Trophy (11 page)

Elizabeth Caspersen’s voice acquired an edge: ‘And again I’m asking you why? I’ve no reason to think he died from anything other than a heart attack.’

He phrased his next sentence carefully.

‘I think there are too many unrelated incidents. An otherwise healthy man suffers a heart attack, then there’s the break-in, the theft of the rhino horns, the hunting rifle with ammunition still in its magazine. The film. You have to agree, it’s all a bit odd.’

The pause was extra long.

‘You’re right, and you’re wrong,’ she said at last. ‘But I’ll get hold of the papers and have them sent to you.’

‘Thank you.’

Elizabeth Caspersen had finally stopped giggling, something for which he was grateful.

After their conversation Michael fetched his travel bag and took out a scratched, white plastic press pass the size of a credit card. It had a microchip and a blurred passport-sized photo of him. Using adhesive letters he could alter the name on the pass as and when he needed it. It wouldn’t stand up to professional scrutiny, but few people had ever seen a press pass and no one had ever looked at it twice.

He would be Peter Nicolaisen from Danmarks Radio, he decided, and prepared the lettering.

Michael wasn’t a believer in the traditional sense. His father, the fallen vicar, had cured him comprehensively of Christianity, but he still hoped that someone somewhere would understand and forgive the step he was about to take: bringing false hope to grieving relatives.

Lene parked some distance from the fine, classical redbrick building that was the home of Holbæk Police Station. The sun had passed its zenith, but it was still warm. She pulled up the hood on her sweater and donned a pair of sunglasses. The death of the veteran along with the Rigspolitiet’s presence had made crime reporters flock to the west Sjælland market town, and they could spot Superintendent Lene Jensen’s red hair from miles away. She had no wish to be besieged by clamouring journalists right now; they would have to wait until tomorrow’s press briefing.

She entered through a side door and popped her head round the duty office, exchanged a few words with the duty officer and was allocated a room on the first floor.

The room was furnished with a faded blackboard, an old poster of Storstrømsbroen, fire evacuation instructions from 1983, a scratched desk and two chairs. She hung her anorak over one chair, put her shoulder bag on the floor and sat down at the desk. She took off her wristwatch and put it on the desk next to her notebook and a ballpoint pen.

She had had another brief chat with Arne, the CSO, on her way to Holbæk. In many ways, a disturbing conversation which had confirmed her own suspicions.

At four o’clock there was a knock and the young female officer whom Lene had met in the forester’s cottage opened the door to allow Louise Andersen to enter. Then she closed the door behind her. Lene didn’t get up, said nothing and carefully kept her facial expression neutral. She gestured to the chair opposite the desk and the widow sat down.

Louise Andersen’s face was freshly scrubbed, the bridal make-up had gone and she had aged ten years. She had dark circles under her eyes and the corners of her mouth were turned down in a way Lene suspected might be permanent. She didn’t look the superintendent in the eye.

‘How are you, Louise? Where are the children?’

‘With my mother.’

‘Have you managed to get some sleep?’

‘No.’

Lene tried, and failed, to catch the other woman’s eye.

‘Can you remember what happened yesterday?’

‘How could I forget?’

She glanced at Lene before staring down at her red Converse trainers. She was an attractive woman, Lene thought. She had great hair, dark brown and naturally curly, high cheekbones and her big eyes were slightly slanted, though they were currently stripped of life.

‘You made coffee for Kim when you woke up yesterday.
You called out for him. You looked for him in the bathroom, you went back to the kitchen … Please, would you take it from there?’ Lene prompted her.

‘I went out into the kitchen,’ the widow mumbled. ‘I felt sick and I had a headache. We’d had far too much to drink. I drank half a carton of orange juice and made some coffee. I can’t remember if I called out to him. I thought he might have gone for a walk.’

‘A walk?’

‘Yes. He often did. I drank my coffee and poured a mug for him. Two sugars and a dash of milk. Kim can’t drink coffee without sugar.’

Her mouth began to twitch.

‘Then what did you do?’

Louise Andersen shielded her eyes with her hand.

‘I went out into the garden. I found him. Someone had hung Kim from a tree …’

Her hands dropped into her lap, her face dissolved and the tears flowed. She got up without warning, crossed the floor and pressed herself into a corner by the door. Her shoulders started heaving.

Lene leaned back and looked out of the window. In the car park below, an officer was opening the back of an estate car to let an Alsatian out into the sunshine. The animal rose on its hind legs and planted its paws on the man’s chest. The officer pushed the dog down and it licked his hands. A young dog. Still a playful puppy.

