Death Sentence, page 6
In time, a friendship developed. Finn Gelf took a chance on In the Dead Angle and The Walls Have Ears and he continued to believe in me, despite the losses his company suffered in the early years. He later told me, once we knew each other better, that he saw in me a stubbornness and a hunger for recognition. Those two traits combined provided fuel; all I needed was direction. He judged I would discover the right formula at some point and he wanted to be there when it happened. Besides, the age difference between us – ten years – wasn’t too big so he found it easy to empathize with the idealism I radiated the first time we met. Perhaps he saw himself in me a decade younger, or the man he hoped he once was.
My breakthrough novel also signalled the breakthrough for our friendship. Together, we travelled around Denmark and abroad and it was on these trips that we grew closer and started talking about other subjects than literature and the publishing industry.
Finn Gelf was the son of the travel publisher Gustav Gelf. Even as a boy, Finn was part of his father’s business. When he was old enough he started packing books for mail order, a job that earned him extra pocket money and his father’s respect. He was later apprenticed to a printer, but the printing works were owned by a brewery and he ended up producing beer labels, day in and day out. Finn, soon bored out of his mind, quit his apprenticeship and returned to his father’s business. He was given an office job on the condition that he continued his education. He managed both some A levels and a business degree and soon became an invaluable part of the company.
The ageing Gustav had imagined that his business would be carried on by his son, but when Finn introduced plans to expand their list to include other types of books, such as fiction, they fell out to such an extent that Finn left and started ZeitSign.
Despite his young age, Finn had built up a reliable network within the industry and he managed to get his publishing house up and running through solid agreements with printers and buyers. It wasn’t a highly profitable business, but he survived and was even able to make small investments in new writers. In the Dead Angle was one such gamble, and had it not been for Finn Gelf, I might never have been published at all.
I took a taxi from the hotel to Gammel Mønt. On the way, I wondered if I should tell Finn about the murder in Gilleleje. It would be right thing to do, but if the police hadn’t turned up yet, it might mean they had already solved the crime. Perhaps there was no link to the book after all; ultimately I only had Verner’s word that the details matched.
ZeitSign’s reception lay behind toned glass doors. The floor and walls were covered with pale sandstone and a polished black counter lay like an overturned monolith in the lobby. The 45-year-old receptionist, Ellen, a noble-looking woman who never lost her composure, sat behind the counter. On the wall behind her, the name ‘ZeitSign’ was displayed in large black letters.
‘Frank!’ she exclaimed when I pushed open the heavy glass doors and entered. She got up, came towards me and gave me a big hug. I returned it with gratitude. It was a long time since a woman had hugged me, possibly not since last year’s book fair, and that had probably been Ellen too.
‘How are you?’ she asked sounding overjoyed, and I mumbled that everything was just fine.
‘You look a bit tired,’ she remarked. ‘Late night, was it?’
‘Something like that,’ I replied. ‘How are you?’
Ellen started telling me about her most recent holiday with her husband and two children, who must by now both be close to twenty. I didn’t quite catch where they had been or what they had done, but I went along with her excitement and the joy, all the reassuring and comforting stories of family life. I made appropriate noises to keep her chatting until the telephone rang.
‘I had better …’ she said, nodding towards the telephone. ‘He’s expecting you upstairs … And don’t forget to pick up your post on your way out.’
I thanked her and went to the lift, which took me to the first floor.
In contrast to the light and open space of the lobby, the editorial corridor was narrow and dark. On either side were small offices where editors sat hunched over scripts or keyboards. A few of them looked up as I walked past and one or two even nodded, though I had never seen them before.
Finn’s office lay at the end of the corridor. The door was open and he was just about to go out when I arrived.
‘Frank, good to see you,’ he said and we shook hands.
His hair had turned completely white since I last saw him a year ago. He had been going grey for the last five years, but now his hair had definitively given up and surrendered to the white invasion.
