medical examiner tomorrow at eleven o’clock. One of us will drive you there,” he said. And he briefly went through the investigation of the dismembered corpse that had floated onto the beach in Hellerup. The first sacks had been found on June 3, 1997. Two more sacks were found the day after. The head, limbs, and the intestines were never found. Both breasts, including the musculature, along with the buttocks, were gone. The outer genitalia and the rectal opening had been removed. The victim had extensive bruising on her pubic bone as a result of extremely brutal force.
“She was as empty as a watch case,” Metz commented.
“The dismemberment sounds strikingly like that of our corpse,” Irene observed.
“You’ll get more details about it from the pathologist tomorrow. We didn’t know who the victim was, but two days later, on June 5, a man named Kurt Ostergaard reported that his wife, Carmen, was missing. He hadn’t seen her since the last week in May. He started missing her then since she was his source of income. Both of them were on heroin. We could rule out Kurt as the murderer pretty quickly. He wouldn’t have been able to hold a knife in the shape he was in. Actually, I heard that he died last winter of an overdose.”
Metz caught his breath, wet his index finger, and turned the page. “At the time of her death, Carmen was twenty-five years old. She had been a prostitute for four years, the same period during which she had been married to Kurt and hooked on heroin. Her mother was Danish and her father Spanish. The girl was a souvenir from a hitchhiking trip to Spain. Many of us in the district knew Carmen, since she lived here in Vesterbro. The mortician established that she was HIV positive. She probably wasn’t aware of it since she wasn’t registered anywhere for testing. We interrogated Kurt but he couldn’t give us any information. Carmen never told him about her customers; she just gave him money.”
Metz looked down at the papers and continued, “We interrogated all the prostitutes in Vesterbro. A lot of the women had been threatened by customers during that time, with everything from strangulation to assault. But nothing sounded like the murderer we were after. Sometimes Carmen hung out with two other prostitutes. They talked with each other in between clients and ate together. Carmen supposedly talked to one of them in a cafe about a police officer who had frightened her in the days before she was killed. A customer who paid well but had strange requests and was also a cop. Carmen never said what in particular the police officer wanted. Before they left the cafe, Carmen allegedly said, ‘The policeman or the doctor will be the death of me.’ Her friend asked her if she had to see them again and she just said, ‘Yes. Money and drugs.’”
“Did any of the other prostitutes know anything about a suspicious policeman or doctor?”
“One broad talked about a strange doctor and another started talking about a policeman. But she was high on God knows what. When she started to come down, she denied everything and claimed that she had made it all up. We never found any evidence that these two characters existed.”
“Did you ask the girls at the bordellos?”
Both Moller and Metz smiled. It was Metz who answered. “Do you realize how many nightclubs, escort services, strip bars, and so forth there are in Copenhagen? Not to mention all of the girls at these places? And boys, for that matter.”
He paused, then said, “Since Carmen never worked at a place like that-she worked the street-we only asked the girls on the streets. The papers printed a lot about the murder. Had any of the girls at the clubs experienced something terrifying, they could have gotten in touch with us. But no one did.”
They didn’t dare to because they would lose their jobs, Irene thought, but she didn’t say anything.
“It’s the whores on the street who are addicted to drugs who fall victim to the most gruesome violence. At least in the clubs they have some degree of protection,” Peter Moller added.
“Mmm. We worked the whole summer on this case but during the fall we had to shut it down. It was at a complete standstill. No new witnesses and, thankfully, no new murders.”
“Until now. In Goteborg,” said Irene.
“Yes, it’s really strange. If it hadn’t been for the tattoo, I would have said that there was no way there could have been a connection, even if the dismemberments were identical and extreme. But the sign is located here in Vesterbro. Everyone at the station has seen it,” said Metz.
Moller started talking about their visit to the gay sex shop. Irene noticed that he didn’t mention Tom Tanaka’s short sentence in Japanese. She hoped he had forgotten about it. He finished up with his own theory about the tattoo, “I think the victim in Sweden had taken a photo of the sign. The tattoo looks like the sign and not like the painting in Tanaka’s office.”
Irene nodded.
“That’s not impossible. We have to find the tattoo artist,” she said.
“But if the tattoo was based on a souvenir photo, it could have been made anywhere in the world,” Metz pointed out.
“That’s true but we have to begin somewhere. I’m going to start in Vesterbro,” said Irene.
She unfolded the picture of Isabell Lind and put it on the desk in front of the two Danish crime investigators. “At the same time, I’m thinking about trying to locate this girl. She’s the daughter of a friend.”
She briefly went through the story about Isabell. Moller and Metz examined the picture thoroughly while she was talking. When she was finished, Metz said, “I understand why the mother didn’t find a photographer or agency for photo models that recognized her. You’ll probably find her in one of the clubs. Usually they call the girls at these establishments hostesses or models.”
“Scandinavian Models. . I think it must be an escort service,” said Peter.
Metz gave the picture back to Irene. With a big yawn, he stretched his arms out and straightened his back. “My friends, it’s almost six o’clock, and I want to go home to my dinner. See you tomorrow morning at eight o’clock.”
Peter and Irene went into the corridor. He walked beside her in silence. Finally he said, “And you. . where are you going to eat dinner?”
“Superintendent Bentsen has invited me to a restaurant not far from my hotel.”
“Good. . I mean otherwise I would have asked you. . but as you’ve already made plans with Beate. .”
The relief in his voice couldn’t be missed, and Irene was just as relieved. There was a reserve about Peter Moller that was difficult to overcome and she didn’t feel particularly motivated to try. She didn’t have that kind of time here in Copenhagen. There were other more important people to focus on.
Moller drove her back to the Hotel Alex. The traffic was heavy but he was accustomed to it and navigated skillfully. He parked quickly in front of the hotel entrance. Before Irene got out he offered, “I can pick you up here tomorrow at a quarter to eight.”
“I’ll definitely say yes to that.”
They took leave of each other. In the reflection of the door’s glass she saw the elegant BMW engulfed by the flow of traffic as it disappeared.
When Irene asked for her room key, to her surprise, she was given an envelope by the receptionist. It was made of thick white linen paper and was glued securely shut. She resisted the temptation to open it in the elevator. In her room, with equal parts curiosity and impatience, she tore open the envelope. It contained a stiff white card with the message:
Tom Tanaka. He wanted her to come to his place tonight. It was important. With some trepidation she remembered his words,
AS THE clock struck seven, Irene stepped into Restaurant Vesuvius. She had to revise her misgivings about having been invited to a pizzeria. Obviously they served pizzas but they were the size of mill wheels and smelled wonderful. The restaurant was big and packed with customers. In broken Danish a dark-skinned, harried young man asked if he could help her.
“I’m meeting Beate Bentsen here,” said Irene.
The man bowed and led her into a smaller room with about ten tables. The walls were decorated with black-and-white photos and posters from Italian films. Under a large picture of a young Sophia Loren sat Beate Bentsen. The actress smiled seductively straight into the camera with her bare arms stretched over her head and her hands clasped behind her neck. The ideal of feminine beauty changes, Irene thought, when she noticed that the film star had small tufts of hair in her armpits.
