After that the secretary resumed her usual morose and aloof demeanor.
On Friday Merete took home the last messages that her secretary had left on her desk. After reading through them several times, she tossed them in the wastebasket. Then she tied the strings of the garbage bag in a knot and carried it out to the garbage can. She needed to put an end to this, once and for all.
And she felt mean and miserable.
The home help had left a casserole on the table. It was still lukewarm when Merete and Uffe were done dashing about the house. Next to the ovenproof dish was a little note on top of an envelope.
Oh no, she’s going to quit, thought Merete and then read the note.
“A man brought this letter to the house. I suppose it has something to do with the ministry.”
Merete picked up the envelope and tore it open.
“Have a nice trip to Berlin” was all it said.
Uffe was sitting next to her with an empty plate, smiling in anticipation as his nostrils quivered at the delicious aroma from the food. Merete pressed her lips together and scooped up some of the casserole for her brother as she tried not to cry.
The rushing of the east wind was getting louder, whipping up the waves so the foam splashed halfway up the sides of the ship. Uffe loved to stand outside on the sun deck and watch the wake form alongside the ship while the seagulls soared on outspread wings overhead. And Merete loved seeing Uffe happy. She was looking forward to their weekend. It was good that she’d decided they should go after all. Berlin was such a marvelous city.
Up ahead on the deck an elderly couple was looking in their direction; behind them a family sat at one of the tables close to the smokestack, with Thermoses and sandwiches that they’d brought along. The children had already finished eating, and Merete gave them a smile. The father looked at his watch and said something to his wife. Then they began packing up what was left of their lunch.
She remembered going on this sort of excursion with her parents. That was a long time ago. She turned around. People were already heading below deck to where their cars were parked. They would soon reach the harbor at Puttgarden; only ten more minutes, but not everybody was in a rush. Two men were standing over near the huge picture windows in the stern, with scarves wrapped snugly around their necks as they calmly gazed out to sea. One of them looked frail and gaunt. Merete estimated that they were standing at least six feet apart, so they probably weren’t together.
A sudden impulse made her take the note out of her pocket and look at the six words again. Then she put it back in the envelope and held it up in the air, letting it flutter in the wind for a moment. Then she let it go. The envelope flew upward and then dived down, slipping inside an opening in the side of the ship, underneath the sun deck. For a moment she thought they’d have to go downstairs and retrieve it, but then the note suddenly reappeared and began dancing over the waves. It spun around a few times and vanished into the white foam. Uffe laughed. He’d been watching the envelope the whole time. Then he gave a shriek, took off his baseball cap, and tossed it after the envelope.
“No, don’t!” was all she managed to shout before the cap plunged into the sea.
It was a Christmas present and Uffe’s most-beloved possession. The minute it was gone, he regretted what he’d done. It was clear that he was considering jumping after the cap, in an attempt to get it back.
“No, Uffe!” she yelled. “You can’t do that. It’s gone!” But Uffe had already set one foot on the metal barrier of the railing. He stood there bellowing over the wooden rail, his body’s center of gravity far too high up.
“Stop it, Uffe! There’s nothing you can do,” she shouted again, but Uffe was strong, much stronger than she was, and he was far away. His consciousness was down in the waves with the baseball cap that had been a Christmas present. It was a relic of his simple, godless life.
Then she slapped him hard in the face. She’d never done that before, and she instantly pulled back her hand in fright. Uffe couldn’t understand what was happening. He forgot about his cap and touched his cheek. He was in shock. It was years since he’d felt pain like that. He didn’t understand. Then he looked at her and struck back. He hit her harder than he’d ever done before.
12. 2007
Homicide chief Marcus Jacobsen had spent yet another night without much sleep.
The witness in the case of the cyclist murdered in Valby Park had tried to kill herself with an overdose of sleeping pills. Jacobsen couldn’t understand what the hell could have pushed her so far. She had children and a mother who loved her, after all. Who could have threatened a woman into taking such extreme measures? The police had offered her witness protection and everything else within their powers. She was under surveillance day and night. Where on earth had she gotten those pills?
“You should go home and get some sleep,” said his deputy when Marcus came back from his usual Friday- morning meeting with the police chief in the commissioner’s conference room.
He nodded. “Well, maybe just for a couple of hours. But you and Bak need to go out to the National Hospital and see what you can get out of that woman. And make sure to take her mother and children along, so she can see them. We need to try and bring her back to reality.”
“Uh-huh, or away from it,” Lars Bjorn said.
All phone calls were supposed to be redirected, but the phone rang anyway. “Don’t let anybody through except the queen or Prince Henrik,” he’d told his secretary. So it was probably his wife. “Yeah?” he said, feeling suddenly more tired than ever.
“It’s the police commissioner,” whispered Bjorn, holding his hand over the receiver.
He handed the phone to Marcus and tiptoed out of the room.
“Marcus,” the commissioner said in her distinctive voice. “I’m calling to tell you that the justice minister and the committees have made fast work of things. So the extra allocation of funds has been approved.”
“That’s good to hear,” replied Marcus, immediately trying to work out in his mind how the budget could be divided up.
“Yes, well, you know the chain of command. Today Piv Vestergard and the Judicial Committee of the Denmark Party met with the justice minister, so now all the wheels will start turning. The chief of police has asked the head of the National Police to find out if you’ve got the new department set up yet,” she said.
“Yes, I believe we have,” he said with a frown as he pictured Carl’s weary face.
“That’s good. I’ll let them know. So what’s the first case you’re going to tackle?”
That was not exactly a question he found particularly energizing.
Carl was just getting ready to head home. The clock on the wall said 4:36, but his inner clock was several hours ahead. So it was undeniably a disappointment when Marcus Jacobsen rang to say that he’d be coming downstairs to pay Carl a visit. “I need to report what you’re working on.”
Carl looked with resignation at the blank bulletin board and the row of used coffee cups standing on his little meeting table. “Give me twenty minutes, Marcus. Then you’re welcome to come down here. We’re right in the middle of something at the moment.”
He put down the phone and puffed out his cheeks. Then he slowly exhaled as he stood up and went across the hall to the room where Assad had made himself at home.
On his abnormally small desk stood two framed photographs showing a big group of people. On the wall above the desk hung a poster with Arabic script and a lovely picture of an exotic building that Carl couldn’t immediately identify. From a hook on the door hung a brown smock of the type that had gone out of fashion along with leg warmers. Assad had neatly arranged his cleaning implements in a row along the far wall: a bucket, mop, vacuum cleaner, and a sea of bottles containing caustic cleaning fluids. On the bookshelves were rubber gloves and a little transistor radio with a cassette player that was emitting muted sounds that were reminiscent of the bazaar
