The Killing 3 (13 page)

‘You’ll get there, Juncker,’ she said.

‘So I’m not Asbjørn any more?’

‘I guess not.’

‘Progress then! I’ve got some papers on that case Peter Schultz was handling. The mate and those other two found that girl in West Jutland. Thirteen years old. An orphan. She’d
been in a children’s home for a while. Then foster care. They say she ran away. The Zeeland crew found her dead in the harbour.’

‘Who handled the case?’

‘Local police. They reckoned it was suicide. Peter Schultz signed off the papers. Hang on. Borch wants to talk to you.’

Lund crossed the road, moved back into the street lights. Heard the phone change hands.

‘What about an autopsy?’ she asked.

An older voice, worn and weary, answered.

‘There’s no mention of violence. Foaming round the nose and mouth. Liquid in the lungs. The pathologist was called Lis Vissenbjerg. She said it was death by drowning. Do you know
her?’

‘I don’t spend my entire life around the dead, Borch.’

A long pause. Then he said carefully, ‘I’m aware of that.’

‘Where was the autopsy carried out?’

‘Copenhagen. Department of Forensic Science in the university hospital. Want to see her tomorrow?’

‘Fix it.’

‘Did you find Mark?’ he asked. ‘Are things OK?’

She got to the car, took out her keys. Wondered whether she really wanted to talk about this with a man she’d loved and then abandoned twenty years before.

‘I’ll see you in the morning,’ Lund said. ‘Goodnight.’

Friday 11th November

The Department of Forensic Medicine was in the west wing of the university hospital. She met Borch in the same car park the Zeuthens had used when they were watched by the
kidnapper from his stolen van.

‘Is it a boy or girl?’ he asked as they walked up the winding white-tile staircase to the first-floor rooms where the autopsies took place. ‘Or don’t they want to
know?’

Lund had the file on Schultz in front of her. Barely heard the question.

‘Why would a deputy prosecutor lie about something like this? And the ship’s mate? Why change his testimony two years on?’

They got to the top of the steps. A couple of attendants wheeled a gurney past. Beneath a plain hospital sheet a familiar shape.

‘Had breakfast?’ Borch asked.

‘Yes.’

The downcast, boxer-puppy look.

‘I haven’t. I sort of left in a hurry.’

He wanted her to ask about his marriage. Something there wasn’t good.

‘We didn’t have the chance to talk about the baby,’ she said instead.

‘It’s a perfectly natural question, you know. Pretty obvious.’

Lund asked at a desk for Lis Vissenbjerg, showed her ID. They were waved through. This was the business end. Corpses on silver tables, silent figures working round them. Blood and organs. The
smell of chemicals and flesh.

‘If I was about to become a grandad . . .’ he began.

She turned, put a finger to her lips. Then found the room, pushed open the doors. It was tall and bright, with a semicircular rank of silver seats running round the back. An autopsy theatre. A
stage for the last act of a life.

No audience now. Just a woman in a pale-blue smock and mask bending over a naked male corpse on a flat metal surgical table, a bored-looking attendant watching, hand to his chin.

‘Lis Vissenbjerg?’ Lund asked.

The masked face looked up. Told the attendant they were done for the moment and asked him to wheel the body away.

Then, as the fans whirred trying to clear the room of the smell, they sat down on the lowest bench seat and showed her the papers: an autopsy report on Louise Hjelby, a thirteen-year-old girl,
Vissenbjerg’s signature at the bottom.

‘You must remember it,’ Borch said.

‘Why?’ She was a tall, stick-thin woman in her forties, hair the colour of straw pulled back from a high forehead, a narrow, unsmiling face. ‘Do you have any idea how many of
these things I sign each year? Let me read it . . .’

She took the report. Six pages. Skimmed through them. Didn’t speak.

‘Why was the autopsy carried out here?’ Lund asked. ‘Not in Jutland.’

‘I don’t know,’ Vissenbjerg said. ‘I just deal with what they send.’

‘Who?’ Lund persisted. ‘Peter Schultz?’

The name made her look up.

‘I read about that in the paper. It was terrible. Is this connected?’

‘Maybe,’ Lund replied. ‘Did he send the autopsy here?’

The pathologist shrugged.

‘I can’t remember. You’d have to go back through the files. If it’s still there . . .’

‘We think this case is connected with the Zeuthen kidnapping somehow,’ Borch said.

Lund looked straight at her.

