by David Hewson
Meyer rattled his notebook at her.
‘Got some answers?’ she asked him.
‘Got questions, Lund. That’s a start.’
They took Lisa Rasmussen into an empty classroom.
Lund’s first question.
‘You never told us Oliver and Nanna fought on the dance floor. Why not?’
The teenage pout, then, ‘It wasn’t important.’
Meyer squinted at her.
‘Your best friend got raped and murdered and that wasn’t important?’
She wasn’t going to cry. Today was hostile-to-cops day.
‘We were dancing. Oliver came over. It wasn’t a big drama.’
Lund smiled at her.
‘Oliver threw a chair.’
Nothing.
‘Was Nanna drunk?’
In a rising, nasal petulant voice she said, ‘Nooooo.’
‘You were,’ Meyer said.
A roll of the shoulders.
‘A bit. So what?’
‘Why’d they break up?’ he asked.
‘I dunno.’
He leaned across the table, said very slowly, ‘Why… did… they…’
‘She told me he was immature! Just a kid.’
‘But you still thought she was with him?’
‘I couldn’t find her.’
Lund took over.
‘What was the argument about?’
‘Oliver wanted to talk to her. She didn’t want to talk to him.’
‘And then she left. Where was Oliver then?’
‘Behind the bar. It was his turn.’
‘You’re sure?’
‘I saw him.’
Meyer pushed a piece of paper over the table, looking at Lisa Rasmussen all the time.
‘This is the bar schedule,’ Lund said. ‘His name’s not on it. No one else remembered him working that night.’
She didn’t look at the schedule. Just bit her lip like a little kid.
‘What was she wearing?’ Meyer asked.
A moment to think about it.
‘A witch’s hat with a buckle. A blue wig. She had a broom. Made out of twigs. Kind of this tatty party dress…’
‘It’s cold out there, Lisa,’ Meyer broke in. ‘Didn’t you think it was odd she had so little on?’
‘She had a jacket in the classroom, I guess.’
‘Then she’d have gone upstairs,’ said Lund.
‘But no.’ Meyer came in like a shot. ‘She went downstairs. Lisa told us earlier.’ He looked at her. ‘Downstairs right?’
‘Downstairs,’ the girl muttered.
‘Then how’d she get her jacket?’ Lund demanded.
‘Yeah.’ Meyer was on her now. ‘How?’
‘I don’t know she had a jacket. There were people. Lots of…’
Lisa Rasmussen stopped, face red, looking guilty.
Meyer peered at her.
‘I thought you weren’t going to cry today, Lisa. Why’s it so hard suddenly?’
‘You don’t know when she left or whether Oliver followed her,’ Lund said.
‘We know you’re lying to us!’ Meyer yelled. ‘Did Oliver find the car keys? Did he screw her in the car to prove what a man he was? Did you watch for fun?’
Lund intervened, put an arm round the girl. Floods of tears now.
‘It’s important you tell us what you know,’ she said.
In the squeaky frightened voice of a child Lisa Rasmussen whimpered, ‘I don’t know anything. Leave me alone.’
Meyer’s phone rang.
‘You need to tell us…’ Lund began.
‘No she doesn’t,’ Meyer said and got his jacket.
There was a warren of rooms making up the school’s basement floor. They’d had Svendsen going through each in turn, grumbling about being on his own.
He found the broom of twigs with some plastic bags in an area set aside for storing pushbikes.
Lund looked.
Metal doors in rows. Cell-like chambers beyond them.
The blue wig was in one of the plastic bags.
‘What about her bike?’
‘I’m on my own,’ Svendsen said for the fourth time that morning.
‘Seal off the area. Get a full forensic team down here,’ Lund ordered.
Weber was at his computer. Seemed to live there more with each passing day.
‘Seen the new polls?’ he asked.
‘It’s tomorrow’s polls that matter,’ Hartmann said. ‘When they see there’s an alliance…’
Morten Weber scowled.
‘Until Kirsten Eller’s name’s on a piece of paper let’s not count chickens.’
‘I talked to them last night. It’s done, Morten. Stop worrying.’