‘No … no … no … no …’

The widow was whispering softly to the wall.

‘Louise …?’

The head nodded.

‘Do you know what I see when I look at you?’

‘No.’

‘I see someone very special. I see a strong, brave woman. You’re very like me. And you
have
a future on the other side of this. After Kim. Even though it’s going to take time. It’s up to you to decide if the start of that future will be very hard or just hard.’

‘There is no future.’

The widow was still facing the peaceful, green corner.

‘But there is. Look at me, Louise.’

The widow still didn’t turn around.

‘Bloody well sit down on that chair!’

Lene put on her street voice. Police frequency. It was a long time since she had used it on protesters armed with cobblestones or agitated football hooligans, but its effect was still remarkable. The young woman jolted upright as if she had been given an electric shock, marched across the room and sat down on the chair. She looked at Lene with wide open eyes.

‘Do you think it’s the first time I’ve sat here with someone in your situation?’ Lene demanded brusquely.

‘I guess not.’

‘No. And you
have
a future. I know that right now
everything is shit and it’s going to stay that way for some time. Serious, fucking shit, okay? The question is: are you going to let it win? You’re in shock. Of course you are, anyone would be, but that’s a healthy and normal reaction, and you had damn well better believe me when I tell you that it
will
pass. One day you’ll start a new life and it won’t be because you don’t honour or love your husband.’

‘Have you ever lost someone?’

Lene blinked. She had been asked that question before. She had lost her father, but he had been old, chronically ill and at peace with the world. He was ready to go. And she had had an abortion when she was seventeen, but that didn’t really count. Her greatest loss had been her beloved cat that disappeared when she was eleven. She had cried for three weeks. She had always believed that the cat, Valium, named by her father, who was a chemist, had been the victim of a crime, that their evil neighbour who loathed animals had killed Valium and buried it. While he was at work, she had vainly searched his garden. In a way that had been her first case.

‘No,’ she replied.

‘You’re lucky,’ Louise Andersen said.

‘I know. What did you do when you found Kim?’

‘I cut the rope.’

‘What with?’

‘I ran back to the house, found a knife in the kitchen and then I returned. I stood on the chair, but I couldn’t reach the rope … Oh, God …’

‘Then what did you do?’

‘Then I ran to the garage, found the lopping shears and then I could reach.’

‘I’m impressed,’ Lene said, kindly. ‘No, really. I presume you couldn’t carry Kim? He was a big, heavy man.’

‘No, he fell onto the grass. I tried holding on to him, but the chair fell over.’

‘What time was it?’

‘No idea.’

‘Okay. Kim is lying on the grass and you do … what?’

Her face lost all expression; she avoided looking at the superintendent.

And here it comes, Lene thought.

‘I tried giving him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and CPR. But it was no use. He was cold and he didn’t move. He just stared up at the sky. I don’t think his heart was beating.’

‘Where did you learn how to resuscitate someone, Louise?’

A vertical frown appeared between the widow’s fine brows, freshly plucked for the wedding.

‘I’m a teacher. I did a first-aid course at work.’

‘Did you see the handcuffs straight away?’

‘I saw them straight away.’

‘Do you remember if you touched them?’

‘I didn’t.’

‘Coffee?’ Lene asked.

‘What?’

‘Would you like a cup of coffee? A glass of water? Can I get you anything?’

‘A glass of water, please.’

‘Just a moment.’

Lene left the office, walked down the corridor, found the lavatory, held her wrists under the cold tap and splashed water on her face. She stared at her reflection in the mirror for a long time before she turned off the tap.

The kitchen lay behind the duty office. The dog handler was sitting at the kitchen table and the dog was lapping up water from a plastic bowl that jerked across the slippery linoleum; a long-legged puppy that had yet to learn to coordinate four legs, a tail and its big head. It sniffed Lene eagerly until the handler summoned it. Lene poured coffee into a mug and added three sugars. Then she found a Snickers bar in her pocket and tore off its wrapper. Her hands were shaking. Low blood sugar.

She munched the chocolate, drank the coffee and looked at the dog.

‘Is he going to turn out well?’

The handler gazed at it with fatherly pride.

‘I think so. I trained his big brother from an earlier litter, and he was very good.’

‘King?’

He smiled.

‘No. And not Rollo, either. His name is Tommy.’

Lene smiled at the dog. ‘Good name.’

‘Yes.’

She poured water into a glass for Louise Andersen and walked back to the small, dusty office.

Lene placed the coffee mug next to her wristwatch, put the water glass in front of the widow and glanced at her shoulder bag on the floor. It was untouched.

