Tove Alsterdal - The Forgotten Dead - A dark, twisted, unputdownable thriller

I smiled at the doorman again.

‘Is it possible to get a table for dinner?’ I asked.

The doorman surveyed my clothes: jeans and the red anorak I’d found in the Salvation Army shop on 8th Avenue.

‘I’m sorry but we’re fully booked this evening.’

He moved away to open the door of the next car that had pulled in, and I took the opportunity to slip into the restaurant behind him.

Thick carpets muffled all sound inside. The entire foyer was done in beige and brown. It looked like the decor hadn’t undergone any changes in the past fifty years. A staircase with an elaborate, gilded wrought-iron banister led up to the next floor. The maître d’ blocked my way.

‘Excuse me, I don’t speak French,’ I said, ‘but I’d like to ask you about a customer. I think he was here a little over a week ago, and—’

‘We do not give out information about our customers,’ said the man. ‘They rely on our discretion.’

‘Of course. I understand that,’ I said, smiling at him as I swiftly searched for a suitable lie, a role to play. I knew that Patrick would never go to a place like this merely to have dinner. He must have been meeting someone here, someone he was going to interview.

‘This is so embarrassing,’ I said, making my voice sultry and feminine. ‘I represent a big American company in Paris, and one of our business partners has booked a table here, and I’ve had so much going on, my mother died recently, and now I’m afraid that I’ve mixed up the days and the weeks.’

The maître d’ frowned and glanced around nervously. Two men in grey suits stood near the cloakroom, leaning close as they talked. A petite, energetic woman with a pageboy hairstyle briskly took their overcoats and hung them up.

‘So if you wouldn’t mind just checking to see which day he booked a table …’ I put my hand on the maître d’s arm. ‘I’ll be fired, you see, if I lose this contract.’

He wavered, casting a glance at a lectern made of polished hardwood on which a book lay open. The reservations calendar.

‘What did you say your name was?’ The maître d’ again glanced off to the side and then hesitantly went over to the lectern.

‘Cornwall,’ I said. ‘It’s booked under the name of Cornwall. Patrick Cornwall. He’s my business partner.’

‘No, I’m afraid not. I don’t see …’ The man ran his index finger over past lunches and dinners.

‘Oh, good Lord,’ I said. ‘I guess it couldn’t have been last week.’ I clapped my hand over my mouth. ‘In that case, I really need to come up with a good excuse and contact him …’

The maître d’ kept paging through the book, and then his finger stopped abruptly.

‘A Mr Cornwall made a lunch reservation on the previous Thursday, September 11, but it was for only one person.’ He glanced up hastily and then closed the book.

What the hell was Patrick doing all alone in a luxury restaurant? I thought. Squandering our money? My hand moved involuntarily to my stomach.

‘One moment please,’ said the maître d’, and he went into the next room. I took a few steps in that direction. He stopped to speak to an older man wearing a red jacket.

‘This lady is asking about Monsieur Cornwall. Patrick Cornwall,’ he said in a low voice. ‘But then I noticed …’ The maître d’ glanced over at me. I fixed my gaze on the wall.

‘Cornwall? You mean that journalist? The American?’

The older man lowered his voice. ‘He is no longer welcome here.’

‘I know. But what do I tell the lady?’

And then they both headed towards me, with the older man in the lead.

In the few seconds before they reached me, I thought to myself that it couldn’t be possible. The men had spoken in French. I shouldn’t have been able to understand them, but the language from my childhood had resurfaced like a repressed memory. ‘I’m afraid we’re closed now, madame,’ said the older man in English.

‘What happened when Patrick Cornwall was here?’ I asked.

‘Under no circumstances do we give out any information about our customers.’

The maître d’ put his hand on my back and discreetly ushered me to the door.

‘It’s best if you leave now.’

And the doorman closed the door behind me without saying a word. The street was almost completely dark.

What on earth could Patrick have done to be refused admittance to such a place? Did he talk too loud?

I moved a short distance away from the restaurant, pulled up the hood of my jacket, and leaned against the stone wall.

Well, I’ll soon find out something, I thought. If only she shows up. That woman on the phone.

I glanced at my watch. Ten more minutes.

While I waited, I tried to conjure up some words in French. Shoe, foot, stone, street. I couldn’t do it, even though the language clearly existed somewhere in my subconscious. Those years spent in a French village were not anything I wanted to remember. I was six when we arrived there. My mother became a different person. I had faint memories of a house that echoed with silence. A man who demanded I call him Monsieur . Doors that were locked at night. Loneliness. And fear when I woke up at night and didn’t know where my mother was.

The car pulled over before I saw it. If I hadn’t been so lost in my own thoughts I might have noticed there was something wrong, that it wasn’t a Bentley or a Rolls, but a worn-out Peugeot with rust on the wheel rims. Suddenly a man was standing in front of me. He wore a hoodie and that’s all I saw. Adrenaline shot through my body, all my instincts screaming at me to flee.

‘Get in the car,’ he snarled, speaking English with an accent. He grabbed my arm. I pulled away, but he blocked my path.

‘I’m waiting for someone. They’ll be here any minute,’ I said. The street was deserted. Not a single Jaguar as far as the eye could see. Even the doorman had abandoned me. I was getting ready to kick the man in a sensitive spot and then take off running when I noticed someone sitting in the car behind him. It was dark, but I was almost certain I saw a woman in the driver’s seat. She wore a headscarf. With my heart pounding, I went over to the car. The man followed close behind.

‘Are you the one who called me?’ I said, leaning forward. The back car door was open.

‘Get in,’ she said, motioning to the back seat. I complied. The man crowded in next to me and slammed the door shut. A second later the woman started up the car and drove off. Fear surged like a hot wave through my body.

‘Where are we going?’ I said. ‘Who are you?’

‘Why are you asking about Patrick Cornwall?’ said the woman. ‘What do you know about Josef K?’

‘Nothing. I don’t know anything about Josef K. That’s why I called.’

I saw her looking at me in the rear-view mirror. Brown eyes with heavy eyeliner. The rest of her face was hidden by the scarf.

‘Where is Patrick?’ I said. ‘Do you know where he’s staying? Is that where we’re going?’