Sigurd Altman

Sigurd Altman, known under the former name Ole Sigurd Hansen and as the Kavalier, turns the apparent serial-murder pattern into a more complicated story of revenge and complicity. He tries to direct the police toward Tony Leike, but his scheme uses victims’ names and staged correspondence as bait, helping to bring about the very deaths he claims he meant to prevent.

Identity and Introduction

The novel first presents an unidentified killer’s perspective through a December meditation on photographs displayed in a dark workroom. The pictures show people before their deaths, smiling as if their futures were secure; their newspaper stories and images of the crime scenes have been stripped away, leaving only the earlier portraits. The speaker believes the police have not yet connected the murders but will do so. The later account of Altman’s own workshop, where he collected victims’ photographs, makes this opening perspective part of the pattern through which the novel initially conceals and then discloses his role.

That opening voice also supplies a stark rationale for killing: it treats death as an unavoidable part of existence and murder as a form of mercy. The statement is not a neutral account of the cases but a revealing piece of self-justification. Set against the photographs of people once confident in their lives, it shows how Altman’s abstract reasoning can turn individual victims into elements in a theory—and, later, into pieces in a plan.

Altman is introduced in the investigation through the name attached to the Kavalier case and through the clues Harry Hole gathers about a concealed past. Harry connects the tongue, Altman’s lisp, and a name change to the judgment involving Leike. The connection identifies revenge as the personal history hidden beneath the case’s outwardly elaborate pattern. The evidence does not disclose every detail of the earlier humiliation, but Altman later confirms that Leike had humiliated him and that he wanted to return that humiliation.

The Scheme Behind the Murders

Altman’s initial plan begins after he has watched Leike and Adele Vetlesen together at Hävasshütte. Their encounter brings his buried grievance back with force. He says he wanted to shame Leike publicly, particularly before the wealthy Galtung family, whose money was expected to support Leike’s plans connected with Congo. He describes Adele’s death as unintended: his stated aim was to expose and humiliate Leike, not to arrange her death. That distinction complicates his account without absolving him of the consequences of what he set in motion.

After thinking for several days, Altman returns to Hävasshütte and tears a page from the guestbook. It contains the names and addresses of the people who were there that night. He then sends Leike a letter implying that he knows what Leike did with Adele and demands money, signing the message in the name of Borgny Stem-Myhre. Five days later, Altman reads that Borgny has been found murdered. He says the plan should have ended there: the police were supposed to follow the threat to Leike and arrest him.

The plan fails because the police have too little to pursue. Altman responds by using more names from the guestbook and sending further letters as though each came from a different person. After each murder, the next supposed sender claims knowledge of the earlier letters and raises the price of silence. Altman cuts photographs of the victims from newspapers and hangs them in his workroom at the Kadok Factory alongside copies of the letters he has written in their names. What looks like an accumulating trail of communications is therefore a deliberate performance: Altman manufactures the appearance of multiple witnesses while using the victims as successive prompts to draw the police toward Leike.

Detection and Exposure

The plan depends on Altman being able to pass as an uninvolved observer, but the investigation gradually turns its theatrical devices against him. Harry notices that Altman’s hospital work schedule seems to place him on duty when Borgny Stem-Myhre and Marit Olsen are killed. Yet the apparent alibi is weak: both murders occurred in Oslo, no one at Rikshospitalet can specifically remember seeing him at the relevant times, and his movement between departments could leave hours unaccounted for. The roster looks protective at first glance, but its gaps make it less conclusive than Altman needs.

Harry also uses photographs to obtain physical evidence. He asks Altman to handle images that are still damp, then establishes that the fingerprints left on them match prints found at Tony Leike’s house. The method exposes the calculated simplicity of the trap: Altman’s effort to make the pictures part of his constructed narrative causes him to touch evidence that can link him to Leike’s home. Faced with the match, Altman understands that Harry has not merely shown him photographs for identification. His composed position breaks, and he covers his face before laughing.

The newspaper coverage further shows how far Altman’s chosen identity has distorted the public case. With no photograph of Sigurd Altman as the Kavalier, the paper prints an image of Skai, a police officer from Ytre Enebakk, under a headline asking whether the Kavalier has been arrested. A separate headline reports another body in Ustaoset. The false identification and the continuing discovery of victims keep the public story moving even as the actual attribution remains unsettled.

Revenge, Responsibility, and Bellman

Altman’s confession does not make him the killer of all the victims. When Harry’s team finds evidence that leads Harry to conclude Tony Leike killed them, the distinction becomes explicit. Altman says he saw Leike kill Adele and knows that the letters he sent were followed by the murders of the people supposedly writing them. His own account makes him an instigator who understood that his messages were associated with deaths, even as he claims that his original purpose was to enable an arrest. The murders are committed by Leike; Altman’s manipulation helps expose, provoke, and prolong the sequence.

This is the central contradiction in Altman’s self-description. He presents himself as trying to give the police a chance to catch Leike, reasoning that a murderer will make mistakes as the number of murders increases. Mikael Bellman counters that repeated violence can also make a killer more accomplished, and reminds Altman that Leike already had a history of violence. Altman’s supposed strategy of creating more opportunities for detection therefore carries an obvious cost: every additional letter places another person at risk. His appeal to a good outcome cannot erase his decision to use real people as bait.

Bellman’s view of Altman is shaped by his own interests. He dislikes Altman’s cold stare, slight build, clenched teeth, abrupt movements, and awkward lisp, yet regards him as a benefactor because Altman’s statements seem to move Bellman closer to victory. The contrast makes their interaction more than a simple exchange between investigator and suspect: Bellman is willing to treat Altman’s disclosures as useful, while the reader can see that Altman’s account is also an attempt to frame his conduct as service to the investigation.

Release and Continuing Pursuit

Altman later appears at Oslo District Prison accompanied by a guard and presents a form at the gate for release processing. The scene marks a change in his immediate circumstances, although the available account does not specify the legal basis or terms. His departure does not settle the larger question of responsibility raised by the murders and his role in directing their course.

Later, Katrine Bratt informs Harry that Altman is staying at a hotel in Shanghai, less than an hour’s flight away. Harry looks at the race program, receives a promising tip about a horse in the third race, and heads toward the cable car. The juxtaposition places Altman’s location within a final pattern of pursuit and uncertain outcomes: other people may know how events will end, but Harry has only a lead to follow. Altman remains significant not simply as the man behind the false letters, but as the figure whose effort to control the story of the murders helped make it harder to separate intention from consequence.