Текст книги "Disgrace"

Автор книги: Jussi Adler-Olsen

Соавторы: Jussi Adler-Olsen
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Текущая страница: 22 (всего у книги 29 страниц)

34

As usual, Ulrik was the one who was best informed of the latest news, but then he hadn’t spent the weekend practising with his crossbow, as Ditlev had. That was the difference between them, and always had been. Ulrik, when possible, preferred to take a more laid-back approach to life.

When his mobile rang, Ditlev stood facing the Sound, shooting series of bolts at a target. At first he’d shot some right past the target and into the water, but in the last two days hardly any had been launched without hitting their mark. It was Monday and he’d just amused himself by arranging five bolts in the shape of a cross in the target’s centre when Ulrik’s panicked voice put an end to his fun.

‘Kimmie killed Aalbæk,’ he said. ‘I heard about it on the news, and I just know it was her.’

For a split second this information occupied Ditlev’s entire being. It felt like a premonition of death.

He listened intently to Ulrik’s short and rather disjointed account of Aalbæk’s fatal fall and the details surrounding his death.

As far as Ulrik could glean from the media’s interpretation of the vague police reports, it was impossible to definitively call it a suicide. Which meant it was equally impossible to rule out murder.

It was very sobering news.

‘The three of us have to meet, do you hear?’ Ulrik whispered, as if Kimmie had already scented him out. ‘If we don’t stick together she’ll pick us off one by one.’

Ditlev looked at the crossbow dangling from the strap around his wrist. Ulrik was right. From now on things would have to change.

‘OK,’ he said. ‘For now, we’ll do as we’ve planned. We’ll meet for the hunt early tomorrow morning at Torsten’s, and afterwards we’ll talk things over. Remember, this is only the second time in over ten years that she’s struck. We still have time, Ulrik. That’s my gut feeling.’

He gazed out across the water, his eyes slipping out of focus. There was no ignoring it now. It was either her or them.

‘Listen, Ulrik,’ Ditlev said. ‘I’m phoning Torsten to let him know. In the meantime, call around and find out what you can. Call Kimmie’s stepmother, for example, and tell her what’s going on, OK? Ask people to let you know if they hear anything. Anything at all.’

‘And Ulrik,’ he said before they hung up. ‘Stay indoors as much as possible until we see each other, OK?’

He didn’t even manage to put his mobile back in his pocket before it rang again.

‘It’s Herbert,’ said the voice without inflection.

Ditlev’s older brother never used to call. Back when the police investigated the murders in Rørvig, Herbert saw through his kid brother at first glance, but he never said anything. Never voiced his suspicion, nor did he get involved. But it didn’t foster any love between them. Not that there had been any in the first place. Feelings didn’t suit the Pram family’s style.

And yet Herbert had been there when it counted. Probably because his relentless fear of scandal trumped all else. The fear that everything he stood for would be sullied had suddenly become too overwhelming.

That was why Herbert had been the perfect tool when Ditlev was considering how to get Department Q’s investigation put on standby.

And that’s why Herbert was calling now.

‘I’m calling to tell you that Department Q’s investigation is in full swing again. I can’t give you any more details because my contact at police headquarters has withdrawn his antennae, but in any case Carl Mørck, the department head, now knows I tried to influence his work. I’m sorry, Ditlev. Keep a low profile.’

Now Ditlev, too, felt the panic rising.

He caught Torsten Florin just as the fashion mogul was backing out of his parking spot at Brand Nation. He’d just heard the news about Aalbæk and, like Ditlev and Ulrik, thought it must be Kimmie’s doing. But he hadn’t heard that Department Q and Carl Mørck were operational again.

‘Fuck! It keeps getting worse and worse,’ the irritated voice on the other end of the line shouted.

‘Do you want to cancel the hunt?’ Ditlev asked.

The long silence spoke its own language.

‘There’s no point. The fox is going to die on its own anway,’ Torsten finally said. Ditlev could just imagine. Torsten had no doubt spent the entire weekend relishing the demented fox’s torments. ‘You should have seen it this morning,’ he said. ‘Completely insane. But let me think about it a moment.’

