Found Wanting (23 page)

She was small and slightly built, about forty-five, with shortish blonde hair, a sharp-featured face and slender letterbox-framed glasses. Beneath her pink shirt she wore an austerely wrought platinum necklace. She looked brisk and business like and spoke in a tone that suggested their meeting was no different from half a dozen others she might expect to manage in an average day.

‘Come through to my office,’ she said after a perfunctory handshake. ‘We have the place to ourselves this afternoon. Mjollnir doesn’t encourage weekend working. But this is an emergency.’

‘Is it?’

‘Yes. For us as well as you.’ She marched back the way she had come and Eusden followed. ‘I wouldn’t be here otherwise.’

They entered a large glass-walled office carpeted and furnished in restful pastels and pale wood. A man was waiting there for them, dressed in a black suit and open-necked white shirt. He looked about fifty, balding and neatly bearded, with a melancholic blue-eyed gaze.

‘Erik Lund, CSO,’ said Birgitte.

Eusden shook the man’s hand. Lund’s grip was strong, his expression unsmiling.

‘What does the S stand for?’

‘Security,’ said Lund.

‘Ah.’

‘Would you like tea or coffee, Mr Eusden?’ asked Birgitte.

‘Coffee would be nice. Black. No sugar.’

‘A man of your own tastes, Erik,’ said Birgitte. ‘Pour him a cup, would you? Nothing for me. Let’s sit.’

They sat at a broad maple conference table angled towards a corner of the building and commanding a chevroned view of the vast construction site that stretched away towards the centre of Copenhagen.

‘Please accept my condolences for the death of your friend.’

‘Am I supposed to take that seriously?’

‘I said it seriously.’

‘You’ll be telling me next Karsten Burgaard’s death really was an accident.’

‘As far as I know, it was.’ Birgitte gave him a faintly sympathetic smile that hinted at a vivacious persona she left at home every morning. ‘You’ve had twenty-four rough hours, I think. That looks nasty.’ She acknowledged with a nod the combined effect of the plastered gash on his forehead and the black eye below it. ‘You look tired. And a little desperate. If you don’t mind me saying.’ Lund delivered the coffee and sat down next to her. ‘Maybe that’ll help.’

‘Maybe.’ Eusden took a sip. And it did help – a little.

‘If you have any questions . . .’

‘I’m sure you’re going to tell me why I’m here soon enough.’

‘I am.’

‘Then this’ll do to be going on with: where’s Tolmar Aksden?’

‘Helsinki.’

‘Saukko Bank taking up a lot of his time, is it?’

‘No more than he expected.’

‘But he’s . . . authorized this meeting?’

‘He trusts me, Mr Eusden. I act with his authority.’

‘Is that a yes or a no?’

Lund muttered something in Danish which Birgitte appeared to ignore. ‘This is what you need to know,’ she proceeded. ‘The police have already matched the bullets found in Kjeldsen and Norvig with the gun found near the bodies of two motorcyclists killed in a collision with a lorry on Østbanegade late last night. The motorcyclists themselves haven’t been identified yet. They were carrying millions of kroner in cash. The lorry driver thinks they were chasing a man who ran across the road in front of him. Earlier, a caretaker was locked in Kjeldsen’s office at Jorcks Passage by a man he thinks was English and who said he was going to Marmorvej – the quay where Kjeldsen and Norvig were shot dead. The police don’t have a very good description of this man. Their chances of finding him are poor. He probably left his fingerprints in numerous locations. But I doubt they’re held in the Europol database, so, unless they’re given a name . . .’

‘You’ve made your point.’

‘Good.’

‘What do you want from me?’

‘Help.’

‘
My
help?’

‘Yes. We have a . . . situation . . . we need to deal with.’

‘What kind of situation?’

‘We’ve been contacted by the people we believe employed those two motorcyclists to kill Kjeldsen and Norvig and take back the money they’d been paid. We don’t know who these people are. Let’s call them . . . the Opposition. They have material that could damage our CEO and therefore the company . . . quite severely. They’re willing to sell it to us. And we’re willing to buy it. Frankly speaking, we have no choice. We face . . . a potential disaster.’

‘What is the material?’

‘Don’t you know, Mr Eusden?’

‘Maybe I do. Maybe I don’t.’

