The Dinosaur Feather

Chapter 6

As Søren began to think about leaving the office on Monday October 8, he was firmly of the opinion that Professor Helland’s death would be classed as one of Mother Nature’s enigmatic early recalls, and decided to wrap up the case as quickly as possible. Lars Helland had dropped dead—that was all there was to it. Hearts stopped beating in Denmark every day; even in people who, like Professor Helland, biked fifteen miles to and from work, and never smoked or drank. Admittedly, the severed tongue was a bit out of the ordinary, even to Søren, but it was a relatively common occurrence for people to sustain serious injuries in the process of dying. Søren had seen broken necks, smashed teeth and skulls, burns, shattered bones, and skewered torsos inflicted by everything from barbecues and radiator valves to lawnmowers and cast iron fences. Helland must have suffered convulsions of some sort and had bitten off his own tongue before he died.

Convinced the case would soon be closed, Søren had started his preliminary interviews at the university. The first person on his list was the rather strange-looking and practically transparent biologist, Johannes Trøjborg, who had reported the death. He had been in the department because he was co-writing a paper with Professor Helland. He was hoping to get his PhD application approved, despite the PhD and Human Resources Committee having already turned his application down—twice. Søren had met many oddballs in his time, people whose head and body decorations were so extreme that you could barely make out the naked person underneath them. Johannes, however, was one of the most peculiar creatures Søren had ever seen. His transparency reminded Søren of those little white creatures you find under paving stones. Johannes’s hands were long, slender and silken, his skin stretched tight and pale across his face and he stooped. Only his red hair and intelligent eyes contradicted Søren’s impression of being in the presence of something stale and musty.

Johannes appeared to have nothing but positive things to say about Helland, and only when Søren held a gun to his head—metaphorically speaking, of course—did he reluctantly agree that Helland’s behavior had recently been unfocused and distracted. But then again, he quickly added, Anna wasn’t the easiest person in the world to get along with, either. Søren failed to see the relevance, and Johannes spluttered as he explained that Anna and he had differed wildly in their opinions on Helland’s qualities, both as a human being and as a supervisor, a topic they had discussed several times over the summer. Johannes paused, then he blurted out that Anna had, in fact, been toying with the idea of playing pranks on Helland. Pranks? Søren gave Johannes a baffled look. What did he mean? Johannes blinked as though he had said too much. Nothing, it was just…. He looked away. Anna was angry with Helland, he admitted at last. She felt he had let her down. She had a young child to look after, so she was already under pressure, and she had grown disproportionately mad at Helland in a way that Johannes didn’t like. They had argued about it. Søren listened.

All of a sudden, Johannes asked Søren if he was aware that someone had made threats against Helland. He mentioned it casually, his tone bordering on flippancy, but then rushed to make it clear Helland himself had laughed and declared the threats to be pranks. Johannes didn’t know the nature of them, he only knew Helland’s interpretation, which was that someone at the university bore a grudge and had decided to send him some nasty e-mails. Søren wanted to know if Johannes suspected the sender might be Anna Bella Nor. Johannes dismissed it instantly. Of course not! It would never cross Anna’s mind. Professor Helland was a member of several committees and his administrative influence was considerable; he knew that he was an obvious target for people’s dissatisfaction. He was on the PhD and Human Resources Committee—to name but one—Johannes explained, and was thus in a position to decide the future academic careers of several biologists.

Søren nodded slowly, thanked him and had just closed the door behind him when he remembered something. Johannes looked up, surprised, when the door opened again and Søren popped his head around it.

“Does that mean,” Søren said kindly, “Professor Helland was involved in rejecting both your PhD applications?”

“Yes,” Johannes said, calmly. “It does.”

Søren left, a touch perplexed. Johannes was clearly upset about Helland’s death and hunted high and low for a logical explanation; he had accidentally implicated his colleague, Anna Bella Nor, but then had gone on to defend her, as though it was Søren and not Johannes himself who had made the insinuation. Just as well this was a straightforward case, Søren thought, it saved him from having to dig more deeply to find out what Johannes Trøjborg had actually meant.

Anna Bella Nor’s turn was next. They met in the small library, and she sat with her back to him, but turned around warily when he approached. She had short, brown hair, an oval face, and a slender, yet strong body, he thought. There was something sullen about her movements, as though she minded being here very much. Her eyebrows and lashes were dense and black. Her eyes were indescribable; at first sight they seemed muddy, but when she said something with emphasis, they shone golden. To his surprise, the pace of the interview was sluggish—it was clearly a matter of great inconvenience to Anna Bella Nor that Professor Helland had died. She came across as angry and fraught, and at one point she said outright: “My dissertation defense is in two weeks. This really is very bad timing, to put it mildly.”

Søren asked about her relationship with Helland and learned that Helland was slightly better than useless, and Anna had even considered making a formal complaint about him to the Faculty Council. He also learned that Helland had upset everyone, including Johannes, though Johannes wouldn’t admit it.

“Johannes is a friend,” she interjected, and narrowed her eyes, “but he’s horrible at reading people. He’s just too nice, and he has convinced himself it’s his mission on earth to excuse every single reprehensible act. Johannes can always find a reason, and do you know something?” Anna gave Søren a hard stare. “Sometimes even the best explanation isn’t a justification. Professor Helland didn’t care about me at all, and that’s a fact.”

She went on to tell him that Professor Ewald and Professor Jørgensen hadn’t been huge fans of Professor Helland either, and, as far as Anna could see, with good reason. Helland had managed to get himself a seat on every single academic and administrative committee there was, and was consequently responsible for myriad things that affected the daily running of the department. Anna refused to specify what they were: “Trust me, they’ll bore you to death, seriously.”

What Anna was at pains to point out was that Helland had twice removed the electric kettle, which she and Johannes had bought and kept in their study, and taken it to his office without asking. At this point, Søren’s fingers had begun to itch with irritation, and he told Anna to leave out irrelevant information, whereupon Anna looked straight at him and said: “You want to know about Helland’s relationship with his colleagues at the institute? How better to describe the climate that surrounded him than by explaining what a petty, self-important, emotionally stunted fascist he really was?”

Søren was genuinely impressed at how swiftly Anna could weld so many words into such a hard-hitting sentence.

The next thing he wanted to know was if Helland had seemed all right lately.

Anna replied: “I tended to avoid him, but he was always quite odd. The strangest thing recently was his eye. Whatever it was, it was bad.”

She had first seen it in the early summer and thought little of it, but recently she had noticed that the growth had…

“Bigger isn’t the right word,” she said. “But it grew more visible, as though it was changing character and hardening.” She fell abruptly silent.

Søren thanked her and asked her to remain at the department from where she would be driven to the police station. Anna demanded to know why and looked most unhappy when Søren explained it was procedure. When he left and closed the door between them, he could feel himself sweating.

The two professors were next on his list. They were speaking quietly in Professor Ewald’s office and exuded an atmosphere of profound trust. When Søren knocked, they both rose and asked him to take a seat in a stylish, but rather uncomfortable chair with a metal back and a thin seat pad. Professor Jørgensen was the doyen of the department and had, Søren quickly realized, partly retired, but was still working on a range of research projects.

