by David Hewson
‘I’m staying alive,’ Raben barked back. ‘I’m the only one who managed that. I need to see the personnel files.’
‘It’s the cadets’ ball,’ Jarnvig said, spreading his arms wide. ‘They keep old records at Holmen now, in the personnel office.’
‘I need—’
‘PET know where you are. They’ve been following you all along.’
‘Bullshit.’
‘It’s true,’ Jarnvig insisted. ‘They let you stay loose because they hoped you’d bring these terrorists out into the open.’
‘What terrorists? You don’t believe—’
‘Do everyone a favour and give yourself up.’
‘I need those files.’
‘Are you listening to me? PET are here tonight. They know you’re inside. If you got this far it’s only because they let you. Be smart for once.’
Raben checked the gun, the magazine.
‘Oh for God’s sake,’ Jarnvig cried. ‘Don’t make it worse. I’ll come with you. I can speak up for you—’
‘Speak up for me?’ Raben yelled and the gun came up a fraction.
‘If you give me a chance.’
‘The same chance I had before?’
The scruffy man with the unkempt beard, grubby clothes and scruffy hair seemed so far from the immaculate soldier who’d taken Louise down the aisle. Torsten Jarnvig had been proud that day, even if he had his misgivings.
‘I was coming home,’ Raben said in a low, bitter tone. ‘I had two weeks to go. Then I was back with Louise and little Jonas. Out of the army. A new life. A new home. And now . . .’
The gun shook in his fingers.
‘It’s been two years of hell and it’s never going to end, is it? You could have given me a chance back then. You could have investigated Perk—’
‘There was no Perk, Jens. You ruined everything. For yourself. For Louise and Jonas.’
‘I told the truth! Priest knew it too. Why would he lie? Or the others? I tried to stop him.’
‘Who?’
‘Perk! He had the officers’ academy badge tattooed on his shoulder.’ Raben tapped his temple with his free hand. ‘I can see him now.’
‘You said the man you attacked first of all was Perk—’
‘I know what happened! I know what I saw.’ He glared at Jarnvig. ‘You were my commanding officer. You should believe me first. Not PET. Or whoever’s spinning these tales. To hell with it . . .’
He went for the door.
‘Stop.’
Raben had his fingers on the handle.
‘They’re looking for you, Jens. I told you. Go that way.’ He pointed to a side exit. ‘There’s a corridor. It leads out into the garden. Keep your head down.’
The man in the grimy clothes stared at him.
‘Just do it will you?’ Jarnvig pleaded.
Raben shambled off. With trembling fingers Torsten Jarnvig lit a cigarette, looked at himself in the mirror as he smoked it.
Halfway through a man marched in. Dark suit. Earpiece. PET. Had to be. Said Bilal was behind him.
‘The toilets are at the end of the hallway,’ Jarnvig told him. ‘Show him, Bilal.’
The man looked the colonel up and down, checked the room, the curtains, everywhere, then left.
Torsten Jarnvig finished his cigarette and went back to the ball.
Jan Arild sat on his own, furious, his vulpine face flushed with booze and anger.
‘That was a long call,’ he said. ‘Any news?’
‘No,’ Jarnvig said. ‘Just personal.’
Arild folded his arms, watched Louise still on the dance floor in the arms of Christian Søgaard.
‘Now that,’ he said, ‘is a couple.’
Thomas Buch was starting to know too well the labyrinth of corridors from his office opposite the twisting dragons to Grue Eriksen’s quarters. So when he was summoned he broke recent habit, got a coat, walked outside, behind his own ministry past the little square where he used to eat sandwiches by the statue of Søren Kierkegaard, ambled to the Christianborg Palace through the cold damp night.
Along the way he called home. He and Marie had married when they were nineteen and Buch was still working on the farm, learning the business. They seemed to have been together for ever but that night, in the chilly Copenhagen drizzle, she felt distant from him. She hated the city, the noise, the commotion. He no longer noticed. There were other, more pressing matters. The conversation was difficult and trite, which was less than she deserved. He’d abandoned her in a way, and the pressing questions Monberg had left hidden in his papers meant Thomas Buch barely had time to feel regret.
