A Conspiracy of Faith (43 page)

“That’s OK. You can see perfectly well through the window.”

“You probably needn’t bother with this stretch here,” Thomasen said, steering directly toward the middle of the fjord. “It’s mostly just sandy beach and fields going down to the water’s edge. Our best bet’s probably to go up toward Nordskoven. That’s all woods down to the fjord, but then quite a few folk live there, so it’s doubtful a boathouse could be kept hidden.”

He gestured toward the road that ran north–south along the eastern side of the fjord. Flat agricultural land, dotted with tiny villages. Poul Holt’s killer certainly couldn’t have holed up on that side of the fjord.

Carl looked at his map. “If the theory about fjord trout is right, and if Roskilde Fjord here isn’t the place to look, then that means we need to be over on the other side of Hornsherred, on the Isefjord. The question is, where? Judging by the map, there don’t seem to be that many possibilities. It’s mostly agricultural land, fields down to the water’s edge. Where could anyone have a hidden boathouse there? And if we carry on to the Holbæk side or farther north toward Odsherred, we’ll be too far, because that would take a lot longer than an hour from the site of the kidnapping in Ballerup.” He suddenly became doubtful. “Or would it?”

Thomasen gave a shrug. “Not if you ask me. My guess would be an hour.”

Carl took a deep breath. “In which case, we just have to hope our theory about that local paper is sound. Otherwise, this is going to be a tall order indeed.”

He sat down on the bench next to the suffering Assad, who was by now a grayish shade of green and trembling. His double chin was in constant
motion due to his involuntary regurgitation, and yet he still had the binoculars pressed against the sockets of his eyes.

“Give him some tea, Carl. The wife’ll be upset if he throws up on her covers.”

Carl pulled the basket toward him and poured a cup without asking.

“Get this down you, Assad.”

Assad lowered his binoculars slightly, took one look at the tea, and shook his head. “I will not throw up, Carl. What comes up, I swallow again.”

Carl stared at him, wide-eyed.

“This is how it is when riding camels in the desert. A person can become so weary in his stomach. But throwing up in the desert is to lose too much liquid. It is a very silly thing to do in a desert. That is why!”

Carl gave him a pat on the shoulder. “Well done, Assad. Just keep your eyes peeled for that boathouse, eh? I’ll not bother you anymore.”

“I am not looking for the boathouse, because then we will not find it.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think it is very well concealed. Perhaps not between trees at all. It may be in a heap of earth or sand, or under a house, or in some thicket. It was not very tall, remember this.”

Carl picked up the other pair of binoculars. His assistant was obviously not all there. He’d better do the job himself.

“If you’re not looking for a boathouse, Assad, what
are
you looking for?”

“For the thing that rumbles. A wind turbine or some similar thing. Something that can rumble this rumbling sound.”

“I’m afraid that’s going to be difficult, Assad.”

Assad looked at him for a moment as though he had tired of his company. Then he convulsed so violently that Carl drew back to be on the safe side. And when he had finished, he said in what was almost a whisper: “Did you know that the record for sitting against a wall as though in a chair is twelve hours and something, Carl?”

“You don’t say?” He sensed that he probably looked all question mark.

“And did you know that the record for standing up is seventeen years and two months?”

“Get out!”

“Oh, but it is, Carl. An Indian guru. He slept standing up in the night.”

“Really? I didn’t know that, Assad. What are you trying to tell me?”

“Just that some things look more difficult than they are, and some things look easier.”

“I see. And?”

“Let us find that rumbling sound, then we shall speak no more of this.”

What kind of logic was that?

“All right. But I still don’t believe that story about standing up for seventeen years,” Carl rejoined.

“OK, but do you know what, Carl?” Assad looked at him intensely, then convulsed again.

“No, tell me.”

Assad raised his binoculars. “That is up to you.”

They listened and heard the hum of motorboats, the chugging of fishing vessels, motorbikes on the roads, single-engine planes photographing houses and farms so the tax authorities could make new appraisals on which basis to fleece the country’s citizens of their savings. But no constant sound, nothing that might provoke the rage of the National Association of the Enemies of Infrasound.

Klaes Thomasen’s wife picked them up at Hundested, and Thomasen promised to ask around if anyone knew of a boathouse like the one they were looking for. The forest officer at Nordskoven would be a good place to start, he said. The sailing clubs likewise. He assured Carl he would resume the search the following day. The forecast said dry and sunny.

Assad was still looking queasy after they were dropped off and continued south in their own car.

Carl felt a sudden affinity with Thomasen’s wife. He didn’t want Assad to puke on his covers, either.

“Give us a nudge if you’re going to be sick, Assad, yeah?” he said.

His assistant nodded absently. Most likely it wouldn’t be a matter of choice.

Carl repeated the appeal as they came into Ballerup.

“Perhaps we should have a little stop,” said Assad after a pause.