Skovgaard came off the phone. She didn’t look happy either.
‘You two seem close for a change,’ Hartmann said. ‘What have I done wrong now?’
‘Eller’s people think you’re being evasive,’ Skovgaard said. ‘So do some of our own.’
‘Tell them… tell them the car was stolen.’
Weber’s phone rang.
‘Why not tell them the truth?’ he said before answering it. ‘We’re assisting the police.’
‘The police have got their own agenda,’ Skovgaard said. ‘They don’t give a damn about us.’
Hartmann bristled. The Lund woman intrigued him. He was willing to give her a chance.
‘I’m not going to milk this, Rie. I’m not that kind of politician.’
Skovgaard said, ‘You make me want to scream sometimes. Carry on like this and you won’t be a politician at all.’
‘That was Kirsten Eller.’ Weber put down the phone. ‘She wants to see you. Straight away.’ Weber looked at Hartmann over his glasses. ‘I thought you had this fixed, Troels?’
‘What does she want?’
‘Wouldn’t tell a minion like me, would she? Pretty obvious, isn’t it?’
Hartmann didn’t speak.
‘She wants some wriggle room,’ Skovgaard said.
Both of them looked at him as if he should have known this.
‘Who wouldn’t?’ Weber asked.
Hartmann got up.
‘I’ll deal with Kirsten Eller.’
Fifteen minutes later, Hartmann was alone in a meeting room in the Centre Party offices. Eller didn’t smile.
‘I underestimated the feelings in the group,’ she said.
‘How?’
‘This mess with the police. It makes people talk about you. Bremer’s backers smell your blood.’
‘The car was stolen. The driver’s innocent.’
‘Why does no one know this, Troels?’
‘Because the police asked us to wait. It was the right thing to do. What difference does it make?’
‘A big difference. You could have warned me.’
‘No. I couldn’t. The police asked me to keep quiet.’
‘Bremer phoned me this morning. He’s offering to build ten thousand flats, social housing, minimal rents.’
‘You know him. It’ll come to nothing.’
‘I’m sorry, Troels. There won’t be an alliance. I can’t. In the circumstances…’
Hartmann floundered for a reply, found his temper rising.
‘Bremer’s stringing you along. He just wants you to dither until it’s too late for us to cut the deal. Then he’ll drop you like a stone. You won’t get the flats. You’ll be lucky to get a mayor’s seat.’
‘It’s the group’s decision. There’s nothing I can do.’
He was tempted to shout. To yell at her for being so stupid but he didn’t.
‘Unless, of course, you’ve got a better offer,’ Eller said.
Bremer was in his media studio getting ready for a TV slot. Lights and cameras. A make-up woman. Hangers on.
Fighting to restrain his fury, Troels Hartmann barged in, walked over, looked down at the laughing figure in the white shirt, powder on his cheeks, said, ‘You ruthless bastard.’
Bremer smiled and shook
his grey head.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘You heard.’
The make-up woman stopped padding at him with a brush. Stayed. Listened.
‘Bad timing for me, Troels,’ Bremer said with a genial sigh. ‘You too, I think. Later…’
‘I want an explanation.’
They went to the window, a semblance of privacy. Hartmann couldn’t help himself, was started before he got there.
‘First you steal our plan. Then you double it and propose an unrealistic number of flats you know you’ll never build.’
‘Ah,’ Bremer said, with a wave of his hand. ‘You spoke to Kirsten. A terrible blabbermouth. I did warn you.’
‘Then you exploit the death of a young girl and time it to aggravate the situation… precisely when we’re trying to help the police and the parents.’
Bremer’s face fell. He barged into Hartmann, wagged a finger in his face.
‘Who do you think you’re talking to? Am I supposed to time my proposals according to whatever mess you’ve got yourself into? Grow up, boy. You had nothing to do with the car yet still you chose not to announce it. I thought Rie Skovgaard had more sense than that.’
‘What I do is my business.’
The Lord Mayor laughed.
‘You’re an infant, Troels. I’d no idea it was this bad. A clumsy alliance with Kirsten’s clowns… what were you thinking?’
