The Quiet Girl - Peter Hoeg

by Peter Høeg

  The office was empty; Kasper secured the lift and crawled in the window. He pulled Franz Fieber in after him.

  The doors in the office must lead out to a corridor. And there must be access to the library from the corridor; he reached for the door handle.

  The door was kicked open. It hit Kasper in the chest and flung him against the wall.

  The stocky man with the hearing aid came through the door. Fie had a flat weapon in his hand; it looked like a child's gun, but with a long barrel.

  When Kasper was a child, guards had been recruited among the poorest classes of society. Since then, concern for the common good had risen to the surface; it had become a high-status profession to guard people's money. The man coming toward him moved fluidly, like a dancer at a royal ball. Close at hand his sound had a tone of massive presence and great inner authority.

  He stopped with his legs apart, raised his weapon, and relaxed his muscles against the recoil. Kasper saw why the barrel was long. A perforated metal cylinder had been screwed onto it, and you could see the hole was stuffed with glass wool; it was a silencer. Kasper remembered them from the circus. They were used when killing had to be done quickly--for example, if a horse struck the edge of the ring and one of its legs got an open fracture.

  The prayer began of its own accord, wordless, but the meaning was: "May SheAlmighty grant me an open heart, and give me strength to meet the great light."

  Behind the open door, Franz Fieber was hidden from the man.

  Now he walked out, thrust one crutch between the man's legs, and twisted.

  The sound of the shot was dampened. But Kasper heard a surprising sound behind him, like a hammer against stone. At first he didn't notice any pain, but the middle of his body felt paralyzed. His legs gave way under him, and he slid to the floor. The assailant's face was less than an inch from his own.

  Kasper grabbed the other man's head, and bit him in the nose. He bit in order to survive, but at the same time he felt sympathy; part of his mind prayed, "May SheAlmighty let this man fall into the hands of a skilled plastic surgeon, because that's the minimum requirement if he's ever to be a male model again."

  The man opened his mouth to scream. Kasper stuck the Easter egg into it.

  Kasper got up. His abdominal muscles felt like one continuous disc-shaped pain. He took the egg's brass holder and struck the fallen man on the back of his head, as hard as he could. The man's head flopped back on the floor, and he lay still.

  Kasper took the pistol from him. It was the first time in his life he had held a firearm; he wouldn't have had any idea how to use it. He handed it to Franz Fieber.

  Doubled over with pain, he walked out the door and down the corridor; it wasn't possible to straighten up. There were three doors to the library. He tried one carefully. It was locked. So the others would be locked too.

  He crawled back to the office. He would have to get into the library from the lift outside.

  He had thought that pneumatic tubes had gone out of style; this system must be the second generation. There were no buttons to push, just a black screen; he brushed it with the tips of his fingers, and red numbers came to life. A list of dispatch addresses hung on the wall; he found the library's. He took out his fountain pen. Got the egg from the man on the floor. On the wrapping paper he wrote: "A price has been placed on my head. I'm coming to get you instead." He put the egg into the tube.

  "Count to twenty," he said. "Then send it."

  "You've been shot in the stomach," said Franz Fieber.

  Kasper pulled up his shirt. There was a small swollen hole beside his navel.

  "Also on your back," said Franz Fieber. "The bullet went through you."

  Kasper climbed back on the lift, and glided sideways to the library.

  In just the short time he had been away, the man had bled a great deal. Kasper couldn't tell for sure if he was alive. Aske Brodersen had now turned toward the woman.

  Kasper listened inwardly to the prayer for a moment; it hadn't stopped at any time. He turned it toward his inner picture of Saint Genesius, patron saint of actors and entertainers; he had suffered martyrdom in a.d. 303, but before that had freed numerous souls from torment.

  The pneumatic tube hummed. Aske Brodersen stopped short. He went over to the terminal. We are, all of us, information addicts. All of us have to listen immediately to our telephone messages. Look at our e-mail. Empty the mailbox. In the middle of a meal. In the middle of making love. In the middle of an interrogation.

