Death Sentence

‘Exactly.’

‘OK, see you tonight.’

I hung up before Bjarne had time to reply. The clock on the wall showed nine. That meant ten hours before I could get the address. The dinner invitation prompted me to remember the rest of today’s programme. It was the first day of the book fair and I was expected to promote In the Red Zone by signing copies. My editor’s fear that the book might be stopped was so far unfounded. His words echoed in my head. Pretend nothing has happened. Stick to the plan.

But how could I when Verner lay murdered a couple of floors below me? Then again, neither could I stand being in the hotel any longer.

I took a taxi to Forum in Frederiksberg.

Forum was a large cube of concrete and steel, placed between proud old buildings with the finesse and sensitivity to its surroundings of a piece of rubbish tossed in a flowerbed.

The queue of visitors already stretched outside. I picked up my entrance pass at the information desk and entered the exhibition hall.

My first task was to sign books and even at a distance I could see people lined up clutching books outside ZeitSign’s stand. It was ten minutes after the starting time stated in the programme.

ZeitSign’s black and white colours dominated the stand, which was bigger than usual. Black fabric had been draped over one corner and this was where all my books were exhibited – with the exception of my first two, for which I was grateful. Hundreds of copies of In the Red Zone had been piled up around a small table and chair that were waiting for me. This was where I could look forward to spending the next hour signing autographs.

I toyed with the idea of walking on, losing myself in the crowds pushing and shoving in between the displays. Unfortunately I loathed being swept along by a constant stream of pushy book fanatics with plastic bags and darting eyes even more than I loathed signing books. I took a deep breath and forced my way to the stand and my table. There, at least, I would be able to sit down and no one would bump into me or step on my toes.

People shuffled closer and mumbled impatiently when I hung my jacket over the back of the chair and took my seat. I found my fountain pen, secured the cap, conjured up the biggest smile I could manage and turned to face the first person.

As always it was mostly women who wanted their books signed. This is obviously because more women read fiction than men, but I also think women want to see the person who wrote the book. They are curious to know something about the person behind it and the signature itself is less important. The female interest when I broke through with Outer Demons was huge. Women wanted to meet the monster who had dreamed up such explicit scenes of violence and torture. They searched for something dangerous or evil in my eyes to make them shudder. They may have been disappointed, but it has never prevented them from turning up in vast numbers for book signings to confess how affected they were when they read this or that passage.

‘Oh, there you are,’ a voice said next to me and I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was Finn Gelf. ‘We were just starting to worry that you might not show.’

‘Don’t worry,’ I said, giving a signed copy of In the Red Zone to a woman in her forties. She smiled gratefully and disappeared clutching her trophy. ‘The circus horse is ready to take another trip round the ring,’ I added, and smiled to the next person in the queue.

Finn patted my shoulder.

‘That’s good to know, Frank. Please would you pop by backstage when you’re done?’

The backstage area was a small cubicle behind the stand. A couple of folding chairs let you to take the weight off your feet, a necessity for staff who had to stand up all day and a sanctuary for the authors. Though it was narrow and busy, it still offered some respite from the crowds and, most importantly, it featured a keg of beer. I was already looking forward to it.

The first thirty minutes I wrote dedications non-stop. My smile was set on autopilot while I listened to people’s comments and thanked them, nodded and smiled again. Individuals turned into a blur of smiling, sweating, panting faces. The queue seemed never-ending and the only thing that kept me going was the prospect of an ice- cold beer in the backroom.

My gaze was fixed on the spot on the title page where I signed my name, but I was roused from my daze when someone put a book in front of me with a different title. The book was Media Whore, which I wrote seven years ago. I straightened my back and looked up at the reader. It was a man, which was in itself unusual, but even more unusual, he wore sunglasses and smiled in a bizarrely expectant manner as though he was waiting for me to recognize him, despite the glasses.

He wouldn’t be the first weirdo to come to a book signing, but I must have been thinner-skinned than normal that day because I got a really bad feeling about him that I couldn’t shake off. After I had signed his book, his smile changed to triumphant as he turned around and walked away from the stand.

I followed him with my eyes until the next fan placed their book on the table and demanded my attention.

The queue diminished only slowly. Some fans might even have given up waiting and gone away, but there was no escape for me. I rarely write by hand and my fingers were aching by the time the queue had almost gone. I paused briefly and flexed my fingers while the next female fan expressed her excitement at starting a new Fons thriller. By now, I was exhausted and barely raised my eyes. The books flowed through my hands as if I was a checkout assistant in a supermarket, and the customers were served with haste and indifference.

Suddenly my movements froze.

The last person in the queue placed her book in front of me, opened on the title page, but it already had a dedication, and in my own handwriting, too:

Dear Line

Another scalp. Hope you’re well.

Take care of yourself and the girls.

Your F.Fons

I looked up.

After a few seconds of disbelief, I recognized my older daughter, Veronika.

15

THE THOUGHT OF having children had never really crossed my mind.

I had always imagined my books would be my legacy. With In the Dead Angle and The Walls Have Ears I had given birth to a couple of freaks that I could barely bring myself to acknowledge. They were rejects no parent could love, and it was in the light of this realization that I welcomed Line’s desire to have children. Suddenly it was obvious we should start a family. Of course we should.

The joint project brought us even closer. We became obsessed with every aspect of how to bring up children, decorating the flat and dreaming about the future. We bought baby magazines and read articles on parenting methods and child psychology and our library of literary classics was supplemented with colourful self-help books about nappy changing and sleep training.

Sex acquired a whole new dimension. We enjoyed it more than ever before with the added awareness that tonight might be the night it happened. It made both of us conscious that everything should be just right. We wanted to be in the right mood and the bedroom must have the perfect romantic atmosphere with candles and soft music.

I will never know if this caused Line to fall pregnant as quickly as she did, but after throwing away the pill, we