“The note said the proof was where she lived?” asked Thorsen.
“Yes.”
“She kept notes in English?”
“No,” said Flynn. “The other reporter, Olsen, he gave me a translation. He said there was an underlined note about bevis.”
“Proof,” said Thorsen.
“Yes, and he said it read hvor hun bliver. Where she lives.”
Begitte said, “That’s how it read? Hvor hun bliver?”
“That’s what he told me. I never got to see the notes.”
Begitte looked at Thorsen, who returned her gaze with a shrug.
“Maybe it’s nothing,” said Begitte, “but to say this—hvor hun bliver—you might mean to say where she lives, but not exactly. To say where she lives is hvor hun bor. The literal translation of bliver in this context is to stay. It says where she stays, not where she lives.”
“What’s the difference?”
“Colloquially, nothing. Like in English, you might say my house or my crib. Literally different, but if you know the language, the same meaning. Unless you actually mean to refer to a crib, as in a baby.”
“What are you getting at?”
“Luna lived at our parents’ house before it burned down. But you learned that she did not sleep there, she did not stay there. She couldn’t take the memories, so she let people believe she lived there, but she actually stayed somewhere else.”
Chapter Forty-Seven
They ran across the lawn, using flashlights to guide them, forgoing the path around the circle of houses for the direct line to the Jensen house. Flynn led the way around the side of the house, where he flicked the breaker box back on. Then he led them into the rear yard and over to the fence, beyond which the barley stood still in the night. Flynn stopped at the tiny house and put his hand up under the wheel arch, finding a single key there.
He used it to unlock the door to the small home that wasn’t where Luna Fisker lived but where she stayed. He moved inside to allow the other three in, and he hit the lights, which for a moment blinded them all.
“Take a quadrant,” he said. “Be methodical. Under, in, behind.”
The four each picked a section of the tiny house and started searching. If Luna had proof and she had hidden it where she stayed, it would be here. They opened cupboards and looked in the storage underneath the small sofa and tapped the floor for loose boards. There wasn’t a lot of space for four people to work. Gorski tapped along the walls looking for cavities. Thorsen and Gorski pulled the mattress from the loft, and Flynn opened up the platform underneath, where seasonal bedding and items were stored.
He pulled out an old shoebox, opened the lid, and found nothing inside but a small single black plastic canister.
A 35-millimeter film canister.
He looked at it for a moment and then glanced at the other three people. They were all looking at the canister as if it couldn’t be real, as if it held the secrets of the universe.
Flynn told Gorski and Thorsen to get the mattress back inside. He told Begitte to go home and he would be back soon.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Developing.”
“Developing what? The film? How?”
“I know a little about this stuff. I used to do photography with my dad.”
“I’m coming,” she said.
“No, you’re not. I’ll come to you.”
“You think you can stop me from knowing what happened to my sister?”
“No, I don’t. Nor do I want to. But I don’t know what, if anything, we’ll find here. There may be things you don’t need to see. Things that can’t be unseen. Please. Let me find out. I’ll come to you.”
She relented but not happily. Flynn knew she would be thinking about it, creating the worst possible scenario in her head. He couldn’t stop that, but he could use it. He would find nothing, or he would find something. But if it was something, it might not be as bad as what she came up with herself, and that might cushion the blow.
Flynn strode around the Jensen house, turned the breaker box off again, then walked down the path to the second-to-last house from the end. The one belonging to the old man, Lars. He knew a lot about bees. He liked to photograph them. He liked to develop the shots himself. It was therapeutic, he said.
After flicking the breaker once more, Flynn moved to the rear of the house. Lars had left his back door unlocked. Perhaps the act of a forgetful old man, or the habit of a lifetime. Flynn stepped inside and went straight to the bathroom. It was small and rustic. A shower but no bath, and a large wash basin like something normally found in a laundry room. Perhaps repurposed. A melamine board lay across the basin. But no developing supplies.
Flynn stepped out of the bathroom and noticed a closet straight across the tight hallway. He opened it. He found a set of bedsheets and a blanket and pillows. On the shelf above, there was a ream of eight-by-ten Arista photographic paper, an enlarger, and a red safelight on a cord. There were chemicals: developer and stop bath and fixer. There were trays and quick easels and tongs. On the shelf below the bedding he found measuring cylinders and a developing tank.
Lars knew his stuff. Flynn got the chemicals ready first. Took the developer to the kitchen and scanned the instructions and diluted it. Then he took a cylinder of the diluted solution into the bathroom. He grabbed the developing tank and a spiral. He unscrewed the top off the tank and placed the items in a line on the melamine board.
This was the part Flynn’s father had mostly taken care of because it was the risk point, where everything or nothing could go wrong. He took out the film cassette from the canister and removed the end cap from the cassette. It was black-and-white film, which made things somewhat easier. It was also very old film, and as he held it in his hand, he wondered if it would fail to reveal its secrets.
