‘Why? Isn’t it completely amazing?’
‘What’s so amazing about going around like a fat duck and hurting everywhere? I have nothing against having children, truly not. And I see twins as mostly being a big bonus. It’s better to reduce the years with small children as much as possible. But pregnancy… if I’m going to be completely honest, I hate it more and more every day.’
‘You don’t really mean that, do you?’
‘You said it yourself. I don’t look particularly happy, and what do you think is the cause of that, if not this?’ Malin pointed to her belly with one hand and took the wine glass with the other. ‘The first few weeks I joked with my husband, Anders, that he got to choose either pregnancy, delivery or nursing. That’s not a joke any more. If he doesn’t take over soon there won’t be any children to raise! So take my advice and never subject your – if I may say so – amazing body to pregnancy.’
‘It’s probably not going to happen any time soon.’
‘What do you mean? Are you single?’
‘No, but my boyfriend and I knalder way too little.’
‘Knalder?’ Malin illustrated by moving a finger into the space between her thumb and index finger.
Dunja nodded. ‘We’ve tried talking about it and even made a schedule for it at least once a week, but it didn’t help a bit.’
‘Do you love him?’
‘Carsten? Of course I do. We’re getting married this summer. The plan is to move to Silkeborg in the autumn.’
‘Silkeborg? Isn’t that on Jutland? Excuse me, but what the hell are you going to do there?’
‘Carsten’s going to take over his father’s accounting firm.’
‘But what about you? You have a career here, right?’
‘Yes, but… I don’t want to work full-time with small children anyway.’
‘Dunja, now you listen to me.’ Malin filled both their glasses.
‘Maybe you should be careful that the wine doesn’t get out of hand.’
‘Now I’m the one who’s talking,’ said Malin. ‘And listen to me very closely. I’ve never said this to anyone and presumably I’m never going to say it again. But… you shouldn’t have kids. In any event, not with this Carsten, or whatever his name is.’
‘How can you say that?’ Dunja set aside the glass.
‘If you’ve got a body like yours beside you in bed, you have to be very peculiar for there to be too little “knalderi”, if I’m going to be frank.’
‘Frank?’
‘Either Carsten is homosexual, or he doesn’t love you. And the question is whether you love him.’
‘Of course, we love each other. What the hell gives you the right to come here and—’
‘I’m just telling you what I see.’
‘And what’s that?’
‘I see a woman who… who… okay, I think it speaks for itself. The whole arrangement with this Carsten seems completely…’ Malin fell silent and suddenly realized how thin the ice was beneath her. She set aside the glass and covered her mouth. ‘Oh, my God, excuse me.’ This was certainly not the first time she had just blathered on and said exactly what she thought, but this was the first time she did it to someone she barely knew. ‘Forgive me. I’m sorry. I take back everything. It wasn’t my intention at all to barge in and… Oh, God, how stupid. I don’t know what’s got into me.’
‘Maybe just a little too much of a good thing?’
‘Probably. Besides, my hormones are not to be toyed with at the moment. The best you can do is to keep your distance, which I wish I could do myself.’
Dunja burst into laughter and raised her glass.
4
FABIAN LOOKED OUT OVER Riddarfjärden to the melody of Arcade Fire’s ‘Black Mirror’. The light from the thousands of illuminated windows from the heights of Södermalm reflected in the water and he was struck by how beautiful it was. The surface steamed, at once enticing and treacherous, almost as if it was warm, when in reality it was only hours from freezing to ice.
The song reached a crescendo.
He lowered the volume and searched for her number on his phone, and pressed dial. It didn’t take more than two rings.
‘Hey there, it’s been a while.’
‘Yeah, I guess it’s almost two years since you quit. Sorry if I’m calling a little late,’ he said, even though he thought she sounded anything but tired.
‘No problem. The night is young, and you know me.’
‘Maybe you’ve settled down, started a family and get up early.’
He could hear her laughing on the other end. For Niva Ekenhielm the nuclear family was about as improbable as life on the moon. They had been colleagues at the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation for six years where she worked as an IT investigator, or sci-fi cop, as they’d called it. It had been more of the rule than the exception that Niva was still at work when everyone else had left, slogging far into the night and not going home until the next morning, when people started coming in again.
Fabian had kept her company and spent the night at the department on a number of occasions. Usually it was because he found himself in the middle of an investigation that gave him insomnia, but sometimes it had just been a chance to clear his desk.
On each occasion, Sonja had reacted with a jealousy so strong that it risked corroding their whole relationship. And in a way he could understand it. Niva had both charisma and was incredibly good-looking. Besides, there was something about her attitude. In the beginning he’d assumed she acted that way to all men, but soon he understood that she’d been flirting with him. Even though he’d let it be known that he wasn’t interested, she’d kept up her insinuations and done less and less to hide what she was really after.
But this time he was the one who was after something.
‘Fabian, what can I do for you? You haven’t got divorced, have you?’
‘No, we won’t have that much fun.’ Fabian regretted it immediately, and tried to rescue it with a laugh. ‘Joking aside, I need your help with a case that has to be kept outside the building.’
