Death Sentence (24 page)

‘I’m sure they don’t blame you for anything,’ I said.

‘Perhaps … but how can they ever feel safe here again?’

I put my hand on his shoulder and squeezed it. ‘They’ll catch him. And then you will have another story to tell.’

Ferdinan looked at me with gratitude in his eyes.

‘But, imagine, if you had booked that room,’ he said. ‘It could have been you.’

‘I really don’t think so,’ I declared. ‘It seems more like an act of revenge.’

‘Like in the book?’

‘Just like in the book.’

INNER DEMONS
GOT
a rough reception in the press, but the sales figures spoke their own easily measurable language – it was a hit.

Finn Gelf was over the moon.
Outer Demons
had financed ZeitSign’s offices in Gammel Mønt and now it looked like
Inner Demons
would ensure the company’s financial stability for years to come. There was enough left over for him to buy himself a villa in Spain and replace his old Fiat with a BMW.

For my part I was happy and relieved to know that I had still got it in me to attract readers. I was even grateful I had followed Finn’s advice and dropped
Join the Club
in favour of the moneymaker that was
Inner Demons
.

The familiar merry-go-round of interviews, book signings and talk shows started all over again and I was more or less absent from home for three weeks around the time of publication. Line, who was still on maternity leave, looked after the two girls on her own, far too busy to take
part
in the media circus and so pressed for time that she didn’t read the book until two months later.

When she finally read
Inner Demons
, she left me.

The main character and killer in the story, Ralf Sindahl, had been born in traumatic circumstances. His mother, a Red Cross aid worker, fell in love with another aid worker in Africa and became pregnant, but shortly before she was due to give birth she was abducted by an African tribe who raped her before performing an improvised Caesarean section with a machete. The infant boy was sold or stolen from tribe to tribe where he was starved and abused until he was bought by a rich white couple, who couldn’t have children of their own. Growing up on the family farm, however, didn’t spell an end to the child’s troubles. The husband was a sadist, not only towards the staff who worked under slave-like conditions, but also towards his wife and the most recent victim, little Ralf. The boy in turn takes out his frustration on the workers, who are too scared to resist or tell his father, and his attacks become increasingly vicious, the older he gets. At the age of fourteen, he kills his father, who is trying to stop the boy beating up a pregnant black girl. Ralf decides to run away, but before he leaves, he ransacks the house looking for money. He discovers a report that describes his violent entry into the world and contains information about his real parents. He flees to Denmark with the report, where he tracks down his biological father, Claus, who takes him in. Claus, however, soon realizes there is something seriously wrong with the boy and, a few months after their reunion,
he
is forced to hand him over to the authorities. The boy knows nothing of fear or humility and his brutality puts him on the path to a career as a successful criminal. Soon he has more money than he can spend. However, it isn’t money that interests him, but power. He is obsessed by the thought that his strength is the direct result of his brutal birth, and in an attempt to create small monsters in his own image, he kidnaps pregnant women whom he tortures right up until the birth, after which he kills them. He leaves the babies in hospitals or orphanages, convinced he is their psychological father through the shared bond of a traumatic birth. He believes the children will grow up with his powers and rule the world one day. Ralf’s fate and downfall comes in the shape of a strong pregnant woman, who outwits him and kills him with a sledgehammer.

But his ‘children’ are still out there …

Not terribly original, I know, but there were still a few people who hadn’t read or seen
The Boys from Brazil
and so thought it was quite cool. However, most reviewers agreed that
Inner Demons
was rubbish – a cynical exploitation of people’s need to be frightened and outraged.

Once more I was Mr Splatter and
Inner Demons
was condemned by some as a wicked and dangerous book that people should stay away from – which only served to boost sales even further. A number of libraries, acting as moral guardians, refused to let anyone under the age of eighteen borrow the book. The result was that schoolchildren would steal my books from library shelves in order to read the bloodiest extracts in secret, and among teenagers a cult arose around the book and my authorship. At a school
in
Aalborg, teachers discovered that a group of boys had founded the Deadly Poets Society, whose purpose was to collect and read the most graphic depictions of torture in literature. My two
Demon
books were practically their bibles; they read aloud from them and made drawings of some of the scenes with a precision worthy of a police report. Families were shocked, parent–teacher associations furious and right-wing politicians spoke about bans, censorship and introducing a minimum age requirement for books as is the case with films. Many of my fellow authors queued up to denounce my work. It had nothing to do with literature, they claimed, and hinted that the paper would have been put to better use in a lavatory.

Meanwhile, sales soared.

Around the same time, people started ringing me and making threats. Furious voices called me the worst names and described how I should be put down in ways so vile I wouldn’t even have used them in my books. We got an unlisted number, which put an end to the calls, but it didn’t stop the letters. As my address was also secret, this so-called fan mail was sent to my publishers and a sackful would be waiting for me each week. To begin with I opened and read every letter, including those that smeared me, but in time I became so practised I wouldn’t even need to open the hate mail – I could sense the outrage oozing from the handwriting on the envelope.

However, some readers still supported me and wrote letters of appreciation. In public, few people would admit to having read my books and fewer still to liking them, but the letters painted a different picture. Many wrote of
powerful
reading experiences, not only from the violence in the book, but also from its characterization. They mentioned scenes and images that had moved them in a way they hadn’t been moved for years.

In between these two extremes were letters from a third group, and they were the ones that really worried me. They were fanatical declarations. Initially, these letters resembled fan mail, but they quickly assumed a more disturbing tone. The senders wanted specific information about certain scenes, how I had researched the effect of the murder weapons, or they pointed out mistakes in terms of the body’s reaction to certain influences. Some had re-enacted passages from the book and would either praise me for my accuracy and insight or draw my attention to errors, for example, certain bodily positions that were impossible. A few told me how they had used episodes from the book in sex games and thanked me for the experience; one even attached a series of photos as evidence to prove it.

