The Last Good Man

by A. J. Kazinsky

  “Sure, go ahead.”

  “There are more than seventy-five hundred employees. Half of them are on the job at any one time. But we’re looking for those between the ages of forty-four and fifty, and there are eleven hundred people who fit that category.”

  “How many of them are working right now?”

  “About half.”

  “So we’re talking about five hundred and fifty people?” said Niels optimistically.

  “Plus we can quickly identify those who have no children. About a third, or a hundred and eighty people.”

  “And of those, I’m guessing that Casper can find police records for about a third of them.”

  “So we have a hundred and twenty left. Statistically speaking, at least.”

  “Who am I looking for now?”

  asked Niels. “A senior resident. Dr. Peter Winther.”

  It was quiet in the corridor. A TV was on, but the sound was off, and nobody was watching it. A nurse looked up from her paperwork. Niels showed her his police ID. “I’m looking for Peter Winther.”

  “He’s doing rounds.”

  “Where?”

  She pointed down the hall. Niels saw a doctor come out of a room with a small group of nurses in tow.

  “Peter Winther!” Niels walked toward him, taking out his ID long before reaching the group. The doctor’s face went pale.

  “Go on ahead and wait for me in the next patient’s room,” he whispered sharply to the nurses.

  “Copenhagen Police.” Niels didn’t say anything else. He could see that the doctor was about to confess to something. And yet. He turned red as he stared at Niels.

  “You know why I’m here,” said Niels.

  The doctor glanced over his shoulder and took a step closer. “Am I under arrest?”

  “No. We just want to hear your side of the story. Before we make a decision.”

  “My side?” The doctor snorted. “My side of the story is that she’s totally and completely insane.”

  Niels noticed the saliva collecting at the corners of the doctor’s mouth.

  “And any psychiatrist would agree. She doesn’t have a chance in court. Do you understand? Besides, it was self-defense. And I have the scars to prove it.”

  Peter Winther unfastened the top button of his shirt to show his throat. Long scratches ran from his neck down. “Dammit, I’m the one who should be coming to the police. What would you do if you had a wife who was . . .” He moved closer. He was really working himself up. “Okay, I gave her a slap. But just one! A single slap, and I should have done it three years ago.”

  Niels looked at his phone. He had a text message: Ida Hansen. The obstetrics clinic. A midwife.

  “What the fuck. I can’t believe she really went to the police. It’s unbelievable. Do I need to think about getting a lawyer?”

  Niels shook his head. “No. Thanks for your time.”

  Niels left Dr. Peter Winther behind to deal with his ruined marriage and his despair.

  “Talk to me, Hannah.” Niels was running.

  “She’s a midwife, but she’s on her lunch break. The cafeteria is on the ground floor.”

  “Couldn’t you organize the list geographically?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “So I could start at one end of the building and move to the other? We’ll never make it if I have to keep running from one part of the hospital to the other every time.”

  Hannah didn’t reply. Niels looked out the window as he waited for the elevator. The sun wasn’t red yet, although it was setting fast. He could hear Hannah breathing. A sign pointed toward the maternity ward. A weary mother pushed a little stroller with her newborn son as she absentmindedly devoured a chocolate bar. The baby looked at the sun, just as Niels was doing. I wonder what he’s thinking, thought Niels. If I didn’t know better, I’d almost think the beech trees in the park were carrying the sun on their shoulders. Like pallbearers in a funeral procession. A dying sun being carried to the west.

  With a ding that could be heard even by the hearing-impaired, the elevator announced its arrival.

  “I’m in the elevator now. On my way down,” Niels told Hannah on his cell.

  “Okay. Ida Hansen. Forty-eight. Midwife. Hurry.”

  Hannah ended the call.

  68

  Cannaregio—Venice

  The color of Sister Magdalena’s rubber boots could best be described as screaming pink.

  Tommaso smiled when he saw her cut across Madonna dell’Orto. The northern section of the city was a bit lower than the rest, which meant that it got flooded faster.