Ditlev knew Torsten. At this moment he was fighting an inner battle between his murderous impulses and the basic reasonableness with which he’d managed his professional life and growing empire since the age of twenty. In a moment he would be whispering a quiet prayer. That was another side of him. If he couldn’t solve the problem himself, there was always some god or other he could call upon.

Ditlev put his mobile’s headphones on, tensed the crossbow’s string and pulled a new bolt from the quiver. Then he loaded the weapon and aimed at one of the wharf piles that still remained from the old pier. The bird had just landed and was busy cleaning the sea fog from its feathers. Ditlev measured the distance and the wind and released the bolt ever so gently – as if it were a baby’s cheek he was stroking with his finger.

The bird never saw it coming. Pierced by the arrow, it simply lurched backwards into the water and floated there as Torsten prayed almost soundlessly on the other end of the line.

It was this amazing shot that led Ditlev to his decision.

‘We’ll do it, Torsten,’ he said. ‘Get all the Somalis together tonight and instruct them to keep a watchful eye out for Kimmie from now on. Put them on guard, Torsten. Show them a photo of her. Promise them a huge bonus if they see anything.’

‘OK,’ Torsten said after a moment’s consideration. ‘What about the rest of the hunting party? We can’t have Krum and all those dunces running around.’

‘What are you talking about? It doesn’t matter who’s with us. If she appears in the vicinity, we just need witnesses when the bolts go through her.’

Ditlev patted his crossbow and looked out at the small white blob that was slowly being pulled down into the waves.

‘Yes,’ he went on softly, ‘Kimmie’s more than welcome to show up. Don’t you agree, Torsten?’

He couldn’t hear the response over his secretary’s shouting from Caracas’s terrace. As far as Ditlev could see at that distance, she was waving her hands and raising them to her ears.

‘I think there’s someone trying to get hold of me, Torsten. I’m hanging up now. See you early tomorrow morning, OK? Take care.’

They hung up at the same time, and a second later his mobile rang again.

‘Did you turn off the call-waiting function again, Ditlev?’

It was his secretary. Now she was standing motionless on the hospital terrace.

‘You shouldn’t do that, it means I can’t get in touch with you. We have a bit of a problem up here. A man calling himself Deputy Detective Superintendent Mørck has just turned up and is sniffing around. What do you want us to do, Ditlev? Will you talk to him, or what? He hasn’t shown us a warrant, and I don’t think he has one, either.’

Ditlev felt the salty mist settle on his face. Apart from that, he felt nothing. Over twenty years had passed since the first assault, and during all those years a tickling unease and latent anxiety had served as his ever-growing source of energy.

But at this moment he felt nothing, and it didn’t feel good.

‘No,’ he replied. ‘Tell him I’m out of town.’

The seagull vanished in the dark waves.

‘Say I’ve gone travelling. And see to it that he’s thrown the hell out.’

35

For Carl, Monday started ten minutes after he’d gone to bed.

He had been disoriented all day Sunday. He’d slept like a log for most of the flight home, and it had been almost impossible for the crabby stewardesses to wake him. They’d had to drag him out of the plane, after which airport personnel needed an electric cart to drive him to the medics.

‘How many Frisium did you say you took?’ they asked. But he was already asleep again.

And now, paradoxically, he had woken up the very moment he’d gone to bed.

‘Where have you been today?’ Morten Holland asked, when Carl came tottering into the kitchen like a zombie. A martini appeared on the table quicker than a soul could say no thanks, and the night grew long.

‘You should find yourself a girlfriend,’ Morten purred, as the clock struck four, and Jesper arrived home, offering additional advice about love and women.

Now Carl knew that Frisium was best in small doses. In any case, it wasn’t a good sign when one’s best advisers on matters of the heart were a sixteen-year-old closet punk and an as-yet closeted homosexual. Next it would probably be Jesper’s mother, Vigga, putting in her pennies’ worth. He could just hear it: ‘What’s wrong with you, Carl? If something is wrong with your metabolic system, then you should give rose root a try. It’s good for all kinds of things.’

