by David Hewson
Wondered what she’d say to Jan Meyer after all this time. The things she should have told him in hospital. The words that had run through her head during so many sleepless nights in her lonely bed in Gedser.
I’m sorry I failed you. I wish to God I could make you walk again. Help you be whole. The good, funny, intelligent man you were.
One other refrain that kept going round and round.
For God’s sake, Meyer, if I could take your place I would . . .
She looked up the drive, wondered if he realized who she was.
The kids were getting restless. One of them stole the ball from him, yelled something, started playing again. In an instant Jan Meyer was back where he wanted to be, inside their game, their world.
Lund had the courage to walk that short distance up the drive. She didn’t doubt that. But she didn’t have the right.
A young girl’s happy squeal. Meyer’s rough, joking voice came to her through the window.
Another time, she thought and drove away.
The red and white Danish flag was at half-mast over the main barracks building in Ryvangen. Louise Raben placed two white lilies alongside the bouquets at the foot of the pole and wondered what to do, who to call.
That morning she’d made an effort. Tidied her hair the way she used to when she was first married. Put on a smart navy wool coat over her white nurse’s uniform. It was important not to let go. Even if there was no one there to see.
When she walked away from the flagpole she found Christian Søgaard staring at her from the other side of the road. Khaki uniform, blond hair, beard carefully trimmed. A handsome man. If he’d turned up at Ryvangen earlier her father would have pushed her in Søgaard’s direction. She didn’t doubt that. Didn’t mind the idea too much either. It was too late, but . . .
He was tall and strong and persistent. An officer born and bred, from an upper-class family with a long military tradition. Not a working-class boy like Jens from a grim Copenhagen suburb.
She walked over. He smiled.
‘Did the police find anything?’
‘Not that we know of,’ Søgaard said. ‘Were you and Myg friends?’
‘He served with Jens. They were.’
She shrugged.
‘I’m just an army wife. I don’t get to share in those relationships.’
‘It’s best sometimes.’
‘Because we’re not up to it?’
‘No. Because you’re not there when . . . things happen. It’s hard to explain.’
‘Jens can’t even remember what happened. Even harder for him.’
Søgaard nodded. A wry smile. A man, not an officer. Or that was what she was supposed to think.
‘They come back sick sometimes. Delusional even. Sometimes you see things and . . . I don’t know.’ He took off his black beret, ran his fingers through his perfect hair. ‘Maybe it’s best you tell yourself they’re not real.’
Major Christian Søgaard rarely had this problem she suspected. He looked like a man in control.
‘Everyone’s in shock,’ he added. ‘I hope the police can sort it out quickly. We really don’t need this. I’m sorry to hear they turned down your husband again.’
She stared at the cold ground.
‘Yes. Well . . .’
‘Your father says you’re redecorating the basement. You’re going to stay on for a while.’
‘For a while. I left a list of vaccinations in the infirmary. If you could . . .’
‘Sure, sure, sure.’ He looked as if he was one step ahead of her already. Usually did. ‘If you want some help with the decorating. It’s kind of . . .’ He hesitated. ‘A hobby. Yes. A hobby.’
Christian Søgaard was stumbling for once. She liked that.
‘What’s a hobby?’
‘Painting. Fixing things up.’
Louise Raben put her hands on her hips, raised an eyebrow.
‘It’s been a while,’ Søgaard added. ‘But if you tell me what you want. I’ve got some . . .’
He gestured with his arms.
‘Some brushes?’ she suggested.
‘Brushes. That’s it.’
It was a stupid joke and it made her laugh. Not much else had recently.
‘I’ll bear that in mind,’ she said and took out her car keys.
‘Going somewhere?’
‘To see Jens. If they’ll let me.’
But Director Toft wouldn’t countenance it.
‘I can’t,’ she said sitting primly in her antiseptic office in the medical wing at Herstedvester. ‘He was very difficult last night. The rage. The delusions . . .’
