“So we understand.”
“I was probably at the office until seven. Then I went to a flat we keep—the company, that is—and worked from there for a little while. I had intended to spend the night there.”
“Where is this flat?”
“In Laksegade.”
“Can we call on you there later? It will be necessary to hold a formal interview.”
He thought quickly. The Nokia was still in his briefcase. And the briefcase was still in Laksegade.
“I probably should go home to my wife,” he said. “She must be very distraught. If you like, I can come to the local station tomorrow. Perhaps tomorrow morning?” Show cooperation, he counseled himself. It might be important later.
“We would appreciate that,” she said politely. “Although the case is now being handled by the homicide department of the North-Zealand Regional Police.” From her own briefcase, she drew a small leaflet with the stirring title “Regional Police Reform: This Is Where to Find Us.” She circled an address in ballpoint pen. “Can you come to this office tomorrow at 11 a.m.?”
HE WONDERED IF they were watching him. The taxi slid through the midnight traffic like a shark through a herring shoal, and he couldn’t tell whether any specific car stayed behind them.
Don’t be paranoid, he told himself. They could barely have established cause of death yet, and they surely hadn’t the manpower to follow everyone connected to Karin. Yet he couldn’t help glancing around as he alighted on the sidewalk outside the Laksegade flat. The taxi drove off, leaving the street empty and deserted. There was a certain time-bubble quality to the place—the cobbled stones, the square-lantern-shaped streetlights, even the fortress-like headquarters of the Danske Bank, which from this angle looked more like a medieval stronghold than a modern corporation domicile.
He let himself in and snatched up the briefcase. There had been no calls to the Nokia while he’d been gone.
Twenty minutes later, he had fetched the car and was on his way home. Now he felt reasonably certain that he wasn’t being followed—the motorway was sparsely trafficked at this hour, and when he turned off at a picnic area between Roskilde and Holbæk, his Audi was the only car in the parking lot.
He got out the Nokia and made the call. It was a long wait before the Lithuanian answered.
“Yes?”
“Our agreement is terminated,” said Jan, as calmly as he was able.
“No,” said the man. Just that: the bare negative.
“You heard me!”
“The money was not there,” said the Lithuanian. “She said she gave it back to you.”
“Don’t lie to me,” said Jan. “She took it.” He had seen the empty case in her bedroom. Empty, that is, except for that nasty little note: I QUIT. “She took it, and now she is dead. Did you kill her?”
“No.”
Jan didn’t believe him.
“Stay away from me and my family,” he said. “I don’t want anything more to do with you. It’s over.”
A brief pause.
“Not until you pay,” said the Lithuanian, and then hung up.
Jan stood for a moment, trying to breathe normally. Then he banged the phone against the pavement a couple of times until he was confident it was thoroughly broken. He went into the foulsmelling bathroom, picked the SIM card from the wreckage of the phone, and flushed it down one of the toilets. He then wiped the phone itself thoroughly with wet paper towels and dumped it into the large garbage bin outside, stirring the contents with a twig until the phone had sunk from sight into the malodorous mix of apple cores, pizza cartons, ashtray contents and other road-trip debris.
What else?
He had to. He absolutely had to.
First the little plastic box. No more than two by two centimeters square, and a few millimeters thick. No larger, really, than the SIM card, but the few drops of blood trapped within contained coded information a thousand times more complex than the electronic DNA of the mobile phone. He ground it beneath his heel and dropped the remains into the garbage bin.
Then the photo. He took it from his wallet and looked at it one last time. Tried to come to terms with losing it, and everything it meant. Clicked his Ronson and let the tiny flame catch one corner and flare, before he let that, too, vanish into the bin, still smouldering.
He got back into the Audi and waited for his hands to stop shaking, at least enough so that it would be safe to drive on.
SIGITA’S MOBILE GAVE a muffled ring inside her purse the minute she opened her own front door. The sound went through her like a shockwave, and she emptied the purse onto the coffee table. Anything less drastic just wouldn’t let her get to it quickly enough.
“Yes?”
But it wasn’t Julija Baronienė, a change of heart. Nor was it an unfamiliar voice telling her what she should do to get Mikas back.
“LTV may be willing to broadcast a Missing Person alert on Mikas,” said Evaldas Gužas. “Particularly if you will come to the studio and make a direct appeal to the kidnappers.”
Sigita stood stock still. A few hours ago, she would have agreed without hesitation. But now … she thought of Julija Baronienė and her family, of their obvious fear. And of Zita, one nail missing.
“Wouldn’t that be dangerous for Mikas?” she asked.
She sensed his deliberation and almost thought she heard the clicking of his ballpoint pen accenting his thoughts.
“Have you heard from his abductors?”
“No.”
“This means that more than forty-eight hours have gone by without a single attempt at contact,” said Gužas. “Is this not so?”
“Yes.”
“This is most unusual. Instructions usually arrive promptly, to prevent the parents from calling the police.”
“Julija Baronienė did call.”
“Yes. Within hours of the girl’s disappearance. But less than twenty-four hours later, she withdrew her allegations.”