‘You can smoke if you want to,’ she said.

‘I have asthma.’

‘Oh, that’s right. I think your house is the cleanest I’ve ever been in. Including my own.’

‘It has to be clean.’

‘Of course.’

Lene looked into her mug as she sipped the black liquid.

‘Louise, when I said that it’s up to you to decide if day one of your future will be very hard or just hard, I was being serious.’

The widow twirled a dark curl around a finger, pulled it hard and Lene grimaced. It seemed as if the other was enjoying the pain. The distraction.

‘Okay.’

‘There is something called interfering with a dead body, Louise. It means you mustn’t touch or move a dead person unless there’s a really good reason. You’re not allowed pose a body in any way, undress it, apply make-up, put it on a motorbike or anywhere else. Do you understand? It’s a criminal offence.’

‘Of course.’

‘Good. There’s also something called obstruction or perverting the course of justice. That’s also a criminal offence. And then finally there’s something called perjury or giving false evidence. It’s when you say something during a police investigation or in court which you know to be untrue.’

The widow looked attentively at Lene. Her lips were moist and slightly parted.

‘I know what it means.’

‘I’m glad to hear that, Louise. I really am. Unfortunately it’s my view that you’re guilty of all three and I want to know why.’

‘What are you saying? Just what the hell are you saying?’

Lene looked her right in the eye. ‘When I called you strong and brave, I actually meant it. There were no marks on Kim’s wrists from the handcuffs. We would have expected him to struggle if someone had put the handcuffs on him before pulling him up into the tree, for example. We would also expect to find bleeding under the skin if he had put them on himself because he was afraid he wouldn’t be able to go through with it. It would be an instinctive reaction. Inevitable, in fact.’

Louise Andersen pushed back her chair abruptly and was halfway to the door when Lene ordered her to sit down. The widow stopped as if she had walked into a wall and Lene was about to get up to forcibly push her back into the chair when Louise Andersen spun around with blazing eyes and sat down without saying a word. She crossed her arms
and legs and her knuckles turned white against her upper arms.

‘Thank you,’ Lene said gravely. ‘This isn’t going to go away just because you walk out of that door, Louise. There was only one person’s fingerprints on those handcuffs. Yours. And as far as the alleged resuscitation attempt goes, we would have expected to find traces of your lipstick on his face. We didn’t. We did find your fingerprints on the lopping shears, so that part of your story holds up. Now I want to hear the other part. The truth.’

‘I want a lawyer,’ the widow said.

Lene nodded.

‘Of course. But if you want a lawyer, I’ll have to charge you first, and if I charge you, you’ll go to court and if you go to court, you’ll be convicted. I can guarantee you that.’

The widow’s lips started to tremble. Again she buried her face in her hands.

Lene looked at her watch. Would this never end? She suddenly got very angry with Louise Andersen’s inexplicable excuses and refusal to cooperate.

‘So what’s it going to be?’ she asked harshly. ‘Very hard or just hard?’

The other muttered something.

‘Speak up. I can’t hear you, sweetheart.’

‘I think just hard is more than enough.’

‘That’s what I think, too,’ the superintendent said. ‘Let’s start with the handcuffs.’

‘I don’t know … I don’t know what I thought … Yes, I thought that if I handcuffed him, you, the police, might find out what was wrong with him. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done it.’

‘What was wrong with him?’

‘Oh, fuck … Everything!’

‘His depression? We found the pills and I’ve spoken to his doctor.’

‘No, no … I think they helped him to begin with, but then he became more and more withdrawn and miserable, he isolated himself; he couldn’t even be bothered with the kids any more. And he had always been crazy about them. It wasn’t just his depression. I got that and I could handle it, but some days, some days he didn’t say one word to me or the kids, he didn’t eat, he didn’t shower or change his clothes, he would wander around the forest or go sailing in his dinghy and wouldn’t come home until he was sure that I had gone to bed. We stopped having sex, we never talked, we did nothing.’

‘How long had he been like that?’

‘The last year was terrible. Getting married was my idea. I actually proposed to him … I thought it would make things better. That it might convince him that I would never leave him. He had started dreading that. I thought that the party and planning the wedding, him seeing his old friends, would help. And it did, it really did. I thought he cheered up even though there were still lots of days when he just didn’t get
out of bed. His boss put up with it. Kim was a veteran and his boss was prepared to make allowances for him. But of course he has a business to run and other carpenters to think of. The others had to work extra hard because of Kim. He knew it and he felt really bad.’