He ran into Lars Bjørn at the reception desk, and he didn’t look too good, either.

‘It’s those damn rubbish-bin assaults,’ he said.

They nodded to the officer behind the glass and walked together out to the colonnade.

‘You’ve probably noticed the coincidence between the names “Store Kannikestræde” and “Store Søndervoldstræde”,’ Carl said. ‘Are you keeping an eye on the other streets?’

‘Yes, we have continual surveillance on both Store Strandstræde and Store Kirkestræde. Plainclothes female officers are out there, so we’ll see if that tempts the assailant. Which is why we can’t spare any officers to help on your case, but you probably know that.’

Carl nodded. At this moment he hardly cared. If whatever it was that was making him feel this worn out, slow-witted and woolly-headed was anything like jet lag, then he bloody well failed to understand what on earth a ‘fairy-tale holiday’ could be. Nightmare holiday was a far more appropriate term.

Rose greeted him with a smile in the basement corridor, which no doubt he would soon manage to swipe off her face. ‘Well, how was Madrid?’ was the first thing she said. ‘Did you have time for a little flamenco dancing?’

He simply didn’t have the energy to respond.

‘Come on, Carl. What did you see down there?’

He fixed his heavy-lidded eyes on her. ‘What did I see? Apart from the Eiffel Tower and Paris and the inside of my eyelids, I saw absolutely nothing.’

She started to protest. That’s not possible, said her look.

‘I’ll be blunt, Rose. If you ever do anything like that again, you’ll soon be calling yourself an ex-Department Q colleague.’

He slipped past her and headed for his chair. The padded upholstery awaited him. Just four or five hours’ slumber with his legs up on the desk and he’d be good as new. Of that he was certain.

‘What’s going on?’ came Assad’s voice, the instant Carl entered dreamland.

He shrugged. Nothing, other than that he was about to come unglued. Was Assad blind, or what?

‘Rose is upset. Were you mean to her, Carl?’

He was about to get riled again, but then saw the papers Assad had under his arm.

‘What have you got for me?’ he said tiredly.

Assad sat in one of Rose’s metal monstrosities. ‘They haven’t found Kimmie Lassen yet. They’re searching everywhere, so it’s probably a question of time then.’

‘Is there any news from the explosion site? Have they found anything?’

‘No, nothing. As far as I know they’re finished now.’ He pulled out his papers and glanced through them.

‘I got in touch with those folks at Løgstrup Fence,’ he said. ‘They were very, very friendly. They had to go all the way around in their department before they found someone who could tell us something about the key in the fence.’

‘OK,’ Carl said, eyes closed.

‘One of their employees had a locksmith come to Inger Slevs Gade to help a lady from the ministry who had ordered some extra keys then.’

‘Did you get a description of the woman, Assad? It was Kimmie Lassen, I presume?’

‘No, they couldn’t find out which locksmith it was then, so I didn’t get a description. I’ve told the whole story to the people upstairs. Maybe they would like to know who could have had access to the house that exploded.’

‘OK, Assad. Fair enough. So we’ll cut that string.’

‘What string?’

‘Doesn’t matter, Assad. My next assignment for you is to make a case file on each of the other three, Ditlev, Ulrik and Torsten. I want information about all kinds of things. Tax statements, business ventures, residencies, marital status and all the rest. Just build up the files bit by bit.’

‘Who do I start with then? I have some stuff about all of them already.’

‘That’s good, Assad. Do you have anything else we should discuss?’

‘Up in homicide they told me to let you know that Aalbæk’s mobile many times had been in contact with Ditlev Pram’s.’

Of course it had.

‘That’s good, Assad. So there’s a connection between them and this case. That means we have a pretext for visiting them.’

‘Pretext? What kind of text is that?’