“And you think this was because she had been threatened.”
“Yes.”
“But that means it is dangerous.”
“It’s a question of weighing the options,” he said. “We have reported Mikas missing and sent out the description of his presumed kidnappers to every police station in Lithuania. We’ve contacted the police in Germany, where the boy’s father now lives. We have even approached Interpol, although there is no indication that Mikas has left Lithuania; on the contrary, the link to Mrs. Baronienė’s case gives us reason to believe that it is a local crime. All of this to no avail. We are no closer to locating your son, or his abductors. And this is why I’m considering asking the public for help.”
The public. The mere word sent tremors of unease through Sigita’s body.
“I’m really not sure… .”
“LTV would broadcast your appeal in connection with their latenight news show. We know that this usually causes a great many people to call in, and some of these calls have been helpful in the past. As we are able to show a photo of one of the presumed kidnappers this time, we are very hopeful that it will be beneficial to the investigation at this point.”
He always talks as if he has swallowed one of his own reports, thought Sigita. I wonder what he sounds like when he is off duty? She was temporarily distracted by a mental image of Gužas up to his waist in cold water, dressed as the complete angler and sporting a newly caught fish. “The direction of the current gave reason to suspect that trout might be active in the upper left quadrant of the search area,” commented off-duty Gužas in her head.
I’m very, very tired, Sigita told herself. Or else it’s the concussion. It was as if the imagination she normally kept effortlessly locked down was suddenly bubbling up from the nether reaches of her mind like marsh gas. It made her uncomfortable.
“We have asked your husband, and he has agreed that the broadcast should be made. But we would really like for you to make that direct appeal in front of the cameras. In our experience, this has an effect eve
n on people who would not normally contact the police. Especially when children are involved.”
She rubbed her whole face with her good hand. She was exhausted. Too little to eat and drink all day, she thought. Her headache had become so constant she was almost getting used to it.
“I don’t know… . Will it really help?”
“I wouldn’t suggest this to you if there had been any communication from the abductors. Any opening for negotation or coercion. In those circumstances, public uproar might serve only to increase the pressure on the kidnappers and might endanger the life of the child. But there has been no such communication. Is that not so?”
He is testing me, thought Sigita. He still doesn’t believe me.
“No,” she said. “But if it’s dangerous for Mikas, I won’t do it.”
“It’s a question of weighing the options,” he repeated. “I am not saying it is completely without risk, but in our estimation, it is our best chance of finding Mikas right now.”
Sigita could hear her own pulse. How could one decide something so vital when it felt as if one’s head belonged to someone else?
“We can of course make the broadcast without your consent,” he finally said, when the silence had gone on for too long.
Was that a threat? Suddenly, anger roared through her.
“No,” she said. “I won’t do it. And if you go ahead without me, I’ll… .” But there was no way to finish. What threats could she make? He had all the weapons.
She sensed a sigh somewhere at the other end of the connection.
“Mrs. Ramoškienė, I am not the enemy,” he said.
Anger left her as suddenly as it had arrived.
“No,” she said. “I know that.”
But once she had disconnected, she couldn’t help but wonder. What was more important to an ambitious young officer like Gužas? Arresting the criminals, or saving the victims?
Her blouse was sticking to her back, and she decided to wrap a plastic bag around the cast and attempt a shower. She had to squirt the shampoo onto her scalp directly from the bottle, instead of measuring a suitable dollop into her palm, and it was equally impossible to wrap the towel around her head in the usual turbanstyle afterwards. When it was time for the late news, she turned on the television with a fresh attack of nerves. Despite Gužas’s words there was no dramatic report on three-year-old Mikas Ramoska, missing since Saturday. And then of course all her doubts came rushing back. Should she have done it? Was there someone out there who had seen her little boy? Someone who might help?
When the phone rang, she snatched at it with such clumsy haste that it clattered to the floor. She retrieved it with another snatch and pressed “Accept Call” even though she didn’t recognize the number.
“Hello?”
“It’s me.”
“Er … who?”
“Tomas.”
She nearly said “Who?” once more before she realized that the caller was her little brother. She had never heard his grown-up voice, only the first hoarse cracks of puberty. He had been twelve when she fled from Tauragė, and they had not spoken since.
“Tomas!”
“Yes.”
A pause. Sigita had no idea what to say. What does one say to a brother one hasn’t talked to in eight years?
“We heard from Darius’s mother that Mikas is … that he has disappeared,” Tomas eventually said.
“Yes.” Her throat tightened, and only that one word escaped.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “And … er … I was just thinking. If there’s anything I can do … ?”
An unexpected wave of tenderness washed through her. It stole what little strength she had in her arms and legs, so that she slumped down onto the couch with the phone in her lap, while tears burned their way down the side of her nose yet again. Normally, she never cried. Today, she had long since lost count.
“Sigita?”
“Yes,” she managed. “Thank you. Thank you so much. I am so glad you called.”
“Er, you’re welcome. I hope they find him.”
