The situation was no less bewildering when Leonard Schelderup then broke the silence, throwing up his hands and saying: ‘I don’t understand why he chose me to taste his food. It wasn’t me who started the tape. I didn’t taste the nuts. I have no idea who killed him!’
Leonard Schelderup’s outburst seemed to ease the tension ever so slightly. No one said anything else, but there were sounds of shuffling and sighs around the table.
And fortuitously, I caught the first smile in the room. It was fleeting and a touch overbearing, just as Leonard Schelderup fell silent. A few seconds later the smile was gone, and I never found out whether she saw that I had noticed. But I did. My gaze had swung almost instinctively a couple of places to the left to catch the reaction of the youngest person in the room.
At first glance, I thought it was my advisor, Patricia, who had somehow or other managed to sneak both herself and her wheelchair into Magdalon Schelderup’s home and had joined them at the dining table. Then I started to wonder if it was in fact all an absurd nightmare. Only, I didn’t wake up. The ten guests who remained seated at the table were very much alive. Magdalon Schelderup stayed where he was, lying stone dead on the sofa by the door. The young woman who sat to the right of his empty throne at the head of the table was of course not Patricia, though the girl who was sitting there also had dark hair and the same deliberate movements and held herself in the same self-assured manner.
Only, as far as I could see, this young woman was fully able, and about half a head taller than Patricia, as I remembered her from the previous spring; and also somewhat younger. I had never seen this woman before entering Magdalon Schelderup’s house. But somewhere, I had heard that his youngest child was an extraordinarily beautiful daughter, who left those she met awestruck.
Her gaze was no less bold when her eyes met mine. Another fleeting smile slipped over her lips.
It was in those few seconds that I stood there looking into the eyes of the eighteen-year-old Maria Irene Schelderup that I realized there was only one thing to be done. And that was first of all to gather as much information as possible about the death and the deceased from her and the other guests. Then I would have to hurry home and phone the number without a name at the back of my telephone book. The number to a telephone that sat on the desk of Patricia Louise I. E. Borchmann, the professor’s daughter, at 104-8 Erling Skjalgsson’s Street. I had, with a hint of irony, written it down next to the emergency numbers for the fire brigade and the ambulance service.