‘It’s possible the people he’s killed were involved in covering up this girl’s death. Maybe the kidnapper thinks it wasn’t suicide.’

‘I didn’t cover up anything,’ the pathologist said straight away.

‘Did you speak to Schultz?’ Borch asked.

‘No. Why should I?’

Lund waited. Nothing more. Then she tapped a finger on the report.

‘There are a lot of injuries to the body.’

‘Yes,’ Vissenbjerg agreed. ‘They happened after she died. The girl had been in the harbour for a while. She probably got washed into rocks. Maybe hit by a boat prop or
something.’ The woman looked at both of them in turn. ‘I didn’t see a hint of anything criminal. If I had I’d have said so.’

Borch nodded.

‘And no one argued with you? You never heard about the case again?’

‘No. It was routine. If I remember correctly she was an orphan. She’d been fostered several times. No relatives.’

‘Did anyone ask the three sailors who found her to give DNA samples?’

‘Not as far as I know. They weren’t suspects. No one was. Like I said, there were no signs of crime. Nothing to—’

‘It says here she’d had sex,’ Lund pointed out.

‘Sometime. I don’t know when. She was thirteen. Do you think that’s unusual?’

Borch’s phone rang. He walked to the door to take the call.

‘You said there were no suspicious injuries.’ Lund pulled out two photos of the girl’s wrists. Covered in cut marks. ‘What do you call that?’

‘I call that self-harm. Good indication of her mental state. From what I remember the police said she was disturbed too. All the indications . . .’

Borch came back, apologized for the interruption.

‘Asbjørn’s found a campsite,’ he said. ‘We need to go.’

Lund scooped up the pictures and the report, stuffed them into her bag. Lis Vissenbjerg watched.

‘Do you have a card?’ she asked.

Lund gave her one and said to call any time.

‘You really think this man’s murdering people over this?’

‘Looks that way,’ Lund agreed.

The pathologist waved the card.

‘If I think of anything I’ll get in touch.’

Without being asked Reinhardt had brought an external security consultancy team into the Zeeland boardroom that morning. Zeuthen listened to them. A torrent of jargon. Wave
after wave of impenetrable buzzwords.

One message, a lesson he’d already learned. The man wanted more money.

They spent forty-five minutes saying little more than this then he thanked them, told them he’d handle the matter himself.

Reinhardt watched them go.

‘I hope you don’t think I went over your head, Robert. We used these people in that situation in Somalia. They were very good.’

‘This isn’t Somalia.’

But in truth he didn’t know what it was. Nor did the dispassionate, serious men he’d just sent packing.

On the way out they passed Maja, talking to the PA at reception. Zeuthen walked over, tried to smile, suggested they sit down together, talk this through.

By the window. The grey sea outside, underneath a sullen sky. They sat at the table.

‘We need to keep down the amount,’ Reinhardt cautioned. ‘Leave headroom if he comes back for more.’

The morning paper was on her lap. A photo of Emilie next to the dead prosecutor.

‘That’s the lesson from kidnappings like this,’ he added.

‘This isn’t a business deal,’ Maja said in a faint, hurt voice.

‘I know,’ Reinhardt agreed. ‘All the same you need to be practical.’

‘How’s Carl?’ Zeuthen asked.

She looked up. Glad of that question.

‘He asks about her,’ Maja said. ‘About you.’

‘If you offer too much he may stall and ask for more,’ Reinhardt said.

She shot him a hard stare.

‘We can’t risk angering him again!’

Zeuthen walked to the window, looked at the harbour, said nothing.

‘That’s why we need to come up with a figure,’ Reinhardt replied. ‘Before he calls. Before—’

‘I’ll pay whatever he wants,’ Zeuthen interrupted. ‘However much. Emilie’s more . . .’

Maja was staring at him and for all their years together he couldn’t read her expression.

‘She’s worth more than anything I can give,’ he finished.

Reinhardt took a deep breath.

‘PET don’t want you to offer a huge sum, Robert. There are practical problems. It needs to be portable. We have to find it somewhere. Our own banks don’t carry much in
cash.’

‘I can raise the money privately through Frankfurt. Send the plane there . . .’

Reinhardt shook his head.

‘No one will insure you for this. We’ll be taking the risk.’

‘I don’t care about the risk!’ Zeuthen was close to losing his temper. ‘Just organize this, please.’

Reinhardt looked taken aback.

