Username, page 2
‘Rigor mortis has set in. Stiffness develops about two to four hours after death’s occurred. The whole body’s stiff, so we’re talking over eight hours. It’s a small body, so it’s hard to judge. But I can give a more accurate time once I get her in. She’s about ten years old. Choked with bare hands.’ He raised the girl’s hand and turned it in the light of the torch. ‘She’s been tied up, it seems,’ he mumbled, pointing to the red marks around both the girl’s wrists.
Roland looked the other way.
Leander was in the skip for a while without making a sound. Roland knew his old friend. They had worked together for years, and he knew the forensic pathologist was now examining the dead girl like a tracker dog, despite knowing it wasn’t the best environment to do so in. Leander crawled out the skip with an expression of discomfort on his face. Roland gave him his arm for support.
‘Bloody hell, what a place to leave a child!’
Roland didn’t answer. They had both seen a bit of everything, especially in their time together in Copenhagen. Fortunately, it had been a long time since a case like this had ended up on their desks.
The red and white striped police tape fluttered in the wind around the skip. They started walking. Leander took off the white latex gloves and pulled his facemask down under his chin. Both were silent, thinking about what they had just seen inside the container.
Roland lit a cigarette as soon as they were away from the site of the grim discovery. He looked at Leander as he squinted at the smoke. A dead child was, in his opinion, the worst sight to behold.
‘Did you find anything significant?’ he asked.
‘There’s so much dirt, garden waste and all sorts of other shit. We’ll have to review the skip once the girl’s removed.’
Roland nodded. ‘Of course.’ He took a puff of the cigarette. People had started parking illegally along Edwin Rahrs Vej, staring out their car windows or standing by their cars, watching the scene by the waste container. He was aware the murder couldn’t be kept secret for long.
‘I’m afraid it might be a sex crime,’ he said, keeping a firm eye on whether people were starting to step inside the cordoned-off zone. He feared the reactions in the city. A child murder in Zealand could shake the population in Aarhus to its core. What would the murder of a child in their own city—the city of smiles, for God’s sake—bring about?
He could already see the bold headlines on the front page of the daily papers. Child murder in the city of smiles. Little girl found strangled in skip. And why exactly in a waste container in the Gellerup area? No doubt many would take the opportunity to link the event to the immigrants, violence and crime in the region. Not exactly the best thing to happen to the already burdened area.
‘The girl’s fully clothed, but she only has white sandals on her feet,’ Leander replied.
That made Roland wonder. The weather wasn’t exactly geared towards bare legs this summer. Damn paedophiles, he thought. Even though he found it perverse, if they really wanted to look at naked children’s bodies, they could go ahead, as long as they left them alone and weren’t the reason children ended up on Leander’s table at the mortuary.
‘No one’s missing?’ Leander asked, stepping over a puddle.
‘No, no little girls in any case. Only the usual dementia sufferers getting lost, but luckily we usually find them again. So you’re not sure about the time of death?’
‘No, but the autopsy will tell us. It might also give us a tip about the crime scene. The girl was placed in the skip after she was murdered.’
‘So we also have to find a crime scene?’ Roland sighed.
Leander nodded. ‘The skip’s only where she was found. The crime scene’s of much greater significance to us. But that’s your job to figure out, old friend.’ He patted him on the shoulder to soften his words.
Roland scratched his head. ‘Yes, that’s where forensics will find irrefutable evidence—once we’ve located it.’
‘Well, I can give you a quick answer,’ Leander reassured him. ‘Her hair’s matted with mud and her clothes are soaked with water. That’s a lead. It couldn’t have happened in the rubbish bin.’
‘Mud! Water!’ Roland threw out his arms in despair, sprinkling the ashes from his cigarette everywhere. ‘In this wet summer, it could be anywhere.’
Leander looked up at the sky, which was gathering clouds again for the next rain shower. ‘It depends on what kind of mud the analyses show. Mud isn’t just mud. I found blood on her skirt, too.’
