by David Hewson
Bengt went straight to sleep the way he always did. Lund got out of bed, pulled on a sweatshirt, went to the window, sat in the cane chair, called Meyer.
‘What did you find out?’ she whispered.
‘Not much.’
Meyer was talking in a hushed tone too. It sounded odd.
‘There’s got to be something.’
‘Forensics have taken a computer and samples.’
The dinner with Hartmann still intrigued her.
‘Was there anything in Nanna’s room that suggests she was going out to meet someone?’
‘Can’t this wait until tomorrow? I’m beat.’
‘She must have had a date.’
‘Yes, Lund. With Oliver. But you won’t let me talk to him.’ Noises behind his quiet voice. Movement. A baby crying. ‘There. Look. You’ve woken the whole house.’
She went out into the dining room, turned on a light, sat at the table.
‘Do the parents remember anything new?’
‘I’ll ask them tomorrow. OK?’ A grunt. ‘Some idiot on the team told the mother the girl had drowned in the boot. She’s going mad.’
Lund swore.
‘You don’t need to do that. I’ll talk to them.’
‘Can I go now?’
‘Yes,’ Lund said. ‘Of course.’
She walked past Mark’s room. He was still fast asleep. Bengt was awake but didn’t want to show it. Everyone here was fine, Lund thought. They didn’t need her at all.
Thursday, 6th November
The morning was dull and damp with drizzle. They ate breakfast together then Lund drove Bengt to the station. Talked about the weekend. Who they’d see in Sweden. What they’d do.
He listened in silence. Then she said, ‘The house-warming party . . .’
‘Forget about the party. I’ve cancelled it.’
She wondered: was that a stray note of displeasure in his voice? It was hard to tell. Anger was so foreign to him.
‘Let’s wait until your case is over, Sarah. Then . . .’
‘I don’t need to wait. I told you. We’re coming Saturday, whatever.’
He gazed out of the window at the traffic and the morning travellers.
‘I’m not inviting lots of people for you to call again and say you’re not coming.’
That was sharp. Unmistakable.
‘Of course I’ll turn up! I’m looking forward to seeing your parents. And . . .’ His little refrain of Swedish names from the other day came back to her. ‘Ole and Missan and Janne and Panne and Hasse and Basse and Lasse . . .’
He was laughing. She could still get that out of him.
‘It’s Bosse, not Basse.’
‘Sorry. Still learning.’
‘Well. If you’re sure . . .’
‘I’m sure! It’s a promise.’
She dropped him at Central Station then drove on to Vesterbro.
Lund sat on Nanna’s bed trying to remember what it was like to be a teenager. The room was small and bright, messy and chaotic. Bags from inexpensive clothing companies, scribbled notes from class, books and magazines, make-up and jewellery . . .
A reflection of Nanna Birk Larsen’s personality, her life.
She went through the diary, found nothing. Nothing in the school notebooks, the photos on the corkboard above her small desk.
Lund thought of herself at this age, an awkward, morose child. Her room was more untidy than this. But different somehow. It existed for her, an inward expression of her solitary, introverted nature. Here, she thought, Nanna had created a place for preparation. A private dressing room from which she would emerge to enchant the world outside, entrance it with her beauty, her clothes, her sparkling and obvious intelligence.
All the things the teenage Sarah Lund lacked this girl possessed in abundance. A loving mother too.
And now she was dead.
There was a path from this room to Nanna’s shocking end in the canal at the Kalvebod Fælled. There were reasons, and reasons left traces.
She looked in the wardrobe, sifted through the clothes. A few had scissored labels, bought from a budget store perhaps. A few didn’t. And . . .
Lund fought again to recall herself at this age. What did she wear? Much the same as now. Jeans, shirts, jumpers. Practical clothes for a practical life, not the attention of others. It was natural for an attractive teenager to dress to be seen. Lund herself was the exception. Yet the clothes she found sifting through Nanna’s coat hangers seemed too good, too adult, too . . . knowing.
