Irene lowered her head but didn’t say anything for the simple reason that she didn’t know what she should say.
“I’m pretty sure I know who the murdered man in Göteborg is. His name is Marcus Tosscander.”
Tanaka had difficulty pronouncing the last name. He held out a business card to Irene, which read:
Tosca’s Design
Marcus Tosscander, Designerin dark blue letters on a card of linen-paper. Simple, nice, and of the highest quality. The address and telephone number for Tosca’s Design were listed farther down on the card.
“Kungsportsplatsen in Göteborg,” Irene said aloud.
She looked up from the card and met Tom’s gaze.
“Why do you think it’s his body we found?”
“The tattoo. He was allowed to borrow the painting from me and take it to Copenhagen’s most skilled tattoo artist, whom I recommended.”
“What’s his name?”
“It’s a she. Woon Khien Chang. Her father is a Chinese tattoo artist in Hong Kong. Woon was trained by her father.”
“Can you give me her address?”
“Of course. It’s no secret. But you can’t tell your Danish colleagues that you learned about her from me.”
“Why not?”
Tanaka hesitated before he started to tell her the story. “Marcus came into my shop for the first time at the end of January. It was. . I don’t know how I’m going to explain. . it was like the whole store lit up. He was so beautiful and radiated warmth around him. He came up to me and said, ‘Hi, Tom Tanaka, I’d like to speak to you.’ He knew my name before he came into the store. I didn’t think much about it, but after the visit from you and the Danish policeman yesterday, I started thinking and I then remembered.”
Tanaka paused and watched Irene as she took notes on a wrinkled pad of paper. Marcus Tosscander. Finally they had a name to go with-the torso.
“I was both happy and surprised that he wanted to meet me. We came in here. It was easy to talk with him. His English was perfect. Suddenly he asked if he could borrow my silk painting because he wanted an unusual tattoo as a souvenir of Copenhagen. Apparently he had seen the sign outside the shop and fallen for it. I still don’t know why I agreed to lend it to him but I did. And I gave him Woon’s address.”
He fell silent. When he started speaking again, Irene heard a sorrowful undertone in his voice.
“After every visit to Woon he would return the painting. It took two weeks to complete the tattoo. He couldn’t go to her every day because he didn’t have time since he had several large projects here in Copenhagen. He continued to come to see me even after the tattoo was finished. He would always come and go by the back way. I’ll show it to you later because you’re also going to use it.”
“When was the last time you saw him?”
“February 28. It was a Sunday. We ate dinner here in my kitchen and he told me that he was going back to Göteborg to get his summer clothes. It seemed as though he was seriously considered moving here. He said that it was mainly for my sake.”
His voice broke after the last sentence. Tanaka lowered his heavy head to hide his tears and sat in that position for a long time. Then lifted his head and looked at Irene with a furious glare.
“He left on Monday, March 1, and since then I haven’t heard from him. Now I know why. That’s why I’m telling you, a Swedish police officer whom I trust. You have to catch the murderer!”
“Why don’t you want to talk to the Danish police?”
“Marcus moved to Copenhagen just after New Year’s. He was living with a. . friend. This friend was a police officer. Marcus was always talking about my little policeman. The officer wasn’t allowed to know anything about us as long as Marcus was living with him. Sometimes I got the feeling that he was afraid of that officer. He often said, ‘He’s almost worse than my doctor in Göteborg.’ ”
“Wait a second! Did he really say ‘worse than my doctor in Göteborg’?”
“Yes. Word for word and on several occasions. I read it as though the officer and the doctor were jealous. Maybe of each other. But maybe Marcus meant something else.”
The officer and the doctor had shown up again. But Carmen Østergaard was a woman and Marcus a man. Was it the same officer and doctor? A coincidence? How did all of this fit together?
“Do you know the officer’s name?” Irene asked.
“No. He didn’t want to tell me. ‘You would be surprised. It’s best that you don’t know,’ he said when I asked. But one time it slipped out that the officer had a connection to Vesterbro. ‘We have to be cautious,’ he said.”
“You got the impression that the officer worked in this district?”
Tanaka considered. “I don’t remember every word. But that he had some connection here was very clear.”
“Do you know where the officer lives?”
“No. Just that it was somewhere around the Botanical Gardens.”
“Do you know how old Marcus was?”
“Thirty-one.”
“Do you know anything about his family and friends in Göteborg?”
“No. Nothing. We talked about almost everything but that.”
“What did you talk about?”
“We had a lot of things in common. Trips, for example. Marcus loved to travel. We had talked about going to Japan in the fall. . ”
Tanaka interrupted himself and stood abruptly. He said, “Here is my cell phone number. Only a handful of people have this number. You can reach me around the clock. Call immediately if there’s anything you can tell me.”
Irene took the note. Tanaka bowed to her and she bowed back. She appreciated the respect and trust Tom Tanaka was showing her.
He led her though the small corridor and into a huge bedroom. The scent of expensive male cologne was prevalent. The room was dominated by a huge bed without covers, made up with black silk sheets. The walls were white plastered and displayed two large framed photographs. Both were studies in black and white of naked young men. On one of the walls there was a door. Irene noticed that it was supplied with both a keypad lock and a heavy-duty burglarproof lock. Tanaka unlocked both locks and opened the door. Behind it there was a little landing and a flight of narrow stone steps.
“If you need to meet with me, call me. We’ll make an appointment and I’ll open the door for you.”
Again they bowed to each other. Irene pushed the glowing button for the stairwell lighting and went down the little half flight of stairs. She opened a door to a small, dark courtyard. The smell of food from a restaurant on the other side of it was nauseating, as was the odor rising from the piles of trash lying against the wall. The scratching and rustling from inside the piles implied that there were inhabitants of the trash pile who were happily living the good life.
As Irene hurried across the courtyard toward the entrance to the street, she saw ashes from a cigarette float to the ground.
Someone was standing just inside the doorway.
She turned around but the door she had used to enter the courtyard had locked behind her. The restaurant didn’t have a back door. She would have to confront the person who was waiting in the darkness. She didn’t know if the person was armed, but would have to assume so.
She started toward the street entrance. She was close enough to hear suppressed breathing as she passed someone in the shadows. When she was about to take the last step into the street, a man jumped out and stood in front of her, blocking her path. The streetlight outside reflected on a knife blade and glimmered faintly on his shaved head. He had been standing outside; that meant there were two of them.