It was like a shopping list.
‘Can we have “A Spotless Rose is Growing”?’ Pernille asked as she and Theis held the hymn book between them.
The minister wore a brown jacket and grey polo sweater. He peered over the page and said, ‘That’s number hundred and seventeen. A lovely hymn. One of my favourites.’
‘I want it to be beautiful in here with plenty of flowers,’ she added.
‘That’s up to you. I can give you the name of some florists.’
‘She loves flowers.’
Next to her on the hard bench Theis Birk Larsen stared at the stone floor.
‘Blue irises. And roses.’
‘Is there anything else?’ Birk Larsen asked.
The minister checked his notes.
‘Nothing. Just the eulogy, but I suggest you write down some things. Do it at home. When you have the time.’
He checked his watch.
‘You mustn’t mention what happened to her,’ Pernille told him.
‘Only Nanna as you remember her. Of course.’
A long silence. Then she said, ‘Nanna was always happy. Always.’
He scribbled a note.
‘That’s a good thing for me to say.’
Birk Larsen got up. The priest did too. Shook his hand.
Pernille looked around the cold dark building. Tried to imagine a coffin there, saw the stiff, cold body inside.
‘If you need to talk to someone,’ the minister said, like a doctor offering an appointment. There was a look of studied, practised sympathy in his eyes. ‘Remember that all is well with her. Nanna’s with God now.’
The man nodded as if these were the wisest, most fitting words he could find.
‘With God,’ he repeated.
They walked to the door in silence.
She stopped after two steps, turned, looked at the priest in the brown jacket and dark trousers.
‘What good does that do me?’
He was taking back a chair. The notepad was in his pocket, like a carpenter’s measuring book. Probably working out the bill in his head.
‘What good?’ she cried.
‘Sweetheart,’ Birk Larsen said, trying to take her fingers.
She shook him free.
‘I want to know!’ Pernille roared at the man on the steps, frozen on the way to the altar, trapped by her fury. ‘What good does that do me? You with your sanctimonious words . . .’
He didn’t recoil. He found a kind of courage. Came back, faced her.
‘Sometimes life’s meaningless. Without pity. It’s a terrible thing to lose one’s daughter. Faith helps to give you hope. Strength.’
Her breath was short, her heart pounding.
‘To know that life isn’t without meaning—’
‘Don’t give me this shit!’ Pernille Birk Larsen screeched. ‘I don’t give a damn if she’s with God. Do you understand?’
Her hands clutched at her breast. Her voice began to break. The man stayed where he was in front of the altar. Theis Birk Larsen froze, buried his face in his hands.
‘Do you understand?’ Pernille wailed. ‘She’s supposed to be with . . .’ In the dark cold church a bird flapped somewhere, dry wings rustling in the eaves. ‘. . . with me.’
Lund was chewing Nicotinell. She looked at the ginger-haired kid, Oliver Schandorff. Screwed-up face, twitching fingers, seated in an empty classroom, nervous as hell.
‘You left school early yesterday, Oliver. You weren’t in class on Monday.’
‘I felt ill.’
‘Idleness isn’t a disease,’ Meyer said.
Schandorff scowled, looked ten years old.
‘You’ve got an absence rate of seventeen per cent,’ Lund added, looking at the records.
‘Class lout,’ Meyer chipped in with a wicked grin. ‘Rich kid. Dumb, forgiving parents. I know you.’
‘Look,’ Schandorff cried. ‘I had an argument with Nanna. That’s all.’
Lund and Meyer exchanged glances.
‘Lisa told you?’ Meyer said. ‘What else did she say?’
‘I didn’t do anything. I’d never hurt Nanna.’
‘Why did she dump you?’ Lund asked.
He shrugged.
‘One of those things. Like I care.’
Meyer leaned forward, sniffed Schandorff ’s expensive sky-blue sweater.
‘Guess she didn’t like you doing dope either.’
Schandorff ran his hand across his mouth.
‘Arrested for speed four months ago. Again two months later.’ Meyer sniffed again. ‘I’d say you’re into some kind of I dunno . . .’
He looked at the kid, puzzled, as if seeing something. Leaned forward, a couple of inches from his face, Schandorff recoiling, scared.
‘Wait,’ Meyer said urgently, peering into his eyes. ‘What’s that?’
‘What?’
‘There’s something. A tiny speck . . . I dunno. At the back of your eyes.’
Meyer reached out with a probing finger. Schandorff was at the back of his seat, couldn’t go any further.
‘Oh,’ Meyer said, with a sigh of relief. Retreated. ‘It’s nothing. Just your brain . . .’
‘Fuck you,’ Oliver Schandorff muttered.
‘Did you hand some of that shit to Nanna?’ Meyer roared. ‘Did you say . . . hey, let’s turn on . . . oh and it’s better with your pants down by the way.’
The ginger head went forward.
‘Nanna didn’t like it much.’
‘Which?’ Lund asked. ‘The dope or the . . .?’
‘Either.’
‘So you got punchy with her?’ Meyer had his chin on his hands. A pose that said: going nowhere. ‘On the dance floor. Threw a chair around. Yelled at her.’
‘I was drunk!’
‘Oh.’ Meyer brightened. ‘That’s OK then. So after nine thirty what did you do?’
‘I worked behind the bar.’
Lund pushed the sheet across the table.
‘You’re not on the schedule.’
‘I worked behind the bar.’
Meyer again.
‘Who saw you?’
‘Lots of people.’
‘Lisa?’
‘She saw me.’
‘No, she didn’t,’ Lund said.
‘I was walking round. Collecting glasses . . .’
‘Listen, brainiac.’ Meyer was loud again, in a different way. Cold and threatening. ‘Nobody saw you after nine thirty.’
