by David Hewson
Then he got in the front next to another man in the passenger seat. Rear doors secured.
Jansen came out of the house, walked up to Brix.
‘Is there anything down there?’
‘Nothing I can see,’ the forensics man said. ‘That doesn’t mean—’
‘Get out of there,’ Bülow ordered. ‘I’ll send people to assess the damage Lund’s done. We’ll have to pay out for that too.’
He went back to his car.
‘Wait.’
The squat man from prosecutions turned and scowled.
‘It may be your job to prosecute Sarah Lund,’ Brix said. ‘But I run homicide.’
‘Your case is solved. Cut yourself loose from that mad bitch while you can.’
He started walking again.
‘Get a full lab team out here,’ Brix said to Jansen. ‘Everyone we have. I want the basement checked.’
Bülow turned, shook his head.
‘We leave when I say so,’ Brix insisted.
‘Done,’ Jansen said, reaching for his phone.
A birthday song. This is how we play the trumpets. Everyone standing round the table, making pretend instruments with their hands.
Party hats. Presents. Cake. Candles and little Danish flags.
A toast of wine and orange squash. Vagn Skærbæk in his smartest clothes, smiling like a proud uncle, beaming at the boys.
Pernille looked at him. So young sometimes, though there were bags beneath his eyes she hadn’t noticed much before. And maybe he was starting to dye the grey flecks in his hair.
Vagn had been a part of them for so long she couldn’t remember how it began. With Theis. Everything started with him. In that mad rush, when she was pregnant with Nanna, running away, getting married. Persuading him to give up the round of petty jobs and try to settle down. Start his own company.
The slight, diffident, sometimes frightened figure of Vagn was always there in the background. Always ready to help. To offer a kind word. To put the life of someone else before his own.
Now she watched him looking at the boys and felt with every passing second that something which once seemed so right, so natural, was deeply wrong. Not for any reason she could comprehend. Not through any single fact, more a line of circumstances and intuitions that still failed quite to connect.
‘The boys are beautiful,’ Vagn said, smiling in that unforced, genuine way she’d taken for granted.
Maybe he saw himself there. Or the boy he wished he’d been.
‘The food was really delicious.’
‘I’m glad, Vagn,’ she said quietly.
And wanted to ask: why?
Was about to when Theis stood up, cleared his throat, announced he wanted to say a few words.
Were there any others, she thought. She loved this man but knew that, in some ways, he was as much a mystery to himself as he was to her.
‘First of all,’ Theis Birk Larsen declared in a voice that was mock-serious, though perhaps he didn’t know it. ‘I would like to say happy birthday to Anton. I hope it’s been a nice day. A little bird told me…’
The man across the table put a hand over his mouth and giggled.
‘That Uncle Vagn has another surprise for you later.’
He stood next to her like the rock, like the great tree in the forest he always was. Swaying a little now. Not the arrogant young tough of old.
Bowing down, his hand reached to the table and gently covered hers.
‘Lotte,’ he said, raising his glass. ‘Anton. Emil. Vagn.’
He didn’t cry. He never had. Not when she was looking. But it was close now.
‘We couldn’t have got through this time without you.’
He squeezed her fingers with his own.
‘And I couldn’t have got through anything…’ Narrow eyes, impenetrable eyes, sly sometimes, fell on her. ‘Not a thing without my Pernille. My sweet Pernille…’
The arm of Birk Larsen’s clean shirt swept his face. No tears. Not quite.
‘Soon we’ll have a new house. And we’ll welcome you all there. A new start. A new…’
The great tree wavered. The table was silent.
‘Skål,’ Pernille said, raising her glass.
‘Skål,’ said Lotte and Theis.
‘Skål,’ said the boys with their orange juice.
Vagn gulped at his beer and roared, ‘Bunden i vejret eller resten i håret!’
The boys giggled. He put his hand over his mouth and blushed.
Bottoms up or the rest in your hair.