The call ended outside the imposing facade of the palace. Buch walked in, went upstairs. The Prime Minister didn’t look too mad. But he was.
‘I had no choice,’ Buch said, taking a seat opposite the silver-haired man behind the vast shiny desk from which he ran the nation. ‘I wanted to prevent—’
‘Be silent, Thomas, and listen to me for a moment.’ Grue Eriksen leaned back in his chair, put his hands together. ‘I didn’t hesitate when I appointed you. Nothing in your past suggested you’d be rash enough to stab your own government in the back.’
‘You didn’t hear me out . . .’ Buch began.
‘You called a press conference without my knowledge. Accused one of your own colleagues of criminal behaviour. These accusations cannot be retracted . . .’
Buch shook his head.
‘I’ve no wish to retract them. The facts—’
‘I’ve worked with Rossing since he first entered politics. I know him. I trust him.’
‘Then let me ask him some questions, in front of the Security Committee. That’s all I want.’
‘You’ve backed me into a corner, haven’t you?’
‘It’s important we get to the bottom of this!’
The Prime Minister leaned back in his chair and muttered a quiet curse.
‘And there I was thinking I was raising a simple farm boy to Minister of State. You learn more quickly than I thought. And a few tricks I’d rather you’d missed. Do you realize what you’ve started?’
‘Tell me,’ Buch answered miserably.
‘A witch-hunt, one I’m now forced to play out in public. If there’s something amiss it’s got to come out. In the open. For all to see, whatever the damage.’
‘Transparency is all I ask.’
‘But if this is nothing but gossip and speculation,’ Grue Eriksen added in a cold and vicious tone, his finger raised, his eyes blazing, ‘I will send you back to Jutland to sweep up cow shit for the rest of your life.’
The Prime Minister glanced at his watch.
‘You can go now,’ he said.
Back in the office Plough and Karina were dissecting the latest news from the Politigården.
‘They found the priest badly injured in his own church in Vesterbro,’ Plough said. The tie was gone, the jacket too. He was changing, Buch thought. Maybe they all were. ‘Gunnar Torpe. He died in the ambulance. A former field chaplain attached to troops from Ryvangen. He was in Helmand at the same time as Raben. That’s five dead. Six if we count Monberg.’
‘Monberg killed himself,’ Buch snapped. ‘The hospital porter saw him jump. Did the priest have a dog tag?’
‘Yes.’ Karina sat on the edge of Buch’s desk. Jeans and a shirt. She looked tired. A little dishevelled for once. ‘It seems Lund interrupted the murder.’
Buch blinked.
‘The woman we met at the wedding?’
‘Her. The priest was with Ægir. He knew the first victim, Dragsholm. She’d visited him. Maybe all the victims knew what really went on in Afghanistan.’
Plough shook his head.
‘We know what happened. Nothing. The army investigated. An official inquiry. It said Raben’s claims were nonsense. Just a way of shifting the blame.’
He threw a report in front of Buch.
‘Read it for yourself. Nothing points towards the killing of civilians.’
‘Things get covered up sometimes, don’t they?’ Buch asked. ‘If there was an atrocity they’d have good reason.’
Plough tugged at his open shirt, as if struggling to come to a decision.
‘There must be someone inside the Defence Ministry who bears a grudge against Rossing.’ He looked at Karina. ‘Can you think of anyone he’s fired recently?’
Buch grinned with surprise.
‘That’s the spirit,’ he said.
‘But it isn’t.’ Plough looked offended. ‘It’s petty and dishonourable.’
‘We need to get close to the police and find out what they uncovered about this officer,’ Buch added.
Karina frowned.
‘Not easy. They’ve taken Lund off the case. It’s being run by PET.’
‘And what do they say?’
