The Keeper of Lost Causes

by Jussi Adler-Olsen

  Carl looked intently at his partner. Inside those warm, brown eyes he saw a glint of genuine hatred that wouldn’t need much coaxing.

  Carl shook his head. “We can’t do that, Assad.”

  “Yes, Carl, we can,” answered Assad. He reached out and slowly pulled the wires and detonators out of Carl’s hand. Then he wrapped them around Lasse’s neck.

  As Lasse glanced over at his imploring mother and his brother, who was shaking as he stood behind her wheelchair, Assad gave Carl a look that was unmistakable. They had to press Lasse to the point where he would start to take them seriously. Lasse might not fight to save his own skin, but he would fight to save his mother’s and brother’s. Assad had seen it in his eyes, and he was right.

  Then Carl raised Lasse’s arms and attached the stripped ends of the wires to the detonation cords, as Lasse had prescribed.

  “Go sit in the corner,” Carl ordered the woman and her younger son. “Hans, take your mother over there and set her on your lap.”

  He looked at Carl with frightened eyes; then he picked up his mother in his arms as if she were a piece of fluff and sat down on the floor with his back against the far wall.

  “We’re going to blow up all three of you along with Merete Lynggaard, if you don’t tell us how to shut off your infernal machine,” said Carl as he twisted a detonation cord on to one of the battery terminals.

  Lasse turned his gaze away from his mother and looked at Carl. Hatred burned in his eyes. “I don’t know how to stop it,” he said calmly. “I could find out by reading the manuals, but there’s no time for that.”

  “That’s a lie! You’re just stalling for time!” shouted Carl. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed that Assad was considering striking Lasse.

  “Believe whatever you like,” said Lasse and turned his head to give Assad a smile.

  Carl nodded. The man wasn’t lying. He was ice cold, but he wasn’t lying. Years of experience told Carl that. Lasse didn’t know how to stop the system without reading the manual. Very bad luck.

  He turned to Assad. “Are you OK?” he asked, placing his hand on the barrel of the shotgun only seconds before Assad would have smashed the butt end into Lasse’s face.

  Assad nodded angrily. The buckshot in his arm hadn’t done any significant damage, nor had the blow to his head. He was made of solid stuff.

  Carl carefully took the shotgun out of his hands. “I can’t go that far. I’m taking the gun, Assad, and I want you to run over and get the manual. You saw where it was. The handwritten manual in the inside room. It’s in the pile at the very end. On top, I think. Go get it, Assad. And hurry!”

  Lasse smiled as soon as Assad left and Carl stuck the barrel of the shotgun under his chin. Like a gladiator, Lasse was weighing his opponents’ strengths to choose the one who matched him best. It was clear he figured Carl was a better choice than Assad. And it was equally clear to Carl that he was wrong.

  Lasse began backing toward the door. “You don’t dare shoot me. The other guy would have done it. I’m going now, and you can’t stop me.”

  “Is that what you think?” Carl stepped forward and grabbed him hard by the throat. The next time the man made a move, he was going to slam the gun in his face.

  Then they heard the police sirens in the distance.

  “Run!” screamed Lasse’s brother as he abruptly stood up, clutching his mother, and kicked the wheelchair at Carl.

  Lasse was gone in a second. Carl wanted to run after him, but he couldn’t. He was apparently in worse shape than Lasse; his wounded leg simply refused to obey.

  He aimed the gun at the woman and her son as he let the wheelchair roll past and crash into the wall.

  “Look!” yelled Hans, pointing at the long cord that Lasse was trailing after him.

  They all watched as the cord slid across the floor. Lasse was obviously trying to tear the explosives from his neck as he ran down the corridor. They saw the slack in the cord being taken up as he made his way out of the building, until at last the wires wouldn’t reach any farther and the battery toppled over and was dragged toward the door. When it reached the corner and ran into the doorframe, the loose wire slipped underneath the battery and touched the other terminal.