At first glance, Professor Ewald came across as the most normal of the four biologists. She was petite, but she had the edge over the rest of them—expensive, well-fitting clothes, a good haircut, modern glasses, and discreet makeup. At second glance, however, he realized that she was fundamentally a worrier. While they spoke, Søren unobtrusively checked out her airy office where every surface was covered with biological specimens. Her subject was invertebrates, she told Søren, and when he looked baffled, she said: “Animals with no spine,” and gestured in a way Søren took to indicate that the numerous animals decorating her shelves and window sills were all such unfortunate creatures.

The professors were terribly upset. Professor Ewald admitted openly that she was plagued by horrible guilt, and Professor Jørgensen nodded in agreement: they had both loathed Helland. Unequivocally. Helland and Ewald had worked in the department for over twenty-five years, Jørgensen even longer, and when they looked back at their careers, the only obstacle had been Helland. He had poisoned the working environment and prevented joint and targeted research by constantly looking out for number one. Further, he was a member of several administrative committees and Professor Ewald and Professor Jørgensen strongly agreed this was the equivalent of giving a baby a razor. Helland had no administrative skills whatsoever, and yet he got himself elected chair of several university bodies, with chaotic consequences for the department every single time. Once, for example, Helland forgot the submission date for joint grant applications, despite the fact he had been reminded of the approaching deadline on an almost daily basis in the preceding six months. The department had been forced to survive a whole term on the remains of the previous year’s grants, students had to pay for photocopied handouts, the annual field trip was canceled, and they had been forced to use faulty microscopes.

Two years ago, Helland had been elected head of the department, which meant he was given overall responsibility for the two units that made up the department of Cell Biology and Comparative Zoology, and in those two years he had practically brought the department to its knees. Helland’s incredibly poor performance and his cavalier treatment of students as well as budgets had sparked a lot of friction, not only among Jørgensen, Ewald, and Helland, but also between Helland and several of the cell biologists who worked on the floor above. The corridors had frequently echoed with arguments, and Professor Ewald said she had come close to resigning on numerous occasions. Unfortunately, having tenure as a scientist at the college of Natural Science was a dream job and she knew she would never get another post like it. Then there was the responsibility toward the students. Morphology was a popular subject, and she felt duty-bound to educate new morphologists—a task that fell almost exclusively to her because Helland quite simply didn’t appear to share her sense of duty, even though teaching was a compulsory part of their employment contract with the university.

Søren failed to understand the latter; as far as he had been informed, the department had only two postgraduates, Anna Bella Nor and Johannes Trøjborg, and surely Helland was supervising both of them?

“Yes…” Professor Ewald hesitated. “But they are his only postgraduate students in the last ten years. During the same period, Professor Jørgensen and I have supervised at least forty postgraduates, of which the vast majority finished their PhDs long ago and are now in full-time employment. Those students are our only hope, and even though it’s undeniably tough to teach undergraduates, supervise postgraduates, and deliver new groundbreaking research that maintains our international reputation as a nation of scientists, you have to take your job seriously, not only as an employee of the college of Natural Science, but also as a human being.” Professor Ewald’s eyes were fiery.

“The truth is, we were both surprised. At Johannes and Anna. Pleasantly surprised, I hasten to add.” She stopped and looked at Professor Jørgensen.

“But…” Søren prompted.

“Neither of them needed a laboratory to do their work,” Professor Jørgensen answered for her. “Johannes wrote a theoretical dissertation, and Anna has done the same.”

“What does that mean?”

“They didn’t spend time with Helland in the laboratory; he didn’t have a student trailing after him for years, which meant he didn’t need to do any research because there was no one to keep an eye on him. Johannes and Anna based their dissertations on existing literature, and though that’s almost certainly twice as hard as writing a practical dissertation, it undoubtedly represented a minuscule effort, if any, on Helland’s part. Of course it troubled us. It was the principle of it.”

A pause followed. Then Professor Ewald said, “Still, it’s dreadful what’s happened. You wouldn’t want that for your worst enemy.” She looked as if she was about to say something else, but stopped and exhaled lightly.

“Was that what he was?” Søren probed. “Your worst enemy?”

“No,” Professor Ewald replied firmly. “He was frequently a pain in the ass, he really was. But after twenty-five years, you learn to live with it.”

Søren cocked his head. At the same time, the light outside changed and the office grew darker, almost black. Professor Ewald leaned forward and switched on a lamp on a low trolley. The base of the lamp was a brass octopus twisting its tentacles up a gnarled stick as though it was trying either to climb out of the sea or pull the white silk shade into the sea with it. Søren wondered if the creature were an invertebrate, too. When Professor Ewald had settled back into her chair, Søren continued.

“Speaking of pain… have you any idea what the problem with Helland’s eye might have been?” he asked innocently, and looked from one to the other. The professors seemed genuinely baffled.

“There was something wrong with his eye?” Professor Jørgensen frowned.

“Johannes and Anna both mentioned a growth of some sort in Helland’s right eye, they said it had become more noticeable in recent months. Did you see anything?”

The professors considered this. Then Professor Ewald began, tentatively: “This may sound odd…” she sighed, “but I never actually looked at him. Not closely. We would say hello in passing, but since Helland, in his year as head had practically handed over the head of department job to Professor Ravn upstairs, I hadn’t needed to discuss administrative issues with him. That was last spring, wasn’t it?” She looked to Professor Jørgensen for confirmation. He nodded.

“The atmosphere here was affecting me badly, you see.” She was looking at Søren now. “However, about six months ago I came to a decision. I finally stopped believing things would ever change. I decided to regard Helland as a necessary evil, like a motorway at the end of a garden you have spent precious years cultivating. I didn’t want to leave. I’m fond of the students and I love my research. And last year I realized I had only two choices: I could resign or I could learn to put up with Helland. Since then I haven’t had much contact with him. We used e-mail to exchange internal messages, but apart from that I avoided him. So, no, I hadn’t noticed that something might be wrong with his eye.”

Søren saw she was resting her hands calmly in her lap and looking straight at him.

“Me neither,” Professor Jørgensen added.

“And what about his health in general? Anything stand out?”

Again both professors looked puzzled. Then Professor Jørgensen remarked, “Something must have been wrong for his heart to stop beating without any warning. He suffered death throes, I imagine? Since he bit off his own tongue?”

“The autopsy will establish that,” Søren said in a neutral voice.

“Perhaps he was an undiagnosed epileptic?” Professor Jørgensen suggested.

“So you never noticed anything?” Søren cut him short.

“No,” they replied in unison. Søren got ready to leave, but sensed hesitation hanging in the air. He looked closely at Professor Ewald.

“Did you want to add something?”

Professor Ewald frowned.

“This is going to sound silly…” she looked away. “No, it’s too absurd.”

“Tell me anyway,” Søren prompted her.