A drunken toast. Not for kids. But maybe Vagn didn’t know that. Maybe there was a line between the boy he wanted to be and the adult he became. One, the imaginary child, happy and free, becoming real. The other, the adult, poor, careworn, solitary, turning into fantasy.
In the morning she’d call Lund. Would talk to her. Knew that the woman would listen. Till then…
She saw him smiling at Anton and Emil.
Till then she’d keep her family close, would not let them out of her keen and eager sight.
The phone rang.
Vagn Stærbæk got straight up from the table, went for the phone barely able to keep his eyes off the boys.
Off Pernille too. She looked so… intense. Happy in a way. As if something, some hidden mystery, was becoming clear.
‘Hello?’ he said. ‘Birk Larsen residence.’
‘It’s Rudi. Is Theis there?’
Past the balloons, past the presents she was watching him.
Vagn Skærbæk smiled.
‘Hi.’
Brightly.
‘What’s up?’
‘I drove by the house. The police are there again.’
Still smiling.
‘What do you mean?’
‘They’re in and out of the basement. Lots of them. Is that OK? I thought…’
‘Well, yes,’ he said. ‘That’s fine. We’ll come right over. Thanks for calling. Bye.’
Sat down. Shrugged.
‘Well,’ he said, looking round the table. ‘I think we have a change of plan.’
Birk Larsen’s heavy brow furrowed
‘The guy I told you about.’ Vagn winked. ‘You know? The one. He wants us to come out right now.’
‘What plan?’ Pernille asked, suddenly anxious. ‘What plan’s this?’
‘Vagn’s surprise,’ Theis said.
He winked too. This annoyed her.
She got up, stood behind Anton and Emil.
‘So how did he know to call here?’
‘My phone’s on the blink,’ Vagn said. ‘Didn’t I mention it?’
He looked at the boys. At Lotte and Pernille.
‘I don’t want to break up the party, Theis. But if we’re going to go we ought to get started. Sooner we leave the sooner we’re back with…’
He looked at the ceiling, rolled his eyes.
‘Can’t we wait till after the cake?’ Birk Larsen asked.
‘No. We have to go now. Half an hour. That’s all.’
A glance at the boys.
‘Save me some,’ he said, then got Birk Larsen’s black leather jacket, held it for him.
Downstairs.
She heard the garage doors getting rolled up. Caught up with Theis as Skærbæk walked to his van.
‘Don’t go,’ Pernille said.
‘Come on.’
‘Why can’t Vagn go alone?’
‘It’s about the dog,’ Birk Larsen whispered. ‘We’ll be back for cake. I promise.’
Then, a six-pack of Carlsberg in his hand, he walked outside.
She stood by the crates and the forklift. Cursing herself. Wondering why she let him ride over her this way.
A small, high voice from the shadows near the office said, ‘Mum? Is this for me?’
Anton, searching round the place, looking where he shouldn’t. He got that from Nanna.
‘Let’s go upstairs. Stop messing with things.’
‘I’m not messing. It’s got my name on i
t.’
She went over. A yellow envelope.
In Vagn’s scrawl: Anton.
It sat on a tarpaulin over something that hadn’t been there before. She dragged it off. There was a kennel underneath, shiny and new. And a cardboard box, old, half open, behind. A noise coming from it.
She pulled back the leaves of the lid.
Anton squealed. Shrieked. Screamed.
‘He’s cute, Mum! He’s cute! He’s mine.’
A black and white puppy.
Pernille looked, mind racing. Wondering.
Anton picked up the dog. Emil was running down the stairs.
Into the office, phone out. Called his number.
Waiting she heard an echo. Walked to the workbench, saw the red Nokia there, light flashing, tone trilling.
‘What’s his name, Mum?’ Anton yelled, following the puppy round the vans. ‘What’s his name?’
‘Lund,’ Pernille murmured.
Anton looked at her.
‘Lund?’ the small voice said.
Svendsen was driving. Lund didn’t know the other guy in the front. As they worked through the busy traffic in Vesterbrogade she said, ‘Send someone for Skærbæk, for Christ’s sake.’
‘Why don’t you shut up and enjoy the ride?’
