The Girl in the Ice aka A Price for Everything

CHAPTER 44

In Præstø Arne Pedersen’s theory that the poplar tree contained the earthly remains of Annie Lindberg Hansson was given reliable support in the form of a young, black female German Shepherd who answered to the name of Cathy, as long as it was the dog handler who said it. Cathy scratched at the tree and barked, while her owner meaningfully gave the detectives the thumbs up. Pedersen pointed to a rusty plate and said, “It sounds strange, but at one time there was a dead pig nailed up here until it rotted away. Could that have affected your dog’s behaviour?”

The handler patted the animal and answered, “I really don’t think so, but we can try from the other side, just to be sure.”

He ordered his dog around the tree, shouted an unintelligible command, and the animal’s reaction was repeated from the opposite side.

“And that means?” Poul Troulsen enquired.

“That there is a body inside the tree, unless Cathy is wrong.”

“Is she often wrong?”

“She’s never wrong.”

Pedersen set up a ladder which he had borrowed from the teachers, who were following the course of events tensely from their kitchen window not far away. He climbed up and with difficulty swung through the many unpollarded branches, aiming his powerful flashlight down into the trunk. Troulsen asked from below, “Is there anything to see?”

“Nothing, only detritus and withered leaves, but it’s hollow, like we thought. Should I try to go down? It won’t be easy.”

“No, let’s leave the rest to the technicians. If anyone is going to destroy evidence, it should be them and not us.”

A few hours later a chainsaw was powering into the old poplar. A technician dressed in what looked like a spacesuit operated the saw. The branches quickly disappeared, the trunk itself put up more resistance, but block by block the tree was cut down. The process was slow. Every time a piece of trunk was sliced off, two other technicians carefully removed twigs, leaves and humus from the hollow space. Only towards afternoon, when the tree was barely two metres tall, did anything finally happen. One technician said quietly, “Okay, now we have her. I can see a hand.”

Gently, almost solemnly, he gathered a portion of composted leaves, which he let fall behind him, then said, “Yes, she’s in a plastic bag, the poor girl.”

Pedersen already had his cell phone out. It was the news he and Troulsen had been waiting for all day. He called Konrad Simonsen and was connected immediately. With triumph in his voice, which he made no effort to conceal, he said, “She’s been found, and there is no doubt that it’s him. Same murder method.”

Then he listened for a long time. After a while Troulsen began to feel worried. Something was wrong, his colleague’s facial expression had lost every trace of optimism. Pedersen ended the call, looking unhappy.

“What’s happened, Arne? You’re completely pale.”

“Falkenborg is gone. He fooled his surveillance team yesterday evening, but we only found out this morning because some blockheads from Glostrup made a total mess of it. Since then everyone has been searching for him, but with no result.”

“Shit.”

“There’s more. Jeanette Hvidt has disappeared, and several witnesses saw Falkenborg at her uncle’s house in Helsingør.”

Troulsen took hold of Pedersen’s arm and turned him around, shouting, “What the hell are you saying?”

“He overpowered her in a bicycle shed in her uncle’s garden. That was the only thing Simon told me. You’ll have to wait to hear more until we get to Copenhagen.”

“But how could that happen? We were going to watch her. Didn’t she have anyone to protect her?”

Pedersen released himself from his colleague’s grasp and repeated slowly, “That was all Simon told me. I don’t know anything else.”

Troulsen folded his hands behind his neck and bent his head. Then he cursed bitterly and impotently.