The Purity of Vengeance (43 page)

He found Ploug sitting in the far corner.

“Playing hide-and-seek, Terje?” he quipped, sitting down and planting his elbows on the table in the close vicinity of Ploug’s painfully PC plate of vegetables.

“Good to see you, Carl. You’re a hard man to find these days. Laursen tell you about the photo?”

“He did, yeah. Seems I’m not out of the woods yet.”

“Out of the woods? No one’s accusing you of anything as far as I know. Or are they?”

Carl tossed his head back. “Not officially, no.”

“Well, then. Anyway, here’s where we’re at. We’re all going to get our heads together. Meaning me, those we’ve got investigating the murders at the repair shop in Sorø, and the Dutch lot working on the killings in Schiedam in the Netherlands. In a few weeks, a couple of months, maybe, we’re going to collate everything we’ve got on these nail-gun cases. Facts, evidence, background material, the lot.”

“And now you’re going to tell me I’ll be called in as a witness.”

“No, just the opposite. You won’t.”

“Why not, because I’m under suspicion?”

“Take it easy, Carl. Someone wants to drag you through the mud, we realize that. So no, you’re not under suspicion. But once we get as far as drawing up a joint report, we’d like you to assess it.”

“I see. And that’s despite my prints being on the coins, the dodgy photo, and Hardy reckoning Anker was mixed up with our colored friend, and that maybe I knew Georg Madsen?”

“Despite that, yeah. As I see it, you’re the one who’s got most to gain by this case being investigated as thoroughly as possible.”

He gave the back of Carl’s hand a gentle pat. It was quite touching really.

 • • • 

“It’s a good, honest policeman’s best shot at doing things properly, and I think we should respect Terje for that, Carl,” said the chief. Jacobsen’s corner office was still reeking of Laursen’s “Dish of the Day.” Had Ms. Sørensen gone that soft as to allow dirty plates and cutlery lying around for more than five minutes?

“Yeah, if you look at it like that.” Carl nodded. “But I’m still riled. That case is getting on my nerves.”

Marcus nodded back. “I’ve spoken to Erling from Fire Investigation. I hear you had visitors last night.”

“No harm done.”

“No, and thank Christ for that! But why did it happen, Carl?”

“Because someone wants me the fuck out of it. And I don’t think it’s one of my stepson’s jilted girlfriends either.” He tried to smile.

“Who, then?”

“Most likely one of Curt Wad’s people. The Purity Party guy.”

Jacobsen nodded again.

“We’re bothering him. That’s why I’m here. I want to put a tap on his phone. Likewise a gent by the name of Wilfrid Lønberg and a journalist called Louis Petterson.”

“I’m afraid I can’t authorize that, Carl.”

Carl probed into why not, annoyed to begin with, then turned sulky before eventually submitting with an exasperated shrug. The only thing he was coming away with was a warning to take care, and strict instructions to report back if anything unusual occurred.

Unusual
. Fucking odd word to bandy about the place.
Everything
in their line of work was unusual, and just as well for that.

Carl got to his feet. Unusual? He wondered what his boss would say if he knew about the stack of files piled up in the dimly lit offices of Department Q, the archive material they’d procured in a manner which even by their standards was more than unusually dodgy.

 • • • 

For once, both secretaries waved cheerily to him from the front desk as he came out.

“Hi, Carl,” said Lis, sweet as sugar, Ms. Sørensen chirping an identical greeting a second later. Same words, same tone, same inviting smile.

A turnabout if ever there was one.

“Erm . . . Cata!” he stuttered, directly addressing the woman whose mere presence had formerly been sufficient to prompt teams of hardened investigators, among them Carl himself, into making long detours just to avoid having to walk past her.

“Do you fancy letting me in on what this NLP course you’ve been on is all about? It wouldn’t be contagious, would it?”

She drew her shoulders up, a flourish of body language possibly intended to display delight at having been asked, then beamed a smile at Lis before stepping intimidatingly close to Carl.

“Neurolinguistic programming, it stands for,” she said, her voice suddenly full of mystery, as though she were about to seduce an Arab sheik. “It’s rather hard to explain fully, but let me give you an example.”