He showed me into his office, which was large enough to house an enormous desk, a meeting table seating six people and an old leather sofa that had followed Finn throughout his career. Framed covers of ZeitSign’s greatest successes, including a couple of my books, hung on the walls. I left my blazer on a coat stand behind the door and sat down at the meeting table where coffee cups and pastries had been laid out. He poured me a cup of coffee without asking. I added a little milk and sipped it. Normally, I never take milk, but Finn made coffee strong enough to give me stomach ache. He sank one cup after another; he must have had his stomach galvanized.
‘So, what do you say to that?’ he asked.
‘To what?’
Finn smiled and picked up something that looked like a sheet of cardboard from the table and held it up in front of me. It was a newspaper cutting, laminated in hard plastic as if he intended to display it on his wall with the other trophies.
The headline read: ‘Young woman mutilated and drowned in Gilleleje Marina.’
9
‘SOUNDS FAMILIAR, DOESN’T it?’ Finn said. He looked at me expectantly while I read the article. It was from a tabloid and revealed nothing beyond what I had already read elsewhere.
I nodded. ‘It is our murder,’ I confirmed. ‘I spoke to Verner yesterday. Everything matches, including the bust and the diving gear, though that information hasn’t been made public.’
Finn snapped his fingers. ‘I knew it!’ he exclaimed, grinning. ‘I said to myself, that murder, that’s Føns. It has to be.’
‘I haven’t got anything to do with it.’
‘No, no,’ Finn said. ‘I know that, but it has your name written all over it.’ He reached out both hands as if to grab my head and place a big kiss on it. ‘Imagine what this will do to the book sales.’
‘Unless it’s banned.’
Finn’s smile froze. ‘What are the police saying?’
‘I’ve only spoken to Verner,’ I replied. ‘So far, we’re the only ones who know about the similarities, but Verner is very keen to tell the Murder Squad.’
‘Oh,’ Finn said. ‘Can’t you get him to hold off for a couple of days? The book is being published tomorrow, for God’s sake.’
‘He said he would contact them last night.’
Finn waved his hand. ‘It’ll be a close call,’ he said. ‘But if we can keep them at bay for twenty-four hours, we can still profit from it.’
Perhaps it was the coffee or the generous breakfast buffet, but I felt a churning sensation in my stomach.
‘Perhaps we should pull the plug on it ourselves?’
‘Are you crazy? This is far too good to miss out on.’ He stared at me as if I had just insulted his closest relative.
‘But … a woman has been murdered … are you sure that—’
Yes,’ he said in a brusque tone. ‘Stopping the book isn’t going to bring her back to life.’
‘Of course not, but what about her family?’
Finn looked annoyed.
‘They might sue you,’ I said.
He blinked at the prospect of spending money on lawyers and damages.
‘We’ll have to deal with that when it happens,’ he said with resignation. ‘We’re not stopping anything until the police ask us to. Christ, Frank, if we’re to base our decision on the information that has been made public, then there is no link.’
‘Except that it has my name “written all over it”,’ I remarked.
Finn rolled his eyes. ‘Only to those who know you,’ he said.
I shrugged. ‘So what do you want me to do? Lie?’
‘No, no. Just act normally, stick to the programme and kindly refrain from going to the police.’
‘That sounds like perverting the course of justice.’
‘Not at all,’ Finn exclaimed. ‘If it wasn’t for your friend Verner, no one would have made the connection until after publication.’
I shook my head. It was obvious that Finn had made up his mind, and somehow that was a relief. There was nothing left for me to do.
‘Besides,’ Finn said. He sliced through the air with both hands. ‘Even without the additional twist, I have a really good feeling about this book.’ He smiled and tapped the table three times. ‘You’ve really hit on something this time. People get the whole phobia and fear theme. I’ve spoken to some of the newspapers today and they’re reviewing it favourably. Weekendavisen wants your head on a plate as always, but otherwise it’s good news across the board. It’ll be a very busy book fair, I promise you. Our people have built a Frank Føns corner on the stand with large banners, “Face your fear” and so on. You’ll love it.’