“As I was saying, we e-mailed occasionally about practical matters. For instance, we shared the SEM computer at the end of the corridor and a couple of times Helland didn’t show up when he had booked a session, so I e-mailed him to ask if I could use his slot.”

“You chose to e-mail him even though his office is about a hundred feet down the corridor?” Søren asked.

“Yes,” Professor Ewald said, curtly.

“All right, go on,” Søren said.

“And if I have to come up with something that might seem a little out of the ordinary, then this is it”—she laughed a hollow laugh—“his spelling was deteriorating.”

Søren and Professor Jørgensen were speechless.

“His spelling?” Professor Jørgensen said.

“Yes,” Professor Ewald replied. “His last two or three e-mails were so appalling I could barely read them. As though he had bashed them out in seconds and simply couldn’t be bothered to spell-check them before hitting ‘send.’ I took it as further evidence of how little respect he had for me. But, now that you mention it, it does seem a bit strange.”

They both nodded and Søren made a mental note.

Still convinced that Helland had died from natural causes, Søren arranged for the four biologists to be driven to the police station where he formally interviewed them and their statements were written down and signed. Anna still looked disgruntled.

As he and Henrik drove down Frederikssundvej, Søren quickly reviewed the case, purely to assure himself that he hadn’t missed anything. Professor Helland clearly couldn’t compete with Santa Claus in the popularity stakes, that much was obvious, but Søren had yet to stumble on anything that might hint at uncontrollable rage, and without that it was quite simply impossible to rip someone’s tongue out. He smiled to himself. Anna Bella was the only one who appeared remotely combative, but the idea that she would mutilate her supervisor was far-fetched.

“What’s so funny?” Henrik wanted to know.

“Nothing,” Søren said and looked out of the window.

At half past four in the afternoon, Søren sat in his office wondering if he could write his report now, even though he was still awaiting the result of the autopsy. It would probably arrive tomorrow, but he was pretty sure he knew what it would say: Lars Helland had died from heart failure. Once he put that in his report, the case would be closed. The only thing stopping him was that he had yet to talk to Professor Helland’s allegedly close colleague, Dr. Tybjerg. After interviewing Anna and her colleagues, he had gone to the Natural History Museum to find him. The place had been like an enchanted forest. Søren had started by asking for Dr. Tybjerg at the reception and had been directed through a door and into a complicated maze of deserted corridors, where he instantly got himself lost. It wasn’t until he had been into four empty offices and knocked on six locked doors, which no one answered, that he met a living human being. It was an old man sitting behind a desk, writing. A huge poster depicting thousands of colorful butterflies of all sizes hung on the wall behind him. The old man directed Søren further down a corridor and up to the third floor where Dr. Tybjerg was supposed to be sitting by the windows overlooking the park.

Five minutes later, Søren was lost again and when he, finally and with the help of a young woman, found the desk where Dr. Tybjerg was supposed to be when he worked with bones, all he could see was an angle-poise lamp, which was switched on, a pencil, and a chair. He hung around for a while, but after ten minutes he grew impatient and decided he had had enough. He found something that appeared to be a cafeteria and informed the catering assistant, who was wringing out a cloth, that he was a police superintendent and insisted on speaking to Dr. Tybjerg this instant. The woman glanced around, said, “He’s not here,” and resumed cleaning.

Someone at a table in the cafeteria, however, told Søren Dr. Tybjerg’s office could be found in the basement, in the right-hand wing; that is, down the stairs in the central wing, then right through two swing doors, and then down to the basement. Halfway down one of the basement corridors, the one facing the University Park, was an office and through that office was another office and that belonged to Dr. Tybjerg. Søren stomped back to reception where he asked, in his most polite tone of voice, the student staffing the counter to get hold of Dr. Tybjerg. The student rang various numbers. Søren drummed his fingers on the counter.

“He’s not in his office, in the collection, the cafeteria, or the library,” she said. “All I can do is e-mail him.”

Søren left his name and number with a message for Dr. Tybjerg to contact him. Then he drove to Bellahøj police station and worked in his office. He had just made up his mind to go home when his telephone rang.

“Søren Marhauge.”

“It’s me.” It was Søren’s secretary, Linda.

“Hello, me,” Søren said.

“The Deputy Medical Examiner just called.”

Bøje Knudsen, the Deputy Medical Examiner, worked in the basement of Rigshospitalet, Copenhagen’s central hospital. Søren had never been able to decide whether or not he liked him. Bøje had a twinkle in his eye, and though Søren appreciated that a certain amount of professional detachment was required, Bøje still came across as strangely aloof. One day Bøje had read his mind and remarked, “Søren, my dear friend, if I broke down and cried every time I felt like it, the hospital would be flooded. But, trust me, my soul is grieving.” Søren had warmed a little to Bøje, but he had yet to be convinced. Søren himself was more thick-skinned now than he had been at the start of his career, that went without saying, but he told himself this made him neutral and composed rather than cold.

“Why didn’t you put him through?” Søren asked.

“He wouldn’t hear of it. He told me to give you his regards and to tell you that if he were you, he would hurry over to the hospital.”

Just before five o’clock Søren drove to the hospital and parked under two poplars stripped bare by the advancing autumn. The blacktop was slippery with fallen leaves, and the wind seemed to blow simultaneously from all four corners. He felt a profound sense of unease. He announced his arrival at reception and took the elevator down two floors to the Institute of Forensic Medicine. It was the second time in one day he had walked through a desolate grid of interconnecting passages and corridors, but this time he didn’t get lost. He greeted a few familiar faces in passing before he heard music from the radio and Bøje’s humming. He knocked on the open door and entered. Bøje was behind his desk. It looked like he was expecting him.

“There you are,” he said, as Søren entered.

Søren took a seat and Bøje glanced at him. Then he looked down at a sheet with indecipherable hieroglyphs and up at Søren again. He rolled his lips and tapped the table once with his finger.

“Today I performed an autopsy on one Lars Helland,” he began.

“And?” Søren wished he could extract the information from Bøje now and absorb it later at his own pace.

“He died from heart failure,” Bøje went on, and nodded. Søren nodded back. It was what he had expected.

“And his tongue?”

“He bit it off himself. His heart failed after a series of violent epileptic seizures and because no one was there to put a splint in his mouth, his tongue bore the brunt of the fits.”

“Right, okay, I might as well get going then,” Søren said, getting up and letting him know through his facial expression he was annoyed at having been summoned to the hospital.

“In theory, yes,” Bøje shrugged. “Unless I can interest you in a charming detail which, in all likelihood, induced the seizures?”

Søren sat down again. Bøje peered at Søren over the rim of his reading glasses.

“It was an agonizing death, Søren,” he then said. “It’s not uncommon for the tongue or the lips to be bitten through in places, but I have never come across a case where the tongue was severed.”

“I think your memory is faulty. There was the Lejre case and that one from Amager,” Søren objected.

“Yes, but in those two cases—actually I know of three, but never mind,” Bøje glanced at Søren. “In each severed-tongue case, other instruments were involved. It requires huge force to bite off a tongue. It isn’t something you just decide to do,” he said emphatically, and then his expression softened.

