The Purity of Vengeance

by Jussi Adler-Olsen

  They swapped places and Nete closed her eyes, trying her utmost to think. If her former tormentor didn’t drink her tea, she’d be compelled to use the hammer again. She would offer her coffee, fetch the hammer, bring it down hard against the nape of her neck, then sit and wait for the worst of her headache to pass. There would be blood, of course, but what did it matter with Gitte being the last? She could always wash the carpets after she’d dragged the body into the room where the others were.

  She heard her guest approach yet was surprised to feel Gitte’s hands on her neck and shoulders.

  “Sit still, Nete. I’m good at this, but you’re sitting rather awkwardly. It’d be much better if you were in the chair,” came the voice from behind and above, her fingers pinching and kneading the muscles of Nete’s neck.

  She heard the voice babbling away, but the words faded. She’d felt this touch before under quite different circumstances. It was stimulating, delectably sensual, and she hated it.

  “I think you should stop,” she said, pulling away. “Otherwise I may be sick. Let me sit for a while. I’ve taken a tablet and I’ll be all right soon. Drink your tea, Gitte. Then we’ll talk about it all once the lawyer gets back.”

  She opened her eyes a crack and felt Gitte’s fingers withdraw as though they’d touched something electric. She sensed her walk around the table before sitting down gently on the sofa next to her. After a moment or two came the quiet clink of a teacup on its saucer.

  Nete leaned her head back slightly and squinted through her eyelashes as Gitte raised the cup to her lips. She appeared tense and ill at ease, nostrils flaring as she sniffed at the tea before taking a sip. Then suddenly her eyes grew wide with suspicion, all systems seemingly on the alert. She sent Nete a brief, piercing look and sniffed at her tea once more.

  When she put down the cup, Nete slowly opened her eyes.

  “Ahh,” she said, trying to assess what was going on in Gitte’s mind. “I feel a bit better already. That was a lovely massage, Gitte. You’re very good.”

  Get up now, she commanded herself. Fetch the hammer and get it done. After that, pour the formalin down her throat, and then you can go and lie down.

  “I think I need a glass of water,” she said, standing up gingerly. “The pills make my mouth so dry.”

  “Why don’t you have a sip of tea?” Gitte rejoined, holding out her cup.

  “No, I don’t like it unless it’s hot. I’ll put the kettle on and make us some more. I’m sure the lawyer will be here any minute.”

  She went out into the kitchen and opened the cupboard, and as she bent down to pick up the hammer she was startled by Gitte’s voice behind her.

  “If you ask me, Nete, I don’t think there is a lawyer.”

  44

  November 2010

  Police HQ was a mechanism in which even the smallest movement of the tiniest cog at the remotest extremity was registered. It was an anthill where signals crackled round the building so swiftly as to defy explanation. Whenever a person under arrest tried to bolt, whenever evidence disappeared, whenever a colleague became seriously ill, or the commissioner was in hot water with the politicians, the news reached every ear.

  It was that kind of day. The place was electric. Visitors at the duty desk, the commissioner’s floor a whirr of energy, advisers, and high-ranking staff from the public prosecutor’s office swarming.

  And Carl knew why.

  The issue of The Cause and those behind it was explosive, and explosives are liable to go off unless doused with water in copious amounts. So upstairs was sopping wet.

  They reckoned on the region of forty people would be charged before the day was over, and each case entailed a scramble to find evidence that would stick. The ball was rolling, and the police officers whose names appeared on Curt Wad’s membership list had already been brought in for questioning. If anything leaked before they were ready, all hell would break loose.

  Carl knew the various departments all had the right people for the job. That much had been demonstrated so often before. But at the same time, he felt just as certain that even in this finely meshed net of concrete and circumstantial evidence, there would be holes through which a man could pass. All it took was power, and the people they were after now had plenty. Sod the petty hooligans. Sod Curt Wad’s stormtroopers. Sod the foot soldiers. They wouldn’t be going anywhere; experience told him that. It was the strategists, the tacticians they were after. Ahead of them lay hour upon hour of patient police work interrogating the minnows who would lead them to the big fish if only the investigators made sure to do their job properly.

  The only thing was that Carl was more impatient than most, especially now. Reports on Assad’s condition were the same as before: they would be lucky if he survived.

  Who could stay patient in a situation like that?

  He sat for a while, wondering how best to proceed. The way he looked at it, there were two issues here that might or might not be linked. On the one hand were the disappearances in 1987. On the other were the injustices committed against a large number of women and the attacks on Assad and himself.

  Rose had got him confused. Until her report, all their efforts had been focused on Curt Wad, whereas Nete Hermansen had seemed only to be a victim, a puzzling yet innocuous link between missing persons. But after what Rose had come up with, warning lamps were coming on everywhere.

  Why the hell had Nete Hermansen lied to him and Assad? Why had she conceded to connections with all their missing individuals except Viggo Mogensen, when the fact of the matter was that he appeared to be responsible for starting the whole unhappy chain of events that had so marked her life: unwanted pregnancy, abortion, rape, unjust confinement to mental asylums, and compulsory sterilization.

  Carl was at a loss.

