The Tenant

by Katrine Engberg

  Jeppe Kørner had called and asked her to remember who had been at the dinner party she had thrown in the early spring, and what had been discussed. Esther headed toward Agnete and the Merman and allowed the memories to flow. It wasn’t hard to remember the dinner preparation. She and Kristoffer had been to the market for skate wings and lumpfish caviar. They had sat wrapped in blankets and drunk hot chocolate in the sun; discussing whether the fish would be best served à la nage or in a blanquette sauce. The pavlova with berries and vanilla parfait had been easy to agree on. Something light and cool.

  Esther swallowed the lump in her throat. She just couldn’t face any more tears. The dogs peed, and she let them sniff around for a few minutes before heading back. The guests? She had invited the Harlovs and Erik Kingo, who had come alone wearing a big hat and for some reason had refused to shake hands with the other guests. Her old colleague, Dorte, and the young PR lady from the publisher she hoped would pick up her book, what was her name again? Gerda, wasn’t it? Frank and Lisbeth, and who else? Bertil, of course, good old Bertil, with his far-too-young and far-too-handsome lover boy, who had left him the following week and taken Bertil’s mink coat with him. He never wised up.

  Esther pushed open the front door and straightened the mat back out with her foot. The dogs whined, but she wasn’t up to carrying them. The stairs creaked under her, and she had to stop on the landing between the second and third floor to catch her breath. She let the dogs go, and they jogged on ahead, while she stood and listened to the cheerful build-up to Friday night outside. Had they discussed her manuscript at the dinner? The subject hadn’t come up until the table was covered in empty bottles, so she didn’t remember the details.

  An unexpected sound, loud and close by. The sound of the front door, banging shut two stories below her.

  Her heart jumped in her chest. Who could it be? She was the only resident home at the moment. Esther stood perfectly still and listened. She called out, her voice cracking. No one answered, silence settled around her. Could it have been her imagination? Did she close the door properly when she came in? It hit her how incredibly foolish it was to leave the door ajar and walk off, what with how things were at the moment. She took a cautious step and heard it creak under her weight. The sound echoed throughout the stairway and startled her again. So stupid! She held on tightly to the railing and wished she hadn’t let the dogs go. Took another hesitant step upward, suddenly terrified. Was someone there? She listened but heard only her own heartbeat pounding in her ears and the dogs yelping. She closed her hand around her pendant and held her breath for what seemed an eternity.

  The stairs creaked again. Esther stood still, but the sound continued and turned into unmistakable footsteps, heavy steps moving upward, up toward her.

  The yell that escaped her was that of an animal being hurt. She stumbled and continued, sobbing now, up toward her door. Fumbled in her pocket for her keys, but her hands were shaking so much that she dropped them on the floor. The dogs pressed themselves to the ground as the footsteps moved upward, coming closer. She fell to her knees and felt around for the keys, wailed and heard her own voice pleading for help. The footsteps continued, so close now, they filled the entire world.

  Esther froze on all fours, fear pounding in her blood like a poison, dizzy and weak, yet crystal clear in the face of death. She looked down the stairs and waited to see him coming toward her. Smiling.

  SATURDAY, AUGUST 11

  CHAPTER 24

  “Okay, Anette, have a good trip. Call when you land.”

  Jeppe hung up and resisted the temptation to read Anna’s text again. He should be feeling terrible, if not hungover then at least shameful over his lack of professionalism. But although he had fallen asleep fully dressed and completely plastered on the sofa, he had for once had a night without dreams of being dumped and scorned. When his alarm clock rang at 7:00 a.m., it woke him from the first night of uninterrupted sleep since his life fell apart eight months ago. With morning wood.

  Had a good time yesterday. When can we do it again? Anna.

  She wanted to see him again. No emoticons or hard to decode statements, how amazingly unwomanlike. Jeppe tilted his head back and laughed in the middle of the hallway, overcome by a surge of happiness. The desire left him no room for regret. Down the hall a group of colleagues from Drug Crimes looked up from their conversation to see what was going on and Jeppe waved his phone at them to indicate that something on social media had cracked him up.