‘Blood! Her own?’ Roland feared the worst.
‘It’s difficult to say yet. Only a DNA analysis can determine that. But at first glance, she doesn’t appear to have any wounds that may have bled so profusely.’
‘What about the marks from the ropes?’
‘Skin abrasions—and they didn’t bleed. I don’t think she was tied up for very long, just long enough to leave marks.’
They reached their cars. Leander opened the door to his used Volvo. Behind them, the press had begun to show up, too. The officers stationed at the scene dealt with the aggressive questioning—they had no comment—and made a diligent attempt to keep the herd at a distance from the waste container. The blue flashes had attracted people from miles around, as if they were magnets and the people were made of light metal being drawn towards them.
‘The vultures have arrived. Let’s get away from here,’ he said with a sigh.
4
As she drove along Edwin Rahrs Vej, Kamilla immediately saw the blue flashing lights of the squad cars in the rain, and the red and white tape cordoning off the area on the other side of the road. Now she regretted not asking the journalist what the assignment was. An accident had happened here—or a crime. Not exactly what she needed most. She had hoped for the opening of a new factory somewhere in the industrial district out here, or an award ceremony for an unusually beautiful garden in the Brabrand Garden Association.
The journalist walking towards her evaluated her with grey eyes from under a red umbrella. The expression in them showed she knew what had happened in Kamilla’s life. The sensation-driven editor Thygesen couldn’t help but tell it in his own dramatic way, of course. Kamilla was tired of seeing all those eyes filled with pity, clearly saying ‘poor little you’. She hated being pitied, because she herself felt strong. Or rather because she had now learned she wasn’t quite as strong as she had thought.
The young journalist held out a hand. ‘Anne Larsen,’ she introduced herself in a confident Nørrebro accent, followed by a question: ‘Kamilla, right?’
Kamilla had no doubt at all she came from Copenhagen. The hand was thin and sinewy, fitting well with the rest of the body. She was small and slim. Despite her slender build, the journalist had a warm and firm handshake. She looked pale under the short, jet-black, boyish hairstyle. One eye appeared sad; it seemed to hang a little. Kamilla guessed she was in her mid-twenties. The black hoodie was a little too long under the yellow raincoat, the pre-washed jeans had bleach stains and were turned up at the bottom, so you could see the bare ankles in a pair of white trainers dirty with grass and mud.
‘Yes, that’s me. Kamilla Holm. How did you recognise me?’ she replied, hearing her own characteristic mixture of Horsens and Aarhus dialects, which suddenly sounded peasant-like in her ears. She had forgotten to ask that, too. What do you look like? How will I find you? She felt unprofessional and squinted in the rain. Of course she hadn’t remembered an umbrella or raincoat either.
‘Thygesen showed me a picture of you,’ said Anne with a twinkle in her eye.
‘What happened here?’ She looked at the crowd of wet people and the few officers trying to keep them at a distance. Her voice sounded nervous.
‘A dead girl was found in a skip.’
‘A girl? Dead?’ Reluctantly, she followed the skinny journalist, who began to walk with long strides towards the herd in the wet grass. ‘A child,’ she said, turning. The lust for sensation shone in her eyes. Kamilla’s legs began to fail. Her knees were like heavy bricks. ‘A child,’ she mumbled, automatically following Anne, as if the old habit of following suit behind a journalist had been reawakened without her even wanting it to be.
She watched Anne rig her equipment as she held her umbrella, taking the opportunity to get shelter from the weather. Anne vanished into the crowd, while she herself remained standing outside the flock with the umbrella in her hand and the camera bag over her shoulder. It was an unfamiliar situation for her. Before, she always knew what to do when she was on a job. It used to come instinctively. She caught sight of Anne, who had managed to get the microphone up under the nose of a young officer who was talking. Kamilla folded the umbrella as she sent the sky a careful glance. It seemed to be clearing up again; one of this summer’s many thunderstorms was drifting over. The sun began to shine through the layer of clouds, despite a few raindrops still falling. She took the camera out her bag and snapped a series of photos of the officers and the crowd of journalists and curious people who had gathered around them. Even though she knew it wasn’t exactly going to be a shot worthy of this year’s press photo award, she had to do something.