Another Danish mutter from Lund elicited a tight frown of irritation from Birgitte. ‘We’re not here to discuss the nature or detail of the material. We believe it originated from your late friend’s grandfather, Clement Hewitson. Is that correct?’

‘Yes.’

‘Marty Hewitson left it with Kjeldsen for safekeeping. Kjeldsen stole it and contacted Norvig, a journalist who has written several articles hostile to this company. Between them, they set up a deal with the Opposition, who then double-crossed them. Is that how it was?’

‘More or less.’

‘You were lucky to survive, Mr Eusden.’

‘I know.’

‘And that’s lucky for us. Because you’ve seen the material. You know what it looks like in its original form. Yes?’

‘Yes. So?’

‘The Opposition may try to sell us fakes. They’ve already demonstrated they can’t be relied on to deal fairly. We need someone who can authenticate the material. We need you.’

‘I may have seen it, but I haven’t studied it. I wouldn’t necessarily know whether it was all there.’

‘You’ll have to do the best you can. We have no one else we can use.’

‘You mean you have no one else you can blackmail into taking the risk that these people may do what they did to Kjeldsen and Norvig all over again.’

‘That’s unlikely. Kjeldsen and Norvig were selling. We’re buying.’

‘Nice distinction.’

‘An important one. Besides, the Opposition won’t want to lose any more men. I doubt last night’s . . . exposure . . . will have pleased them.’

‘It didn’t exactly please me.’

‘We appreciate that, Mr Eusden. You have my personal apology for involving you. I regret there’s no alternative.’

‘There is for me. Maybe I’d rather take my chances with the police than a faceless bunch of hoodlums from who knows where.’

‘I wouldn’t advise it. Think of your career, Mr Eusden. Think of your pension. Think of the months of uncertainty about what charge you’d face – or what sentence if convicted. We’re offering you a much better deal.’

‘It doesn’t sound like it.’

‘That’s because I haven’t finished. We’re not asking you to pick up the material on a deserted quayside in the middle of the night. Everything will be done in controlled surroundings. There’ll be no danger.’

‘So you say.’

‘To prove it, we’re sending someone with you.’ Eusden looked doubtfully at Lund. ‘Who?’

‘Not me,’ growled Lund.

‘Mjollnir can’t be linked with this, Mr Eusden,’ said Birgitte. ‘We have to have . . . deniability.’

Did Tolmar Aksden know what his subordinate was doing? Eusden was still uncertain on the point. Birgitte Grøn had been at pains to emphasize that it was Mjollnir’s interests she was serving. Maybe she saw a crucial distinction between them and those of the company’s founder. ‘I suppose this conversation isn’t actually taking place.’

‘You suppose correctly.’

‘Who are you sending with me, then?’

‘Pernille Madsen.’

‘Tolmar’s ex-wife?’

‘Yes.’

This was a surprise, to put it mildly. And one which only heightened Eusden’s suspicion that Tolmar Aksden himself had been left out of the loop. ‘Why her?’

‘Interesting question. It suggests you really haven’t studied the material. The damage would be to all members of our CEO’s family, particularly his son. Pernille is a loving mother. She wants to protect her child.’ Birgitte delicately cleared her throat. ‘I would do the same in her position.’

‘And what exactly is it you expect her – expect
us
– to do?’

‘Pernille has been fully briefed. She’ll tell you all you need to know
when
you need to know it.’

‘Marvellous.’

‘Erik has pointed out to me that we need to minimize the possibility of third-party involvement.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘Straub,’ said Lund, in a tone that suggested it was Danish for a drain blockage.

‘He flew to Oslo this morning,’ said Birgitte. ‘Do you know why?’

There seemed no point pretending not to. The effort of deciding how much to reveal and how much to conceal had already exhausted Eusden. ‘I knew he’d left, but not where he’d gone. As to why, I think Marty agreed to meet him there, but I doubt he meant to keep the appointment. It was a way of getting Straub off our backs until we could reclaim the . . . material . . . from Kjeldsen.’ He shrugged. ‘A lot of things went wrong.’

‘Straub’s American friend, Mrs Celeste, has also left Copenhagen.’

‘She’s not important.’

‘We’ll have to take your word for that. But you’ll agree Straub is – or could be – a nuisance.’

‘Not in Oslo.’

