The Stolen Angel

by Sara Blaedel

  The message was hard to ignore. And yet she quickly turned it around, wondering if she herself might in any way be in peril.

  How typical, Carl Emil thought, feeling the anger rise up inside him once again. She could take advantage of him when there was something she wanted, yet wash her hands at the slightest unfavorable complication. She had snapped at him and told him it was only fair that he should be the target if anyone really did want to harm them. By putting the Angel of Death on the market he had confirmed to anyone who was even slightly awake that the icon was in the family’s possession.

  * * *

  The idea had taken shape while he had been sitting in Miklos Wedersøe’s office, and later, as he drove home from visiting Rebekka, it became increasingly clear to him that if they were to secure his sister’s help he would have to get to her in some way. He realized rather quickly that her only weak spot was her daughter.

  His niece attended dancing school on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays. It was a somewhat strenuous program for an eight-and-a-half-year-old child, Carl Emil thought, but he knew Isabella was keen on it.

  The routine was always the same: She would arrive and be dropped off at five fifteen and spend approximately an hour and a half in class before being collected again.

  It was usually the Filipina au pair who drove her, Rebekka seldom managing to get home early enough. He failed to comprehend why his sister felt she had to work as much as she did. Termo-Lux had no need for her as CEO with all the other executives drawing their huge salaries to make the wheels go around, but his sister devoted herself anyway, her entire identity seemingly dependent on the title. She loved it when the gossip magazines referred to her as Denmark’s most beautiful businesswoman.

  It had been a long time since he himself had stopped going to work every day at the company headquarters in Roskilde. Now he concentrated on being prepared for the board meetings, and Wedersøe was instructed to inform him if there was anything he thought Carl Emil needed to be involved in. Decision making and the like.

  But for the last forty-eight hours he had been focused entirely on his eight-year-old niece.

  He adored her, and always had. Sometimes it felt like he was closer to Isabella than to his own mother. Often, they did things together that Rebekka would never dream of doing with her. They had gone on trips to theme parks like Lalandia and Djurs Sommerland, and to Disneyland in Paris. The latter especially had been thoroughly enjoyable.

  They were taking their time, he thought, a spike of unease jolting him back to the matter at hand. Was there some other way out of the parking lot that he wasn’t aware of? Or had Marybeth clocked him after all?

  At that same moment a pair of headlights swept over the curb as they pulled out of the lot. Without signaling, the Mini turned out onto Helligkorsvej and set off in the direction of Byvolden.

  Recognizing the vehicle straightaway, he ducked down across the passenger seat and waited until they passed. He gave them time to vanish from sight beyond the first curve of the road before turning the Range Rover’s ignition and pulling out in their wake. There was no panic. He knew where they were going, so he drove sensibly and kept his distance.

  He opened the window slightly and lit a cigarette, sucking in the smoke until the ember glowed red in the dim light, savoring the rush of nicotine that immediately settled his restless nerves. He had been so close to losing focus while he waited.

  The darkness made the imposing homes of the Sankt Jørgensbjerg area seem like oases, issuing their rays of warmth out into the cold of winter. There was little traffic; the roads were quiet as he entered the roundabout by the Viking Ship Museum without braking, his thoughts circling on Isabella. He needed her if he was going to convince his sister to help find the icon.

  Before the Angel of Death they would be absolved of all their sins, he thought to himself, his eyes on the red taillights up ahead.

  What crap. Wedersøe had dug up a pile of material about the icon and its history, but Carl Emil had barely been bothered to read a word of it. It was quite sufficient for him to know how much the Angel of Death was worth in cash.

  Half a billion kroner, if he split with his sister. The figure made him dizzy.

  When he had spoken to Wedersøe earlier in the day, the attorney had told him his American contact had phoned, anxious to have the deal confirmed. Fortunately, Miklos had succeeded in keeping him hanging on and they had won a couple of extra days to get things sorted out.

  He thought about the wreath again. It took quite a bit to unnerve him, yet he realized he was not a courageous man, and he certainly was not unaffected by someone leaving a coffin display outside his door. Maybe he was getting paranoid, but he found it spooky nonetheless that it had been left there the day after the police had started investigating his mother’s death as a murder. He asked a couple of his friends if they by any chance had been around to his apartment, but if they knew what he was talking about they certainly had not let on.

  All this was distracting, and all of a sudden he found himself too close to the Mini Cooper when it pulled up at a red light. He had not seen the flashing turn signal and had been unprepared when the vehicle had switched into the turn lane. His foot left the accelerator and stamped the brake, though too late for him to be able to pull up behind, forcing him to draw up alongside them instead. And there they waited, window-to-window. When the lights changed he would have no option but to carry on straight ahead.

  He swore under his breath and flicked his cigarette out of the window. He felt observed, and fought the urge to put his foot down and speed off. He leaned his elbow against his side window, concealing his face behind his hand and staring at the road. Then the lights changed and the Range Rover’s turbo thrust him forward as he pressed down on the accelerator. Having passed through the lights, he considered turning back and trying to catch up with them again, but swiftly dismissed the idea.

