Synnøve Jensen waved her left hand towards the back of the room again, with even less force. Her eyes looked into mine with a deep desire to tell me something, but she was unable to express what. Her free hand crept slowly up and stopped on her belly. Then her eyes closed.
For some reason, as soon as her eyes closed, I started to count the pulse in her wrist. I felt four slow beats. Then Synnøve Jensen’s pulse stopped.
I sat for a few seconds with her hand in mine before slowly releasing my hand from her dead body, which sank down onto the sofa with no resistance. I was gripped by a violent rage, in part with myself, but mostly with the faceless person I was pursuing. Synnøve Jensen was dead, and her unborn child was now dying in her womb. I had come a few minutes too late to prevent the murder and perhaps only seconds too late to hear Synnøve Jensen say who it was who had shot her. I had no idea what to do now. I had seen no sign of another living soul out there in the dark. It was most likely that the murderer was over the hills and far away by now.
I went over to her telephone and called for an ambulance. Then I rang Romerike police station to let them know that there had been a murder, and that I was already at the scene of the crime.
Then I dialled Patricia’s number.
I was worried that she might already have gone to bed. It was a great relief when I heard her voice after only five rings. I explained very quickly where I was calling from and what I had seen.
There was silence on the other end for a few seconds. Complete silence. It felt as though neither of us dared to breathe.
After a few breathless seconds, Patricia let out a deep sigh before starting to speak.
‘You said that you had just come in through the door, which was unlocked, and found Synnøve Jensen who had been shot and was dying, but still visibly alive with her eyes open. A pistol lay on the floor beside her. She could not speak but waved her hand twice towards the back of the room before she died?’
‘Yes,’ I confirmed.
‘But…’ she started.
There was silence again for a moment, before she mustered the courage and continued.
‘But then the shot cannot have been fired more than minutes before and it is unlikely that the murderer would dare to leave while she was visibly still alive. So then the most feasible explanation is without a doubt that the murderer was standing there waiting for her to die and when you knocked on the door, dropped the gun onto the floor and ran upstairs to hide in one of the rooms. In which case, he or she will still be there.’
