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shower. The hot water made his skin tingle. Afterward he walked naked through the room to the window and opened it. Second floor. Backyard. Through an open window came the groans of simulated enthusiasm. He grasped the curtain pole and leaned out. Looked straight down onto an open garbage can and recognized the sweet smell of trash rising forth. He spat and heard it hit the paper in the can. But the rustling that followed was not of paper. There was a crack, and the stiff green curtains landed on the floor on either side of him. Shit! He pulled the thin pole out of the curtain hem. It was the old kind, with two bulbous pointed ends; it had broken before and someone had tried to stick it together with brown tape. Harry sat down on the bed and opened the drawer in the bedside table. A Bible with a light-blue synthetic leather cover and a sewing kit comprising black thread wound around a card with a needle stuck through. On mature reflection, Harry realized they might not be such a bad idea, after all. Afterward guests could sew back torn fly buttons and read about forgiveness of sins. He lay down on the bed and stared at the ceiling. Everything was new. Everything … He closed his eyes. On the flight he hadn’t slept a wink, and with or without jet lag, with or without curtains, he was going to have to sleep. And he began to dream the same dream he had had every night for the last three years: He was running down a corridor, fleeing a roaring avalanche that sucked out all the air, leaving him unable to breathe.
    It was just a question of keeping going and keeping his eyes closed for a little longer.
    He lost a grip on his thoughts; they were drifting away from him.
    Next of kin.
    Kin. Kith.
    Next of kin.
    That’s what he was. That’s why he was back.
    S ERGEY WAS DRIVING on the E6 toward Oslo. Longing for the bed in his Furuset flat. Keeping under seventy-five, even though the highway was virtually empty so late at night. His cell phone rang. The conversation with Andrey was concise. He had spoken to his uncle, or the
ataman
—the leader—as Andrey called Uncle. After they had hung up Sergey could not restrain himself any longer. He put his foot down.Shrieked with delight. The man had arrived. Now, this evening. He was here! Sergey was not to do anything for the moment; the situation might resolve itself, Andrey had said. But he had to be even more prepared now, mentally and physically. Had to practice with the knife, sleep, be on his toes. If
the necessary
should become necessary.

Tord Schultz barely heard the plane thundering overhead as he sat on the sofa breathing heavily. Perspiration lay in a thin layer on his naked upper body, and the echoes of iron on iron still hung between the bare sitting-room walls. Behind him were his weights and the mock-leather upholstered bench glistening with his sweat. From the TV screen Don Draper peered through his own cigarette smoke, sipping whiskey from a glass. Another plane roared over the rooftops.
Mad Men
. The sixties. U.S.A. Women wearing decent clothes. Decent drinks in decent glasses. Decent cigarettes without menthol and filters. The days when what didn’t kill you made you stronger. He had bought only the first season. Watched it again and again. He wasn’t sure he would like the next season.
    Tord Schultz looked at the white line on the glass coffee table and dried the edge of his ID card. He had used his card to chop it up, as usual. The card that he attached to the pocket of his captain’s uniform, the card that gave him access to the cockpit, the sky, the salary. The card that made him what he was. The card that—with everything else—would be taken from him if he was found out. That was why it felt right to use the ID card. There was, in all the dishonesty, something honest about it.
    They were going back to Bangkok early tomorrow morning. Two rest days at the Sukhumvit Residence. Good. It would be good now. Better than before. He hadn’t liked the arrangement