by David Hewson
‘Her passport? Are you sure about that?’
Ditte was back, trapped by the screen.
‘Her plane leaves tonight,’ the manager said.
‘Her plane? Where to?’
The laundry girl looked puzzled. Lund halted the video. Let her catch her breath.
‘Take this slowly. There’s no rush.’
‘She wants you to play the video,’ the man said.
So Lund did.
‘The man asks her where she’s going to. But she just asks for the keys. She says she’s met someone else. Someone she loves very much. Someone she’s going away with.’
Two faces on the screen, love and hate in the same moment. Both dead.
‘He asks her where she’s going again.’
Lund closed her eyes.
‘And she says Paris. But Paris…’
Ditte stopped. She looked cross.
‘What about Paris?’
The hands again.
‘It isn’t Paris. She’s lying.’
‘How do you know?’
She pointed to the video.
‘When the girl speaks she won’t look him in the eye.’
Lund nodded. The hands flew again.
‘Just like you, when you said you’d forgotten your badge. And it was your day off.’
The laundry girl sat at the laptop smiling at Lund. Proud of herself.
‘I won’t get into trouble for this, will I?’ the manager asked.
‘No,’ she said. ‘I promise.’
Outside, in the hard seat of Vibeke’s green Beetle, travelling back into the city, she called Meyer.
‘Nanna’s plane was leaving that night. She lied about the destination.’
She could hear the sound of papers getting slammed on the desk. Meyer had her on speakerphone. He was probably making rude gestures at the handset as she spoke.
‘We never came across anything to suggest she was going on a trip.’
‘She said goodbye to her parents. Goodbye to her friends at school. To Kemal. To Holck. You saw that too.’
‘Did I? Who was she going away with?’
‘Get all the passenger lists. Talk to the airlines.’
‘No problem. I’ve got nothing else to do.’
‘Did you check the old cases?’
‘I’m looking at them now. I can’t see any link. Except for Mette Hauge’s bike and really—’
‘Check the departures and find out who she was travelling with. The Hauge girl—’
The phone clicked.
‘Meyer?’ Lund said into the neck mike. ‘Meyer?’
Nanna’s room looked different again. Pernille had relented. Got some Birk Larsen boxes. Carefully started stashing her belongings.
Moving things. Changing things.
There was a globe on Nanna’s desk. Marked with ink stars for all the cities she wanted to visit one day. London and Rome. New York and Beijing.
Pernille looked at it. A simple piece of plastic. Placed it in the cardboard box and walked back into the living room. Looked around.
All their life had been here, from Nanna to the boys. All the love and squabbles. All the pain and joy.
On the door in crayon were the height marks. Red for Nanna, green for Anton, blue for Emil. The junk the police had posted was gone. She could see the place again without being reminded of the world outside and what it contained.
Lives were never still. They shifted always. Or they weren’t lives at all. She’d forgotten this in the dreadful limbo that had consumed them. Forgotten it before, perhaps, in the comfort of their cramped apartment above the grubby, busy depot. Bringing up kids. Feeding Theis. Enjoying his strong arms around her when they were alone.
Never still. You either moved with time or it flowed past heedless. Left you stranded in the bare, cold sand.
She walked downstairs. The woman from the agency had called. Theis was talking to her. Knuckles still raw from whatever happened two nights before. Face grim and dark.
Pernille knocked on the door, went in, sat down.
The woman said, ‘I really think you should take the offer. I know it’s not wonderful. But the market’s not very good. With your finances the bank expect the money.’
‘The bank,’ he muttered.
She smiled, and said to Pernille, ‘Now that it’s all over a clean break might be nice.’
Pernille froze.
Quickly, the estate agent added, ‘I don’t mean over with, of course, but—’
‘When would they move in?’ he asked.
‘Very soon. The money—’
Pernille said, ‘We’d like to talk about this. Can you wait outside?’
She seemed shocked, but went.
‘Stinking banks,’ he muttered.
The plans were on the desk. Some drawings. The agency photos.
‘I never had the time to look at it.’
‘No…’
‘What’s it like? Is it nice? Is there a garden?’
‘It’s Humleby. Three floors…’
‘Would the boys like it, Theis?’
‘Their own rooms? They could have a train set. Of course they’d like it.’
‘And the school’s not far…’
‘Pernille.’ He eyed the woman beyond the glass. ‘The dragon out there just told me she’s found a buyer. The price is lousy but…’
She didn’t speak.
‘The bank would love it.’
Her fingers were running across the photos. Grey Humleby brickwork. A garden.
‘But if you’ve changed your mind—’
‘No, no. Take the offer.’
She looked at him.
‘We need the money, don’t we?’
‘Money,’ he said.
Lund found the taxi driver, Leon Frevert, polishing his Mercedes on a rank by the tourist ferry stop in Nyhavn.
He didn’t want to talk.
After three monosyllabic answers Frevert said, ‘I told you everything I knew. I picked up a fare. I took her somewhere. What else is there to say?’
‘Did she have a bag?’
He started on the windscreen. She thought of Ditte. Frevert wouldn’t look her in the eye.
‘It’s been almost three weeks. This is ridiculous.’
