The Fire Pit

by Chris Ould

  “Do you remember?” Nicklas asked.

  “It’s very different,” I said. “I think a lot’s changed.”

  “Yeh, yeh, for sure,” Nicklas said. “But if you rub under the surface a little, some of the old stuff is still there. We just make it more modern on top.”

  With the distraction of talking I’d moved along to the corridor a short way. “Do you think it’d be okay?” I asked, gesturing on.

  Nicklas gave a theatrical shrug. “Sure, go for it,” he said. “What do you say, ‘In for a penny’?”

  The first room was a small study with a desk and computer, and next to that was the bathroom. It was larger than the previous room, but not by much and the position of a low-silled window and the door dictated that the layout was probably the same as it had been forty years ago. Nothing else was the same. The basin, toilet and shower were modern and the tiles on the floor were almost new.

  This was where Lýdia had been – where she’d died – but there was no memory. Nothing. I couldn’t picture it; or rather, I knew not to trust the image my mind tried to superimpose: white enamel, brass taps and water, black and white tiles. And there was red. What my mind’s eye wanted to see – to remember – was coloured by that. But it was all an illusion. I didn’t know this place and there was nothing to see.

  After a moment I stepped backwards and closed the door tight.

  * * *

  On the way out I managed pleasantries, noncommittal and general, but with enough appreciation that Nicklas wouldn’t think he’d wasted his time. He locked the apartment door behind us and seemed happy enough that I’d got what I wanted when I told him that it had brought a few memories back and that it was good to see it again.

  By the front door we shook hands. “Thanks. I appreciate it,” I said. “You’ve been very kind.”

  He motioned it away. “No problem,” he said. “It was good to meet you.”

  The kindness of strangers.

  Outside I didn’t go back the way I had come because I knew what was there. Instead I walked in the opposite direction, until the houses and cottage gardens grew fewer, and eventually I turned off the road on to a damp, sandy footpath. It led into sparse woodland, climbing a bank, then emerging on the far side alongside a wide, flat expanse of water; too still to be a river and more like a lake. There were rushes along the shore and areas of gravel and sand, like small beaches. I stopped beside one of these, where a log had been placed for a seat overlooking the water, and because it was there I sat down to smoke.

  I suppose I’d hoped that by going into the apartment there would be some kind of jolt, to jumpstart any recollection I might have buried away. Memory doesn’t work that way, though. We see and remember what we choose to recall: maybe only what we believe will not hurt us, or what will allow us to live with ourselves. I knew that better than most.

  So the memories hadn’t come, either because they weren’t there or because self-preservation was still stronger than any intellectual desire to know. But if the past really is another country, then our past selves are different, too. We’re no longer the person we once were; either by choice or through attrition, the result is the same.

  I knew at first hand what it was like to rebuild myself, to slough off the past and grow a new skin, and I knew how I’d felt when events had lifted that skin just a little and exposed the raw flesh underneath.

  Leave it alone; don’t pick at the scab. I’d come this far and still didn’t know why Lýdia had chosen to die. The mute suicide is never really explained, but how somebody deals with that isn’t about the deceased, it’s about themself. It always is, and my own way had been never to ask.

  But now I had and now I knew – as much as I would ever know – and the only decision I had to make was whether I could simply accept that, for whatever reason, I hadn’t been enough to keep Lýdia from taking her life: accept and move on. Forgive, as Thea had said. My mother; myself.

  I dropped my cigarette butt in the grass and trod it out. If there had been a stone within reach I might have tossed it into the water, which was rippled and disturbed by the breeze: bright light catching grey facets of waves which disappeared a second later. On the far bank the windows of a couple of houses looked back at me from the cover of trees, as if waiting passively for a decision.

  Enough.

  I stood up.

  Enough.

  42

  “MIKKJAL, WOULD YOU LIKE A COFFEE?” HENTZE ASKED FROM the doorway of the cell.

