The Considerate Killer

by Lene Kaaberbøl

  “There’s my wife too,” he said. Then he roared again. “You need to help my wife and daughter at home. They’re dead. Someone killed them.”

  Vincent felt the eyes on him. Something was expected of him. He didn’t know what it was. When was Diana coming back? Victor, who in spite of his steady work with the baby had been able to follow events, turned to look at him too, and Vincent knew that Victor could see it. His paralysis. His complete uselessness. And yet Victor’s look was warm and encouraging.

  “Go see what happened,” he said. “Diana and I will come as quickly as we can. Just stay calm.” The man grabbed Vincent’s T-shirt and pulled him close. His alcohol-laced breath was warm and pungent.

  “Help,” he gasped. “Help me.”

  Trailing a tail of neighbors, Vincent followed the man down the alley at a stumbling run, past a few dilapidated shacks, until he ducked into a crudely but solidly built brick house with a tin roof and a window that was closed with sturdy, peeling shutters. The door was wide open, and in the gloom Vincent could make out three mattresses. Two figures lay curled up as if they were sleeping.

  The man began to scream again.

  “I can’t wake them. They’re not waking up.”

  Vincent’s nausea returned. The one he always got in response to strong smells. It was hot in the slums. There was no air conditioning here to bring relief, day or night. Dead people and animals began to smell after just a few hours, and the distance between life and decomposition was short. The two people lying on the mattresses had already begun to give off a faint sweet stench.

  Vincent remained standing in the doorway as if turned to stone. Just stood there and stared until a scented angel gently nudged him aside and pushed her way past him into the house. Diana.

  She checked the girl first for signs of life.

  She must have been about six years old. Her hair was tangled, its neat bedtime braid now frizzy and untidy. For some reason that was what Vincent focused on. The delicate childish skull, and the way the hair was flattened where her head had come to rest on the pillow as she fell asleep. Diana held the girl’s wrist with an inward-looking, concentrated expression. Then she let go and moved to the woman lying next to the child. As Diana rolled her on to her side, he caught a glimpse of a smooth and peaceful face.

  Diana got up and kicked angrily at a foil tray which had been placed directly on the earthen floor. Ash and half-burned pieces of charcoal scattered across the packed dirt. A few embers flared briefly before subsiding completely.

  “They’re dead,” she said to the man. A hand placed calmingly on his shoulder. The whites of his wide-open eyes shone in the gloom. “You have to arrange for embalming and lamay as fast as possible. They’ve already lain here for several hours.”

  “But we just got here,” he said, confused. “We just moved in. I sold our land . . .”

  The sentence hung unfinished in the air, while Diana turned on her heel and started to leave.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “If you need to talk about the accident, you’re welcome at the clinic another day.”

  Vincent followed her through a flock of curious bystanders and back to the clinic.

  “Peasants,” said Diana. “It happens now and then.”

  “What happens? They just die?”

  “You could say that.” Diana searched her shorts pocket for a cigarette. Lit it and stepped across a pair of emaciated cats and a muddy puddle. “It rained last night when she was making dinner. It was tough to light a fire outside. Where they come from, they probably had a hut wowen from bamboo, possibly on stilts. Lots of natural ventilation. If it rained, they could light their charcoal fire inside and stay dry. But here . . . the poor wretches apparently bought the only halfway decent house in all of Las Pinas City, and she didn’t put out the coals properly.”

  “Carbon monoxide poisoning?”

  Vincent took a deep breath.

  “Yes,” said Diana. “Still, there are worse ways. You just fall asleep and don’t wake up. As deaths go, it doesn’t get much better.”

  She took a long and deep drag on her cigarette, and rubbed her eyes quickly with the heel of her free hand

  “Come on,” she said. “Want to hand out some birth control pills?”

  Stay here. Stay inside. I’ll get the car.”

  Søren left her by the main entrance and ran off with a newspaper over his head in the direction of the parking lot.

