With a sigh, Irene decided to leave Jonny’s problems hanging. She had enough of her own to deal with. Peter Møller was expected to show up in two hours.
PETER ANNOUNCED his arrival at the front desk at eleven thirty on the dot. With an unpleasant, tingly feeling in her stomach, Irene took the elevator down to accompany him to their unit. Their meeting was stiff and cold, just as she had expected. The intimacy of the restaurant visit had vanished completely. Had it ever been there or had she just imagined it? Irene was unsure where she stood with him as she breathed in his wonderful scent. His expression was neutral and he displayed no special feelings. Dressed in a thin light gray blazer, dark blue pants, and a chalk white shirt without a tie, he looked like a bank director on his day off. Definitely not like a police officer.
He held a briefcase in cognac-colored leather in his right hand. Expensive. Probably his own, thought Irene.
He greeted Hannu as he entered the office. Jonny hadn’t arrived yet. Irene asked them to be seated. Peter, with the briefcase in his lap, started by saying, “We need a VCR.”
“Not a problem. We have one in the break room,” said Irene.
Peter shook his head. “Not the break room. Someplace where only we can see.”
“I can take care of that,” said Hannu. He disappeared into the corridor.
When he had closed the door, Irene said, “Tell me what’s happened to Tom.”
Her distressed tone of voice didn’t escape Peter’s attention. He observed her closely before he said, “If only I could understand how the two of you ever hooked up.”
A faint smile could be detected in the corner of his mouth. Irene felt a bit more at ease.
Peter took off his cotton blazer and hung it over the back of his chair. “Tanaka closes the shop at eleven o’clock on Saturday evenings. His employee, Ole Hansen, also worked on Saturday. Hansen was in the employee’s lounge just before ten thirty. As you know, it’s located between the shop and Tanaka’s apartment.”
He stopped when Hannu returned with Jonny in tow. Jonny greeted Peter warmly but avoided looking at Irene. As far as he was concerned, she was empty air. If Peter noticed the tension, he pretended not to. He picked up where he had left off.
“Hansen heard a noise inside Tanaka’s apartment.”
“A shot?” Jonny asked.
“No. A crash, from a broken window. Hansen hurried after Tanaka, who went into his apartment. Hansen, standing in the doorway to the kitchen, saw Tanaka disappear in the direction of his bedroom. Almost immediately, he heard a terrible commotion. He describes it as a roar, and the sound of people fighting.”
The roar had probably come from Tom. A sumo wrestler summons up power and instills fear in his opponent with the help of loud screams, thought Irene.
“Hansen dialed the emergency number on his cell phone as he was running toward the bedroom. When he got there, he saw Tanaka lying on the floor in a rapidly growing pool of blood. The room was covered with it. A large blood vessel in his throat had been cut and his blood was pumping out.”
Irene’s stomach knotted when she pictured the scene in her head.
“Hansen saw a man dressed in black, wearing a hooded sweatshirt, disappear through the window. Hansen didn’t see his face, only his back. But he got the impression that the man was large. Not fat, but tall, with a large build.”
“Did he take anything?” Irene asked.
“Yes. A picture. Apparently a framed photograph. According to Hansen, there had been two on the wall. Now only one of them is left.”
“What’s the subject of the picture that’s still hanging there?”
“A naked man sitting in the water.”
The culprit had taken the backlit picture of the man standing in profile, leaning against a stone wall-the one that had sparked in Irene a faint feeling of recognition. He had left the picture of Marcus. She jumped out of her chair and said, “The mail!”
Without paying attention to her colleagues’ curious looks, she ran to get it. She heard Jonny say, “She’s been knocked totally off-kilter. This investigation has taken its toll. Women can’t see their limitations.”
To her joy, she heard Peter reply, “I don’t see her that way. Strongwilled, but definitely not off balance.”
With shaky fingers she started sorting her mail. There! She recognized the stiff exclusive envelope that was just like the one she had gotten Tom’s message in at the Hotel Alex. Triumphantly, she went back to her office bearing the white envelope and impatiently cut it open.
Two photographs floated down onto the desktop. Without a word, Irene pushed the pictures in front of Peter and Hannu’s surprised eyes. Jonny’s curiosity got the better of him and he drew closer in order to get a glimpse.
“How did you get these?” Peter asked, amazed.
Irene leaned back in her chair and said, “I’ll start from the beginning. But first I want to know if Tom is going to make it.”
Peter smiled widely for the first time since his arrival. “Of course. He’s had several blood transfusions and he’ll recover.”
The smile faded a bit when he continued, “The problem is that he lost so much blood that his brain may have been affected. But the doctors don’t know yet.”
At least Tom wasn’t going to die from his injuries. Irene would have to take comfort from that.
It didn’t take very long to explain her dealings with Tom to Peter. Since Hannu and Jonny had just heard it all, they studied both of the photographs. As Irene was finishing, Hannu looked up from the picture he held in front of him.
“I recognize this guy. But I can’t recall who he is.”
He turned the photo around. It was the backlit picture. Irene nodded.
“That’s exactly what I thought. Do you recognize him, too?” she asked Jonny.
He shook his head without looking at her. Peter took the picture and looked at it for a long time.
“No. I can’t say that I recognize him,” he said finally.
Irene took the picture back and stared intently at it, as if to force the man to turn toward the light. She had to put the photo down finally.
“It’s getting close to movie time,” Jonny said, and grinned.
They rose and went into an empty interrogation room where there was a TV with a VCR.
“We usually use this room for children we believe have been subjected to abuse,” Irene explained.
Peter nodded and put one of the films into the VCR.
The first thing they saw was a naked body lying on a long table. The table was covered with strong, see-through plastic. Scaffolding and miscellaneous junk could be seen under and behind the table. In the background, a sturdy tackle hung from a chain fixed to the ceiling. It appeared to be a large industrial building. Above the table, a bare lightbulb emitted a harsh light.
There was absolutely no doubt that the person on the table was dead. The camera zoomed in on a long incision that ran along the front of the corpse’s abdomen. It was obvious that the internal organs had been removed. At first it was difficult to decide if the body was male or female, since both chest muscles and the genitals had been cut away. But based on the curves of the hips and the thighs, Irene concluded that the body was that of a woman.
Peter hit the pause button and spoke. “We found these two films in a hidden compartment in Emil’s bookcase. These are copies that you can keep. There is no soundtrack on either of the films. This is Carmen Østergaard’s body. Neither the actual murder nor the rituals performed with the body afterward are shown. As you can see, the pelvic area is severely damaged. What follows now is the dismemberment itself. That’s Emil’s thing.”