The Scarred Woman

by Jussi Adler-Olsen

  They also couldn’t rule out the possibility that Jazmine was one of the two girls who committed the robbery at Victoria nightclub, as Pasgård said. As he very reasonably argued, there was still a hundred and forty-five thousand kroner missing. No doubt someone would kill for that amount of money, but where was it? All in all, wasn’t it logical that Jazmine Jørgensen should be their main suspect?

  The problem, however, was that no one had any idea where she was. They had called the address where she was registered as living and spoken to a woman who said she was Jazmine’s mother. She told them that she was tired of people asking where Jazmine was when she had no idea. Did they think she was running an information service?

  But, as Pasgård admitted, it wasn’t as if they had made extensive inquiries to find her. They would intensify their search first thing in the morning when everyone had had a chance to get some sleep. Now that the search for Denise Zimmermann was no longer relevant, it was only appropriate that they redirected their efforts to finding Jazmine Jørgensen.

  —

  “The woman isn’t at home, Carl,” concluded Assad when they had been staring at Anne-Line Svendsen’s buzzer for long enough. “She’s certainly up with the lark. Do you think she’s gone to work?”

  Carl shook his head and looked at his watch again. Why would she go to work so early? And at a municipal office? No, it was more likely that she was home and wouldn’t let them in. But if they had to obtain a search warrant, they would have to wait a few hours until the employees at the court registry came in to work.

  He mulled over the possibilities. What could her reason be for not wanting to let them in? She had proven to be cooperative before, and as she had now reported her Ka stolen, she was in theory less of a suspect. After all, it hadn’t been possible to see who left the Ka after last night’s accident. Only that it was a woman.

  “Maybe she didn’t even come home last night, Carl. She is a grown woman, after all,” said Assad. “When was it the police tried to get ahold of her yesterday?”

  “I think they said it was before midnight.”

  “They didn’t put a surveillance team on her house afterward?”

  “Nope.”

  “Well, I’ll say it again. I don’t think she came home.”

  Carl stepped back down onto the sidewalk. It was difficult to keep a clear head after only a few hours’ sleep.

  “We might as well turn our attention to Jazmine Jørgensen while we wait for the public offices to open. What do you think?”

  Assad shrugged. He probably imagined himself taking a nap in the passenger seat in about two minutes. But he could forget that—even if it meant that Carl had to listen to those jabbering hosts on Radio P3 at full blast.

  “What’ve we got on that Jazmine?” asked Assad, sounding surprisingly awake as Carl was about to turn on the car radio.

  “What we’ve got? Er, more or less nothing. But Anne-Line Svendsen’s manager gave Pasgård a list of her clients the day he went to her office. It’s just been gathering dust in his office. However, Lars Bjørn made sure that Pasgård scanned it and sent it out to everyone working on the cases, together with Michelle Hansen’s selfie, which the IT department retrieved. Much to Pasgård’s annoyance, he emphasized that it should also be forwarded to us. So check your cell phone.”

  After a few seconds Assad was nodding to himself and scrolling down the document.

  “There are actually two Jazmines on the list, but here she is,” he said. “The only information is her social security number, a cell phone number, and her address. There’s also a note saying that the cell phone number is for her mom, who she also lives with.”

  “What are we waiting for? What’s the address?”

  “Borgmester Christiansens Gade in Sydhavnen. But can’t we just call her?”

  Carl gave him an admonishing look. It was clear that Assad just wanted to get it over with so he could get back to HQ and take a nap until the search warrant was granted.

  “No, Assad! Because if Jazmine is there, and if she has good reason to avoid the police, you can be sure that her mom’s answer will still be that she has no idea where Jazmine is. And if Jazmine suspects that we might turn up anyway, she’ll make herself scarce. So don’t you think it would be a better idea to simply go there and ring the doorbell?”

  “Well, couldn’t she just take the back stairs, in that case?”