She couldn’t say another word, and maybe he realized. There was a soft click as he hung up. But he had called. She had only ever had sporadic news from home, and since she and Darius had separated, her most reliable source of Tauragė information had dried to a trickle. And right now there were a thousand things she wanted to know. What Tomas had been doing since leaving school. If he was still living at home. If he had a girlfriend. How he was.
If he had ever forgiven her.
But perhaps he had. He did call her, after all.
SIGITA WENT TO bed, but sleep was a hopeless enterprise. The hideous sense of imagination she had suddenly developed kept tossing images up inside her eyelids, and she didn’t know how to turn it off.
If you hurt my boy, she thought, I will kill you.
It was not an outburst of anger, as when two drunks yell at each other—“I’ll fucking kill you!” or the like. It was not like that.
It was a decision.
Somehow, it made her calmer. She could almost believe that the kidnappers would be able to sense her decision and realize what the price of harming Mikas would be. Just because she had determined that it should be so. This was of course hopeless nonsense, as the rational part of her well knew. Nonetheless, it helped: If you hurt him, I will kill you.
In the end, she went out on the balcony and sat in the white plastic chair she kept there. The heat absorbed by the concrete during the day was being released now that the air was cooler, and there was no need to put anything on over her night dress. She thought of Julija Baronienė, who had her child back. She thought of Gužas, and of Valionis. Had they gone home, or were they still at work? Was Mikas important enough? Or were there so many missing children that no one would work twenty-four-hour shifts just because another one had disappeared?
They wanted me to go on television, she thought. That must mean that he is important. She remembered the little English girl who had disappeared, but couldn’t recall her name. It had been all over the news for months, and even the Pope had become involved. And still the girl had not been found.
But Mikas will come back, she told herself firmly. If I believe anything else, I won’t be able to stand it.
A taxi drew up in the parking lot in front of the building. Sigita automatically looked at her watch. It was past 2 a.m.—an unusual time to arrive. A woman got out and glanced around uncertainly. Clearly a visitor, trying to get her bearings. Then she headed for Sigita’s block.
It’s her, thought Sigita suddenly. It’s Julija!
She leapt to her feet so quickly that she stubbed her toe on the doorframe. It hurt, but that was irrelevant. She hopped to the intercom and pressed the lock button the moment the buzzer sounded. She limped out into the stairwell and followed Julija Baronienė with her eyes, all the way up.
Julija stopped when she caught sight of Sigita.
“I had to come,” she said. “Aleksas wouldn’t hear of it, and I had to wait until he was asleep. But I had to come.”
“Come inside,” said Sigita.
HOW PECULIAR THAT one still says things like “Have a seat” and “Would you like some coffee?” even when life and death and heart’s blood is at stake, thought Sigita.
“May I call you Sigita?” asked Julija, twisting the coffee cup nervously in her hands. “I still think of you like that, even though you are a grown woman now.”
“Yes,” said Sigita. She had seated herself in the armchair, or rather, on the edge of it. Her right hand was clenched so hard that the nails bit into her palm, but she knew somehow that trying to rush the woman on the couch would be a bad idea. She suddenly remembered Grandfather’s carrier pigeons. How they sometimes landed on the roof of the coop and wouldn’t come all the way in, so that their recorded flight time would be minutes slower than it might have been.
“No use trying to hurry things,” her grandfather would say. “Sit on the bench beside me, Sigita, they’ll come when they
come.”
Grandfather had died in 1991, in the year of the Independence. Granny Julija didn’t care about the races. She sold the best pigeons to a neighbor and left the rest to their own devices until the roof blew off the coop during a winter storm five or six years later.
Sigita looked at Julija and forced herself to sit quietly, waiting.
“You mustn’t tell the police,” said Julija in the end. “Do you promise?”
Sigita promised. It still didn’t seem to be enough.
“He was so angry because we had called them. He said he had had to hurt Zita because we told, and that it was all our fault.” The hand that held the cup was trembling.
“I won’t say anything,” said Sigita.
“Promise.”
“Yes. I promise.”
Julija stared at her unremittingly. Then she suddenly put the coffee cup down. She raised her hands to the back of her neck and bent her head so that she could take off a necklace she was wearing. No. Not just a necklace. It was a crucifix, thought Sigita. A small golden Jesus on a black wooden cross; despite the miniscule size, the pain in the tiny face was evident.
“Do you believe in God?” asked Julija.
“Yes,” said Sigita, because this was not the time to mince the nuances of faith and doubt.
“Then swear on this. Touch it. And promise that you won’t go to the police with anything I tell you.”
Sigita carefully put her hand on the crucifix and repeated her promise. She wasn’t sure that this meant more to her than the assurances she had already given, but it seemed to ease Julija’s mind.
“He gave us an envelope. So that we could see what we had made him do, he said. Inside was one of her nails. An entire nail. I knew it was hers, because I had let her play with my nail polish the day before.” Julija’s voice shook. “He said that if we went to the police later on, he would take Zita again, and this time he would sell her to some men he knew. Men of the kind who enjoy having sex with little girls, he said.”
Sigita swallowed.
“But Julija,” she said. “If he is in prison, he can’t take Zita.”
The Boy in the Suitcase Page 16