Life and Limb (18 page)

Andersen beamed at his words and turned to Dicte, who stood up automatically.

‘Visiting hours are over,' the nurse chirrupped.

Dicte hesitated in the doorway. She turned and studied the man who looked like he was asleep again. Tousled hair fell over his forehead. His lips parted as he breathed out. With his eyes closed, his face was a picture of tranquillity; the years melted away and childish innocence settled over his features. A little butterfly fluttered its wings somewhere inside her. Once she might have brushed the hair aside and put her hand on his cheek.

She took her bag and followed the nurse down the corridor.

J
anos Kempinski followed the woman with his eyes as she walked from the cafeteria, past the information desk and towards the exit. Before she reached it, though, the revolving door practically spun on its axis as a lean man in cowboy boots and with blond hair – which had obviously just been cut – took long strides towards her then started talking and gesticulating.

Kempinski caught only a couple of names: Anne and Torben – or was it Torsten? Not that he was eavesdropping, but he had seen the woman before and he couldn't place her. This irritated him so much that he was tempted to approach her and ask her who she was. Instead, he lingered by the information counter and pretended to be lost in thought while watching the woman with the dishevelled hair as she frowned and questioned the man about something. The pair didn't touch, so that wasn't how Kempinski inferred that they were a couple. Rather, there was that unique intimacy between them – perhaps the way they looked at each other and waved their hands in the air, and the relative proximity between them. He had never shared that kind of intimacy and familiar body language with someone, and he had always felt envious when he had seen it in others. Perhaps it was a kind of physical conversation between two bodies, between two people who loved each other despite the disagreements and the grudges that could accumulate in a relationship.

‘Who is she again?' Kempinski asked the male assistant behind the information counter as he nodded in the direction of the couple.

‘Isn't she that journalist? The one with the video of the beheading last year?'

Kempinski studied the woman again. You wouldn't call her beautiful, but there was something awkward and sweet about her that caught his attention, and she was undeniably prettier in real life than in the photos he had seen. The assistant was right: it was definitely that journalist. She had a girlish authority, which seemed to him almost a contradiction in terms. Her movements were feminine, almost graceful, and her body had all the right curves, as revealed by her tight jeans and T-shirt. But there was also something stubborn and persistent about her, as if she was telling her boyfriend that she had made up her mind and was not going to back down.

‘Thank you.'

He garbled the words and tore himself away from the scene just as the man made a gesture of resignation, put one arm around the woman's shoulder and guided her towards the exit.

Kempinski looked at his watch: 1:30 p.m. and he had two patients to see. They were first on the waiting list and had both been called in as potential recipients for a kidney that had arrived from Oslo earlier that day. A young man from Aalborg had top priority and would receive the kidney, unless there were complications such as an infection or an incompatible crossmatch. Second in line was a man from Svendborg. He would get the kidney if the first patient couldn't receive it and if his health otherwise met the requirements.

As Kempinski walked down the corridor to his office he wished the situation was different and that they didn't always have to summon an extra patient. It could be devastating to be prepped for surgery only to find out that your blood wasn't a crossmatch for the donor kidney. Kidney patients had to be in excellent health.

He passed the ward where the two uniformed guards were sitting outside waiting for the Special Patient. There was a rumour going round that he had a visitor who might be family; Kempinski resisted the temptation to go in and ask. Nor was he in the mood to hear his nickname, ‘Dr Death' – his colleague Torben Smidt had also started using it. That very morning they had bumped into each other in the cafeteria and Smidt had said in a loud voice, ‘Dr Death, I presume. May I offer you some refreshment from the land of the living?'

For once Kempinski hadn't been in a rush and had sat down and had a coffee, but the nickname annoyed him because Smidt had been as liberal with that as the sugar he tipped into his cup.

‘Incidentally, I got an e-mail yesterday. Real blast from the past. I nearly fell off my chair.'

Kempinski had looked at Smidt. ‘From the old gang?' A hundred years ago they had both been medicine students in Aarhus.

Smidt nodded.

‘Precisely, Dr Death.'

‘Please ...'

‘But it's a very appropriate nickname. You should be honoured.'

‘Well, I'm not.'

Smidt raised his cup and blew on his coffee.

‘Anyway, do you remember Palle Vejleborg?'

‘The Palle Vejleborg who was always nicking the faculty's loo rolls and was caught red-handed breaking into a cupboard full of hospital alcohol?'

Smidt nodded again.

‘The very one. An untrustworthy bastard.'

‘Yes, but funny,' Kempinski said, recalling student parties at Vejleborg's hall of residence, where the aforementioned alcohol had circulated on the black market.

‘Funny, yes. I don't deny it.'

‘So what happened to him? Did he ever specialise?'

