The House That Jack Built

by Jakob Melander

  “Dammit, I explained all of this a long time ago. She was just pissed off because I fucked one of her friends.” He glanced at Lisa. “Oh, sorry.”

  Lisa raised an eyebrow. Lars kept his eyes on the report, pretending not to have heard Mikkel’s explanation.

  “These pictures are from Penthouse the night of June 15 at 1:45 a.m.” Lisa banged her knuckles on a pile of photographs. “How do you explain these?”

  Mikkel moved his hands from his face. He tried laughing but it came out as a strained cough.

  “All right, listen. She was begging for it, the way she was standing there sticking those tits out. Those damn teases —”

  “Are you saying she was begging to be raped?” Lars interrupted.

  “I just told you, I don’t know anything about that. I’m talking about this one.” He pointed at the next photograph in the pile. It must have been taken right after he grabbed Stine Bang’s breasts. The picture showed Stine Bang facing Mikkel. Her hand was raised, milliseconds away from landing on his cheek. Her face was distorted with rage.

  Lisa was about to say something but Lars beat her to it.

  “What were you doing that night between two and three in the morning?”

  “I buggered off home, after this ice queen hit me. Dammit, I should be reporting her.”

  “And when did you get home?”

  “It must have been about 2:20. Or 2:30. Listen, that report there —”

  “Can anyone confirm that?” Lisa took over.

  “I live on my own.”

  “That doesn’t surprise me,” Lisa mumbled. “And what were you doing last night?”

  “One of your psychopath officers assaulted me at a gas station and threw me into his car. In handcuffs.”

  Lars looked out the window. “And before that?”

  “I was with a friend in Lille Karleby.”

  Lars was desperate for a cigarette. Instead, he searched inside a drawer, pulled out an old pack of Ga-Jols. He offered them to Mikkel after taking one himself.

  “Did you run away after raping Stine?”

  Mikkel stopped chewing. “I already told you —”

  “And then yesterday, you went and found Louise Jørgensen and gave her the same treatment?” Lisa broke in. She had gotten up and now stood with her arms crossed. Mikkel opened his mouth but no sound came out. “You were arrested in the convenience store at Borrevejle Camping,” she continued, “on the way back to your friend in Lille Karleby. We’re going to need a name and an address.”

  Mikkel shook his head. “I’m no rat.”

  “We’re just trying to help. If it wasn’t you, then your friend can provide you with an alibi.”

  “You wouldn’t believe us anyway.” Mikkel crossed his arms, imitating Lisa.

  Lars opened a drawer and pulled out a small case. He opened it. Inside was a pair of rubber gloves, a mask, sterile swabs, and brown paper evidence bags.

  “We’re going to take a DNA test now, and —”

  “I’m not taking any DNA test. As soon as I’m in the registry —”

  “It’s in your own best interest to help us.” Lars proceeded to put on the gloves.

  Mikkel crossed him arms. “Nope.”

  “Jesus, what an idiot.” Lisa closed the door behind the two officers who had collected Mikkel to return him to lock-up.

  “He did cool down again. And he didn’t ask for a lawyer.” Lars put the DNA test kit back in the drawer.

  Lisa flipped through the pictures once more. “Why didn’t you show him the shirt?”

  “Let him sweat it until tomorrow,” he said. “Then we’ll try again.”

  * * *

  Lars got off the 5A at Nørrebro Station. He fought through the swarm of people, then headed toward Folmer Bendtsens Plads. The sun was hidden behind a cover of milky white clouds. The bright light filtered through, stung his tired, sand-filled eyes. He had wanted to buy flowers for Maria, to congratulate her on the great result the previous day. But he had forgotten, and it was too late to go back and find a florist. He was ready to drop with fatigue.

  He examined the flowers in front of the SUPER CORN R- STORE. Even he could see that the limp, half-dead stems were not exactly in their prime.

  Still, he pulled two bouquets, the best of a bad bunch, out of the black plastic bucket. Water was dripping onto his pants as he walked inside the store.