  They felt the explosion only as a faint tremor, along with a muffled thud in the distance.

  Merete lay on her back in the dark and listened to the whistling as she tried to arrange the position of her arms so that she could press hard on both wrists at the same time.

  It wasn’t long before her skin began to itch, but nothing else happened. For a moment she felt as if the greatest possible miracle was going to shine upon her, and she screamed at the nozzles in the ceiling that they weren’t going to get her.

  But she knew the miracle wasn’t going to happen when the first filling began loosening in her mouth. During the next few minutes she considered letting go of her wrists as the headache and joint pains and the pressure on all her internal organs worsened and began to spread. By the time she decided to let go of her wrists, she couldn’t even feel her hands.

  I need to turn over, she thought, and ordered her body to turn on to its side, but her muscles no longer had any strength. She noticed everything getting hazy at the same time as nausea made her retch, almost suffocating her.

  She lay on the floor, immobile, and felt the convulsions increase. First in her gluteal muscles, then her abdomen, and up into her chest.

  It’s going too slow! a voice inside of her cried, as she again tried to release her grip on the arteries in her wrists.

  After a few more minutes she slipped into a foggy lethargy. It was impossible to hold on to thoughts of Uffe. She saw flashes of color and glints of light and spinning shapes; that was all.

  When the first filling burst out of her tooth, she began a prolonged and monotonous moaning. All the energy she had left went into this tortured sound. But she didn’t hear herself; the whistling from the nozzles overhead was much too loud.

  All of a sudden the seeping out of air stopped, and the sound disappeared. For a moment she imagined that she might be saved. She heard voices outside. They were calling for her, and she stopped her wailing. Then a voice asked if she was Merete. Everything inside her called out: “Yes, I’m here.” Maybe she said the words out loud. After that she heard them talking about Uffe as if he were a normal boy. She said his name, but it sounded wrong. Then she heard a loud bang, and Lasse’s voice was back, slicing through all her hope. She breathed slowly, noticing the clumsy grip of her fingers letting go of her wrists. She didn’t know if she was still bleeding. She felt neither pain nor relief. Then the whistling in her cage returned.

  When the earth shook beneath her, everything turned cold and hot at the same time. For a moment she remembered God and whispered His name to herself. Next she felt a flash inside her head.

  A flash of light followed by an enormous roaring and more light streaming in.

  And then she let go of herself.

  EPILOGUE

  2007

  The media coverage was tremendous. In spite of the sad outcome, the investigation and solving of the Lynggaard case was a success story. Piv Vestergård from the Denmark Party was extremely pleased and reveled in the attention, since she was the one who had demanded the formation of Department Q in the first place. At the same time, she took the opportunity to trash everyone who didn’t share her view of society.

  That was just one of the reasons why Carl finally couldn’t take anymore.

  Three trips to the hospital to have the buckshot dug out of his leg and a single appointment with Mona Ibsen, which he canceled. That was about all he’d been able to deal with.

  Now they were back at their posts in the basement. Two small plastic bags hung from the bulletin board, both filled with buckshot. Twenty-five in Carl’s and twelve in Assad’s. In the desk drawer lay a knife with a four-inch blade. Eventually the whole kit and caboodle would probably be tossed in the trash.

  They took care of each oth
er—Carl and Assad. Carl, by letting his assistant come and go as he pleased, and Assad, by creating a more carefree mood in their basement. After three weeks of stagnation with cigarettes and coffee and Assad’s cat-howling music playing in the background, Carl finally reached over to the stack of case files sitting on the corner of his desk and began leafing through them.

  There was more than enough to keep them busy.

  “Are you going over to Fælled Park today, Carl?” asked Assad from the doorway.

  Carl looked up with an apathetic expression.

  “You know. May first? Lots of people on the streets and drinking and dancing and carrying on? Is that not how you say it?”

  Carl nodded. “Maybe later, Assad. But you go ahead if you want to.” He glanced at his watch. It was noon. In the old days getting half the day off was a human right in most places.