‘May I know what amount you have in mind?’

She was still wearing the old green parka. It had mud on it from two nights before.

‘I’d give him this place if I could,’ Robert Zeuthen murmured. ‘Gladly if only . . .’

Out on the cold Øresund a ship’s horn boomed over the flat indifferent sea.

The debate was planned for the Black Diamond, the gleaming glass library by the waterfront. Ussing, Rosa Lebech and Hartmann were there for a sound check. Karen Nebel had a
preliminary report from Mogens Rank about PET’s response to the dossier they’d been sent from the
Medea
.

‘As you can see,’ Hartmann told them, ‘there was no direct threat to the Zeuthens. No one was involved in these decisions from the political side. It was PET’s call
entirely. Your accusation that I somehow dodged my responsibilities is false and misleading. Next time you find something stuck in your pigeonhole think twice before making a fool of
yourself.’

Ussing flicked through the report.

‘Your people still screwed up. Mogens Rank doesn’t really believe he can crawl out from under this catastrophe by blaming PET, does he?’

Rosa Lebech kept quiet, looked uncomfortable to be there.

Hartmann held out his hand.

‘Unless you’ve got more questions we should bury the hatchet. Let the police do their job. And we can do ours.’ He nodded at the stage. ‘When we get up there
tonight.’

‘I agree,’ Rosa Lebech said finally. ‘There’s no need for a public argument in these circumstances.’

Ussing shook his head. That big, sarcastic laugh.

‘So that’s it? The Justice Minister investigates himself for thirty minutes and . . . surprise, surprise! You’re all blameless.’

‘This is too much . . .’ Hartmann muttered.

‘There’s no mention in here of an old police case in Jutland. Why not?’

‘More anonymous messages in your pigeonhole?’

‘You’ve got too many skeletons in your cupboard, Troels. They go back years. I’m going to start rattling them.’

‘Listen!’ Hartmann yelled. ‘I’ve given you every detail from the beginning.’

‘Not everything,’ Rosa Lebech said carefully.

He stared at her.

‘Fine! If you’re so unhappy with the government, cut a deal with him.’

He left them there, walked down the corridor back towards the campaign coach, Karen Nebel clucking like a worried hen behind him.

‘Enough,’ Hartmann ordered. ‘I don’t have to listen to Ussing’s crap.’

Morten Weber was on a seat outside, looking at his messages. He got up and joined them.

‘Went well in there, did it?’ he asked.

‘To hell with them. What’s happening with the Zeuthens?’

‘He’s going to offer a fortune. They’re not sure they can get the money together in time. We could offer to help. Maybe with a cash loan.’

Hartmann just looked at him.

Fast footsteps behind. Rosa Lebech ran up, stopped him with an outstretched arm.

‘I’ve got appointments,’ he said.

‘You’re not the only one with something at stake here, Troels. If you can’t find the time to close the gaps . . . ?’

‘What gaps? We’ve talked this through a million times.’

Karen Nebel intervened.

‘We can find the time. The Ministry of Justice will answer any questions you have. We’ve nothing to hide here. Ussing knows that. He’s just playing games. So . . .’ She
smiled. ‘If you’ve got questions, put them to me. I’ll deal with them personally.’

A long pause then Rosa Lebech said, ‘OK.’

They watched her walk slowly back to the hall.

‘How the hell did Ussing know about that Jutland case?’ Hartmann wondered.

‘You’re sailing a leaky ship,’ Weber said and left it at that.

The campsite was on waste ground thirty minutes outside the city. Decrepit caravans and motorhomes everywhere. More than two hundred Juncker said. Curious, scared faces watched
their arrival from behind small, dusty windows.

Brix called as she got out of the car. The Zeuthens had come up with a ransom. The sum was breathtaking.

‘Did you get anywhere with the old Jutland case?’ she asked.

‘Just focus on the campsite. And keep that phone turned on.’

Juncker had been there for an hour. A camper van that looked like the kidnapper’s had checked in the previous night then left first thing that morning.

Lund looked at her watch. It was eleven thirty already.

‘Why didn’t I know earlier?’

‘This place is a dump,’ the young detective told her. ‘The guy who runs it’s downright weird. He doesn’t turn up to work till ten.’

‘Sarah!’ Borch was coming off the phone. ‘We’ve got something back from the Internet phone people. The call last night came through the site’s Wi-Fi router here. We
don’t have a number. But . . .’