‘He killed Nanna. He killed Frevert. He shot Meyer.’
Svendsen took his hand off the wheel, wound a finger in the air, made a childish sound.
‘Woo-woo-woo.’
Laughed.
‘Maybe I’ll come and visit you in the funny farm. Probably not though.’
‘We need to bring in Skærbæk—’
‘Tell Brix about it. You’re boring the living shit out of me.’
The radio snapped into life.
‘Twelve twenty-four, call in.’
Picked up the mike.
‘Twelve twenty-four. Over.’
‘Twelve twenty-four. Nanna’s mother called. She insists on talking to Lund.’
‘Lund’s in a straitjacket howling at the moon. What’s the problem?’
She wanted to shriek at him. Rip the mike from his hands. But she waited.
‘She wants us to track down her husband.’
‘Are we lost and found now?’
‘Dammit, Svendsen,’ Lund yelled.
‘Yeah, yeah.’ He waved. ‘What’s it about?’
‘He left with an employee. She doesn’t know where. She’s worried.’
‘What employee?’ Lund said. ‘Ask him that. Gimme the damned mike.’
As she reached over the one in the passenger seat slapped her hard in the face with the back of his fist.
‘Come on, Svendsen!’ she yelled. ‘Bring that lonely brain cell into action for once in your life. Ask who it was? Humour me.’
He looked at her in the driving mirror, shook his head, asked the question anyway.
A pause.
‘He went off with someone called Vagn Skærbæk. They were supposed to pick up a puppy. The wife says it’s not true.’
Lund leaned over the seat. The other one kept watching her.
‘We need to send a patrol car over there. Get the number of Skærbæk’s van.’
‘Copied that,’ Svendsen said and put down the mike.
She blinked, bright eyes gleaming.
‘What in God’s name are you doing? Put out a call on Skærbæk. He’s killed two people already. Svendsen!’
His big bull head rolled in anger.
‘You don’t know that, Lund! I can’t put out a call because someone’s gone out for a drive. It’s Friday night. They’re probably on the piss and don’t want the old woman to know.’
‘Skærbæk isn’t going for a drive. Do your job.’
He looked at her again.
‘My job’s to take you back to headquarters and throw you in a cell. You’ve no idea how pleasant this is going to be.’
Lund sat back on the hard seat. Lights flashing past in the black night. Time running out.
Two men from homicide. Typical male detectives. Glocks on their belts always, like a piece of jewellery, an icon of their manhood.
She looked towards the dashboard, then lower. Svendsen was right-handed. The other guy left. Their weapons sat between them. Grips out. Calling.
‘I did ask nicely,’ she whispered.
‘I’m sure the only cell left is the shittiest one,’ Svendsen began. ‘I so regret that, I—’
Reached forward, both hands. Flicked up the leather catches in one, grabbed the grips, dropped one gun in the footwell, pulled the slide to load on the second.
Held the barrel against Svendsen’s bull neck.
‘What is this crap?’
He sounded scared.
‘Pull in,’ she said. ‘Right now.’
‘Lund…’
She took the weapon away from his skin, edged it round his face, then for the first time outside the range fired.
The side window shattered in crazed glass. The car skidded and wheeled on the dark wet road.
By then Svendsen was on the brakes and the other guy was screaming. They came to a halt outside a gift shop. Red brick. Christmas trees in the window and decorations.
‘Get out of the car,’ Lund said. ‘Both of you. Stand against the window. Don’t piss me off.’
She watched them. Climbed over the seat, gun in one hand, eyes on Svendsen all the time.
Then turned the unmarked police car round in the broad road, back to Vesterbro.
Bülow refused to leave Humleby. He stood and watched as Brix’s men tried to find some logical way to examine the mess that was now the basement.
Two senior forensic officers in white suits and mob caps were spraying for bloodstains. Brix stood with Jansen by the stairs, Bülow baiting them all the time.
‘This isn’t easy,’ one of the men in white moaned. ‘All this sawdust and shit—’
‘You’re wasting police resources,’ Bülow cut in. ‘That’s an offence in itself, Brix.’