  He decided it didn’t matter. He knew Marybeth picked his niece up from school and drove her home, and that just after five she would drive her to dancing school and collect her again ninety minutes later.

  He had it sussed and could just as well go home and wallow in a hot bath. He felt cold and his body ached from sitting in the car for so long. He turned the radio on and put his foot down, the Range Rover responding like an arrow as he headed for the highway.

  * * *

  He pulled up at the curb outside Sticks’n’Sushi on the Strandvejen and inhaled three cigarettes while pacing the pavement and waiting for his meal. He added two beers and a tin of wasabi peas to the order and paid in cash. It was one of the things he had decided to do from now on: He didn’t want anyone being able to trace his movements, so instead of using his credit cards he withdrew cash from the bank. He put the bag of takeout food down carefully on the passenger seat and climbed in.

  The radio was playing the Rolling Stones. Carl Emil cranked the volume up and drummed on the wheel as he turned toward Tuborg Havn. For the first time since Saturday morning the feeling was absent: the sense of an iron fist gripping him by the neck, steering his actions without him knowing who it was holding him so firmly in their talons.

  He sang along as he entered the underground parking facility and was still humming to himself when he cautiously lifted the bag out of the car so as not to disturb its contents. He wondered whether to go out a bit later on. Though it was only Monday there was sure to be someone he knew at the wine bar, but then again he had no desire to be bothered by journalists and decided against it.

  He sang to himself as the elevator slid up through the building. The doors opened. As he stepped out, the bag of sushi dropped from his hand onto the landing’s dark terrazzo.

  In front of his door was a headstone, the block letters of his name painted crudely on its surface:

  CARL EMIL SACHS-SMITH

  Born 06.06.1972

  Died 18.02.2010

  Rest in Peace

  Someone had decided when he was going to die. He had less than three
days.

  He picked his bag of sushi off the floor and found his keys in his pocket. When he closed the door behind him he was crying.

  17

  No,” Camilla repeated and stared at Nymand wearily. “I have absolutely no reason to believe that Walther Sachs-Smith is responsible for the murder of his wife. But it doesn’t seem to matter what I say, does it? You don’t believe me anyway.”

  The chief superintendent cleared his throat. “That’s not entirely true,” he protested. “I believed you enough to have the new batch of analyses carried out—”

  “Yes,” Camilla cut in, “and I was right, wasn’t I? So try at least to entertain the assumption that what I’m saying now might be right, too.”

  Following her talk with Willumsen in his office, she had been summoned to the Mid and West Zealand Police in Roskilde at nine that morning. They had already been through the formalities about her risking being charged for withholding information, and Nymand had eventually accepted that she was entitled up to a point to protect her source.

  “You don’t really think Walther Sachs-Smith would be asking you to direct your attention to his wife’s death if it was he who had killed her?” she asked, looking him in the eye.

  Nymand did not reply.

  “I’m willing to tell you all about my meeting with him, but I’m not going to say where we met. It’s got no relevance.”

  “Very well,” said Nymand, tipping backward in his high-backed swivel chair.

  “Walther Sachs-Smith was present at a board meeting on Fyn when he received a phone call from the family housekeeper informing him of his wife’s suicide attempt. At that point the ambulance crew had yet to arrive on the scene, so Inger Sachs-Smith had not yet been pronounced dead,” Camilla began. “Naturally, he broke off his meeting immediately, but while he was in the car he received another phone call. His wife had failed to respond to any resuscitation attempts.”

  Nymand nodded while she spoke. So far everything she had said was already in the report.

  Camilla wondered for a moment whether she ought to have contacted Walther to square with him how much he wanted her to tell them.

  Too late now, she thought. Besides, there was no sense in holding anything back if she was meant to relieve him of a murder suspicion.

  “His attendance at the board meeting has been confirmed by the others who were present,” the chief superintendent put in.

  Camilla nodded without comment.

  “He disappeared after the service on the day his wife was put to rest. Having thanked the mourners, he drove home and packed a small suitcase. He left some personal documents and his wallet on his desk and went directly to the airport, taking with him his passport and a couple of credit cards allowing him access to his foreign bank accounts.”

  “Why?” Nymand interrupted. “What reason did he have to leave in such a hurry?”

  Camilla folded her hands in front of her and took a deep breath.

  “He already knew when he was called home from Fyn that Inger had not taken her own life, but to begin with he was unable to make sense of it. It was only that same evening when he withdrew to his office with a bottle of whiskey and his consuming grief that he discovered the icon was missing from the wall.”

  She paused as she noticed the same crease appear again on the chief superintendent’s brow.

  “There were any number of valuables on the Boserup property that a thief might have made off with. Anyone unfamiliar with the history of the Angel of Death would be highly unlikely to have targeted the icon.”

  Nymand had no time to interject before Camilla went on, relating the story of how the art treasure had fallen into the hands of Walther Sachs-Smith’s family and how for almost forty years they had retained the secret of its continued existence.