“And as it doesn’t look like anyone was directly involved in Helland’s death, it’s my theory he experienced extreme convulsions which led, among other things, to the severing of his tongue and heart failure shortly afterward. There is no doubt that Lars Helland died a brutal and painful death.” Bøje was looking urgently at Søren now.

“But, Søren Marhauge, my friend,” he said, amicably. “That’s nothing compared to the hellish agony he must have suffered while he was alive.” A sincere and almost naked horror briefly revealed itself in Bøje’s eyes, before he managed to herd his feelings back into their box.

“What do you mean?” Søren asked.

“He’s riddled with bugs,” Bøje said.

“Bugs?”

“Parasites of some sort, but I’m a forensic examiner, not a parasitologist, and I’m ashamed to say I’ve been unable to identify the little devils. All I can tell you is they are everywhere in his tissue. The strongest concentration is found in his muscles and central nervous system. It’s unbelievable. For example, his brain is filled with encysted organic… growths. Do you understand what I’m saying? A parasite of some kind. I’ve sent samples to the chief medical officer at the Serum Institute, obviously. We’ll know what we’re dealing with tomorrow.”

Søren was speechless.

“Yes, that’s exactly how I felt when I realized what the poor man had been through. I can’t imagine how he was able to function on a daily basis.”

“Where do they come from?” Søren asked eventually.

“I don’t know.”

“But is this normal?” Søren wanted to know. He had never heard about parasites in human tissue before. A tapeworm, yes, threadworm, giardiasis, bilharziasis even, he had heard of, and he knew the latter was widespread in the Third World, but they were unwanted guests in the stomach, the intestines and, possibly, in the blood, but not in actual human tissue. It was the most disgusting thing he had ever heard.

“I don’t know,” Bøje repeated. “Like I said, I’m no parasitologist.”

“How many of them would you estimate he had in him?” Søren asked.

Bøje picked up his sheet.

“Around 2,600 in total, spread across nerve, muscle, and connective tissue… a relatively high concentration in his brain…” Søren held up his hand.

“. . . and one in his eye,” Bøje said. “It was visible.”

Søren shook his head in disbelief. “Listen,” he said. “Are you saying Professor Helland didn’t die from natural causes?”

“Again I’m tempted to take a pass on guessing,” Bøje said gravely. “On the one hand, his death is exceedingly natural. His system collapsed, and it was exclusively down to his superb physical condition and strong constitution that it didn’t happen much sooner. And like I said: I don’t know enough about parasites to be specific, but if I can speak off the record, my immediate and most pressing concern is obviously: how did the little devils get into him?” Bøje narrowed one eye.

“A disturbing thought,” he went on. “On the other hand, Helland was a biologist, and who knew what he was up to? Perhaps it was a work-related injury? Perhaps he knocked over a dish in his lab?”

“The man was an ornithologist,” Søren objected.

“The source of the infection could be birds. It’s pure guesswork for my part, and I don’t enjoy that, but we have a distinguished expert, Dr. Bjerregaard, on parasitology at the Serum Institute and I’ve already spoken to her. She promised me she would embed the samples in paraffin, slice them before going home today and examine them first thing tomorrow morning. At twelve noon we’ll have the answer. And then there is Professor Moritzen at the College of Natural Science. She’s one of the world’s leading parasitologists and worked for years in South America and Indonesia, which have huge parasite problems. She’s definitely the right person to talk to. She can explain to you how all these little critters ended up inside Lars Helland.” Bøje paused, then he held up his index finger.

“Meanwhile, I have some more fascinating information to share with you. Lars Helland had a fair number of recent fractures that were left to heal by themselves; not a pretty sight in some places. He had broken three fingers on his left hand, two on his right and two toes on his right foot within the last six months. Further, he had scarring on his scalp from violent seizures and two minor hematoma in his brain, neither of them in a dangerous location, but they’re there.”

Bøje had been hunched over his papers, now he looked up at Søren. “I can also tell you he has had brain surgery, eight to ten years ago? Not that it matters and, apart from the two hematoma, there is no sign of brain disease. I just thought I would mention it. Now, about the fractures. I called a colleague of mine in the ER and asked him to check their records. He owed me a favor and, yes, I do know it’s illegal.” Bøje raised his hand to preempt Søren’s objection. “Helland never visited the ER in the last year. Not once. Obviously, he might have seen his own doctor, you’ll have to check that, but he definitely never went to the ER here, even though several of his injuries would require immediate medical assistance. The damage resembles those of victims of domestic violence, women who are too scared to see a doctor because they know it would mean a week in jail for the husband. If Helland’s body hadn’t been crawling with parasites, I would have suggested he might have been abused. Now, of course, my guess is the fractures are connected to the parasites. Why he was never patched up is a different story altogether…” Bøje gave Søren a knowing look as if to say that was Søren’s department.

“Could his injuries alone have killed him?”

“No,” Bøje said. “Lars Helland died from 2,600 uninvited organic growths in his tissue. I’m 100-percent sure.”

Søren’s knees wobbled as he stood up.

After his visit to the hospital, Søren drove home as though the devil was on his back. The sky had been gray and heavy all day, but while Søren had been in the basement with Bøje, patches of blue had broken through and the temperature had dropped. Søren rolled down the window and felt the sharp air against his face.

What the hell just happened?

He pulled behind a truck and reduced his speed.

Easy now.

Once he got home, he cooked dinner and sat down to eat. Suddenly, he felt crawling and prickling underneath his clothes. His groin itched, and after he wolfed down his food he took a shower. His cheek tingled, and so he shaved. Finally, he tried to check himself for head lice and spent ages staring at his big toenail. Did he have a fungal infection? How had those ghastly creepy-crawlies entered that poor man? He couldn’t come up with a single explanation. Had Helland eaten one of them? How had it multiplied? Had it reproduced once it was inside him? Was it airborne? Or in the drinking water? He paced up and down the living room. Then he fetched a beer and told himself to give it a rest.

Early the following morning, Søren drove to Copenhagen, bursting with pent-up energy. From the car he called Helland’s widow, Birgit. He got the answering machine. He asked her to call him as soon as possible. Then he called his secretary and asked her to find the number for Professor Moritzen, a parasitologist at the University of Copenhagen. He liked making Linda laugh, but this morning he failed. She called him back three minutes later. He had to move to the slow lane to write down the number and hoped none of his more officious colleagues were around. He called Professor Moritzen and pulled back into the fast lane.

“Hello?” Hanne Moritzen answered at the first ring. She sounded sleepy and distant. When he introduced himself, she went very quiet for a moment.

“Is Asger all right?” she whispered, almost inaudibly. Søren had done this a million times before, so he quickly reassured her.

“I’m not calling about your family.”

He heard her breathe a sigh of relief and gave her two seconds to process the false alarm before saying, “I would very much welcome your help regarding some parasites we’ve found in connection with a death. Yesterday, Bøje Knudsen, the Deputy Medical Examiner, told me no one knows more about parasites than you.”

