A bouncer the size of a barn came over to them. He was wearing a white tuxedo and was polite enough, even if the look of animosity in his eyes was plain to see.
‘Is there anything you gentlemen would like?’
Everyone else it seemed had to get their own drinks at the bar over at the opposite side if they wanted anything, but the two older men were apparently worthy of better service. Arnold waved him away.
‘Yeah, we’d like to be left alone, if that’s all right?’
The man withdrew, his expression stony.
‘Can you see any door that might lead upstairs?’ Simonsen asked.
Klavs Arnold jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. The door was wallpapered and the join barely visible. Simonsen smiled, picking up a drinks menu, a laminated sheet of black paper with white lettering that lay next to the lamp lit by an artificial candle. He wanted to see if they served anything non-alcoholic. At least half the kids there looked like they were under eighteen. He ran his eyes down the list, without a clue as to what sort of beverage the various exotic names might denote. Klavs Arnold came to his aid.
‘None of these teenagers will be forking out a hundred kroner for a Mai Tai or Caipirinha when they can get a Tequila Sunrise or a Sex on the Beach for half that. They won’t drink anything if it isn’t fancy and colourful and hasn’t got a funny name…’
Simonsen stopped him by nodding towards the entrance, where Jesper Mikkelsen had just come in. With a young girl for company. Arnold fell silent and they watched the club owner lead his partner to the bar before they both came towards the lounge area, she with a garish blue drink in a tall glass with a straw in it, he with a small draught beer. Simonsen thought the man looked older than he had been expecting, older and wearier. The oddly matched couple passed through the room. Klavs Arnold took out his mobile phone and filmed them without concealing what he was doing. Mikkelsen sent him a brief look of puzzlement, but otherwise ignored them. The couple stopped at the door in the wall immediately behind where Simonsen and Arnold were seated. The girl received a peck on the cheek before Mikkelsen went out through the door with his beer in hand.
The girl was left on her own and stood there looking almost forlorn. Simonsen studied her. Her short-sleeved dress was black and short without being vulgar. It was loose-fitting, with big pockets at the front that gave the garment volume. Her hair, too, hung loose, though thick with hairspray. She was barely more than sixteen. Simonsen watched her as she went back to the bar. Her heels were too high, and she wobbled as she walked. Or perhaps she was intoxicated, it was hard to tell. She sat down on a bar stool at the counter, and Konrad Simonsen nodded to himself as he noted how Pauline slid in and settled beside her.
‘Smoky eyes, glitter on the cheeks, the trashy bimbo look,’ said Arnold.
Simonsen replied distractedly:
‘I’m beginning to find you a bit suspect, you sound like you’re used to places like this.’
‘I worked a brief spell as a doorman in Esbjerg once. It’s almost like coming home again.’
‘Policeman, doorman, fitness instructor. How many jobs have you had all at once anyway?’
The answer never came. The bouncer who had approached them before returned with a colleague of much the same proportions. Their previous politeness had evaporated, though the animosity in the eyes remained.
‘Right, you come with us. Now!’
The second man opened the door in the wall and stood aside until Simonsen and Klavs Arnold had been ushered through, then followed on behind, giving Simonsen a brutal shove between the shoulder blades and grunting something incomprehensible in the process. The two policemen were prodded up a flight of stairs wide enough for only one person at a time, the first man leading the way, the second bringing up the rear. The stairs opened on to a short corridor, at the end of which they were bundled through a door.
The room in which they found themselves was not large, comparable to a small living room at best. It was without windows, lit only by two bright strip lights on the ceiling. The walls on three sides were lined with a metal shelving system that was stuffed with ring binders in various colours. Behind a desk at the opposite end sat Jesper Mikkelsen. He looked at his guests with disdain. In front of him, his beer remained untouched.
Simonsen hardly registered the five seconds that followed. Klavs Arnold stepped forward, enquiringly almost, as if he hadn’t really grasped what was going on, and was immediately flanked by the two security men. Then, in one swift movement he swivelled round and smashed a fist into the face of the man on his left, audibly fracturing his nose, at the same time seamlessly delivering a backwards kick to the groin of the man on his right. He slumped to the floor and rolled over in pain. Before Simonsen could emit even a gasp of surprise, Arnold delivered a second kick that swept the legs from under the first man, whose hands had yet to be lifted to the bloody mess that was his nose before he too lay in a heap on the floor.
‘You sit still. Don’t move.’
Arnold had his gun out now, as though it had somehow been conjured into his hand, as Simonsen later recalled. The barrel was pointing at Jesper Mikkelsen’s chest and the tiny metallic click as he unlocked the safety catch rang in Simonsen’s ears. Klavs Arnold repeated his command, calmly, ominously, left hand supporting his extended right arm:
‘Just relax, no sudden movements. And get that hand out of the drawer. Slowly!’
Jesper Mikkelsen did as he was told. His raised his arm’s and placed both hands on his head, as if anticipating Arnold’s next instruction. Klavs Arnold stepped up to his side, dragging him out from behind the desk by his tie, frisking him quickly for any concealed weapon, then forcing him to get down between his two groaning minders. Arnold secured his service pistol and slid it back into its shoulder holster.
Simonsen stepped behind the desk and looked into the open drawer. In it was a mobile phone. He checked the display: Jesper Mikkelsen had managed to press the number of the Aalborg police. At the same moment, there was a knock on the door. Arnold opened it and Pauline came in, followed by the young girl from the bar. She stared in dismay as she saw Mikkelsen on the floor. She got down beside him and began to cry. Pauline Berg surveyed the scene before summing things up:
‘Well, this looks like trouble.’
Simonsen sorted things out. The two injured men were quickly dealt with, he and Jesper Mikkelsen agreeing that mistakes had been made on both sides and it would be in everyone’s best interest if the episode were dismissed. The minders hobbled from the room, Simonsen scowling at Klavs Arnold as they went. The man from Jutland looked at the floor, realising he was in for a serious dressing-down on account of his overreaction. Pauline encouraged the girl to talk. Hesitantly, she put them in the picture.
Eighteen months previously she’d been in dire straits, dropping out of school after Year 8 and then running away from home. After a couple of brief sojourns abroad she’d ended up in Aalborg, moving in with her boyfriend, a drug abuser. From there it all spiralled out of control. The boyfriend’s habit was expensive, and before long she was picking up trade a couple of times a week on Gøglergade and surrounding streets, as well as taking the odd shift at a massage parlour in Nørresundby when she wasn’t out of her head on dope. In November she’d been admitted to Aalborg Sygehus with alcohol poisoning, and it was here she first came into contact with Jesper Mikkelsen, albeit to begin with turning down his offer of support. Three weeks later she was back in the hospital, this time following a half-hearted suicide bid. Mikkelsen came to see her, and after a long talk she had accepted the couple’s help.