  Carl sighed. “So we park as close to the main door as we possibly can and keep an eye on it while we call her. She isn’t likely to take the back stairs if she thinks we’re calling from somewhere else, is she?”

  Assad let out a mighty yawn. “Come on, Carl, I’m too tired for all that. Let’s just do whatever you think.”

  That was something Carl had never heard him say before.

  —

  It was only twenty-five meters to the main door in the large block of apartments. A distance they should be able to muster up the energy to run if Jazmine suddenly appeared.

  What was it she looked like again? thought Carl. He must be more tired than he thought.

  “Let me see that selfie, Assad.” Assad handed him the phone.

  “It’s so strange,” he said, looking at the photo. “It’s only a few weeks old and now two of them are dead. The death of young people is something I’ll never get used to with this job.” Carl shook his head. “Such lovely sunny weather, and such beautiful young women having a great time together, and suddenly they’re not here anymore. It’s a good thing we can’t see our own future; that’s all I’m saying.”

  “Jazmine is the one on the far right with the longest hair. Do you think it’s real?”

  Carl doubted it, and Assad was right. They had to be on their guard because girls like them could be like chameleons. Blondes one minute, brunettes the next. Tall in heels and short in sandals. You couldn’t even rely on a consistent eye color these days.

  “I’m sure I can recognize her no matter what.” Assad rubbed his eyes a couple of times. He had a good eye for the ladies—they would just have to hope he could keep at least one of them open.

  Carl rang the cell phone number on the client list and waited a long time for an answer.

  “Aren’t you aware that it isn’t even seven o’clock?” said an accusing and extremely annoyed female voice.

  “I apologize, Mrs. Jørgensen. You’re speaking to Inspector Carl Mørck. I was hoping you could help me with information about your daughter’s whereabouts.”

  “Oh, would you shut up!” she just said and hung up.

  They waited fifteen minutes while keeping an eye on the main door, but it remained firmly closed.

  “Out,” ordered Carl, making Assad’s legs twitch. He must have managed to fall asleep anyway.

  They found Karen-Louise Jørgensen’s name on the buzzer and pushed and held it for a few minutes without any result. That set their alarm bells ringing.

  “Go and keep an eye on the gate to the courtyard, and stay there until I give the word, Assad.”

  Then Carl pressed a few of the other buzzers and was finally let in by someone who didn’t dare refuse when he said where he was from.

  There were already a couple of women in dressing gowns on the stairs when Carl stood in front of the door with the name “Jørgensen” on it.

  “Could I persuade you to ring the doorbell?” he asked an elderly grey-haired woman who was standing with one hand tightly holding the top of her dressing gown around her neck. “We’re very concerned about Mrs. Jørgensen’s daughter and need her help to find her. But it appears that her relationship with the police is somewhat strained, so it would be a great help.” He smiled as well as he could and showed the woman his badge to help his cause.

  She gave him a friendly and understanding nod and tentatively pressed the doorbell to Mrs. Jørgensen’s apartment. “Karen-Louise,” she said quietly, with
her cheek pressed against the door panel, in the gentlest voice Carl had ever heard. “It’s only me. Gerda from the fourth floor.”

  For whatever reason, it worked. The woman in there must have ears like a bat, because a moment later there was a rattling and clicking sound and then the door was opened.

  “He’s come to help you with Jazmine,” said the quiet woman with a smile that was by no means returned as Carl stepped forward and held up his badge.

  “You idiots are incorrigible,” she said angrily, with an extra-reproachful look at the old woman. “Was it you who called my phone?”

  Carl nodded.

  “And pretended that my buzzer was a foghorn?”

  “Yes, sorry about that. But we need to know where we can find Jazmine, Mrs. Jørgensen.”

  “Oh, give it a rest with your Mrs. Jørgensen. Aren’t you listening? I do not know where Jazmine is.”

  “If she’s in the apartment, I’d appreciate it if you told me now.”

  “Are you simple? I would know where my daughter was if she was in this apartment, wouldn’t I?”