‘They’re still chasing what we told them about Monberg. König doesn’t think it’s relevant to the investigation. They feel . . .’
She was reluctant to say it.
‘They still think we can solve this by locking up every last Muslim we can find?’ Buch asked.
‘Pretty much.’
‘And these clowns are running the show? While Lund’s fired?’
‘König’s a very experienced officer,’ Plough said carefully. ‘He’s very . . .’
‘Very what?’
‘Very well connected.’
‘I think we need to make some calls,’ Thomas Buch said, waving at the phones. ‘Let’s get busy.’
Thirty minutes later Erik König was back in an interview room in the Politigården. It felt, Brix thought, a little formal, and he was happy with that.
‘Don’t you think it’s odd no one ever found Møller’s dog tag?’ he asked.
König laughed.
‘Not really. The man was blown to bits. How many pieces do you expect them to pick up?’
‘You’ve had us chasing Islamists for days, Erik. Up and down the country. But there’s nothing, not a thing, that indicates fundamentalists are behind these killings.’
‘Only the video and the material we found at Kodmani’s.’
‘Faith Fellow planted that on him. And we don’t have a clue who he is.’
‘Speculation—’
‘Why aren’t we investigating the army and Ægir?’ Brix asked. ‘Do they have some kind of immunity?’
‘Stop this. I won’t answer to you, Lennart. We’re PET. We never have.’
‘I want Raben brought in here for questioning. If you know where he is fetch him now.’
The PET man took off his rimless glasses, polished them carefully with his handkerchief, placed them back on his face.
‘That’s not possible. He’s got away from us.’
‘You’ve lost him?’ Brix roared. ‘If you were one of my men—’
‘I’m not. We’re looking. We’ll find him. When we do . . .’ König sat back in the hard interview room chair. ‘. . . I’ll let you know.’
Brix threw up his hands in despair.
‘Lennart.’ König leaned on the table, looked him in the face. ‘Do you honestly think that if I knew there was something to hide in that barracks I’d be sitting here, lying to you?’
Brix didn’t answer. Hedeby came in.
‘I just had a call from the Ministry of Justice,’ she said. ‘Monberg told Buch he knew the first victim, Anne Dragsholm. She’d found the officer Raben talked about. The one responsible for the massacre. They want a full investigation. By us.’
She sat down next to König, very close, looked into his grey, emotionless eyes.
‘Us,’ she repeated. ‘And if anyone stands in our way they want to know.’
‘Do they indeed?’ the PET man said and got up, put on his coat and left.
Ruth Hedeby watched him and didn’t say a thing. That took guts, Brix thought.
‘Thanks,’ he said.
‘Don’t thank me. Thank the Ministry. They’re even more pissed off with PET than they are with us.’
‘There’s the question of staffing—’
‘I don’t want Lund back. We’re on thin ice as it is. The answer’s no.’
Her phone rang again. She looked at the number.
‘Dammit. Don’t these Ministry people ever sleep?’
Brix watched her take the call, followed the expression on her face.
‘Minister Buch . . .’ she said quietly. ‘It’s not normal for a politician to become involved in personnel issues here.’
The response was so loud and furious Ruth Hedeby held the phone away from her ear.
When it was over she said, ‘I’ll see what I can do.’
Brix sat and waited. When she stayed quiet he said, ‘So you told them Lund wasn’t coming back?’
‘No,’ she said haughtily. ‘But they found out anyway.’ She glared at him. ‘I wonder how.’
He glanced at his watch and said, ‘Search me. I’m going home. We can put everything together in the morning.’
‘Lennart!’
He stopped at the door.
‘For God’s sake keep an eye on her this time. If you can. She scares the living daylights out of me.’
‘I’ll tell her.’
‘No.’ Hedeby got up and pulled her coat around her. ‘No need.’
Lund didn’t object when Strange drove her to his flat. The last thing she wanted was to bump into a bunch of happy, drunk guests from her mother’s wedding.
