The Marco Effect: A Department Q Novel (29 page)

It couldn’t have been better.

Marco scanned the café. For a thief this was perfect: a lively hum of voices, couples with fingers entwined, intimate conversation, joking between friends. A landscape free of cares, in which people like Marco worked best. Bags dumped on the floor, coats and jackets draped over chairs, mobile phones on table edges.

He straightened his shoulders and slid like a shadow into the passage between the bar and the cake display. If he could find a seat in the armchair on the raised area just behind Carl Mørck without the librarian seeing him, he’d be able to ease the wallet out of Mørck’s jacket that hung from the back of his chair.

It took him a minute or two to weave his way between the columns and into position. He advanced no more than a couple of meters at a time, for this was the technique and would hopefully reach the chair while it remained unoccupied.

When eventually he found himself seated back-to-back with Mørck
he was close enough to sense their intimacy. The librarian talked the most while Mørck sat immobile and listened, beguiled and wholly absent from the world around him.

Before long she would casually place her hand on the table next to his, and if he responded by laying his on hers, Marco could just as well sound a fanfare as he dipped into the inside pocket of Carl’s jacket. They wouldn’t notice a thing.

Two minutes later he stood at the top of the stairs leading down to the restrooms with the open wallet in his hands. He was going to put it back as soon as he was finished with it, but then a waiter appeared, asking if he’d like to order, and he hadn’t the courage to stay that long. Mørck and his librarian were already ordering dessert.

He peered into the wallet. It was the flat kind preferred by men who couldn’t care less what was dictated by the fashion pundits in Milan and New York. The stitching was coming apart, the leather was thin and shiny from wear and tear, and it had gradually assumed the shape of the body against which it had unceasingly been pressed for years on end. Moreover, it was utterly unsuited to modern forms of payment. Marco couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen a wallet without slits for credit cards and ID, where cards, coins, and banknotes were stuffed into the same zipper compartment.

Marco folded his slip of paper several times and slipped it in between Mørck’s old receipts and battered calling cards. The man apparently had none himself.

All I need to do now is wait, he told himself, then felt a prod on his shoulder. He looked up slowly to see his former employer, who had come up from his office in the basement.

“What are you doing here, Marco? Didn’t I tell you on the phone to stay away? You attract the wrong people, people I don’t care to see here. I want you to respect that. I thought we agreed.”

Munthe was OK, though he was a guy with his own opinions who wouldn’t shy from defending them promptly. This was definitely not what Marco wanted.

“I just need to use the bathroom, Munthe. I thought it would be OK.”

At that moment his eyes were bluer than ever.

And then Marco turned and went down the stairs. But not before noting that Munthe had already removed his apron.

Sure enough, only ten minutes passed before Munthe left the premises as usual to pick up his wife in the shop next door, and Marco was on his way back up the stairs.

From this vantage point he could see their table. The waiter had placed the bill in front of Mørck, who was now on his feet, frantically checking all his jacket pockets.

He stood there gesticulating like a character in a silent movie. Mystified, shocked, feverish, and ashamed. The entire gamut in seconds. And then the librarian put her hand reassuringly on his. The bill wasn’t a problem, even if it was a shame he’d lost his wallet.

Absorbed in discussion, they passed close by him on their way out as Marco’s fingers did what they were best at.

The time was exactly
twelve o’clock when Eriksen’s secretary appeared before him with a printout of a scanned message saying a UPS shipment was on its way.

He studied the invoice. One bubble envelope, 320x455mm, 600 grams. It seemed reasonable enough.

He leaned back in his chair and mused on how it would feel to be holding 600 grams of immeasurable prosperity safely in his hands. Once the package arrived, his future would be brighter than he could ever have dreamed. Provided he handled the sale of his shares appropriately, their proceeds together with what he made from selling off his stock in Karrebæk Bank would not only provide a very satisfactory future: they would also lift him definitively out of the life-sapping social stratum to which he had hitherto belonged, to those unmentionable heights where luxury and beautiful women seemed to be almost inevitable parameters of daily existence. Farewell, wife and children, who had written him off anyway. Farewell, crappy little car and dismal little house. Farewell, cruel winters and terminally dull colleagues. Farewell to all the times he had stood in the checkout lines of low-end supermarkets with low-end people for whom, while they may have been his neighbors, he couldn’t be bothered to spare even a thought.

Now eternal summer beckoned beyond the gates of the future, gates he was more than ready to throw wide-open.

He looked around his office and began laughing at the sight of shelves full of dreary cases and years of trivial toil. What joy he would feel at
giving it all the finger. Simply baring his ass and pulverizing the self-importance of it all with a derisive emission of methane.

He laughed the way his wife so hated. He could hardly wait for the day he would use that laugh while he patted her on the head and said good-bye forever.

For a while he sat there, his face frozen in a mask of glee until it almost hurt. And then his secretary came in and placed a folder in front of him.

“While the folder you left on my desk is the budget for the draining project in Burkina Faso, it’s the wrong year, despite what it says on the front. Dare one ask for a file with the right contents?”

René shook his head in annoyance. It wasn’t often he made a mistake like that.

