The Girl in the Ice aka A Price for Everything

CHAPTER 45

While in Præstø Arne Pedersen’s moment of triumph was transformed into defeat, Pauline Berg was lying on a reclining chair on her terrace, trying once again to figure out what she should do with herself. The initial shock of the fiasco on Saturday afternoon had subsided. With a little luck maybe the episode would remain undiscovered. She had talked with her boss yesterday and twice today with Pedersen, when she had asked for news while faking a heavy head cold. After all, Andreas Falkenborg was under intensive surveillance so she was in no danger, and with her police training she was in an excellent position to protect herself, especially considering that besides her course in hand-to-hand combat she was also in possession of a 9mm Heckler & Koch, the standard issue pistol.

“I’ll have to get my hair dyed back again as soon as possible.”

No one answered Pauline, who was talking to herself. She repeated the sentence in slightly varied form and concluded that unfortunately she would have to withdraw some of her savings to cover the outrageous eight hundred kroner the hair treatment cost. Pauline Berg yawned. She was comfortable here but really ought to think about starting on dinner. Last night she had slept poorly, and fatigue was gradually starting to get the better of her. Maybe it didn’t matter. She could have a couple of sandwiches for once, and if Asger Graa simply kept his mouth shut and came to dinner and shared the sandwiches with her…

She heaved her head up with a start, aware that she was about to fall asleep. Then she set the alarm on her cell phone, which lay on the garden table beside her, and closed her eyes while a cuckoo called from the forest, as if it could not come to terms with the fact that it wasn’t night-time either. She was soon out like a light. A quiet little snore escaped from her nostrils, barely audible unless you were close by.

When she woke up, she was immediately aware that she had slept much longer than planned. It was dusk already and she felt cold even though she had a blanket over her, which surprised her. She didn’t remember bringing it. She picked up her phone. The battery was flat. She had been asleep for almost three hours. She cursed to herself, even though there was nothing wrong with taking an unplanned long nap other than that she might have to postpone her planned painting project until tomorrow. She got up, stretched to get the sleep out of her body, folded up the blanket and went inside. With the blanket over her arm, she locked her garden door and pulled on the handle a few times; the door seemed solid. She thought that she must get a curtain she could close so as to screen off the terrace. Sometime when she had the money.

In the house she briefly considered changing her routine around. She was hungry, but usually did her daily ballet exercises before dinner and not after. She went to her practice room, which was one of the first she had furnished. Here she changed into a leotard, placed herself at the bar and expertly went through her drill. Outside it had grown dark and she observed her own reflection in the window until a twinge of discomfort took hold of her. She was unused to seeing herself with black hair, and the sight reminded her of Saturday’s fiasco with Andreas Falkenborg.

After her exercises she took a quick bath. She was in a strange mood, as if the day was somehow out of sync. She had put the blame on her black hair, but there was something else too. Something was wrong. Maybe it had been a bad idea to call in sick. She seldom took time off for no good reason, and usually had a bad conscience when she did. She was starving besides, which was her own fault, of course, but that didn’t make her any less hungry. She tried to remember what she had in the refrigerator to put in her sandwiches while, feeling oddly ill at ease at being naked, she hurried out of the bath and into her bedroom to get dressed. At the same time she decided to call Ernesto Madsen and ask whether he felt like visiting her. That would be nice, really nice. Then she realised that for that she would need to find the charger for her phone, which was not in its usual place in the socket below the night stand by her bed. She tried in vain to remember where she had put it, and at the same time cursed her customer-unfriendly telecoms company for having a four-week waiting time for a landline connection.

The sandwiches did her good. Both Ernesto Madsen and the charger were forgotten in favour of a quiet evening alone in front of the TV. A rerun of Pretty Woman was exactly what she needed. She took her glass and empty plate and went out to the kitchen. After putting the dishes in the dishwasher she carefully wiped off the kitchen table, although it had barely been used. Then she found a can of cat food in the kitchen cabinet, opened it, took a spoon from a drawer and crouched down while she scooped half the contents into the cat’s bowl. Then it was as if she stalled. A desire to keep sitting there on the floor came over her. As if she had found completely the right place to be, however irrational that might seem. She tried to laugh off her own behaviour but remained sitting for a while, gathering the strength to stand up. Once upright again she put a plastic lid on the cat food can and set it in the refrigerator, while she repressed the urge to sit down again.

Pauline Berg enjoyed the film. Although she had seen it many times, it was just as good every time. Then suddenly a text crawl broke in over Julia Roberts and announced an extra TV news broadcast in ten minutes. Pauline shuddered. News that was important enough to interrupt programming was seldom good. A brief channel surf to text-TV was uninformative, so there was nothing to do but wait. The film no longer captivated her. She used up the next few minutes calling for Gorm, around the house and out on the terrace, without the animal making an appearance. He usually showed up at mealtimes, but on the other hand he had become considerably more independent since they’d moved, now that he had a game preserve that had to be tended. Sometimes she heard vicious cat fights at night, and some mornings he came home scratched, tired, and proud as a peacock. No doubt he had benefited from the change of scene.