I was far from sure that I would. The book fair was a necessary evil for me and I was uncomfortable with all this attention. Especially now.
‘Interviews have been arranged.’ Finn’s smile disappeared. ‘TV3 is sending Linda Hvilbjerg.’ He held up his hands. ‘I know you don’t like her, but we’ve no choice and she’s popular.’
I nodded. ‘It’s OK. I’ll just imagine her with a noose around her neck and I’ll be fine.’
Finn laughed. ‘I don’t think she’s forgiven you for Media Whore yet.’
Linda Hvilbjerg had hosted book shows on various TV channels for years and at one point I blamed her for the breakdown of my marriage. That was nonsense, of course. But I was so embittered in the years following the divorce that when I wrote Media Whore I put in so many similarities with Linda Hvilbjerg that any reader could see the character was based on her. In the book, the over-ambitious TV reporter, Vira Lindal, died suspended from a beam in the production suite with a script rammed up her vagina. Linda Hvilbjerg didn’t review the book on her show and has never had a good word to say about my books since, if she even mentions them in the first place.
‘I haven’t put you on the guest list for the party on Saturday,’ Finn continued. ‘But if you want to go, just let me know. We can always get you in.’
I shook my head. ‘I’m busy.’
I wasn’t, but I knew that after a long day at the book fair, going to a party with the same people was the last thing I wanted to do.
We spoke for another hour. Mostly about the book fair, interviews and foreign interest in In the Red Zone. There had already been offers from Germany and Norway, a good indicator of further foreign sales. My breakthrough novel, Outer Demons, and its successor, Inner Demons, had sold reasonably well outside Denmark, but since then there have been no takers. The future prospects of In the Red Zone sounded promising, and the more Finn talked to me about contracts and expectations, the more hopeless it appeared to be to try and stop the huge machine that had been set in motion.
On the way out, I picked up my post from reception. Ellen had put a small stack of letters and a single packet in a black plastic bag with the company’s logo.
‘I hope it’s a hit,’ she said, smiling.
‘So do I,’ I replied and returned her smile. Ellen is one of those thoroughly decent people who do their job without complaint and is always kind. I have never heard her speak ill of anyone and she has an aura of authority and professionalism that is a great asset to the company.
‘We need it,’ she whispered, looking around embarrassed.
I leaned over the counter. ‘What do you mean?’
‘We need a bestseller,’ she whispered. ‘It’s been a while since we’ve had one and I think money is a bit tight.’
‘Finn didn’t say anything about that.’
Ellen shook her head. ‘He would be the last person to admit it,’ she said. ‘Or he’s just pretending he isn’t worried to protect the rest of us.’ She heaved a sigh. ‘If your new book doesn’t sell, the future looks bleak. That’s why he’s making such a big thing of it. He would do anything to promote that book.’
Getting this far hasn’t been easy.
My intention of switching off all emotion and letting the words flow unstinted has proved harder than I expected. There is nothing wrong with my memory, but my subconscious tries to manipulate the images that emerge when I add the words. The timing appears slightly better, the dialogue more polished or the mood lighter.
However, this kind of fraud won’t go unpunished. I feel there is someone in the room with me, hiding in the shadows. A critic looking over my shoulder, constantly aware of the errors I make and upsetting my concentration every time I’m disloyal to the project. Then my body fills with dread, a nervousness that doesn’t cease until I go back and rewrite the chapters where I was insincere, passages where I omitted details or toned down my behaviour.
It’s not until I have corrected discrepancies and lies that I’m permitted to carry on, even more naked now and in the certain knowledge that it can only get worse.
10
WHEN I WAS young, I had no intention of getting married. Marriage was an artificial construct that, at worst, was based on religion, i.e. a lie, and at best was a bureaucratic manoeuvre to improve your tax status, i.e. hypocrisy. This was the general attitude among us in the commune and we took every opportunity to voice it. Later, when I got married, it wasn’t for rational reasons – I simply couldn’t help it.
