Three Dog Night (8 page)

She breathed in and out. Slowly, but regularly.

She started moving forward again, concentrating on being systematic. Routine was her salvation. She swam back and forth, back and forth between the poles in a steady rhythm. It was important not to think too much.

It worked. Her focus returned and she could dismiss the episode while her hands worked away once more and she felt the current pulling at her body. It was strong, but the poles had been anchored firmly and evenly across the seabed and were held down by weights, fixed, so they couldn't move. There was an eighteen-kilo weight at each end, and a seven-kilo one in the middle. In addition, a rope was attached to each pole leading up to a buoy on the surface. The poles weren't going anywhere. Bodies were another matter. They had a tendency to drift in strong currents. She hoped they weren't chasing a body on the move around the harbour.

Time passed quickly, and yet it didn't. Suddenly she felt a double tug from above on the line connecting her to the surface. Then a single tug and then another double tug: Morse code for ‘k', which meant it was time for her to surface. She hadn't finished this line so there had to be another reason to break off. She rose to the surface, annoyed. She had found a variety of things: bicycles, shopping trolleys, tyres, oil barrels and bottles. But she hadn't found Nina Bjerre.

‘There's a fishing boat coming in,' Allan told her as soon as she grabbed onto the dinghy. Niklas, too, had been asked to surface. They waited in the water until the boat had entered the basin. It was pointless to summon the divers all the way up only to send them down again immediately afterwards. If you did, they would have to start all over again, adjusting the equipment at the bottom. Even so, she had lost her momentum when Allan Vraa finally did send them down again, and when the time was up and the diving was over, she felt dissatisfied.

She sat on the gunwale of the inflatable, her teeth chattering, drinking from a Thermos of hot coffee as they were taken back to shore. The others were wrapped up in one-piece diving suits and wearing caps and gloves. There was always water in the bottom of the rubber dinghy, but today it had almost frozen to ice. There was also a layer of ice over all the equipment. At the mouth of the harbour yet another fishing boat was on its way in. Allan lightly punched her shoulder.

‘Remember the saying: a proper sailor is never cold …'

She couldn't even finish the saying, her teeth were chattering so much. Allan did it for her: ‘… he just turns blue and dies.'

They quickly reached the quay, and it was only now that she noticed several cars parked there. People were wandering around, some with TV cameras on their shoulders.

A couple of the cars had press logos on their sides: TV2 News was there,
Ekstra Bladet
as well. There was also a van from Private Eyes, another TV company. The cameramen followed them and filmed her and Niklas going ashore. They also shouted out questions.

‘Did you find anything?'

‘What will you do if you find her?'

She shook her head and held up a hand.

‘Don't film my face,' she said to the TV2 News cameramen who had come up to her. ‘Speak to my boss when he gets ashore. Allan Vraa. I can't comment.'

They were naval officers and sometimes they were deployed in anti-terror operations. Their faces were not allowed to appear in the media, and this was usually accepted and understood. It would be fatal if enemies – Danish as well as foreign – could identify and possibly attack them.

Before Kir had reached the warmth of the diving truck she caught a glimpse of a man with black, shoulder-length hair talking to a blonde. He raised his eyes and she felt them on her for a brief moment. Police, she thought. He exuded a kind of authority.

Niklas and Kir quickly helped unzip each other so they could get out of their drysuits. Her teeth were still chattering despite the oil heater in the truck. They hung up their suits in the drying cabinet and sat on the bench with another mug of coffee.

‘In a way I wish I'd found her,' Niklas said. ‘Then at least I would've known what it was like.'

She got up and put on her army trousers over her merino wool bodysuit.

‘Finding a body isn't much fun. It's worse when the visibility is like it is here. When you practically swim into it,' she said.

He warmed his hands on the mug.

‘But if I had, then I would've experienced the worst that can happen.'

‘Have you been to the Morgue and seen the bodies there?'

He shook his head.

