The Killing 3 (29 page)

‘We tried to do everything we could. I thought we were getting somewhere. She seemed happy. We felt . . . I guess . . . we felt like a family.’ A hard glance at the photograph.
‘But I suppose we didn’t really know what that was like. So one day . . .’

The place was no bigger than her own little cottage. Yet it felt like a home. Much more than she’d ever managed.

‘If you thought she was happy she probably was. Louise didn’t kill herself.’

‘Sorry?’

‘We think she was murdered.’

He didn’t know what to say.

‘If I could see her room . . . her things . . .’

Without a word he took her to the garage. Full of boxes. No space for a car. Photographs and scrapbooks. He ran through that final day. Louise rode to school on her bike, was due back in the
early afternoon as usual. Always used the same route: past the harbour, along the water by the pier.

‘She definitely went missing on a Thursday? Not Friday?’

The suspicious, hostile look returned.

‘You don’t forget things like that.’

‘Who was the last person to see her?’

He had to think about the answer.

‘The head teacher. She saw her pushing her bike towards the harbour. But then . . .’

‘Then what?’

‘A bit later someone told me they’d seen her up on the main road. Nowhere near the school. I told that policeman, Overgaard. He said he checked and it was someone else. All those
politicians were in town for the election. I don’t think the police had much time for Louise.’

Lund gave up on the girl’s things.

‘Did they ever find the bike?’

‘If they did they never told us. They didn’t tell us much anyway.’ He closed his eyes for a moment. ‘Murdered? Our Louise?’

‘We think so.’

‘She was a kid. Just getting her life back. Who’d do that? Why?’

The autopsy gave the answer to that. But she looked at this decent man, realized how much grief she’d raised from the ground already, and kept quiet.

On the way out Lund gave him her card. Went to the car. Breathed in the soiled maritime air.

Then she made some calls. The last one to Borch telling him she was going to the school.

Maja Zeuthen walked straight into Drekar, through the black and white tiled hall, into the office. He was there with Reinhardt. It looked as if the two men had been close to an
argument, and that was unheard of. Robert was unshaven, hair adrift, tie gone. The place stank of brandy, not that he looked the least bit drunk.

Then she saw. Broken bottles. Broken glasses. Shattered lampshades. He’d taken down the vast grey painting of the ocean and the Zeeland freighter. Slashed at it. Maybe put a boot through
the thing.

He looked more than distraught. Pathetic. She’d never seen that before, didn’t know how to feel.

The argument resumed. She soon worked out the source. Robert had sent his own recovery crew out to the bridge to look for Emilie. The police had brusquely turned them back.

‘You can’t interfere,’ Reinhardt insisted. ‘Not like this.’

‘If they can’t find her I will.’

A maid came in and started to sweep up the broken glass. Reinhardt dismissed her. He glanced at Maja.

‘Robert wants to talk about the funeral,’ he said in a quiet voice then left.

She thought about sitting next to him. Stayed where she was.

‘We need to discuss this with the church,’ he began.

‘Carl’s staying with Grandma. I’ve got Carsten outside with the car. We’re going to look for her. Are you coming?’

His head came up. Baffled. Offended.

‘She might be standing by the road somewhere. Waiting for us.’

Robert Zeuthen’s eyes grew wide with disbelief. She thought there might be tears coming.

‘I heard them in the Politigården,’ she added. ‘They wouldn’t talk to me. But I heard. Lund doesn’t think she’s dead.’

‘Lund!’ he cried. ‘You believe her. What is this?’

She pulled a torch out of her green parka.

‘This is me looking for our daughter. We’re starting at the bridge. I thought you’d want to come. Maybe he put her on a boat somewhere. Maybe . . . they don’t know what
happened, Robert!’

‘I know,’ he whispered. ‘I saw . . .’

Such agony in his eyes.

‘He shot Emilie. Then he threw her in the water.’

‘Lund saw too, didn’t she? And she doesn’t think she’s dead. Are you coming? Or do you want to stay here and wreck the bloody place instead?’

He got to his feet and she knew what he was thinking.

‘I’m not crazy,’ she snapped. ‘I asked you once if you could feel it. If she was dead. You said no. Do you feel it now?’

‘I saw! Is this what we’re going to tell Carl? That his big sister’s coming back?’ He hesitated, looked round the ruined room. ‘That everything’s going to be
the way it was? When we were happy?’