The officers were in the process of shooing the crowd further away from the skip. Anne stood behind the container, making signs to her from under the police tape between the bushes. Kamilla scowled at the officers before walking over to her. They were so busy driving people away and rejecting questions that they didn’t see them at all.
‘Shit,’ Anne whispered to the side of her face as she bent down to help her under the cordon. ‘They’ve already removed the girl.’
Kamilla felt relieved. Could she handle the sight of another dead child? Why did that have to be the assignment she had agreed to? There had been so many others she could have accepted. Because she hadn’t asked. That’s why. Had she known what it was about, she would have said no. Again.
‘Come here!’ Anne waved her closer. The bushes hid them from the officers. She had discovered a hatch on the back of the skip. The police hadn’t locked it. They probably hadn’t even noticed it, hidden by the bushes. It was rusty like the rest of the back of the large container. Its hinges creaked when Anne opened it. A lukewarm stench hit them. Kamilla stepped into something slimy. It was vomit. She was about to vomit herself.
‘It seems that hatch was opened recently,’ mumbled Anne. She waved Kamilla closer again. ‘Here, come on! Take a picture!’ she said in a low voice.
‘Into the skip? Are you serious?’ She heard her own shrill and puzzled voice, despite feeling deaf in both ears, but she did as she was asked. The flash lit up the inside of the dark container. She couldn’t see anything on the LCD screen, not even in the viewfinder, and she took some pictures at will. When the flash flared, she caught brief glimpses of black bin bags, blue-striped Aldi bags crammed with rubbish, cardboard boxes, old furniture, leftover food, leaves, branches and rotten plants.
‘We have enough now.’ Anne suddenly pulled her by the sleeve. She had spotted an officer approaching from where she was keeping a lookout.
‘What are you doing there!?’ he shouted as they ducked down under the striped tape back onto neutral ground. Anne showed him her press card.
‘No comment,’ he said, pointing to the camera hanging on its strap around Kamilla’s neck. ‘What did you photograph?’
‘Just the skip. We have to bring something back to the paper, otherwise we’ll be fired,’ said Anne defensively, pushing back her hair.
Kamilla wondered how Anne could look so innocent, even be on the offensive against the tall broad-shouldered officer towering in front of them. She was red-cheeked from the excitement and was hoping the officer wouldn’t notice. She began to wipe the vomit off her shoe on the wet grass.
The officer nodded, but he checked anyway to see whether the padlock on the front of the skip was still locked, and whether the tape showing the container had been seized by police was still intact. You never knew with reporters.
‘Okay, off you go!’ He turned his back on them and started walking. Tall, erect, and full of authority in his police uniform.
5
It had been over a year since he had last driven here. He had a lump stuck in his throat. He coughed to remove it. Why did he do this? He had taken his punishment. Sanne had left him as she couldn’t live with what he had done—or rather she couldn’t live with his guilt. When he had been asked to take leave from his job—which he could no longer concentrate on—when he came out of prison, she had thought he had been fired. She had felt the income and the good life disappear, then she had disappeared, too. He had neither been able to support her, nor give her a child.
Being in prison, isolated from everyone and treated like a common criminal, had been directly contrary to his nature and upbringing. He had found it deeply unfair he had been convicted and locked up, until what he had done had slowly dawned on him. He was reassured by the fact his father was dead. If not, he probably wouldn’t have survived that shame. His mother’s senile brain wouldn’t grasp it anyway, despite a nurse probably having told her what had happened and why her son wasn’t coming for his usual weekly visits. She just wanted to smile and nod and fiddle with the top button of her blouse. She might not have even noticed his absence. Thinking of his mother hurt just as much as thinking about his own sufferings. She was in a kind of prison, too. Her own prison. Old age without memories. Only after his father had died and she had gone into a nursing home did he notice how spoiled he had been as a child. He had been used to being waited on by his mother. Sanne wouldn’t put up with it. Her life hadn’t been quite so easy. In a way, he was relieved to take a break from work. He couldn’t bear the reproachful looks of his colleagues. They had driven home drunk that night, too, but it had gone alright for them. Damn cat! He couldn’t help the thought popping into his head, but felt ashamed afterwards. His director was also their personal friend, so he had shown understanding beyond all bounds. If he hadn’t been a friend, he would undoubtedly have been fired.
