‘Okay.’ Elin turns to Morten, who is looking at the messages on the laptop screen, standing at her shoulder. ‘So we can’t do it?’ she asks, twisting in her seat to look up at him.
‘No,’ Morten says. ‘If Dahlin sues, and you can’t use this material in court, you’ve got nothing else. So no.’
‘So where does that leave us? Jeppe?’
David Jespersen, looking worried, sets his jaw and directs his eyes to the windows. He models himself, to some extent, on David Beckham. The sharply tailored jacket. The 1930s haircut. The groomed blonde stubble.
Jeppe starts to talk about the national security implications of the story.
Elin interrupts him.
‘Yes, okay,’ she says impatiently. ‘If he sues, we have no defence. That’s the point. What do you think?’ she asks Kristian, who has said nothing so far.
He too has left his seat and is leaning over the laptop screen, looking through the texts. There are hundreds of them. It’s embarrassing, in a way, to see them. The language of them. I want you. You’re breaking my heart. All that sort of stuff.
He straightens himself up. ‘It’s a major story,’ he says. ‘He’s a senior minister. It’s got to be a major story.’
‘So you think we should do it?’ Elin asks him.
‘I think we’ve got to.’
‘He’ll sue and you’ll probably lose,’ Morten says, taking a seat again in his tracksuit, knees spread. ‘It’ll be very expensive if you do. I have to tell you that.’
Elin is still looking at Kristian. He has a very serene energy, Kristian. A soft, slightly pudgy face. In his narrow-lapelled suit, his thin blue tie, he might be an unusually elegant accountant, or even a young undertaker. It’s easy to imagine him dealing tactfully with the family of the deceased, knowing what to say, and how to say it. ‘Sure,’ he says to Morten. ‘I understand. We just need something more. Another source.’
‘Like who?’ Elin asks.
‘How about Edvard himself? What if he admits it?’
‘Why would he do that?’ Jeppe says
Kristian ignores him. ‘He doesn’t know this is all we’ve got,’ he says to Elin. ‘He doesn’t know what we know, or how we know it.’ Now he looks at Jeppe. ‘Does he?’
Jeppe just stares at him with open hostility until he looks at Elin again.
‘We make him think we’re going to do the story anyway,’ Kristian says, ‘and say we’re offering him a chance to have his say, to put his side of it…’
‘What if he just denies it?’ Jeppe asks.
‘Then he denies it,’ Kristian says. ‘I don’t think he will.’ He says, to Elin again now, ‘I know him quite well.’
She says quietly, ‘You do, don’t you.’
He shrugs modestly.
‘I mean, that’s the other thing,’ Elin says. ‘We like Dahlin, don’t we?’
‘We can’t ignore the story just because of that,’ Jeppe says.
‘We can’t ignore the story for all sorts of reasons,’ Kristian says. ‘It does mean we should talk to him first. He’d expect that. We want to handle it as sympathetically as possible. That’s what we tell him. If he thinks we’re going to do it anyway, it just wouldn’t make sense for him to deny it.’
‘You should talk to him,’ Elin says to Kristian.
Jeppe sighs petulantly.
‘Has anybody else got this?’ Elin asks him.
Jeppe says, ‘No. I don’t think so.’
‘You don’t think so?’
‘No,’ he says. ‘They don’t.’
‘Still, we should move quickly with it,’ Kristian suggests. ‘We don’t want anyone else stumbling on it. And we want to do it before she dumps him, if she does. I’ll talk to Edvard today?’
Elin says, ‘Okay, talk to him. Let’s see what he has to say for himself. And well done, you two,’ she says to the others. ‘Okay, that’s it.’
As they start to leave, she asks Kristian to stay.
Hanging back, Morten says to her, ‘If you want to do this, I advise you not to name the woman. She’s a private citizen. She’d have some sort of case against you for invasion of privacy, even if your story is a hundred per cent true and not otherwise actionable.’
‘Okay,’ Elin says. ‘I’ll think about it. Thanks, Morten.’
When they are alone, she asks Kristian to set up the meeting with Dahlin and he phones Ulrik Larssen, the defence minister’s media advisor. Kristian knows Ulrik fairly well. They talk, typically, several times a week.
‘Ulrik,’ he says. ‘Kristian.’
A few pleasantries, then he says, ‘Listen, Ulrik, I need a meeting with Edvard. Face to face. Oh.’ He looks at Elin. ‘He’s in Spain, is he?’ he says, for her to hear. ‘Well, can I meet him down there? I can fly out this morning. It is important,’ he says. ‘It’s very important. He’ll want to hear what I have to tell him. No, I can’t tell him over the phone. Okay, let me know what he says. Thanks, Ulrik.’
He hangs up, and says, ‘He’s in Spain for a few days.’
‘Officially?’
‘No, he’s on holiday.’
While they wait for Ulrik to call back Elin says to him, ‘There’s going to be a fairly major shake-up around here, Kristian. Our new proprietor — he wants to take out a lot of costs. He needs to. We need to. You know that.’
He nods at her, smiles.
She says, ‘We’re going to have to lose some people. Quite a few people.’
‘I know,’ he says.
They have taken adjacent seats at the long table. His phone is on the table in front of them, waiting for Ulrik.
‘You’re always so smartly dressed,’ she says, smiling at him admiringly.
‘I try my best.’
‘Jeppe’s a slob.’
He says nothing, just aligns his phone with the edge of the table.
‘What do you think of him?’
‘You thinking of losing him?’ he asks, his eyes still on his phone.
‘He’s hanging by a thread,’ she admits.
‘This might help. If it comes off.’
‘I’m sure David did all the work.’
‘I’m sure,’ he agrees.
‘Can you see David doing Jeppe’s job?’ she asks.
She is looking at him, in that way of hers — as if he is the only thing in the world that interests her. It’s very flattering. ‘I’m not sure,’ he says.
‘I can’t,’ she says. ‘If I’m honest.’
‘Maybe he’d grow into it,’ Kristian suggests.
‘We don’t have the space to experiment.’
‘No,’ he agrees.
‘You get quite a lot of stories from Dahlin, don’t you?’ she asks.
‘A fair few. He’s a decent source. We have a relationship.’
‘Won’t this damage that?’
Kristian knits his soft white hands and frowns thoughtfully. ‘No,’ he says finally. ‘That’s about self-interest, on both sides. That won’t change. And if it does,’ he says, ‘it’s worth it. I think.’
‘I could send someone else.’
A faint smile acknowledges her thoughtfulness. He shakes his head — his haircut is corporate, mouse-coloured. ‘No.’
‘Might this cost him his job?’ she asks.
‘No, I don’t think so.’ He thinks about it some more. ‘No. If he was married, maybe. But he isn’t.’
‘What about Natasha Ohmsen?’ Elin asks.
‘Yeah, I was thinking about that,’ Kristian says, taking off his glasses. ‘We should keep an eye on her. Find out where she lives. We have her number, obviously — we can flip the phone. See what she’s up to. If Edvard tells me to fuck off — which he might, he’s pig-headed when he wants to be — we might get what we need from her.’