The Woman from Bratislava

by Leif Davidsen

  ‘Deduct as you see fit.’

  Teddy beamed happily at her. He was sure the two of them were going to have a lot of fun. She was a sister after his own heart.

  She let go of his hand, smiled up at the almost clear blue sky, stretched her arms over her head and tossed her short curls. Teddy was gazing at her with almost lovestruck eyes, so he saw the little red hole appear, heard the dull thud of the bullet driving into her right breast and saw the blood spatter over the wall behind from the much bigger exit wound in her back before he heard the actual shot. It was followed by another and yet another – the last one splintering the plaster only half a metre from his stunned, stricken face – and then, with staring eyes and a gurgling sound in her throat, Mira slid off the stool into the black mud, from which only a few green blades of grass protruded.

  Per Toftlund had got there that crucial second too late.

  Like Teddy he had roamed around the grim disused factory grounds, doing his best to block out the misery, the hopelessness and the stench as he searched for a woman of whose appearance he had only the vaguest idea. Eventually, down by a building at the very back, he had been stopped by two men in white trousers and jackets with the Red Cross emblem on them. On their left breast pockets they wore a little Norwegian flag.

  They had asked him straight out in Norwegian if he was one of the Danes who had come with the convoy from Dürres. They were an odd-looking couple. One was a tall, lanky character with small, fishy, blue eyes and a great bush of hair spilling over his face. The other was a stocky guy with brown hair and eyes to match, little glasses and a smile so dazzlingly white that it seemed the snow of the Norwegian mountains had settled permanently on his teeth. He introduced himself as Dr Per Samuelsen and asked if Toftlund knew the three men who had presented themselves to the Norwegian doctors as members of the Danish health delegation, but had looked blankly at Samuelson when he smiled, and in the spirit of Scandinavian brotherhood, switched to the lovely, lilting Norwegian language.

  ‘It’s odd, though,’ Samuelsen had said. ‘I’ve never met a Dane who didn’t understand at least some Norwegian. They didn’t seem like doctors or Danes to me so I called the French soldiers.’ He patted the neat, new little satellite phone in his hand lovingly, as if it were a precious doctor’s bag. Toftlund had simply pointed, and then they had pointed and in their Bergen accent said ‘Down at the bread store,’ and then Per had started to run, with the mud spurting up over his trouser legs and his heart like a galloping lump in the left side of his chest. Children and women stared at him with horror in their eyes as he whipped his gun out of its shoulder holster, cocked it and hurtled onwards, careless of whether he knocked down any of the startled people in his way. They backed away from him, clutching their loaves of bread or tins of food, because in his face they recognised the violence from which they had fled.

  Toftlund rounded the corner of the last building before the bread store, which was housed in the old factory building closest to the fence. Ahead of him was one of the two young men from the restaurant in Dürres, standing like a competition marksman with his legs slightly apart and a two-hand grip on his pistol; at the very second that Toftlund caught sight of him and shouted he fired. Out of the corner of his eye Per saw that he had hit his target, then he instinctively raised his own gun, wrapped both hands round the butt and fired three times in rapid succession. The first bullet embedded itself in the shoulder of the black-haired young man, staining his jacket red. The second hit him above the left eye, causing his head to explode in a cloud of blood and brain matter and the third flew across the fence and burned out somewhere on the way to the suburbs of Shkodra.

  As if looking down a tunnel, Toftlund saw the woman start to keel over and slip sideways, saw Teddy screaming and trying to hold onto her; he heard the shrieks of women and children round about him and then he felt a searing pain in his left arm and knew that he had been shot. The bullet bored straight through his left upper-arm, flaying open his jacket and shirt sleeves and taking a large chunk of his triceps with it. The initial burst of pain was like nothing he had ever experienced before, but the shock soon deadened it enough for him to raise his head, go down on his knees and scan his surroundings.