‘He’ll be back soon, though, won’t he? And he’ll expect you to explain why Mr Hewitson didn’t show up. So, we need you to be . . . out of his reach. We’d like you to phone the Phoenix Hotel and tell them you’re sending someone to collect your belongings and settle your bill. We’ll supply the someone.’

‘Where am I going?’

‘Tonight, Stockholm. Jørgen will drive you to the airport. You’ll catch the train there. You have to change at Malmö, where your belongings will be waiting for you. We’ve booked you into a hotel in Stockholm. Pernille will drive up tomorrow and meet you there. You’ll be travelling with her on the overnight ferry to Helsinki.’

‘
Helsinki?
’

‘Yes. The exchange will take place there on Monday.’

‘But Tolmar’s in Helsinki.’

‘Yes. The threat is clear. If we don’t meet the Opposition’s terms, they’ll give the material to the Finnish media. That would put our CEO – and us – in an impossible position.’

‘Shouldn’t you warn him to leave?’

‘The deal requires him to stay.’

‘He doesn’t know, does he?’

Lund plucked an envelope out of his pocket and slapped it down on the table. ‘Your travel documents,’ he said baldly, as if that was the only kind of answer to his question Eusden could expect.

‘The documents include a Finnair club-class ticket for a flight from Helsinki to London on Tuesday,’ said Birgitte. ‘Our business will have been safely concluded by then.’

‘How confident are you of that?’

‘Very.’

‘Really?’

‘Really.’

Eusden sighed and looked down at the envelope, then up at Birgitte. ‘I wish I was.’

‘We’re grateful for your cooperation, Mr Eusden.’ She treated him to another of her fleeting smiles that was like a shaft of sunlight through a blanket of cloud. ‘And now . . . we need to make a start if you’re going to catch that train.’

STOCKHOLM

THIRTY-TWO

‘It’s me.’

‘Richard? I’ve been waiting for you to call all evening. What’s going on? Your hotel said you checked out this afternoon.’

‘That’s true.’

‘Where are you now?’

‘Stockholm.’

‘What?’

‘I can’t explain, Gemma. I had to leave Copenhagen. I
will
explain, when I’m back in London. But I can’t now. The thing is—’

‘How could you leave Copenhagen just like that? What about Marty?’

‘There’s nothing I can do for him.’

‘Of course there is. There are arrangements to be made. Aunt Lily is desperate for news. She wants to know how and when he’s going to be flown to England. She’s hoping he can be buried on the Isle of Wight.’

‘Maybe he can. I don’t know.’

‘But you’re on the spot, Richard. Or you
were
. What did you tell the hospital?’

‘Nothing.’

‘
Nothing?
’

‘Marty died in a cathedral.’

‘I know that. What—’

‘Just like the babushka predicted.’

‘The who?’

‘The babushka. Don’t you remember? The old woman we met at the Orthodox Cathedral in Paris in September seventy-six.’

‘Never mind that. It’s the here and now that matters.’

‘If only it was so simple.’

‘For God’s sake pull yourself together, Richard. Why have you gone to Stockholm?’

‘Orders, I’m afraid.’

‘Orders? What the hell are you—’

‘I can’t talk any more, Gemma. Whatever arrangements need to be made, you’ll have to make them. There’s nothing I can do.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous. This is—’

‘Sorry.’

Eusden stared at the telephone for a minute or more after putting it down, then rose and crossed the room. He slid the glass door open and stepped out on to the balcony. The night was still and cold, the lights of Stockholm bright and clear in the motionless air. He knew he should have handled the conversation with Gemma better. But fatigue and grief and anger had fed his reluctance to offer her anything by way of justification for his behaviour. He would make his peace with her in due course. He would have to. Meanwhile . . .

The cold had done its numbing work. He stepped back into the room and closed the door. He had dozed fitfully on the train and knew he would not sleep if he went to bed now, tired though he was. He decided to head down to the bar. The only way to cope with the night that lay ahead of him, alone in an anonymous hotel, mourning a friend and cursing his misfortune, was to blot it out as best he could.

Sunday dawned cloudless and icily cold. Squinting through the thick double glazing of his hotel room as he nursed a cup of black coffee and a headache that thumped away behind the gash over his eye, Eusden rehearsed all the ways in which he could have avoided the situation he now found himself in. The surest one was never to have left London, of course. But it hardly helped to know it.