The Scarred Woman

by Jussi Adler-Olsen

  All this could probably have gone on for years if things between James and Rigmor had not blown up one fateful Saturday. It had all begun as an ordinary Saturday get-together with an early dinner, and then came one surprising question from his father-in-law that opened a Pandora’s box.

  The question was inappropriate with Dorrit sitting at the table, but Fritzl didn’t care. “What do you think is the worst thing a soldier can do? Commit random executions or random adultery?”

  For a moment, James thought that it was part of their game and told his daughter to go and play in the garden until they called her. It was probably just another one of Fritzl’s morbid and crazy ideas, but when James answered after a short pause that of course it was random executions, Rigmor Zimmermann slapped him on the cheek so hard that his head was thrown to one side.

  “Bastard!” she shouted while Fritzl laughed and slammed his fist on the table. James was in shock, and when he turned to his wife for an explanation, she spat straight in his face.

  “You fell right in the trap, you idiot. I’ve told my father and mother about all your women and affairs and about how you keep letting us down. Did you think you could get away with that?”

  Then he lied about the affairs, and cried, and swore that there was nothing to it—that he only stayed away for the night when he was doing the books. But she said they knew better.

  “She hates you for everything you’ve done, James. For cheating on me. For being drunk several times a week. For encouraging Father to talk about things that he isn’t supposed to talk about.”

  That day, Rigmor Zimmermann revealed her true self to James, leaving him in no doubt who the boss was in the family. When she placed the divorce papers on the table, James saw that Birgit had already signed.

  James begged her to rip them up, but she didn’t dare. And besides, Rigmor and Fritzl had promised to take care of her once he was out of the picture.

  And he suddenly was in every sense.

  He later tried to pressure Rigmor to have the divorce annulled, threatening that if she didn’t he would inform the authorities about Fritzl’s crimes committed during the Second World War. And promised that they would catch up with him this time. He had evidence.

  —

  The response came a few days later in the form of an offer of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars if he went back to the US and never showed his face again. The money would be paid in three installments to his US bank account, and that was the end of that. James agreed. It wasn’t every day a working-class guy from Duluth, Minnesota, came into that sort of money.

  The problem, however, was that he neglected to inform the US tax office about the transactions. And after several court cases and fines, the money was gone. And more besides.

  So James Lester Frank was left with no choice but to enlist again, and he was rewarded with years of almost uninterrupted missions so close to the Taliban that he and his men began to smell and look like them.

  “We were like animals. We shit where we slept. Ate whatever we could kill. And we died like animals. The Taliban saw to that. The last one from my unit I saw them execute had his arms cut off first.

  “Then I escaped. For eleven months, I lived up in the mountains, and when I finally managed to get out of there, I was done with killing for the US and the US Army.”

  “But then you were spotted in Istanbul,” said Carl.

  He nodded and pulled the quilt all the way up to his neck.

  “I was working in a tourist bar where most of the guests were Americans. That was stupid. Even though I’d shaved my head and grown a beard, the officer immediately spotted me. Luckily for me, that day I’d met a Danish couple in the bar who had a camper van and were happy to give me a lift to Denmark. I told them my story. That I had been a soldier and was now a deserter, but it wasn’t a problem for them. Rather the opposite, I’d say. You’d be hard-pressed to find greater pacifists than them.”

  “Hmm, that’s a great story,” said Assad with a hint of irony. “But where are you going with this?” His stomach was rumbling loudly. The lack of energy was apparently beginning to make him irritable. Carl had almost forgotten about the food. If only he could smoke a cigarette, he could keep going for a few more hours.

  “When I arrived back in Denmark, I had no papers or money. So my only option was to contact Fritzl and Rigmor and tell them that I intended to stay and that they had to help me. They were horrified because they and Birgit had told Dorrit—Denise—that I was long dead.

  “Hearing that made me furious, so even though they tried to stop me, I forced my way into Fritzl’s secret office and stole whatever I could get my hands on so I had something to bargain with. I took photos of the room and of them shouting and screaming. Finally, I took Fritzl’s army knife and held it against Rigmor’s throat. I told her that I knew what it would sound like when I slit her windpipe. Together with the other threats, this was enough to make them cooperate.

  “The deal was that they would let me live in this apartment and cover my expenses, and on top of that they would pay me twelve thousand kroner a month for the rest of my life. Of course, I should have demanded more, but I wasn’t that smart.” He laughed and sighed at the same time, looking like he was about to fall asleep. His eyes were as yellow as a werewolf’s. He clearly wasn’t well.

  “In return, I promised to keep away entirely from Birgit and Denise. Rigmor assured me that if I contacted them, she wouldn’t give a damn about what I told the authorities about Fritzl. She’d make sure I was arrested and deported—and she really meant it. She’d rather sacrifice Fritzl and the good name of the family than the girls.”

  “But I assume you didn’t stick to that promise,” said Carl.

  He smiled. “Yes, I did, actually, in a way. I have no idea how many times I stood behind the trees by Sortedams Lake and watched the main entrance to Bolman’s Independent School without ever contacting Denise. I was just hoping to catch a glimpse of her when she left school.”