  Through a kind of haze, and yet as clearly as if he were spotlit, he saw the other young man from the restaurant. He was standing about twenty metres off, and was clearly in two minds. His gun was pointed at Toftlund, but his eyes were on the woman and Teddy. He turned towards them. The woman had fallen into the mud and Teddy was leaning over her with her face in his hands, yelling in his incomprehensible tongue. Toftlund’s arm was on fire; he almost slid right down into the mud, but braced himself with his burning left hand, pushed himself back onto his knees and took aim. It was like a film in slow motion. He saw the young man turn back and discerned the fear in his eyes at the split-second when it dawned on him that he should have kept his attention on Toftlund. He dropped into firing position, both hands gripping his pistol and just managed to raise it before Toftlund shot him three times in the chest and watched him fly backwards as if kicked in the chest by a mad bull.

  Toftlund was fghting for air. His throat seemed to have narrowed to nothing and his mouth was full of sand. He simply could not breathe and his heart was about to kill him, hammering at a rate that his system could not take. He knelt there in the mud with the taste of bile in his throat, seeing everything through a fog. But out of the fog came a man in a white jacket with a grizzled ponytail and rings on the fingers curled round yet another gun. An old-style Russian Makarov, Toftlund thought automatically as he struggled to make his arm do what its nerves were commanding it to do: lift his hand, aim and pull the trigger. But it was not listening. He could only watch as the man in the incongruous, white, too-tight jacket, the man who had called himself Don Alberto, stepped closer, shot an indifferent glance at the dying Mira and brought up his gun. And Toftlund told himself: Do something, for God’s sake. Raise your gun. Raise your gun, he urged again, but nothing happened. Then Don Alberto’s chest was one great splash of scarlet and the white jacket changed colour, looking now as though a mad artist had thrown all he had at it. Toftlund thought he could see the deformed bullets exit Alberto’s chest and drop down into the mire at the old gangster’s feet before, with an expression of the most profound astonishment, he fell forward into the mud, the blackness of which was slowly covered by red, darkening to brown.

  The last thing Toftlund saw was the two French legionnaires in bulletproof vests with their storm rifles in the air. A plume of gunpowder gas issued from the barrel of one of the guns. The faces of both young soldiers were so white that for a moment he was afraid they were ghosts. But then he remembered something from his childhood, a visit to a chalk mine where he had been scared of the same darkness that now engulfed him and filled him with an even greater terror. Because this was the chalk mine all over again. And he was sure that the darkness would never relinquish its grip on him.

  28

  PER TOFTLUND OBSERVED the Minister of Justice with interest. He looked as young in real life as he did on television, but one should not be fooled by those boyish features, the blonde locks or the soft, benign mouth. Toftlund was well aware that this was a politician who knew his stuff and who had got where he was by dint of a gift for political manoeuvring and a generous dash of brutality. Without such attributes you would not get far in politics. He was not a graduate of the law, but that did not matter. He was in charge of a heavyweight ministry and he had civil servants to take care of the legal side. It was his job to make sure that politics always prevailed over the law and that the Prime Minister was not presented with unnecessary problems.

  They were in the minister’s office. His secretary had set out three cups and saucers and a coffee jug, along with the cream and sugar which hardly anyone took these days, and then she had left them to it. No minutes would be taken of this meeting. Toftlund was wearing a sling and there were dark circles under his eyes, but his arm did not really hurt
that much. The minister sat at the head of the table, Vuldom across from Per. She had been given permission to smoke. The documents of the case lay in front of the minister, both the big fat file and the single sheet of paper which Toftlund took to be the recommendation from the Public Prosecutor. The minister had politely inquired after his health and when Per had replied that he was fine that busy man had prepared to cross this meeting off his schedule.

  ‘We’re dropping the case,’ the Minister of Justice said, tapping the single sheet of paper in front of him.

  ‘I have here the Public Prosecutor’s recommendation. We don’t have enough evidence to press charges. And while I must compliment Inspector Toftlund on his report, the Public Prosecutor and I agree that since all we have is hearsay it would never stand up in court.’