Professor Moritzen was clearly relieved.

“Is it urgent? I drove up to my cottage late last night, and I wasn’t planning on returning to Copenhagen until Wednesday.”

Søren thought about it, and they agreed he would call her back when he knew more about just how urgent it was. Professor Moritzen wanted to know what questions he might have and Søren concluded the conversation by saying: “I’m afraid I can’t disclose that at this stage, but I’ll obviously explain the circumstances to you, if it turns out we need your expertise. For now, I would like to thank you for your time.”

Søren was about to hang up when Professor Moritzen said, “Does this have anything to do with the death of Lars Helland?”

“You knew Lars Helland?” Søren said before he could stop himself.

“Yes, we both worked at the institute, but in different departments. I’ve just heard what’s happened. I’m very sorry.” She sounded genuinely upset. They ended the conversation.

Søren parked in the basement under Bellahøj police station and was slow-clapped by his colleagues when he arrived for the morning briefing, five minutes late. He summarized Bøje’s unofficial conclusion and saw how nausea colored every face. Søren’s colleague reported on his visit to Helland’s widow and daughter the day before. This had, not surprisingly, been depressing. The daughter, Nanna, had been on her own, and the officer had stayed with her while Mrs. Helland rushed home. The girl had cried her heart out, and her mother sat on the sofa hugging her for a long time before the officer had been able to ask them questions. A family friend was called to comfort the daughter. Mrs. Helland insisted her husband was in great shape. He was a cycle-racing enthusiast, a hobby he had enjoyed for years, and he also played squash and was a runner, but then Mrs. Helland remembered Helland’s father had died from a heart attack at an early age, and soon convinced herself that a similar fate had now robbed her of her husband. At this point, everyone looked at Søren, as though a collective decision had been made that he would be the one to go back to the villa in Herlev and break the news to the widow about Helland’s uninvited guests.

No one touched the pastries, quivering with yellow custard, on the table.

At noon, Søren and Henrik arrived at the Serum Institute. It was yet another trip through a bewildering maze of clinical corridors, and Søren gave up trying to find his bearings. The woman escorting them swept through the building with familiar ease, pressed buttons, turned corners, opened doors, and led them, at last, to a light and pleasant laboratory. A woman rose from one of the microscopes, smiled, and introduced herself as Dr. Bjerregaard. She offered them a seat in a low office at the center of the room.

“I’ve looked at the samples,” she said, once they had sat down. “And there’s no doubt the parasite is an advanced cystic stage of the pork tapeworm, Taenia solium. It takes between seven to nine weeks for a viable cysticercus to grow and, in my opinion, the patient was infected three to four months ago, at the most.” She looked briefly at the two police officers.

“Taenia solium is a member of the phylum Platyhelminthes, or as they’re more commonly known, flatworms. In its adult stage, Taenia solium is a parasite in humans where it feeds on intestinal fluid. Inside the intestines, it deposits proglottids, as they are called, which leave their host through feces. Each proglottid contains approximately forty thousand fertilized eggs. From human feces, the eggs access the secondary host, also known as an intermediate host, which, in the case of Taenia solium, are pigs. Pigs acting as intermediate hosts, by the way, are the primary reason why Taenia solium cysticercosis is mainly found in countries where animals and humans are in close contact, for example, in households in developing countries where people defecate in areas accessible to pigs. We know of hardly any cases in the West, where animals and humans live separately, nor in Muslim or Jewish areas, where pork isn’t consumed.”

Again she looked briefly from Søren to Henrik, and didn’t appear to have much faith in their ability to keep up with her. She seemed to be contemplating something; then she rose and produced a whiteboard, which descended silently from the ceiling. She grabbed a felt-tip pen and accompanied her explanation with simple drawings.

“Inside the pig, the egg hatches and the bloodstream transports the larva until it attaches itself to muscle tissue, nervous tissue, or subcutaneous connective tissue, where it develops into a cysticercus, a dormant cyst, whose further development isn’t triggered until the pig is eaten—by humans, for example.” Her hands flew across the board. “Inside the human stomach, the cysticercus wakes up from hibernation, attaches itself to the intestines where it grows into a tapeworm, thus completing its life cycle.”

Søren felt nauseated. He stared at his notepad, where he had scribbled down a few words. He was about to say something, but Dr. Bjerregaard beat him to it. She put the cap back on her pen.

“A tapeworm is harmless and won’t necessarily cause its host to fall ill,” she said. “As a result, you can host even very long tapeworms for a long period of time without knowing that you’re infected. In the vast majority of cases, the tapeworm is discovered by chance, during an operation or an autopsy. They normally grow six to eight feet long, and when a tapeworm is discovered, the host is given medication that kills the tapeworm and it’s expelled from the host with feces. Unpleasant, certainly, but as I said, quite harmless.”

Søren was close to retching. At the same time his brain was troubled by a discrepancy.

“I’m not sure I quite understand,” he stuttered. “Professor Helland didn’t have a tapeworm, but carried…” Søren checked his notes, “cysticercus.” Dr. Bjerregaard waited patiently.

“That’s correct. However, I haven’t finished my explanation,” she said calmly. “The life cycle of parasites is a complex area, even for a great many biologists, and in order for you, as lay people, to understand what I’m telling you, I need to give you some basic information.” She suddenly looked at the two men as though she was enjoying herself tremendously.

“Yes, of course. Sorry,” Søren said. Henrik looked sick.

Søren expected Dr. Bjerregaard to launch into the second half of her disgusting lecture, but she merely said, “The logical conclusion is… ?” She looked sternly at the two men.

“That Helland ate shit,” Henrik blurted out. “Gross.”

Søren glared at Henrik.

“It means,” he said, addressing Dr. Bjerregaard, “that Helland somehow ingested a tapeworm egg.” On realizing the implications, he fell silent.

“Or, to be precise, 2,600 eggs,” Dr. Bjerregaard interjected. “If that’s the number of cysticerci Bøje found in the tissue of the diseased, then it would equal 2,600 eggs.”

Søren managed to suppress his revulsion to such an extent that he could follow her logic. “But he didn’t ingest a whole…” he checked his notes again, “proglottid?”

“That would be impossible to know.”

Søren detected a microscopic smile at the corner of her mouth.

“If the proglottid carried more than forty thousand eggs, you would have expected many more than 2,600 cysticerci. However, there might be several factors why only 2,600 managed to develop.” She shrugged. “The point is Lars Helland acted as the intermediate host, and that happens very rarely in these latitudes. During my thirty years here, I’ve only come across three cases of human intermediate host infection, and they were all discovered in people who had recently returned from countries with a high prevalence of Taenia solium, such as Latin America, non-Islamic Asia, and Africa. Do you know if Helland spent time in a high-risk country?”

“We’ll be checking that. The parasite theory is still very new to us,” he said, by way of apology, and continued, “How can you tell how long the cysticerci have been in Helland’s tissue?”