  The young, rather stout Dane greeted him with a nod. “Two packs of King’s Blue?”

  “You remembered.” Lars said. “These too. Can you wrap them?”

  The boy looked doubtful. “In newspaper?”

  “Just leave them as they are.” Lars shook his head, pulled out his bank card, and swiped it in the machine. He rocked back and forth on his feet.

  “Are you a police officer?”

  “Is it that obvious?” Lars punched in his PIN and pressed OK.

  “Well yeah . . . Are you out at Bellahøj precinct?”

  Lars grabbed the cigarettes. He picked up the flowers, holding them at arm’s length to avoid the dripping water.

  “Homicide.” He managed to pull the cellophane off one pack with his teeth, and using his free hand, tapped out a cigarette.

  “I see.” The guy raised his eyebrows, gave him a light. Even in outer Nørrebro, in spite of the numerous riots in the district throughout the seventies and eighties, there was still a certain fascination surrounding murder investigations. Slightly morbid, but better than having rocks thrown at you — or having your car destroyed.

  “So you’d better stick to the straight and narrow.” Lars laughed and raised his hand to say goodbye.

  “Of course. See ya.”

  Maria wasn’t home. When he finally got the door open, the kitchen looked like a war zone: dirty dishes, breadcrumbs, half-empty milk cartons in one god-awful mess. He didn’t have the energy to do anything about it. He just opened the kitchen cupboard to find something to put the flowers in. But there were no vases. He gave up, put each bouquet in a pitcher of water, left one in the kitchen, and took the other into Maria’s room. All of her old things had arrived. The bed was made; a couple of her old teddy bears were nestled in and among the pillows lined against the wall. There were posters of half-naked young men on the wall. Music? Sports? He had no idea.

  He put the bouquet on her table. The flowers hung their heads. He was craving another cigarette. Instead he went into the living room, found a pen and paper, folded the sheet down the middle, and wrote.

  To Maria, my clever, beautiful daughter.

  Congratulations.

  I’m proud of you.

  Love, Dad

  He rested the improvised card against the pitcher. She’d spot it as soon as she came in.

  He went into the living room and stopped by the bookcase. His eyes searched for the tattered copy of The Tempest on the bottom shelf. With great effort, he managed to stop himself from looking at the row of LPs. Instead he walked into the bedroom and threw himself on the bed fully clothed.

  Shortly after, he was asleep.

  Chapter 22

  Allan turned down Nordre Ringvej and followed the road’s curves. Sanne let her body follow the car’s motion and stared out the front window. Low-rise apartment blocks, commercial buildings, residential neighbourhoods, and greenery — apart from the size of the city, they could just as easily be driving through a suburb of Kolding. But the monstrosity that towered above the patches of green farther ahead didn’t look like anything they had in Kolding. Glostrup Hospital was a Stalinist architect’s wet dream.

  “Yeah, it’s not pretty,” Allan said as he turned into an empty parking spot and turned off the engine.

  Sanne shook her head and looked at the map on her phone. “Well, let’s hope it proves useful.”

  * * *

  They got off on the fourth
floor. Sanne grabbed a nurse, just as the elevator door closed behind them with a quiet sigh.

  “Excuse me, where can we find Professor Lau?”

  The nurse sent them down the corridor toward an orange door. Sanne thanked her and followed Allan under the fluorescent tube lighting, past a long painting of a verdigris green ocean and a light blue sky covered with wisps of cloud. Stylized terns were suspended in frozen poses on the flat canvas.

  “It must be here.” Allan stopped, pushed the door handle down without knocking, and stepped inside. Sanne followed.

  “Professor Lau?”

  A large man in a lab coat, hairnet, and face mask got up from behind a microscope and waved with gloved hands.

  “Out!” he roared.

  The door slammed behind them, but before Sanne and Allan had a chance to recover, the man stepped out. He was wide as a barrel, and his small, dark eyes flickered behind light-framed glasses. He took off the mask, let it hang around his neck. Red spots covered his cheeks and neck.

