinating and yet frightening experience to look in the eye of someone who, quite frankly, is more intelligent than you will ever be. You feel you are in good hands and helpless at the same time.’
    I nodded vaguely. I did not like to say in so many words, but I knew that feeling only too well. For example, I felt it every time I spoke to Professor Director Borchmann.
    ‘Of course you have. I have perhaps felt it less often than others, but I too have experienced it. Unless the discussion involves my specialist areas, I experience