  But Assad shook his head. “It is not for me, Carl. Too many people that I do not want to meet.”

  Carl nodded. It was up to him. “Tomorrow we’ll look through this pile of cases,” he said, giving the folders a pat. “All right with you, Assad?”

  Assad smiled so broadly that the bandage on his temple almost came off. “That’s good, Carl!” he said.

  Then the phone rang. It was Lis with the usual request. The homicide chief wanted to see him up in his office.

  He pulled open the bottom desk drawer and took out a thin plastic folder. He had a feeling that this time he was going to need it.

  “How are things going, Carl?” This was the third time in a week that Marcus Jacobsen had had occasion to ask that question.

  Carl shrugged.

  “Which case are you working on now?”

  He shrugged again.

  Jacobsen took off his reading glasses and set them on top of the paper chaos in front of him. “Today the prosecutor agreed on a plea bargain with the lawyers representing Ulla Jensen and her son.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Eight years for the mother, and three years for the son.”

  Carl nodded. Only to be expected. “Ulla Jensen will most likely end up in a psychiatric institution.”

  Again Carl nodded. No doubt her son would soon land in the same place. That poor guy would never survive a prison sentence in one piece.

  Jacobsen lowered his eyes. “Is there any news about Merete Lynggaard?”

  Carl shook his head. “They’re still keeping her in a coma, but there’s little hope. Apparently her brain was permanently damaged from all the blood clots.”

  Marcus nodded. “You and the diving experts from the Holmen naval station did everything you could, Carl.”

  He tossed a newspaper over to Carl. “It’s a Norwegian publication for divers. Take a look at page four.”

  Carl opened the paper and glanced at the photographs. An old photo of Merete Lynggaard. A picture of the pressure container that the divers had attached to the airlock door so the rescuer could move the woman out of her prison and into the mobile pressure chamber. Underneath was a brief article about the rescuer’s role and the preparations that were made inside the mobile unit. About how it was attached, about the pressure-chamber system, and about how initially the pressure in the chamber had to be raised slightly, partly to stop the bleeding from the woman’s wrists. The article was illustrated with a blueprint of the building and a cross-section drawing of the Dräger Duocom unit with the rescuer inside, giving the woman oxygen and first aid. There were also photos of the doctors standing before the National Hospital’s huge pressure chamber and of Senior Sergeant Mikael Overgaard, who tended to the patient—gravely ill with the bends—inside the chamber. Finally, there was a grainy photo of Carl and Assad on their way out to the ambulances.

  In big type it said in Norwegian: “Excellent coordinated efforts between naval diving experts and a newly established police division resolves Denmark’s most controversial missing-persons case in decades.”

  “Well,” said Marcus, putting on his most charming smile. “Thanks to that article, we’ve been contacted by the Oslo police department. They’d like to know more about your work, Carl. In the autumn they want to send a delegation to Denmark, and I’d like you to meet with them.”

  Carl could feel his mouth turn down at the corners. “I don’t have time for that,” he objected. He’d be damned if he was going to have a bunch of Norwegians running around downstairs. “Keep in mind that there are only two of us in the department. And exactly how much did you say our budget was, boss?”

  Marcus nimbly evaded the question. “Now that you’ve recovered and returned to work, it’s time for you to sign this, Carl.” He handed Carl the same stupid application for the so-called qualification courses.

  Carl made no move to pick it up. “I’m not doing it, chief.”

  “But you have to, Carl. Why don’t you want to?”

  Right now both of us are thinking about having a smoke, thought Carl. “There are plenty of reasons,” he said. “Just think about the welfare reform. Before long the retirement age will be seventy, depending on rank, and I have no desire to be some doddering old cop, and I don’t want to end up a desk jockey either. I don’t want lots of employees. I don’t want to do homework, and I don’t want to take exams. I’m too old for that. I don’t want to have a new business card, and I don’t want to be promoted. That’s why.”