  Tausen shook his head. He was sitting on a thin green mattress with his back to the wall, knees drawn up in front of him. He hadn’t moved from this position since he’d thrown up in the toilet. Beside him a copy of Weekendavisen lay untouched, along with the packet of sandwiches Hentze had brought in an hour ago. The bottle of water was still three quarters full.

  “Okay,” Hentze said. “Let me know if you change your mind.”

  He took a step back and put a hand to the door, but as he did so Tausen looked up. “Wait. Please,” he said.

  “Yes?” Hentze asked.

  For a second Tausen seemed to rethink his request, but then he rose stiffly to his feet. “I need to see a lawyer,” he said. “Here, before we go back. Then I’ll tell you… I’ll give you information about Astrid and Else. I had nothing to do with their deaths but I know who did. I know what really happened, and other things, too. I can tell you the whole thing, but it has to be agreed now. My lawyer needs to speak to the Prosecutor’s office.”

  “I can’t speak for the Prosecutor,” Hentze said. “But if you do have information I think it would be better to wait until we’re back in the Faroes with a lawyer who can—”

  “No. It has to be done now,” Tausen said, cutting in. “Before people know. Otherwise… Otherwise things that would prove it could be changed or destroyed.” He stiffened his shoulders. “Do you want to be responsible for that? For losing a case; for letting the real murderer escape?”

  There was some authority in Tausen’s speech now, as if he’d hit his stride, but Hentze had already drawn up the police officer’s resolutely impassive aspect. “I think it would take too long to do what you ask before our flight leaves,” he told Tausen. “But as soon as we’re in Tórshavn I’ll make sure there’s a lawyer available. That’s the best I can do.”

  Without waiting for a response he moved again to close the cell door, but now Tausen took an urgent step forward.

  “Wait. Just a minute.” He paused briefly. “Okay, listen. To prove I’m not… to prove that I mean this, let me ask you: do you know about a little girl being raped? It was some time between 1973 and 1974, I don’t know when exactly, but she was taken from somewhere on Borðoy: Hvannasund, somewhere like that. It must be in your files. You can check.”

  Hentze studied the other man for a second, then took his hand off the door and slid it into his pocket. “What was this little girl’s name?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” Tausen said, shaking his head. “But it was Boas who did it, I know that. He gave her a drink – a spiked drink – then he took her somewhere and he raped her.”

  “Did Boas admit this to you?” Hentze asked.

  “No, it was—” Tausen broke off for a second, as if judging how much to give away. “It was someone else; someone worse. But that’s as much as I’ll say now. Nothing else. If you want to know the whole picture I must have a lawyer. I must have assurances, and it has to be now.”

  Hentze let the silence hang for a moment, then he gestured back at the mattress. “Okay, why don’t you sit down again, Mikkjal? Let me see if I can verify what you say.”

  “And if you can, you’ll bring a lawyer?”

  “Let’s see what I can find out first.”

  Hentze left the cell, closed the door, then turned to see Annika standing at the end of the corridor. Hentze didn’t speak until they were both back in the office and the door to the corridor was closed behind them.

  “I wondered what was keeping you,” Annika said, h
alf in apology for her eavesdropping.

  Hentze waved it away. “How much did you hear?”

  “That Boas Justesen raped Sunnvør Iversen. And that he drugged her to do it.”

  Hentze nodded. “Which matches what Gunnar Berthelsen told me about the state she was in.”

  “So you think Tausen’s telling the truth?”

  Hentze pursed his lips. “A small part of it, maybe – or maybe nothing at all. I don’t think it matters. He’s obviously hoping that if he volunteers information about other crimes – other people – he can make some sort of deal with the Prosecutor over Boas’s murder.”

  Annika frowned. “But in that case, wouldn’t he have to have something really significant to offer?”

  “Well, if he’s blaming Boas he can concoct any story he likes. Boas can’t answer back now.”