‘Did she have a bag?’
He put down the cloth, glanced in her direction.
‘Maybe she had her wallet in a bag. I don’t know.’
‘I meant a travel bag. A suitcase. A rucksack.’
‘No. She didn’t.’
‘You’re sure?’
‘If she had I would have put it in the boot.’
The car ahead moved off. That left him second in line. She felt sure Frevert would have driven off given half the chance.
‘Did she tell you where she was going afterwards?’
He looked thinner than she recalled. More careworn.
‘What I said before. City Hall and Grønningen. That’s all I know.’
The first car left. Frevert was next.
‘She didn’t mention the airport?’
‘Definitely not. I would have driven her there. A good ride that.’ He scratched his thinning hair. ‘Now you mention it though—’
‘What?’
‘She asked me to wait.’
‘To wait?’
‘Yeah. I remember now. She said she had to go round the corner and then she’d be straight back. So could I wait?’
He laughed.
‘On a Friday night? I was nice to the kid when we went to City Hall. But there were plenty of customers. I couldn’t hang around there.’
For a moment he looked bleak and ashamed.
‘Jesus. What if I had?’
‘Where did Nanna want to go next?’
Frevert was thinking.
‘I think she said Central Station.’
The station was opposite Tivoli. Lund could think of only one reason why Nanna would want to go there.
She went straight to the left luggage department. There was an off
icious-looking youth in a blue uniform behind the counter. He said that after three days every box got emptied and any uncollected contents taken into store.
‘If you give me a key I’ll find it,’ he added. ‘There’ll be a charge.’
‘I don’t have a key.’
‘What’s the number?’
‘I don’t have the number.’
‘In that case,’ he said very brightly, ‘you don’t get any luggage.’
‘It’s a travel bag. Handed in around October the thirty-first.’
He looked about eighteen. She could see the storage area behind the counter. Rows and rows of bags.
‘Is this bag yours by any chance?’
‘If you let me behind and tell me where to look I’ll find it.’
He folded his arms.
‘Anything else you’d like? A free ticket, first class, to Helsingør? A cheeseburger?’
She pulled out her police business card, gave it to him.
‘Sarah Lund. You called us about a suspicious suitcase.’
He read it, put it in his pocket.
‘Let’s see some ID.’
She started climbing over the steel gate beside him.
‘I can find the bag myself.’
Lund marched past him, ignoring his shouts, got to the back, dragged a bag off the shelf. The date was recent. Nanna’s had to be somewhere else.
‘You stop this now! I’m an official of the railroad.’
‘I’m trying to help,’ Lund said, running quickly down the lines of shelves.
‘I’m getting mad now.’
He stood there, thin arms folded.
‘You’re getting mad?’ she yelled at him. ‘I came in on my day off as a favour to someone in transport. And I’ve got a spotty teenager on my case. Fuck off over the road and take a fairground ride, sonny. Grown-ups have got work to do.’
Face red, he started bleating, arms flapping.
‘You… oh… You!’
‘Mickey Mouse is waiting,’ she said, pointing out to Tivoli.
‘You stay here!’ he shrieked. ‘I’m fetching my boss.’
Lund moved quickly.
So many bags. Most of them black. The kind men bought.
Nanna was pretty and liked pretty things.
Voices at the end of the room. Someone getting loud.
Lund half-ran until she saw it. Pink and fashionable. A brand name. The kind Jens Holck might have bought on City Hall expenses.
She looked at the name tag. Frederiksholm High School on one side. Vesterbrogade 95, Lotte’s address on the other.
Of course Nanna kept it there. She’d never want Pernille and Theis to know.
Lund picked up the bag and rushed out with it, ignoring the flapping, screeching teenager at the counter.
Meyer didn’t put the phone down on her.
‘Do you have the passenger lists?’ she asked.
‘No.’
He sounded reluctant to speak.
‘You’re driving somewhere, Meyer.’
‘SAS are on strike. I’m going to the airport. OK?’
‘Good. I’ve got her bag.’
She was back in the green Beetle, going through Nanna’s belongings, the suitcase open on the passenger’s seat.
‘Any indication where she was going?’ he asked.
A sketchpad. Trainers. Swimsuit. Warm clothes. Price tags on most of the things. She reeled them off to Meyer.
‘Anything to suggest who she was going with?’
‘No.’
Lund had a spare pair of forensic gloves from home. Bit the pack open with her teeth, snapped them on.
‘I’m going to ask the Birk Larsens,’ Lund said.
‘For God’s sake, don’t do that. Yesterday I told them we’d closed the case. Those two need a break.’
‘Yes, well… I’ll work something out.’
‘Lund!’
Birk Larsen turned up outside the Indian restaurant on the dot. Pernille called.
‘The bank won’t help us, Theis.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘They won’t help us with the house. Maybe we could take out a loan against the company?’
‘The company’s got enough loans. We’re selling the house, aren’t we?’
She sounded calm. Happy almost.
‘I’m there now. In Humleby. You haven’t put up any curtains.’
‘Curtains! Why do women always think of curtains! There’s plumbing and wiring and—’
‘Even without the curtains it looks beautiful.’