  “Who told you that you could walk straight into my laboratory? It’ll be pure luck if that sample isn’t contaminated.”

  Sanne raised her chin. “Professor Lau? I’m sorry if we’ve spoiled anything. But we were told you could help.”

  The man was rubbing sanitizer into his hands as he looked over his shoulder. “I see. And you are?”

  “Sanne Bissen. Copenhagen Police. This is my colleague, Allan Raben. Could we —”

  “Follow me.” Lau crossed the corridor and opened the door to a spare office with a view of the hospital’s rear entrance and the barrack-like houses on the other side. He went inside and sat down behind his desk. The chair creaked under his weight as he gestured toward two plastic chairs by the door.

  “Shoot.” He folded his fleshy hands behind his neck, stared at Sanne through half-closed eyes.

  She placed her purse on her lap, took out the small box she had gotten from Forensics, and placed it on the corner of his desk without speaking. The box practically disappeared in Professor Lau’s large hands as he picked it up and opened the lid.

  “Hmm.” He returned the box to the table with the lid open. The glass eye was resting on a bed of cotton. It had a jagged hole above the pupil, half inside the iris, where a few shards of glass were missing. Thin lines in the milky-white glass revealed the fractures.

  Professor Lau picked up the box again.

  “May I?”

  Sanne nodded. Professor Lau picked up the green glass eye with great care, placing the concave back on his right index finger.

  “Where did this come from?” he asked.

  “Forensics assembled it from fragments we found next to the body of a woman three days ago,” Sanne said.

  Professor Lau didn’t move a muscle. Then he rested his glasses on his forehead, twisted and turned the glass eye, meticulously studying the concave back, the nuances from the pupil to the iris to the surrounding white. Then he placed it back in the box.

  “Well, it’s not from the mass-produced collections the opticians sell.”

  Sanne nodded. “We know that.”

  Professor Lau winked at her. “On the other hand, it’s nowhere near the quality we normally see. I refuse to believe that any of the ocularists who work in this country would lend their name to it.”

  “Ocularists?” Allan leaned forward in his chair.

  “The artisans who produce eye prostheses. Glassblowers. In this country, the only ones doing this work, as far as I know, are German.”

  “Sorry.” Sanne opened and closed her purse, placed her elbow next to the box. “Does that mean that nobody in Denmark does this type of work?”

  “As I mentioned before, mass-produced eye prostheses are sold at most larger opticians.” The professor was smiling now, moving the box away from the edge of the table, away from Sanne’s elbow. “But if you want quality, there’s no avoiding an ocularist. A glass eye will last from one and a half to two years. Then you need a new one. The old one gets worn. The musculature around the eye, the eye socket itself, changes over time. Ocularists travel here a few times a year to make new prostheses for their regular clients. Either at the hospitals or at certain opticians.”

  Sanne placed the box back in her purse. “You work with a German . . . ocularist?”

  The professor nodded. “Dr. Henkel in Mülheim. It’s a shame — he was just in Copenhagen. Now you’ll have to make do with his number.”

  “A German.” Allan sat down in the driver’s seat, turned the key in the ignition.

  “I’ll deal with him. In southern Jutland we grew up with German TV.” Sanne closed the door and fastened her seatbelt. “I loved watching Sesamstraße.”

  Allan laughed. They were on the way out on Ringvejen again when Sanne got through.

  “Hallo?”

  “Hallo. Sanne Bissen. Dänische Polizei.” She briefed Dr. Henkel on the case, got his email address, and sent him a series of quick photos of the eye prosthesis. The doctor got back to her before they had reached Politigården.

  “I’d like to help you, Frau Bissen, but I’m sorry: I can guarantee you that neither I nor any of my German colleagues produced this glass prosthesis. None of us would lend our name to such poor workmanship.”

  Sanne ended the conversation. “We drew a blank,” she told Allan.

  He clenched his teeth, just managing to brake as a 5A bus pulled out from its stop at Copenhagen Central Station without signalling.