When he came back from Afghanistan he was raving about nightmares, about monsters, things he thought real that couldn’t be. Now, Toft said, that had changed into an obsession that he was being kept in jail for reasons no one would tell him.
‘It’s very simple,’ she explained. ‘If he does what we ask. Takes his medicine. Learns to control his temper and his fantasies, then . . .’
‘He’s been fine for months. You said so yourself. You told us he was ready for release . . .’
‘The Prison Service makes the final decision. Not us.’
‘Why’s this happened? When he was making such good progress?’
Another time she might have cried at a conversation like this. Not now. There was a distance between the two of them, one that had grown slyly, like a tumour, over two years. Louise could look at Jens the way she looked at one of her own patients in the Ryvangen infirmary: dispassionately. And this she hated.
‘I don’t know,’ Toft said. ‘Let’s hope it’s not a total relapse. He has to learn to cooperate. I felt he was improving . . .’
Director Toft was getting bored. Her day ran on precise appointments. Judging by the way she kept looking at her diary another was on the way.
‘Your husband was very badly wounded in Afghanistan. The physical hurt’s ended. But the mental . . . He doesn’t remember what happened to him. Let’s not forget he took a complete stranger hostage thinking he was an army officer from Helmand. When in fact he was . . .’
A librarian from Vesterbro. How many times did they have to say that?
‘He can’t differentiate between what’s real and what’s not. We can’t release him safely until we’re sure he’s over that. Let’s see how things stand in a week.’
‘A week? We’ve got a meeting with our lawyers. I have to make decisions about school. Where we’re going to live.’
Toft leaned back in her chair, almost yawned.
‘Your husband needs rest. He can’t deal with that now.’
Louise Raben was ready to scream.
‘Punish him if you like! But why punish me? Why hurt his son?’
‘We’re trying to help. He needs to understand that. So do you.’
‘All Jens needs is his family.’
There was no point in begging. Or threatening. Nothing would move these people. Nothing . . .
‘I’ll see what I can do,’ Toft said, checking her watch. ‘But he must cooperate. Without that . . .’
Lund went through security at Herstedvester. A woman was leaving as she came in. Someone she’d seen before. Pretty, pale face, worried. In pain.
The barracks, Lund thought. She was there. And if she was visiting Herstedvester . . .
‘That’s Raben’s wife,’ Director Toft said, noticing Lund’s interest. ‘I just told her she couldn’t see him. Now I’m supposed to let you in there.’
‘I won’t tell,’ Lund promised.
She never took an instant dislike to anyone. But if she did this slender, glacially elegant woman would do.
‘It’s a bad time to question him. We had trouble last night. Can’t it wait?’
Lund had visited Herstedvester a few times in the past. It was the principal penal psychiatric institution in the country and housed some of Denmark’s most dangerous criminals. Two separate buildings: one for medical staff, one a high-security jail. Toft took her over to the pris
on, walked her down long yellow corridors, past iron doors, a guard with them all the time.
‘I won’t be long. Why’s he here?’ Lund asked as she waited for another heavy security gate to be unlocked.
‘Not long after he got back from his last tour in Afghanistan he abducted someone in the street. He said he thought the man was a former officer. Someone Raben thought . . .’
‘Thought what?’
‘I don’t have the exact details. The man had never even been in the army. Raben seized him, took him to some woods, tied him to a tree. Beat him to a pulp trying to make him confess to something . . . I don’t know.’
Another long corridor, another door.
‘The court decided an indefinite term here was the best sentence. He’d been discharged from the army for unacceptable behaviour. He was delusional . . .’
Toft looked concerned for a moment.
‘We send them out there and expect them to do whatever’s needed. But when they come back we don’t really give a damn, do we? I want this man better. He’s got a nice wife. A child. They need him and he needs them. I thought . . .’
‘Thought what?’
Toft stared at her. There was doubt in the woman’s face, and Lund guessed that was unusual.