Then she brushed the hangers to one side, looked at the back where a small mountain of shoes stood, pair upon discarded pair.
Behind them something glittered. Lund reached in, felt Nanna’s clothes fluttering against her cheeks like the wings of gigantic moths, retrieved what was there.
A pair of shiny brown cowboy boots decorated with coloured motifs, glitter, studs, tiny mirrors.
They shouted money.
No. They screamed it.
‘My wife’s here,’ said a brusque male voice behind her.
Lund jumped, banged her head on the hanger rail.
It was Theis Birk Larsen.
He watched her rub her hair.
‘Be careful what you tell her.’
Seated round the table, frozen faces captured in the surface.
‘I’m sorry you were told,’ Lund said.
The day had brightened. The flowers were fading. But still the place smelled of their sweet scent.
‘The officer shouldn’t have done that. He’s been transferred so you won’t see him again.’
Theis Birk Larsen, head down, eyes dead, muttered, ‘Well, that’s something.’
‘It’s nothing,’ Pernille said. ‘I want to know the truth. I want to know what happened. I’m her mother.’
Lund checked her notes.
‘No one saw Nanna after the party. She was probably driven away in the stolen car. The one we found her in.’
Lund looked out of the window, looked back at her.
‘She was raped.’
Pernille waited.
‘She was beaten.’
Pernille waited.
‘We think she fought back. That may be why he hit her.’
Nothing more.
‘In the woods?’ Pernille asked.
‘In the woods. We think so.’ Lund hesitated. ‘But maybe she was held captive somewhere else first. We just don’t know.’
The big man went to the sink, placed his fists knuckles down on the draining board, gazed out at the wan grey sky.
‘She told us she’d be at Lisa’s,’ Pernille said. ‘Nanna didn’t lie to me.’
‘Maybe she didn’t.’ A pause. ‘Do you have no idea?’ A glance at the shape at the window, the hunched back clad in black leather. ‘Did you remember anything else?’
‘If something was wrong Nanna would have told me,’ Pernille insisted. ‘She’d have told me. We’re . . . We were . . .’
Words proved a struggle.
‘Close.’
‘When did she stop seeing Oliver Schandorff ?’
‘Is he involved?’
A long, broad shadow fell across the table. Theis Birk Larsen turning to listen.
‘I’m just gathering information.’
‘Six months ago or so,’ Pernille said. ‘Oliver was a kind of boyfriend.’
‘Was she upset when it ended?’
‘No. He was.’
Lund watched her.
‘She wouldn’t talk to Oliver on the phone. Nanna . . .’ She leant forward, tried to hold Lund’s wide and ranging eyes. ‘If something was wrong she always told me. Didn’t she, Theis?’
The silent man stood at the window, a giant figure in his scarlet bib overalls and leather jacket.
Lund’s phone rang.
Meyer had something.
‘OK. I’ll come straight away.’
They stared at her, expectant.
‘I have to go now.’
‘What was th
at?’ he asked in a low, brutal voice.
‘Just a call. I saw a pair of boots in Nanna’s room. They look expensive. Did you give them to her?’
‘Expensive boots?’ he grunted.
‘Yes.’
Pernille said, ‘Why do you ask?’
A shrug.
‘I ask lots of questions. Maybe too many. I put my nose in where it’s not wanted.’ A pause. ‘That’s what I do.’
‘We didn’t buy her expensive boots,’ Pernille said.
Interview room. The lawyer was brisk and bald and built like a hockey player. When Lund walked in he was yelling at a bored-looking Meyer who sat on the table edge, chin on fist, smiling childishly.
‘You’ve ignored all my client’s rights. You questioned him without a lawyer present . . .’
‘Not my fault you wanted a lie-in. What’s the big deal? I took him on a tour. Bought him breakfast. I’ll change his stinking nappy if you want . . .’
‘Come with me, Meyer . . .’
‘There will be consequences,’ the lawyer bellowed as Lund took him into the next room.
Meyer sat down, looked at her.
‘They put Oliver Schandorff in the last free cell we had. So I drove Jeppe round a bit and dropped him off here at five.’