Carl opened his eyes and looked into a pair of dark brown question marks. Honestly, every now and then it was a bit much. Maybe a few private sessions in the Danish language could remove a few feet of the language barrier. On the other hand, there was the risk that he’d suddenly start speaking like a bureaucrat.

‘And I’ve found Klavs Jeppesen,’ Assad said, when Carl didn’t react to his question.

‘That’s good, Assad.’ He tried to remember how many times he’d already said ‘that’s good’. He wouldn’t want to overuse the expression. ‘And where is he?’

‘He’s in the hospital.’

Carl straightened in his chair. What now?

‘Well, you know,’ Assad said, making a slashing motion across his wrist.

‘Jesus Christ. Why’d he do that? Is he going to survive?’

‘Yes. I’ve been out there. I went already yesterday.’

‘Well done, Assad. And?’

‘Not much. Just a man without backbones.’

Backbones? There it was again.

‘He’s come close to doing it for many years, he said.’

Carl shook his head. No woman ever had that kind of effect on him. Unfortunately.

‘Did he have more to say?’

‘I don’t think so. The nurses threw me out.’

Carl smiled wearily. By now Assad must have become accustomed to it.

Then his assistant’s facial expression changed. ‘I saw a new man up on the third floor earlier today. An Iraqi, I think. Do you know what he’s doing here?’

Carl nodded. ‘Yes, he’s Bak’s replacement. He’s from Rødovre. I met him out at the high-rise early Sunday morning. Maybe you know him. His name’s Samir. I don’t remember his surname.’

Assad lifted his head a little. His full lips parted slightly and a set of faint wrinkles formed around his eyes, which weren’t caused by smiling. For a moment he seemed far away.

‘OK,’ he said softly, nodding slowly a few times. ‘Replacement for Bak. So that means he’s staying?’

‘Yes, I assume so. Is something wrong?’

Suddenly Assad’s expression changed back. His face relaxed and he looked directly at Carl with his usual unconcerned air. ‘You’ve got to figure out how to be good friends with Rose, Carl. She’s just so hard-working and so … so sweet. Do you know what she called me this morning?’

He was no doubt going to find out in a second.

‘Her “favourite Bedouin”. Isn’t that just sweet then?’ He flashed his overbite and shook his head, pleased as Punch.

Irony wasn’t exactly the man’s strongest suit.

Carl plugged in his mobile to recharge it and studied the whiteboard. The next step would have to be direct contact with one or more from the gang. Assad would have to go with him, so there would be a witness in case they gave themselves away.

Apart from that, he had yet to meet with their solicitor.

He rubbed his chin and gnawed at the inside of his cheek. It was bloody unfortunate that he’d done that number on Krum’s wife. Claiming Krum was having an affair with his own wife! How idiotic could one person be? It certainly wasn’t going to make it any easier to arrange a meeting with him.

He looked up at the board where the solicitor’s number was listed and punched it in.

‘Agnete Krum,’ said a voice.

He cleared his throat and threw his voice into a higher register. Recognition was good if a person was famous. Not if he was infamous.

‘No,’ she said. ‘He doesn’t live here any more. If you would like to get in touch with him, I suggest you call his mobile.’ Sounding sad, she gave him the number.

He called it right away and then listened to the message on Bent Krum’s voicemail, saying he was out preparing his yacht for the new season, but could be reached the next day at the same number between nine and ten.

Son of a bitch, Carl thought. He called Krum’s wife again. The boat was in Rungsted Harbour, she said.

That was hardly a surprise.

‘We’re going for a drive, Assad, so get ready!’ he shouted across the corridor. ‘I just need to make one more call, OK?’

He punched in the number to his old colleague and rival at Station City, Brandur Isaksen, who was half Faroese, half Greenlander and one hundred per cent North Atlantic in his very soul. The Icicle of Halmtorvet, he was called.

‘What do you want?’ he asked.

‘I’d like to know about one Rose Knudsen whom I’ve inherited from your department. I’ve heard she caused some friction with you lot at City. Can you tell me what it was?’

Carl hadn’t expected the uproarious laughter that followed.