  Anette would be boarding the morning flight to the Faeroe Islands right now. Jeppe was not convinced that it was worth the trip, but they couldn’t afford to leave any clue unexplored. He filled a paper cup with hot coffee and balanced it carefully as he made his way to his office, practically crashing into Thomas Larsen on the way. For once Larsen looked tired and grumpy.

  “Ah, there you are, Kørner. I see you opted for a late start today.”

  “There have to be some perks to being team leader,” Jeppe said. Larsen’s sarcasm didn’t even come close to bothering him today. “You on the other hand look like you’re already on your way home. Rough night?”

  “I’ll say.” Larsen raised one eyebrow. “I looked after the old lady when she had her nervous breakdown last night. I got only a couple of hours of sleep.”

  “The old lady?”

  “Yeah, the one from the building, Esther. She called emergency services last night; heard footsteps in the stairwell and was convinced the murderer was after her.”

  Jeppe swore under his breath. Feelings of guilt came thundering in like an express train.

  “And was he?” he asked.

  “There was no sign of it. No attempted break-in, no witnesses who had seen or heard anything. She, on the other hand, had drained her liquor cabinet and was completely hysterical.”

  “How is she now?” Jeppe took a hesitant sip of his coffee and burnt the tip of his tongue.

  “She’s afraid to be alone in the building.” Larsen emitted a sigh that evolved into a heartfelt yawn. “You can’t blame her for that, but we don’t exactly have the resources to keep watch.”

  Jeppe considered this. He sucked cool air in over his tongue.

  “I’ll get in touch with her,” he said. “Thanks, Larsen.”

  In his office he sat down heavily in his chair and set the coffee aside to cool. Was Esther de Laurenti really in danger? She very well could be. Her building, her tenant, her manuscript, her singing teacher. He had to ask the superintendent to authorize funds for around-the-clock surveillance of her for the next few days. If the perpetrator really killed to get even, as Mosbæk believed, maybe they were looking for someone who needed to take revenge against a single, elderly, not-so-wealthy academic with authorial ambitions.

  He composed a quick email to the superintendent and opened the notifications on his phone before he had a chance to stop himself. He hadn’t responded to Anna yet, and enjoyed letting the initiative sit on his side of the court for a bit before replying. A very graphic memory of her soft, wet tongue hit him and he sat up straighter in his chair, feeling fidgety. His fingers typed Tonight?, and he hit Send before he had a chance to think through his move. Now it was his turn to wait.

  Sara Saidani knocked quietly on his door and walked in. Jeppe quickly straightened up even more, embarrassed that she in particular might catch him thinking these sultry thoughts, which must surely be visible. Saidani, however, did not seem to notice anything. She had a piece of paper in her hand, which she put on the desk.

  “Esther de Laurenti wrote to the killer. On the Google Docs page. Last night. She addresses him directly, taunts him, calls him dumb. See!”

  Jeppe skimmed the text in front of him.

  “So maybe that’s why he went to her place. She pissed him off.”

  “I thought Larsen said she imagined it,” Saidani protested. “That she was drunk and made it up—”

  “Maybe she didn’t after all. But she’s playing with fire. I’m going to have a serious
talk with her.”

  They looked at each other for a moment, thinking in tandem.

  “If he answers her, maybe we can use that somehow, draw information out of him, lure him into a trap.” Jeppe spoke slowly, weighing his words.

  “Can we trust her? Isn’t it too dangerous?”

  “What other options do we have? Isn’t the question rather if we dare to not do it?”

  Sara Saidani eyed him without revealing her thoughts. Then she got up and left the office with a curt nod. Jeppe watched her go and sat still for a moment in the aroma of vanilla and warm skin she left behind. In his current urgently lustful state, her presence was a definite distraction.

