And with that, the head of the investigation cautiously concluded that ‘there is currently no evidence to justify further investigation’, and the hunt for the truth regarding Falko Reinhardt’s fate came to a halt. The final documents in the file were two short letters from 1969 – a handwritten one from Falko Reinhardt’s parents, and a typed one from Marie Morgenstierne – which both complained about the perceived lack of police engagement in the case.
The investigation into the disappearance of Falko Reinhardt had taken place while I was on holiday and had been led by Detective Inspector Vegard Danielsen. He was the youngest detective inspector after me, and was possibly even more ambitious – and he was one of those endlessly irritating people who embody guile, but are also extremely competent.
In short, I did not particularly wish to discuss the Reinhardt case with Detective Inspector Vegard Danielsen, and was even less keen to involve him in any way in my investigation into the murder of Marie Morgenstierne. The idea of solving both cases right under his nose, with secret help from Patricia, was far more appealing. So I put the file to one side, but kept the exemplary list of the telephone numbers and addresses of the witnesses in the Falko Reinhardt case to hand, as it was currently the best starting point for establishing the truth about the murder of Marie Morgenstierne.
According to the file, Falko Reinhardt’s parents were Arno Reinhardt, a photographer, and his wife Astrid, who lived at the end of Seilduk Street in Grünerløkka. ‘NOTE: NORWEGIAN COMMUNIST PARTY!’ had been scribbled in the margin of the filing card in Detective Inspector Danielsen’s annoyingly neat handwriting.
I put the card with the two elderly Communist Party members to one side in favour of a list of the names of the four remaining members of the Socialist Youth League who had been with Falko Reinhardt and Marie Morgenstierne at the cabin in the mountains two years ago. It read:
1. Trond Ibsen, psychology student, born 1944.
2. Anders Pettersen, art student, born 1945.
3. Miriam Filtvedt Bentsen, literature and language student, born 1947.
4. Kristine Larsen, politics student, born 1945.
There were addresses and telephone numbers for all of them except the young Miriam Filtvedt Bentsen, whose address was given as a room at Sogn Halls of Residence.
I noticed immediately that Detective Inspector Danielsen, as the entrenched reactionary conservative he was, in addition to all his other unlikeable qualities, had written the students’ details down in alphabetical order but had put the men before the women. I was sitting pondering which order to contact them in when the phone on my desk solved my problem.