  He called to her, “Sister! You were going to tell me something. A message from my mother.”

  The alarm siren drowned out his words. She vanished inside the hospice without looking back. Unless Tommaso wanted to walk across the bridge at Dell’Orto and get wet to the knees, he would have to go back in order to reach the northern dock, which was seldom flooded. He glanced at his watch. The detour around Fondamenta Nuove would take at least fifteen minutes longer. He had an hour, maybe less, until sundown. The Danish woman had given him the GPS coordinates: 45º26’30’’ and 12º19’15’’. His cell phone could display longitude and latitude. Right now his position was at 45º26’45’’ and 12º19’56’’. Tommaso had no idea how long it would take him to reach the right location, wherever it was. So he’d better get going. The flooding would keep its grip on the city for at least a couple of hours, and he couldn’t imagine that Sister Magdalena would be going anywhere in the meantime. Besides, what could be so important to tell him?

  His socks were already soaking wet as he ran south along Fondamenta dei Mori. His shoes splashed through the water. He was the only person on the street. Was this the place? He stopped in front of Tintoretto’s house. Tommaso was very fond of the painter. Not so much because of his magnificent painting of the legendary stealing of the body of St. Mark; rather, because Tintoretto had almost never left Venice. Only once in his lifetime had the painter ventured away from the lagoon, and it was said that he was miserable during the entire journey. Tommaso had never gone far from the lagoon, either.

  The GPS signal began frantically jumping around. It was difficult to get a signal in the narrow streets.

  He moved on, heading down toward the casino and the Grand Canal, hoping to get a better signal near the wide waterway. His thoughts were still on Tintoretto. No. On St. Mark. Maybe because it was easier to think about the dead evangelist than about his newly deceased mother. He pictured the body of St. Mark, the first painting that every child in Venice sees. The saint was the guardian angel of the city, after all; the central piazza was named for him. Two Venetian merchants had stolen his body in Alexandria—minus the head, if the people of Alexandria were to be believed. The head was supposedly still in Egypt.

  The headless corpse, his mother’s withered hand, and the colors of death all haunted Tommaso as he reached Strada Nova. The GPS signal jumped again. At the canal he caught sight of the light of the setting sun. He would never find the right place this way; Venice wasn’t built for receiving GPS signals or for cars. He had to get hold of a computer.

  The entryway was underwater. Ads, dog food, and his mother’s black shoes were floating in a lake of canal water; on the surface was a thin film of oil from the boat motors, trying to look like a rainbow. The light went out a second after he turned it on. The main switch had shut off. He reminded himself that his laptop had a battery as he raced up the steps, taking them three at a time. He shook his head. His building had survived four hundred years of monthly floodings. His IBM laptop was only six months old, yet it was already signaling that the battery was almost dead. Google Earth. He looked for a spot where he could type in the coordinates, without success. Low on battery. Tommaso found the lagoon on the globe, frantically clicked on it, and then zoomed in on Venice. He was getting close. Low on battery. Save documents now. He checked the coordinates on his cell and moved the mouse a tad north. There it was.

&
nbsp; He sat back, staring at the results. Then his computer shut down.

  69

  Personnel office, the National Hospital—Copenhagen

  2:50 P.M.

  Hannah recognized the methodology from her own experience. Casper’s cerebral gears were well oiled, and he had plenty of them. Myriad kinds of information could pass through his head simultaneously, to be handled, assessed, weighed, and categorized. As opposed to Thor, who took one thing at a time.

  “I’ve found one more,” exclaimed Casper. “And I think she’s at work.”

  “Think?”

  “I’ll call security and find out.”

  Hannah sat down next to Casper. “Listen. The other murder victims—”

  “I know. We need to find more common factors, or this is going to take hours. Days. And we don’t have that kind of time,” said Casper.

  “Exactly.”

  “What do we know aside from their age and the fact that they don’t have children?”