‘Ophthalmologist. He's just opened a new private eye clinic in Vejle with a view of the fjord. Raking it in.'

‘I can imagine. What did he want?'

Smidt smiled ruefully, and now Kempinski knew why. This was their old priority debate all over again, but this time with names attached.

‘His daughter. Marie Vejleborg, aged twenty-four. She's just been put on the waiting list.'

‘Let me guess. He wants us to move her to the top?'

Smidt made no reply and merely looked at Janos.

‘I hope he understands it isn't something we could or would want to do.'

Smidt stirred his coffee with a teaspoon. A smile played on his lips.

‘If so, he probably wouldn't have asked. This is his daughter we're talking about; his flesh and blood and, incidentally, his only child.'

‘And what did you reply?'

Smidt took out the teaspoon and placed it on the saucer. The coffee continued to whirl around inside the cup.

‘I said it was out of the question, obviously. Surely you don't doubt me?'

Kempinski hesitated for a second too long and they both knew what his real answer was.

‘No, no, of course not,' he said instead.

Quite apart from the fact that it was practically impossible to rearrange names on a waiting list without anyone objecting, they had not compromised their principles – despite their regular jousting about priority. It was possible that his hesitation was an expression of surprise. Kempinski watched Smidt drink his coffee while his own remained on the table untouched. It was the first time anyone had put out such a brazen feeler for a name to be moved up and, more than outrage, there was a curiosity within him that he suddenly sensed was dangerous. It was a tantalising, piquant sense of danger, similar to the one he felt when he spoke to the Special Patient.

Smidt reached out for a dog-eared newspaper someone had left on the table. He started flicking through it while he spoke.

‘Do you remember the time someone put cannabis in the hotpot at Palle's birthday?'

Kempinski tried to remember.

‘It's all a bit of a blur,' he finally admitted.

‘I should think so,' Smidt said. ‘Too many cooks – wasn't that the night Lisa turned up?'

They had been rivals for her attention, he and Torben. Lisa was a first-year medical student who had just moved into the hall of residence. She'd had blonde hair all the way down to her waist and wore tight red trousers and red clogs. Her nipples had been visible through her blouse.

‘Women's lib,' Smidt mouthed, looking blissful. ‘They used to burn their bras.'

The memory evoked only a small pang in Kempinski. It was a long time ago in another life. He had won the girl and her love, too, for a while. But, as always happened, his ambitions had gotten in the way of long-term plans.

He promised himself, while Smidt flicked through
Avisen
, that never again would he let his job steal what really mattered.

Janos Kempinski stopped in the corridor in mid-stride, his thoughts still circling round the meeting in the cafeteria.
Avisen
.

He spun on his heels and quickly marched back to the cafeteria. It was still on the table. He picked it up and leafed through to what he thought he had seen over Torben Smidt's shoulder. The article about the stadium killing filled the centre pages. The woman from earlier stared up at him with an enigmatic smile from a small photo accompanied by an e-mail address.

Without knowing why, he sat down and spent five minutes reading it. He had heard about the murder, of course – there was no one in Aarhus who had not. But he hadn't paid close attention. His work prevented him from keeping abreast of events, and there had been other matters on his mind.

The name of the journalist was Dicte Svendsen. There was, as far as he was aware, nothing at the hospital that could be of any professional interest to her, but she was known as someone who could ferret out secrets. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but the press held little attraction for him. He had seen too many colleagues vilified in the press and read his share of biased articles about waiting lists and the shortcomings of the health system. It wasn't Svendsen's fault that in his opinion her profession was not to be trusted. What was she doing in the hospital? Was she working on a story? Whatever it was, her presence didn't bode well.

J
ohn Wagner took the lift up to Forensics on the fourth floor, during which he tried to take comfort in the limited progress they were making in the investigation. They had drawn a blank on Mette Mortensen's final whereabouts, but now were close to narrowing the time frame on the Saturday night. The taxi driver had told them that at 2:15 a.m. he had driven three people from Åboulevarden to an address in Jægergårdsgade which corresponded to that of Arne Bay's. They had all gone inside and had been in high spirits, especially the girl, who had been chatting so much that she left her handbag on the back seat.

It was annoying, of course, that the taxi driver hadn't come forward until now, but he had only just returned to work after a bout of pneumonia. At the moment they probably didn't have enough evidence to charge Bay, but the next move was clear: search every centimetre of Bay's flat, because it was the last place Mortensen was known to have been alive.

Wagner had had no problems getting a warrant. Now he looked at his watch. The crime scene investigation team would be turning up in an hour and a half. While Wagner thought it unlikely that the murder had been committed in Arne Bay's flat, they might get nearer to the truth by having a good look around. It was also important to ask the neighbours if they had seen anything, although so far no useful information had been gathered in that area of the investigation.