Despite the – for me – enormous attention, I had no problem being out in public. Of course people recognized me, but it was rare for anyone to approach me directly. Perhaps they were scared of me, scared I would turn into one of my notorious killers if they came too close. The few people who did come up to me were friendly and usually only wanted an autograph. One woman told me she couldn’t sleep after having read
Inner Demons
, and another, heavily pregnant and sweating, said she simply had to stop reading and would have to finish the book after she’d had her baby.

It seemed as if everyone had an opinion about the book,
whether
or not they had read it. But a great many people bought the book and did read it.

Except Line.

After a month, it started to irritate me. Of course she was busy with the children while I ran around doing interviews and attending receptions, but she could have shown a bit more interest, I thought. I nudged her, but it was another month before she picked it up.

To this day, I wish I had never encouraged her.

She started reading it while I was in Germany. Finn was with me; we were meeting with the German translator and settling some contractual issues with the German publisher. When I phoned home from the hotel that evening, Line had just started the book. She remarked that it was rather bloodthirsty, but that was all. We talked about the children and I told her about the German publisher, who had turned out to be a whisky connoisseur and was determined to prove it later that night. The following day she didn’t answer the telephone and on the third day, I got the answering machine.

I was surprised, but not worried. She had probably gone to stay with her father as she was on her own with two children, so I didn’t regard it as cause for concern.

When I came home, exhausted after three days of talking literature and drinking whisky, the house was empty and
Inner Demons
was lying on the kitchen table.

A note stuck out from it.

It’s over
.

I’m scared to leave you alone with the children now
.

Line

I must have read that note a hundred times, thinking alternately that it was all over or that she would probably come back. The German publisher had presented me with a bottle of 37-year-old Highland Park for special occasions, but it was opened that night and when I woke up next morning only a quarter was left. I hadn’t tried to call Line even though I was fairly sure she had gone to stay with her father. Somehow I knew it would be pointless and I needed to think, to come up with a strategy before contacting her, but no useful plan had materialized during the night so, after a cup of pitch-black coffee, I rang my father-in-law.

I had expected rejection, that Line would refuse to talk to me, but after a moment she came to the telephone. She even sounded composed and resolved as she explained that she didn’t feel safe with me and would never leave her children in my care again. When I pointed out that they were my children too, she hardened her voice and informed me that she was scared I might hurt them, unless she was around.

The most idiotic thing I could do was lose my temper, so that’s what I did. I screamed at her down the telephone and spewed out stupidities I have regretted ever since, but I felt unfairly treated. It was for their sake that I wrote what I did. It was so they could live comfortably in the house in Kartoffelrækkerne and have the holiday cottage in Rågeleje that I had gone the whole hog with the book.

Line said very little during my outburst. She waited until I had finished, then, when my torrent of justifications and accusations had run dry, she informed me that I would be hearing from her solicitor. I couldn’t think of anything
to
say. I was knocked for six, exhausted by my attacks on her, and I realized that everything I had said and done had only served to convince her she had made the right decision. Finally I begged her to at least let me speak to Ironika. She hesitated for a moment, which sparked a slender hope in me, but then she declined and hung up.

In the days that followed I tried various forms of lobbying with Bjarne, Anne and Line’s family, but everyone was of the opinion that this time I had gone too far and they neither could nor did they want to help me. A letter arrived from her solicitor. Even up until that point I had been deluding myself I could talk my way out of it, that Line would forgive me and return after some days or weeks, but the formal, legal language and dry presentation of facts hit me head-on like an express train.

Line wanted full custody and banned me from seeing my children. The lawyer pointed out that I had myself supplied the most damning proof by virtue of my two books
Outer Demons
and
Inner Demons
, which clearly demonstrated that I fantasized about torturing and killing my wife and children. To substantiate their claim, they would produce the interview with Linda Hvilbjerg and witness statements in connection with the cut to Ironika’s thigh.

I knew the battle was lost. There would be no court hearing or arguments over the children because I had no defence. All I could do was hire a lawyer and let him do what was necessary. I couldn’t subject my children to years of court proceedings that I would probably end up losing anyway. It would only make matters worse. In time, I might be allowed to see them, but for now I was beaten.

My mental state and lack of self-worth made me considerably more generous than strictly necessary. I gave Line the house in Kartoffelrækkerne, unencumbered, and would of course be paying alimony and child maintenance until the girls grew up. I kept the cottage and initially moved in with Bjarne and Anne in my old Scriptorium room. They were sympathetic, but I couldn’t talk to them about the break-up. I suspected they sided with Line and therefore couldn’t see the point of bringing up the subject.

Instead I pretended that Line had ceased to exist and threw myself into the life of a bachelor, which nearly proved to be the death of me.

DARKNESS HAD SPREAD
over Frederiksberg. It was cold and I wrapped my jacket around me as I walked from the taxi to the Forum entrance. I showed my invitation and was admitted.

The dinner was taking place in the large restaurant across the entrance foyer. I could see tables had been laid and candles lit, but only a few guests were here already. The authors would probably be among the last to arrive, too snobbish to arrive early and too greedy to stay away. The other guests would be the interviewers, mostly members of the press, and editors from publishing companies, publishers and other helpers from the book fair. I had never attended before, but it was understood that tonight everyone let off steam, tired after two busy days at the book fair and desperate to recharge for the final day, a very long Sunday.