  “The day Inger died he was scared,” she explained. “He realized someone was after the icon, and he knew that whoever it was had killed his wife in order to get their hands on it. That’s why he elected to leave the country as soon as the funeral was over.”

  “And the original icon is still in existence?” Nymand inquired.

  Camilla nodded. “What’s more, he intends to exploit the fact in order to lure his wife’s killer into the open,” she said. “However, that won’t be an option until you realize that his wife was indeed murdered and that the two things are connected.”

  Nymand nodded pensively now.

  “Benefit of the doubt, I suppose,” he mumbled, before adding somewhat more clearly: “He’s always come across as a very decent and honest businessman, so it’s not that I don’t want to believe him.”

  “Anyone not knowing about the Angel of Death would be bound to suspect him, it stands to reason,” Camilla prompted. “But you have that information now.”

  He acknowledged that she was right.

  “Is he really somewhere abroad? Or is he still in Denmark?” Nymand probed, leaning forward in his chair. “And how would he be intending to go about this?”

  Camilla shook her head, unwilling to answer the first of his questions, unable to answer the second.

  “It would certainly make our inquiries a lot easier if we could talk to him ourselves.”

  She nodded and told him she was perfectly willing to facilitate the contact, but that she would have to speak to Walther first and let him make the first move.

  “Does he have any idea himself who might be after this icon?”

  “He has a list of names, people with a conceivable interest. He’s willing to send it to you, but not before you’re convinced there’s a connection. There are a number of international collectors, fanatics he calls them, who have shown an interest in tracing the object. He keeps himself informed on the subject and has collected all the articles that have appeared in the professional journals. I’m not sure if there’s anyone he actually suspects, though.”

  “Tell him we’d like to speak to him and that we’re naturally very interested in pursuing any lead he might provide as to his wife’s murder. However, we need something more to go on if we’re to get started.”

  Camilla was just about to stand up when Nymand took a deep breath and continued:

  “Remind me again of your own private involvement in the Sachs-Smith family.”

  Her jaw dropped in surprise and she fell back in the chair, wondering if she ought simply to ignore the question. At the same time, she was annoyed by the fact that he still seemed to be doubting her even after she had been straight with him about what she knew.

  “My involvement is no more than I’ve already stated. I met the man and listened to what he had to tell me. I’ve no other ties to Walther Sachs-Smith than that.”

  “It was more his eldest son I was thinking about,” the chief superintendent clarified.

  “I’m not involved with his son, if that’s what you mean,” she said curtly.

  Nymand raised an eyebrow.

  “As I understood it, the two of you were seeing each other at some point, is that right?”

  “At some point, yes. But not anymore,” Camilla replied, rising to her feet to escape the piercing gaze that now drilled into her private sphere. She strode to the door and opened it, only then turning to say good-bye, and shutting it quickly behind her as she left.

  In the corridor she paused for a moment and closed her eyes. She had been prepared for the eventuality that he would ask her about Frederik and had even worked out what she would say in reply. But when the question came it had thrown her completely.

  She walked toward the staircase, descending to the big glass entrance doors that led out into the parking lot.

  She missed him and thought about him all the time, no matter how much she tried not to. They had been so good together when she and Markus had stayed with him in Santa Barbara. He had come over to visit her twice after they came home again, and now he was doing everything right, calling her and sending her flowers.

  It was his quiet demeanor that drew her so compellingly. His equilibrium. The way h
e was so much more than simply his rich father’s son. Indeed, he seemed so unaffected by his family’s wealth, trusting instead his own singular talents. She had fallen for all these things, but he was still so far away. It was going to hurt once they got around to realizing that geography would work against them. She had decided to spare herself the pain.

  But hurt did not diminish for being self-inflicted.

  She sat for a while in the car before feeling ready to drive home, toying with the idea that perhaps she ought to pull out of this whole business concerning Walther and the death of his wife, and put the family behind her once and for all. Every time she returned to the matter of his father and the agreement they had made, she thought of Frederik, too. But it was no good; she couldn’t just pull out of a promise. Besides, she was already at work on the articles.

  18

  There were three messages for Naja Holten when she stopped by reception on Tuesday morning. All three concerned the premiere of her new movie. The film company’s PR department wanted her to confirm some interviews that were being slated for immediately after her return home so they could appear in the newspapers on the day of the premiere. Breakfast TV wanted her, too, and the national broadcasting company DR was inquiring about a phone interview for the TV news that same evening.

  There was a message from Jesper as well, asking her to call. He missed her.

  The cold blast of the lobby’s air-conditioning made the tiny hairs stand up on her forearms, so before sitting down at the guest computer to reply to her press secretary she popped back to her room to pick up a cardigan.

  She tossed her bag on the bed, picked up her cell phone, and went back out.

  It was more a feeling, an instinct rather than any physical sense, that alerted her. Was someone lurking there, at the end of the corridor? She closed the door behind her and stood still for a moment. But there was no one in sight.

  Shaking her head as though to dismiss the thought from her mind, she turned and started back toward reception, sensing her fright subside as she went. At the bend in the corridor she glanced back over her shoulder to reassure herself there was no one there, not even a shadow in the dim light.