Wagner pressed the bell on the door, which was always kept locked due to the nature of evidence held by Forensics officers. Erik Haunstrup, the head of the department, opened the door with a Mick Jagger grin and mop of red hair in dire need of a decent barber.

‘Are you here for news about the mobile phone?'

Wagner nodded. As expected, it had been found in Mortensen's handbag.

‘Any results?'

Haunstrup shrugged as they walked down the corridor.

‘We checked the cover and found the girl's fingerprints. Jacob from IT is examining the contents. I haven't heard if he has found anything yet, but then we are rushed off our feet.'

‘I hope you're not too busy to double-check Mette Mortensen's clothes for evidence? As you know, we're about to search a man's flat in Jægergårdsgade. That's where she was last seen.'

Haunstrup shook his head.

‘We're not too busy for that.'

He winked at Wagner. ‘Who knows? Perhaps the man has a dog with a short coat. Remember, we found dog's hair on her clothing.'

‘Can you be any more specific?'

‘We can certainly narrow it down. The dog has a short coat, a mixture of mustard yellow and white. If we can get a sample to compare it with, we can give you evidence that will hold up in court. So make sure to take a vacuum cleaner bag, if you can find one.'

Wagner smiled. ‘We'll have enough dust and hair for you to set off an allergic reaction.'

Haunstrup sniffed by way of reply. He was a delicate man, fair-skinned and prone to eczema. Recently he had been able to add dust allergy to his list of afflictions. Not a very convenient ailment for a man whose job was to identify tiny particles, Wagner reflected.

‘What else did you find on the body? Some sort of oil, I gather?'

They had received the forensic report but there had been little point examining it in detail until they had a potential crime scene where samples could be compared.

Haunstrup nodded. ‘Definitely not engine oil,' he said, winking at Wagner again.

‘Massage oil?'

Haunstrup nodded.

‘We've identified it and it has a name. It's available in various porn … I'm sorry, I mean
erotic
shops.'

This was something else that had changed completely in recent years, Wagner thought: from being the preserve of a narrow, rather shady clientele porn had become more acceptable. Erotica, sex toys and massage oil were as easily available as vitamin pills and woolly socks in winter. He wondered what they would turn up in Arne Bay's flat.

Jacob Andersen was one of two IT experts who were being kept busy by a new type of criminal activity that was becoming more and more common: cyber crime. He was staring at a computer monitor and turned away as the two men entered.

‘Busy girl, this Mette Mortensen,' said Andersen as he got up and retrieved the mobile phone from a locked drawer. It was contained in a clear plastic bag.

‘I'll just get you a print-out.'

‘Thanks. Do you want me to wait here?' Wagner asked.

Andersen nodded as he saved his work and opened the list of Mortensen's contacts.

‘There are also several text messages. It's lucky for us she was crap at deleting them. I've printed them out and listed times and dates.'

He hit the enter button and a few seconds later the printer hummed and spat out four sheets of paper. Andersen took them and put them in an envelope, which he handed to Wagner.

‘I hope they get you somewhere. We only have the numbers and we haven't had time to check the addresses, but get back to me if there's a problem.'

‘Thanks. Talking about numbers,' Wagner said, taking the envelope, ‘how are you getting on with her notebooks? Has anyone cracked the code, if that's what it is?'

Andersen shook his head and sat down in front of his computer again. ‘We've got a theory that it's related to her work, so with that in mind we've given them to our accountants to see if they can make head or tail of it, but I haven't heard anything back.'

‘Will you follow it up for me?'

Andersen nodded absentmindedly as he clicked to bring his work back onto the screen.

‘I'll give them a call and chase it up.'

Haunstrup escorted Wagner back to the door.

‘Will I be seeing you later? In Jægergårdsgade?'

Wagner nodded.

‘We've brought in the suspect and we'll be interviewing him later. But first I want to have a look at the flat myself.'

‘Mind you don't slip on the oil,' Haunstrup said, grinning.

Wagner handed the list to Kristian Hvidt and asked him to try to match the telephone numbers with names and addresses. Later, after a detour to the canteen for a roast beef sandwich, he took Ivar K with him to Jægergårdsgade, where the blue vans belonging to Forensics were parked outside the building. The two men were issued with white suits, latex gloves and blue plastic shoe protectors before they entered the flat on the third floor.

The first sight that greeted them was the dog. It was tied to the radiator, wore a muzzle and lay as if in a coma. Wagner noted its colouring: mustard yellow and white.

Haunstrup appeared from the bowels of the flat, dressed in a white coverall. He nodded in the direction of the dog, which didn't even seem to register that two new people had entered the flat.

‘We had a real scrap with it, and in the end we had to call in a vet to give it a sedative.'

Wagner looked at the animal as it breathed in deep sighs. It was a muscular dog, small and compact.