‘Can it wait till tomorrow?’
‘Preferably not.’
He fixed his gaze on the Münchenbryggeriet Conference Centre on the opposite side of Riddarfjärden and started counting how many windows were illuminated. He could hear Niva walking back and forth in high heels on a creaking parquet floor.
‘Okay, tell me.’
5
KAREN NEUMAN HAD BEEN afraid of the dark for as long as she could remember. When she was little, living in a small town outside Copenhagen, she’d believed in monsters that hid under the bed or behind the curtain, so she always kept a light on when she was sleeping. Her parents thought it was normal at that age and were convinced that she would grow out of it. Instead the problem got worse, and when Karen entered her teens she suffered from such severe insomnia that she had to take sleeping pills.
Now she no longer believed in monsters under the bed, but her fear of the dark still held its grip on her and she would never manage without the pills, something that didn’t improve now that winter was only just beginning and it was getting darker and darker with every passing day.
They lived in an old half-timbered house, which was no great help either. It was very lovely, situated on the Danish coast with an outstanding view of Öresund, but Karen had never really been able to enjoy it, because however you twisted it, the sea wasn’t their nearest neighbour – it was darkness.
The pressure in her chest had alleviated a bit over time because of the many hours she had spent in therapy, not to mention the small fortune Aksel had paid for the outdoor lights. But the feeling was far from gone, even if she could now manage to stay home alone when he was working on his evening TV 2 show three nights a week. On those nights she insisted on keeping every light in the house on, despite Aksel’s protests about the high electricity bills.
But tonight the pressure in her chest was more tangible. As soon as she came home from yoga shortly
after nine, she’d sensed that something was in the air. She had first noticed the sports car parked a little out of the way down Gammel Strandvej. A parked car was nothing unusual; on the contrary, it was relatively common that people would leave their cars to walk along the shore, but not during the winter months. It was definitely not normal that a car with Swedish licence plates found its way down to Tibberup, even if it was only a kilometre or so north of the Louisiana Art Museum.
She tried to resist the temptation to give in to the fear, just as she’d agreed to with the therapist, and continued to calmly walk through the garden towards the house. But when the garden lighting didn’t turn on, even though she jumped and waved her arms in front of the motion detector, she’d felt helplessly lost and her heart rate doubled. She ran as fast as she could up to the door, unlocked it and turned off the alarm with trembling fingers.
Fortunately, the indoor lights were working, and she illuminated the whole house with the remote control. She went into the kitchen and boiled a big cup of water and added some squeezed lemon, a pinch of Himalaya salt and honey to restore her substance balance after the Bikram session. Assuming a fuse had blown, she felt a sense of calm returning.
‘I’m sure it was nothing,’ she repeated out loud to herself on her way to the living room. She grabbed her tablet that was sitting on the coffee table, and scrolled to Lisa Nilsson, whose voice always calmed her. She pressed play and music started streaming out of the concealed speakers in the ceiling. Aksel had initially struggled to get her to understand the advantage of streaming music instead of putting on a CD. Now she couldn’t imagine not having the freedom to take music to any room in the house with a single click.
She walked to the bathroom, where she ran a hot bath, took off her yoga clothes, put up her hair and sank down into the Jacuzzi, letting the massage jets work on her body. She relaxed and closed her eyes. ‘I’m sure it was nothing,’ she repeated to herself, and sang along with ‘Heaven Round the Corner’ in the best Swedish accent she could.
Aksel had warned her that he would probably be spending the night in the apartment on Vesterbro and not be home until breakfast tomorrow. There were guests on the programme, who would almost certainly want to have a few drinks after the broadcast. But she would have no problem passing the time at home. After the bath she would add yesterday’s chicken salad to some quinoa, settle down in front of the TV and binge watch as many episodes of Mad Men as she could, even though Aksel expected her to watch his show.
But as Lisa Nilsson faded out, the uncertainty came creeping back. Had she heard a door closing out in the hall? It couldn’t be Aksel, could it? The show hadn’t even started yet. Karen pressed on the Jacuzzi’s panel so that the massage jets fell silent and reached over the edge to pause the music on the tablet before the next song started. Her hand was too wet and soon Lisa was going on again with ‘Never, Never, Never’.
Thoughts whirled through Karen’s head. Should she lock herself in the bathroom or venture out into the house and see if there really was someone there? She got out of the tub and dried her hands so that she could turn off the music. The silence fell over the room so abruptly that it gave her a start. Her entire body was now tense as a spring and she felt like a five-year-old again – a five-year-old with a monster under the bed.
She slipped over to the bathroom door and put her ear against it. All she could hear was her own breath. It took all her courage to push down the handle and open the door slightly. It creaked so loudly that the sound cut into her belly. She’d been after Aksel so many times about that door that it had become a standing joke.
Maybe it was just Aksel. After all, the show might have been cancelled for some reason. She stuck her head out and called to him, but there was no answer. And why should there be? She was the only one home – or was she?
She yelled again, this time really loud, but was met by the same suffocating silence. The sound of the door had probably just been in her head. Her father always said she had a lively imagination.