‘You’re the one who got her?’ Isaksen howled ominously. Hearing him laugh was about as uncommon an occurrence as hearing him say anything friendly.

‘I’ll sketch it out for you,’ he went on. ‘First she backed her Daihatsu into three of her colleagues’ private cars. Then she put her leaky teapot on the chief’s handwritten notes for the weekly reports. She ordered all the office girls around. Bossed all the investigators and nosed about in their work. And last of all she shagged two colleagues at a Christmas party, as far as I understand.’ At this point he seemed about to fall off his chair – it was apparently that hilarious. ‘Is it you who got her, Carl? Don’t give her anything to drink, I’m warning you.’

Carl sighed. ‘Anything else?’

‘Yes, she has a twin sister – not an identical twin, but one who’s at least as strange.’

‘Aha, and what about her?’

‘Well, wait till she starts calling Rose at work. You’ve never heard two women do so much yakking. In short, she’s clumsy, unmanageable and sometimes extremely contrary.’

In other words, nothing he didn’t already know, apart from the bit about the alcohol.

Carl hung up and stared into space while his big ears attempted to decipher what was going on in Rose’s office.

He got up and sneaked into the hallway. Yep, she was on the telephone.

He crept up close to the door frame and turned his ear directly towards the open door.

‘Yes,’ she was saying, softly. ‘Yes, you’ve got to accept that. Uh-huh, yes, of course. Really … ? Well, then, that’s lovely …’ And much, much more in the same vein.

Then Carl put his head in the doorway and gave her a trenchant look. One could always hope it would have some kind of effect.

Two minutes later she hung up. The effect hadn’t been too dramatic.

‘Well, are you sitting here having a nice chat with your friends?’ he asked acidly. His comment apparently bounced off the silly girl.

‘Friends?’ she said, breathing deeply. ‘Hmm, I guess you could call them that. It was a department head at the Justice Ministry. He just wanted to say they’d got an email from Kripo in Oslo, in which they praise our department and say that it’s probably the most interesting thing that has happened in Nordic crime history in the last twenty-five years. And now the Ministry just wanted to know why you haven’t been nominated for superintendent.’

Carl swallowed. Were they starting that bullshit again? He’d be damned if he was going back to school. He and Marcus had abandoned that idea long ago.

‘How did you respond?’

‘Me? I began talking about something else. What would you have liked me to say?’

Good girl, he thought.

‘Hey, Rose,’ he said, gathering himself. It wasn’t so easy to apologize when a guy came from a hick town like Brønderslev. ‘I was a little sharp with you earlier. Forget it. The trip to Madrid was actually OK. I mean, the entertainment value was above average, now that I think about it. In any case I saw a tramp without teeth, had all my credit cards stolen and held a strange woman’s hand for at least twelve hundred miles. But next time, give me a little orientation first, OK?’

She smiled.

‘And there’s one more thing I just thought of, Rose. Was it you who spoke to a maid that called from Kassandra Lassen’s house? I didn’t have my police badge, you’ll recall, so she called here to check my identity.’

‘Yes, I did.’

‘She asked you to describe my appearance. Do you mind telling me what you told her?’

A pair of traitorous dimples planted themselves in her cheeks.

‘Weeell, I just said that if it was a guy wearing a brown leather belt and super-worn-out size 10½ black shoes who looked totally unremarkable, then there was a considerable probability that it was you. And if she could also see a bald spot on his crown that looked like a pair of butt cheeks, then there could be no doubt.’

She’s bloody merciless, he thought, sweeping his hair back a bit.

They found Bent Krum all the way out on pier number 11, sitting in an upholstered easy chair on the quarterdeck of a yacht that no doubt cost more than a man like Krum was worth.

‘That boat there is a V42,’ said a boy in front of the promenade’s Thai restaurant. He was certainly well educated.

Whatever enthusiasm Krum might have displayed upon seeing a guardian of the law enter his white paradise, followed by a deeply sunburned and thin-haired representative of Alternative Denmark, was very hard to detect.