“I’ll be more careful next time,” he said curtly.

And then reality suddenly dawned on René E. Eriksen.

The right contents
echoed in his mind as he stared at the receipt for the UPS shipment.

Who the hell was to say whether the contents of the package would be what he was waiting for?

—

Snap didn’t sound particularly communicative at the other end of the line. He had been up since six o’clock Curaçao time, and not being allowed to nurse a two-day jet lag was no fun.

“You’ve got the receipt you asked for, what more do you want?” he barked. “Once the package arrives you’ll see for yourself what’s in it, OK?”

“And what if my share certificates aren’t there?”

“They are, René. Now leave me in peace and let me enjoy what few days I’ve got here, all right?”

René pictured him. An overweight bon vivant who thought he was born with the right to stand first in line when the privileges were handed out.

But this time he was wrong, dammit, when it was going to be at René’s expense.

“Listen to me, Teis. You can call Brage-Schmidt and tell him that if the two of you are pulling one over on me, I’ll turn you both in. I’ve found a fail-safe way out so you can’t drag me down with you.”

“Come on, René, don’t give me that. The three of us are in this up to our necks, and there are a thousand things incriminating you that you can’t talk your way out of. Our liaisons over the years have been a bit too close for that.”

René would have liked to have laughed but couldn’t. The rage he was suppressing was just too powerful. “Yeah, but you know what, Teis? You’re wrong, dangerously wrong. The authorities will be able to see you’ve given me financial advice on occasion, and that it was for this reason I purchased Karrebæk shares as a way of supporting the bank. And because you owed me favors from our school days, you told me when the prices were favorable. Nothing illegal there, and that’s all they’ll be able to find out. And as for the Curaçao shares, they’re all unregistered, so you can’t threaten me with that one. And what else is left? Bank transfers? Correspondence? Nothing, right? Phone calls, perhaps, but that’s natural enough. As a friend, I’ve been trying to get you to stop being party to this fraud that I’ve long suspected you and William Stark of carrying out, but which I’ve only now become certain of, having found proof of Stark’s involvement. That’s right, it’s all here in black and white. And that’s what I’ll be telling the police if it comes to that.”

“You’re bluffing, René. It doesn’t become you. You’d do well to bear in mind that I’m the fox running free in the woods and you’re the rodent in the mouse hole, where you belong. So you can forget all that nonsense and relax. We’re on the same side, and it’ll all blow over in a few days, mark my words.”

Yeah, once you’ve killed that boy, René thought. “I’ll only ask you this once, Teis,” he said aloud. “When have I ever bluffed? Isn’t that something I’ve always left to you?”

“Stop this now!” It wasn’t the first time Teis Snap had hissed at him like that, but it had been a long time. René could picture his purple face swelling up with rage.

“Watch your step, René! If you threaten us, then I strongly suggest
you begin looking over your shoulder, no matter where you happen to be.”

And with that he hung up.

—

Teis Snap stared at his mobile for a moment before taking it with him from the bedroom and leaving his wife to pack their suitcases. The tone could become rough in a minute.

“What now?” said the voice that answered his call.

“The package has been dispatched and two minutes ago I had Eriksen on the line. He’s smelled a rat.”

“And? Once the fuse is lit, what can happen other than Eriksen blowing himself up?”

“That’s why I’m calling. Getting rid of him can’t wait until after the boy’s been killed.”

“Why not?”

“Because he’s taking precautions, and knowing him the way I do, I’d say he’s being too straightforward to be lying. Dull people aren’t very good when it comes to playing the comedian. My assessment is he’s serious.”

“What kind of precautions?”

“He’s constructed material that will cast all the blame on William Stark and us. We need to get René out of the way before he puts it to use, which he might well do once he discovers what’s in that package. I don’t think he’s likely to find a stack of newspaper pages in the Papiamento language a reasonable substitute for what he was expecting.”

“You didn’t send that package express, did you?”

“No, of course not, but it’ll be arriving very soon, anyway. But listen, isn’t it about time your crew got its hands on that boy? He’s only fifteen years old for Chrissake, and every scumbag in the city’s out looking for him. It can’t be that difficult, surely?”

“We’ll see.”

Teis didn’t have that kind of patience, he knew René E. Eriksen a little too well. He was the toiler who put his head down and slogged
his way through university without complaint. The man who gained top marks all round because he was brighter than the rest and knew how best to please his professors. No, Teis didn’t like the idea of waiting at all.

“I am well aware that we agreed the order of things was to do away with the boy first and thereby make it plausible for Eriksen to have killed him and then committed suicide because of it. But surely we can find another way? Couldn’t we kidnap Eriksen now, then hold off on getting rid of him until the boy is dead? I mean, if Eriksen is going to become an alleged child killer, no one’s going to wonder about his having been missing for a couple of days before committing his crime. And the times of death will fit nicely, won’t they? No reason to give the police too much to think about, is there?”

For a moment there was silence at the other end.

“Perhaps you’re right.” The voice came hesitantly. “But in that case we’ll have to do it before that package arrives.”