The men were using luminol. Any trace of blood would shine bright yellow under the ultra violet lights they’d brought.
‘Seen a single thing?’ Bülow asked.
‘Well, no,’ the forensic officer answered carefully. ‘That’s often the case before you look.’
‘Are all the people you employ smart-arses, Brix? Tell me. Truly. I’d like to know.’
‘We need to turn off the lights,’ Jansen said. ‘See if we’ve got any traces.’
He glared at the man from prosecutions.
‘Careful you don’t trip.’
Then it went dark.
The two men in white suits picked up a pair of long fluorescent tubes.
Blue.
They ran them up and down the stripped and sprayed walls.
‘I’m not seeing anything, Brix,’ Bülow crowed.
His phone rang.
They moved their lights to the skirting board, ran round every inch.
‘Right,’ Bülow said. ‘I’m on my way. Track down the car. Warn everyone she’s armed. Approach with caution.’
He cut the call, stood in front of Brix and Jansen.
‘Your colleague has just threatened two officers with their own firearms and hijacked a patrol car.’
Brix said, ‘What?’
‘You heard. I’m getting you suspended, Brix. You’ve been standing in our way all along. When I’m finished—’
A long whistle from one of the men in white.
‘And now,’ said a voice ahead in the strange blue light, ‘stand back in wonder.’
They looked at the floor. Bülow and Brix. Jansen and the men in white.
Between the centre set of floorboards patches of yellow had crept across the blue pool of light.
Puddles and splatters. Long running stains.
‘Raise your eyes, gentlemen,’ said the man from forensics. ‘This is something else.’
A yellow handprint on the wall. Fingers scraping at the plaster, like the shadows left behind by a vanished g
host.
It was coming to life everywhere. Strips and smears, scrawls and pools.
Like a room in a sick nightclub.
In the strange light Jansen looked around.
‘She was fighting for her life in here, Brix. This was a…’
Bülow’s mouth was half open, flapping, wordless.
Brix was getting out his phone.
‘Get me control,’ he said.
There was a solitary nurse at the desk of the private hospital wing.
‘Are you family or friends?’ she said when he asked to see Poul Bremer.
‘Neither.’
‘Well then I’m sorry.’
‘Tell him Hartmann’s here. He asked to see me.’
‘He needs rest.’
Hartmann leaned on the desk and waited.
She went off to a room a few doors down. Not long after four people came out. Hartmann recognized Bremer’s wife and sister. Both were weeping. They walked past him, down the corridor, towards the waiting room.
The nurse came back.
‘I don’t want him excited. If he becomes sick or agitated you need to let us know. There’s a bell push by the bed. We’ve just moved him into this room and we don’t have all the monitors working yet.’
‘Sure,’ Hartmann said with a shrug. ‘How is he?’
She didn’t say a word. Then showed him to the room and left.
Just a lamp over the bed. Bremer in a white gown lying on a white sheet. Drip feed into his nostrils. No spectacles. Unshaven.
He seemed younger like this. As if the small, solitary room had removed the cares of the outside world, burdens Poul Bremer carried with him every moment of the working day.
The Lord Mayor of Copenhagen looked up at him, squinted, laughed.
‘I would have beaten you easily on Tuesday, Troels,’ he said in a weak, faint voice. ‘You know that, don’t you?’
Hartmann stood by the IV stand, hands in pockets.
‘Maybe you still will.’
‘If only.’
‘You know maybe you should talk to the doctors, Poul. Your family. Not me.’
‘You’re my legacy,’ Bremer said with a feeble scowl. ‘You can damn well listen.’
There was a stool by the curtain. Hartmann pulled it to the side of the bed and sat down.
‘Oh please, Troels. Don’t look so sympathetic. It turns my stomach.’ That faint laugh again. ‘If I were you, thirty years ago, I’d be standing on that drip feed now. Sending me to hell and stealing the prize for myself.’
‘I don’t believe that for one moment,’ Hartmann said, surprised to find he was smiling.