  “Tell Marcus Jacobsen he can reach me on the mobile,” he barked at the duty officer when eventually he decided to move into action.

  His feet were taking him in the direction of the motor pool, but his head realized their mistake. Bollocks, he’d given the fucking car to Rose.

  He glanced toward the rail terminal, nodding to a couple of plainclothesmen who were making off somewhere on foot. Why not walk? He could do that. What was two kilometers for a man in the prime of life?

  He made it to Central Station a few hundred meters up the road before he found himself flagging and decided to sod it and grab a taxi.

  “Bottom of Korsgade, by the Lakes,” he told the driver, the city crowds bustling. Carl looked back over his shoulder but couldn’t tell if anyone was following him.

  He felt for his pistol. He wasn’t going to be caught with his pants down this time.

  • • •

  The elderly lady sounded surprised over the entry phone but recognized his voice and asked him to come up and wait a moment outside her door.

  He stood there for a few minutes until eventually it opened and Nete Hermansen bid him welcome in a pleated skirt, hair neatly brushed.

  “I hope you’ll forgive me,” he said, his nostrils registering a smell that indicated even more than last time he’d been here that she was a woman who perhaps wasn’t quite as inclined to air her rooms as often as she ought to.

  He looked down the hallway. The matting by the bookcase at the far end had been scuffed up into a bump that had come loose from the carpet tacks.

  He turned toward the living room. It was a signal that he wasn’t intending to leave just for the minute.

  “I’m sorry to come bothering you like this without prior warning, Ms. Hermansen, only I’ve got a couple of issues I’d very much like to talk to you about.”

  She nodded and showed him in, reacting to a sudden click from the kitchen, a sound that in Carl’s home meant the kettle was boiled.

  “I’ll make us a nice cup of tea,” she said. “It’s about that time anyway.”

  Carl lifted his
head. “I’d prefer coffee, if it’s no trouble,” he said, recalling Assad’s molten tar, which for once he would have accepted gladly. The thought that it might never be offered again was devastating.

  Two minutes later she was standing behind him at the sideboard in the living room, pouring him Nescafé.

  She handed him the cup with a smile, poured herself some tea, then sat down facing him, hands folded in her lap.

  “So, how can I help you?” she asked.

  “Do you remember last time I was here we talked about those missing persons and I mentioned a Viggo Mogensen?”

  “I do indeed.” She smiled. “I may be seventy-three, but I’ve not lost my marbles yet.”

  Carl smiled back. “You said you didn’t know him. Might you have been mistaken?”

  She gave a shrug. What was he getting at?

  “You knew all the others, which was hardly surprising, given the circumstances. Nørvig, the lawyer who defended Curt Wad against the charges you brought. Your cousin Tage. Gitte Charles, the nurse who worked in the home on Sprogø. Rita Nielsen, who was there at the same time as yourself. Obviously it wouldn’t have done you any good to deny that.”

  “No, of course not. Why should I? Though, granted, it does seem to be a lot of coincidences all at once.”

  “And yet one of those missing persons was someone you didn’t know at all. That’s what you told me, and I assume in doing so you supposed we might turn our attentions elsewhere.”

  There was no reaction.

  “When we came to see you last Saturday, I told you we were investigating Curt Wad. For that reason, I think you probably thought you were in the clear. But do you know what, Nete? We now know that you were lying to us. You did know Viggo Mogensen, rather well, in fact. He was the cause of all your misery. You had a relationship with him and he got you pregnant, which sent you straight into the arms of Curt Wad, who performed an illegal abortion. We can see that from Curt Wad’s own records, which I can inform you are now in our possession.”

  At this point he’d expected her to tense up, perhaps even break down and cry. But on that count he was mistaken. Instead, she leaned back slightly in her chair, sipped her tea, and shook her head slowly.

  “Well, what am I supposed to say?” she replied. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the whole truth. What you say is correct, of course. I did know Viggo Mogensen. What’s more, you’re right in assuming I had no choice but to claim that I did not.”

  She looked at him with eyes that had lost their luster.

  “The fact of the matter is I have nothing whatsoever to do with any of it, and, as you suggest, I felt that everything nonetheless seemed to be pointing toward me. What else could I do but seek to ward off your attentions? I can assure you I am guilty of nothing and have absolutely no idea what happened to all these unfortunate people.”

  She expelled a sigh of indignation, as though for emphasis, then gestured toward Carl’s cup. “Drink your coffee and explain it to me again. And by all means take your time.”

  Carl frowned. Nete Hermansen was unusually confident for a woman her age. With hardly a pause for thought, she seemed in little doubt. Well-formed sentences, and never a question posed. It was all so matter-of-fact: Explain it to me again.

  Why should that be necessary? And why should he take his time? Was she trying to stall him? Was that it? Why had she made him stand outside the door all that time? Had she called someone? Someone who might help her out of a jam?

  Carl couldn’t work it out. Had she joined forces with her archenemy, Curt Wad?

  It seemed like he had nothing but questions. He just wasn’t sure what they were.

  He scratched his chin. “Would you mind if we searched your apartment, Nete?”

