The Purity of Vengeance (27 page)

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Authors: Jussi Adler-Olsen

BOOK: The Purity of Vengeance
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“Did you really go to the bathroom, Assad?”

Assad laughed. “No, Carl, I didn’t. I poked around upstairs and found this, full of photos.” He arched his midriff upward, reached under his belt, and plunged a hand into the most intimate depths of his trousers.

“Here,” he said, retrieving an envelope. “I found it in Mie Nørvig’s wardrobe in the bedroom. In the kind of cardboard box that so often has interesting things inside. I took the whole lot thinking it might be less obvious than only taking a few,” he said, as he began to peruse the contents.

Logic for dummies.

Carl pulled over and took the first of the photos Assad handed him.

It was a group picture, clearly taken on some festive occasion. Champagne glasses raised to the photographer and smiles all round.

Assad planted a stubby finger in the middle. “This is Philip Nørvig with a woman who is not Mie. I think we should assume it’s his first wife. And look at this . . .” He slid his finger to the edge of the group. “Here is Herbert Sønderskov and Mie, not as old as now. Don’t you agree he seems to have been rather fond of her even then?”

Carl nodded. Sønderskov’s arm was certainly well wrapped around Mie’s shoulders.

“Look on the back, Carl.”

He turned the photo in his hand.
July 4 1973. 5 years of Nørvig & Sønderskov
.

“And look at this other one I found.”

The colors were faded, and the photo had clearly not been taken by a professional. A wedding photograph, taken outside the town hall in Korsør. Mie and Philip Nørvig, Mie bulgingly pregnant, Philip wearing a triumphant smile in stark contrast to Herbert Sønderskov’s thin-lipped expression a little farther back on the steps behind the happy couple.

“Do you see what I mean, Carl?”

He nodded. “Philip Nørvig knocks up Herbert Sønderskov’s lady love. The secretary’s shagging the both of them, but Nørvig ends up with the prize.”

“We need to check and see if Sønderskov really was in Greenland when Nørvig went missing,” said Assad.

“Yeah, but I’m pretty sure he’s telling the truth on that. What I’m more interested in is his defense of this Curt Wad bloke, whose guts Mie Nørvig obviously can’t stand. Not that I blame her, he sounds like a creep, if you ask me. My feeling is we should follow Mie Nørvig’s female intuition and take a fine toothcomb along with us.”

“A fine toothcomb?”

“Yes, Assad. Or a fine-toothed comb. Whatever. We’ll get Rose onto it, if she can be arsed.”

 • • • 

When they’d got as far as the McDonald’s sign that beckoned to the motorway traffic at Karlstrup, Rose called back.

“You don’t honestly expect me to be able to give you the lowdown on this Wad wanker off the top of my head, do you? He’s a million years old at least, and he hasn’t stood still once, I can tell you.”

Her voice grew increasingly shrill, until Carl realized he’d better step in and calm her down before things got out of hand.

“No, of course not, Rose. Just give me the bare bones, that’s all. We’ll get to the details later, if needs be. Just find out if there’s any source that can give us a summary. A newspaper article, something like that. What we want to know to begin with is if there’s any dirt on him. As far as I understand it, he’s rather a controversial character.”

“If you want dirt on Curt Wad you should speak to a journalist called Louis Petterson.
He’s
definitely been on his back, believe me.”

“Yeah, his name already cropped up earlier on. Has he written anything on him recently?”

“Not really, no. Most of it was five or six years back, then it seems like he stopped.”

“Maybe there was nothing left to dig up.”

“That’s not the impression
I
get. As far as I can see, there’s been quite a lot of journalists trying to find out what Curt Wad’s been up to. But this Louis Petterson was the one who got the headlines.”

“OK, where does he live, this Louis Petterson?”

“In Holbæk. What for?”

“Just give me his number, there’s a good girl.”

“Oooh, say that again, would ya? I didn’t quite catch it.”

Carl contemplated riposting with something sarcastic, but stifled the urge. “I said, ‘there’s a good girl.’”

“I thought that was it. Wonders never cease, do they?” she retorted, before giving him the number. “But if you’re thinking of having a word with him, you’d do best to go to Café Vivaldi on Ahlgade, number 42, because that’s where he drinks and that’s where he is now, according to his wife.”