  The rain trickled across the asphalt in little runnels, dragging the fallen leaves toward the sewer grate. The dark-brown walls of the hospital were covered by considerable amounts of ivy, but the flaming fall glory was fading now. Like so much else, thought Nina grimly. But at least she was out. Discharged, released, free. With instructions to take it easy and ample warnings about the increased risk of meningitis.

  She stood in the doorway because she could barely stand to be inside any longer. It was amazing to breathe in air that didn’t come from a ventilation system, and she filled her lungs and tried not to think about anything else. There were lots of people around her: staff, visitors, patients. This wasn’t a deserted parking garage, and no one was lurking in the shadows with an iron bar . . .

  Ida and Anton were waiting at their grandmother’s. The Viborg visit had been in the cards since forever. Nina knew that Morten had planned a trip for himself, and had a strong suspicion that this holiday involved some female she had not yet met. Still, he had come close to canceling both.

  “You’re not doing it again,” he had said. “You’re not exposing them to that kind of thing one more time.”

  There were times when she missed Morten terribly. His body, which knew hers so well. His love for the children. His care, his warmth, his humor. The odd-ball music he had introduced her to, his complete inability to lose a board game without pouting like a five-year-old, the way he could reach Ida when she couldn’t. But whether she liked it or not—and she didn’t like it—she didn’t see much of that Morten these days. It was as if he was constantly looking for confirmation that he had made the right decision. Her role as the irresponsible adrenaline-junkie seemed set in concrete, and he in turn became the cranky and corrective supervisor. She seriously doubted they would ever be one of those harmonious ex-couples who were each other’s best friends.

  “Then you’ll just have to do without,” she muttered under her breath. If they could prevent it from affecting the children, that had to be enough. Life was a bitch, and you just had to get on with it.

  The cell phone growled and shuddered in her pocket. It wasn’t a text, it was just an annoying alarm she had not yet figured out how to turn off—a synthetic “plop” that sounded every time one of her so-called “close friends” updated their Facebook status. But the update was from Ida, so she read it at once.

  Visiting my sweet grandmother. ♥ ♥ ♥

  Three pink hearts? From Ida? Whose favorite T-shirt was still the one that said I’m only wearing black until they invent something darker? What on earth was going on?

  She scrolled down to see if there was more of the same, but the rest were the usual world-weary observations.

  Nina knew that several psychological experts counseled parents against spying on their children on Facebook. She didn’t care. After the divorce, she had thrown inhibitions like that to the wind—how else was she supposed to keep tabs on anything? Morten only told her the absolute minimum, and Ida had never been particularly informative, even before the split. Nina had been quite relieved that her friend request had been accepted . . .

  In just a few weeks, she had become surprisingly more knowledgeable about her daughter’s friends, activities and values. She’d already known about the roller hockey club and Ida’s musical taste, which was still for the most part, but not exclusively, the doomsday rock that used to make the walls of the apartment on Østerbro vibrate. But many of the faces in the girlfriend pictur
es were new, and who the heck was this “Daniel” clutching a bouquet of long-stemmed birthday roses with a besotted and self-conscious expression on his smooth young high school face? A classmate, maybe? Ida had, to Nina’s great surprise, applied for acceptance at Sankt Annæ, an institution known for its high standards and musical tradition, and now went to school with kids—no, young people, Nina corrected herself—from Copenhagen’s cultural elite. A dawning social consciousness showed itself in the form of a “NO to Racism!” campaign and membership of more than one environmental group. Nina was not dissatisfied.

  She peered into the rain. Still no Søren. How far away had he had to park? The parking conditions around the old hospital were of course completely inadequate, but still . . .

  She checked her own page. Someone had posted something. She felt a freezing jolt in her stomach when she saw what it was. A biblical quote, and in English.

  Fat pale lilies that smelled like a funeral. Those damned flowers popped into her head again. This quote was a bit longer:

  “. . . they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.” Isaiah 40:29-31. May the Lord keep you strong in your hope of Heaven. Victor.