  This time there was a slight darting of her eyes. A tiny, almost imperceptible dissociation from the here and now. He’d seen it before, hundreds of times, and it told him more than as many words.

  Now she would say no.

  “Well, if you must, I’m sure there’d be no harm in your looking around. Just as long as you don’t make a mess.”

  She tried to look coy but failed.

  Carl leaned forward. “In that case, I think I will. But I must inform you that you have hereby granted me permission to search the entire property as I find relevant to our investigations. We’ll be thorough, and it may take some time. As long as you know.”

  She smiled. “Drink your coffee. It sounds like you’ll be needing the energy. It’s not a small apartment, by any means, as I’m sure you realize.”

  He swallowed a mouthful. It tasted horrendous and he put the cup down again.

  “Let me just call my superior and then I’ll ask you to confirm to him what we’ve just agreed, OK?”

  She nodded her consent, got to her feet, and went out into the kitchen. Maybe she needed to collect herself after all.

  Carl was sure of it now. Something here wasn’t right.

  “Yeah, hi, Lis,” he said when his call was finally taken. “I want you to get hold of Marcus . . .”

  He sensed the shadow behind him. Startled, he turned his head.

  And saw that the hammer aimed at the back of his neck was about to hit him full-on.

  45

  November 2010

  He had held the hand of his beloved all through the night and into the morning. Squeezing, kissing, and caressing it until the funeral director arrived.

  Curt trembled with emotion when they asked him to come into the living room and he saw her laid out in the coffin in snow-white silk, hands folded around her bridal bouquet. For months he had known this day would come, and yet it was practically unbearable. The light of his life, the mother of his children. There she lay. Departed from the world, departed from him.

  “Allow me a moment alone with her,” he instructed, his eyes following the besuited undertaker and his assistant as they left the room and closed the door behind them.

  He bent forward and stroked her hair one last time.

  “Oh, my dearest,” he murmured, barely able to find voice. He dried his eyes, but the tears had a will of their own. He cleared his throat but choked still on his sorrow.

  Then he made the sign of the cross above her face and softly kissed her frigid brow.

  The shoulder bag on the floor beside him contained everything he needed. Twelve 20 ml ampoules of Propofol, the contents of three already drawn into hypodermic syringes. Enough anesthetic to end the lives of five or six human beings. But there was flumazenil, too, to counter its effect should the situation so demand. He was well prepared.

  “We shall be reunited tonight, my love,” he whispered, before straightening up. The way he’d planned it, two more would die before his own turn came.

  He was waiting only for the word.

  Where was Carl Mørck?

  • • •

  He was met by his informant two buildings away from Nete’s apartment on Peblinge Dossering. The man who had taken out Hafez el-Assad.

  “I thought he was going to walk the whole way, so I just tagged along on his tail. I was right behind him until we got to the Central Station,” he said with an apologetic shrug. “It’s a good place to shove someone under a bus, but all of a sudden he was in a taxi. I took the next in line and followed him from a distance, but he was already on his way into the building when I came round the corner.”

  Curt nodded. Another idiot incapable of doing a proper job.

  “How long is it since he went in?”

  The man glanced at his watch. “An hour and a quarter now.”

  Curt looked up at the windows of the apartment. Apparently she had lived here ever since she sent him her invitation all those years ago. And who could blame her? It was an imposing building with a commanding view, centrally situated amid the vibrant hum of city life.

  “Have you got that pick gun for
me?” he asked.

  “Yeah, but there’s a knack. Let me show you.”

  Curt nodded and followed him to the front door. He was familiar with the basics.

  “The lock here’s a six-pin tumbler and looks pretty tricky, but it’s not,” his man explained. “We can assume she’s got the same kind in her apartment door. I’d say they probably changed the whole lot when they installed the entry phone.”

  He produced a small leather case and glanced about. Apart from a young couple idly strolling arm in arm along the path, there was no one around.

  “First there’s the torque wrench here,” he explained, inserting it into the lock. “Don’t touch it until you squeeze your trigger. Place the gun all the way into the keyway right under the pins. You can actually feel them. Keep your needle at a slight angle like this, then squeeze and apply pressure to the wrench, OK?”

  He squeezed the trigger a couple of times, tweaking the wrench simultaneously. The door opened almost immediately.

  He nodded and handed Curt the tools. “Now you’re in. Are you going to be OK, or do you want me to come up with you?”

  Curt shook his head. “No, I’ll be fine. You can go home now.”

  From now on he preferred to handle things on his own.

  • • •

  The stairs were empty. Apart from the faint sound of a television, there was no indication that anyone else in the building was at home.

  Curt put his ear to Nete’s door, expecting to hear voices inside but heard none.

  He stuck his hand into his shoulder bag, producing two hypodermics. He made sure the needles were in place, then put them in his coat pocket.

  His first attempt with the pick gun failed. He recalled his instructions and tried again.

  Despite its age, the lock was rather stiff, but after angling the needle and squeezing the trigger again he eventually felt the cylinder turn. Cautiously, he pressed down on the door handle with his elbow, and the door opened.

  An odd, musty smell filled his nostrils. Like moldy books or cupboards that hadn’t been opened for years. Old clothes and mothballs. A secondhand shop with no customers.