‘You couldn't handle a little bow-wow?' he teased.

Haunstrup shook his head.

‘It's an Amstaff. You don't mess with them.'

‘An Amstaff?'

‘American Staffordshire bull terrier. It's a kind of fighting dog, but it's perfectly legal. Though I wouldn't want to meet it and its owner in an alleyway on a dark night.'

Wagner noticed that the flat was clean and tastefully furnished, obviously in a man's taste. The furniture consisted of a gigantic leather sofa, big stools and leather armchairs on an off-white carpet that might once have been pure white. The walls were decorated with erotica: fairly explicit and yet – he had to admit – relatively tasteful paintings and photos of naked men and women in various submissive positions. There weren't many books in the bookcase; they ranged from reference works on dogs to biographies of Nazi leaders, including Albert Speer's autobiography, to an obscure novel about Hitler,
The Hitler Scoop: The Hunt for the Führer's Body
. In between the titles he spotted surprises such as works by Karl Marx and an anthology of Edgar Allan Poe short stories.

Wagner was careful not to touch anything. He knew that the Forensics team preferred to work undisturbed and without senior officers trampling over potential evidence, but it was also important for him to form his own impression and they respected that.

‘Come with me.'

He followed Haunstrup's voice, with Ivar K on his heels. They both gasped when Haunstrup opened the door.

‘God Almighty!' his companion and colleague exclaimed. ‘The sick bastard! He must have been spanked a lot when he was a boy.'

The room was small and cell-like. Its size was reduced because the walls were padded with sound-proofing material, like egg cartons but of better, professional, quality. It's the perfect crime scene, Wagner thought. Not a living soul would hear screams coming from this room. Not even that of a young woman crying out in pain and fear.

Opposite the door and against one wall was a fixed floor-to-ceiling metal frame. From its shiny steel bars hung whips, chains, handcuffs, leather gloves and various other implements that all looked as if they were intended to inflict the maximum amount of pain. In front of the grid there was a bench that reminded him of an old torture rack. It looked solid and was upholstered in black leather and fitted with various screws and hinged mechanisms and more metal bars to which someone could be tied.

On a table in the corner three model heads displayed a variety of masks. One was a black rubber hood; another was made of iron and looked as if it had been inspired by old-fashioned armour. The third was a leather mask made from numerous black criss-cross straps. There were black candles, partly burned down, on this table as well as on a couple of other smaller side tables.

Posters decorated the walls, but not with sensual messages: portraits glorifying Adolf Hitler, photos of Ku Klux Klan burnings and white supremacist slogans. There were no windows.

Ivar K looked at the candles.

‘Someone after a bit of mood lighting,' he muttered and poked one with a latex-clad finger. He sniffed the air. ‘Someone's used this room recently.'

Wagner had to agree. The scent of candle wax mixed with what might have been bodily fluids lingered in the slightly stuffy air. But there was something else, and it was a sense of activity. He had never believed in the supernatural and he regarded himself as a logical man of reason; even so, he could almost sense the activities that had taken place here, as if someone had forced him to learn a bizarre choreography by heart. He could visualise the arm that brandished the whip swinging through the air and hear the clicks as the handcuffs snapped into place around the wrist. He could see Mette Mortensen, humiliated and terrified, knowing she was about to die.

‘There must be a lot of evidence here,' Ivar K ventured.

‘We need to keep an open mind,' Haunstrup said. ‘Let's not forget that none of this is illegal. Bizarre, possibly, but people's sexuality doesn't turn them into killers.'

‘It does for some,' Ivar K argued. ‘And this one looks the type.'

Wagner sighed. Haunstrup was right, of course, but it didn't remove his suspicion that something had happened in this room – something which related to the death of Mortensen.

‘We need to do a thorough examination anyway,' he said, turning his back.

Wagner decided to walk back to the police station on his own while Ivar K remained in the flat a little longer. Outside in the street summer had turned up the flame and Wagner tried to raise his spirits by admiring the young women in short dresses cycling past him. It was, though, as if they all metamorphosed into Mortensen, so he chose to stare hard at the footpath instead and, while doing that, feel the sun on his back and inhale the smell of warm tarmac and exhaust fumes.

On his return there was a message that a Jeppe Ødum had called. He vaguely remembered the name but couldn't put a face to it; he started rereading the case file to refresh his memory. He got nowhere until he read the print-out of their meeting at Hammershøj Accountants. Ødum had been one of Mortensen'scolleagues. They had spoken to him and he had volunteered the opinion that there was nothing to say about the woman that they didn't already know.

Wagner sighed and leaned back in his chair. Had Mortensen started talking to them from beyond the grave?

He picked up the telephone and rang Ødum's number, but there was no reply – not even voicemail.