Black Seconds

Ida Joner gets on her brand-new bike and sets off toward town. A
good-natured, happy girl, she is looking forward to her tenth birthday.
Thirty-five minutes after Ida should have come home, her mother starts
to worry. She phones store owners, Ida’s friends—anyone who could have
seen her. But no one has.

Suspicion immediately falls on Emil
Mork, a local character who lives alone and hasn’t spoken since
childhood. His mother insists on cleaning his house weekly—although
she’s sometimes afraid of what she might find there. A mother’s worst
nightmare in either case—to lose a child or to think a child capable of
murder. As Ida’s relatives reach the breaking point and the media frenzy
surrounding the case begins, Inspector Konrad Sejer is his usual calm
and reassuring self. But he’s puzzled. And disturbed. This is the