When Civil Servants Fail

by John Schou

instructions. Is that clear?”

  “Clear as ink. Only two questions: how much does Henrik expect to get?”

  “50,000 €.”

  “I wish somebody would pay so much to get me back. What a devoted animal that pet may be.”

  “That is none of your, I mean, our concern. Next question?”

  “Where are the Petrov boys?”

  “At first, invisible. They will listen to your instructions and know where you go. Then they will either arrest the culprit when he opens the suitcase or follow him to his hideout and liberate the animal. We cannot exclude the possibility that there is more than one gangster involved. You shall go straight to Fredensborg after having picked up your girlfriend; I have made a reservation for five o’clock.”

  “A bit early for dinner.”

  “A good dinner takes several hours and starts slowly. You can also turn up and postpone it a couple of hours, I have made a reservation for two in the adjacent hotel.”

  “Two persons or two rooms?”

  “I don’t remember,” he lied. “But since you are going for an excellent dinner, you should just have something small now. Juanita prepared it in the morning room. Then you better drive home and change for the evening. You can largely disguise it with a long coat and a scarf.”

  “Except for the stripes on the trousers.”

  “Nobody will notice them.”

  “Alice will be furious if I come in dinner jacket and she like a small poor girl in flat shoes.”

  I could read in his face that this was an aspect he did not care about. He had no feeling about women’s needs. He said, “She can change at the hotel,” and I thought, ‘so can I.’ If two hours would suffice?

  After having eaten half of Juanita’s competition meal, a small one only for Mr. Smith’s old appetite, I went down to the garage and brought the old sledge out. The suitcase found place behind in the luggage store where I could lock it up invisibly. I had kept my businessman clothes on. At first, I went to a gasoline station and filled it up. That was the only problematic point in the whole project, I found. The 12 cylinders ate a lot of fuel, and when speeding up, you could almost see the indicator move downwards in direction of empty. To compensate, they had not made the car more economic but built in a larger tank. I kept the recipe and hoped Mr. Smith would pay that, too.

  At home, I left the suitcase in the car; the advantage of a closed luggage store is that nobody can see what is hidden there and not even in a Bentley does any sensible person – now with one exception – hide a small fortune. I called Alice again and asked her, if I could pick her up at ten past two, we needed to get her toothbrush and a little more. It was okay with her. Fortunately, she lived near her working place in the centre of Copenhagen. I carried my own things to the car but then, upon second thought, let my gun stay at home. It does not suit my dinner jacket.

  She was indeed waiting for me as I passed by her working place at the agreed time. I had thought over my strategy and altered it a couple of times. “Now, imagine that you are Lauren Bacall and I Humphrey Bogarth at their best age ...”

  “Except that none of us smokes,” she interrupted.

  “And you are not blonde,” I added.

  “Bah, all girls colour their hair blonde nowadays. Don’t you like my natural chestnut brown long hair?”

  “Oh, is it even the natural colour? I thought ...” I had to brake to avoid causing an accident, quite suitable according to Alice’s reaction. Then I took her hand and kissed it in the old-fashioned style, adding, “I love your long hair whatever colour it has at any particular day, as I love all of you.”

  “All right. Then tell me, what’s up now?”

  “We just have a small coup to make and then a luxurious evening before us. In a suitcase in the back, there should be a colour bomb as a surprise to a blackmailer. I am going to deposit it according to his instructions. I am certain that this kind of keys is only found at the Central Station, contrary to the information I got from Mr. Smith. I only want to know, if the man, who gets this characteristic suitcase, opens it and looks, and if something then happens. I am going to set you off near the Central Station in half an hour at latest. If something goes wrong, I shall call you on the mobile.” She was always carrying it and I had used it already twice today.

  “If I am right about the Central station, I can only park, at the North entrance. Our gangster may use entrance and exit there or at the East entrance, opposite Tivoli. When you have made your observations, use the Western exit, I shall wait for you there. But we are in a hurry, you have just ten minutes to pack a long dress, some shoes that fit and a toothbrush. We’ll dress in the hotel. While you are packing, I shall drive slowly once around the block.” A Bentley can be driven but not parked in Copenhagen.

  I had to drive a couple of times around the block and the ten minutes were doubled. Honestly, it hampered my mood. When she finally came, I told Alice to take a taxi to the Central Station. It was anyhow not good for both of us to be seen in the big car, further characteristic through its green and olive colours, just before the big deal. I just managed to come to the place in front of the old Royal Theatre, where I immediately made my double encirclements and then continued to the Marble Church. I was hardly there when the telephone called.

  “Georg Hansen,” I said.

  “It’s Henrik. I understand that you have the desired amount.”

  I confirmed.

  “Great. We’ll make it simple: drive to the Eastern entrance of the old Assistents Churchyard.”

  “And the key suits one of the graves?”

  “We’ll come to that later. Wait there till I call again.” He answered. Even if we had the possibilities of the police, we could not have identified the place where he had called due to our brief conversation. Besides, it was also not that important, he had seen the car at the square and the mobile phone was surely not his own.