‘Don’t go lower than you are, Bremer. It’s hard I know…’
‘Oh dear. This is like dealing with your father all over again. The desperation. The paranoia. How very sad.’
‘I’m telling you—’
‘No!’
Poul Bremer’s voice boomed round the studio, loud enough to silence everyone, Hartmann too.
‘No,’ he repeated, more quietly. ‘You tell me nothing, Troels. Go find me a real man to fight. Not a tailor’s dummy in a flash suit.’
The church was plain and cold, the priest much the same. They sat as he listed the options. For prayers, for music, for flowers. For everything except the thing they needed most: understanding.
It was like a shopping list.
‘Can we have “A Spotless Rose is Growing”?’ Pernille asked as she and Theis held the hymn book between them.
The minister wore a brown jacket and grey polo sweater. He peered over the page and said, ‘That’s number hundred and seventeen. A lovely hymn. One of my favourites.’
‘I want it to be beautiful in here with plenty of flowers,’ she added.
‘That’s up to you. I can give you the name of some florists.’
‘She loves flowers.’
Next to her on the hard bench Theis Birk Larsen stared at the stone floor.
‘Blue irises. And roses.’
‘Is there anything else?’ Birk Larsen asked.
The minister checked his notes.
‘Nothing. Just the eulogy, but I suggest you write down some things. Do it at home. When you have the time.’
He checked his watch.
‘You mustn’t mention what happened to her,’ Pernille told him.
‘Only Nanna as you remember her. Of course.’
A long silence. Then she said, ‘Nanna was always happy. Always.’
He scribbled a note.
‘That’s a good thing for me to say.’
Birk Larsen got up. The priest did too. Shook his hand.
Pernille looked around the cold dark building. Tried to imagine a coffin there, saw the stiff, cold body inside.
‘If you need to talk to someone,’ the minister said, like a doctor offering an appointment. There was a look of studied, practised sympathy in his eyes. ‘Remember that all is well with her. Nanna’s with God now.’
The man nodded as if these were the wisest, most fitting words he could find.
‘With God,’ he repeated.
They walked to the door in silence.
She stopped after two steps, turned, looked at the priest in the brown jacket and dark trousers.
‘What good does that do me?’
He was taking back a chair. The notepad was in his pocket, like a carpenter’s measuring book. Probably working out the bill in his head.
‘What good?’ she cried.
‘Sweetheart,’ Birk Larsen said, trying to take her fingers.
She shook him free.
‘I want to know!’ Pernille roared at the man on the steps, frozen on the way to the altar, trapped by her fury. ‘What good does that do me? You with your sanctimonious words…’
He didn’t recoil. He found a kind of courage. Came back, faced her.
‘Sometimes life’s meaningless. Without pity. It’s a terrible thing to lose one’s daughter. Faith helps to give you hope. Strength.’
Her breath was short, her heart pounding.
‘To know that life isn’t without meaning—’
‘Don’t give me this shit!’ Pernille Birk Larsen screeched. ‘I don’t give a damn if she’s with God. Do you understand?’
Her hands clutched at her breast. Her voice began to break. The man stayed where he was in front of the altar. Theis Birk Larsen froze, buried his face in his hands.
‘Do you understand?’ Pernille wailed. ‘She’s supposed to be with…’ In the dark cold church a bird flapped somewhere, dry wings rustling in the eaves. ‘… with me.’
Lund was chewing Nicotinell. She looked at the ginger-haired kid, Oliver Schandorff. Screwed-up face, twitching fingers, seated in an empty classroom, nervous as hell.
‘You left school early yesterday, Oliver. You weren’t in class on Monday.’
‘I felt ill.’
‘Idleness isn’t a disease,’ Meyer said.
Schandorff scowled, looked ten years old.
‘You’ve got an absence rate of seventeen per cent,’ Lund added, looking at the records.
‘Class lout,’ Meyer chipped in with a wicked grin. ‘Rich kid. Dumb, forgiving parents. I know you.’
‘Look,’ Schandorff cried. ‘I had an argument with Nanna. That’s all.’