  Kasper opened the window. He got up onto the windowsill, slid onto the floor. Aske Brodersen stood with the egg in his hand.

  11

  Aske Brodersen had taken off his jacket. Underneath he was wearing suspenders.

  "I want to see the girl," said Kasper.

  The other man stood with the egg in his hand.

  "She's in the room next door."

  Kasper placed his fingers on one side of the husband's neck; the man was alive. Lona Bohrfeldt was gagged with sports tape, which had also been used to tie her to the chair. The roll of tape and a scissors lay on the table. Kasper cut her free.

  Aske Brodersen led the way toward a door. Kasper couldn't hear any discord. Maybe the world was really so simple when one had deep contact with one's musicality Maybe he would see KlaraMaria now. The tall man opened the door and let Kasper walk in.

  At first the room seemed completely dark, but then Kasper noticed a gentle light coming from the sea. One entire wall was glass. He looked around; KlaraMaria would be sitting somewhere on the floor with her dolls.

  He heard the egg hit the floor. Then he was grabbed from behind. The other man had a good grip; he was holding Rasper's upper arms. He lifted him off the floor and smashed him against the windowpane.

  The window must have been laminated, like bulletproof glass; it had no elasticity; it was like hitting a cement wall.

  Aske Brodersen didn't say anything, but Kasper could hear him nonetheless. Or actually, not him, because he wasn't there anymore. When feelings become strong enough, the ordinary personality disappears: The sound of the heart disappears; the compassionate aspect of the frequency field disappears. What is left is an extreme form of the impersonal. Kasper could hear that the figure behind him wanted to kill him.

  He was flung against the glass again, this time much harder. He saw something being drawn across the lighted windowpane. At first he thought it was Venetian blinds or a blackout curtain, but then he felt the warmth on his eyelids; it was blood.

  The next time the window struck him there was no pain and no sound; he knew he was very close to the end. The prayer in his heart began by itself. What he heard himself pray was: "May SheAlmighty give me strength to strike back."

  The windowpane came toward him again. But this time he flexed his hands and feet; his palms and soles took the blow. It sounded like an explosion; he heard one wrist break, but his head was not struck.

  He let his body go limp like a rag doll, let his head fall forward. The man behind him took a deep breath for the final effort. In drawing the breath, he lowered Kasper. The instant his feet touched the floor, Kasper gave the man behind him a backward head butt.

  The backward head butt is the Dom Pérignon of stage fighting and onstage violence. Kasper had practiced for two years on a swinging sandbag before he learned to perform a knockout with one blow. And then he practiced for months to learn to stop the movement just beforehis partner's head. But now he didn't stop; now he followed through.

  The man didn't go down immediately. He was still standing upright when Kasper slipped out of his grasp and swept his feet from under him. But his eyes were blank.

  He hit the floor without bracing himself. On the way down, Kasper ripped off the man's suspenders and wrapped them around his throat. He put a knee against the back under him and tightened the suspenders. He could use only his right hand.

  The door opened, and the ceiling light was turned on; the blond woman stood in the room.

  Actual vio
lence against real people is terrible. But stylized scenic violence is necessary. For those of us who haven't come farther than we have.

  . "Please come in," said Kasper.

  She walked in, like a robot.

  The light had transformed the panorama pane into a mirror; in it one saw the face of the man on the floor.

  "When a person is strangled," said Kasper, "it's not primarily because he can't get his breath. The first thing that happens is that the supply of oxygen to the brain stops. Because of the pressure on the large veins in the throat. If you look in the mirror, you can already see sort of avocado-colored, burst blood vessels in the whites of his eyes. Do you see that?"

  The woman's legs collapsed under her; she slid down along the wall until she was sitting on the floor.

  "Where is KlaraMaria?" Kasper said.

