Robert Goddard - Found Wanting

‘Richard Eusden?’

The softly inflected voice belonged to a woman standing beside his chair. He had not heard her approach. She was dressed in a black coat and boots, with a peacock-patterned scarf round her neck. There was nothing of the blonde Scandinavian about her. Her hair and eyes were dark brown, her face pale, her features delicate, her pink-lipsticked mouth opened in a hesitant smile even as her brow furrowed into the slightest of frowns.

‘I’m Pernille Madsen.’

‘Where did you get that from?’ Pernille asked. She pointed at the sheet of paper in Eusden’s lap. ‘And why is my name on it?’

‘See for yourself.’ Eusden rose and handed her the sheet. ‘Heard of Karsten Burgaard?’

‘Yes.’ She said no more than that. After scrutinizing the family tree for a moment, she returned it. ‘His work?’

Eusden nodded, then, belatedly, offered her his hand. Her smile broadened by a cautious fraction. They shook. ‘Want some coffee?’

‘Yes. It’s been a long drive.’ She took off her coat and scarf to reveal another layer of black – woollen cardigan, jumper, skirt and wide shiny belt. The only colourful note was struck by a peridot necklace that she fingered as they sat down.

The waitress was already approaching with the coffee. Eusden signalled for her to deliver it to Pernille and ordered another for himself.

‘Does it hurt?’ Pernille asked, gesturing with her eyebrows at the wound on his head.

‘Only when I laugh. And I haven’t been laughing much lately.’

‘Birgitte told me about your friend. I’m sorry.’

‘Thanks. What else did she tell you?’

‘Everything I need to know.’

‘And now you’re going to tell me everything I need to know.’

She sipped her coffee, then gave him a long, strangely soothing look of scrutiny. ‘We’ll be met in Helsinki by a former Mjollnir employee, now retired: Osmo Koskinen. He’s arranging the handover. That’s as much as I know.’

‘Surely not.’

He knew from Burgaard’s family tree that she was in her late forties, but already she had looked both younger and older than that. There was vulnerability as well as strength in her, insecurity as well as self-control. Marriage to Tolmar Aksden had been an experience that had left its mark.

‘I’ve no idea what Hakon Nydahl’s letters to Clem Hewitson reveal about your ex-husband, but you must have. It’s why you’re here.’

‘Not exactly.’

She broke off as the second coffee was delivered. Eusden studied her skittering glance around the room as the waitress came between them. She was frightened, though precisely what of he sensed he would not discover. Perhaps, it occurred to him, she had been frightened for a long time.

The waitress departed. She compressed her lips, then looked back at him. ‘All I know is that the… material we’re to collect… would ruin Tolmar if it reached the media. I don’t know how. I don’t want to know. Michael, our son, matters to me more than… all my troubles with Tolmar. Do you have children, Richard?’

‘No.’

‘Maybe you’re lucky. Maybe it’s best not to… care so much, so very, very much… about this person who… grows and changes and… sometimes seems to hate you. But that’s how it is to be a mother. I worry about Michael all the time. He isn’t strong like his father. He couldn’t cope with… pressure. He plans to join Mjollnir. He thinks Tolmar is… a great man. He wants to be like him, even though he can’t be. If Tolmar is ruined, I don’t know what would happen to Michael. And I don’t want to find out.’

‘Perhaps it would be the making of him.’

‘No. It wouldn’t. I’m sure of that.’

‘You’re taking quite a risk for his sake.’

‘For my sake as well. Tolmar ruined… would be a dangerous man. Besides, Birgitte said there’s no serious risk. These people… just want money. And Mjollnir have plenty of that.’

‘How much are they paying?’

‘That’s something else I don’t know and don’t want to know. Koskinen will deliver the money to us and we’ll deliver it to the people Birgitte calls the Opposition in a safe, secure setting. They’ll deliver the attaché case, you’ll check the contents and the exchange will be complete. Then we’ll go our separate ways. And you and I can get on with our lives.’

‘Sounds simple.’

‘Why shouldn’t it be?’

‘Doesn’t it worry you that Tolmar doesn’t know about any of this?’

‘Birgitte Grøn is a better judge of his interests than he is himself. She’s calm and calculating. Tolmar… gets angry if he’s threatened. And then…’ Pernille took another sip of coffee and fingered her necklace again. ‘It’s better this way,’ she said softly, as if addressing herself rather than Eusden. ‘Much better.’

It was a short drive to the Viking Line terminal at Stadsgården. The sinking sun was casting long shadows across the harbour ice as they crossed to Gamla Stan. When Pernille lowered her visor, Eusden noticed a photograph of a fair-haired, smiling boy of twelve or thirteen taped to the back of it: Michael, as his mother preferred to remember him, waiting to greet her whenever the sun shone.

Pernille brought her BMW to a gentle halt in the queue for the ferry. The bluey greyness of dusk was creeping over the harbour. She took a folder containing their tickets out ofthe door pocket and checked the contents, then dropped it back into place. She seemed nervous now their departure was drawing closer.

‘I’ll stop here on the way back and do some shopping,’ she said. ‘Treat myself… to some normality.’

‘Good idea.’

‘You’ll be back in London by then. Your life will be normal again as well.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘You sound doubtful.’

‘To be honest, I’m finding it difficult to remember what normal life is like.’

‘How did they persuade you to help them? Mjollnir, I mean. I’m here for my son. Why did you come?’

‘They left me no choice.’

‘I thought they couldn’t have.’ She ran her hands round the steering-wheel. ‘I used to work for Mjollnir. That’s how I met Tolmar. On the surface, they’re a… perfect employer. Good pay and conditions. Health insurance. Childcare. Pension. Everything you could ask for.’

‘And beneath the surface?’

‘They organize things so that… people have no choice… except to do what Mjollnir wants.’

‘Or what Tolmar wants.’

‘It’s the same thing.’

‘Not this time.’

‘Apparently not.’

‘Why did you marry him?’

‘I was young. He was… powerful and wealthy and attractive. Very attractive, actually. I loved him. And I persuaded myself he loved me.’

‘When did you find out he didn’t?’

‘When Michael was born. That’s what Tolmar wanted from me. A son and heir. Once he’d got it, he… blanked me out of his life.’

‘Well, you’re back in it now. Even if he doesn’t know it.’

The sun had set, but its glow was still lighting the western sky when the M/S Gabriella eased away from the pier and headed out into the shipping lane that curved ahead of it like a dark grey snake through the matt white expanse of ice. Eusden lingered among the hardy souls on deck, watching the cityscape slowly change as the ship moved across the harbour. Pernille had gone to her cabin. They were to meet later for dinner. He wondered if she felt as he did: that it was better to be two than one on the journey they were taking; better by far.

Pernille toyed with the salmon on her plate and sipped some wine. She did not seem to have much of an appetite – for food or conversation. Eusden suspected uncertainty about what lay ahead of them was a likelier explanation than seasickness. Neither had any way of knowing whether the planned exchange of attaché case for Mjollnir money would really be the swift, simple and above all safe affair others had predicted. Those others would not be there when it happened.