But he didn’t get a snowball’s chance in hell to sling out any professional protests.

‘I’ve spoken with Valdemar Florin,’ Carl said, ‘and he suggested I talk to you. He said you would be the right person to speak for the family. Do you have five minutes?’

Bent Krum shoved his sunglasses above his forehead. He might just as well have left them up there the whole time, seeing as there was no sun. ‘Five minutes is all. My wife is expecting me at home.’

Carl smiled broadly. Fat chance, the smile said, and Bent Krum, being the sly, old rat he was, recognized it immediately. Perhaps he’d be more careful about lying in the future.

‘You and Valdemar Florin were present in 1986, when the youths were brought down to the Holbæk Police Station under suspicion of having committed the murders in Rørvig. He suggested to me that a couple of them stood out from the others in the group, but thought this was something you could better elaborate on. Do you know what he was referring to?’

In the sunlight he was a pale man. Not without pigmentation, but anaemic-looking. Bleached and worn down by all the villainy he’d had to defend over the years. Carl had seen it time and again. No one could look paler than a policeman with unsolved crimes in his baggage or a solicitor with all too many solved ones.

‘Stood out, you say? They all did, I guess. Fine, young people, I’d call them. Their activities since then have proved that, wouldn’t you say?’

‘Well,’ Carl said, ‘I’m not that much of an expert. But one shoots himself in the private parts, another makes a living stuffing women with Botox and silicone, a third lets undernourished young girls prance back and forth while people stare at them, a fourth is sitting in prison, a fifth specializes in making rich people richer by preying on the ignorance of small investors, and the sixth has been living on the street for just over eleven years. So, really, I’m not sure how to respond.’

‘I don’t think you should make such statements in public,’ Krum said, already prepared to file a lawsuit.

‘In public?’ Carl said, glancing round at the teak and glossy fibreglass and chrome. ‘Is there anything less public than this?’ He spread his arms and smiled. A compliment, many would say.

‘What about Kimmie Lassen?’ Carl continued. ‘Didn’t she stand out? Isn’t it true that she was a central figure in the gang’s activities? Isn’t it the case that Florin, Dybbøl Jensen and Pram might have a certain interest in seeing her quietly disappear from the face of the earth?’

Vertical wrinkles appeared on Bent Krum’s head. Not especially attractive. ‘I’d like to remind you that she already has disappeared. Of her own free will, it should be noted!’

Carl turned to Assad. ‘Did you get that, Assad?’

He raised his pencil in confirmation.

‘Thank you,’ Carl said. ‘That was all.’

They stood up.

‘I beg your pardon?’ Krum said. ‘Got what? What just happened there?’

‘Well, you said the gang had an interest in Kimmie Lassen disappearing.’

‘No, that’s not at all what I said.’

‘Did he not, Assad?’

The little man nodded vigorously. He certainly was loyal.

‘We have all kinds of indications that suggest it was the gang that killed the siblings in Rørvig,’ Carl said. ‘And I’m not just talking about Bjarne Thøgersen. So we’ll probably meet again, Mr Krum. You’ll also be meeting a number of people that maybe you’ve heard of, and maybe not. In any case, they’re all interesting people with good memories. Like Kåre Bruno’s friend, Mannfred Sloth, for example.’

Krum didn’t react.

‘And a teacher at the boarding school by the name of Klavs Jeppesen. Not to mention Kyle Basset, whom I interviewed yesterday in Madrid.’

Now Krum reacted. ‘Just a moment,’ he said, grabbing Carl’s arm.

Carl looked disapprovingly at the hand, and Krum swiftly removed it.

‘Yes, Mr Krum,’ he said. ‘We’re aware that you have a considerable stake in the gang’s well-being. For one thing, you’re the chairman of the board of Caracas, Pram’s private hospital. That alone may be the main reason you can sit here in such gorgeous surroundings.’ He gestured at the pier’s many restaurants and further out across the Sound.

There was no doubt that in a moment Bent Krum would be making a few frantic calls.

But then the gang members would be nicely prepared by the time Carl came to visit. Maybe even tenderized.