Birk Larsen stopped in the street. Broke into a broad smile. Laughed at the gloomy winter sky.
‘Women,’ he said.
He heard her happy voice down the line. Could see her face in his head.
‘Baby?’
He hadn’t called her that in ages.
‘Baby?’ Pernille echoed. ‘Do I answer to baby?’
‘You used to. Why not? What I’m going to do, baby, is call the estate agency. Tell them the sale’s cancelled. And they can shove their commission up their tight backside.’
Silence.
‘If that’s OK.’
Silence.
‘If,’ he said again, ‘that’s OK.’
‘It’s a house, Theis. We never had a house. What about the money?’
‘I’ll find a way to make it work.’
‘Where do we get the money?’
‘You never asked before. Why start now?’
‘Can I bring the boys over this afternoon? Can you come? We can show them the place together.’
He saw Amir in the window of the restaurant. Gloomy and anxious, just like the previous night. He was with his father, who looked no happier.
‘You bet,’ Birk Larsen said.
Phone in pocket. He clapped his big hands. Beamed at strangers. Felt… whole.
There were places for the money. It wasn’t the first time he’d steered through stormy waters to keep things afloat. The calls he’d been making would be all the more useful now.
Across the road Amir and his father were outside the restaurant, arguing. The old man pointing an accusing finger, shouting so loudly Birk Larsen could hear him. The babble of another tongue.
The father had his hand on Amir’s arm. The young man broke free with a ferocious burst of Danish curses.
Two little kids in the box of a red Christiania trike. Off to school. Trapped for ever in a photograph on a table.
They all grew up. They all went somewhere, a few into an endless night.
Amir walked over the road, came to him.
‘Is something wrong?’ Birk Larsen asked.
‘Let’s just get out of here.’
Then he walked to the scarlet van.
Skovgaard was on the phone chasing the missing document from Stokke’s minutes. Morten Weber had spent an hour with Bremer’s people trying to clear the air. Mai Juhl waited in Hartmann’s office, getting impatient on her own.
‘What does the old man have to say?’
‘Bremer’s about to start the hearing into Holck’s department. You’re expected. Either you issue a correction and withdraw what you said or he’ll sue you.’
Hartmann waved to Juhl. Got the faintest of smiles in return.
‘So I’m supposed to retract it and look like a complete fool?’
Weber shook his head.
‘There are ways around these things, Troels. We could say you’d been under a lot of pressure after the false arrest. Bremer will put out a sympathetic message if you give him what he wants.’
‘Forget it.’
Mai Juhl had much the same idea. That probably came from Bremer too.
‘Don’t paint yourself into a corner, Troels.’
‘Bremer knew I was innocent. He let me sit in a jail cell, face a charge of murder. When all along he could have picked up the phone and—’
‘So you say. But can you prove it?’
‘He thinks he owns us, Mai. Maybe he does.’
‘Be practical. We’re all sorry about what happened. But you need friends. Don’t cut yourself off—’
‘What exactly do you want me to do?’
Skovgaard walked in.
‘Not now,’ Hartmann said, barely looking at her.
‘Yes, now.’
She was smiling. There were some printouts in her hand. Something in her eyes…
‘Go on, Mai.’
‘If you change your mind we can stop the libel suit. Word won’t get out.’
Hartmann took the papers and started to read.
‘There are six mayors and Bremer,’ Juhl went on. ‘He won’t leave you education. He wants me for that. But you’ll get one of them. Maybe… environment now.’
‘The last man in that job prospered, didn’t he?’ Hartmann said, still going through the documents.
‘I’m trying to help. There are people out there who don’t think you’re worth it. Prove me right. Prove them wrong. Let’s do this the proper way. Draft the letter. OK?’
He barely moved. It wasn’t a nod, not really.
But Mai Juhl snatched at it. Picked up her jacket, said cheerily, ‘Thank God for that. See you shortly.’
Then left.
Hartmann stared at the world beyond the window. Thought about possibilities and directions. Choices to be made.
‘Troels?’
Weber had walked in and he’d barely noticed.
‘The hearing’s soon. We need a plan.’
No answer.
‘Hello?’ Weber called. ‘Anyone in?’
‘I’m in,’ Hartmann said. ‘Here’s a plan. Tell Bremer we’ll work out a denial afterwards.’
Weber squinted at him.
‘You’re going to withdraw the accusation?’
‘Afterwards.’
‘Right…’ Weber said.
She walked through the garage, ignored the hard stares of the men in their red uniforms, went up the stairs, rang the bell.
‘Hi, Pernille.’
Lund smiled, tried to appear friendly.
‘Is it a bad time?’
‘We’re moving. I’m going to see the house.’
‘We need to number the evidence in the case. It’s just a formality.’
‘What?’
A gap. An opportunity. Lund walked in, stood in the kitchen. So many things. Little vases and plants, animal silhouettes in the window, dishes on the side. She could never create a home like this.
‘I need to go through Nanna’s belongings again. The last time, I promise.’
‘Meyer said you were off the case.’
‘Tomorrow. It’s my last day. Didn’t he mention it?’