Got up, pulled a chair next to Schandorff, sat so close they touched. Put an arm round his shoulder. Squeezed.
Lund took a deep breath.
‘What did you do, Oliver? Tell your uncle Jan. Before he gets cross. We both know you won’t like it if that happens.’
‘Nothing . . .’
‘Did you follow her outside?’ Another squeeze. ‘Hang around the basement?’
Schandorff wriggled out of his grip.
Meyer winked at him.
‘Nanna had someone else, didn’t she? You knew that. You were jealous as hell. I mean really.’ Meyer nodded. ‘Think about it. School rich kid. She was yours. How could some pretty chick from a dump like Vesterbro screw you around?’
Schandorff was up shouting, running his hands through his wild ginger hair.
‘I told you what happened.’
His voice was a couple of tones higher. Young again in an instant.
‘The car keys . . .’ Meyer began.
‘What . . .?’
‘You knew the car was there.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Nanna didn’t want you. So you raped her. Dumped her out in the canal. On your way home—’
‘Shut up!’
Meyer waited. Lund watched.
‘I loved her.’
‘Oliver!’ Meyer was beaming. ‘You just said you didn’t give a shit. You loved her but she thought you were a jerk. So you did the thing any no-good little dope-smoking shit would. You raped her. You tied her up. Stuck her in the boot of that black car . . .’
Back on the seat, ginger head shaking side to side.
‘Stuck her in there so no one could hear her scream then pushed her into the canal.’
Meyer slammed his fist so hard on the table the pens, the notebooks jumped. Oliver Schandorff was a crumpled heap on the chair, silent, shaking.
Lund waited. After a while she said very calmly, ‘Oliver. If you’ve got something to tell us it would be best to say it now.’
‘Let’s take him down the station,’ Meyer cut in, reaching for his phone. ‘Oliver and me need a quiet chat alone in a cell.’
The classroom door opened and two people walked in. A middle-aged man in an expensive-looking suit. A woman behind him looking worried.
‘I’m Oliver’s father,’ the man said. ‘I want a word with my son.’
‘We’re police officers,’ Lund said. ‘You’re interrupting our interview. Get out.’
The man didn’t move. The woman was watching him, expecting something.
‘Have you charged him with anything?’
Meyer waved a hand in his face and said, ‘Hello? Did you hear . . .?’
A wallet. A business card waved in their faces. Erik Schandorff. Big-shot lawyer from a big-shot firm.
‘Don’t talk to me like that,’ Erik Schandorff said.
‘Oliver’s helping—’ Lund began.
‘Dad?’
The cry of a frightened kid. No one could mistake that.
‘I want to talk to him,’ the father said.
Outside in the corridor, Meyer hissing and cursing beneath his breath, Lund watched through the window.
Father and son, Oliver head down, moving side to side.
Lifted it and then the father struck him full force across the face with the back of his hand.
‘Happy families,’ Meyer murmured, lighting a cigarette. ‘Now if I’d done that . . .’
One minute later, rich lawyer, rich kid, quiet wife walking out. Not a word.
‘See you soon, Oliver!’ Meyer called as they left.
Lund leaned back against the wall, folded her arms, closed her eyes.
He was watching her when she opened them.
‘I know what you’re thinking, Lund. That it’s vaguely possible I was a bit hard on him. But if that idiot hadn’t walked in . . .’
‘Fine.’
‘No really. I knew what I was doing. I was in control. All the time. Honest . . .’
‘Meyer,’ she said, coming up to him, peering up into his wide-open, staring eyes. ‘I said it was fine. Check downstairs again. Contact forensics. If Oliver drove the car they should know. Time the journey from here to the woods.’
She pulled the car keys out of her bag.
‘Anything else?’
‘You’ll think of something.’
‘And you, Lund?’
‘Me?’
‘Going to catch a movie or what?’
She nodded, left him, smiling when he couldn’t see.
There were flowers on the sideboard, on the small iron mantel above the fire. Flowers by the sink still wrapped in their paper, bouquets on the floor.
Some were blue irises. Some roses.
Pernille stood washing dishes, staring out of the window.
A woman from the forensic department sat with the boys at the table Pernille and Nanna made, smiling at them. Cotton sticks in her hand.
She looked no more than twenty-two or so. No older than Nanna when she went out for the night.
‘Is this really necessary?’ Theis Birk Larsen asked.
‘We need DNA,’ said the woman in the blue uniform. ‘For comparisons.’
Downstairs the car was packed. Suitcases with clothes. Boxes with kids’ things. Vagn Skærbæk helped as he always did.
He had new toys. Cars. Cheap and tinny but Vagn was bad with money and Pernille lacked the heart to scold him. The men in the depot were like everyone else. Like Theis. Like her. Desperate to do something, lost for what that might be.
‘OK?’ the woman asked and didn’t wait for an answer. Leaned over the table, got Anton first, then asked Emil to open his mouth.
Pernille watched from the sink, dishes in her hand.
They were back in Nanna’s bedroom. Two men in blue walking round, putting up more stickers, making notes.
Lotte her sister, younger, prettier, still single, did most of the packing. Now she came and hugged each of them in turn.
‘Take some flowers if you want,’ Theis said.
Lotte looked at him and shook her head.
‘Boys,’ Theis said. ‘Let’s go see Uncle Vagn. Help him finish up downstairs.’
Pernille promised she’d be there soon and watched them go.
Soon.
She left the sink when he was gone. Looked around the untidy room.
In this small warm place an unexpected miracle had emerged between them. The magic that was family. Shared lives. Shared love.
Now men in blue tramped through Nanna’s little bedroom, opening drawers they opened yesterday, talking in low tones, going quiet when they thought she could hear.
The boys rushed back up, snatched kites, snatched more toys. Showed her the tinny cars Vagn bought.