by David Hewson
Plough went through the photo frames, picked up one, showed it to Buch whose heart fell instantly.
‘New York. Of course.’
A younger Carsten Plough. Dark hair. A pretty, happy wife by his side. A son with them, tall and smiling, no more than twelve or thirteen. They stood on the observation deck of the World Trade Center. Clothes from a different time. Everything from a different time.
‘It was the most expensive holiday we ever had,’ Plough admitted. ‘I wanted it to be something we’d remember for ever.’
He gazed at the picture: lost faces, lost world. Lost family.
‘There’s nothing wrong with dreaming, is there? You’ll be the crown prince now, Thomas. Karina can be your right hand—’
‘All this time, Plough, all these years of service! And still you don’t see how it works, do you? Monberg was screwing with you! What else are you hiding?’
A furtive look and that too was new.
Buch walked round the desk, tapped Plough on the plaid shirt.
‘Tell me dammit or I’ll take you down with them.’
‘I’d like you to go now, please.’
The prim tone was back in his voice.
‘Jesus.’ Buch wanted to scream. ‘You did just what they wanted all along. You helped the wrong man. You sucked up to the bastard who caused your own son’s death—’
It came out of nowhere. A slap across the face. Like a challenge to a duel. Or a spat between children. Buch felt his cheek. It barely hurt. Not physically.
‘The right people have been punished. I owed that to my son.’ His arm stretched out to the door. ‘You will leave now. I demand it.’
There were tears behind the staid horn-rimmed civil servant’s glasses.
Thomas Buch picked up his old Western novel from the table, wondered why he’d given it to Plough in the first place. Even he wouldn’t like these stories any more. Too many heroes and villains. Too much black and white and never a hint of grey.
‘Goodnight,’ he said then let himself out into the dark chill street.
Raben was back in a Politigården interview room, facing the same lawyer he’d seen the day before. He couldn’t work out whether she was mad with him for fleeing the cops at the hospital or pleased he’d been proved right.
Either way it didn’t matter. Louise now sat by his side. There was a deal on the table, a better one, though it still came with conditions.
‘I don’t think there’s any doubt they’ll accept your story this time,’ the woman said. ‘That doesn’t change everything. You still need to drop your accusations against the police officer here.’
His arm was in a fresh sling. They’d cleaned up Louise’s face. He didn’t say a thing.
‘It’s clear your other allegations were correct. That means you’ve served two years in custody for something that should never have happened. Whatever penalty you get for the crimes you’ve just committed I can argue the time you’ve served already covers that.’
‘You mean I’m free?’ he asked. ‘I can go home? See my son?’
‘You can see your son. But you’ll have to be in custody until we can get in front of a judge. It’ll take a week or two at the most.’
He glowered at her.
‘You’ve waited a long time, Raben!’ the woman cried. ‘For God’s sake be patient now. I’ve talked them into giving you a place at Hørserod. It’s an open prison. As pleasant as jail gets.’ She glanced at Louise. ‘You’ll have family quarters there. The three of you can live together. Just a week, two or three at the most. Then I’ll get you released. On bail at first. But they won’t get away with opposing that. I can’t believe they’d even try.’
‘Jonas,’ he whispered.
‘And I advise you to sue for damages. You’ll win. Big time.’ She placed a piece of paper on the table. Raben looked at it. His original witness statement naming Strange as the officer in Helmand. ‘But please . . . you need to sign a formal statement withdrawing that accusation against the policeman. As long as that’s hanging over us . . .’
He looked at Louise.
‘Can we have a moment to ourselves?’
‘Of course,’ the lawyer said then left the room.
He turned to the battered, tired woman next to him, didn’t see the dirty clothes, the blood, the bruises.
‘If we want . . .’ he began.
Her head fell on his shoulder. Her hand found his. He brushed her dark and grubby hair with his lips.
‘I’ll do anything they ask,’ he whispered. ‘Whatever they—’
‘So long as you come home I just don’t care.’
