— It's clear. I was just about to wake you up. It's time for us to have breakfast and go to the department.
— Wonderful. I need half an hour.
Glenda got into the shower. She did not have any bath accessories with her. Fortunately, Larsen used a good shampoo that was also suitable for women’s hair, the same way her parents washed themselves in order to save on various shower cosmetics, and Glenda was pleased, her hair glowed with a healthy shine, unlike her eyes.
A cloudy, barely noticeable veil, after a terrible night, clouded the pupils so that upon expert examination it looked like the consequences of a week-long binge.
She turned on the light above the mirror and tried to get a better look at her eyes. Approaching the mirror almost to the point of eyelashes, Glenda recoiled all the way to the opposite wall. Worms swam chaotically in her left eye.
Small, no larger than a child's nail stub, white, twisted creatures simply swarmed in the vitreous humor.
Overcoming herself, Glenda once again looked into her pupils. There was no one there anymore, as she thought. Quite angry at her helplessness, but no longer feeling any fear, she decided.
"Enough for me. I'll go to the pharmacy before the police. I need sedatives, and the stronger the better. I'm going crazy."
— Everything is fine? — Iver was waiting for her at the table with mozzarella and croutons.
— Not good.
— I heard a crash in the bathroom, as if you had hit yourself. Are you okay?
— Yes, except for the bruises on the elbows.
— So what happened?
— Damn it, I'm just sick! “Glenda didn’t expect such behavior from herself, but she didn’t have the strength anymore.
— Fine. Stay home, get treatment. — Iver said a little alarmed.
— No way. I need to go to the pharmacy, I'm sure it will get easier.
“Fesipam truly relieved nervous tension, as well as the desire for life, interest in the investigation and Mr. Larsen as well. But I don’t agree to this either. Better a sick mind than a helpless one.”
Glenda opened the bottle and poured all the pills into the toilet.
After three hours, the effect of the medicine should decrease, but for now she will remain in a trance for a while.
Once again seeing a bloody stump instead of a thumb, the girl was not afraid. It was more like apathy. Like a soldier lying on the battlefield in the morning with wounds incompatible with life and shock from which no pain is felt, he simply dies quietly, looking at the sky.
Then she heard a familiar voice in the background.
— Bro, take the forensic report. This is not suicide. We are officially starting to find the killer.
Iver casually threw some papers on the table and walked up to the girl in a purple T-shirt.
— The meeting is over, you can go to Mr. Johanson.
— Yes, let's go.
— You're kind of lethargic.
— Yes, I took Fesipam.
— Oh my God. Are you crazy?
— And if so, then what? You are not my husband or father. I do what I want. — Glenda, usually active and lively, now showed her insolence like an amoeba.
— It's clear. You won't go to the hospital with us like that.
— Well, please, Mr. Larsen. Just don’t forget that it was I who helped you yesterday with the Cowboy.
— I didn’t say that you wouldn’t go at all. Let's just bring you to your senses first. — the man in uniform turned towards the next table. — Irene, please help Miss Miller cope with the poisoning.
A woman in high heels and a business suit led Glenda into a small room, like a utility room. She smelled divine, and her hair hung from her shoulders directly onto the girl who sat in the office chair.
— Are you Mr. Larsen's mistress? — Glenda asked just as sleepily.
— No, miss. I'm his colleague. Sit back, now I will install the system for you.
“Political?” she giggled, but as if someone had done it for her.
The employee remained silent. She stuck a thick plastic catheter into the vein, applied a band-aid, and as she removed the needle, a drop of blood fell from her nose and onto Glenda's jeans.
— Sorry.
She took off the tourniquet and raised her head. The beautiful Asian face now looked disfigured by a puncture wound right down the middle.
The first drops of the antidote worked quickly, Glenda perfectly felt the horror, undisguised by the lubricating effect of the muscle relaxant.
— What's wrong with you, miss? — Irene asked in bewilderment, and her face became normal again.
— Nothing. Thank you. — barely pulling herself together, Glenda said.
Thirty minutes later, consciousness cleared up, the vivid colors of the surrounding world returned, but, unfortunately, along with this, the whole range of emotions, especially fear.
"What is wrong with me? Or is there something wrong in Denmark? Or maybe it’s God after all. Well, forgive me! I shouldn't have left London, selling out like Judas. Sorry! Can you hear? Father-in-law at all?
— Are you okay? Can we go? — Iver asked, noticing how Glenda turned pink.
— I think more than yes.
— Great. Then go ahead.
The police station was no longer as empty as the night before. Now it looked like a beehive, everyone was doing something and were busy with some papers, and the boss, like a queen, was collecting everyone’s attention like honey.
— Here is a list of all the married influential businesswomen in Copenhagen. Three hundred and forty people. According to graphological analysis, only ten were suitable. Of these, only three do not have an alibi for last night.
— Wow. When did you get everything done?
— The guys have been working on this issue since early morning. In addition, our database is simply huge.
— But then, why are we going to Rigshospitalet?
— Because none of the list fits.
— What does this mean?
— Bro, give Glenda a package with photos, please. — Iver was driving, and Jack handed over some kind of yellow envelope.
Glenda quickly unpacked it and began to look at the photos of the “criminals.”
One depicted a forty-year-old mother with a curvaceous figure surrounded by five children of the same age. Her happy face shone with confidence in her homely comfort.
On the second one, two retired spouses were cooing; on the wife’s hand there was a ring with a “kohinoor”.
The third was very young, in the photo she stood surrounded by thugs and bodyguards, and her face strongly resembled the daughter of a tycoon. It is obvious that all three shots were taken by a secret observer, since they hardly looked like they were staged.
— And why is none of them suitable?
— Because the bullet was directed from above, which means he was a tall man, taller than the victim by a full foot.
— It could have been one of the beauty's bodyguards in red.
— Perhaps, but as soon as we come to them with interrogations, their lawyers will quickly bury us under a pile of dirty money. Moreover, no one will give us permission to detain without serious evidence.
— Okay, then we have a chance to find out everything at Rigshospitalet.
— Hope.
Gray August Copenhagen looked strangely like London at this time of year. It even seemed to Glenda that she had never gone anywhere, but the nasty Danish language on the walkie-talkie quickly brought her back to reality.
An enormous multi-storey building made of granite tiles with metal crossbars looked menacingly at the three who drove up in a BMW.
A security guard in a black robe and constantly sniffling led them to the third floor to the office of the Hospital Manager. The pale yellow walls, the smell of medicine, and the patients slowly walking down the halls made Glenda remember her mother's death ten years ago. Then she and her father visited her every day after school. The cancer consumed all her tissue, so during the last days of her life, tormented by unbearable pain and living only on morphine, Mrs. Miller was practically unconscious. Glenda cleared her throat, choking on the wet lump in her throat. “You can't cry. I mean business. Everything here is already quite difficult, it would be completely risky to go limp.”