EQMM 2010-01 by Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine

Author:Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine [Magazine, Ellery Queen’s Mystery]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

The Fifth Guest

by Richard Macker

The following tale by Norway’s Reidar Thomassen, writing as Richard Macker, was originally published in Norwegian in the crime-fiction anthology I sakens anledning (Aschehoug 1997). “The story takes place,” Mr. Macker’s son told EQMM, “at a cabin much like the one my father owned in the north of Norway. Norway is a country of cabin owners; there are cabins by the sea, by lakes, and in the mountains.”

Translated from the Norwegian by Runar Fergus

The cabin had a turf roof and walls of grey stone and dark timber. It was positioned on a wooded plateau next to the inlet to a small oval lake that was caressed by the gentle June breeze. Two rowboats were drawn up on the stony beach. The birch wood was close by, leaves not yet sprung. Higher up was the mountain plateau, the glacier, and the snow-capped peaks.

Robert Odden sat against the cabin’s southern wall. He was a dark-haired, stocky man, aged forty-five. He meticulously fastened a wet fly to a thin nylon line. He put down the rod, lit his pipe, and leaned back in his chair.

His wife Linda appeared carrying a tray, which she placed on a solid wooden table in the shadow of the birch tree in the yard. She was a few years younger than her husband, with a well-maintained figure and an attractive face colored by the sun and discreet makeup.

“Do you need a hand?” he inquired.

“No, I’ll let you know when I do. Do you know what? In the kitchen I put four cups and plates on the tray without even thinking. Then I realized. But I’ll never get used to Father being gone. I often feel that he’ll reappear. That everything will be the same as this time last year.”

“Yes,” he said quietly. “It’s a natural reaction. Birger will be a part of us for as long as we live. There’s Marta, by the way.”

A tall woman in green-speckled sportswear approached them from a copse. She was sixty-seven, but bore her age well. A melancholy shadow lay over the thin brown face.

“Did you go far?” her daughter asked.

“To the beacon on Stolshogda.”

“Oh. The same walk you and Father took so many times. I should have known you went there today.”

“I know. I had to. And do you know what? It was as though Birger followed me the whole way. I didn’t see him, and I didn’t hear him. Yet he was there, like a detached part of myself. Isn’t that strange?”

The daughter hugged her mother, eyes blank.

“Well, you must be tired now. Would you like to sit down? The table is set, as you can see.”

“I need to freshen up first. It’s only eleven-thirty. At twelve o’clock exactly we drink a toast to Birger, as we agreed. The guests arrive at one o’clock. If anyone turns up, that is. We can’t expect it, now that Birger is no more. But we must be prepared.”

“I’m pretty sure Arne Midtli will turn up,” said Robert Odden. “He mentioned he had made something Birger was supposed to have had.

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