I immediately thanked her for coming and said that it was indeed the right thing to do. I asked her to recall as well as she could what she had heard, and to tell me in as much detail as possible anything she thought might be of interest.
Aase Johansen took this task very seriously. She started by pointing out that she could of course not be one hundred per cent certain, but that she was at least ninety per cent sure that it was Marie Morgenstierne who had been walking in front of her yesterday evening. She knew the road very well, and she was just past the lamppost that was a couple of hundred yards from the station. So the timing fitted, as she had arrived at her friend’s flat, which was only a hundred yards or so from there, at around a quarter past ten. Aase Johansen had reacted immediately when a woman who was walking at a steady, relaxed pace about ten yards in front suddenly broke into a run. And they were the fastest steps the blind woman could ever recall having heard on the streets of Oslo. In addition, she had heard someone on the road call out ‘Marie!’ But the woman who must have been Marie Morgenstierne did not slow down – if anything, she ran faster.
All in all, it had been strange enough for her to feel it was the right thing to come here, my blind witness said in a slightly anxious voice. I nodded reassuringly, then realized that that was not of much help, so put my hand gently on her arm. Then I asked if she had heard any other people on the road.
Aase Johansen nodded eagerly. She had not heard anyone ahead of Marie Morgenstierne on the road, but she had heard two different sets of footsteps between herself and Marie. The first belonged to a man with a walking stick. Our blind witness had automatically assumed that it was an older man, but added that his breathing did not appear to be laboured and he walked at a steady pace. It had sounded as though this man with a stick had carried on walking at the same steady pace even after Marie Morgenstierne had started to run. Behind him, and just in front of the blind woman, were the steps of another younger person, in all likelihood a woman. These steps had at first picked up speed and then stopped completely in the wake of Marie Morgenstierne’s sudden flight.
The blind witness said that she could not be certain what happened in this confusion, as the footsteps then became indistinct, but also because she was at this point almost pushed over by a person with a suitcase who tried to get past her from behind. She was fairly certain that the person with the suitcase was a man, given the short and violent outburst when he bumped into her. However, she would not dare to guess his age. It sounded as though the man with the suitcase also picked up speed along with Marie Morgenstierne, but then stopped. At this point, the soundscape was so confused that the witness was not at all sure about the situation. The person who shouted ‘Marie!’ did sound like a woman, but it was so quick, and there was so much other noise.