His soldier’s fingers found her cheek. They were too rough for her. Too coarse, too soiled by the work he’d done. But she never minded, and didn’t now. She lifted her mouth, held it close to his, waited.
It was a brief and awkward kiss. The only kind he had. What was good between them came from her alone and she never even knew it. All he had to give was himself, his love, his dedication. And they’d failed somewhere along the way.
Not now though, he thought, as he held her, smelled the mud and mould of that underground hell they’d left behind.
Raben kissed his wife again then got up, moved his pained and aching frame to the table, and ripped the statement there to pieces, scattering the shreds across the floor.
Jarnvig was back in place in Ryvangen. Reinstated as colonel by Operational Command. Søgaard had been sent on leave ahead of an inquiry into his conduct towards those under his command. A new major, a genial man from the south, had taken his place.
They hadn’t had much time to talk. Jarnvig had been on the phone constantly, to Camp Viking in Helmand, to contacts in Denmark demanding an immediate reopening of the investigation into the incident Raben had reported.
A distant voice in Afghanistan was listening to his orders.
‘I want a military police team sent back to that place immediately. Look under every stone. Interview that Afghan officer Lund found. I can’t believe she uncovered more in one day than we managed in three months.’
‘I wasn’t here then, sir,’ the man said dryly.
‘Well you are now, Major, and you’ve got a job to do. Get on with it and make sure I’m kept informed.’
He finished the call. The new man stood in front of his desk. Not stiff and severe like Søgaard. He looked more like a civilian who’d found a uniform somewhere.
‘Any news about General Arild?’ Jarnvig asked. ‘I need to talk to him.’
‘Not yet. We’ve got a new team arriving tonight. If it’s OK I’d like to welcome them myself . . .’
‘No, no,’ Jarnvig said, not looking up from the pile of papers on his desk, most of them to do with the original report into Raben’s claims. ‘Thanks but I can manage.’
‘I thought . . . Your daughter’s back. She wants to see you. She looks . . .’ He grimaced. ‘She looks worn out. Really. If you need me . . .’
‘Then I’ll let you know. Show her in.’
The new man nodded at the window.
‘She’s in your house right now. Packing her things. I think she’s called a cab to Hørserod.’
Jarnvig took off his reading glasses.
‘Hørserod?’
Two soft bags full of clothes. Jonas trying hard to stuff his plastic sword into the second.
Ryvangen was a castle, a fortress of a kind. It protected her. It enclosed and trapped her too. Like family. A trade-off between security and freedom. She’d come close to making a bargain that carried too high a price. The bed beyond the door. Søgaard beneath her . . .
It was nothing to do with him. Nothing to do with Jens much. It was about being an army wife and mother. Another loyal servant inside the tribe. There was a time for that, and a time to break free, wrap your arms around the ones you loved, the people who truly mattered. And leave.
She’d stopped packing, was still staring at the unmade bed when her father walked in.
A smile for him. She knew what
was coming.
‘We’ve got to go now, Dad.’
‘May I ask where?’
‘Hørserod. To visit Jens. They’re giving us family quarters.’ She picked up a scarf, put it in the bag with some of Jonas’s shirts. ‘It’s easy enough to come and go. I can still be in the infirmary.’
She’d spent so long in the shower, washing off the filth and the memories of the place Bilal had taken her. The bruises were healing. There was a light ahead of them, dim and shapeless, but one she recognized. It had a name she hadn’t heard in a long time. The future.
‘We’ve got to get away from Ryvangen.’
‘To live in a prison camp?’
‘It won’t be for long. The lawyer said Jens will be out in two or three weeks at the most.’ She patted Jonas on the head. ‘We can wait for that, can’t we?’
He was more focused on his toys than their conversation, still trying to cram as many as possible into the bag. Plastic dragons, more swords.
She got up, went to her father, took the door keys out of her bag, handed them over.
He looked like a man betrayed. Deprived of something that belonged to him.
Soldiers, she thought. Good men. Decent men. Clinging to the things they loved for strength and confidence.