She shook her head and decided to get back into the bath and try to relax, but she changed her mind almost immediately, stood up again and dried off. She carefully rubbed her body butter on herself, especially the area around the scar. She always felt a sting of immorality whenever she stood naked in front of the mirror, even though over ten years had passed. Besides, it didn’t seem as if the sensory nerves ever intended to repair themselves. The area was numb, and if she drew her fingers on one place she felt it somewhere else entirely. But she didn’t complain – everything had a price.
She put on her silk kimono and left the bathroom, whistling ‘Heaven Round the Corner’, and continued towards the kitchen. As usual, it was freezing cold in the hall, and she reminded herself to nag Aksel until he agreed to extend the under-floor heating there, too. But this time it was colder than normal. She stopped mid-step and turned towards the front door, which was ajar. Hadn’t she closed it properly? She always locked it behind her, even in the middle of the day.
She had been jittery since she came home. First the parked car and then the garden lights that didn’t work. I’ve just been careless, she thought, closing the door. To be on the safe side she checked that it was really locked, before continuing towards the kitchen where she arranged a chicken salad plate and put out a carbonated bottle of water. She set everything on a tray and walked to the living room. Then the phone started ringing.
She set the tray aside and went over to grab the phone. Instead of answering, she stared at it as if, by pure mental force, she could get it to stop ringing, but it refused to obey.
Finally, she gathered her courage and picked up the receiver. ‘Yes, hello?’
‘Why didn’t you answer?’
‘Aksel? Is it you?’
‘Yes, who did you think it would be? I’ve called your cell so many times. But—’
‘My cell?’ Only now did she realize that she had no idea where she’d put it.
‘I just wanted to check in and make sure that you’re okay with me sleeping in town.’
‘Do you have to?’
‘But, sweetheart, you know how it is. Some guests more or less demand that we go out after the show and Casper is one of them.’
She thought she heard a noise from the hall, but this time it wasn’t the door shutting. It sounded like something quite different, almost like something rolling. Or was it just the wind howling outside?
‘Sorry, I missed that. What did you say?’
‘It’s nothing important. Just go to bed. I’ll come home with fresh bread tomorrow.’
‘No, I really want you here tonight. Please, can you come home right now?’
‘Now? How would that work? The broadcast starts in eight minutes.’
‘I know, but I feel like there’s something or someone… I’m not really sure. Can you just come home? Please, I’m begging you.’
‘Sweetheart, I don’t know how many times we’ve been through this: the dark can be tough. We all feel the same way, but there are no monsters under the bed, I promise. There never have been and there never will be either. Okay? If you put on the TV, it will almost be like I’m at home.’
‘Okay.’
‘I have to go. I love you and I’ll see you tomorrow.’
Aksel hung up and Karen set down the phone with a sigh. She went out into the hall and looked around, but saw nothing different – until she lowered her eyes to the floor. The transparent plastic surface protector had been rolled out from the front door all the way through the hall and further around the corner into the corridor.
‘Hello?’ she yelled, following the plastic around the corner and down the hallway. ‘Excuse me? Hello!’
The house was completely silent, except for the plastic film that rustled under her feet. She was surprised at herself for not running in the opposite direction. It felt as if something inside her was tired of being afraid. She was more angry than afraid. Whatever kind of monster this was, she intended to look it right in the eyes �
� at least that’s what her therapist always told her to do.
She followed the protector into their bedroom and looked around. The plastic she was standing on continued across the wall-to-wall carpeting and up on to the double bed.
‘Hello, is anyone there? Because if there is come out! Come out, if you dare! Come here and look me in the eyes!’ She waited and could feel her legs shaking under her. ‘I thought so! When it comes down to it you wouldn’t dare!’
She waited but couldn’t see anything except the plastic on the bed and under her feet. Then she heard a noise, a hissing sound right behind her. When she turned around and tried to determine its origin she saw white smoke seeping out between the slats in the wardrobe door. She didn’t even consider fleeing. Instead she walked up to it, as if she had no other choice than to find out what was inside.
Just as she opened the door, she realized that she’d been right all along.
Someone dressed in heavy dark clothing and boots with their face hidden behind a gas mask came out of the wardrobe.
‘Who are you and what are you doing here?’ Karen burst into tears and felt her legs buckling under her. ‘Answer me. Please! What do you want? Why are you here!?’
But Karen got no answer. All she could hear was the hissing from the gas mask. And never again would Karen need to be afraid.
6
FABIAN RISK HAD BOTH hands on the wheel as he drove out of the city through the burgeoning snowstorm. He was trying to dismiss the uncomfortable feeling that he had absolutely no grasp of his new assignment’s potential magnitude. He really ought to decline Edelman’s instructions and head home to his kids, but he couldn’t turn his back on it.
Edelman had specifically given the task to him, and he knew himself well enough to know that he would pursue it regardless of how many warning lights were blinking. The Minister for Justice had been missing since this afternoon and, like Edelman, he didn’t believe for a moment that the minister had chosen to disappear of his own accord and would soon show up again.
The Ninth Grave Page 4