It was the psychologist he had sought help from who had advised him to return to Jutland as a form of therapy. The best thing for all parties, the psychologist had said, was that he seek out the relatives and talk with them if they wished. But he knew he would never have the courage or conscience to do so.
He realised he was driving past the spot where the car had almost slid into the ditch a year before. Shortly afterwards, he passed the accident site itself. He instinctively pressed the brake when he saw a boy with a large sports bag cycling on the bike path. The image of a football rolling out onto the road in slow motion flickered like a film clip before his eyes. It rolled infinitely slowly, stopped, lay there for a moment, rocking back and forth, as if it couldn’t decide whether to stay or roll on. A sight that haunted him like a curse. Suddenly he knew what the psychologist had meant by his advice. He needed to revisit the site and to drive this stretch in a sober state. Maybe he was just hoping time would be rewound. That he had managed to see the cat and brake in time. Or that he had run the damn cat down instead of trying to avoid it. He regretted his thoughts again. The cursed thing was he hadn’t stayed over that night, he had headed out to reach the Molslinjen ferry back to Zealand.
He also wanted to see the place where it had all begun. He only had to drive a few minutes before he saw the marina ahead, its beautiful white ships on the blue water sending dazzling glimpses at him in the sunlight. When he spotted the sign for Restaurant Egå Marina, he drove into the car park and parked. It was here they had held the fateful reception to celebrate the end of the huge assignment they had been working on for so many months. He still wondered how an Aarhus company had chosen an advertising agency in Zealand, given all the good agencies in Aarhus, but it had probably been because of their reputation. They had won quite a few advertising awards over time. They had practically worked around the clock to meet the deadlines and make it all run smoothly with models, photos and film footage. It was a campaign worth several million Danish kroner, one the advertising agency had reaped great rewards from—hadn’t he deserved that last drink?
There was a smell of grilled fish and fresh dill in the restaurant. He remembered he hadn’t eaten since the meagre breakfast. After hanging his jacket over the back of the chair, he sat down at a table already laid, overlooking the harbour. Despite there being many people, it didn’t take long for a young waiter to hand him a menu. He quickly decided on warm smoked salmon and handed the menu back to the gracious server, who bowed just the way he had been taught at waiter school. The waiter handed him the wine list, but he waved it away with his hand and asked for a jug of cold water with ice.
While waiting for the salmon, he recalled the festive reception. They had all been so happy and carefree. Nothing could touch them.
Suddenly a tall thin man with a sandwich on a plate and a cold beer sat down in the chair opposite him. Only now did he notice there was a jacket on the chair opposite and he had sat down at a table that was already occupied. He apologised and was about to get up, but the thin man asked him to stay.
‘I could do with a little company. Troels Mortensen,’ he introduced himself before launching into his sandwich.
‘Danny Cramer. Are you sure I’m not disturbing you?’
The man muttered and nodded convincingly. ‘You’re not from here, are you? Copenhagen?’
He explained he was from Zealand and on holiday here in Jutland. Shortly afterwards, the salmon was served.
‘That looks good,’ Troels said, nodding at his plate. ‘For those who can afford it. May I ask what you do for a living?’
‘I’m an advertising manager,’ he replied, knowing the other man had no idea what that meant. Not many were aware of the goings-on in the advertising industry, he had learned. They just turn their noses up at the junk mail that comes in the post and throw it in the bin. Some without even looking . Without knowing all the hard work that lay behind the colourful pages.