  She tried to say something, but had to give up.

  A broad stream of perspiration was running down into Rasper's eyes. He rubbed his face against the back under him; the shirt became colored as if he had used a paint roller. It was blood.

  He heard something unexpected. He heard love. It came from the woman. He looked down at the man beneath him. It was the man she loved.

  "Tell me where she is," he said. "And we won't have to pull the suspenders tighter."

  "They're both down in the basement," she said.

  "So the boy is alive too?"

  She nodded.

  "What are you going to do with them?"

  Something clinked like pieces of glass when Kasper spoke; at least two of his teeth were broken or knocked loose.

  The blond woman didn't say anything. He tightened the suspenders.

  "I don't know," she said, "I swear. I look after her, after them-- please don't do anything, please don't."

  He stood up.

  "Take my arm," he said.

  She obeyed mechanically. She opened the door. They went down the hall. The door to the office was open. He pointed; she led him over to the desk, to a telephone.

  He dialed the Institute's number.

  "I want to talk with the Blue Lady," he said.

  Half a minute went by until she came to the phone. He fell in and out of consciousness.

  "Yes?"

  It was a year since he had last heard her voice.

  "Both children may be alive," he said. "They may be in the basement at Konon, a place built on the landfill beyond Tippen in North Harbor. I'd like to go and get them myself. But I've encountered a slight problem which prevents that."

  Her sound did not change. Perhaps she could receive news of the end of the world without modulating.

  "We'll contact the police," she said.

  He supported himself against the desk. The telephone connection was poor; the small receiver and speaker holes were filled with blood.

  "I have a couple of errands to do," he said. "And then I'll come and collect the payment."

  "We'll be glad to see you."

  He hung up.

  * * *

  The elevator worked; they rode down three floors, stopped, the door opened. Franz Fieber stood outside. He got in. The elevator continued down. Franz Fieber stretched up and looked at the top of Rasper's head.

  "Your head is split open," he said. "You've got a fractured skull."

  Kasper gave Franz Fieber his other arm; they half carried him across the yard. He could hear blood dripping on the flagstones, a brittle, slightly ringing sound, very different from drops of water, because of the fluid's greater viscosity.

  The moment they walked into the shadow of the outer wall, floodlights illuminated the yard. Through his feet he could feel many running steps. They opened the door and walked into the glass booth. The green admiral was still shaken. Kasper could hear that. But it was nothing compared to what he now became. He stared at Kasper, at the woman, recognized her, could not move. Kasper felt he needed to say a few words. When we have inconvenienced our fellow human beings, we can't leave them completely confused.

  There are many people who believe they have bought a ticket to Gilbert and Sullivan in this life. And only when it's almost too late do they discover that existence is a piece of doomsday music by Schnittke instead.

  "Aske didn't think the egg was big enough," Kasper said. "And you know his temper."

  * * *

  Out on the sidewalk Kasper let go of the woman's arm; she just stood there. He and Franz Fieber reached the van. The woman behind him hadn't moved. Kasper managed to get up into the front seat.

  "We're going to take a ring road," he said.

  "You're bleeding to death," said Franz Fieber.

  "All bleeding from the veins can be stopped. With gentle but firm pressure maintained for ten minutes."

  "You've got only two hands."

  At the end of Sundkrog Street they turned north. The lights all blurred together before Kasper's eyes. Franz Fieber made a U-turn; Kasper was thrown against the door.

  "A police blockade," said the young man.

  They drove along Strand Boulevard. Continued along Jagt Road. Kasper found a stack of linen. He folded cloth napkins like a compress. Tried to tie them on his head with tea towels. As fast as he applied them they got soaked with blood. He was beginning to run a fever. The young man beside him started to cry.

  That was the trouble with apprenticeships. When the master lights the afterburner the student may get flattened. Just look at the Bach sons. None of them ever rose to their father's level. And think of Jung. He could never completely wipe away the footprints after Freud had walked all over him.