“The host body forms calcium capsules around the cysticercus, to protect itself from the foreign object, and in the capsule, the cysticercus awaits its next developmental stage. You can determine the exact age of the cysticercus by measuring the thickness of the calcium shell. This would normally take place in pigs, which will be eaten sooner or later, and this places an upper limit on how calcified the capsule becomes. However, humans are unlikely to be eaten, aren’t they? The growth of the cysticercus is generally very slow, and as Helland’s cysticerci were fairly large, I would estimate that they’d developed over a long period of time. The capsules were thick and the cysticerci would undoubtedly have demanded more and more room. To begin with, they would have caused Professor Helland only mild irritation, but in time they would have become a pathological condition, and I can’t imagine how he coped with it. Cysticerci have a preference for the central nervous system, and from records—from Mexico, for example, where the occurrence of humans infected with cysticerci is high—82 percent of cysticerci had attached themselves to nerve tissue. Otherwise they prefer muscular and subcutaneous tissue, in that order.”

“What about symptoms?” Søren asked. Bjerregaard pursed her lips.

“The symptoms of an infected patient depend on several factors. Generally, you’ll expect to find a positive correlation between the number of cysticerci and the extent of the symptoms. However, it depends on where the cysticerci are located. Forty thousand cysticerci located exclusively in muscle tissue can, in theory, cause less damage to their host than five unfortunately located cysticerci in nerve tissue. Muscular tissue tolerates the uninvited guests surprisingly well, and their presence may not cause muscular pain until the very late stages. However, if they are located in the central nervous system, it’s a completely different matter. As the cysticercus grows, it takes up more room and diverts blood supply from the surrounding tissue, and the tissue in the central nervous system is of far more critical importance for functionality than muscular tissue, for example. If the central nervous system is attacked, the patient will experience severe seizures of an epileptic nature, the same as have been observed in brain tumor patients. In addition, the patient will experience sudden blackouts, and very likely suffer from severe motor problems and spasms. Bøje Knudsen informed me the deceased had a fairly high concentration of cysticerci in his brain tissue, and he showed signs of multiple fractures and falls. That makes perfect sense.”

She allowed the conclusion to hang in the air before she continued. “If the cysticerci are discovered in time, the patient will be given medication and/or surgery, depending on the number of cysticerci, their location, and how advanced their development is. In the case of the deceased, the cysticerci weren’t discovered which, in itself, is incredible. To me, it’s a physiological mystery how the deceased managed to go to work on the day he died.”

A moment of silence followed, then Dr. Bjerregaard said, “Anything else I can do for you gentlemen today?”

Søren was taken aback. He wasn’t used to being shown the door before he had announced he had no further questions. Dr. Bjerregaard glanced at her watch and pursed her lips again.

“Can you explain how Helland was infected?” Søren said, refusing to be brushed off.

“No,” Dr. Bjerregaard replied. “I certainly can’t.”

She sounded almost hurt, and Søren realized what a stupid question it had been. It was the equivalent of asking the mechanic what caused a car crash.

“But, like I said,” she carried on, giving Søren a final look, “either he ingested feces, or something which had been in contact with infected feces—and all things considered, that’s highly unlikely. Or he worked with live tapeworms and was accidentally infected, which doesn’t really add up, either. There are parasites that infect their host through the skin, the blood-sucking Japanese mountain leech, for example, which causes bilharziasis, but Taenia solium has to be ingested via the digestive tract to complete its life cycle, so even if we assume the deceased had a work-related accident, I still can’t see how he could have been infected. You would expect a biologist who happens to drop a test tube to take precautions immediately, and you would most certainly not expect him to go to lunch without washing his hands after an accident involving Taenia solium. My guess is Professor Helland must have spent time in a high-risk area within the last six months, and that was where he was infected. It’s still hard to imagine how, but as I said, it does happen.”

Søren looked at Dr. Bjerregaard for a long time, before he said, “And if it’s none of the above?”

Bjerregaard stood up.

“The deceased lived in excruciating pain and died as a result of this infection. The idea that he was infected accidentally is unpleasant enough in itself. The suggestion that someone infected him deliberately, well, that’s not a thought I would like to pursue. Besides, to my ears it sounds highly implausible. It requires biological competence to extract a proglottid from infected feces, and it would be difficult for a layperson to clean that kind of organic material without destroying it. And even if you were successful, the rest of the plan seems rather far-fetched. It’s regrettable and horrifying that the deceased died under such dramatic circumstances, but I find it hard to see how a crime could have been committed. Very hard.” Bjerregaard’s face made it clear their meeting was over.

“How do you store your material?” Søren persisted. Dr. Bjerregaard flashed an irritated look at Søren before she relented.

“It’s impossible to gain access to material here at the Serum Institute, if that’s what you’re insinuating. That’s self-evident. We store far more dangerous material than tapeworms. HIV, hepatitis C, Ebola, avian flu. And it’s obviously impossible,” she shot Søren a sharp look, “to force entry and steal such material. And if anyone were to succeed, only an expert would know how to treat the material to keep it alive. If someone broke into our basement and nicked a test tube, the contents would die and, consequently, cease to be infectious before the thief was halfway down the street.”

“Are you the only facility that stores live organic material?” Søren wanted to know.

“We store the majority. But, as you may know, there’s the parasitologist, Hanne Moritzen, at the University of Copenhagen. And Professor Moritzen has a substantial supply, otherwise she wouldn’t be able to do her work. But she’s Denmark’s biggest expert, and I can promise you she treats her material with the utmost care. She’ll be awarded a Nobel Prize for her brilliant work in the Third World one day. She would never take safety lightly. Never.”

This declaration concluded the meeting, and Søren and Henrik left the Serum Institute in silence. When they were back in the car, Henrik was about to say something, but Søren stopped him.

“No,” he said. “Just no.”

They drove through the city without speaking. Søren leaned back in his seat and looked out of the window, where trees and houses rushed past. He felt he was on very thin ice.

Back at the station, Søren went to his office and drank three cups of tea. Professor Helland had died from 2,600 parasites in his nerve and muscular tissue, and he had sustained multiple fractures and other injuries. What the hell did it all mean? Before he had time to think it through, he called Mrs. Helland to ask if she was at home. Ten minutes later he was on his way to Herlev. If Professor Helland had been murdered, and this was now a possibility, Søren could no longer ignore the fact that there was a 98 percent probability the killer would be found among family or close friends. Birgit Helland had just gone straight to the top of his list of suspects.

Mrs. Helland offered him a seat in a large, airy room and called down her daughter from the first floor. Both women were red-eyed. Without revealing any details, Søren explained that Helland appeared to have suffered from a tropical infection, and the police were looking for a possible link between the infection and his death. Mrs. Helland’s reaction was a cross between denial and shock. A tropical infection? That’s impossible, she said, over and over. Her husband had never visited the tropics. He had a fear of flying. It had been a source of endless frustration, as the vast majority of bird symposia and conferences were held abroad, and every time he had had to send his young colleague, Erik Tybjerg. He only traveled to places he could reach by train or by car. Nanna sat beside her mother, crying. Mrs. Helland obviously wanted to know more about the tropical infection, but Søren said that at this stage in the investigation, he was unable to provide her with further details. Investigation? Mrs. Helland’s jaw dropped, and Søren explained that while a heart attack was regarded as “natural causes,” they had now learned something that meant yesterday’s conclusion no longer applied. Helland’s death was now being treated as “suspicious,” and this forced him to withhold certain information due to the ongoing investigation.