  “They’ve all done something remarkable. One was in prison for speaking out against Putin. One was thrown into an Israeli military prison for releasing two Palestinians. A Canadian had used unapproved medicine and was then fired.”

  “So you’re saying that they all ended up in the news for some reason?” said Casper.

  “Yes. All of them did something newsworthy.”

  “If you’ve been in the news in Denmark, your name can be Googled. Everything is posted on the Internet. Even the smallest article in a local newspaper. If you’ve worked as a volunteer for only an hour for some charitable organization, your name will be on a list. And that list will be on a website. Even a person’s work for a co-op apartment association is posted.”

  “That’s what I mean.”

  “Let’s do a search for . . .” He looked at Hannah.

  She finished the sentence for him: “The qualified candidates.”

  “Right. It’ll take two seconds to Google each one. We’ll run through all the candidates and then isolate the ones who are the most likely.”

  Thor put down the phone. “She hasn’t punched out yet.”

  “Quick! Give me a name, Thor!” said Casper.

  “Maria Deleuran.”

  Thor spelled the last name, but even before he was finished, Casper had found her. “She’s a nurse,” he said.

  They studied the picture on her Facebook profile: blond, pretty. Tiny wrinkles that made her even more attractive.

  She looks a little like the girl Gustav ran off with, thought Hannah.

  “Okay. Here’s something.” Casper straightened up. “She’s a volunteer for IBIS.”

  A link took Casper to the IBIS website. Aid work in Africa and Latin America. Photographs of Maria Deleuran.

  “ ‘Rwanda. HIV. AIDS. Education and prevention,’ ” he read out loud.

  “She’s been a project leader down there,” said Hannah.

  “Twice.”

  Casper logged off and entered the police database. “Pure as snow. Didn’t pass her driving test until the third try. That’s the only thing we have on her.”

  70

  2:52 P.M.

  The nurse was speaking kindly and patiently to the old man, even though he was badgering her. Niels could hear him complaining from far away. “No, I don’t want to go up yet.”

  “But we promised the doctor. Don’t you remember?”

  “I don’t give a shit about the doctor.”

  The nurse laughed and patted the old man on the shoulder as she released the brake on his wheelchair and began pushing him back to his room.

  Niels stopped her. “Excuse me, where is the employee cafeteria?”

  “Back that way. Take a right at the chapel.”

  The old man snorted. “Chapel.”

  “Thanks,” said Niels. “By the way, I know this sounds like an odd question, but do you have any children?”

  “Yes,” replied the nurse in surprise. “Why?”

  Employee cafeteria—Copenhagen

  2:57 P.M.

  Niels had a feeling this wasn’t going to end well. On the lower floors, it was impossible to see the sun. Instead, he glanced at his watch. Forty minutes left. Tops. Niels didn’t feel any better about things when he opened the door to the cafeteria. Men and women wearing white coats. Hundreds of them. It was impossible. No. He had nothing to lose. He climbed up onto a chair.

  “I’m from the Copenhagen Police.”

  Everyone fell silent. The only sound was some machinery clanking in the commercial kitchen. Everyone was staring at Niels. Faces that were used to hearing bad news.

  “I’m looking for Ida Hansen.”

  No one answered. A single hand was timidly raised in the air. Niels jumped down from the chair and walked along the rows of laminated wooden tables. Cafeteria food—the special of the day was chicken, mashed potatoes, and boiled peas. Everyone was looking at him. Especially the doctors. Faces of authority.

  “Ida?”

  She put her hand down. It couldn’t be her. She was too young. “No. I just wanted to say that she has already left. Has something happened?”

  “Left? Where did she go?”

  He looked at his cell. This was the third time Hannah had called.

  “She had to go and help with an emergency birth. She ran out the door.”

  “How long is it going to take?” Niels could hear how stupid his question sounded. Hannah was still trying to call him. “Just a minute,” he said.

  He moved away to take the call. “Hannah?”

