Copenhagen Noir

He turned to her, stared down at her wrinkled cleavage, the ample makeup.

“You fucking Polacks. Big men, but what are you shooting? Blanks? I want grandchildren, Marek.”

She looked him hatefully in the eyes, but then broke off and walked over to the dresser, put on her large glasses. She brought out a folder. Marek glimpsed a passport and a pile of other papers.

“We have a job for you in Copenhagen. One of our Polish girls has run away. Adina something or other. Olek will tell you everything. Zbigniew has arranged another car.”

“Can’t I take my own car?”

“No. You are escorting another girl. Here are her papers, straight from Moldavia.”

Marek walked past the well-lit bistro. Another hooker job. Do they think I’m worthless? He looked in through the glass. His wife, Irina, stood inside, flushed, red blisters on her body. Five years and nowhere. She was giving orders to a girl who stood trying to keep a tub from spilling. He could feel Reza’s fingernails all the way into his soul.

He walked over to his own car, grabbed the spare tire, 100,000 euros stowed under the rim.

He’d reached 100,000 yesterday. Enough for a new life.

The girl, pale and silent, was already in the car when he plopped down in the driver’s seat.

“Marek,” he said. “I’m Marek.”

The girl began crying.

Thursday, 7:10 p.m. Abel Cathrines Gade 5, Fifth Floor, 1654 Copenhagen V

Henry og Connie Jensen was the name on the oval copper nameplate on the fifth floor. Adina had run and run and run like a deer in a cone of light, she was all in, and it wasn’t until now that she felt how cold she’d been, how scared. She had stood on the bridge above Dybbolsbro Station, wanting to throw herself in front of the train. Better to die than go back to Olek, better to do it herself. But then suddenly she didn’t dare do it, and she remembered Henry. You can come anytime, and I mean it, he had said. He always repeated it: Anytime. It was stupid to hide at a client’s place, impossible, but now he opened the door, welcomed her, stood there with his big furrowed face, the worried eyes, and she fell into his apartment, was sucked into the warm hallway. Henry helped her over the thick wool rug, over to the sofa.

“You need to take your clothes off, Adina,” he said. “I don’t mean that way,” he added, without irony. “I think I still have some of Connie’s clothes. Wait here.”

A brown bureau filled the wall to the right; tiled table, wing-back chair, floor lamps, TV. Christmas plates lined the walls, all the way around. With stiff fingers she lit up a cigarette and searched her bag; a half Rohypnol in foil, two codies, and a Valium. She stuck the pills in her mouth, swallowed them, and slid back on the sofa. She felt nauseous. Henry returned with a pair of much-too-large beige pants and a wool cardigan. He helped her off with her clothes, rolled them off her, the pantyhose, the clammy panties. She sat smoking through it all, it was nice to let someone else take over. He sat at the other end of the sofa and hugged her ankles.

“What happened?”

She didn’t want him sitting there touching her.

“Adina, you have to tell me, or I can’t help.”

“Lenja is dead.” It popped out of her mouth, and she doubled up; she wasn’t going to cry while he was touching her.

“We have to call the police, then.”

“No, no, no, Olek will kill me!”

“Do you want some soup?” he asked suddenly. “I have some broth I can warm.”

A few minutes went by as he rummaged around in the kitchen. Then a bowl of steaming soup was sitting in front of her, and he handed her a spoon. She was insanely hungry.

“Lenja’s the one with the blond hair, right?”

Adina ate with her face in the bowl, three dumplings and four meatballs, she counted them.

“I’ll get out, Henry. I’ll leave in a minute. I just need to lie down a while.”

Friday, 1:30 a.m. Hawaii Bio, Oehlenschl?gersgade 1, 1620 Copenhagen V

Just call me Yvonne, said the middle-aged fake blonde at the till in the rear of Hawaii Bio, a twenty-four-hour dive filled with porno films and sex toys at a corner on Vesterbrogade. I’m looking for Olek, Marek replied in English, the language she had spoken. Yvonne turned her head and yelled, Olek! Then she offered him a cup of coffee. She sat knitting a stocking cap with a purple border. The coffee tasted bitter.

The girl was asleep in the car. She lay there hugging his coat. Ludmilla, fourteen years old, from Moldavia. She’d just sat there on the ferry, blue-eyed, cold, and frightened. Marek couldn’t get a single bite down her, so he’d gone into the dutyfree shop and bought a box of assorted candy, which she ate in the front seat. When they drove off the ferry she said, I have money for school, in English, and showed him a brown envelope. He looked out over the turnip fields and stuck a Marlboro in his mouth.

She’d fallen asleep while he was filling up in Tappernoje.

“Where is she?” Olek said, barging in through the back door. His eyes were bloodshot, he was every bit as blistered as his sister.

“Who?”

“You know, the new one.”

“We’ll get to her. She’s asleep in the car. Your mother says there’s something that needs taken care of quick.”

They sized each other up. Olek gave him the eye and turned on his heel. Marek followed him out to the stairway, where Olek took three steps at a time. Second floor: cubicles, they heard someone moaning in one of the closest. Third floor: rooms to let, they entered one and Olek passed him a photo- Adina Sobczak. Thirtyfive years old. Disappeared yesterday morning, emptied her closet and tricked a moronic Albanian at the till into handing over her passport. Last job: four Polish workmen on Mysundegade 3, the loft, lunch break, two hundred kroner per. Her roommate Lenja croaked yesterday morning, that might have made Adina crack. Olek pointed out Lenja’s things in the small room. Clothes, mashed down in a large sports bag. The breath freshener was hers too. Why don’t these fucking Lats brush their teeth?

Only the metal case belonged to Adina. Quickly they dumped it out, a barrette lay at the bottom. Marek picked it up. Hello Kitty. There was also a receipt. She’d bought a brush and something in product group 16 for 67.75 in Fotex on Vesterbrogade, the day before yesterday.

Not much to go on. Four Polish workmen who had gotten it on the cheap. He turned the barrette in his hand.

“Find her,” Olek said. “Find her and do her.”

Thursday 9:23 p.m. Abel Cathrines Gade 5, Fifth Floor, 1654 Copenhagen V

Adina brushed her long hair. The rain had made it ratty. Her back hurt, her lower back. Olek’s sperm burned inside her. All the humiliations, the beatings, the cold. Lenja had lain on the bathroom floor behind the shower curtain, naked, bloody behind her ear. Olek’s signature. He fucked them in the ass, then before he came he smacked them behind the ear so they would tense up and contract; they laid there waiting for that clout. She went over and opened the curtain a crack. One of Olek’s boys, Kofi, was selling dope on the corner. She’d have to wait until he left. She sat down and Henry came in with coffee and a plate of cookies.

“It’s strange having someone in the apartment,” he said, speaking into the air while he set the cups down. “It’s two years now since Connie died. We had two wonderful children,” he continued, calmly. “Tina and Jorn. I don’t see Jorn very much, but that’s because of his new wife. Tina lives in Perth, Australia. Would you like to see some pictures?”

He edged past the coffee table and over to the bureau, opened the lowest drawer, and returned with a photo album.

“Here, this is their ranch. Greg breeds horses. And here, that’s William, and this is Bill and Evan, and what’s his