‘Dad . . .’ She put her arms round him, kissed his rough cheek. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow. The day after that. The week after that.’ She touched his face, looked into his hurt eyes. ‘We’re not leaving you. Just Ryvangen.’
‘Right,’ he whispered.
Men were always lost for words when emotion raised its awkward head.
Jonas walked up and gave Jarnvig something. A warrior with a shield and a sword. Wrapped the colonel’s wrinkled fingers round its body.
‘The car will be here,’ she said and kissed him again, very quickly. ‘I’ll call. Come on, Jonas.’
The two of them left, didn’t look back. Jarnvig watched them go, clutching the toy soldier Jonas had given him.
Then he sat at the dining table trying to imagine what the house would be like without their presence. Bereft of Louise’s energy and warmth. Of Jonas’s childlike curiosity and games.
Dead, Jarnvig thought. One more brick box in the warren that was Ryvangen.
His phone rang. It was Søgaard’s replacement.
‘You wanted me to find General Arild,’ he said.
‘Yes . . .’
‘Well he’s here.’
Arild was in his office, smoking as he went through the papers on the desk. Jarnvig could only smile awkwardly as he walked in.
‘Oh come on, Torsten,’ Arild said. ‘You’re not going to play hurt with me are you? Like a little girl?’
Jarnvig took his chair. Arild grabbed the one opposite.
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
Arild gestured at the office.
‘You’re back here. Running Ryvangen again. The colonel. Louise came to no harm. Things aren’t so bad. I could have put you in front of a court if I’d wanted.’
‘Raben was right.’
Arild smirked.
‘So what? He was a criminal on the run and you helped him escape PET. But what the hell? Water under the bridge.’
Jarnvig nodded, said nothing.
‘What a business!’ Arild added, still grinning as if it was all a game. ‘Young Bilal running rings round us to make sure we never found out what really happened in Helmand.’
‘You knew, didn’t you?’
‘Me?’ Arild threw back his head and laughed. He looked like a young man sometimes. So fit he could go out on active service tomorrow if he wanted. Perhaps did. ‘How could I? I’m a pencil-pusher in Operational Command. My life’s even more boring than yours.’
Jarnvig watched him, becoming more convinced with every easy gesture, each casual denial.
‘You do believe me, don’t you?’ Arild asked.
‘No,’ Jarnvig said with great certainty. ‘I know how it goes with engagements like these. I worked them with you once . . .’
‘That was a long time ago. These are different days.’
‘Nothing on paper. No trails to entrap you. No footprints . . .’
‘This is a fantasy,’ Arild insisted.
‘If you’ve got something to tell me, General, say it now. You can’t cover it up any more. The police are involved. The Ministry. Tell me and I’ll do everything I can to clear up this mess. I don’t want to harm the army . . .’
‘What a smug little cretin you’ve become,’ Arild declared then blew smoke at the ceiling. ‘Your horizons really don’t stretch beyond these miserable barracks, do they? You’ve no idea how complicated the world’s become.’
‘A Danish officer massacres an innocent family. What’s so complicated about that?’
‘Lots,’ Arild said. ‘We have to protect our own.’ His fist banged the desk. ‘Our own! No one else will. The politicians play armchair generals in Slotsholmen. The media snipe from the sidelines looking to belittle and blame us at every opportunity. And every year we send more men . . .’ A shrug. ‘. . . and a few women to their deaths. For reasons we forgot ages ago, even if we ever knew them.’
‘Either you lied to the police or you didn’t.’
‘Did I? Even if I did . . . so what?’
‘I can’t believe I’m hearing this . . .’
‘Believe it, Torsten, or by God I will have you in front of that court. Yes, the police came to me. They had the name of a special forces officer. A man who served with courage and dedication.’
Jarnvig folded his arms and waited.
‘They suspected him,’ Arild continued. ‘I told them I’d looked at the records and he’d been demobilized six months before.’ His knuckles rapped on the desk. ‘He wasn’t even in Afghanistan at the time.’ The short, muscular man flexed his shoulders, eyed Jarnvig. ‘That wasn’t strictly true. He was there. Not that you’ll find that in the records.’
