The Killing 3 (51 page)

‘Drekar’s a very fine mansion, Maja. Where do you think it came from?’

She went to the boy, scooped up his toys, put them in her bag. Kornerup followed.

‘I would like you to know—’

‘When we get Emilie back things are going to change here,’ she snapped. ‘As for your misunderstanding . . .’

A little hand came up and took hers.

‘Mum,’ Carl said. ‘Let’s go.’

The TV studios for the last debate in an interminable election. Hartmann fought hard to concentrate, to get Benjamin out of his head. The girl Sally. A set of keys.

‘Can you confirm that the police are on their way to Norway to get Emilie?’ the presenter asked at the outset of the programme. ‘I know this is an unusual way to start a
debate. But all of Denmark wants an answer . . .’

‘We do,’ Hartmann said without a second thought. ‘We all want the agony of the Zeuthen family to end. The Justice Minister will be making a fuller statement shortly. But I can
say that it appears the kidnapping’s over. The criminal who seized Emilie has agreed to tell police where she’s being kept.’

Ussing, Rosa Lebech, the minority party leaders all in a row.

‘Here we go,’ Ussing cut in. ‘Hartmann’s selling his hollow optimism. How long before we realize it’s just a pack of lies again?’

‘This is a child’s life,’ Hartmann shaking his head.

‘Yes and you’ve played it for your own advantage,’ Ussing retorted. ‘Because none of your promises are worth a cent without your friends in Zeeland. Is it true
they’re withholding money from your campaign funds until Emilie Zeuthen’s found?’

‘Not that I know.’

‘So you won’t deny it . . . ?’

‘Oh for pity’s sake, Ussing. Where are you going with this?’

‘Who leaned on the deputy prosecutor, Hartmann? Who set those goons of PET on me?’

Ussing was losing it. Getting loud. Gesticulating.

Hartmann looked straight at the camera. Kept calm. Didn’t waver.

‘Someone’s behind this!’ Ussing yelled. ‘Someone . . .’

Fifteen minutes later back in the make-up room Karen Nebel was pacing up and down.

‘He managed to sow some doubt there. We’re two points down in the polls.’

Mogens Rank was on the monitor, giving an interview about the hunt in Norway.

‘There isn’t a woman in this country who’ll vote for him after that,’ Hartmann said. ‘What’s Lund up to?’

‘Doing what this bastard Rantzau asks. He won’t give them an address. They have to go wherever he says.’

He leaned back and looked at himself in the mirror.

‘For how long?’

She shrugged.

‘They seem to believe him. Robert Zeuthen’s with them too.’ She came and sat on the make-up table, looked at him. ‘How about we pull in some of the little people on the
right for a beer?’

He laughed.

‘I’m not that desperate.’

‘You are, Troels. With margins like these it could go any way.’

A rap at the door. Morten Weber came in. Damp coat from the wet night. Downcast.

‘Anything?’ Hartmann asked.

‘No joy,’ Weber said dangling the keys. ‘I tried the people at that place he went to. They don’t know anything.’

‘They fit somewhere. Benjamin gave them to that girl. He had a backup of some photos from Jutland. Give me the keys.’

Weber handed them over.

‘He must have got photos of Karen talking to Reinhardt. It doesn’t mean a damned thing.’

Hartmann shook his head.

‘Then why did someone from Zeeland delete them from the server?’

‘Because Zeeland closed that company down. Lots of people have lost their stuff . . .’

Nebel sighed, got their coats.

‘I want to see what he had,’ Hartmann insisted. ‘There must be someone you haven’t asked about the keys.’

‘Like who? The election’s tomorrow. Why are we wasting time on this? Have we given up already? I’m sorry about Benjamin. But you’re getting obsessed—’

‘Give me the keys,’ Nebel snapped and took them out of Hartmann’s hands. ‘If it’s so important I’ll take care of it.’

‘For God’s sake Karen . . .’ Weber whined.

‘It’s done,’ she said brightly, pocketing the things. ‘Let’s get out of here, shall we?’

An hour outside Stavanger, travelling down narrow winding roads. The Norwegian police were in the front. Next came Lund and Borch in a small van with a secure unit at the back.
Loke Rantzau was in there, cuffed to a metal bar attached to the seatback. The medics had given him painkillers for his wound, which he popped from time to time. Zeuthen and Reinhardt followed
behind.