‘You should ask to go and visit it. It helps. Once you've seen a dead child, nothing else is really that bad.'

He'd been with them in Vejle when they found the body of a woman during a dive at night, but he wasn't in the water when it happened. He could blow up mines and defuse bombs. He could dive down a hundred metres into a shipwreck lying upside down and out again. And yet what scared him most was encountering a dead body.

‘They won't hurt you. You need to tell yourself that when it happens. The dead can't hurt you.'

What she didn't tell him, however, was that they might haunt you for months. They could wreck your sleep and they could creep into your subconscious and lodge there like parasites.

In very bad cases, they could fill you with a black fear of everything beneath the surface of the water.

N
EITHER
A
NNA
B
AGGER
nor Mark Bille was anywhere to be found at Grenå Police Station, so Peter left a message at reception and asked one of them to call him. But he heard nothing for the rest of the day and concluded they probably had other things to think about. Never mind. At least he had shown willing. Driving home after work, he knew immediately that something was wrong. The window in the back door was smashed, and the front door was unlocked. Irrationally, his first thought was that the house would be freezing cold now, and he would have to light the wood burner quickly to warm the place up. Then he realised there were more important things at stake than wasting heat.

He entered cautiously. Kaj followed him, whining and keeping low on his front paws. He immediately embarked on his own search of the crime scene and sniffed around, from the sofa to the overturned bookcase to the cushions lying on the floor, the drawer that had been emptied onto the wooden floor, the paintings that had been snatched and cut up. Peter put the cushions back where they belonged on the sofa and sat in the middle of the chaos. He surveyed the wreckage.

‘This is not good, Kaj. Not good at all.'

The dog understood him, he knew he did. Kaj, too, enjoyed having a system and a routine, what other people might call a humdrum existence. Days when you were allowed to do your own thing and maintain contact with the world outside, without anyone getting too close. He patted Kaj on the head when he came back from a recce with frown lines etched into his forehead.

‘Good boy.'

It was all because of Ramses and Stinger, Peter thought. Someone had trashed his place looking for information about their miserable get-rich-quick scheme, of that he was certain. The timing of the break-in couldn't be a coincidence. Miriam was right: it was all about the past. It was about Horsens. About everything he wanted to put behind him.

The dog tore itself from his grasp and soon afterwards he heard the click of claws on the stairs, as Kaj decided he would explore the first floor. He started to bark and Peter's immediate thought was that the intruder was still upstairs. He got up and grabbed the poker from by the wood burner to protect himself before going upstairs.

A body in a black Puffa jacket lay across the fleece. The ceramic lamp from the table was lying on the floor, broken in half.

‘Felix. Can you hear me?'

He shook her gently. She groaned. Opened her eyes, closed them again. Then she opened them again and stared at him.

‘What happened? What are you doing here?'

He helped her into a sitting position, then leaned her against the yellow sofa, which had come with the house when he bought it. Her nose was bleeding and one eye was swollen. Her hair was matted with blood. Her small figure seemed even smaller and thinner than he remembered and her eyes were filled with frightened anger. He took his clean handkerchief and dabbed at some of the blood. Then he held his hand in front of her face and hid his thumb.

‘How many fingers am I holding up?'

‘Four.'

‘I'm calling an ambulance.'

‘No. Don't.'

Her head slumped against her chest, as if out of her control. He started to sweat. What if she died here? What would he say to the police?

‘Give me a hand,' she said. ‘The sofa.'

He helped her to her feet, laid her on the sofa and put cushions under her head. She waved her arms in the air, and moaned.

‘I just need a little rest,' she managed to say. ‘No police. No ambu …'

He went downstairs and put the kettle on, then rummaged around in a kitchen cupboard until he finally found a packet of instant soup and stirred it into a mug of hot water. He took the mug, a glass of water, some painkillers and a blanket upstairs. She didn't seem keen, but he ignored her and put the tablets into her mouth one at a time and held her head so that she could drink. He tried to get a little bit of soup down her, but she pressed her lips together like a stubborn child and he gently released her.