  The old woman tugged at Carl’s sleeve. “It’s true. Jazmine hasn’t been here for—”

  “Thank you, Gerda. You can go back to your own apartment now.” Mrs. Jørgensen looked at the other curious spectators leaning against the bannister. “And the same goes for the rest of you. Good-bye!”

  She shook her head. “Well, come in if you’re coming. Those nosy old buggers can kiss my ass,” she said. Obviously Sydhavnen hadn’t completely lost the language of its working-class roots.

  “What is it Jazmine’s done, since you’re all on my back?” she asked through the smoke of what was probably the first cigarette of the day.

  Carl looked at her with respect. It was highly likely that this woman had carried this family single-handedly. Her hands were tough, and her face bore the signs of night shifts, cleaning, working at a cash register, or something similar. The lines on her face weren’t the result of smiling. They were wrinkles born of constant regret and frustration.

  “We are worried that Jazmine might have been involved in a number of serious crimes, but I have to stress that we don’t know anything for certain. We might be wrong—it happens—but just to be on the safe side, and for Jazmine’s own good, we—”

  “I don’t know where she is,” she said. “There were a couple of women who called for her at one point. One of them said she owed Jazmine money, so I told her she had moved to somewhere or other in Stenløse. A place called Sandal . . . something or other. That’s all I know, and I haven’t mentioned it to anyone else.”

  Carl couldn’t help it. The information made him gasp for breath so loudly that the woman looked surprised and lost her tough expression.

  “What did I just say?” she asked, sounding puzzled.

  “Just what we needed, Karen-Louise Jørgensen. Exactly what we needed.”

  —

  “Damn it, Carl. I know it was her I saw looking out through the curtains in the kitchen. I just know it. We should’ve let ourselves in.”

  “Yes, I suppose we should’ve.” Carl nodded, wondering if they should turn on the siren. “But I’m afraid my instinct tells me it’s too late. That the bird has flown.”

  “Carl, I have a really horrible feeling about this.”

  “Me too.”

  “Rose’s door was open, damn it. That’s not normal, and especially not for Rose. And now she’s vanished into thin air. And that Jazmine has been next door all this time. And so has Rigmor Zimmermann’s granddaughter, Denise, I bet.”

  That comment made up Carl’s mind to activate the siren and step on the gas.

  When they arrived, Carl drove right up onto the sidewalk. Assad was quicker than he was and already standing with the key in the keyhole when Carl reached the walkway, audibly out of breath.

  He drew his pistol and poised himself as Assad pushed open the door.

  “Police! Jazmine Jørgensen! Come out into the hallway with your hands in the air. You’ve got twenty seconds!” shouted Carl. After ten seconds, they both stormed into the apartment, ready to shoot first.

  The place seemed deserted and had a strong smell of urine. There were clothes scattered all over the hallway, and in the sitting room at one end of the hallway they could just make out an upturned chair on the carpet. It didn’t look at all normal.

  They stood quietly outside one of the bedrooms for a moment. There wasn’t a sound.

  Then Carl walked over to the door into the sitting room, entered with one fluid movement, and pointed the pistol around the room. Nothing here either.

  “You take the balcony, Assad. I’ll take the dining room and the bedrooms.”

  Carl stood in the back bedroom looking at the unmade bed and a lot of dirty laundry scattered all over the floor. He was just about to open the wardrobes when Assad shouted from the balcony that the bird really had flown. “There’s a rope made of bedsheets dangling from the balcony, Carl.”

  Damn it, damn it, and double damn it!

  They stood for a moment in the sitting room, looking at each other. Assad’s frustration was visible, and Carl knew how he felt. His eyes and intuition had been right, but Carl had stopped him.

  “I’m sorry, Assad. Next time, I’ll have more faith in what you believe you’ve seen.”

  Carl looked around the sitting room and the adjacent dining room.

  Blouses and shoes and dirty dishes were strewn everywhere. There were obvious signs of a struggle. A couple of chairs had been pushed over, and the tablecloth was lying on the floor.