No words by way of answer. Nothing in her head at all.

‘I need your help with Carl. With the funeral,’ he pleaded. ‘Don’t ask me to believe in something I can’t.’

‘Fine,’ she said and left him.

The school was near the pier. Swings in the playground. An empty car park. A low single-storey building, peeling paint and windows with simple drawings in them.

Borch called and demanded to know where she was.

‘Louise’s school. Did you know this town was swarming with politicians when Louise Hjelby went missing?’

No answer straight away. Then he said, ‘We searched all the holiday homes. Didn’t find a damned thing.’

‘Oh.’

‘No need to rub it in.’

‘I didn’t!’

‘Yeah, well. There’s a pig farm we ought to look at. Want to come?’

Poor Borch. He wanted her company.

Lund went to the front door of the school. Tried the handle. It was open. She went in.

‘What are you doing, Sarah?’

‘There’s a teacher I want to see. She said we could meet here. She was the last one to see Louise alive.’

The place seemed to be in darkness. Lund found the light switch. Blinked at the sudden brightness. The walls were covered with paintings and posters.

‘I expect you to join us with the pigs,’ he said, a hopeful note in his voice.

‘You always knew how to sweet-talk me.’

‘Is that a yes?’

Phone to her ear she walked on. A classroom, upturned chairs on desks, funny faces scrawled on paper covering the walls.

She walked to the long windows. Broken glass, shards on the inside.

‘I think he’s been here,’ she said softly. ‘Someone’s broken in.’

‘Coming,’ he said straight off. ‘Stay where you are. And do it this time.’

Lund put the phone away, took out her gun. She turned right into a dark passageway.

At the end a door, just ajar. The light on. It was an office, white walls, charts, timetables, family photos. A filing cabinet stood by the window, the top drawer pulled open. She was rifling
through the papers inside, pupil records, when there were footsteps behind, back in the corridor.

Gun up, cold in her short raincoat, aware of the school smell, disinfectant and a sweaty gym somewhere nearby, she walked out, looking.

Two things, simultaneously.

Borch came flying through the entrance, pistol extended, waving side to side.

From a door opposite a woman in a long waistcoat, blonde hair, too long for her age, stepped out, stared at them, started to shriek.

Twenty minutes later, back in a temporary ops room set up in the boarding house, the teacher sipped nervously at a cup of coffee. Along from the bedrooms the place was bustling
with locals and officers from neighbouring districts.

‘Rushing round with your guns,’ the woman complained. ‘In a school. I’ve never seen anything like it.’

Lund mentioned the name Louise Hjelby. The teacher put down the coffee, didn’t speak for a while.

‘Maybe the wind broke the glass,’ she said.

‘He was there, looking through your files.’

‘Someone could have left the drawer open. Nothing happens here,’ the woman replied. ‘Nothing. Ever.’

‘Tell me about Louise,’ Lund asked.

A brief smile.

‘She was a lovely little kid. Bright. Polite.’ She closed her eyes. ‘I think she’d been hurt by something over the years. Losing her mother I guess. Being in a
home.’

‘Did you believe she killed herself?’ Lund asked.

‘Not really.’ She nodded at the local cops. ‘But they said so. Who am I to argue?’

‘We think she was murdered.’

The woman regarded her the way she did before: as if they were lunatics.

‘Murdered?’

‘That’s what I said. On the day Louise disappeared you noticed her pushing her bike towards home after school? Did anyone else see her?’

Another caustic glance at the local officers.

‘One of her classmates said she did. Up on the main road. God knows what she was doing there. But they . . .’ A hand waved across the room. ‘They told her she was mad so that
was it. I don’t know why you keep asking me all these questions. I went through all this with that officer of yours when he called an hour or two ago.’

‘Who called?’ Lund asked.

‘He said his name was Mathias Borch. He was very nice and polite I must say. Didn’t sound like the kind of person who’d wave a gun in my face.’

At the end of the table Borch looked up at her.

‘Shit,’ he muttered and asked the woman for her phone number.

Ten minutes later. They’d let her go. Lund had sat alone, brooding mostly. Borch came back and said they couldn’t trace the call.

‘He’s back on Skype again I guess.’

She looked at the desks, the busy officers. The search had thrown up nothing.

