Christian Jungersen - The Exception

Families often rejected violated Bengali women on their return, because they were regarded as a dishonour to their relatives. This woman was fortunate; although her husband refused to take her back, her neighbours showed her some compassion. When they pressured the husband to accept her back as his wife, he hanged himself.

After reading this account, Anne-Lise goes through it again to find the best descriptive words for the library database, but grinds to a halt after a few paragraphs. She tries to start from the beginning, but it’s no use. I need a break, she thinks after the fourth attempt.

As Anne-Lise steps into the brightly lit Winter Garden, Camilla is on the phone, saying that she must cancel her rehearsal session with the choir tonight because she has to attend a parent-teacher meeting at her daughter’s school. The fluorescent light above the shelf of Dutch publications is on the blink. Camilla puts the receiver down and now Anne-Lise can talk to both of them.

‘I’m off to the kitchen to make myself a mug of tea. Does anybody else want one?’

To her surprise Iben says that she wouldn’t mind some tea, thank you. And her face seems more relaxed than usual; she even looks friendly. But then, Malene is away. Anne-Lise still has serious doubts about her chances of getting to know Camilla better. Everything here would be so much easier if Iben changed her attitude and encouraged everyone to work together. Especially after Iben’s accusations yesterday.

Anne-Lise pours water into the electric kettle and waits for it to boil.

Obviously, Camilla is worried about her figure. Her colleagues try not to comment on the rather odd things she has for lunch. Currently, she’s eating almost nothing but cucumbers. During the past year Camilla has tried three contradictory diets, all of which have failed to produce a result. At Lyngby, two of Anne-Lise’s colleagues also ate erratically, but they would joke about their fad diets. Camilla’s problem is that she takes her weight issues far too seriously, even though she is nowhere near as large as Anne-Lise’s former colleagues. Camilla is small and on the plump side, but no more than one might expect of a forty-year-old woman with a child. Couldn’t Camilla’s obsessive relationship with her body fit with the kind of upbringing that might also cause DID?

Despite being about the same age as Camilla, Anne-Lise feels she looks younger than her colleague. One reason is Camilla’s hairdo, an out-dated perm that has dried out her ash-blonde hair. The overall effect is dull and matronly.

Anne-Lise recalls the dramatic story of Camilla’s friend who died from uterine cancer, and the way Camilla stepped into her friend’s life to live with her husband and care for her daughter. Apart from that, all Anne-Lise has to go on is her observations of Camilla’s behaviour.

The day after Iben and Malene received the emails Iben had been speaking about what made people commit war crimes. She had argued that, in one sense at least, they too were victims of forces they could not control. Anne-Lise had never seen Camilla so upset. Was that significant? And if so, what did it mean? Why couldn’t she discuss forgiveness for such crimes? Then there was her strong reaction to receiving one of the emailed threats herself. All she had wanted was to lie down and be alone. Was that a typical reaction or was it a sign of a disturbed person?

The water is about to boil when Iben turns up in the kitchen and leans against the fridge. ‘I’m aware,’ Iben begins hesitantly, ‘that my tirade on the phone yesterday was unreasonable.’

It sounds closer to an apology than anything Anne-Lise has ever dared hope for.

‘I had no good grounds for being so convinced that you were the one who’d exchanged the pills,’ Iben continues, looking away timidly.

Anne-Lise realises that she should try to be receptive to Iben’s attempts at conversation or she’ll never be able to persuade Camilla to give her secrets away. She must control her anger. ‘You were very upset, naturally. You weren’t yourself. I understand it must have been terrible for you.’

‘It really was.’

Anne-Lise thanks Iben once more for her suggestion about phoning Tatiana. The call went very well — so well, in fact, that she almost got the impression that Tatiana had been expecting it.

‘It was so good of you. Let’s see if Tatiana will use our library more after this.’

Anne-Lise has an impulse to phone Henrik, but discreet conversations are impossible now that the door is open all the time. It wouldn’t look right if she were to shut it again, even for a short while.

Over lunch they discuss the changes in the lives of university students in East Pakistan after 1971. The Indian army had intervened in support of the Bengalis to stop the genocide and establish East Pakistan as the independent state of Bangladesh. Part of the contempt felt by the Pathans and Punjabis for the Bengalis was related to the fact that they were not a warrior race; indeed they were regarded as unfit for military service. However, the genocide wrought many changes and the effects were perhaps especially marked in the universities.

One of the top priorities of the Pakistani soldiery had been to kill off university staff, students and other intellectuals to stop them from becoming leaders. In 1971 the universities became slaughterhouses and, after the secession, the students were so used to carrying arms that conflicts between opposing student factions were frequently settled with shoot-outs. This made universities amongst the most dangerous places to be in Bangladesh. The extreme violence of the students undermined the whole academic system.

Anne-Lise cannot concentrate. She thinks about the change in Iben’s behaviour. The peaceful morning has been like a breath of fresh air. She watches Camilla pause before covering her fourth slice of crisp-bread with fat-free cottage cheese and slices of cucumber. The three of them seem quite at ease with each other. Perhaps she can persuade Camilla to reveal something that would show her emotional volatility and prove that she is the one who should be under suspicion.

As Anne-Lise tries to muster the courage to ask Camilla a question, Iben interrupts: ‘Isn’t it amazing how little we know about each other, even though we work so closely together?’

‘It is.’

Iben has always been pale, but recently she’s had dark rings beneath her eyes from lack of sleep. She looks at Anne-Lise and smiles.

‘So I was thinking, Anne-Lise, now that we’re just sitting here: why don’t you tell us a bit more about yourself.’

It is raining hard when Anne-Lise parks in a dark street, well away from the post office building. She walks quickly. Under the golf umbrella she always keeps in the trunk of the car, not even her shoes get wet. When she has passed the entrance to the Tivoli Concert Hall, she turns left at the Central Station.

Anne-Lise is scared. She has never done anything like this before and it goes against her nature, but her back is against the wall. If she is sacked, she may never work again.

She has to find out more about Camilla.

The edifice in front of her is not so much a single building as a mass of concrete blocks all joined together: Copenhagen’s Central Post Office.

Outside one of its doors waits a group of women, mostly in their fifties. Anne-Lise introduces herself: ‘I’m Brigitte.’

They seem pleased that she is joining them this evening. One of the women unlocks the door with a magnetised ID card and leads the way down a steep metal staircase.

A woman in a long black dress explains where they are going: ‘The room we use is actually next to the reception area, but in the evenings so many of the alarms on the doors have been set that we have to go via the basement.’