  “And Birgit?”

  “Yeah, out of curiosity I tried to find out where she was living, but she wasn’t registered anywhere. I planned to follow Denise when she walked home from school.”

  “So you did?” asked Carl.

  Assad tapped Carl on the shoulder, sighing. “Carl, honestly, do you see any humps on me?”

  “You’ll get something to eat in twenty minutes, Assad. Please, no camel jokes now, okay?”

  Assad sighed even louder. Apparently twenty minutes was too long.

  “So did you follow Denise?”

  “No, it never came to that. But I did see her leave the school several times. She had grown so beautiful and vibrant. It was really fascinating to watch her.” He took another sip from his glass. It seemed like he was running out of energy.

  “But not as fascinating as watching Stephanie Gundersen, was it, James?”

  A little water trickled out of the corners of his mouth, ending up as drops on his chin. His suddenly bright eyes expressed surprise.

  “Why did you kill Stephanie?” came Carl’s inevitable question.

  He put the glass on the table, clearing his throat, as the water had gone down the wrong way.

  Then he shook his head eagerly. “Did I say you were good before? I take it back.”

  Assad giggled. Was that another protest over the lack of food?

  “Because?”

  “Because I loved Stephanie. I chose her over Birgit and Denise. Simple as that. I saw her leaving the school one day, and we were both smitten. We saw each other for nine months, meeting up in town. In fact, we were together several times a week.”

  “Why all the secrecy?”

  “Because she was Denise’s teacher. If Denise saw us together and recognized me, I would . . . They’d told her I was dead. My agreement with Rigmor would be finished. I would be arrested and extradited.”
r />   He stared vacantly and suddenly cried quietly. No sound, no sniffling.

  “I didn’t kill Stephanie. Rigmor did.” His voice was quivering. “I’m sure the bitch saw me in town with Stephanie and took her revenge by killing her. When I confronted her with my suspicion, she screamed that it wasn’t her, but I didn’t believe her. Of course I didn’t. I just knew that I couldn’t touch her and that she could easily blame me for the murder. That I would be painted as an illegal foreign blackmailer and professional killer.”

  “So you started drinking and kept your mouth shut while you stayed in this apartment and accepted her money. How pathetic can you get?”

  Carl looked at Assad. Well, that sounds like the conclusion to that story, said his expression. But Assad was sleeping. The past few hours without anything to drink or eat had taken their toll.

  “Fritzl drowned the next day, and after a few weeks I didn’t see Rigmor anymore because she sold the shop and the house and moved to Borgergade,” he continued.

  “And what about you?”

  “Me? I had absolutely nothing left to live for, so I just drank my days away.”

  “And it was years before you got your revenge, is that how it was?”

  “I was drunk every day for twelve years. That was all I wanted to do. And with twelve thousand a month, I wasn’t exactly drinking champagne.” He laughed dryly. That was when Carl noticed that he didn’t have a single tooth left in his mouth.

  “And what changed that situation?”

  He tapped his stomach. “I became ill. I saw the same thing happen to one of my drinking buddies, and he didn’t last long. Like him, I was suddenly dead tired all the time. Threw up blood and couldn’t be bothered to eat. I developed little red spots all over my upper body, and my skin turned yellow and itchy. I bruised easily, my legs cramped up, and I couldn’t get an erection. If I didn’t sleep constantly, I risked collapsing on the street. Yes, I was damn well aware what was happening.”

  “So the time had come. Is that it?”

  He nodded. “Even though I was ill, I didn’t stop drinking. I always had a bottle of cherry wine on me. I knew it was only a matter of time before I kicked the bucket, so I didn’t care about the agreement I had with Rigmor. Those fucking army men could do whatever the fuck they wanted with me. That was how I felt. As long as I got my revenge. So I went to the library and googled Rigmor and found out that she was still registered on Borgergade.”

  “But she didn’t live there, though, did she?”

  “No, as I discovered. The names on the door were Birgit and Denise F. Zimmermann. Oh, that little ‘F’ made me so happy because it meant I hadn’t been completely forgotten. I considered ringing the bell, but in the end I didn’t. I looked like shit and hadn’t had a shave or a wash for a week. I didn’t want them to see that. So I went over to the other side of the street and looked up at the windows, hoping that I might catch a glimpse of them. For the first time in many years, I was euphoric inside. And then Rigmor came out of the main door.”

  “Did she recognize you?”

  “No, not before I approached her. And then she bloody well started running off in the rain. She turned toward me shouting that I could go to hell and threw a bundle of thousand-kroner notes in front of me on the wet pavement. But that didn’t stop me. On the contrary, it made me fucking mad.”

  “So you ran after her?”

  “I was wasted, man, and the bitch ran quickly down a side street toward Kronprinsessegade. I only just saw her darting into the King’s Garden, but when I reached the entrance she was gone.”

  Carl nudged his assistant. “Assad, wake up! James has something to tell us.”

  Curly looked around in confusion. “What time is . . . ,” he managed to say before his stomach drowned him out.

  “Rigmor Zimmermann had disappeared by the time you reached the King’s Garden. What happened then, James?” He looked at Assad. “Are you listening, Assad?”