She opened and closed her eyes. The second she looked at him was like a glance all the way into her soul, and he was drawn in, feeling oddly that this was only happening because she was weak. Again, she waved her arms about. He glimpsed some scars stretching from her wrist to under the sleeve of her jacket. He wanted to ask what she was really doing here, in his house. And, not least, who had been here at the same time. But she'd already closed her eyes and was evidently asleep.

He picked up the shattered glass and found a couple of pieces of wood in the outhouse, cut them to size and hammered them across the broken window in the back door as a temporary fix. Then he started clearing up. He was well into his stride – he'd put the bookcase back and filled it with books, organised drawers and cupboards – when he heard noises from above.

He went upstairs. She was sitting upright, still wearing the black Puffa jacket and lying on the sofa in her winter boots. There was a misty look to her eyes and he wondered whether she might be psychotic, existing in a different reality to his. She could be on drugs, but she didn't look like a junkie. She just looked like someone who couldn't cope with life.

‘I've got to go home,' she said.

‘Not before I have an explanation.'

‘I didn't do it,' she muttered. ‘I just wanted to see how you lived.'

‘And so you took the key?'

‘I saw the man take it the other night.'

‘Stinger? New Year's Eve?'

She nodded.

‘He borrowed my shovel. I wanted to find out who you were.'

He sat down on the coffee table.

‘And did you?'

She shook her head and pulled a face as though it hurt.

‘No.'

‘Here, drink some soup.'

He handed her the mug, which was still lukewarm. She averted her face.

‘When did you last eat?'

She didn't reply.

‘You have to eat. Have you got any food in your house?'

She ignored the question and explained she'd been on the first floor when someone had arrived by car and smashed the window in the door. She'd been scared and had taken the lamp to defend herself while the man was ransacking the house below.

‘What did the car look like?'

‘It was a four by four.'

‘Colour?'

She couldn't remember. Grey or black. It was covered in snow. She told him about the break-in and the noises coming from the ground floor.

‘Afterwards he came up the stairs and in here.'

‘Who was he? What did he look like?'

She shook her head and coughed. The cough didn't sound healthy.

‘He was wearing a black balaclava. Like the ones you wear under a motorbike helmet. I think he was just as surprised to see me. I hurled the lamp at him, but he ducked and it hit the wall. Then he took one half of it and knocked me out.'

She pointed to the two pieces.

‘I'll pay for the damage.'

A cautious smile appeared on her lips. ‘I hope it wasn't a priceless heirloom. Ming dynasty or something like that.'

He'd bought it at a flea market in Ebeltoft.

‘This is about the dead body, isn't it? Someone broke in here because you knew Ramses.'

Peter pointed at her arms.

‘Were you in a fire or something? Is that why you've stopped eating?'

She carefully pulled down her sleeves. Then she raised her hand to her throat as if to check her jacket was buttoned all the way up.

‘Where do you know the dead man from?' she asked.

‘From prison.'

She blinked. If her throat had been visible, her gulp would have been more obvious.

‘I was in an accident,' she said. ‘I was the sole survivor.'

She gave him enough time to think she had been lucky before adding: ‘You don't decide if you'll survive or not. Had it been up to me, I'd have chosen differently.'

M
ARK
B
ILLE
H
ANSEN
had seen the woman diver before. He recognised her red hair and inquisitive eyes. He had also noticed her smile when she spoke to her colleague. It was a wry, elfish smile and revealed a big gap between her front teeth. He took all this in before she and her colleague zipped each other up at the back and worked together donning their diving hoods. A yellow neck ring had to be attached and then a rubber hood was folded over it – to prevent water from seeping in, he guessed. The only diving he had ever done was snorkelling, and that was in the Mediterranean on holiday in Malta, in somewhat warmer waters.