  Victor?

  A second passed before it dawned on her. Victor from Manila. She remembered him mostly as a big, competent and good-natured bear of a man, a head taller than the other Filipinos she had worked with. She didn’t remember him being especially religious. Or . . . well, perhaps. When they found the dead. When he was sure there was no life in the crushed and trapped bodies. Then his thick fingers made the sign of the cross, and he mumbled something in Tagalog that was probably a prayer.

  He had found her on Facebook about a month ago, but this was the first time he had posted anything. And then a weirdo post like that. She tried to make sense of the archaic words Much the same kind of message as the card that had come with the bouquet.

  Victor was in the Philippines. Victor couldn’t have sent her flowers. Or could he? Through Interflora? Did they use small local Viborg florists? Bouquets for every occacion. Old-fashioned and comfortingly provincial. But how did he know she was in the hospital—and where?

  Fear flopped and writhed in her stomach. The terror of the trapped animal. She took a step backward, into the lobby’s busy, protective atmosphere and stayed there until Søren’s Hyundai appeared in front of the steps.

  The rain had stopped, and the October sun shone warm and golden through the tall windows of the conservatory. Her mother sat in a wicker chair with a blanket around her legs sipping a glass of the devil’s claw tea that her alternative medicine friend Grethe claimed would help. Who knew, maybe it was true. But it stank to high heaven and tasted awful.

  They smiled carefully at each other, like two negotiators at a peace conference.

  “Coffee?” asked Hanne.

  “Thank you.” Nina let herself slide into the wicker chair’s matching companion.

  “I’ll get it,” said Ida, astonishingly helpful, and disappeared in the direction of the kitchen. Nina could hear her speaking with Søren, who apparently was already quite at home and able to find such necessities as cake plates and forks. They had bought a pear tart on the way home. With crème fraîche, no less. It was all too staid for words, and Nina felt as if she was about to be smothered by bingo club invitations and barbecues with that nice couple next door . . .

  Like her, Søren had his roots in Jutland, but it was a different kind of Jutland. Gym dances and football and hot dogs from the local grill instead of Viborg’s carefully cultivated atmosphere of culture and provincial etiquette. Both of them had left those roots behind a long time ago, but whereas he seemed to be perfectably comfortable living in middle-class suburbia, she wasn’t sure she’d be able to stand it.

  Which might be a moot point as he hasn’t actually asked you to move in, she told herself and wondered why the thought had popped up at all.

  “So, how are you?” asked Hanne.

  “Fine,” Nina answered automatically.

  “Søren says that you still can’t remember what happened.”

  “That’s true.” Nina squirmed in her chair. “Mom, I . . . I’m sorry about what I said.”

  Hanne Borg raised her tea glass as if to make a toast.

  “I guess your saying it instead of just thinking it is progress of a kind,” she commented drily.

  The door slammed and there was a rapid clatter of nine-year-old footsteps. Anton came running through the living room. He had been playing next door with Filip, the neighbor’s grandson, who was also visiting during the midterm vacation.

  “Mom!”

  Nina got up a little too quickly, but a discreet hand on the doorjamb allowed her to retain her balance.

  “Come here, you rascal you . . .”

  He had grown so big during the past six months. Everything downy and babyish had been whittled away. He was a boy now, with knobby knees and broad hands and an apparently bottomless reservoir of energy. He was still happy to give and get hugs, but he had begun to protest if she tried to kiss him.

  Right now he dug in his heels and put on the breaks so you could hear an almost cartoon-like shriek of boy feet against the lacquered wood floor.

  “What happened to your eyes?” he asked.

  “It’s just a mask to hide my secret identity,” she said. The swelling from the raccoon-eye hematoma was mostly gone, thank God, but traces of the bruising still lingered.

  He gave a single awkward croak-like laugh, but she could see that he was startled and uneasy.

  “It’s okay, sweetie,” she said. “It’ll fade soon.”

  “Someone hit you,” he said as if he was only now realizing it.