  Assad nodded grumpily and pointed at his phone. It had been recording all along.

  “I stopped by the entrance and looked around. Rigmor wasn’t on the lawn and she couldn’t have reached the opposite end and left the park so quickly. So she must still be there somewhere, I thought. I scanned the park thoroughly. Something I became really good at when I was in the Balkans because the Serbians were so brilliant at hiding. You really had to be wary of bushes, not like Iraq, where it was roads, roadsides, or miscellaneous piles left on pavements or dirt tracks. In the Balkans you risked being killed if you didn’t remember that bushes were dangerous places.”

  “So you found Rigmor Zimmermann in the bushes?”

  “Yes and no. I exited the park on Kronprinsessegade, standing by the railings so she wouldn’t immediately see me if she appeared from her hiding place. It was about five minutes before I sensed movement in the bushes behind the bicycle stands.”

  “She didn’t see you?”

  He smiled. “I quickly sneaked back to the entrance and around the ridiculous sign welcoming people to the King’s Garden and reminding them to be considerate toward other visitors so everyone can enjoy themselves. I’ve laughed at that sign before. I thought to myself that I would be very considerate toward my ex-mother-in-law and kill her with one single blow.”

  “So it was premeditated murder?”

  He nodded. “One hundred and ten percent premeditated, yes. I’ve got no reason to say otherwise.”

  Carl looked at Assad. “Are you writing all this down?”

  He nodded and held out his phone again.

  “And the actual murder? You let her run down toward the restaurant?”

  “No, I hit her in front of the bushes. She screamed when she saw me duck under the branches, and then I pulled her out and hit her on the back of the head with the wine bottle. It was as easy as that. One blow and she was stone dead.”

  “But you didn’t leave her there?”

  “No. I stayed where I was, looking at her before deciding in my drunken state that it would be wrong of me to leave her in that smelly place where drunkards stop to take a piss.”

  “You moved the body?”

  “Yes.”

  “Rather risky, if you ask me.”

  He shrugged. “There was no one in the park because of the shitty weather, so I just slung the body over my shoulder and threw her on the grass near the next exit to Kronprinsessegade, so I could make a quick getaway.”

  “So you killed her with a bottle of cherry wine?”

  “Yes.” He flashed a toothless smile. “It was almost full at the time, but it wasn’t an hour later, so I put it in a trash can on Frederiksborggade. Then I just walked home. I say walked because I had built up so much energy by that time that you wouldn’t believe it. That lasted about twenty minutes, and then I collapsed. That was where they found me.”

  “You haven’t drunk since. Why?”

  “Because I’m not going to be brought before a judge and come across as mentally unstable. I want to be sober and make my statement in front of a Danish court. I don’t want to go back to the US.”

  “Why didn’t you just confess to the police who questioned you at the hospital?” interrupted Assad. It almost sounded like he thought that would have saved him from his imminent death by starvation.

  James shrugged. “Because they would have arrested me then and there, and I wanted to find Denise and talk to her first. I owed that to myself and her.”

  Carl nodded and looked at Assad. He had already taken quite a few notes, and the voice recorder indicator on his smartphone was still red. This was being served to them on a platter. How often could you say that? He smiled, and not without good reason. They had come to find Denise but ended up solving one or two murders.

  Yes, Assad could soon replenish his humps.

  “What did you do then?” asked Assad. He wanted all the details.
>
  “I went over to Birgit’s building yesterday. I saw her come out the main door with several empty wine bottles in her hands. She was staggering down the sidewalk and didn’t recognize me because she was so pissed out of her head. I wanted to tell her that I still care for her, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it when I saw her.”

  No doubt the feeling is mutual, thought Carl.

  “That’s all,” he said. “Now you know everything. I’ll stay here until someone comes to pick me up.”

  —

  The shawarma wrap almost made Assad’s eyes pop out. Watching him shove this Middle Eastern treat into his mouth was like watching a child eating an ice pop on a hot day. Even if he had won a yacht, he couldn’t have been happier than he was right now.

  Carl picked at his kebab. It was probably one of the best you could find in Rødovre, but the fact was that a man from Vendsyssel would always be more at home with a hot dog.

  “Do you believe everything James Frank told us?” mumbled his chewing partner.

  Carl put down his kebab. “I think he believes it himself, but it’s up to us to make sense of it all now.”

  “So do we think he killed Rigmor Zimmermann? Or is it just something he’s made up to avoid being deported?”

  “Yes, I do believe he killed her. I’m sure it can be confirmed by traces on her clothes. They still have them in forensics. And perhaps there are also traces from Rigmor on the clothes he was wearing that night. I’d be surprised if there weren’t.”

  Assad raised his eyebrows. “So what’s the problem with the story?”

  “I don’t know if there is one. But don’t you find it an odd coincidence that Fritzl Zimmermann died the day after Stephanie Gundersen? I’m wondering what happened in the time between those two deaths.”

  “And you think Birgit Zimmermann might have an idea?”

  Carl looked at his partner, who was ordering another shawarma. It was a good question, and hopefully time would tell once Assad had finished eating. First he would call Marcus, and then they would head out to Stenløse.