‘That was our zone,’ Jarnvig insisted. ‘We should have been told.’
‘It was none of your business. Why do you think I ordered Bilal to delete those radio messages? It was important there was no trace—’
‘He killed this family!’
‘You don’t know what happened!’ Arild yelled. ‘He was a trained special forces commando. Not a hothead. Or a war criminal.’
Jarnvig grabbed a pen and a pad, began to write.
‘Don’t bother with that,’ Arild ordered.
‘There’s going to be an investigation.’
‘It won’t go any further than the last one. The family who died weren’t innocents. The father was funding the Taliban through drug shipments. He was an informer, a crook and a murderer.’
‘There will be an investigation,’ Jarnvig repeated.
Arild swore, shook his head, laughed more loudly than ever.
‘You stupid little man,’ he said, wiping his eyes. ‘You never really understood, did you? You thought all there was to being a soldier was to listen and obey.’
‘Get out,’ Jarnvig said, staring at him.
‘And you’re right, for most of them,’ Arild went on. ‘But it’s a shitty world out there. The Taliban don’t play by the rules. If we do, then more fool us.’
‘Get out!’
Arild didn’t move.
‘Do you know why I stopped going hunting with you?’ he asked.
No answer.
‘Because you didn’t get that either. You used to wait for the prey to come to you. You thought it was enough to hide somewhere and hope it would come along.’
Arild stood up. Wiry man, active, general’s uniform, handgun on his belt. He got his heavy winter coat from the stand.
‘That’s not what hunting’s about,’ he said. ‘A jæger tracks his prey. Follows it. Identifies it. Gets to know it. Then . . .’
A hand as a gun, a finger as a barrel, aimed straight at Torsten Jarnvig’s head.
‘Boom!’
‘Never show your face in here again. Never come nea
r me or my men . . .’
Arild thrust his hands into his pockets and smiled.
‘Do I make myself clear?’ Jarnvig barked.
‘You’re overwrought. The strain I imagine. Take a week off. That’s an order. When you come back I expect you to make the next team as strong and as ready as the last one. I’ll be around to check—’
‘No—’
‘Torsten. Do I have to spell it out? Are you really so idiotic you can’t take a hint?’
Arild patted his handgun, buttoned his coat, pulled on a pair of leather gloves, then looked at the man opposite him.
‘Fuck with me and I will eviscerate you,’ he said simply. ‘Fuck with me and you’ll wish you and your sorry little family were never born.’
A noise from the phone in his pocket. Arild looked at a message there then put it away.
‘And now,’ he said, ‘you must excuse me. I have more interesting company to keep.’
She hated it when people started drinking at work. There were places for alcohol and the Politigården wasn’t one of them.
Lund watched them gather as she sat at the desk she’d shared with Strange. He had a can of Coke, was moving from officer to officer, all genial smiles and relief. Brix was the leader, proven right in the end, a glass of whisky in his hand as if to show it. Ruth Hedeby hung on his every word, even though her elderly husband stood alone and bored at the other side of the room, silent next to one of the junior detectives who was too gauche and shy to mingle.
She followed Brix telling a joke, Hedeby giggling, gulping at her glass of wine, eyes glittering, never leaving his rugged face. There was something going on between those two. Lund just knew it.
Strange caught her eye, grinned, his ordinary face, so full of pain and uncertainty once, now happy, satisfied.
‘Come on,’ he mouthed, waving her in with his hand.
She smiled, said, ‘In a minute.’
Then sipped at the bottle of beer Brix had forced on her and turned her back on them all.
The photos of the dead were still on the walls. Anne Dragsholm and Lisbeth Thomsen. Myg Poulsen, David Grüner and Gunnar Torpe.
No pictures yet of Said Bilal, blown to pieces in that underground warren outside Hillerød. No photos of an Afghan family murdered in their own home two years before. They would never get that dubious privilege. And soon the rest would be gone.