Lund and Meyer exchanged glances.
‘Lisa told you?’ Meyer said. ‘What else did she say?’
‘I didn’t do anything. I’d never hurt Nanna.’
‘Why did she dump you?’ Lund asked.
He shrugged.
‘One of those things. Like I care.’
Meyer leaned forward, sniffed Schandorff ’s expensive sky-blue sweater.
‘Guess she didn’t like you doing dope either.’
Schandorff ran his hand across his mouth.
‘Arrested for speed four months ago. Again two months later.’ Meyer sniffed again. ‘I’d say you’re into some kind of I dunno…’
He looked at the kid, puzzled, as if seeing something. Leaned forward, a couple of inches from his face, Schandorff recoiling, scared.
‘Wait,’ Meyer said urgently, peering into his eyes. ‘What’s that?’
‘What?’
‘There’s something. A tiny speck… I dunno. At the back of your eyes.’
Meyer reached out with a probing finger. Schandorff was at the back of his seat, couldn’t go any further.
‘Oh,’ Meyer said, with a sigh of relief. Retreated. ‘It’s nothing. Just your brain…’
‘Fuck you,’ Oliver Schandorff muttered.
‘Did you hand some of that shit to Nanna?’ Meyer roared. ‘Did you say… hey, let’s turn on… oh and it’s better with your pants down by the way.’
The ginger head went forward.
‘Nanna didn’t like it much.’
‘Which?’ Lund asked. ‘The dope or the…?’
‘Either.’
‘So you got punchy with her?’ Meyer had his chin on his hands. A pose that said: going nowhere. ‘On the dance floor. Threw a chair around. Yelled at her.’
‘I was drunk!’
‘Oh.’ Meyer brightened. ‘That’s OK then. So after nine thirty what did you do?’
‘I worked behind the bar.’
; Lund pushed the sheet across the table.
‘You’re not on the schedule.’
‘I worked behind the bar.’
Meyer again.
‘Who saw you?’
‘Lots of people.’
‘Lisa?’
‘She saw me.’
‘No, she didn’t,’ Lund said.
‘I was walking round. Collecting glasses…’
‘Listen, brainiac.’ Meyer was loud again, in a different way. Cold and threatening. ‘Nobody saw you after nine thirty.’
Got up, pulled a chair next to Schandorff, sat so close they touched. Put an arm round his shoulder. Squeezed.
Lund took a deep breath.
‘What did you do, Oliver? Tell your uncle Jan. Before he gets cross. We both know you won’t like it if that happens.’
‘Nothing…’
‘Did you follow her outside?’ Another squeeze. ‘Hang around the basement?’
Schandorff wriggled out of his grip.
Meyer winked at him.
‘Nanna had someone else, didn’t she? You knew that. You were jealous as hell. I mean really.’ Meyer nodded. ‘Think about it. School rich kid. She was yours. How could some pretty chick from a dump like Vesterbro screw you around?’
Schandorff was up shouting, running his hands through his wild ginger hair.
‘I told you what happened.’
His voice was a couple of tones higher. Young again in an instant.
‘The car keys…’ Meyer began.
‘What…?’
‘You knew the car was there.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Nanna didn’t want you. So you raped her. Dumped her out in the canal. On your way home—’
‘Shut up!’
Meyer waited. Lund watched.
‘I loved her.’
‘Oliver!’ Meyer was beaming. ‘You just said you didn’t give a shit. You loved her but she thought you were a jerk. So you did the thing any no-good little dope-smoking shit would. You raped her. You tied her up. Stuck her in the boot of that black car…’
Back on the seat, ginger head shaking side to side.
‘Stuck her in there so no one could hear her scream then pushed her into the canal.’
Meyer slammed his fist so hard on the table the pens, the notebooks jumped. Oliver Schandorff was a crumpled heap on the chair, silent, shaking.
Lund waited. After a while she said very calmly, ‘Oliver. If you’ve got something to tell us it would be best to say it now.’
‘Let’s take him down the station,’ Meyer cut in, reaching for his phone. ‘Oliver and me need a quiet chat alone in a cell.’