  Jacobsen looked tired. “A lot of the things you just mentioned aren’t going to happen. It’s all guesswork, Carl. But if you want to be head of Department Q, you have to take the courses.”

  He shook his head. “No, Marcus. No more books for me; I can’t be bothered. It’s bad enough that I have to help my stepson with his math homework. And he’s going to fail anyway. I say that from now on the head of Department Q should be a deputy detective superintendent. And yes, I’m still using the old title. Period.” Carl raised his hand and held the plastic folder in the air.

  “Do you see this, Marcus?” he went on, taking the paper out of the folder. “This is the operations budget for Department Q, exactly as it was approved by the Folketing.”

  He heard a deep sigh from the other side of the desk.

  Carl pointed to the bottom line. It said five million kroner per year. “According to my calculations, there’s a difference of more than four million between this number and what my department actually costs. Don’t you think that’s about right?”

  The homicide chief rubbed his forehead. “What’s your point, Carl?” he asked, obviously annoyed.

  “You want me to forget all about these figures, and I want you to forget all about the course requirements.”

  Jacobsen’s face visibly changed color. “That’s blackmail, Carl,” he said in a carefully controlled tone of voice. We don’t use those kinds of tactics here.”

  “Exactly, boss,” said Carl, taking a lighter out of his pocket and holding it to the corner of the budget sheet. Figure by figure the flame swallowed up the whole document. Carl dumped the ashes on top of a brochure advertising office chairs. Then he handed the lighter to Marcus Jacobsen.

  When Carl returned to the basement he found Assad kneeling on his rug, deep in prayer, so he wrote a note and placed it on the floor just outside Assad’s door. It said: “See you tomorrow.”

  On his way out to Hornbæk, Carl brooded over what to tell Hardy about the Amager case. The question was whether he should say anything at all. During the past few weeks, Hardy had not been doing well. His saliva secretion was down, and he had difficulty talking. They said it wasn’t permanent; on the other hand, that’s what Hardy’s depression had become.

  Therefore they had moved him to a better room. He was lying on his side and presumably could just catch a glimpse of the convoys of ships out there in the sound.

  A year ago the two of them had been sitting in a restaurant in the Bakken amusement park, eating huge portions of roast pork with parsley sauce as Carl griped about Vigga. Now he was sitting here, on the edge of Hardy’s bed, and couldn’t permit himself to gripe about
anything at all.

  “The police in Sorø had to let the man in the checked shirt go, Hardy,” he said, deciding not to beat around the bush.

  “Who?” Hardy asked hoarsely, not moving his head a millimeter.

  “He had an alibi. But everybody is convinced he’s the right man. The man who shot you and me and Anker and committed the murders in Sorø. But they still had to let him go. I’m sorry to tell you this, Hardy.”

  “I don’t give a shit.” Hardy coughed and then cleared his throat as Carl went over to the other side of the bed and wet a paper towel under the tap. “What good would it do me if they caught him?” said Hardy with saliva in the corners of his mouth.

  “We’ll catch him and the others who did it, Hardy,” Carl said, wiping his colleague’s mouth and chin. “I can tell that I’m going to have to get involved soon. Those shits aren’t going to get away with this; no fucking way.”

  “Have fun,” Hardy said, and then swallowed, as if preparing to say something else. Then it came: “Anker’s widow was here yesterday. It wasn’t nice, Carl.”

  Carl remembered the bitter expression on Elisabeth Høyer’s face. He hadn’t spoken to her since Anker’s death. She hadn’t said a word to him even at the funeral. From the second they informed her about her husband’s death, she had directed all her reproaches at Carl.

  “Did she say anything about me?”

  Hardy didn’t answer. He just lay there for a while, slowly blinking his eyes. As if the ships out there had taken him on a long voyage.

  “And you still won’t help me die, Carl?” he asked finally. Carl stroked his friend’s cheek. “If only I could, Hardy. But I can’t.”

  “Then you have to help me go home. Will you promise me that? I don’t want to be here anymore.”