The shoulders came up again, like a little foretaste of what lay in store.

She picked up her handbag and fished around in it, eventually producing a piece of chalk. An odd item for a woman to be carrying around. Wasn’t chalk meant for the trouser pockets of cheeky schoolboys? Was it gender equality again?

She bent down and drew two circles on the floor, which in itself would have been enough to make her faint only a few weeks earlier. Others, too, for that matter. Then she drew a minus sign in one and a plus sign in the other.

“There you go, Carl. A positive circle and a negative circle. Now I want you to stand first in one, then the other, and say exactly the same sentence. In the negative circle you pretend you’re speaking to someone you dislike, and in the positive circle, to someone you’re fond of.”

“I see. This was the upshot of it, was it? Because I can do that already.”

“Come on, let’s hear it, then,” Lis urged, folding her arms under her scrumptious bosom and stepping closer. Who could say no?

“Choose something simple, like: ‘I see you’ve had your hair done.’ Say it nicely first, then not so nicely.”

“I don’t get it,” he lied, scrutinizing both women’s short-cut hair. This was going to be too easy. Ms. Sørensen’s thatch didn’t have quite the same appeal as Lis’s, if he was to say so.

“All right, let me demonstrate the positive,” said Lis. “Then Cata can do the negative.”

Hang on, that ought to be the other way round, Carl thought to himself, distractedly tracing a little circle with his foot.

“I see you’ve had your
hair
done!” Lis was all smiles as she spoke. “That’s how you talk to a person you like. Now it’s your turn, Cata.”

Ms. Sørensen laughed, then collected herself. “I see
you’ve
had your hair done!” she spat with envy. She looked truly gruesome. Just like the good old days.

Both women fell about, spluttering with laughter. This was getting girlish.

“Was that it? Not exactly an earth-shattering difference, was it? What am I supposed to get out of that?”

Ms. Sørensen pulled herself together. “The point is that exercises like this teach you to understand how subtle little changes of tone can impact on your surroundings in different ways. It gives you an insight into the effects of what you say and the kind of signals you send. And not least, as an extra plus, how it all rubs off on your own self.”

“Isn’t that just the same as saying what goes around, comes around?”

“You could call it that. Do you know how you impact on
your
surroundings, Carl? That’s what the course can teach you.”

I learned that when I was seven, he thought to himself.

“Sometimes the things you say can seem rather harsh, Carl,” Ms. Sørensen went on.

Thanks for the compliment. Rather choice coming from you, he mused. “Well, thank you both for making me aware in such a considerate fashion,” was what he eventually said, now eager to be on his way. “I’ll be certain to give it some thought.”

“Try the exercise first, Carl. Step into one of the circles,” urged Ms. Sørensen aka Cata. She gestured to indicate which one he should start with, only to discover he’d succeeded in erasing most of it with the toe of his shoe while they’d been playing charades.

“Oops,” he said. “I
truly
am sorry,
indeed
.” He withdrew from their aura. “Afternoon, ladies. Stay cheerful, eh?”

34

September 1987

As she stood there
gazing out of the window, part of her hatred had gone. It was as though the blow to Viggo’s temple and his final intakes of breath after she had given him the henbane had drawn a splinter from her mind.

Her eyes passed along Peblinge Dossering and the swarms of people enjoying the last of summer. Ordinary people, each with their own lives and destinies, and most probably their secrets and skeletons, too.

Her lips began to quiver. All of a sudden she felt overwhelmed by emotion. Even Tage, Rita, and Viggo were human in the eyes of the Lord, and now they were dead by her hand.

She closed her eyes and pictured it all. Viggo’s face had expressed such warmth when she opened the door. Tage had been so grateful. And now it was Nørvig’s turn. The lawyer who wouldn’t listen when she’d desperately needed help. The man who had guarded Curt Wad’s reputation so fiercely and with such scant regard for her life.

But was she entitled to do unto him as he had done unto her? To take his life away?

The doubt remained inside her when she spotted his wiry figure by the lakeside in front of her building.