I remember the months after meeting Line as one long series of revelations. She surprised me again and again with her humorous nature and the convergence of our interests. When we made love it was with an intimacy and intensity I had never experienced before. I couldn’t believe a relationship could be like this. We could talk about everything, and we did; we usually had the same attitude towards political issues, but on the rare occasions we disagreed we could have a debate without the mood turning ugly. We spent practically all our time together, interrupted only by our respective studies and work.
Line was the youngest of four siblings; she had two sisters and a brother and it soon became clear to me that her family was very close-knit. Rarely a day went by without her being in contact with one of her sisters and at least once a week we’d have dinner with her father. I’d been invited over for dinner after only two weeks, and everyone welcomed me and treated me with the greatest kindness. The family was mourning for the mother, but they still had the generosity to include me in their group. Line’s father, Erik, was an engineer who worked for the government. He designed motorway bridges, an occupation that had also become his hobby. In Erik’s study in the villa on Amager were miniature models of over twenty bridges and he could tell the story of every single one of them – not without a certain amount of pride.
Line’s sisters were also dancers and resembled her so much that I always felt a little awkward in their company. It was like being with three versions of Line at yearly intervals; I could tell how she would age and that certainly wasn’t bad at all. Her brother had followed in his father’s footsteps and worked as an engineer for a consultancy firm in Lyngby. The first time I met him he had just accepted a posting to Africa where he would build a water purification plant, but he had postponed his departure by a month following the death of his mother.
I recall get-togethers with Line’s family as relaxed and yet lively and engaging. With so many children, their partners and grandchildren, there was an incredible maelstrom of people, but it never became superficial or meaningless. They accepted without question that I wanted to make my living by writing – something my parents never did – and when Line’s family asked how my work was going, they were referring to my books and not to whatever casual job I happened to be doing at the time.
Unfortunately I was struggling with the writing and I produced little in the first few months. I only managed some editing of In the Dead Angle and the scathing reviews it received did nothing for my motivation. If I hadn’t been with Line, I would probably have fallen into a black hole of self-pity and rage, but with her around, the negative feedback didn’t matter all that much. It was impossible to be upset for very long in her company; she could always make me laugh with a remark or one of her smiles.
Bjarne was almost as fond of Line as I was. Line was a superb cook while I regarded myself as being something of a wine connoisseur and Bjarne benefited from both. The three of us would often eat together and sometimes our after-dinner debates would last well into the night.
Mortis didn’t join in. He isolated himself, shut himself in his room to write, he claimed, and became increasingly sullen. His mood deteriorated to such an extent that even I, in my deep infatuation, couldn’t help noticing, and it was at that point that I discovered it was Mortis who had invited Line to the Angle party in the first place. I tried to talk to him about it, but I was probably more concerned with describing how lovely Line was and ultimately only succeeded in making matters worse.
He must have breathed a sigh of relief when three months after the Angle party I announced I was moving out of the commune and into Line’s flat on Islands Brygge. According to Bjarne, Mortis cheered up visibly after my departure. He resumed talking to me when I visited without Line, but the relationship between us was never the same again. My room was rented out and during the years that followed there was a high turnover of lodgers. They were all obsessed with writing, the original inspiration behind the commune, but the companionship was never as harmonious as it had been in the first few years.
The last lodger, Anne, fell in love with Bjarne’s gentle nature, and he fell in love with her. Like Line, Anne was a fantastic cook and Bjarne had to admit there was some truth in the proverb that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. You could tell Anne was rather too fond of food simply by looking at her. She was big, not obese as such, but because she was of medium height, her weight tended to look rather excessive and I think it upset her more than she ever let on. She was always happy and welcoming, one of those people who remembers what you told them and asks interested follow-up questions the next time you meet.