He switched off the light and worked in darkness by feel alone. He pulled the start of the film out and tucked it into the spiral, then used the spiral to wind the film out of the cassette. When the entire roll was wound onto the spiral, he put it into the developing tank and screwed the cap on.
Next he kicked the door open and allowed a hint of ambient light to come in. He filled the developing tank with solution, turned it up and down a few times, and then hit the stopwatch on his watch.
He left the tank in the bathroom and started taking equipment out of the cupboard and setting up in the kitchen. He flicked a light on and found a string draped across the room above the counter with pegs on it, as though Lars did his laundry inside. Flynn suspected it wasn’t a laundry thing. Lars developed a lot of prints.
Flynn set up the three trays and diluted more chemicals, then prepared the enlarger and placed the easel flat on the counter below it. He collected the developing tank, and then when his stopwatch went off, he gave a little extra time to allow for the age of the film. He poured out the developer and poured in the stop bath. He put the lid on and turned the tank upside down and back again for thirty seconds, then he poured out that solution and poured in the fixer. He upturned the tank again and let it sit for a few minutes.
Out of caution rather than necessity, he turned on the red safelight and turned off the light in the kitchen. He rinsed the tank twice with water, then he removed the cap and pulled out the spiral.
Flynn hung the end of the roll from a peg and used a squeegee to clean the water off the negatives. He left them hanging to dry a bit and retrieved the photographic paper. He placed a piece of the paper in the easel. He checked that the F-stop on the enlarger was at 8, a good starting point, and then glanced at the negatives.
He could see images there. Too small to make out faces and actions, but he suspected what was on them. For a moment he hesitated about bringing them to life, but they had done all the ill they could do, and now he planned to use them to set some things right. He could analyze the negatives, check the focus in the easel, and do a test print to ensure the best contrast. But he wasn’t looking for a prize, so he just got at
it.
He took the negatives and put the first one on the roll in the negative holder, slipped it in the enlarger, and lit it up for ten seconds. It would be enough, or not. Probably okay for his purposes. A little overexposed or a little underexposed, one way or the other. Enough to make out faces.
He took the paper out and sloshed it in the first tray, then the second and the third. Developer, stop bath, fixer. Make the print appear, stop the developing, fix the image in the paper for good. As he watched it under the solution, he saw the first picture was a face. A woman. After he finished rinsing it under water, he hung the image from the string and looked at it. It was light, underexposed. But enough to see that it was not a woman. It was a girl. A young Freja Jensen, twenty years earlier. Half smiling, as if not completely happy but fulfilling the social conventions when faced with a camera lens.
Flynn started over. He moved to the next negative, put it in the enlarger, and let it go for twelve seconds. Through the chemical baths and rinsed and hung from a peg. It was another of Freja, like a portrait. A pleasant-enough shot.
Then Flynn developed a similar portrait of Luna Fisker. A full facial shot, unblemished by time or denial or drugs. Then a shot of two young guys. They were definitively older than the girls but not really men. They were no older than Flynn had been when he had joined the French Foreign Legion, but they had seen nothing and done nothing. Life was comfortable, yet to throw up any real challenges, so they had the slack posture of boys pretending to be men.
Flynn developed all the shots. They were photographs of friends enjoying good times. Smiles and drinks and some weed. All innocent enough.
Until they weren’t.
Flynn knew he was looking at something different before he had even put the negative in the holder. He saw the image in the enlarger and felt his skin crawl. He washed it through the chemicals and hung it and willed himself not to look, as if it was not something he should see.
He saw Luna Fisker. She lay naked on a bed. There was a man between her legs looking at the camera with a mischievous expression. Having himself a hell of a time. He was not Victor Berg. Flynn didn’t recognize him at all. But he didn’t spend much time on the man’s face. He couldn’t take his eyes off Luna Fisker.
Her eyes were filled with pure unvarnished terror.
Chapter Forty-Eight
Flynn went back to the enlarger and, using a piece of plain paper to cover Luna, he exposed a picture of the man with the mischievous grin. He printed the image and the others after it. They didn’t get any easier to look at. The last picture was telling. It was the two men, Berg and the other, sitting on a sofa, enjoying a cigarette. Neither of the girls was in the shot; clearly one had taken the picture. Flynn guessed it was Luna. He guessed that after taking it, she removed the film and replaced it with a fresh one, keeping the original for herself. She already knew that what had happened would be impossible to prove otherwise.
He didn’t pack up. There would be time for that later, or not. He cut the negatives, slipped them into plastic sleeves, and put the photos in a large envelope. He turned the power off to Lars’s house, then he walked back over to the Thorsens’. He left the envelope against the side of the house and went in.
They were waiting in silence. There was no conversation, no planning, no nervous chatter. Three faces looked at him as he stepped into the living room. He held up the doctored picture of the other young man.
“Who’s that?” asked Gorski.
“I don’t know. Do you?”
Gorski shook his head. Thorsen shook his head. Flynn showed the shot to Begitte.
“Is that it?” she asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Is that all there was on the film? One photo?”