Mrs. Helland was outraged. “Are you suspecting me? Because if you are, just go on and say so.”

“I’ll do everything I can to find out how and why your husband died,” he said, avoiding her question. “Until then I’m asking you to trust me. Will you do that, please?”

She looked skeptical, but Nanna nodded. Eventually Birgit Helland agreed.

Nanna left to go to the lavatory, and Søren started asking about Professor Helland’s health.

“Lars was in great shape,” his widow protested.

“So, in your view, he was well?”

“Of course, I’ve just said so. Nearly nine years ago Lars had surgery for a brain tumor. It was discovered early, the tumor was removed, and there’s been nothing since. He went for regular checkups. He was in great shape,” she repeated.

“So no signs of illness?”

“No!”

Søren thanked her, got up and left, unable to decide whether Mrs. Helland simply knew nothing about parasites or fractures, or whether she was devious enough to hide it.

When Søren got back to the police station, he called the Natural History Museum and asked to be put through to Erik Tybjerg. The telephone rang for a long time before the switchboard operator informed him Dr. Tybjerg wasn’t in his office, but she would send him an e-mail asking him to call back. Søren sighed.

There was a knock on the door and Sten appeared. Sten was the crime squad’s computer analyst, and since yesterday he had been busy examining Helland’s computer. Søren had barely given the computer a second thought; he had been convinced he wouldn’t have to devote much time to this case. Overcome by sudden guilt, he asked Sten for his verdict.

“Professor Helland’s e-mail account was opened in February 2001,” Sten began. “Approximately 1,500 e-mails are stored on the server, and I’ve been through them all.” He looked drained.

“The vast majority are work-related, apart from those he sent to his wife, Birgit Helland, who works at the Humanities College of the University of Copenhagen, and to his daughter, Nanna. The only interesting thing I discovered was that for the last four years Lars Helland exchanged twenty-two e-mails with a professor of ornithology at the University of British Columbia—a guy named Clive Freeman. Mean anything to you?”

Søren shook his head.

“They disagree about something,” Sten went on, “and they refer repeatedly to each other’s papers in various scientific journals, such as Scientific Today, which I’ve heard of, but also a range of other journals that I haven’t. To begin with, their correspondence is relatively balanced, but it changes in early summer. The tone of their e-mails shows they’re trying to maintain the illusion that they’re fine, honorable scientists engaged in a duel, but it becomes obvious on numerous occasions that Freeman is increasingly cornered and Helland is enjoying it big time. Twice, Freeman actually threatens Helland.” Sten handed Søren a printout with highlighted sentences.

“At the end of June, there is unexplained silence. Nothing in their correspondence up until then indicates why, and even though I did some searching on the Internet, I haven’t been able to find a plausible cause for their sudden ceasefire. However, shortly afterward, on the ninth of July, to be exact, Helland starts receiving anonymous e-mails.” Sten pulled out a new file and extracted a small pile of printouts. “And now the tone is brutal and blunt. Someone is threatening Helland.”

“Did Clive Freeman send them?” Søren asked.

Sten shook his head. “I’m fairly sure he didn’t. The tone is completely different. The person making the threats has only one aim: to scare Helland. The threats consist of one sentence only.”

Søren waited.

“‘You will suffer for what you have done.’”

Søren frowned. “Did Helland reply to them?”

Sten nodded. “And he seems to find the threats highly amusing. Perhaps he thinks they’re coming from Professor Freeman and are merely empty threats, or maybe… well, he just doesn’t take them seriously.”

“Sender unknown, you said?”

Sten nodded again. “A Hotmail address. Whoever created it registered themselves as ‘Justicia Sweet.’ Neat, eh? The person who threatened Helland could be anyone.”

Søren buried his face in his hands and groaned.

“Anything else?” he asked.

“There is. I don’t know how important this is, but Helland seems to have unfinished business with another colleague.” Sten narrowed his eyes. “In the ten days leading up to his death, there was a fierce exchange of opinions between the deceased and Johannes Trøjborg.” He paused to let the sentence take effect.

“However, in contrast to the exchange between Helland and Freeman, it was easy to figure out what the problem is. They appear to be cowriting a scientific paper and Johannes Trøjborg expresses dissatisfaction with Helland’s lack of effort. Johannes wants Helland to pull out, so Johannes becomes the sole author of the paper, and Helland is refusing.”

Søren nodded, and Sten carried on.

“There’s more. I only started noticing it in the e-mails Helland sent over the last five to six weeks. He became very careless. His e-mails are littered with typos, and those sent in the last three to four weeks are practically illegible. Have a look at this.” Sten handed Søren a printout which read:

I ca’nt elph yu bcase we d’nt argee. Soory, se yo tmorrrow at mu office a 10 a..m as arrrnged. L.

“You wouldn’t call that standard spelling, would you?” Søren remarked, and then he realized the obvious.

“Sten,” he exclaimed and looked utterly revolted. “Helland’s brain was teeming with parasites. No wonder he couldn’t type.”

When Sten had left, Søren called Professor Moritzen again to insist on a meeting. She was still in her cottage, she protested. Søren checked his watch, asked her for the address, and told her he would be there as quickly as the highway traffic would allow him. Reluctantly, she agreed.

Then he called Johannes Trøjborg. Søren’s intuition told him that the account given by the transparent Johannes was genuine. Still, he wanted Johannes to explain why he hadn’t mentioned his disagreement with Helland. The telephone rang repeatedly, but no one answered.

Søren found Professor Moritzen’s cottage, with great difficulty, in a resort at Hald Beach. It was a small, well-maintained cottage on a huge plot, like a building block on a football field. The cottage consisted of a single airy and sparsely furnished room, with a few Japanese-inspired objects placed directly on the floor. Hanne Moritzen served an almost white but surprisingly strong tea in Japanese cups and offered Søren something he thought was chocolate, but it turned out to be a foul-tasting Japanese concoction. She laughed when she saw the look on his face.

She’s not a happy woman, Søren thought instinctively, and felt sad. Anna Bella Nor wasn’t exactly a picture of happiness, either, but she had her rage, and rage, at least, sparked life. Hanne Moritzen had given up, and her defeat had left permanent traces in her dull silver eyes. However, she was articulate, precise, and far more accommodating than Søren had expected after their telephone conversation. She was wearing soft clothes, and her hair was loosely gathered in a ponytail.