“How do you know that? Have you already called him?”

“Of course I have! Who do you think you’re dealing with here?” she snorted, and hung up.

“Bollocks,” said Carl, and pointed a finger at the GPS. “Assad, enter Ahlgade 42, Holbæk. We’re going for a drink,” he instructed, picturing Mona’s face when he called her in a minute to cancel his session with her psychologist friend, Kris.

She would not be amused.

 • • • 

Maybe he’d been expecting a dingy little dive impenetrable to the harsh light of day, to which weary reporters for reasons unfathomable retired to recharge their batteries. But Café Vivaldi was nothing like it.

“This is not what I expected, Carl,” said Assad, as they entered what looked like the handsomest building on the street. It even had a tower.

Carl glanced around the packed room, only to realize he had no idea what the man they’d come to see looked like.

“Get on the phone to Rose. Maybe she can give us a description,” he said, scanning the decor. Opalescent glass, stucco work on the ceiling. Tastefully done out, with pleasant lighting, comfy chairs and benches, and little details all over.

Any money that’s him over there, Carl thought to himself, eyeing a man who was sounding off at the center of a group of late-middle-aged men who had gathered on a raised area in the middle of the room. Typically blasé, weary features, and eyes forever on the lookout.

Carl turned to Assad, who stood nodding into his mobile with Rose on the other end.

“So what do you reckon, Assad? Is that him over there?”

“No.” Assad ran his gaze over the variegated collection of salad-consuming young ladies who lunched, enamored couples sipping cappuccinos with fingers entwined, and others who were on their own, immersed in newspapers, full glasses of lager in front of them.

“I think that’s him over there,” he said eventually, pointing to a youngish sandy-haired guy seated on a bench in a corner by the window, playing backgammon with a man of about the same age.

Carl knew he wouldn’t have clocked him in a hundred years.

They went over and stood for a moment as the two men shoved their counters around the board, seemingly oblivious until Carl cleared his throat.

“Louis Petterson? Can we speak to you for a minute?”

The man looked up, instantly bridging the gap from deep concentration to adrenaline-charged reality. In less than a second Petterson registered the two men’s disparate appearance and gauged them for what they were: cops. His eyes went back to the backgammon board for a moment, and after a couple of quick moves he indicated a time-out.

“I don’t think these two are here to watch us play, Mogens.”

The man’s cool was rather surprising, Carl thought. Petterson’s opponent nodded and disappeared into the throng on the other side of the raised floor area.

“I don’t do crime anymore,” he said, turning his glass of white wine slowly in his hand.

“Fine. But we’re here because you’ve done a lot of stuff on Curt Wad,” Carl explained.

Petterson smiled. “You’ll be from intelligence, then. Long time since PET have been round to see me, I must say.”

“No, we’re from homicide in Copenhagen.”

The man’s expression went from casual supercilious to wide-eyed and alert with the appearance of just a single line in his brow. Without his years of experience, Carl might not have even noticed. This wasn’t the reaction of a journalist on the lookout for a story, in which case his face would have lit up. The prospect of well-paid copy in a major paper was ever-present whenever the word “homicide” was mentioned. But that wasn’t what this guy was thinking, which told Carl a lot.

“Like I said, we want to know about Curt Wad. Can you give us ten minutes?”

“Sure, but I haven’t done anything on the man in five years. Ran out of steam, you could say.”

Ran out of steam, my arse. The rate you’re twirling that wineglass tells another story, Carl thought to himself.

“I checked up on you,” Carl lied. “You’re not on the dole, so how are you earning a living these days, Louis?”

“I work for an organization,” Petterson replied, trying to gauge how much Carl really knew.

And for that reason Carl nodded. “Right answer. Care to tell us about it?”

“Maybe. Or you could start by telling me which murder you’re investigating.”

“Did I say we were investigating a murder? Don’t think I did, did I, Assad?”

Assad shook his head.

“Relax,” said Assad. “You’re not under suspicion for anything in particular.”

It was true, but Petterson was alerted nonetheless.

“Who
is
, then, and for what? Oh, and maybe you could show me some ID while we’re at it?”

Carl held his badge high enough for everyone in the vicinity to get a good look.