“No. There are others.”
“Where are they?”
“You don’t want to see them.”
Begitte clenched her jaw. “Are they proof?”
“Yes,” said Flynn. “They are proof. Berg is in them, and this guy.”
“I know who he is,” said Begitte.
“Who?”
“I’ve seen his face. I’ve seen those eyes before. He’s that media guy, the one who owns all the newspapers and TV stations. What’s his name?”
“Let me see again,” said Thorsen.
Flynn handed him the photograph.
“Okay, I see it. You’re thinking of Oscar Madsen, the media baron.”
“Yes, that’s him,” said Begitte.
“Madsen,” said Flynn. “Freja said that Berg kept referring to this guy as a madman. Maybe he was saying Madsen.”
“Or it’s a nickname,” said Gorski. “Madsen, madman.”
“No, hold on,” said Thorsen. “Oscar Madsen has to be more than seventy years old, which puts him at fifty at the time of this photo. This is a young guy, maybe twenty, but not fifty.”
Flynn stepped over to Thorsen. “Does he have a son?”
Thorsen shrugged. Flynn jinked his head at Thorsen’s laptop. Thorsen said, “Oh,” and began typing. When he was done, he flipped his screen around so they all could see it.
It was a graduation picture, a half dozen young guys in robes, finishing their university days and heading off into the world. One of the guys was a young Victor Berg. One of the others was the guy from Flynn’s photo.
“Who is he?” asked Gorski.
“Flynn’s right. He’s Oscar Madsen’s son. His name is Mads Madsen.”
* * *
It was time. The opposition forces had been weakened and disoriented as much as was ever likely, so now it was time. Begitte made coffee because tea wouldn’t cut it. It was late and was going to be a lot later before anyone got any sleep.
Flynn took out the obnoxious woman’s phone and called Klaasen’s mobile. He had left a note saying to meet at the skate park at Fælledparken in Copenhagen. Flynn expected that Klaasen would have men there already, at 11:30 p.m. Not Ager and not his team, and not the new guy who had joined them in the cellar. Maybe the remnants of that guy’s team.
“Where are you?” asked Klaasen. “We’re waiting.”
“Who’s waiting? Not you. You’re not at the skate park.”
“Neither are you.”
“Got that right. I’m not interested in talking to more of your men. I need to talk to you directly.”
“So talk.”
“Face to face.”
“Where are you?”
“Østvand.”
“Østvand?”
“Yeah. I know you know where it is.”
“When?”
“Now.”
“It’s late. I’m not going out now.”
“You think you’re going to send a hit squad instead?” asked Flynn. “Listen, pal, you want to talk about Mads Madsen, then let’s talk. Right now. Tomorrow’s too late. For him and for you.”
“I don’t know what you think you have.”
“I have it all. And I’m a ghost. I don’t exist, so Mads’s daddy can’t run a smear campaign on a ghost. I can just keep nipping away from the shadows, and I’m sure old Oscar doesn’t pay you for that. But that’s your decision.”
Flynn killed the call.
Flynn knew he would come. Now the power was out in the open. Now Klaasen couldn’t leave it just to the grunts. Klaasen was a soldier, a special ops man. When a general told him to take care of things, he would take care of things. Himself. Flynn was confident of that. Whether that turned out to be a good thing was yet to be determined.
* * *
Klaasen called the second in command of Beta unit and made him team leader in lieu of the regular team leader. The regular guy had been sent to find Ager and had gone AWOL himself, so now Klaasen was scrambling, working with a guy whom he barely knew. He had primed the team leader and had relied on him to bring his guys along. He had, so he said, and the second in command had responded when called. That was a good sign. How good these guys were, and how far they’d go for Klaasen—that was unknown.
; The team was short by one, so it was now a unit of four. They were deployed to the skate park at Fælledparken, hiding around the darkened concrete course.
“Nothing to report, sir.”
“The mark just contacted me.”
“He contacted you, sir?”
“Yes. He’s not coming. He’s in Østvand.”
“Where?”
“It’s a village out near Stenløse. I’ve got a chopper coming to you. Be ready for exfil in ten.”
“Yes, sir.”
Klaasen made a second call to an old unit pal to arrange a chopper. Not tomorrow, not in an hour. Now. There was a chunk of cash in it for his friend. Told him to write it up as exercises. Klaasen said he’d sign it.
He called his driver and strode out of his office. His assistant made to speak but saw the look in his eyes and held it. Smart woman, he thought. He dashed down to the executive parking lot where his driver was waiting.
“Fælledparken,” he said. “Get me there yesterday.”
The driver drove fast. It was a government car that had no lights or sirens, but fortunately the hour was late. He had Klaasen at the park in eight minutes. He didn’t head to the skate park. That was old news. He stopped outside the Niels Bohr Institute. Klaasen told him to go home and strode past the institute and into the park. Half a dozen football pitches waited side by side in darkness for daylight to return and the players to take the field.
The Rotten State: A John Flynn Thriller Page 29
