He did that, painfully and weighed down with grief, so his two listeners almost felt embarrassed to admit that he had not told them anything they did not already know. When he was done, Troulsen asked as carefully as he could, “You and your daughter argued a bit in the months before she disappeared.”
“Yes, I was the one who was unreasonable. I simply could not cope with her leaving me. It was selfish, I can see that now, but not then.”
“Did she plan to move to Copenhagen?”
“Yes, she really wanted an education, and I also believe she wanted to be with others her own age. There wasn’t much of that out here.”
“She was a pretty girl, what about boyfriends or that sort of thing?”
“Not many, I think, but that was not something she shared with me.”
“Because you were jealous?”
“I’m sure I would have been.”
“Did she want to move to Copenhagen together with a boyfriend?”
“I don’t believe so. No, she wasn’t planning that.”
“Did she have any connections with Copenhagen?”
“She had an aunt there.”
“Whom she visited?”
“Occasionally, not that often.”
“Where did the aunt live?”
“Well, in Copenhagen. That’s what we’re talking about.”
“I was thinking more about where in Copenhagen. Do you have her address?”
“Platanvej, I can’t remember the number, but I can find it if it’s important.”
Troulsen looked at Simonsen, who shook his head. He let the thread fall.
“You say that she wanted to get an education. What kind of education?”
“Cosmetologist, but she was going to earn money first to pay for school, so she was applying for jobs there.”
“What kind of jobs?”
“Anything at all. She went for two interviews, but didn’t get either of them. I hoped every time that they wouldn’t hire her. It’s unbearable to think about today.”
“Do you know the companies where she got an interview?”
“One was at Irma’s headquarters. The other I can’t remember… it was a smaller place, exactly where I’ve forgotten. But I’ve saved her papers, and I think it’s there. Is it significant?”
“Maybe. In any event we would be pleased if you’d look.”
He got up without further encouragement and left the room. Soon after that they could hear him in the attic. He had left the handkerchief lying on the chair. Simonsen looked at the grandfather clock against the wall and the garden beyond. It had stopped, in the same way as the man himself had. Yes, the whole place appeared to have frozen in time after that evening in October eighteen years ago when Annie Lindberg Hansson did not come home. Troulsen looked at the pictures and sweated.
After a while the man came back with a letter, which he silently set in front of them. It was an invitation to an employment interview dated Friday, 14 April, 1990. The letter was brief and consisted only of two lines and Andreas Falkenborg’s signature in neat handwriting. Konrad Simonsen folded it up and placed it in his inside pocket without worrying about possible fingerprints; there was no doubt about the sender.
“We would like to examine this letter more closely, if that’s all right with you?”
The man clenched his fists and hissed, “Is he the one who killed her?”
“We don’t know.”
“But you think so. I can see it on your face. You think it’s him.”
Simonsen made an effort with his explanation.
“When you’re talking about something as final as killing another person, it’s not enough to think so. There has to be more than that, much more.”
CHAPTER 13
Arne Pedersen and Pauline Berg took a walk in the summer forest after conducting two interviews, which combined lasted less than five minutes and produced nothing. Andreas Falkenborg’s summer house proved to be a modest country place, one side bordering the forest they were now walking in, and the other side a farm whose fields were in front of and behind the house. Since the summer of 1991 the place had been rented out to a childless couple, both of whom were teachers. They met the woman at home, but she had nothing to say about her landlord, whom she had never met, and assured them her husband had not either. They paid the rent, which incidentally was extremely reasonable and had not been raised since they signed the lease, to a law firm in Præstø. She had nothing else to contribute, and the two officers had to leave empty-handed.
They achieved roughly the same negative result with the neighbour they encountered in the midst of repairing his tractor. He had no knowledge of Falkenborg either but was sure his parents did, without elaborating as to why. Unfortunately his father had just lain down for a nap while his mother was in town. A resolute attempt on the part of Pauline Berg to get him to waken his father had no effect, but on the other hand he said they were welcome to come back in an hour. And so it was.
Pedersen kicked at a stone on the forest path. It sailed between the beech trees in a lovely arc. He followed his success with another stone, but this time missed badly. Pauline Berg, who was posing a few steps ahead of him while she imagined his gaze running up and down her body, was abruptly torn out of her fantasy. She said, “Would you mind stopping that? It irritates me.”
In response he stepped over to her side and they strolled slowly back towards the farm with-as if by mutual agreement-enough distance between them not to risk physical contact. Even so she asked, “What about us?”
And sensed at once how he stiffened. She chose to forestall him.
“Okay, I know what you’re going to say, if you even dare. Your kids count more than me.”
“Yes.”
“I’m really very clear about that, and the strange thing is that I don’t even know if I want you, but it offends me to be rejected. Do you understand?”
“Yes, I do.”
“But that’s how it is? Like last time.”
“That’s how it is.”
She felt exposed and quickly hid behind a more teasing facade.
“Now I’ve got a house where there’s plenty of room for both of us.”
“Yes, and a lovely house, I must say. Although there is one thing I’ve thought about, Pauline. Maybe you should consider getting a dog.”
“As a substitute for you? That’s worth a thought.”
“Go ahead and joke, but you live in a very isolated spot and so close to the forest. Any Peeping Tom can sneak up and look in at you without being seen.”
“Does it bother you to think that others can look at me too?”
“It’s not about me, it’s about you.”
“I have a cat, that must be good enough.”
“Take this a little seriously. It’s meant seriously.”
She considered it briefly and then rejected the thought.
“No, Gorm will never allow it.”
“Who is Gorm?”
“That’s my cat.”
They laughed, and for the rest of the way they held hands, until they were out of the forest.
When Pedersen and Berg came back to the farmyard, the retired couple were sitting on the terrace waiting for them. The man was a round, short fellow with a bald head that seemed to sit right on his body, as if his neck had been cut away. The woman looked stern. They were sitting at a garden table, set with a pitcher of water and two cut-crystal wine glasses. The woman was working on a large dish of strawberries, which she expertly trimmed and let fall into a bowl below her chair. She barely greeted them when they arrived. The man on the other hand was more lively, and extended a short, fat arm towards two vacant chairs.
“Sit down. Mother has put out iced water, if you want a little against the heat.”
They poured and drank, while they let the man talk.
“My son tells me that you’ve come from Copenhagen to question Director Falkenborg, who once lived in the neighbouring house, and we know all about him. He was a very unsympathetic type, isn’t that right?”