‘I thought we were there. I recommended him for release last week. But the Prison Service turned him down.’
‘Why?’ Lund asked.
‘I don’t know yet. It’s their call. All I have to deal with is his mental state. They have broader considerations. And now . . .’ She folded her slender arms. ‘Now we’re back where we began.’
They stopped outside a cell. The guard opened the small metal shutter on the door. Lund peered through. He was there waiting for her. Thin, alert face, searching blue eyes, dark stubbly beard. An unremarkable man. One who’d disappear easily in a crowd.
‘Careful with your questions,’ Toft told her. ‘We’ll have a guard with us. If Raben starts getting upset I’m bringing it to an end.’
The room was cold and tiny with a single opaque window. Raben stood by it, looking at the light outside as if he craved to see the grey sky for himself.
‘Myg wanted to help me,’ he said. ‘He had a job. Carpenter. I could do it. I could get out of this hole.’
He came and sat down at the table.
‘Was he nervous? Did he seem afraid of something?’
‘Afraid? Myg wasn’t easily scared. He served with me three, four times. No. He wasn’t afraid.’
Lund waited.
‘He seemed a bit uneasy. Maybe he was in trouble. We were men, not officers. Sometimes we did things they didn’t like.’
‘Such as what?’
‘Just little things. Showing . . .’ He said the words very carefully. ‘. . . insufficient respect.’
‘Just that?’
‘I don’t know if he was in trouble or not. I shouldn’t have said that. What happened?’
Toft was staring at her.
Lund said, ‘Someone cut him with a fake dog tag. Then strung him up by his legs, head down.’
Raben’s eyes widened.
‘Does that ring a bell?’ she asked.
It took a while but eventually he shook his head and said, ‘No.’
Lund looked at her notepad.
‘He hadn’t served abroad for two years. The last tour was the one where you were wounded. A month ago he re-enlists. A week ago he volunteers for Afghanistan. Why did he suddenly want to go now?’
‘He said he wasn’t happy here. I think he was bored. Myg did a lot of work for the veterans’ club. He was a good man. But . . .’ Raben’s face broke into a brief smile. ‘Who wants to spend their time trying to help wrecks like me? He was a soldier. I guess he wanted to feel the buzz again.’
‘All the same . . .’
‘I really don’t have anything else to tell you. I’d like some peace now.’
‘This was good, Raben,’ Toft said, getting to her feet. ‘Thank you.’
‘I need you to look at this.’ Lund picked up her bag and took out the photo she’d shown Søgaard. ‘This woman’s called Anne Dragsholm. She was a legal adviser to the army. Was she connected to Myg Poulsen in some way?’
Raben was staring at her. Blue eyes very open and interested.
‘Why’s that important?’
‘She was murdered two weeks ago. There’s a connection between her death and Myg’s. I’m trying to understand what it is.’
Raben thought for a while.
‘I don’t know her,’ he said, pushing the photograph back across the table. ‘If Myg did he never mentioned it.’
Jens Peter Raben didn’t look in the least delusional, Lund thought.
‘You’re quite sure?’
‘I don’t know her,’ he repeated. ‘What else can I say?’
That was it. Toft was getting anxious. And Raben was saying nothing more.
Lund gave him a card.
‘If you think of anything . . .’
He turned to Toft.
‘I’m sorry for last night. It was stupid. I don’t know what came over me. I want to cooperate. Just tell me what to do.’
Toft smiled at him.
‘Good. First it’s medication. We’ll take it from there.’
She stood up. They all shook hands. Then the two women left.
‘That was a surprise,’ Toft said outside. ‘I got something out of him.’
‘Lucky you,’ Lund said and watched the guards start the long, slow process of letting them back into the grey world outside.
In the car park she called Strange. He had teams of men pulling in Kodmani’s contacts. More than thirty were in custody already, their names culled from customer lists and other databases.
‘And?’ she asked.
‘Where do we begin?’
‘You find out where they were yesterday afternoon for one thing.’