  “Yes, I suppose so,” Annika said, not entirely convinced. “But if he was going to make up a story why would he mention Sunnvør? I mean, as far as he knows we’ve never even heard of her, so why would he link what happened to her with Astrid or Else’s deaths unless he does know more than he’s said?”

  Hentze drew a dissatisfied breath and rubbed his unshaven chin. “Yes, well, you might have a point there.”

  “So if he wants to talk, couldn’t we get him a lawyer?”

  “Sure, we could,” Hentze said. “The only thing is, if we start down that road we don’t know how long it might take, or even if it’ll turn out to be anything more than a delaying tactic so we miss our flight.”

  His dissatisfaction hadn’t abated – in fact it had got worse. He could ignore it, of course, but the obvious vehemence of Tausen’s assertions hadn’t been lost on him either and the nagging what if wouldn’t be silenced.

  “I think I’d better see what Remi thinks,” Hentze said, taking out his phone.

  “Hjalti, it’s not up to suspects to dictate the terms under which they’ll talk,” Remi Syderbø said, speaking up over the noise of his car when Hentze reached him a few moments later. “You know that. Besides, if he starts talking to lawyers the next thing we know they could be challenging our right to bring him back here at all. That’s probably what all this is about. Tausen’s not stupid, is he? And he’s got money, so he probably hopes he can get an expensive lawyer to hold things up while the arrest clock is running.”

  “Yeh, I’ve thought about that, of course,” Hentze said. “And you could well be right. Even so, Tausen definitely knows more than he’s said so far – especially about Múli. He’s also indicating that there are other crimes, too.”

  “You think that’s genuine?” Remi asked.

  Not wanting to muddy the waters of the case – not at a distance – Hentze still hadn’t told Remi about the human remains found at Vesborggård House and their possible connection to the man known as Mickey. He thought of doing so now – briefly – before dismissing it again.

  “I think there could be something in it, yes,” he said. “So if getting a lawyer in now makes the difference between getting him to open up now and refusing to comment once we get him back there…”

  “Yeh, I follow,” Remi said. “Hold on for a second, I need to park.”

  Hentze heard the engine note change in the background. He also suspected that Remi was using the delay to consider his stance.

  Remi came back on the line. “Listen, I’m not standing where you are, so I can’t properly judge what Tausen’s saying. I’d still prefer it if he was questioned here, but if you can satisfy yourself that he’s for real, then give him what he wants. And just remember that if he spins it out we’ll have to go through the Danes if we need to extend his detention.”

  “I’ll keep it in mind,” Hentze said. “Thanks.”

  “And let me know what you get,” Remi said, punctuated by the sound of his car door closing.

  “Will do.”

  Hentze rang off, looked at his phone for a moment, then made a decision.

  “I’m going to give Tausen the chance to stretch his legs,” he told Annika. “Just as far as here. Okay?”

  “Okay,” Annika said. “Do you want me to do anything?”

  “No, but if anyone comes in shoo them away.”

  He glanced round the room, a quick check of potential hazards, then went along the corridor and opened Tausen’s cell.

  Immediately he heard the locks turn Tausen stood up and faced Hentze expectantly.

  “I’ve been able to verify some of what you said,” Hentze told him. “A young girl was abducted and raped in April of 1974.”

  “Right. So—”

  Hentze held up his hand. “But I’m afraid that changes nothing,” he said. “We’ll look into it, of course – and any other details you want to give us – but when I spoke to him the Prosecutor was adamant that there couldn’t be any deals. You can’t trade one crime off against information on another; that’s not how things work.”

  Tausen looked crestfallen, but then stiffened, defiant. “Suit yourself then. You’ll never know. Give it a day and there’ll be nothing. I told you, he has money, resources; you’ll never get to the truth.”

  Hentze nodded sombrely. “Well, then,” he said. “I suppose you have the choice of spending your króna today or finding it’s worthless tomorrow. The only thing I can say is that if you choose to tell me something and I think it requires immediate action then I’ll take it directly to Vicekriminalkommissær Christine Lynge in Copenhagen. I’ll tell her exactly where the information has come from and ask her to act on it. That’s as much as I can do.”