  “Niels. We’ve come up with a new method. Instead of . . .” She came to a halt. “Well, basically, we have three very qualified candidates. There will probably be more. But start with Maria Deleuran. She works in the Pediatric Department. And she’s been an aid worker in Rwanda.”

  Niels could faintly hear Casper saying something in the background. “And she’s written articles about the West’s inadequate efforts in fighting AIDS in Africa.”

  “Okay. I’ll find her.”

  He ended the call and went back to Ida Hansen’s younger colleague. “So where did you say she went?”

  “To the birthing ward.”

  Niels hesitated. He had just come from there. It would take five minutes to go back. “What do you think of her?”

  The young nurse looked at Niels in astonishment. “What do I think of Ida?” A nervous giggle.

  “Do you like her? Is she a nice person?”

  “Why are you asking me this? Can’t you just wait until—”

  Niels interrupted her. “What’s your opinion of her?”

  “Has she done something wrong?”

  “Answer the question! What do you think of her? Is she nice? Is she good? Is she stern? Is she a good person?”

  The nurse looked at her other colleagues for a few seconds. “I don’t really know. Ida is nice enough, but . . .”

  “But what?”

  Niels looked at her. No one said a word as she stood up, picked up her tray with the half-eaten chicken thigh and shreds of lettuce, and left.

  71

  Cannaregio, the Ghetto—Venice

  Tommaso had found large quantities of painkillers in his mother’s medicine cabinet, and he’d taken some with him. When he got home—without reading the pharmacist’s instructions—he had swallowed a cocktail of brightly colored pills, washing them down with a glass of lukewarm water. He thought about his father’s test for fever: “Does it hurt when you look up? If yes, you have a fever.” Tommaso tried it. Yes, it hurt. He felt dizzy. He racked his brain to remember what had been said during Monday’s briefing at police headquarters. Several politicians. He couldn’t recall which ones. A judge. A cardinal. It could be anybody. The next victim could be anyone at all, but he or she was on the train that was due to arrive at the station a few minutes from now. Tommaso had no doubt about it. If the coordinates were telling the truth, that is.

  Tommaso couldn’t see the sun, only its glow behind the building in Santa Croce. There w
asn’t much time left. If the woman from Denmark was right and the murder was going to be committed when the sun went down, then time was running out. For a moment he lost confidence. He looked at the display on his apartment wall, showing the victims. The case had become the curse of his life. Or was it a blessing? Tommaso didn’t know anymore. He happened to think about his mother—he still had her coins in his pocket—and about her dog. He remembered the slightly reproachful look the dog had given him when he left the dachshund to an uncertain fate. Tommaso put the thought out of his mind. He had to get to the train station.

  His back hurt as he bent down to pull on his rubber boots. At the bottom of the stairs, he nearly fell on the slippery steps. He sat down. Had to rest for a moment. Maybe he should just call Flavio. Explain the situation to him, say that they had to be on guard. No, it was too late for that. He would have to do it himself.

  72

  The National Hospital—Copenhagen

  3:04 P.M.

  A new corridor in the apparently endless universe of sterile corridors, closed doors, and people wearing white coats. “Excuse me, where is the Pediatric Department?” Niels asked a nurse.

  “Take a right,” she told him.

  “Thanks.” He set off running.

  Pediatric Clinic—Copenhagen

  3:07 P.M.

  The kids were sitting in a circle in the playroom. Two of them were too sick to get up, so their beds had been rolled into the room. A young man wearing a red-checked shirt was sitting on a chair that was much too small for him, holding a book in his hand. Above him hung a poster that said: MEET THE AUTHOR OF THE HORROR-BOOK SERIES FOR CHILDREN.

  “Where do you get all your ideas for the monsters?” asked a child’s voice as Niels barged in. The nurse sitting on the floor with a five-year-old girl on her lap looked up at Niels in annoyance.

  “Maria Deleuran?” he asked.