Assad and Carl walked into Caracas like a couple of narcissists interested in exploring the place before they got a little fat sucked out here and there. The receptionist stopped them, of course, but Carl pushed determinedly on towards what resembled administrative offices.

‘Where is Ditlev Pram?’ he asked a secretary, when he finally found the sign that read: DITLEV PRAM, CEO.

She already had the phone in her hand to call security when he flashed his police badge and gave her a smile that even Carl’s down-to-earth mother would have found irresistible. ‘Excuse us for barging in, but we have to speak with Ditlev Pram. If you can get him to come here, he’ll be pleased and so will we.’

She didn’t fall for it.

‘Unfortunately he’s out today,’ she said authoritatively. ‘But can I set up an appointment for you? How about the 22nd of October, at 2.15? Does that work for you?’

So it wasn’t Pram they’d be talking to on this trip. A damned shame.

‘Thanks. We’ll call,’ Carl said, pulling Assad with him.

She was going to warn Pram, no doubt about it. She’d already stepped out on to the terrace with her mobile. Sharp secretary.

‘We were sent down here,’ Carl said, pointing towards the prep and recovery ward as they passed the receptionist again.

Watchful eyes followed them, and they returned each glance with a friendly nod.

After they’d passed the surgical wing, they stood a moment and kept an eye out in case Pram showed up. Then they headed past a number of private rooms, from most of which classical music came streaming out, and reached the utility wing where less well-preserved people were wearing less prestigious uniforms.

They nodded at the cooks and finally wound up in the laundry, where a lot of very Asian-looking women seemed utterly terrified to see them.

If Pram found out that he had been down here, Carl ventured to guess that these women would disappear within the hour.

On the trip back Assad was very quiet. Only when they reached Klampenborg did he turn to Carl. ‘Where would you go if you were Kimmie Lassen?’

Carl shrugged. Who could tell? After all, she was pretty unpredictable. Apparently she had truly mastered the art of improvising her way through life. She could be anywhere.

‘We both agree that she would have a great interest in Aalbæk not looking for her any more. I mean, she and the rest of the group weren’t exactly the best of chumps.’

‘Best of chums, Assad. Chums.’

‘The homicide division says that Aalbæk was at something called Damhuskroen Saturday evening. Did I tell you that?’

‘No, but I’ve heard it.’

‘And he left with a woman, yes?’

‘That, I hadn’t heard.’

‘Which means, Carl, if she killed that Aalbæk, they are probably not so happy, the others in the gang.’

That was probably putting it mildly.

‘So there’s a war between them now.’

Carl nodded wearily. The last twenty-four hours were beginning to settle not only into his head, but also his entire nervous system. Suddenly the accelerator seemed impossibly difficult to press down.

‘Don’t you think she would go back to the house where you found the box so she could get hold of the evidence against the others then?’

Carl nodded slowly. That was definitely one possibility. Another was that he pull over and take a nap.

‘Shouldn’t we then drive over there?’ was Assad’s conclusion.

They found the house dark and locked up. Rang the doorbell a few times. Found the telephone number and called. They heard ringing inside, but no one picked up. It seemed rather pointless. In any event Carl couldn’t muster the energy to do anything more about it. For God’s sake, elderly women were allowed to have a life outside their home’s four walls.

‘Come on, let’s go,’ Carl said. ‘You drive so I can take a nap.’

Rose was gathering her things when Carl and Assad arrived at headquarters. She wanted to go home, so they wouldn’t be seeing her for another two days. She was tired, having worked hard Friday night, Saturday and part of Sunday. They weren’t getting any more for that nickel.

Carl felt exactly the same way.

‘By the way,’ she said. ‘I got hold of the university in Berne, and they found Kirsten-Marie Lassen’s file.’

So apparently Rose had made it through her entire list, Carl thought.

‘She was a good student, down there in Switzerland. There were no problems, they said. Aside from her losing her boyfriend in a skiing accident, it was a highly successful stay, according to her records.’