“Who did you talk to about this, if I might ask?”
“I don’t remember.”
“It wasn’t Borge Bak from the Rapid Response Team, was it?”
She pointed her index finger at Carl, as if to say “Bingo.”
That damned Bak. Did he always leave out so many details when he wrote up his reports?
Carl looked over at Sos’s chosen cellmate. She wasn’t exactly lavish with the smiles. Right now she was just waiting for him to disappear.
Carl nodded to Sos and stood up. Between the bay windows hung various tiny studio photographs in color, as well as a couple of large black-and-white pictures of Sos’s parents, taken in better days. They must have been quite attractive at one time, but it was hard to tell, given the way Sos had scratched and scored all the faces in the photos. He leaned down to look at the small framed pictures. From the clothes and posture, he recognized one of the many PR photos of Merete Lynggaard. She too had lost most of her face in a network of scratches. So Sos collected pictures of people she hated. Maybe he could have won a place for himself if he’d made an effort.
For once Borge Bak was alone in his office. His leather jacket was even more creased than usual. Indisputable proof that he was working hard, day and night.
“Didn’t I tell you not to come barging in here, Carl?” He slammed his notepad on the desk and glared at him.
“You fucked up, Borge,” said Carl.
Whether it was the use of his first name or the accusation, Bak’s reaction was instantaneous. All the furrows on his forehead went vertical, reaching right up to his comb-over.
“Merete Lynggaard got a bouquet of flowers a few days before her death. And from what I’ve heard, she never used to receive flowers.”
“So what?” Bak’s expression couldn’t have been more condescending.
“We’re looking for someone who might have committed a murder. Has that slipped your mind? A lover could be a likely candidate.”
“We looked into all that.”
“But it wasn’t included in your report.”
Bak shrugged. “Take it easy, Carl. You, of all people, should talk about other people’s work. The rest of us are working our asses off while you’re just sitting on your backside. Don’t you think I know that? I put what’s important into the report, and that’s that,” he said, smacking his pad on the desktop.
“You neglected to include the fact that a social worker named Karin Mortensen observed Uffe Lynggaard playing a game that indicated he remembered the car accident. Maybe he also remembers something from the day when Merete disappeared. But apparently you didn’t pursue that angle very far.”
“Karen Mortensen. Karen spelled with an
“Does that mean you realize how significant this piece of information from Karen Mortensen could be?”
“Shut the fuck up. We checked it out, okay? Uffe didn’t remember shit about anything. That kid’s got nothing upstairs.”
“Merete Lynggaard met a man a few days before she died. He was part of a delegation on research into the workings of the immune system. You didn’t put anything about that in your report either.”
“No, but we looked into it.”
“So then you must know that a man got in touch with her, and there was clearly strong chemistry between them. That’s what her secretary, Sos Norup, says she told you, at any rate.”
“Yes, damn it. Of course I know that.”
“Then why isn’t it in your report?”
“I don’t know. Probably because it turned out that the man was dead.”
“Dead?”
“Yes, burned to death in a car accident the day after Merete disappeared. His name was Daniel Hale.” He enunciated the name carefully, so that Carl would take note of what a good memory he had.
“Daniel Hale?” Apparently Sos had forgotten his name over the years.
“Yes, he was working on the placenta research that the delegation was trying to get funded. He had a laboratory in Slangerup.” Bak presented these facts with supreme self-confidence. He had a good handle on this part of the case.
“If he didn’t die until the following day, he still could have had something to do with Merete’s disappearance.”
“I don’t think so. He came home from London on the afternoon she drowned.”
“Was he in love with her? Sos hinted that might be the case.”
“If so, I feel sorry for the man. She wasn’t having any of it.”
“Are you sure, Borge?” His colleague clearly wasn’t comfortable hearing Carl use his first name. So that settled things-he was going to hear it nonstop. “Maybe it was this Daniel Hale she had dinner with at Bankerat. What do you think, Borge?”
“Listen, Carl. There’s a woman in the cyclist murder case who’s talked to us, and now we’re hot on the trail. I’m busy as fuck right now. Can’t this wait until some other time? Daniel Hale is dead. He wasn’t even in the country when Merete Lynggaard died. She drowned, and Hale didn’t have shit to do with it, OK?”
“Did you try to find out whether Hale was the person she had dinner with at Bankerat a week earlier? There’s nothing about it in the report.”
“Listen to me! The investigation finally pointed to the likelihood that her death was an accident. Besides, there were twenty of us on the case. Go ask somebody else. Now, get out of here, Carl.”
24
If he relied exclusively on his sense of smell and hearing, it was hard to distinguish the basement in police headquarters from Cairo’s teeming alleyways on Monday morning when Carl arrived at work. Never before had that venerable building ever reeked so much of cooking smells and exotic spices, and never before had those walls heard the likes of such twisted tones.
A secretary from Admin who had just been down to the archives glared at Carl as she passed him, her arms filled with case files. Her expression said that in ten minutes the whole building was going to know that everything had run amok down in the basement.
The explanation was to be found in Assad’s pygmy office, where a sea of baked goods and pieces of foil holding chopped garlic, little green bits, and yellow rice adorned the plates on his desk. No wonder it was causing raised eyebrows.
“What’s going on here, Assad?” shouted Carl, turning off the cassette player. Assad merely smiled. Evidently he wasn’t aware of the cultural gap that was presently in the process of gnawing its way deep under the solid foundations of police headquarters.
Carl dropped heavily onto the chair across from his assistant. “It smells wonderful, Assad, but this is the police department. Not a Lebanese takeaway in Vanlose.”
“Here, Carl. And congratulations, Mr. Superintendent, one might say,” replied Assad, handing him a buttery dough triangle. “This is from my wife. My daughters cut out the paper.”
Carl followed Assad’s hand as he gestured around the room. Now he noticed the brilliantly colored tissue paper draped over the bookshelves and ceiling lights.
This was not going to be easy.
“I also took some to Hardy yesterday. I have read most of the case files to him out loud now, Carl.”
“Is that right?” He could just picture the nurses as Assad fed Egyptian rolls to Hardy. “You mean you went to see him on your day off?”