  “So we’re back to the two brothers.”

  Sanne dropped the phone back into her purse. “But someone had to have made that glass eye.”

  Chapter 23

  “They’re all yours.” Søren slipped into his leather jacket, flipped up the collar. The singing quality of the detective’s accent indicated he came from the island of Funen. He was solid and broad shouldered, but the horn-rimmed glasses made him look like an academic. “The Bukoshi brothers haven’t left the club all day.”

  “Anything happen at all?” Allan placed his pizza box on the table. Søren’s colleague, Kasper, a small, thin man wearing a freshly ironed shirt and pressed pants, scrunched up his coffee cup and threw it toward the cardboard box in the corner. The box was overflowing with garbage. Sanne placed her Chinese takeout container and the box of spring rolls on the table next to Allan’s pizza.

  “Their crew stops by about every four hours to deliver the girls’ earnings.” Kasper grabbed his coat from the back of the chair. “The times are written in the book.” He pointed at a lined notebook on the table. Columns with times and names were written in neat handwriting across the open pages.

  Søren was already heading for the back door.

  “I just put fresh batteries in the camera.” He smiled. “Well, I guess all that’s left is to say have fun.”

  Kasper acknowledged them by raising his fingers to his forehead. Then they headed down the staircase at the back.

  “Well, this looks comfy.” Sanne looked around at the table in the middle of the room, the three folding chairs, and the cardboard box in the corner. Other than that, the room was bare. Long strips of wallpaper had been torn off the far wall. The floor could do with being stripped and varnished.

  “Mind if I let in a little fresh air?” Sanne wrinkled her nose. “That garbage . . .” She walked over to the window.

  Allan stopped her. “Open the one in the kitchen. This apartment is supposed to be vacant, right?”

  Oh, right. No need to advertise the fact that they were here. She walked to the other end of the apartment and into the kitchen and opened both windows. Hot air poured in. Asphalt, brick, the entire city had been soaking up the sun for several days; the pent-up heat was now surrendering to the night air.

  Inside the front room, the camera was clicking and she hurried back. Allan was pressed against the wall between the two windowpanes, shooting a ser
ies of photos. The long, grey-white lens followed the movement on the street below.

  “What have they been calling them?” He continued shooting. It was only when she looked in the notebook that she understood what he meant.

  “Leather Jacket, Baldie, and Toilet Seat.” She laughed. “Toilet Seat?”

  “It must be this guy.” Allan put the camera down on the windowsill. “He’s got one of those beards.” Using his finger, he drew a circle around his mouth and chin.

  Sanne continued writing in Søren and Kasper’s neat columns, while Allan was shooting photos of people coming in and out of the club across the street. When Toilet Seat emerged from the club ten minutes later, Sanne jotted down, 8:45 p.m. exit Toilet Seat.

  “What does your wife say about you doing stakeouts?” she asked Allan.

  “She’s used to it by now. It’s worse with the little ones.”

  “I didn’t know you had kids?”

  “Two of them. Nine and three and a half. How about you?”

  Sanne shook her head. How would it have been if she and Martin had . . . She must have seemed upset because Allan got that look on his face.

  “Sorry. I didn’t mean . . . Oh jeez.” He grabbed the camera and held down the shutter release. The small clicks merged into one long salvo.

  “What’s happening?” Sanne got up, positioned herself behind him. She had to stand on her toes to see over his head.

  Meriton and Ukë Bukoshi were heading up the street. A dark-haired girl was walking between them, smoking. The expression on the girl’s face was impossible to read, but everything about her looked strained. The glowing cigarette shook in her hands. Allan continued shooting. Sanne checked her watch. It was 8:59 p.m.

  Meriton removed the cigarette from the girl’s lips, threw it into the gutter. Then he walked over to a black Audi, opened the central locking, and got into the driver’s seat. Ukë bundled the girl into the back and climbed in next to her.

  “Do you think . . .” Despite her skepticism about Ulrik’s theory that Meriton and Ukë were killers, she quivered.