  The old Assistents Churchyard has been acknowledged as a ‘green lung’ in Copenhagen, a strange park full of graves but banned for further funerals. It was one of the few places in Copenhagen where I could park legally and free of charge while Henrik hurried to take his new position. That lasted some time, all the while I pondered about how amateurishly his plot was made. If he also planned me to drive to the Central Station, I almost felt pity for him and considered if I should suggest another scenario. But Mr. Smith was listening and at least one of Petrov’s gang was there already.

  Indeed. ”Drive to the Central station and wait just in front until one of the cars leaves to give you opportunity to park. Then I shall call you again.”

  Poor boy, I thought, your richness shall be of a brief duration, but I obeyed. After all, should my conscience later object, from me he got precisely what he asked for.

  I had just arrived as a car left. I noticed its registration number for the possibility that this was advantageous – getting a parking place in central Copenhagen is hardly possible without exerting some criminal energy.

  Henrik called again. “Insert the suitcase in number 216 and remove the key.”

  “And what shall I do with the key?”

  “Keep it as a souvenir, I have a copy.”

  “Not only you. Many drug addicts have made copies for these luggage keepers.”

  “Thanks for the warning. After the delivery, you drive away immediately.”

  “Great. I have an appointment.” I fed the parking watch, to be on the safe side – the average parking agent hates people driving rich cars, disregarding that we drivers may be as poor as they are. Then I took my precious suitcase out and went with it up the stairs to the central station.

  I know I was seen by many persons who all pretended not to see me. I also saw Alice and pretended not to see her as well, from one hypocrite to the other. To the right of me were the luggage deposits for optimists. According to my warning, Henrik could not be far away, but what could I say? It was not my task to identify him, but I could not help trying it. Probably, he was a young m
an and after my warning, he would definitely keep an eye on the luggage ‘safe.’ In that case, he could not see when I drove, but he might have assistance outside. What the hell, I just did my job, and then went out as fast as I could. Why had I involved Alice? Let’s go north and let the world burn behind us, it is not our game anymore, I thought.

  I went to the car. Another car was already waiting behind, the same which had given me the place. What a coincidence. A young lady expressed gratitude for getting the place. I felt pity for her but could not do anything. I drove to the western exit of the station, possibly a few hundred meters away in airline direction but involving a 10 minutes drive through the city. When I finally arrived there, Alice was impatiently waiting – several seconds if not even minutes.

  “There was no surprise. He opened the suitcase, made a happy face and closed it again. Then he went out the same way as you and that’s all. What do you drag out of that?”

  “That we need an alibi for something terrible that may soon happen. At best in the form of a not too excessive speeding ticket.”

  “They don’t exist. In Denmark, they are all excessive,” Alice noticed.

  “You are right. But if we report in Fredensborg and change our dinner-start to one hour later, it should be as good as that.”

  Although I had decided to drive decently, I still got my speeding ticket shortly before Hillerød. In general, also policemen hate drivers of luxurious cars. Seven kilometres too fast, he claimed and gave me a bolshevist excessive ticket. I put it together with the gasoline recipe and hoped for the best. The remaining part of the trip, I drove seven kilometres slower and led a long cortège of impatient drivers.

  “I am already tired of being Lauren Bacall,” Alice said.

  “How about Ginger Rogers?”

  “That’s better, but you only have a dinner jacket on the back seat. That’s below my social level.”

  “It’s the best even Fred Astaire would offer, if he lived today,” I argued.

  At a quarter past four, we arrived at Fredensborg and postponed our dinner one hour. Then we went to the hotel, where the wedding suite was reserved for us. Alice immediately forgave me ‘my lower social level,’ as she pronounced it. I quickly redressed – too quick, it turned out, so I took off my jacket again and laid down on the bed to rest for a while; in the meantime, Alice build up her dress, disregarding that my only interest was, when it was taken off again. But I let her keep these illusions.

  The rest of the evening and subsequent night fall under the protection of the privacy sphere, as I also told the police later when they asked me about my alibi.

  3 – Discrete Appearance

  „Wake up, Cinderella, the dream is almost over. We have just time for a quick breakfast, and then I’ll drive you to work and bring the coach back to the palace where it belongs and where I work as a humble servant.”

  “It was a beautiful dream,” she replied, “and I only start working at 9 a.m.”

  “But you can surely use an hour in the bathroom,” I argued

  “Cinderella doesn’t need so long – the princess, perhaps, but we are going back to the cruel, gray world this morning”

  “If you don’t mind, I’ll proceed down to breakfast, then you can follow when you have finished.” I had already had my shower and dressed, and after all that we had drunk the previous evening, I was in desperate need of a Fernet Branca. Besides, I was curious for the news.

  Alice locked the door behind me and I went downstairs. The newspaper knew of nothing dramatic in Copenhagen, so I enjoyed my coffee in peace. Astonishingly rapid, I was accompanied by Alice, as myself just dressed ready for work.

  We checked out, bill for ‘Mrs. and Mr. Gusto’ already guaranteed by Mr. Smith, as it had been said yesterday after dinner, and slowly changed our mood for the everyday.