  “I’ll just check the last bedroom.” He immediately noticed a small suitcase on the bed, packed and ready for takeoff.

  “Get in here, Assad!” he shouted.

  He pointed at the suitcase. “What do you make of this?”

  Assad sighed. “That someone was interrupted in their plans. I just hope it wasn’t our fault.”

  Carl nodded. “Yes, that would be vexatious.”

  “What does vex . . . Hey, look at that, Carl.” He pointed at something under the bed. Carl couldn’t see what it was until Assad picked it up with his fingertips. It was a rolled-up banknote.

  “Shall we just agree that this five-hundred-kroner bill came from Victoria nightclub, Carl?” he said as he wafted the note in the air.

  “Definitely.”

  “Okay, so what do we do now?” he asked.

  “We call HQ and let them know that they need to intensify their search for Jazmine Jørgensen. Everything points to us having a killer on the loose.”

  Carl took his phone out of his pocket as he walked toward the front door.

  If Assad was frustrated, then Carl felt the same ten times over. Not only had they been so close to catching the person they were after, but they also could have prevented the murder of Denise Zimmermann. It was a mystery to him what had happened after the escape from the balcony and what had happened between Denise and Jazmine Jørgensen. He sincerely hoped they would catch Jazmine so they could get to the bottom of it.

  “Hang on a minute, Carl. I just need to pee before we go,” said Assad. He stopped in front of the bathroom door, which was slightly ajar. Then he froze.

  “Look there,” he said, pointing at a couple of holes in the door.

  Carl put his phone back in his pocket.

  Then Assad turned on the bathroom light and pushed the door open wide.

  The sight that met them was horrific.

  54

  Tuesday, May 31st, 2016

  There were now at least ten vehicles with flashing lights down in the parking area. The atmosphere was intense, and more colleagues kept arriving—some to keep away the curious public, others to go over the crime scene ahead of the technicians.

  Assad and Carl looked on helplessly as Rose was carried into the ambulance on a stretch
er. The doctor shook his head with a concerned expression. Even though Rose was breathing faintly, there were many indications that this couldn’t possibly end well.

  Assad was inconsolable, and there was almost no end to his self-reproach. “If only we’d entered the apartment yesterday,” he said over and over again.

  Yes, if only they had.

  “Keep us informed!” Carl shouted to the doctor before they took Rose to the hospital.

  They nodded to the medical examiner returning from the apartment.

  “The cause of death is a gunshot, and the woman has presumably been dead for at least twelve hours. The forensic pathologist can give you a more precise time of death.”

  “So in theory it could be Jazmine who shot Denise. But then who shot Jazmine?” asked Assad quietly.

  “Well, there’s no hint of gunshot residue on the body. So she definitely didn’t do it herself,” said the doctor with a smirk. “If you ask me, you’ll find the gunshot residue on the outside of the bathroom door.”

  Carl agreed.

  Then he took Assad’s hands in both of his and looked intensely at him. “Listen to me, Assad. At least we know it can’t have been Jazmine Jørgensen driving around with Denise Zimmermann’s body. On the other hand, we know for sure that the driver was a woman. That’s all we really need to know. Shall we get going?”

  Assad had never looked so defeated before. “Yes. But you have to promise me that we’ll drive to the hospital as soon as we can, okay?”

  “Of course, Assad. I’ve called Gordon, who was very shaken by all this, but he’s heading out to the University Hospital straightaway to wait for the ambulance. He said we can get him on his cell phone anytime we want.”

  —

  “I’ve got four jobs for you, Assad,” said Carl on their way to Copenhagen. “Can you make sure that HQ puts someone outside Anne-Line Svendsen’s house? Then get ahold of Lars Bjørn and give him a detailed update of what’s happened out here and tell him to call off the search for Jazmine Jørgensen. Tell him we’re on our way to Webersgade and it would help if the search warrant was ready and waiting when we get there. Then call Anne-Line Svendsen’s work in Vesterbro and ask if she’s there.”