Brix called. He’d set Juncker working on shipping records in conjunction with Zeeland’s security people. Seventy containers had passed through Stavanger during the window they were
looking at. Every last one went in a different direction.

Nothing cross-referenced with the lists they’d found in the underground lair he’d been using. The
Medea
, where he’d tortured the three sailors, had been searched again
in the hunt for useful paperwork. Nothing so far.

Borch was driving. Lund told him what was going on.

‘Doesn’t matter if he leads us to the girl,’ she added.

It wasn’t easy to see the surrounding countryside in the dark but it must have been hilly and wild.

‘If,’ Borch muttered. ‘He could still be jerking us around. There’s no guarantee she’s still alive. If he put her in this tank. Jesus . . .’ He glanced back.
‘Who could do something like that? To a kid? Bloody hell . . .’

‘She has to be alive.’

‘Yeah.’ He looked at her. Grinned. ‘By the way . . . congratulations, grandma.’

Lund laughed.

‘Thanks.’

‘A girl.’ She’d told him this already. ‘That’s good. The important thing is for them to have another kid soon. You need eighteen months, two years between them.
That way they team up. Become their own little army.’

He glanced at her.

‘You were an only child. Look where it got you.’

‘Thanks!’ She tried to remember. ‘You were an only child too.’

‘Yeah. Maybe that’s why we hooked up in the first place. Like attracts like. Screwed up together.’

She put down the map she’d been using.

‘You were never screwed up.’

‘I was when you left me.’

Lund didn’t say anything. Just liked the sound of his voice.

‘Let’s say we find Emilie alive,’ he went on. ‘And this all has a happy ending. You go back to being a granny in Copenhagen. Pushing paper in OPA.’

That would be good, she thought. That was a life she could take.

‘I like that idea,’ Lund said.

‘So will you move in with me? You still owe me the deposit for that flat we never took. I’m willing to take that as a downpayment. You won’t have to give me a penny.’

Her hand went to her forehead. He was looking at her. The puppy expression again. Full of need and longing.

‘I’m not moving in with anyone. And besides . . . you’re married.’

‘Not for much longer. That was falling apart anyway.’

‘Mathias . . . I don’t want to hear—’

‘You’re a grannie!’

‘So you keep saying.’

‘It’s about time you settled down.’ He took his hand off the steering wheel and tapped his chest. ‘With me. We could live in that little shed of yours I suppose . .
.’

Her phone rang. Borch kept nagging. She told him to shut up.

It was Juncker. He said they’d got some mobile phone data from the masts in Jutland on the day Louise was snatched. Fifty black cars on the road besides those in the notebook. German,
Polish, Swedish . . .

‘Talk to the drivers,’ she said. ‘Check their alibis.’

‘Fine but are we sure about the date? In the prosecutor’s report it says April the twenty-first . . .’

‘Forget that, Asbjørn. He changed the date. It’s April the twentieth you need to look at. Check the watchmakers like I asked. The pathologist thought the damage to
Louise’s teeth came from a watch. Find out if any of the motorists handed one in for repair.’ She glanced at Borch. He was still lost in his imagination. ‘And keep going with the
old files.’

A noise from behind. Rantzau was banging on the window separating them from the secure compartment.

‘Can we stop?’ he asked over the intercom. ‘I’d like a cigarette.’

‘We’re not stopping till we get there,’ Borch told him.

‘Fine,’ Rantzau said. ‘Take the next left, then up the fjord. Just where it runs inland. You need to drive to the end.’

Lund checked on the map.

‘That’s got to be another four hours or more,’ she said. ‘The road goes nowhere. There’s no town—’

‘I know that,’ Rantzau said. ‘Wake me up when we arrive.’

She looked in the mirror. He’d rolled his head back, closed his eyes, looked ready to sleep.

It was almost midnight. They’d be lucky to reach the place he’d indicated by dawn.

‘We’ll get there,’ Lund said. ‘We’ll find that girl.’ Borch nodded.

‘Also . . . my house may be small but it’s not a shed.’

‘Could use some work,’ he suggested. ‘An extension at least.’

She snorted.

‘Oh, yes. And I remember how good you were at that. Screaming at screwdrivers. Drilling through pipes . . .’

That got to him.

‘Hey. That was back then. I’m pretty good now. Lots of practice.’