Although more than thirty years had passed, she recognized him immediately. Still fond of his tweed jacket with its leather buttons. Still the brown attaché case under his arm. A man who seemingly had not changed, yet she could sense from his body language that perhaps not everything was the same as before.

He wandered a few steps back and forth beneath the chestnut trees, glancing out over the lake. He took a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed at his face as though wiping away perspiration or perhaps tears.

And then she noticed his jacket was too big for him, his polyester slacks, too, sagging at the shoulders and knees, respectively. An outfit bought in better times, for a frame of greater substance.

For a second she felt sorry for the man, who at this moment stood oblivious, soon to enter the grave.

What if he had children who loved him? Grandchildren?

The very thought made her clench her fists. Her eyelids twitched uncontrollably. Had
she
ever had children to love her? And whose fault was that?

No
. She needed to look out for herself and stay focused. Tomorrow afternoon she would leave this life behind her. But first she had to complete what she had now begun. She had promised this man who was a lawyer by profession that he would receive ten million kroner. She had done so in writing, and a man like him would never allow her to rescind her word.

Not Philip Nørvig.

 • • • 

He stood there, not quite as tall as she remembered him, staring at her like a repentant puppy dog, eyebrows aloft. As though this meeting with her was of immeasurable importance to him and the first impression he gave was crucial.

His eyes had been considerably colder the time he’d lied in court and coerced her into uttering foolish words. Not once had he blinked or allowed himself to be moved by her emotional outbursts. Her sobs had only made him deaf, just as her tears made him blind.

Were these really the same uncompromising eyes, now lowered so humbly as she let him in? The same implacable voice, now thanking her?

She asked if he would like some tea, and he accepted the offer gratefully, still struggling to lift his gaze from the floor and look her in the eye.

She handed him the cup and watched as he drank it down. A momentary frown appeared on his brow.

Perhaps he didn’t care for the taste, she thought to herself, but then he held out his cup and asked for more.

“I’m afraid I’m in need of sustenance, Miss Hermansen. There are so many things I have to say to you.”

Finally, he lifted his head and looked up at her. And words that should have remained unsaid began to pour from his lips. But the occasion for it had long since passed.

“When I received your letter, Nete . . .” He paused. “I’m sorry, may I address you informally?”

She nodded almost imperceptibly. It hadn’t bothered him then, so why should it now? “When I received your letter, I found myself suddenly confronted by something that has been eating away at me for a very long time. Something I would like to make up for, if indeed that were possible. I have to confess that I have come to Copenhagen today with the intention of rescuing both my own life and that of my family. The money is not without significance, I must admit, but I have also come to apologize.” He cleared his throat and took another gulp of his tea.

“In recent years I’ve often thought back upon the desperate girl who sought justice in the courts only to be committed to the asylum at Brejning. And I’ve wondered what could have possessed me to thwart the accusations you leveled against Curt Wad. I knew, of course, that what you were saying might be true. All that fabrication about how feeble-minded and dangerous you were was so obviously inapplicable to the girl who sat before me on the stand, fighting for her life.”

He bowed his head for a moment. When he looked up again his pale skin seemed even more colorless than before.

“I forced you from my mind when the case was over. And there you remained, banished from memory until the day I read about you in the magazines. About you having married Andreas Rosen. Such an intelligent, beautiful woman.” He nodded as if in acknowledgment. “I recognized your face immediately. It all came back to me, and I was ashamed.”

He sipped his tea again and Nete glanced at the clock. Any moment now, the poison would kick in. Only she didn’t want it to, not just yet. If only time could stand still. This was her moment of redress. How could she allow him to go on drinking? He was repentant, it was so obvious.

She looked away as he continued speaking. The evil she was perpetrating became even more evident when she looked into his trusting eyes. She had never imagined such feelings could be wakened inside her. Not for a second.

“At the time, I’d been working for Curt Wad for a number of years. I was beguiled, I admit. I have to concede I’m not nearly as strong as him in nature.” He shook his head and put the cup to his lips again. “But when I saw you on the front of that magazine I resolved to reassess the deeds I had committed, and do you know what became clear to me?”