A slender young man stood leaning against the reception desk. He had short blond hair. He must have heard her steps on the stairs because he turned in her direction. His light blue eyes passed over her appraisingly. She saw that he was older than she had first thought, at least thirty-five. He smiled pleasantly and walked toward her with his hand extended.
“Irene Huss, I presume?”
“Yeah. I mean. . yes.”
“Inspector Peter Møller.”
They shook hands and he motioned in the direction of the street.
“The car is outside.”
He walked in front of her and held the door for her. When they passed each other, Irene noticed that he smelled of good aftershave and that she was just a hair taller. He was also dressed in civilian clothes, a short light brown suede jacket and light tan chinos. Peter Møller walked up to a dark wine red colored BMW, the newest and largest model, and opened the door for Irene. When they were sitting in the car, Irene said, “The police certainly have nice cars here.”
“It’s my own,” said Møller.
A short silence followed and Irene decided to leave the topic of cars and move on. “I’m sorry that you had to wait. The ferry took some time. . ”
She left the sentence unfinished on purpose. Møller turned his face toward hers and smiled charmingly.
“I expect that sort of thing when I’m picking up a lady,” he said.
Knowing that Denmark had had weather as bad as Sweden’s during the spring, Irene concluded that his dark tan resulted from a trip abroad. It could just as easily have been acquired on a tanning bed at home but something about Møller’s manner told her that his tan was genuine. It would have to do as a conversation opener.
“Have you had good weather here in Denmark? You’re so dark.”
He laughed softly. “No. I’ve been to a place with guaranteed sunshine.”
“Wonderful!”
“Yes. But a bit too warm. Have you been to Copenhagen before?”
“Twenty years ago.”
“Then it was about time for you to come back.” Møller smiled.
He quickly became serious and asked, “Do you want to drive out to Hellerup now or later?”
“Hellerup?”
“That’s where the sacks with the body parts of Carmen Østergaard were found.”
“When was that?”
“June 1997. Almost two years ago.”
It was a good thing he added that it had been almost two years ago; the number ninety-seven, uttered in Danish, was completely incomprehensible to Irene’s ears.
“I think we can drive out there later if it’s necessary. It feels more important to see the sign with the dragon.”
“You’ll get to see that in just a second.”
They drove down a wide street that, according to the signs, was Bernstorffsgade. Peter Møller turned into a parking lot behind a boxlike building of gloomy brown brick. He didn’t have to tell Irene that they had parked behind the Police Department. All police department buildings built during the sixties and seventies appeared to have been designed by the same deeply depressed architect.
“Come. We’ll go and look at the sign right away,” said Peter.
They left the parking lot and started walking along a small, quiet street lined with dreary-looking houses. The dirty building fronts, rotten doors, and windowsills with chipped paint gave the whole street an atmosphere of gloomy decay. The dirty gray weather added to the unpleasant impression.
The houses farther down the street were covered with scaffolding and plastic fabric. Under the fabric, the harsh buzzing of a highpressure sprayer could be heard.
“Nice that they are renovating the old buildings,” said Irene.
“They are trying to sanitize the shacks. Get the houses in order and raise the rents so that the rabble can’t afford to stay there. These old houses are in an attractive central location.”
“Something similar has been done at home in Göteborg. Has it been successful here?”
“The poor are driven away, farther out into the suburbs. They are the drug addicts and the street prostitutes. We don’t get rid of the others as easily. They have far too much money.”
“Sex is a profitable business,” Irene concluded.
“Exactly. Do you know anything about Vesterbro?”
“No.”
“It’s known as Sin Central in Copenhagen. It used to be Nyhavn but now only millionaires and people of culture can afford to live there. Upscale bars and restaurants have opened, pushing out all but the most discreet sex operations. But if you want sex, you come to Vesterbro and, above all, to the area around Istedgade. Everything can be found here. Absolutely everything!” As confirmation, a porn movie store popped up advertising “Here you can get the video you didn’t think existed!” Peter continued walking as though he hadn’t noticed.
“Are we on the way to Istedgade?” Irene asked.
“Yes, to one of the cross streets. We’re almost there.”
A sex shop on the corner in front of them had thin gauze underwear with strategically placed holes hanging in the display window. As a counterbalance, there were more substantial items in leather but these also seemed to be made of thin straps and holes. It was probably a good thing they were well equipped with rivets so that they sort of held together. In order to embellish the display further, whips and handcuffs hung from the ceiling. Dildos in various colors and sizes lay on the floor of the display window. A large one in black rubber was almost as long and as thick as Irene’s forearm.
Bewildering pictures came to mind: A man was whipping a woman in see-through red underwear after first having chained her with handcuffs to the bedpost and then taken the black rubber dildo. . What kind of people would have to subordinate other people in order to get some enjoyment? Was it power over another person that gave them a boost? Pictures, and mechanical procedures with sex toys, provide a quick release. Warm and sensual relationships are more difficult and take longer to build. Most of all, they required emotional engagement. Masturbation is easy; relationships, difficult and time consuming.
Suddenly she became aware that Peter Møller was talking to her. With a great deal of effort she abandoned her train of thought.
“Pardon me. What did you say?”
“Are you going to buy anything?” Peter teased.
Irene felt her throat tighten with rage but she managed to sound relatively calm when she answered, “No. There’s nothing here that I want. I get depressed when I see this sort of thing.”
“It’s just for fun. Casual sex toys-”
“No! It cannot be fun to have that huge rubber dick shoved in! It must hurt terribly!”
She stopped herself and tried to calm down. Møller looked at her in confusion. With great control she said, “You may not understand this, but there is no casual sex in this display window.”
Peter Møller didn’t answer. He looked completely unsympathetic and shook his head slightly. Maybe he thought his colleague from Sweden had taken a dose of prudishness? He could think what he wanted.
They crossed Istedgade and walked one block up the street of sin.
“Here it is,” said Peter Møller. He stopped at the corner and pointed at a cross street. The street sign said Colbjørnsensgade. Irene took a few steps before she stopped short.
A large enameled sign hung on the wall over a store. It was almost three square meters in size. The Japanese character for “man” was encircled by a terrifying dragon. The background was light blue, which effectively contrasted with the colorful dragon. Every scale on the monster’s body glittered in varying colors. The horrifying mouth with its razor-sharp teeth was wide open, and the whole monster pulsated with restrained power.