Headlights punching through the black Norwegian night. Trees by the side of the road. Forests to get lost in. She hadn’t been in one of those since Nanna Birk Larsen went missing six long
years before. And now Mark, little Mark, was a father. The elusive bonds of family were finally beginning to fall into place.

‘OK,’ Lund said. ‘You can build us an extension. I want radiators in it though.’

And left it at that.

Mathias Borch let out a little whoop and then a drum roll on the steering wheel. His fingers drifted towards hers.

A tunnel loomed up. He had to swerve to keep in line.

‘Eyes ahead,’ she said. ‘On the road.’

Then patted his hand on the wheel and went back to the map.

Friday 18th November

Election day. The formal campaign was over. Nothing for the politicians to do but smile for the cameras, vote for themselves then sit back and wait for the verdict of the
public.

When Hartmann walked to the polling station near Christiansborg the mob of reporters around him didn’t want to know about the economy or his rescue package. Every question was about
Emilie.

Was she alive or dead? Could he offer any prospect of the miracle the whole nation sought? That she might come home safe, be reunited with her family?

His answers were anodyne and non-committal. Talk of hope and prayer. Little else.

Inside Weber briefed him. The opposition parties were still on the fence, waiting to know what would happen in Norway.

And from there . . . no news. The convoy had driven deep into the remote, empty hinterland, travelling through the night. Whenever the police thought they were approaching their destination
Rantzau gave them fresh instructions. Ten hours they’d been on the road and still it went on.

Hartmann went for the door.

‘Hang on.’ Weber grabbed his arm, nodded at the voting hall. ‘Ussing’s in there.’

‘I’m not waiting for Anders Ussing,’ Hartmann said and marched inside.

The Socialist leader was putting his paper into a ballot box, beaming for a line of photographers.

‘Sorry we turned up together,’ Hartmann said. ‘Bad luck they say.’

‘For you,’ Ussing replied happily. ‘Enjoy today, Troels. It’s your last in Christiansborg.’

Hartmann kept quiet, went into the booth. Looked at the paper with the names, the pencil. His phone went.

‘It’s Karen . . .’

‘Anything on the keys?’

‘One of Sally’s friends saw him buying a padlock. He had a place where he kept his basketball things and some stuff he brought back from America.’

‘Benjamin never played basketball. That can’t be right.’

‘She said it wasn’t far from the railway. Where he died . . .’

Outside he could hear Ussing braying as usual.

‘Perhaps he doesn’t know who to vote for!’

A round of laughter.

Hartmann came out, placed his paper in the box, was gone before most of the photographers caught it.

‘Another picture,’ a couple cried.

‘Even the Prime Minister only gets a single vote,’ Hartmann told them with a brief smile and went for the stairs, Weber hard on his heels.

On the steps the little man started whining.

‘This is our last chance to turn the tide. Can you just stop and smile for the cameras please?’

‘Karen’s found a place Benjamin was using to keep things. Maybe those keys fit—’

‘Oh for God’s sake. Not today . . .’

‘Cancel all my appointments,’ Hartmann ordered. ‘We’re going to Nørrebro.’

After the serpentine rural roads through Norway Rantzau had led them back to the coast and a small container terminal north of Bergen. Borch was fuming. The man himself was
silent, had slept seemingly peacefully most of the time.

When they arrived the modest dockside was stacked with containers from all over the world. He said the one they were looking for was green and numbered 67678. It wasn’t there.

Lund was on the phone to Brix. He was getting nervous.

‘Why the hell can’t you find it?’ he demanded.

‘Borch’s checking out the shipping logs with the manager here. I’ll let you . . .’

An angry figure came out of the office. Sheets in hand. Two Norwegian uniform men had Rantzau by both arms near the waterside. He kept looking at the grey sky and yawning.

She followed Borch as he crossed the jetty, trying to get him to talk.

They got to Rantzau.

‘You had the container picked up from here yesterday,’ Borch said. ‘Where is it?’

The yawn again then Rantzau asked, ‘Did I?’

It happened in a second. Borch’s right hand came up and slapped him in the face.

‘Where the hell is it?’

A laugh. Another slap. The Norwegians were getting nervous.

Lund got between them, told him to cut it out. Rantzau looked sicker than ever. A red weal was working up on his right cheek. He was unshaven. Pale. Unsteady on his feet.