  He shook the carnal thoughts out of his head and woke his computer back up. Found the notes Falck had written when he questioned Esther de Laurenti’s former colleagues from the University of Copenhagen and browsed through them. It appeared that the ivory tower was more devious than Jeppe had imagined. But still, who would nurse such a demented hatred for a retired professor that they murdered someone in order to hurt her? A failed student or wronged colleague? It just didn’t fit. And why kill Julie and Kristoffer if Esther herself was the target? Most people are relatively straightforward in their methodology when they’re angry at someone. Revenge cases are usually transparent at first glance. There was nothing transparent about this case.

  His phone beeped and he forced himself to wait a full minute before he checked it.

  Come over tonight after nine. My husband’s out of town.

  Jeppe’s fingers trembled faintly as he answered Okay. He was going to have sex with her again tonight. The thought subsumed all his other thoughts and he sat at his desk, reduced to one big, throbbing sexual organ.

  He drank from the coffee, which was now cold, and tried to remember what he had to do. Get ahold of Esther de Laurenti and find a murderer. Does one bring a hostess gift when going to someone’s house for sex? Jeppe leaned back in his uncomfortable desk chair, letting the blood course through him, and put off everything so he could surrender to his fantasies. Just for two minutes.

  * * *

  “THANK HEAVEN FOR little girls, for little girls get bigger every day. Thank heaven for little girls, they grow up in the most delightful way…”

  The headache was in the worst place, behind her eyes, and jabbed unbearably all the way out into her ear canals. Alcohol is a deceitful lover, so sweet at night but savage the morning after.

  Esther sat up tentatively and discovered that she was lying on the sofa in the living room and not in her bedroom. The light from outside was blinding and made the room sway. She leaned over and threw up on the floor. Her vomit was thin and stank. She threw up again.

  “Those little eyes so helpless and appealing, one day will flash and send you crashin’ through the ceiling…”

  She fumbled between the cushions for her smartphone and turned off the Maurice Chevalier that was her alarm. Her head felt empty and drugged, as if yesterday’s intoxication had permanently destroyed her ability to think. It wasn’t just uncomfortable. If only the pain and the nausea would subside, she could lie here in this vegetative state and let her eyes and mind be blank from now on. Not commit herself anymore, never regret again.

  The dogs brought her back to reality. Their barking reminded her of her responsibility, that she wasn’t alone in the world and that it was up to her to provide them with love, food, and fresh air.

  Esther rolled pathetically off the sofa and ended on all fours with one hand in the pool of vomit. The floor gave way and teetered menacingly. She closed her eyes until the vertigo passed. The dogs whined miserably and she started crawling. One hand, then one knee, then the other hand, slowly and unsteadily to the bathroom. Sat up halfway and turned on the cold water in the shower without taking her clothes off, let the water pour over her body and rinse the nausea away.

  After the first helpful shock of the cold, she mixed in some warm water and stood up. Clinging tightly to the shower fittings with one hand, she ineptly peeled her wet clothes off with the other. Finally, she was clean, and well enough that she could stand up without falling and think without throwing up.

  She had survived.

  By a stroke of magic, her old arthritic fingers had grabbed the right key; she had scrambled to her feet and managed to open the door. Before the footsteps reached her. Slammed it shut behind her and held her breath until she couldn’t anymore. Then she had found her phone and called for help.

  The police had been mildly uncomprehending, until she managed to convey to the officers that she was the key witness in a murder case and wanted to talk to one of the detectives working it. She had been lying on the floor in her front hall, crying, when he finally turned up. Not Jeppe Kørner this time but a younger man, handsome but tired and overworked. She had tried to explain about the front door slamming and the footsteps on the stairs. About her fear that she too was going to die. He had nodded sympathetically and taken notes, but she could tell that he didn’t believe her. He had suggested that she go to bed and sleep it off, whatever the hell he meant by that.