‘He wanted something at the school,’ Lund said.

Borch came over, stood and leaned on the desk by her side.

‘Sarah. He probably wasn’t even there. It was just a broken window. If you’d helped me search—’

‘You didn’t find anything.’

‘Maybe if you’d been with me . . .’

She put a hand to her head. Long day. Memories of the night before, the blue tarpaulin, the shots, the figure pushing something over the side, kept creeping back in. Along with them a tiny shape
on a hospital monitor, a life to come hidden inside Eva Lauersen’s swelling belly.

He took a call. Something about it made him walk off towards the bedrooms.

She followed at a distance. He went into his own. The door was open so she stood outside and listened.

You could judge so much from the tone of a voice. He was talking to a superior. Probably Dyhring the taciturn boss of PET who seemed to nag him, pull his strings constantly.

‘In that case,’ Borch said, ‘we’ve got a big problem. She’s worked that out already.’

He was pulling on a fresh shirt in the mirror. Saw her there.

‘We’ll talk later,’ he said and finished the call, came round and met her at the door.

‘Anything?’

‘Who were you talking to?’

‘Headquarters.’

He buttoned up his shirt. She walked in.

‘Your room’s down the hall. It’s nicer than mine. I think you’ve got more—’

‘Cut the crap,’ Lund snapped. ‘What’s going on here?’

His eyes closed. The puppy look.

‘Huh?’

‘How did he know to use your name?’

‘Maybe he’s psychic. Why ask me?’

She got closer.

‘This place was dripping in politicians two years ago. PET looked after them. You must have had officers here when it happened. Were they involved in covering up the old case? Did you give
them a hand?’

He thought about it, nodded as if he was taking the questions seriously, then said, ‘No.’

‘So why were you here two days ago?’

He seemed offended.

‘I was trying to help. I wanted . . . I wanted to give you something.’

‘Oh for God’s sake. You expect me to believe—?’

‘I had nothing to do with the old case, Sarah. Maybe he heard my name on the radio. Or perhaps he’s . . .’ A sarcastic tone entered his voice. ‘He’s programmed us
to have this conversation. Either that or you’re paranoid as hell as usual . . .’

Lund swore, turned to go. He was on her, strong arms dragging her back.

‘Why the hell don’t you believe me? Why’s it so hard for you to trust someone?’

He was getting mad with her and she’d scarcely ever seen that, even before when she’d surely asked for it.

‘You’re talking crap.’

‘No I’m not! You shut out everything the moment someone gets close to you. Us back then. Your son. Me now.’

Hands up, she stepped back.

‘You now? Fat chance.’

‘It’s true! I loved you. I wanted you. And you threw me out of your life because that scared you . . .’

‘No . . .’

‘Yes!’

Borch stood there in his fresh shirt, unshaven.

‘Yes,’ he repeated more quietly. ‘I could take being dumped because I bored you. Or you found someone else. But you . . .’ He came and jabbed a finger in her face.
‘You walked away because we were so damned right together. And that scared you. That . . .’

Lund turned on her heels and left him again.

Out by the bridge it was raining. Maja Zeuthen looked up and down the long empty road, stood by the rail, tried to imagine the scene in her head.

Gave up after a while. Talked to the salvage team. Still looking, they said.

Made Carsten Lassen drive down every track nearby. Didn’t listen to him much. Couldn’t lose the memory of Robert, distraught, lost, vulnerable.

There’d been that side to him when they first met. He was the solitary, diligent student, shunned by everyone. She was the beautiful party girl all the men wanted to court.

It wasn’t opposites attracting. Nothing like that. As they got to know one another that distant summer they met somewhere in the middle, his shyness melting, her brief attraction to the
wild life dissipating in awe at his quiet, loyal honesty.

Everything happened by degrees, accidentally. And yet was inevitable somehow.

Memories.

After an hour she was soaked, walking down another dim and narrow road. Torch out. Calling her daughter’s name.

Back in the ops room. Still nothing. One of the team said Juncker was looking for her. Not now, Lund snapped. Went outside. Sat in her car. Wished she still smoked. Ran her
fingers through her damp hair. Wondered whether she ought to drive all the way back to the city. Wake up the next morning and put on an office uniform: white blouse, grey skirt, sensible shoes.
March to a desk in OPA. Look at the pile of paper clips. Start to count.