Søren tried to explain the situation as best he could. He passed on Dr. Bjerregaard’s best wishes, though she hadn’t asked him to. Hanne Moritzen went pale when Søren summarized the autopsy and mentioned the 2,600 cysticerci, and he noticed how her eyes flickered and her hands trembled slightly before she regained her composure. Søren asked to use the bathroom and when he came back, she had calmed down and gave, without prompting, her opinion on the matter. She was adamant Professor Helland couldn’t have been infected at work accidentally.

“He was a vertebrate morphologist,” she said, as if that explained everything, and then she added: “He hasn’t been in contact with parasites in the course of his work since the obligatory introduction to parasitology at the start of his degree in the 1970s. It’s a highly specialized field, and Lars Helland went completely in the opposite direction. Parasitology and vertebrate morphology are about as far removed from each other as psychiatry and orthopedic surgery.”

In the next half hour Professor Moritzen confirmed all of Dr. Bjerregaard’s hypotheses.

“The last registered case of cysticercosis in Denmark was in 1997,” she informed him. “The patient, a twenty-eight-year-old male, presented with violent skin symptoms after a lengthy stay in Mexico. We soon located nine cysticerci in his subcutaneous tissue and all were surgically removed. And do you know how he was infected? He got caught up between two gangs of boys hurling mud at each other, and the mud hit his mouth. It sounds very unlikely, but it was the only explanation we could come up with. There are plenty of other parasites that are easy for people from Western Europe to pick up, parasites that infect you directly through your skin, through food and drinking water, from unhygienic toilets or sexual transmission. But an actual cysticercus infection is rare, if hygiene levels are generally high. If we’re talking about the tapeworm itself, well, of course, that’s another matter. Raw or undercooked meat is a constant source of infection, and the human penchant for raw meat is, for some inexplicable reason, considerable.”

“So, in your opinion, a natural infection is unlikely?”

“No,” Professor Moritzen said. “A natural infection is the only explanation that is even vaguely possible, but it still remains highly improbable. I just don’t buy that Helland had an accident in his lab.”

“Why not?”

“Because he had no contact with parasites,” she said, emphatically. “There is no living material in his department.”

“Might he have become infected during a visit to the department of parasitology?”

“In theory, yes, but it’s unlikely.”

“Why?”

Professor Moritzen looked directly at Søren.

“Because I’m the head of that department, and I know who comes and goes, what leaves the department, who with, and why. It’s a legal requirement.”

“Dr. Bjerregaard estimated that Helland became infected three to four months ago,” Søren stated, and looked back at her.

“That, too, sounds highly improbable,” she said, locking eyes with him.

“Why?”

“Because it seems very unlikely that anyone could live in that state for several months. Have you ever pricked yourself on a cactus?” she asked. Søren shook his head.

“Its spikes are thin and transparent but scalpel-sharp and they dig deep into the palm of your hand. After just a few hours, they cause irritation and in only a few days each cut turns into an infected abscess. Imagine the same thing occurring in vital tissue. It’s unrealistic, don’t you see?”

Søren nodded.

“But maybe Helland’s an exception?” she suggested. At first, Søren thought she must be joking, but her silver eyes looked gravely at him.

“Perhaps the locations of the cysticerci were such that he could still function? We know from brain tumors that it’s a question of where the pressure is. Some people collapse when the tumor’s the size of a raisin, others are fine until it’s the size of an egg.” She shrugged.

“This has really shocked you,” Søren said, scrutinizing her. “You’re trying to hide it, but I can sense it.”

“Death is shocking,” Hanne Moritzen replied in a neutral voice. “And I, more than anyone, can appreciate the hell he must have been living in, if Dr. Bjerregaard’s time line is right. Of course I’m shocked at such an unpleasant death, and of course I want to know how it could have happened. I’m also sorry for his daughter. It’s hard to live without your father.” She flashed Søren a look of defiance.

“So you didn’t know Lars Helland personally?”

“No,” she replied. “He taught ‘Form and Function’ in the second term when I was a student. He was a good teacher. When I started working in the same building as him, we would run into each other from time to time and we would say hello. That’s all.”

“Are you married? Do you have children?” Søren asked.

“Excuse me, how is that relevant?”

He just stared at her and repeated his question.

“No, I’ve never been married, and I have no children,” she then said. “Getting to this level in my profession requires many sacrifices.”

Søren nodded. “Do you know if Professor Helland had any enemies?”

Hanne Moritzen laughed a hollow laugh, but didn’t look even vaguely amused.

“Of course he had enemies. Professor Helland was a brilliantly gifted man who was never afraid to take center stage. If the rumors are to be believed, he drove his closest colleagues to the brink of madness. That’s a recipe for making enemies, some might say. People who court controversy are often hated. Like I said, I barely knew him, but I instinctively liked him. He had drive, and he entered the arena of academic debate with all guns blazing—it made him a real asset to the faculty. For example, for years he has been at the forefront of a completely ridiculous and—allegedly—scientific row about the origin of birds. It provided the faculty with loads of press coverage even though, in my opinion, it’s a total waste of column inches.”

“Why?”

“Because birds are dinosaurs. The end. Kids can read that on the back of cereal boxes. When Anna told me it was the subject of her dissertation and she would be spending a year or more explaining Helland and Tybjerg’s storm in a teacup, I was outraged. That dissertation will do nothing for her career, and I tried telling her that. It’s much ado about nothing, if you ask me. That Canadian, whom Tybjerg and Helland are squandering their grants doing battle with, is a fool, and—”

“Are you saying that Clive Freeman—”

“Oh, yes, that’s his name,” Professor Moritzen interrupted him.

“Do you think he might have infected Helland with parasites as an act of revenge?”

Hanne Moritzen laughed out loud.

“No, I promise you I don’t think that for a second! I can’t imagine why anyone would go around infecting other people with parasites…” She hesitated. “That would be completely insane.”

“I understand that you know Anna Bella Nor. Do you know anyone else from Helland’s department?” Søren asked.

“Yes, I know them all, of course. Though I don’t know the man Anna shares a study with very well. I’ve said hello to him a couple of times, when I popped in to see Anna.”

“But you and Anna Bella Nor are friends?”

“In a way, yes…. She attended one of my summer courses, and we got along really well.”

Søren saw a hint of warmth touch Professor Moritzen’s eyes.

“I always wanted to have a daughter,” she said and almost looked shy. “Anna reminds me a little of myself when I was younger.” She smiled a wry smile before she continued. “I also know Professor Ewald and Professor Jørgensen from the faculty. The three of us have been working there a lifetime.”

She got up and lit the fire in the fireplace. Søren had run out of questions. He got up to leave and she saw him out. It had started to snow. Large fluffy snowflakes descended in columns toward the ground, which was already white.

“Snow at this time of the year,” Professor Moritzen commented, and shivered.

“Yes, it’s a very odd autumn,” Søren said, and shook her hand.

“I’ll be driving back to Copenhagen early tomorrow morning,” she said. “If there is anything else, I’ll be in my office.”

Søren nodded.

As he drove toward Copenhagen, he suddenly missed Vibe. Uncomplicated, gentle Vibe, who always held her blond head high and looked on the bright side of life. The department of Natural Science could do with a few people like her.