  Esther dried herself slowly and unsteadily. Nothing had happened to Epistéme or Dóxa or to her, either. But how safe was she in her own home? Where else could she go? She didn’t have anywhere in the world but here.

  The dogs’ unhappy whines sped her up. She got dressed, still dizzy, and dutifully wiped the vomit up off the living room floor, holding her breath. The actual cleaning would have to wait until after their walk. She got the leashes and plucked up her courage to very cautiously open her front door.

  The stairway seemed quite different in the daylight. Of course it did. Monsters hide in the shadows, not in sunny patches. The fear from last night seemed incomprehensible now, almost laughable. Maybe he was right, that policeman. Maybe in her drunkenness she had confused sounds from the street with her own nightmares and made up the person on the stairs.

  Esther closed the door behind them and was just about to grab the railing and descend the stairs when she saw it. She knew it hadn’t been there before because the doorframes in the stairwell had just been painted that spring. It was by her doorknob and couldn’t be missed. Into the thick, gray paint on her doorframe a little star had been carved. Like the stars that marked an unfortunate fate during World War II, singled out for humiliation and deportation.

  A warning.

  Well, Esther de Laurenti. We are apparently writing to each other now. That wasn’t the intention. But all right. Here is another little contribution to your work:

  You call me dumb. Permit me to return the charge. I know who you are. You still have no idea who I am.

  But let me give you a hint. With the words of a poet greater than myself:

  My heart loves all the impossible children,

  the ones no one cares about and no one understands,

  lying children and stealing children and promise breaking children,

  the children all the grown ups are very angry with.

  Do you follow?

  CHAPTER 25

  Signhild Patursson was the oldest person Anette had ever seen. So stooped that she was more horizontal than vertical, and with a face wrinkled as the bark of an oak tree. She had welcomed Anette warmly into her little house on a hill in the outskirts of Tórshavn and now stood among her heavy furniture, making coffee in a pot on the stove. Every once in a while, she tensed her neck and glanced up from the deep with a sweet smile, which seemed generations younger than the rest of her.

  Anette stretched her legs under the low dining table and thanked her creator that she had arrived unscathed to these unwelcoming islands in the far north. The landing at Vágar Airport had been terrifyingly steep and windswept, and on top of her fears Anette had needed to use the bathroom with desperate urgency. The Faeroese police officer who had been sent to pick her up at the airport had had to wait until Anette could finally lock herself in the arrivals concourse bathroom and rest her forehead on her arms for a few minutes.

&nb
sp; In the village of Velbastaður, Julie Stender’s former lover’s childhood home was a little red-painted blob in the middle of a sparse settlement of gray wooden houses with shingle roofs. One lone road separated the village into uphill and downhill. Otherwise it was just cliffs and grass, birds and the sea. Signhild Patursson explained how she had inherited the house from her parents and lived here her whole life, given birth to her four children in it, and buried both her husband and her youngest son in the local cemetery. She didn’t understand Anette’s question about whether it was hard to manage all on her own out in these hills so far away from everything, but even though, like most of her countrymen, she was bilingual, her Danish was indeed a little rusty, she apologized.

  She set black coffee and a bowl of what Anette, to her surprise, recognized as pecan sandies on the table, then folded her hands in her lap and started to talk. Her accent was gentle and singsongy, the flow of words slow and filled with pauses.

  “Hjalti was the apple of my eye, the son who came when I thought it no longer possible. Yes, yes, the apple of my eye. I cried when he wanted to go to Denmark to study, because I knew he would fall in love and stay there. And so he did, yes.”

  “With Julie Stender, you mean?”

  The old woman seemed not to have heard the question.

  “Kirsten, his wife, was so stern, so stern, she didn’t respect him at all. My boy was like that bull Ferdinand, grand and gentle. Far too dreamy for Danish women. Things didn’t last with Kirsten, his wife. I suppose she got tired of him and all his plans. Hjalti didn’t give a damn about money. She never forgave him for that.”