“OK, can you wait two minutes? I’ve something to do first, it won’t take long. It’s on the way to Holte. I’ll drive you home after.”

Assad said nothing.

Carl gazed ahead. It was dark now. The question was, would they even let him in?

“I need to drop in on Vigga’s mother, you see. Something I promised Vigga I’d do. You OK with that? She lives at a care center just around here.”

Assad nodded. “I did not know Vigga had a mother. What is she like? Is she nice?”

It was a question that for all its simplicity was so hard to answer that Carl almost drove through a red light on Bagsværd Hovedgade.

“When you have been there, can you then drop me off at the station, Carl? You are going north, and there is a bus right to my door from there.”

Assad certainly knew how to preserve his anonymity. His family’s, too, for that matter.

“No, I’m afraid you can’t visit Mrs. Alsing now. It’s much too late for her. Come back tomorrow before two o’clock, preferably about elevenish. That’s when she’s most lucid,” said one of the caregivers on evening duty.

Carl produced his police ID. “It’s not a private matter. This is my assistant, Hafez el-Assad. It won’t take a moment.”

The woman stared in astonishment at the badge and then at the odd individual who stood rocking on the balls of his feet at Carl’s side. This was not an everyday occurrence for the staff of Bakkegården.

“Well, I think she’s asleep. She hasn’t been doing too well of late.”

Carl glanced at the clock on the wall. Ten past nine. What the hell was this woman on about? Normally, the day was only just starting for Vigga’s
mother about now. She hadn’t been a waitress in Copenhagen’s nightspots for more than fifty years for nothing. She couldn’t be that senile, surely?

They were led, politely but reluctantly, to the area set aside for the center’s dementia sufferers, coming to a halt outside the door of Karla Margrethe Alsing.

“Give us a shout when you want to get out again,” said the caregiver, pointing farther down the corridor. “There’s a staff room just down there.”

They found Karla amid a clutter of chocolate boxes and hair clips. With her long, tousled gray hair and carelessly tied kimono she looked like a former Hollywood actress yet to come to terms with her career’s demise. She recognized Carl immediately and leaned back in a pose, chirping his name and telling him how adorable he was standing there like that. It was plain to see how much Vigga took after her mother.

She didn’t so much as glance at Assad.

“Coffee?” she asked, pouring a cup from a thermos without a lid. The cup looked like it had been used all day. Carl signaled that he was fine without but realized the futility of it. He turned instead to Assad and handed him the cup. If anyone needed a shot of cold coffee left over from this morning, it was Assad.

“Nice place,” said Carl, glancing around at the furnished landscape. Gilded frames, ornate mahogany, brocade. Karla Margrethe Alsing had always taken pride in appearances.

“What keeps you busy, then?” he asked, expecting some lament about how hard it was to read and how bad the television programs had become.

“Busy?” A distant look appeared in her eyes. “Well, apart from this…”

She paused mid-sentence, reached behind the cushion at her back, and produced a luminous-orange dildo resplendent with all manner of nodulations and projections.

“…there’s bugger all to do.”

Assad’s coffee cup trembled on its saucer.

With each hour that
passed, her strength diminished. She had screamed at the top of her voice when the sound of the car died away, but each time she emptied her lungs, it became more difficult to fill them again. The weight of the boxes was simply too great. Gradually her breathing became more shallow.

She wriggled her right hand forward and scratched at the box in front of her face. The sound of her fingernails against the cardboard was enough to raise her spirits. She was not entirely helpless.

After some hours, the strength to scream was unequivocally gone. Now all she could do was try to stay alive.

Perhaps he would show mercy.

She recalled the feeling of suffocation all too vividly. The sense of panic and impotence, and in a way also relief. The experience was familiar to her—she had been through it a dozen times at least. The times her thoughtless giant of a father had pinned her to the floor when she was small and squeezed the air from her lungs.

“Try getting away now!” he used to say, laughing. To him it was just a game, yet she was always so frightened.

But she loved her father, and so she said nothing.

Then one day, he was gone. The game was over, though she felt no sense of relief. “He’s run off with some cow,” her mother told her. Her wonderful father had found another woman. Now he would cavort and frolic with other children.

When she first met her husband, she told everyone he reminded her of her father.

“That’s the last thing you want, Mia,” her mother had replied.

That was what she had said.

Now she had been trapped under the packing cases for some twenty-four hours, and she knew she was going to die.

She had heard his footsteps outside the door. He had stood listening and then gone away again.

You should have groaned, she thought to herself. Perhaps he would have come in and put an end to her misery.

Her left shoulder had stopped hurting. All feeling had gone from it, her arm, too. But her hip, which absorbed much of the weight, pained her dreadfully. She had sweated profusely during the first hours in this claustrophobic embrace, but even that had stopped. The only secretion of which she was now aware was the occasional seep of urine against her thigh.