“We can get it over with right away as far as I’m concerned. Eriksen’s home every evening, if I know him right. He’s too scared of his wife not to be.”

The voice laughed. A most inappropriate and malicious laughter that oddly enough left Teis feeling out of sorts. The feeling of having just now raised the ax over the neck of his old schoolmate hardly suited such merriment.

“But if Eriksen has a wife, we’re obviously going to have to take her as well, aren’t we?”

Teis shook his head. “That cow? For all I care, you can send her to hell where she belongs. I could never stand the sight of her.”

“OK. It’s sorted, then. I’ll get the ball rolling and call the people who got Stark out of the way. A nice little home break-in, they’ve done it before. The only difference this time is it’ll be the occupants themselves they steal.”

And then all there was was a dial tone.

Teis snapped his phone shut and glanced toward the bedroom door. There was a sound of suitcases being closed.

He checked his watch. Things were looking good.

It wall all just a matter of timing.

—

Eriksen came home rather later than usual, acting as though everything was fine. His wife did not care for him to kiss her on account of his dentures, which she found repulsive despite being aware that periodontal disease had left him with no other option, though he gave her sulking face a fleeting kiss on the cheek nonetheless. Then he took a quick nap before bringing his dinner to the coffee table and switching on TV2 News. And apart from Lars von Trier’s blunder about Nazism, the news was the same trivial bullshit as always. Who could be bothered to hear about Queen Elizabeth’s visit to Ireland? An Irishman, perhaps, but certainly not René E. Eriksen or even his wife, who was pacing about in the utility room as usual, muttering her dissatisfaction with just about everything: the housecleaning, their daughter’s arguments with her husband, the button that wasn’t to be found anywhere after the last wash. And then there was the ceaseless ironing of anything that had the audacity to exhibit the tiniest wrinkle.

Thank God all this will soon be history, he thought, and sank into the cushions of the sofa.

The next moment shards of glass from the patio doors exploded across the room. The rush of adrenaline pumped him into an upright position as his dinner landed on the carpeting. The figures entering through the shattered doors wore balaclavas, only their eyes visible, and without saying a word lunged toward him, striking him hard on the side of the head. As he fell backward onto the sofa, legs quivering, he heard one of them say in English that now it was his wife’s turn.

They hit him again, harder this time, but although he saw a glitter before his eyes like shooting stars, he remained conscious. His arms had lost all their strength and his legs refused to obey him, but inside he was still there.

What’s happening? he thought, trying to move his body as the men spread out into the house.

From upstairs came the sound of tumult, as if all the furniture were
being hurled aside and curtains and bedspreads torn asunder, but from the utility room, where René knew his wife was, all was quiet.

“Is she downstairs, Pico?” the man upstairs shouted.

René was terrified. Like everyone else, he had seen the papers and read about home invasions, they were a modern-day scourge, everyday life transformed into B-movie horror. Now these stories of ordinary people’s sudden demise in their own homes were no longer just newspaper copy. There were always plenty of loudmouths with their wallets full of notes and there were always suspicious elements ready to lighten their burden. But René was no loudmouth.

What do they want from me? he wondered. I’ve got nothing worth stealing. The television’s outdated, the wife’s jewelry is trash, the Karrebæk shares are in a safe-deposit with Nordea . . .

His train of thought stopped there.

If you threaten us, I strongly suggest you begin looking over your shoulder,
Teis Snap had said.

Cold shivers ran down his spine.

Had these people not come to steal? Had they come to kill them?

He managed to turn his head as the man who had shouted came bounding down the stairs and headed for the utility room.

“What the hell . . . ?” cried the man a second later.

What’s happening? was all René could think, as cries and thuds merged into one. For a brief moment all seemed quiet, and then the clamor erupted again.

Just as he was thinking that despite everything this wasn’t the fate he had wished upon his wife, the door of the utility room slammed hard.

Now René felt the floor beneath his feet again, the cushions of the sofa against his back. He stretched his neck and felt for blood. Then, seeing only a thin smear on his fingertips, he pushed himself upright until he stood, the room swimming around him.

All he could think of was to get away.

“Where do you think
you’re
going?” came a severe, penetrating voice from behind as he staggered across the shards toward the patio doors.

He turned to see a pair of eyes flashing with rage in a face white as chalk.

“Why didn’t you come and help me?” his wife snarled, her apron spattered red and still clutching her beloved steam iron, blood dripping from its point.

“But you can relax now, you coward, they won’t be coming back,” she said, her voice trembling as she scanned the chaos around them. “I slammed the first one right on the chin before he even saw me and the other one’s not going to be a pretty sight in the morning either. And what were
you
doing while I was chasing them away?” she spat, taking a step toward him.

René shook his head instinctively. Nothing was going to help anyway.

“Nothing, that’s what! But who were they, René?” she asked coldly. “I know you know, because they knew my name.”

“I can assure you I’ve no idea. I’m as shocked as you are. All of a sudden they were just there.”

“I think you do know. If the second one hadn’t been such a hard case and managed to drag his friend away with him even though his face was still burning from the iron, I’d have gotten to the bottom of this, believe me.”