Wondering how bad this might turn out, Lund asked, ‘Did you question him?’
‘Have you seen his emails? Plenty. And he rang Nanna fifty-six times in one week. If you ask . . .’
‘Did you question him without a lawyer present?’
‘The lawyer said he would be here at seven. He didn’t turn up till nine.’ Meyer tried to look the picture of reasonableness. ‘Like I said, I couldn’t throw the little jerk into a cell. We just had breakfast together.’ A small boy’s gesture of guilt. ‘It would have been rude if I hadn’t talked to him, Lund.’
Buchard came through the door. Blue shirt. Grey face.
‘We didn’t have anywhere to hold the suspect last night,’ Lund said straight off. ‘The lawyer was two hours late. Meyer bought him breakfast.’
‘He wasn’t very hungry,’ Meyer broke in, ‘but it seemed the polite thing to do.’
‘Maybe the kid thought he was being interrogated but . . .’
Lund left it at that. Buchard was unimpressed.
‘Perhaps Meyer could explain this to me himself.’
‘What Lund said,’ Meyer told him.
‘Write that in a report. Bring it to my office. I’ll put it in your file with all the others.’ A studied pause. ‘After the hearing.’
When the chief left Lund got to her desk, started on the photos and the messages.
Meyer brightened.
‘I thought that went pretty well. Didn’t you?’
The press conference was packed. Cameras. Microphones everywhere. Troels Hartmann wore a tie this time, black. That morning he went to the barber that Rie Skovgaard chose, sat in the chair as she ordered the cut she wanted: short and severe, mournful.
Then the script.
‘It’s been a turbulent time. But I’ve been working closely with the police. The car was stolen. No staff were ever implicated. Our thoughts and sympathies go out to the girl’s parents. Our priority all along was to help the police. Nothing more.’
‘Is the driver a suspect?’ a woman asked.
‘The driver came from an agency. He’s been cleared.’
A sea of voices, the loudest shouting, ‘Is this the position of the police?’
Hartmann looked and saw the bald head and beaming smirk of Erik Salin.
‘I don’t speak for the Politigården. But I’ve discussed this with them. They’re happy I make it clear our involvement was an unfortunate coincidence. We’ve nothing to do with this case. Speak to them if you want any more.’
Still the questions rained down on him.
A politician picked the ones he answered. Carefully. Hartmann listened to the clamour, thought of Bremer, waited in silence until the right question came along.
‘Will you form an alliance with the Centre Party?’
A puzzled expression, bemused but knowing.
‘You know,’ he said, ‘the world of local politics is rarely as dramatic as you people would have your readers believe. Thank you.’
He rose to leave.
The woman reporter was on her feet.
‘You’re forming an alliance?’
Nothing.
The political editor from one of the dailies pounced.
‘Is Bremer wooing her too?’
There was the flash of a camera in his face. Stick to the script, Rie Skovgaard said.
‘He is.’ The room went silent, every eye upon him. ‘Personally though, I think he’s a bit old for her. Now . . .’
Sudden, raucous laughter.
A delicate balance, one that fell in his favour. The hacks hated Bremer as much as he did. At least that’s what they said in their cups.
Troels Hartmann retreated to his office next door.
There Rie Skovgaard fussed over him. Adjusted his tie, his jacket. Looked girlish and pleased.
One short ticking-off for the departure from the script at the end. But that worked. So she was happy.
‘I’m fine,’ Hartmann said, retreating from her hands. ‘Fine.’
‘Troels. You’ve got a bunch of meetings ahead. Then a school visit. The cameras will be there. They’ll want you.’
He stepped back to the window like a sullen child.
She played the same game. A pout. A practised one. She’d had her hair done before him. Black and sleek. Fitted dress hugging her slender body.
Weber rushed in brandishing papers. The draft of the alliance speech. He wanted it cleared with Eller.
‘We’ll read it in the car . . .’
‘Take Morten with you,’ Skovgaard said. ‘Then the two of you can talk. Go over the points . . .’