A long pause on the line.
‘I wasn’t being literal,’ Strange complained. ‘Yes, we’re checking their alibis. They all look OK to me. These are small fry. All mouth and not much else. They came in like tame sheep. If they were real terrorists we wouldn’t be able to pick them up this easily.’
He hesitated then asked, ‘How about Herstedvester? Did this Raben character come up with anything?’
‘Probably not.’
‘Sounds like we’re pretty much in the same boat, doesn’t it?’ He had a chirpiness about him at times. ‘Here’s one thing for you. Remember the foreign-looking officer we met at Ryvangen?’
‘Remind me.’
So many men in uniform. They began to run together after a while.
‘Bilal?’ Strange said. ‘Myg Poulsen’s company commander? The one who showed us his bunk?’
‘What about him?’
‘He’s in Kodmani’s customer file. Bilal bought a lot of rabid Islamic literature from him. A hell of a lot. Nasty stuff too.’
‘I’ll pick you up,’ Lund said.
Thomas Buch was on the phone arguing with Krabbe again when Karina walked in. The look on her face made him cut the call.
‘What is it?’ he asked.
‘I don’t know. I just heard Agger’s called a press conference of her own. About the anti-terror package. Did we get an agreement or something?’
Buch grabbed his jacket.
‘No,’ he said.
They went through the maze of corridors, into the committee rooms of the Folketinget, found Agger close to her office. She didn’t look pleased to see him.
‘I was going to call you, Buch,’ she said, suddenly flustered.
‘But you didn’t.’
She was smartly dressed, plenty of make-up. Looked young. Looked ministerial. Ready for the TV cameras.
‘What’s going on, Birgitte?’
‘We’re out. You’ll have to make do with Krabbe, I’m afraid.’
‘But—’
‘We’ve discussed this at length. We no longer have confidence in you.’
‘One
day in the job and I’m suddenly incompetent?’
‘You deceived me.’
Buch’s eyes narrowed with astonishment.
‘Come again?’
‘I know about the memo.’
‘What memo?’
‘The memo PET gave Monberg. Warning him the first killing was connected with terrorism. Not a domestic murder.’
Karina shook her head and said, ‘I never saw that and I was his personal secretary.’
Agger laughed, shook her head.
‘Oh please. I’ve got a copy. Dated, stamped, signed. You’re not going to hide behind us, Buch—’
‘How many times? I know nothing about any memo!’
Agger stared at him, still amused.
‘In that case, it’s even worse, isn’t it? Excuse me. I’ve a press conference to attend.’ She put her hand to his arm for a moment. ‘Don’t worry. I won’t tell them that last part. You can save that for the inquiry. And there will be one. That I promise.’
Back at Ryvangen Barracks, in the midst of the military, Lund felt a little less out of place this time round. She and Strange had got through security on the gate without much in the way of argument, found Said Bilal working on an armoured vehicle in one of the depots.
‘Got a moment?’ Strange asked.
‘The colonel’s at a meeting in town,’ Bilal said and went back to the equipment.
‘It’s you we want to talk to.’
He stopped at that. Put down the spanner he was wielding, climbed down from the ramp. Stood half to attention, staring at Strange, not at Lund at all.
‘Do you know Abdel Hussein Kodmani?’ Strange asked.
Bilal hesitated then said, ‘No.’
Strange pulled out a file.
‘So how come you’ve bought so many books from him? Thirteen over three months. You want the titles? Al Jihad. Radical Islam. Not exactly comics are they?’
Bilal was looking round to make sure no one was listening.
‘I bought them off the Internet. I don’t know who from.’
Strange just looked at him.
‘I haven’t broken the law, have I?’
‘Why did you get them?’ Lund said.
‘What’s this to you?’
‘Just tell us,’ Strange demanded. ‘You’re a serving soldier. What are you doing with this shit?’
Bilal glared at him.
‘I want to know who these scum are. I want my men to know too.’