  Toftlund understood what he was saying, but try as he might he found it hard to pay attention when, more out of duty and routine than conviction, Vuldom proceeded to clarify the more ambiguous aspects of the investigation. As always it was a matter of stressing what massive resources had been used in this case and what massive resources would be required for future investigations. It was all a part of the ritual dance in Denmark today, Toftlund thought fleetingly. And then, in his mind, he was back in Albania.

  The French helicopter had been quickly on the scene, landing with a bump among horrified adult refugees and awestruck children. On the way to the French field hospital he remembered the rattle of Mira’s breathing through the oxygen mask. White coats had been leaning over her, then the doctor had straightened up and shaken his head. Teddy had not kissed her, but he had patted the ageing cheeks as if she were a little child. Toftlund’s own arm had been bleeding like blazes and hurt like hell, but the bullet had gone straight through and had not damaged the bone. They had given him a shot of morphine and bound up his arm. A flesh wound was not top priority with a dying Mira on their hands. The Albanians they had left where they were. The local police and the UN could take care of their worthless carcases. But the one person he really took his hat off to was Teddy. He had drawn himself up to his full and not especially imposing height and declared that if he was not allowed to take his sister home in her coffin to be buried in a place where at least one straight, true person with no hidden agenda could visit her grave then he, Teddy, was not telling anyone what her last words had been. Teddy’s lips were sealed as tight as an old maid’s twat he had announced so emphatically that even in such tragic circumstances Per and Torsten Poulsen could not help smiling. Torsten had taken care of everything and had been polite enough not to mention that he found himself having to clear up after Toftlund after all. And then they had flown home – a long, lumbering flight in an air force Hercules. The pain in his arm was nothing to the ache in his heart when Torsten informed him that he had received a call from Copenhagen on his satellite phone. Lise had gone into labour and been taken to hospital.

  It had preyed on his mind all the way home: here he was, turning up late again. Teddy had not said a word, or at least he had merely sat next to the anonymous body bag patting it and mumbling to himself. To begin with Toftlund could not catch what he was saying for the droning of the engines. Gradually, though, he began to make it out. And he shared Teddy’s pain. Because Teddy was right. They had led the Albanian gangsters to Mira. The treacherous, wrathful mafiosi had had a rough idea of where she was hiding, but they did not know exactly how she looked. Teddy and Toftlund had fallen for their ruse, walked straight into the trap and handed Mira on a plate to Don Alberto and his assassins. The Albanian gangsters had played Teddy and Toftlund for the gullible tourists they had turned out to be. They had been chosen as bait. And bait they had been. Don Alberto had put on his courtly Sicilian act, vaunting pledges of honour and links with the classic Cosa Nostra, while in fact he was the hired stooge and paid executioner of the brutal, modern-day Russian mafia. It was not pleasant to know that he had been tricked, conned, and that he had not had the slightest suspicion that he had been walking into a trap. It did not even help to know that he had personally put two of them in the grave. It was not in his nature to kill someone and not feel bad about it or think it wrong. It had, in all ways, been a long trip; throughout it all he had carried a picture of Lise in his mind, but this image had become mixed up with that of Mira sliding sideways into the mud and the sound of her last desperate, gargled breath.

  Toftlund was jolted back to the present by the sound of Vuldom asserting in her police chief voice:

  ‘She’s guilty! She’s guilty as sin.’

  ‘Yes, she is, but you have no proof that she had opportunity,’ the Minister of Justice countered. ‘Not without – how shall I put it – the other, whose identity, unfortunately, remains a mystery. It really is a very complicated affair.’

  ‘So she gets off.’

  This was a statement of fact and the minister knew it. He leaned across the table:

  ‘Well, she’ll get out of going to jail.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘By law she cannot be named, but we’ve already made sure the press and TV stations know the court hearing will take place tomorrow. They’ll be on the spot with their cameras and microphones when she’s released.’

  ‘But the press still can’t publish her name,’ Vuldom said.