  He considered Tausen for a second, then turned away. “I’ll leave the door open for now. You can have five minutes’ exercise in the corridor if you like.”

  * * *

  Annika looked up when Hentze came back to the office. He shrugged in answer to her unspoken question and moved to the coffee maker, inserting a capsule and standing over the machine as it ground away. When the flow of liquid ceased he picked up the cup and turned in time to see the door to the corridor open tentatively. Mikkjal Tausen took half a step into the room, his water bottle held in one hand.

  He glanced at Annika, then at Hentze.

  “I’ll make a statement,” he said. “But I won’t talk about Boas – about his death – without a lawyer. I’m saying – admitting – nothing about that, is that understood?”

  “If you’d like to make a statement, what you say is entirely up to you,” Hentze replied. “Do you want to sit down?”

  Tausen moved to the table and drew out the chair facing away from the door.

  “I want it recorded as well, the whole thing,” he said. “I want it on the record that I’ve helped you with this.”

  “Of course. That’s procedure.”

  Taking her cue, Annika took out her phone and set it to record. When Hentze sat down she placed it on the table between the two men, then stood by the wall out of Tausen’s sight line.

  “Are you ready?” Hentze asked.

  “Yes,” Tausen said.

  “Okay. This is a recorded interview with Mikkjal Tausen taking place at Kastrup airport holding cells. The time is 16:13 hours and those present are Mikkjal Tausen, Officer Annika Mortensen and Acting Inspector Hjalti Hentze of Tórshavn station.” He paused and looked at Mikkjal Tausen. “You wish to make a statement, is that correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay, go ahead.”

  Now that he had the floor Tausen seemed uncertain of the best place to start, but then he drew himself up squarely and said, “I’m making this statement in order to help the police with their investigation into the deaths at Múli on the Faroe Islands in 1974. The men responsible were Boas Justesen and Oscar Juhl. Oscar Juhl is also responsible for other crimes, including murder, and the rape of a girl at Vesborggård House near Skanderborg in 1976. I was a witness to some of those crimes.”

  As if he had got this far on a single thrust, like a swimmer pushing off from the side of the pool, Tausen paused, then picked up and drank from his bott
le of water.

  Sensing that Tausen might be searching for the best way forward again, Hentze said, “Can I ask a question?”

  Tausen nodded.

  “Who is this man, Oscar Juhl, and how did you know him?” Hentze asked.

  “I worked with him at Vesborggård House,” Tausen said. “It was a clinic, here in Denmark – a facility to rehabilitate young offenders. Oscar was in charge of research and development – the administrative side – but his family company, Juhl Pharmaceuticals, owned the clinic as well. I was part of the research team, assessing the effect of different drugs. We were—” He hesitated briefly. “We were friends. At least I thought so, until I found out what he’d done.”

  “And what was that exactly?” Hentze asked.

  “I told you: he raped a girl, one of the patients at the clinic. I found her and when I saw what he’d done – what he was going to do – I knew I couldn’t do nothing so I— I helped her. I got her away. But then, when Oscar found out, he admitted that he’d done it before. He told me about Múli – what he and Boas had done to a little girl there – and how they’d killed her mother as well and buried their bodies so no one would know.” Tausen leaned forward, pressing his point. “You have to understand, he wasn’t trying to hide it; he was boasting about it. He was proud of how clever they’d been. He admitted it all, I’ll swear to that in court.”

  On the edge of his vision, Hentze saw Annika shift, just a little, but he kept his attention fully focused on Tausen, timing his next question neither too fast nor too slow. He straightened slightly, as if for the crux of the matter.

  “When we spoke earlier, you said that if the person who’d committed these crimes found out that we were questioning you, he would destroy evidence of what he’d done. Is that right?”

  “Yes.” Tausen nodded. “He will. He’s bound to. He’ll know what I can tell you, so he’ll try to cover it up.”