Weber shook his head.
‘There’s nothing new. You don’t need me. I’ve work here—’
‘I’ll hold the fort while you’re gone,’ she insisted. ‘Go.’ She waved at them. ‘Go.’ A smile. ‘And talk.’
Sometimes they played chess together. He usually won. Because she let him? Hartmann wondered that sometimes.
‘Go, boys!’ Rie Skovgaard shouted like a scolding mother, waving her thin hands, flashing her rings.
‘On Saturday night,’ Meyer said, ‘Jeppe Hald called Schandorff several times.’
‘What about the woman Oliver was with?’
‘Divorcee out for some fun. She said he was miserable and worried about something.’
Lund scowled at him.
‘That’s it?’
‘No.’
That petulant ring to his voice was back. The smoking ban she’d imposed in the office was getting to him.
‘What about the prints from the boiler room?’
‘Half the school was down there.’
‘What about DNA?’
‘Still waiting. Ready?’
She looked through the glass door at the interview room across the passage. Oliver Schandorff, head down at the table.
‘I want to be in there,’ Meyer said. ‘We’re supposed to be working on this together.’
This was true.
‘OK. You can come in. But leave the questions to me.’
He jumped to his feet. A short salute and click of the heels.
The moment they were through the door Schandorff, scruffy in a green polo shirt, pointed at Meyer.
‘I’m not talking to him.’
‘No,’ Lund announced. ‘You’re talking to me.’ Pause. ‘Good morning, Oliver. How are you?’
‘I feel like shit.’
She held out her hand. The kid took it. Then the bald lawyer they’d seen earlier did the same. Lund sat next to them. Meyer perched at the end of the room, on a stool in the light from the window.
‘All we want to do,’ Lund said, ‘is ask you a few questions. Then you can go home.’ No response. ‘Nanna told her parents s
he would be at Lisa’s. Was she meeting you?’
‘No. I told you.’
‘Do you know who she met?’
‘No.’
From her folder Lund pulled a couple of photos of the fancy leather boots from Nanna’s wardrobe.
‘Did you give her these?’
He looked as if he’d never seen them.
‘No.’
Meyer leaned back in his chair at the window, let loose a long yawn.
Lund ignored him.
‘Why were you so angry that you threw a chair?’
The bald lawyer beamed and said, ‘My client reserves the right not to answer.’
Lund ignored the man.
‘I’m trying to help you, Oliver. Tell us the truth and you’re gone from here. Hide behind this man and I promise—’
‘She said she’d found someone else!’
‘That’s enough,’ the lawyer said. ‘We’re going.’
Lund’s eyes never left the ginger-haired kid.
‘Did she say who?’
The lawyer was on his feet.
‘My client’s had a rough night—’
‘Did she say anything else?’
‘I said,’ the lawyer cut in. ‘No more questions.’
Schandorff shook his head.
‘All I did was ask her if she’d come to the basement and talk to me. But she wouldn’t—’
‘Oliver!’ the lawyer barked.
‘Kid,’ Meyer cut in. Schandorff glanced at him. ‘He’s not your dad. He won’t hit you. I won’t let him.’
‘She wouldn’t come with me.’
Lund nodded.
‘So what did you do?’
‘I called her a bunch of names. That was the last I saw of her.’
She picked up her papers.
‘Thanks. That’s all.’
Outside the room. Thinking.
‘Nanna had a date. She had expensive boots no one knew about.’
‘Oliver could have bought them,’ Meyer said. ‘He’s lying. Maybe she was going on a date with him.’
‘It feels wrong.’
‘It feels wrong,’ he muttered, reaching for a cigarette.
‘Don’t smoke in here,’ she ordered. ‘I told you that already.’
‘I’ll tell you what’s wrong, Lund. You. You’ve been here so long you’re part of the furniture. You think no one can ever replace you. That’s what’s wrong. You.’
Then he lit the cigarette anyway. Blew smoke in the air. Coughed. Said, ‘My office. Mine.’
Svendsen stuck his head through the door.
