‘Why does the Catholic Church want to buy her pictures? Does she know?’
Some moments passed before Madame answered. Her eyelids fluttered, then eventually she spoke.
‘It’s seldom I see them so clearly. How pretty she is. But she’s being coy. Wouldn’t you like to know? is what she says. And with a smile, too.’
Simonsen felt a warmth consume him such as he hadn’t felt in years, and he blushed as Madame went on with the same gravity in her voice:
‘The young women seem to be swarming over you at the moment, Konrad. But perhaps you’re overlooking the most important of them. It will prove fatal.’
After this rather nebulous warning she leaned forward and passed her hand over the poster in front of her and spoke again, searchingly this time.
‘Lucy is buried in black sand. Black Danish sand. Yes, that’s what she’s saying… black sand. She was killed in her tent.’
She paused and stared into space, continuing only after a while.
‘It wasn’t her own tent. She’d borrowed it from her friend. Her friend on the motorbike.’
‘Was she killed by her friend?’ Simonsen asked.
But Madame wasn’t listening. Instead, she spoke softly:
‘She was raped… or, rather… I think she was raped. I’m not quite sure. Attacked, certainly. Sexually abused. But what a mess. Two dead girls and this screaming child as well.’
She wheeled herself back a metre and sat there like some general watching a parade, with remote interest.
‘Listen to the Christian man you don’t like, Konrad. Promise me that.’
‘All right. But how did she die?’
‘I don’t know. I sense a sudden fear. Panic. Dreadful.’
It was the sounds Pauline Berg made that caused Simonsen to spin towards her. She had stiffened in mid-movement and stood there white as a ghost, gurgling as if she were about to vomit. Her wide eyes stared without seeing him, her hands clutching her throat as though she were grappling an assailant. She reached out to him in desperation, pitifully almost. He shouted out: ‘What’s wrong?’ Then: ‘Pauline, what’s the matter? Say something. Do you need an ambulance?’ But Pauline failed to respond.
Madame reassured him.
‘No point in your panicking. Calm down, she won’t die.’
It helped him to know that. And yet it was clear to him that Madame’s seance had to be abandoned immediately. Mercifully, she was in agreement. Pauline needed attention, that much was obvious. He wheeled Madame out of the room, manhandling the wheelchair down the steps in the path and delivering her to her husband before dashing back to the gallery, where he found Pauline sitting huddled up against a wall, knees drawn to her chin, shoulders tightly raised, her whole body twisted into an unnatural knot of tension. Droplets of perspiration glistened on her brow and upper lip. She didn’t respond to his questions. He placed a protective hand on her shoulder, only for her to shuffle away from him as if he were burning hot. He wondered again if he should call an ambulance, but decided to give her the tranquilliser he kept for her in his wallet. He left her for a moment to fetch some water, then almost forced her to swallow the pill. After a while there was some contact again. He could tell from her eyes that she was coming round from her panic and asked cautiously:
‘Is the medicine working?’
She shook her head.
‘What should I do?’
It was simple: she wanted to go home. But he was not to call a doctor, she was adamant about it. Instead, she wanted him to stay with her. She gripped his hand insistently.
‘You mustn’t go. I can’t be on my own. You’ve got to promise.’
He promised not to leave her. It was all he could do. Even though, as far as he could tell, she needed a psychiatrist, or perhaps ought even to be admitted to hospital. But what was he to do when she expressly told him not to call for medical assistance?
In the car on the way she gradually succumbed to exhaustion and her anxiety seemed little by little to fade. In the lift up to her flat she leaned her head against his shoulder, and outside her door she handed him the keys. Her legs buckled and he had to support her as he unlocked the door.
It was the first time he had seen where she lived. The flat was neat, meticulously so, and made him think of a library. He would have expected her to be more untidy. The view from the living-room window was dismaclass="underline" two concrete blocks of flats the same as the one she lived in, next to the S-train line somewhere between Rødovre and Brøndbyøster, as far as he could make out. He led her into the bedroom, helped her off with her shoes and put her to bed. Again, she made him promise not to go, a snivelling plea and yet unequivocal, and again he promised to stay. She drifted into sleep almost as soon as her head touched the pillow, while he sat at her side on the edge of the bed. In the living room he picked up an armchair and lugged it into the bedroom. He sat down and once more took her hand, then after a while turned on a small TV set on the dresser at the end of the bed, muting the sound, though she would hardly wake up even if he were to let off fireworks.
At one point the Countess rang. They were supposed to be going out to see a film together but now they would have to put it off until some other day. She offered advice: he was to remember to put Pauline on her side, that was important. Then two equally sensible-sounding instructions he failed to take in fully. Besides that, she had little to say apart from suggesting she come and take over, an offer he rejected.
He listened for a long time to the sound of Pauline’s steady breathing while thinking about what Madame had told him. Not about the investigation – he would hold off on that until the morning – but more her comment about young women swarming over him. That, and the fact that he had overlooked the most important one of all. His mind ran through a list of candidates: Lucy, Rita, Anna Mia. Maja Nørgaard perhaps, or Pauline Berg? He glanced at her huddled figure as she lay in the dim light. Who was he overlooking? He racked his brains. The most important of them all. Who was that?
The evening was long, the night even longer.
The hypnosis session displayed a side of Pelle Olsen that Simonsen had never seen before. Olsen had toned down the light-hearted banter of Monday in favour of a more professional demeanour. His wife sat down in an armchair and within minutes was guided into a state of mental relaxation Simonsen could best describe as semi-sleep. Olsen then led her gently back to her time at the gymnasium school as though the forty-odd years that had passed since then were little more than a wink of the eye.
‘Where are you now?’
‘In the classroom. We’ve got maths with Kite.’
‘What class are you in?’
‘Two Y. The coolest class in the school.’
‘What day is it?’
‘Thursday the fourteenth of March nineteen sixty-eight.’
Pelle Olsen turned to Simonsen and spoke softly.
‘I’m going to chat with her for a while about what she’s experiencing. You can ask questions afterwards, but do it through me. Is that all right?’
Simonsen confirmed with a nod, sceptical as to whether or not he was being taken for a ride.
‘Can you ask her if there are any animals in the class? Pets, I mean.’
If Olsen felt he was being tested, it didn’t show.
‘Are there any animals in the classroom?’
‘No, Uffe’s ill, so Silver isn’t here.’
Simonsen was satisfied, and Olsen went on.
‘Kite, is that your teacher?’
‘Henderson, the principal. We call him Mr Kite because of his hobby. He’s a champion kite-flyer. That’s why those Japanese are here. He’s a big name in Japan.’
She giggled like a teenager.
‘It might even be true, for all we know. He goes on about it sometimes, but apart from that he’s nice enough. They say he’s a hard examiner, but I don’t believe it. They say that about everyone. The third years, I mean. To put the wind up us.’