  "Both children are alive," said Kasper.

  "You need to go to a hospital."

  "Later. We have a couple of quick errands."

  "Just look at you."

  "We're so close. I say, like Saint Thérà¨se of Lisieux, 'Je choisis tout,' I want to have everything."

  Kasper rolled down the window. The fever was a reaction to physical injury; he remembered it from his accidents in the ring, from when he was still performing as an acrobat. The cool wind helped. His weariness was a more serious matter; it was related to the loss of blood.

  They drove along Jagt Road, on the border between central and greater Copenhagen. Turned onto Tagen Road, drove past the lakes. The city had never sounded like this before. It had acquired a bit of focus. The sound reminded him of Christmas Eve, of the times a decisive final soccer match was on TV. But darker. Far more tense. People listened toward the barricaded area. Toward the possibility of new earthquakes. They listened in solidarity. It was, however reluctant one is to say it, the solidarity of people who see in one another's eyes that perhaps they will die together. Pater Pio once told believers that the best place to pray is in an airplane during a crash. "If you truly unite in prayer then," he said, "you cannot help but realize the Divine."

  "I've met many crazy people," said Franz Fieber. "But so help me, I've never ..."

  Kasper pointed; the vehicle turned from Øster Void Street, past the Geological Museum, up a 15 percent incline and through the low, open wrought-iron gate of the Mind Institute.

  There was light inside the glass door. A blond Prince Valiant was sitting at the desk.

  "Please drive all the way into the office," said Kasper. Franz Fieber shook his head.

  "In my condition," said Kasper, "it's nice to not have to go out into the cold."

  Franz Fieber pressed down on the accelerator. The van struck the glass door, broke through it like a paper screen, stopped with the front of the van inside the office.

  Kasper struggled down from the high seat. Seated himself in a chair by the desk. The man on the other side of the desk was immobilized.

  When Kasper was a child many professors had had an unfortunate clang that made people look around for something to plug their ears with--rugs, for example. At that time, having an academic career required neurotic, biased mental overexertion. Kasper had met professors who were in the audience with Maximillian at premier performances. They had been fragmented.

/>   Time had changed the sound; the man on the other side of the desk had a broad spectrum. But still.

  "Many artists," said Kasper, "are afraid of academics. But not me. My favorite figure in commedia dell'arte is Il Dottore. Do you know him? 'Learning can cure everything.'"

  The blond man cast a sidelong glance toward the shattered front door. Kasper could hear him calculating his chances for a successful escape.

  "I don't recommend it," said Kasper. "I don't have anything to lose."

  The sound across from him gave up.

  "What were you supposed to dor"

  The other man didn't answer.

  "You were supposed to give scientific luster to the demonstration. What did they demonstrate?"

  The blond man looked out at the van. Franz Fieber was still sitting behind the wheel. The doors and windows were locked.

  "There's no witness to this," he said.

  "God hears everything," said Kasper. "But He doesn't testify in municipal court."

  The professor moistened his lips.

  "They didn't demonstrate anything. The little girl just said, 'There won't be any more earthquakes.' There were twenty buyers. Foreigners. Everything was translated into English. That was all. It took five minutes."

  Kasper could hear he was telling the truth.

  "What do you get out of it?"

  "Scholarly information."

  "Can we get a little closer to the truth?"

  The professor looked down at the desk.

  "You are extremely talented," said Kasper. "I can hear that. You also came with King Kong to try to bribe me. You aren't the violent type. But I am. Just look at me. I've come directly from the battlefield."

  The professor looked at him.

  "The university is a flat structure," he said. "If you want to move up in earnest, it has to be outside the university."

  There is a pleasant firmness of tone when one is in harmony with oneself. Even when it's a weak ethic one is resonating with. "What can the children do?"

  "We've scanned them. They have interesting brain waves. That's all."

  "What can the Blue Lady do? Mother Maria."