  ‘No, but she’ll be free to make a statement and I think she will.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘Then the Public Prosecutor and I will let the public know, in no uncertain terms, that we consider Edelweiss to be as guilty as sin. But that the case has lapsed and cannot, therefore, be tried. I’ll be holding a press conference tomorrow. And the Public Prosecutor will happily make himself available for comment.’

  Vuldom stubbed out her cigarette and smiled:

  ‘So – condemned by public opinion. And that she’ll have to live with for the rest of her days.’

  ‘The media represent the modern version of the old village stocks,’ the Minister of Justice said with satisfaction. ‘As for the rest, that will have to be dealt with in the Commission on Cold War Intelligence Activities’ report, if it ever gets round to producing one.’

  ‘But you don’t think it will?’

  ‘Well, something’s bound to come to light. At the moment that’s the Danish Institute of Foreign Affairs’ problem, but if you ask me it will be up to our children’s generation to discover the truth about those who chose the wrong side in the cold war, just as it was left to the post-war generation to look into the darker aspects of the history of the occupation. Every country needs a few good myths about the times in which it lives. And there are too many – how shall I say, living skeletons from the cold war still rattling around in the closet of modern-day Denmark for anyone to be genuinely interested in total disclosure. They’re fine where they are, tucked away in the files. In the meantime the journalists can dig all they like, but the articles they write have a very short life. And we can live with that.’

  It was almost like a political address, Toftlund thought to himself. Or an attempt to justify himself, or excuse the fact that society was not yet ready to truly confront the recent past. Most people would prefer to forget all about it.

  ‘What about Irma’s controller, the mysterious ambassador? Or whatever he is. Because there’s no doubt he exists, is there,’ Toflund broke in.

  They turned to him in surprise. He was present at this meeting because he had been in charge of the investigation and because he deserved to be told how the story ended, but he was not expected to exceed his role and start ad-libbing.

  The Minister of Justice sighed and clasped his hands over the closed case.

  ‘Toftlund, you did a good job, and I hope Commissioner Vuldom will reward you with some time off. I also hope that you have been offered the necessary counselling?’

  ‘Toftlund did not want counselling,’ Vuldom interposed, as if the minister had just insulted one of her officers.

  ‘Ah – yes, well, I am familiar with your military background. But the offer still s
tands, of course. It’s the least we can do. And congratulations on the new baby. It’s great to have children. You’ve got something to look forward to there. Having kids around – it’s such a positive thing. Yes, what about this mysterious ambassador. Does he actually exist? Or is he an illusion, a figment of Mira Majola’s imagination? Has anyone in this story been telling the truth? If he does exist he must be nearing retirement. Or maybe he is dying. Nature or God will punish him for us. We’ll win the war in the Balkans. That’s a foregone conclusion. It’s only a matter of days. Now what we have to do is win the peace.’

  He paused, thought for a moment before continuing:

  ‘We’ll be holding a referendum on the euro within the year. It’s definitely on the cards. And that we have to win. That’s our top priority. In a couple of years we’ll have the chairmanship of the EU. That is going to be extremely important for Denmark. It will be our first chance in years to put a solid Danish stamp on the future of Europe. Who knows? The chairmanship may never come our way again. What with the expansion of the EU I don’t think we can take that for granted.’

  ‘So he’ll get away with it, is that what you’re saying?’ Toftlund persisted.

  The Minister of Justice glanced at Vuldom, who took over. In her capacity as the loyal public servant who did not engage in battles she could not win:

  ‘We’ve looked into it, Toftlund’ she said. ‘If we do a relatively wide search and draw up a profile based on that, we find at least a dozen candidates who fit that profile. If we include those politicians who have had access to confidential information over the years through their links with the Select Committee on Surveillance Procedures, the Committee for European Affairs or the Foreign Policy Committee, well, the list is a whole lot longer.’

  ‘All with cancer?’

  ‘That is not one of the parameters used in our search. It is deemed neither appropriate nor expedient.’