Jussi Adler-Olsen - Mercy aka The keeper of lost causes

“Actually, a lot of people that we interview don’t talk, but we manage all the same. We’re good at deciphering nonverbal signals over here in Department Q.”

“Department Q?”

“Yes, we’re an elite investigative team here at police headquarters. When can I come out to see him?”

Carl heard the man sigh. He wasn’t stupid. He recognized a bulldog when he met one.

“Let me see what I can do. I’ll get back to you,” he said then.

“What exactly did you tell that man when you called him up, Assad?” yelled Carl when he put down the receiver.

“That man? I told him that you would talk only to the chief and not to a director.”

“The director is the chief, Assad.”

Carl took a deep breath, got up, and went over to his assistant, looking him in the eye. “Don’t you know the word ‘director’? A director is a kind of boss.” They nodded to each other; all right then. “Assad, tomorrow I want you to pick me up in Allerød, where I live. We’re going to take a drive. Do you understand?”

He shrugged.

“And there’s not going to be any problem with that when we’re out driving around, is there?” Carl pointed at the prayer rug.

“I can roll it up.”

“All right. But how do you know which way Mecca is?”

Assad pointed to his head, as if he had a GPS system implanted in his temporal lobe. “And if a person is still a little like he does not know where, then there is this.” He picked up one of the magazines from the bookshelf to reveal a compass underneath.

“Huh,” said Carl, staring at the massive conglomeration of metal pipes running along the ceiling. “But that compass isn’t going to work down here.”

Assad again pointed at his head.

“So, I suppose you just have a sense of where it is. And you don’t have to be precise, is that it?”

“Allah is great. He has such wide shoulders.”

Carl stuck out his lower lip in a pout. Of course Allah did. What was he thinking, anyway?

Four pairs of eyes with dark rings underneath turned to look at Carl as he entered team leader Bak’s office. No one could have any doubt that the team was under extreme pressure. On the wall hung a big map of Valby Park showing crucial aspects of the current case: the crime scene; where the murder weapon, an old-fashioned cut-throat razor, had been found; the place where the witness saw the victim and the suspected perpetrator together; and finally, the route the witness took through the park. Everything had been measured and thoroughly analyzed, and none of it made any sense.

“Our talk is going to have to wait until later, Carl,” said Bak, tugging at the sleeve of the black leather jacket that he’d inherited from the former homicide chief. That jacket was Bak’s most treasured possession, proof that he was particularly fantastic, and he rarely took it off. The rumbling radiators were pumping out at least forty degrees of heat into the room, but it didn’t matter. Besides, he was probably counting on heading out the door at any moment.

Carl looked at the photos pinned up on the bulletin board behind the team members, and it was not an encouraging sight. Evidently the body of the victim had been mutilated after death. Deep gashes in the chest, half of one ear cut off. On his white shirt a cross had been drawn with the victim’s own blood. Carl assumed that the cut-off ear had served as the pen. The frost-covered grass around the bicycle had been trampled flat, and the bike had also been smashed, so the spokes in the front wheel were completely crushed. The victim’s satchel lay open on the ground, and textbooks from the business school were scattered all over.

“Our talk has to wait until later, you say? OK. But before then could you just ignore your brain-dead efforts for a moment and tell me what your key witness says about the individual she saw talking to the victim right before the murder?”

The four men looked at him as if he’d desecrated a grave.

Bak’s eyes had a dead expression. “It’s not your case, Carl. We’ll talk later. Believe it or not, we’re really busy up here.”

He nodded. “Oh, sure, I can see that in your well-fed faces. Of course you’re busy. I imagine that you’ve already sent people out to search the witness’s place of residence after she was hospitalized, right?”

The others exchanged glances. Annoyed, but also with a questioning look.

So they hadn’t. Excellent.

Marcus Jacobsen had just sat down in his office when Carl came in. As usual, the homicide chief was well groomed. The parting in his hair was sharp as a knife, his eyes attentive and alert.

“Marcus, did you search the witness’s residence after her suicide attempt?” asked Carl, pointing at the case folder that was lying in the middle of Jacobsen’s desk.

“What do you mean?”

“You haven’t found the piece missing from the victim’s ear, have you?”

“No, not yet. Are you saying that it might be in the witness’s home?”

“If I were you, I’d go and look for it, boss.”

“If it really was sent to her, I’m sure she got rid of it.”

“So look through the garbage cans down in the yard. And take a good look in the toilet.”

“It would have been flushed away by now, Carl.”

“Haven’t you heard the story about the shit that kept reappearing no matter how many times the toilet was flushed?”

“OK, Carl. I’ll take it under advisement.”

“The pride of the department, Mr. Yes-man Bak, didn’t want to talk to me.”

“Well, then you’ll just have to wait, Carl. Your cases aren’t about to run off anywhere.”

“I just wanted you to know. It’s going to set me back in my schedule.”

“Then I suggest you take a look at one of the other cases in the meantime.” He picked up his pen and tapped it on the edge of the desk. “So, about that strange guy you have working for you downstairs… You’re not involving him in any of the investigative work, are you?”

“Well, you know, considering the huge department I’m in charge of, there’s not much chance that he’ll hear about what goes on.”

Jacobsen tossed his pen on to one of the piles of documents. “Carl, you’ve taken an oath of confidentiality, and the man isn’t a police officer. Just keep that in mind.”

Carl nodded. He’d be the one to decide what was discussed and where. “How on earth did you find Assad? Through the employment office?”

“I have no idea. Ask Lars Bjørn. Or ask the man himself.”

Carl raised a finger. “By the way, I’d like to have a floor plan of the basement, to scale, and showing the points of the compass.”

Jacobsen was looking a bit tired again. There weren’t many people who dared make such strange requests of him. “You can print out a floor plan from the departmental intranet, Carl. It’s easy!”

“Here,” said Carl, pointing at the floor plan spread out in front of Assad. “Here you can see that wall over there, and here’s where you’ve put your prayer rug. And here’s the arrow pointing north. So now you can position the rug in exactly the right place.”

The eyes that turned to look up at him were full of respect. They were going to make a good team.

“Two people called with the telephone for you. I told both of them that you would be pleased to call them back sometime.”

“Who were they?”

“That man who is the director in Frederikssund, and a lady who talked like a machine that cuts through metal.”

Carl sighed heavily. “Vigga. That’s my wife.” So she’d found out what his new phone number was. Any chance of peace and quiet was now gone.