Craig Russell - The Valkyrie Song

‘I guess I wasn’t what you were expecting…’ a female voice said in English. Fabel turned in the direction of the voice. The attractive young woman he had noticed earlier was now standing directly in front of him. She arched an eyebrow.

‘ Politidirektor Vestergaard?’ he asked feebly.

‘Yes, I’m Karin Vestergaard. I’m sorry — I know it’s so confusing.’ She sighed and rolled her eyes. ‘I got promoted because I’m so damned good at making coffee and they sent me here because all the men were too busy solving really complicated cases.’

Fabel gave a half-laugh at the joke, then let his smile die when he saw the cold glint in Vestergaard’s ice-blue eyes. Not a good start. ‘My car is parked outside,’ he said weakly.

It wasn’t a cosy journey. After Fabel asked Karin Vestergaard how her flight had been, and what the weather was like in Copenhagen, he struggled to make small-talk as they walked to his parked BMW. Politidirektor Vestergaard was obviously not the small-talk type. They drove in silence down the Alsterkrugchausee towards the city centre.

‘We have an election coming up in a few months,’ he said eventually, with artificial cheer. ‘For Principal Mayor. Effectively that’s Prime Minister for the State of Hamburg. Anyway, one of the candidates is actually a Dane. Well, she’s a German-Dane — you know, from the Danish-speaking minority in Schleswig-Holstein.’

Karin Vestergaard turned to Fabel and gave him a weak smile of uninterested indulgence. There was something about her face that troubled him, but he couldn’t work out what it was. They passed the sign informing them that they were entering the city quarter of Eppendorf.

‘Isn’t this where your Institute for Judicial Medicine is based?’ she asked.

‘Yes,’ said Fabel. ‘Indeed it is. You know Hamburg?’

‘No. I checked before I came down. Is that where Jens is?’

‘That’s where the morgue is, yes.’

‘I’d like to see Jens. Now.’

‘You want to go now? I thought I’d take you to your hotel first before going into the Presidium. I know that-’

‘I don’t understand.’ Karin Vestergaard interrupted him, her voice cold and hard. ‘I don’t see the problem if we’re passing through Eppendorf. I want to see Jens’s body. Can we go or not?’

Fabel shrugged and turned off into Geschwister-Scholl-Strasse.

The University Clinic Hamburg-Eppendorf was a huge complex of buildings, almost like a small town in itself, sitting between Geschwister-Scholl-Strasse to the north and Martinistrasse to the south. The University Clinic even had its own park to the south of Martinistrasse and, as Fabel passed along its northern boundary towards Butenfeld, huge cranes towered above the complex.

‘The hospital here is a teaching one,’ explained Fabel. ‘They’re building a new campus. It’s all going to be very high-tech.’

If Vestergaard was impressed, she hid it well; instead she stared grimly ahead, as if her mind was already ahead of them and in the morgue with her dead colleague. Fabel found a parking space outside the Institute for Judicial Medicine and led Vestergaard in through the glass double doors to the waiting area. It took Fabel a couple of minutes to arrange a viewing of Jespersen’s body, during which time Vestergaard sat impassively in the reception area.

‘We can go in now,’ he explained and she followed him into the morgue.

Fabel didn’t know what to expect in the mortuary. Despite having shared the journey from the airport with her, the Danish policewoman remained a complete stranger to him. He didn’t know anything about her professional relationship with Jespersen, or what kind of personal relationship they might have had. Fabel watched her face when the sheet was pulled back from Jespersen’s body. Again he found himself distracted by her appearance. There really was something about the way she looked that perplexed him… Then he realised what it was: her features were perfect. Her face possessed an absolute symmetry and every feature was in classic proportion. The effect was strange: it gave her beauty; true archetypal beauty. But it was also a forgettable beauty.

Fabel watched the bland beauty of Karin Vestergaard’s face as her subordinate’s dead body was revealed to her. There was a flicker of something in the expression and then it was gone in the same instant. But Fabel had recognised it: anger. She was angry with Jespersen for having died.

‘I’m very sorry,’ said Fabel. ‘Had you worked together long?’

‘When is the autopsy scheduled?’

‘Tomorrow,’ said Fabel. ‘Two p.m.’

Vestergaard leaned forward and examined Jespersen’s face more closely. Then she pulled the sheet completely clear of his body.

‘What are you looking for?’ asked Fabel, no longer hiding his irritation with her uncommunicativeness.

‘Who’ll be doing the autopsy?’

‘Herr Doctor Moller. He’s our Chief Pathologist. He’s really-’

‘Tell him to look for puncture wounds. Needle marks. Particularly in hidden areas: under hair, skin folds, around the anus…’

‘Look, said Fabel. ‘I think this has gone on long-’

‘Do you believe this is a natural death?’ Vestergaard turned to him. More cold fire in her eyes.

Fabel sighed. ‘It looks very much like a heart attack.’

‘Do you believe this was a natural death?’ she repeated.

‘No. Or at least I have my doubts. It was Anna Wolff, one of my officers, who brought me into this. She thinks there’s something fishy going on too.’

Vestergaard straightened up but continued to gaze at the face of her dead colleague. After a moment she turned to Fabel again. ‘We need to talk…’

Fabel took Vestergaard to her hotel on the Alter Wall. Somehow it didn’t surprise him that she had booked into the same hotel where Jespersen had died. It didn’t surprise him but he thought it ill-advised. He arranged for coffee to be served in a quiet seating area off the bar while Vestergaard took her bags to her room.

‘I thought we’d have a coffee and then head up to the Police Presidium and talk about Jespersen.’

‘Let’s talk here,’ she said. ‘There’s no one around. Neutral territory. Then we can head up to the Presidium.’

‘Neutral territory?’ said Fabel. ‘We’re supposed to be cooperating. I didn’t think that colleagues needed “neutral territory”.’

‘Just an expression,’ said Vestergaard, sipping her coffee and leaving a trace of pink on the rim of the cup. ‘Maybe it’s just that my English isn’t as good as yours. I notice you don’t speak English with a German accent.’

‘I learned it when I was young,’ he said, annoyed at the distraction technique. He knew what she was doing, and she knew he knew. They were both police officers; both interrogators. ‘I am half-Scottish. I grew up bilingual.’

‘I see.’ Another sip. ‘It’s unusual to hear a German speak without an accent. In Denmark we subtitle all English-language films and TV. You dub them. Germans don’t have the true exposure to the language we do. Like a cultural condom. That’s why we Danes and the Dutch speak better English. With less of an accent, I mean. But I noticed your lack of accent when you picked me up at the airport. It would have made things easier for Jens. You didn’t meet him, you say?’

‘We spoke on the phone. Once.’ Fabel laughed without warmth. ‘Is this an interrogation, Frau Vestergaard? If so, I’d remind you that I am the police officer here. And if there is anything suspicious about Jespersen’s death then it is my case, not yours. This is my jurisdiction.’

‘Jens didn’t like Germans,’ she said, still cool. Cold. ‘Did you know that?’

‘No,’ Fabel sighed. ‘Any particular reason?’