The place was barely furnished, the way Danish bachelors liked. Two bedrooms, the second with a couple of single beds for his kids when they visited.
They sat next to each other on the low sofa, opposite one of the giant TVs she hated so much. He had a menu for pizza from a place round the corner.
‘Number thirty-eight,’ she said.
He was on the phone to them already.
‘Number thirty-eight,’ Strange said in his calm, genial voice.
‘With extra cheese,’ she added.
He sighed.
‘With extra cheese. Same for me. No cheese.’
The hospital had given her something for the wound. She was pouring some fluid onto a piece of cotton.
‘How’s your head?’ he asked.
‘I took some pills.’
She dabbed the cotton onto her forehead and missed.
‘Let me,’ Strange said and tried to take it from her.
‘I’m not an invalid.’
‘You can’t see what you’re doing. Is it so hard to be helped?’
She let him take it. Sat there like a child as he brushed back her hair, looked carefully at her face.
‘It’s not so bad. You won’t even get a scar.’
‘Wonderful.’
‘You’re a tough old bird.’
‘You’re too kind.’
He dabbed at the wound with the cotton. She gasped.
‘I know. It stings.’
‘Why am I here? I could have stayed in the Politigården.’
‘You could have put yourself up in a hostel too.’ He looked round the room. ‘It’s not so bad is it? No dirty underwear on the floor. No porno mags lying around. And I wasn’t expecting you. Give me a break.’
There was a photo on the low table by the sofa. Black and white and old. A tall, upright man in uniform.
‘Your father was a soldier?’
His face turned grim and she couldn’t guess why.
‘Uniforms run in the family. Army usually, not always. That’s my grandfather. He was a policeman. That’s the old uniform. Didn’t I tell you?’
‘No.’
‘Well he was. In the Politigården during the war.’ Strange stopped and looked at her. ‘He was working with the Resistance. The Germans found out. Someone, some stikke, informed on him. My father said he died with all the other heroes at Mindelunden. Tied to one of those stakes I guess. I don’t know why I keep that picture really. Such a long time ago. There’s enough shit happening now without worrying about yesterday.’
She pulled back from him, pi
cked up another photo of a man in uniform, army this time, more recent but still old.
‘Is this your father? He looks just like you.’
‘Soldiers you see. There’s something in our blood. We’re born to serve.’
He laughed, looked vulnerable at that moment.
‘I’m not like you. I’m best when I’m part of the pack and someone’s telling me what to do. I guess I inherited that—’
‘What happened to him? Your father?’
Strange stared at her.
‘Who said anything happened to him?’
‘It’s an old photo. If he was still around you’d have a recent one.’
‘Good God. You’re a piece of work. Do you ever stop?’
‘Not really. If you don’t want to tell me—’
‘He quit the army. My mum nagged him to leave. He bought a franchise for some stupid insurance agency with his pay-off. Was never going to happen. Remember what I said? We’re born to serve. Not lead.’
Something on his face made her wish she’d kept quiet.
‘We didn’t know he was going bust. I’m not even sure it would have made a difference. I was only nineteen. That summer I was in the Politigården. When I thought the police uniform was for me.’
‘How long will the pizzas be?’
He frowned at her.
‘You asked. You’ve got to listen now. Only polite.’
‘Strange—’
‘I came home one day. He was hanging in the garage. I remember seeing the shoes first.’
‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything.’
Strange scratched his stubbly cheek.
‘You can’t stop yourself. Besides, why not? You weren’t to know. I hated him for that. For years. Then, when I was looking to come out of the army, my wife started giving me the same line. You’re bright enough. Start your own company. Get a job in management. Be your own man.’
He brought the cotton wool to her face and dabbed again.
‘That was enough to get me to re-enlist. I know who I am. I like being told what to do. By you. By Brix. Suits me. You’re brighter and you know it.’
‘I never said that.’
He laughed.
‘You think you need to? You’ve got a face like an open book.’
‘I’ve got a face like a football.’
‘Still nice to look at.’
