ÖSTERSJÖN – ITÄMERI

THIRTY-FOUR

Pernille toyed with the salmon on her plate and sipped some wine. She did not seem to have much of an appetite – for food or conversation. Eusden suspected uncertainty about what lay ahead of them was a likelier explanation than seasickness. Neither had any way of knowing whether the planned exchange of attaché case for Mjollnir money would really be the swift, simple and above all safe affair others had predicted. Those others would not be there when it happened.

‘For what it’s worth, Pernille,’ he ventured, ‘I think it’ll all go very smoothly.’

She smiled fleetingly. ‘That’s not what you said this afternoon.’

‘I’ve thought it over since.’

‘Have you? Well, so have I. And I’m sure you’re right. The Opposition want money. Mjollnir want the material. We’re just the… mellemmændene – the middlemen. There won’t be a problem with the handover.’

‘With something else, then?’

‘It’s what you said at the terminal. I’m back in Tolmar’s life, even if he doesn’t know it. But he will know. Eventually. He finds out everything in the end.’

‘Surely it won’t matter by then.’

‘You don’t know him. It always matters.’

‘I get the feeling… you’re frightened of him.’

‘That’s what my psychotherapist said.’

‘Is it true?’

‘Oh yes.’ She smiled and shook her head in wonderment at the obviousness of the truth. ‘The question is whether the fear is about something else… in me. That’s what my psychotherapist thinks.’

‘I guess that’s the sort of thing they always think.’

She laughed. ‘How would you know? You’ve never had one.’

He was forced to laugh himself, discovering in the process that he had been right: the wound above his eye throbbed painfully. ‘How can you be sure of something like that? You hardly know me.’

‘It’s obvious. Look at yourself, Richard. White, male, middle-aged, well-paid, heterosexual Englishman. Nice family. Good education. Comfortable life. What would you talk to a psychotherapist about?’

‘Divorce maybe. You didn’t mention that.’

‘I bet it was very… civilized.’

‘Wasn’t yours?’

‘On the surface, yes.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means Tolmar pays me a generous allowance and leaves me alone. And it means I think he might be standing there, with that… look on his face I remember so well because I… see it in my dreams…every time I answer the doorbell.’

‘Is he a violent man, Pernille?’

‘He never hit me. Not once. But I knew… if it happened… it only ever would be once.’ She swallowed some wine. ‘I don’t know why I’m telling you all this. I don’t normally… open up. Neither do you, I guess.’

‘Maybe there’s nothing for me to open up about.’

‘There’s always something. Plenty, according to my psychotherapist.’

‘Have you ever considered… remarrying?’

‘Once. A few years ago. He was a good man. But it didn’t work out.’ A brief silence fell. Then she went on. ‘Are you going to ask me what went wrong?’

‘If you want me to.’

‘He died. In a car crash. At night.’ She looked Eusden in the eye. ‘Remind you of anything?’

‘Are you saying…’

‘Tolmar told me, when he agreed to the divorce, that I shouldn’t… get into a permanent relationship again. I thought he was… giving me advice. But when Paul died, I… remembered that Tolmar always means exactly what he says.’

‘Good God.’

‘There’s no evidence it wasn’t an accident. I can’t prove a thing. But I… wouldn’t want another death on my conscience.’ She laid her knife and fork neatly down. ‘I can’t eat anything else. We could finish the wine in my cabin if you like. Mjollnir booked me a suite. We may as well use the space.’

Pernille’s suite was an elegant contrast with Eusden’s cramped single cabin. Mjollnir treated their CEO’s ex-wife and an outsider very differently. Sloping windows, across which the curtains had not been drawn, looked out over the bow into the still, cold Baltic night. The comfortably furnished lounge was large enough to hold a party in and came complete with complimentary champagne, the bottle standing forlornly in a bucket of water that had once been ice.

‘I’m sorry if I rushed you out of the restaurant,’ Pernille said as she topped up their wine glasses. ‘I suddenly thought I was… saying too much… in a public place.’

‘Afraid someone might’ve recognized you?’

‘No. But…’ She cradled the glass against her throat and gazed out into the darkness. ‘One of the reasons I drove to Stockholm was to make sure I wasn’t followed. I know the signs. I know them well. Tolmar has no spies aboard. He doesn’t know what we’re doing. Even so…’

‘How long have you been taking such precautions?’

‘Since Paul died.’

‘And how long’s that?’

‘Seven years.’

‘Sorry.’

‘What for?’

‘Your loss. Your… anxiety. Being divorced from Tolmar Aksden doesn’t sound like a lot of fun.’

‘It’s better than being married to him. You can take my word for that.’

‘When did it end?’

‘When he sent Michael away to a… kostskole. You know? A school where the children live as well as learn.’

‘Boarding school.’

‘That’s it. Michael was twelve years old. The school was near Aalborg, up in the north of Jutland. We’d only just moved from Århus to Copenhagen. Everything changed around then. Tolmar got… harder.’ She smiled. ‘I think he finally decided what he wanted to do. And I was… irrelevant.’

‘What did he want to do?’

‘I don’t know. He has a lot of secrets, Richard. He collects them. He enjoys them.’

‘Everyone seems to think what we’re buying is… the biggest secret of all.’

‘Maybe it is.’

‘You must know it involves his father.’

‘Yes. There’s always been a… mystery about the family. Only Tolmar knows what it is. Lars would like to. Elsa would prefer not to. But only Tolmar knows. Though one day, I imagine, he’ll tell Michael.’

‘As his son and heir.’

‘Yes. And that frightens me also. Michael becoming… the next keeper of the family secret.’

‘There’s a Russian connection. You must know that too.’

‘Of course,’ she said sadly. ‘The last house I lived in with Tolmar was at Klampenborg. From the garden, you could see across to Hvidøre. Lars said Tolmar had chosen the house because you could see Hvidøre from it. He told me stories about his great-uncle, Hakon Nydahl, the courtier. He thought I could get more out of Tolmar than he was able to. But I wouldn’t have, even if I’d tried. No one gets more out of Tolmar than he wants to give. And that isn’t much.’ She drained her glass and set it down on the table. ‘Would you like to go on deck? I need some fresh air after all this… talk about the past.’

‘It’ll be freezing up there.’

She smiled and nodded at him. ‘Good. That’ll be how I like it.’

It was freezing. And no one else was braving the conditions. The sky above them was scattered with more stars than Eusden could ever recall seeing. The cold was intense, almost tangible. The ship’s engine rumbled below their feet. And sea ice stretched away, blue-grey and ghostly, on every side.

‘It all seems so simple out here,’ said Pernille, her breath frosting in the air as she gazed upwards. ‘The stars and the sea and the moving ship. But it can’t stay like this, can it? Tomorrow, we will reach Helsinki.’

‘Have you ever been there before?’ Eusden asked.

‘No. Tolmar often went to Helsinki for business. But he never took me with him. He has an apartment there. It’s his only base outside of Denmark.’

‘Does he still have the house in Klampenborg?’

‘No. He moved out to the country after the divorce. He bought himself an estate near Helsingør. A lovely place – they tell me. I could have been… lady of the manor… if I’d stayed with him.’