  “Not here,” she said and touched one cheek. “It’s because I got bonked on the back of the head.”

  “But someone did that,” he insisted. “Hit you on the head, I mean.” His face was serious, and she could see a deep, glittering fear in his eyes.

  “What’s wrong, sweetie?”

  He bit his lower lip for so long that she could see the mark of his teeth remain for a brief moment when he opened his mouth.

  “What if he does it again?”

  “He won’t.”

  “Yes . . . but what if?”

  “If he tries, the police will come and arrest him,” she said firmly. “They are already searching for him.”

  She pulled Anton close, and he clung to her in a highly uncharacteristic way. She could feel his shoulders shaking and knew he was crying but trying to suppress it.

  “It’s okay,” she said. “Nothing is going to happen. It’s okay.”

  Her reassurances only made it worse. A heartbreaking sob emerged from the boy.

  Ida passed by with the cake tray and punched him in the shoulder.

  “Come on, Anton. Only losers cry.”

  “Ida!”

  But Ida got it right. Anton took a deep, uncertain breath and freed himself from Nina’s arms.

  “Yep,” he said. “The rest of us get up and go for the gold.”

  “Precisely, maggot!”

  “Maggot yourself. You . . . booger!”

  “Fart!”

  “Earwax.”

  “Tapeworm!”

  They grinned more and more broadly with every disgusting word.

  “Same to you . . . dog turd!” Anton concluded, apparently completely restored to his boyish composure.

  “Yes, all right,” said Nina. “I think we get the general idea.”

  But later, when the cake platter had been vacuumed for the last crumbs and Anton sat in his favorite corner in the living room, absorbed in a PlayStation game, Ida stood staring out the kitchen window with her hands stuck as deep in pockets of her hoodie as they could possibly get.
/>   “What’s wrong, sweetie?”

  “Nothing.” But then she turned around anyway, and Nina could see how tense her face was. “You’re not going to leave us, are you?”

  “Ida. No! Of course I won’t. Where would I go?”

  “I don’t know. One of those places where people die.”

  Nina put her hand on her daughter’s cheek and for once was not pushed away.

  “People die everywhere, sweet pea. But Grandma is going to get well.”

  In the course of the afternoon coffee ritual, Nina had finally realized what all those pink hearts were all about. Ida had discovered the existence of death. Not as an abstract concept or as a symbol you could flirt with to be hip and Goth and a little different. Dead as in “gone.” It was clearly visible in the desperate care her normally slightly distanced daughter lavished on her grandmother. Smiles. Small pats. Hugs for no reason—or at least, hugs that weren’t part of the usual rituals of arrival or departure. It was heartbreaking to watch.

  Nina’s mother had spotted what was going on long ago, but just returned smiles with smiles and hugs with hugs and pretended that everything was as usual. That was almost as heartbreaking. Nina felt the urge to yell at them both that the prognosis was decent and there was no reason to bury anyone yet.

  But it was apparently not just the cancer that had shaken Ida out of her teenage worldweariness

  “It’s not Grandma so much,” she said and looked at Nina with an angry and vulnerable gaze. “It’s more you.”

  The expression in Ida’s eyes hit her like a sucker punch. You have two children who are afraid to lose you. Her mother had been right.

  “I have no plans to leave here anytime soon,” she said lightly and stuffed her own fear of death back into the cave where it belonged.

  • • •

  It was only later, when the rest of the household slumbered sweetly, that the terror came creeping out of its hiding place again. Sleep seemed to her to be a healthy and normal but completely unattainable state—something other people did. It only helped a little that Søren lay next to her in the spare room’s less than king-sized double bed. His body created a landscape both alien and familiar underneath the comforter, a shoulder mountain and the curve of a back, a ridge of sloping fabric covering a leg. His breathing was calm and only slightly obstructed, and she was pretty sure he was sleeping . . . no, peacefully was probably an exaggeration, he had his own nightmares . . . but deeply at least.