“Would you like to see mine, too?” Assad inquired boldly.

Thankfully, Petterson declined. Perhaps it was about time they fabricated some form of ID for Assad. A business card with something that looked like a police logo would probably do the trick.

“We’re investigating four cases involving missing persons,” said Carl. “Does the name Gitte Charles mean anything to you? She was an auxiliary nurse, lived on Samsø.”

Petterson shook his head.

“Rita Nielsen, then? Or Viggo Mogensen?”

“Nope. When did they go missing?”

“Beginning of September 1987.”

Petterson put on a smirk. “I’d have been twelve at the time.”

“So it wasn’t you, then,” Assad smirked back.

“How about Philip Nørvig? Ring a bell?”

Petterson leaned his head back and pretended to rack his brains, but Carl saw right through him. The journalist clearly knew full well who Philip Nørvig was. He might just as well have put it up in lights.

“He was a lawyer in Korsør, lived in Halsskov,” Carl said, applying a smile of his own. “Formerly active in the Purity Party, excluded in 1982. But you were only seven then, so that won’t have been your fault either.”

“Can’t say I’ve heard of him. Should I have?”

“Considering the amount of copy you’ve put out on the Purity Party, let’s say I’d be surprised if you hadn’t.”

“OK, I may have done. Just not certain, that’s all.”

And why not? Carl thought.

“We can always check up in the newspaper archives. The police are good at that sort of thing, or maybe you didn’t know?”

Petterson paled.

“What have you written about The Cause?” asked Assad. A bit prematurely, but still.

The man shook his head. It was supposed to mean “nothing,” and maybe it was the truth.

“You realize we’re going to check this, don’t you, Louis? And let me say this: your body language tells me you know considerably more than you’re letting on. I don’t know what, and it may even be immaterial, but I think you should start talking right now. Are you working for Curt Wad?”

“Everything OK, Louis?” asked his friend, Mogens, who’d cautiously approached them again.

“Yeah, I’m fine. But these two are barking up the wrong tree.” He turned back to Carl. His voice was calm. “I’ve nothing to do with that man, nothing at all. I work for an organization called Benefice. It’s an independent body run on voluntary funding. My job is to gather information on the mistakes of the Denmark Party and the government coalition over the past decade. Let’s just say there’s enough there to keep me going.”

“Yeah, you must be a busy man. OK, so we’ll drop that angle. But who would that information be for?”

“Anyone who asks for it.” Petterson straightened up. “Listen, I’m sorry I can’t be more helpful. If you want to know about Curt Wad, you can read up on him. It sounds like you’ve got all my articles, but I’ve moved on since then. So unless you’ve got any specific questions about these missing persons of yours, I’d be grateful if you’d let me enjoy what’s left of my day off.”

 • • • 

“Bit of a turn he took there,” Carl mused, when they were back on the street a few minutes later. “All we asked him for was a quick briefing on this Curt Wad. What the fuck’s he up to, I wonder?”

“I will tell you in a short time, Carl. Right now the man is making a whole lot of phone calls. Don’t look, because he is watching us through the window. But I think we should get Lis to find out who he is calling.”

22

September 1987

That Friday morning Nete
awoke in her apartment with a thumping headache. Whether it was due to her olfactory experiments the day before, or the knowledge that on this momentous day she would be killing six individuals within twelve hours, she had no idea.

All she knew was that if she didn’t take her migraine tablets, everything would go down the drain. Two tablets may have been sufficient, but she took three, and for the next hour or two she sat staring at the clock until the capillaries of her brain finally relaxed and light could strike her retinas without it feeling like an electric shock.

Then she put the teacups out on the mahogany sideboard in her stylish living room, laid out the silver teaspoons in a neat row, and placed the decanter of henbane extract at the ready so when the time came she could pour her guests the correct amount with a minimum of fuss.

She went over the procedure in her mind for the tenth time before sitting down once more to wait, the English grandfather clock ticking away behind her. Tomorrow afternoon she would fly to Mallorca, and Valldemossa’s luscious green would fill her senses and expel the past and all its demons from her mind.

But first the burial chamber was ready for occupation.

 • • • 

The family to whom her father had been referred following her miscarriage in the stream received Nete as an outcast, and an outcast she would remain.

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