She sat back in her chair just in time for the extra broadcast, activated the sound, which she had put on mute before so she could listen for the cat better, and barely glimpsed an image of the TV studio with two serious announcers before the TV went off with a little pop. Not only the picture and sound disappeared, the standby lamp went out too. She tried to use the remote control to switch off and start again, but with no effect. The same procedure on the buttons of the TV was no use either. Her first thought was that with her immediate financial crisis this might mean several months without a television, but then she remembered that she had bought the set no more than five months ago, so it was still covered by the warranty.

Irritated, she went into her study and turned on the computer. Outside rain was striking the window, and the irregular percussion of the drops and the wind howling around the sides of the house made her feel exposed, so she drew the curtains. As soon as the computer was functional, she opened the web browser and connected to the Dagbladet news portal, but experienced disbelief when instead she was directed to a website for the Louvre museum in Paris, even though the address field quite correctly showed dbnews.dk, which she had also typed. She tried dr.dk and got the same result. The next three addresses ended up in a similar situation. She had experienced many strange things with her computer, but never anything this peculiar. She considered restarting, but first she activated her Windows Messenger, eager to get in contact with the outside world, which with the cell phone, TV and now the computer seemed to be withdrawing. For that reason she was very relieved when the program window popped up as usual, and she could put aside her paranoid thoughts. Three friends were on-line, and she chose an old schoolmate, whom she normally avoided because he almost worshipped her, but a little adoration was just what she needed on an evening like this, where everything was messed up.

Princess Pauline says:

Hi Mads, have you seen the news?

My TV is dead.

Mads from Rødovre says:

Pauline, great to talk with you!!! News OK, what do you want to know?

Princess Pauline says:

Extra broadcast on TV about what?

Mads from Rødovre says:

You ought to know that, aren’t you still a cop?:-)

Princess Pauline says:

Still a cop, home sick today, what news???

Mads from Rødovre says:

Why do you write that, I haven’t bothered you:-(

Princess Pauline says:

What do you mean???

Mads from Rødovre says:

1/3 2/3 1/8 3/8 5/8 7/8 7/8 5/8 3/8 1/8 2/3 1/3

Princess Pauline says:

That was complete gibberish, try again.

Mads from Rødovre says:

Old witch with the coal-black hair, the clock is striking, the clock is striking

Pauline all alone says:

Don’t you mean yellow-green?

Mads from Rødovre says:

No, it’s coal-black, disgusting whore.

Mads from Rødovre says:

Send news, start news, enjoy news.

She looked nervously over her shoulder towards the door to the study, while the Windows Messenger screen disappeared and an hourglass told her that the computer was working on an unknown job she had not requested. Suddenly a face appeared, a weeping, horror-stricken face that she recognised immediately. The sound of Jeanette Hvidt’s pleading voice, punctuated with sobs, streamed out of the speakers, while the girl on-screen threw her head back and forth in a vain attempt to avoid her fate.

“I don’t want to, don’t do it, won’t you please stop?”

“He is angry at her, she is impolite, she must have another blow with the staff.”

“No, no, I’ll do anything you say, whatever you ask for.”

“Everything that he says, everything that he asks me to. That’s what she will say.”

“I’ll do anything he says, anything he asks me to.”

“Then she will tell about the song.”

“This song is for you, Pauline.”

“She must not cry when she says it. Otherwise she’ll get something to cry about.”

“Excuse me, I will, don’t do that. I will.”

“Then she will say it again, with a smile on her ugly face.”

Pauline watched, paralysed, how Jeanette Hvidt tried to smile while the tears rolled down her cheeks. The video continued:

“This song is for you, Pauline.”

“Then she will sing the song.”

“Can you guess where he is, can you guess where he is, because I put the mask on, misk mask mask on… ”

“No, she is singing it wrong. Because he has put the mask on… that’s what’s fun. How stupid she is. Then she will sing again, the right way, or else she’ll get the staff.”

Jeanette Hvidt sang again, though scared out of her wits. It sounded awful, crazy and heart-rending, but that was not the reason Pauline Berg put her hands over her ears.

“Can you guess where he is, can you guess where he is… ”

Suddenly the song stopped, the camera zoomed in a little, then the picture froze and immediately dissolved in ten thousand asynchronous washed-out pixels only to materialise again a moment later. This time Jeanette Hvidt was not crying. Instead she sat anxiously covering her ears while the Belphégor demon cautiously approached her from behind. Pauline clenched her fists, Jeanette Hvidt clenched her fists. The demon behind her grew bigger and bigger, until finally she could see the watchful eyes in the loathsome mask. Only then did she understand: the little camera that was attached to the upper edge of her screen no longer showed Jeanette Hvidt at all.

Pauline Berg whirled around on a wave of adrenaline that surprised them both. The man behind her took a step backwards. She grabbed the first thing she could lay her hands on, a solid ceramic mug that stood next to the keyboard, and at the same time heard herself scream while her brain vainly bombarded her with warnings that this was the dumbest thing she could do. His instinctive retreat when she turned around gave her just enough time to put herself in a defensive position with legs slightly spread, side turned and the coffee mug poised ready to strike. They stood like that, facing each other for what seemed like an eternity. Behind her a woman started howling like a tormented animal, but Pauline ignored that and concentrated on her opponent, aware that with every split second that passed her odds improved.

He had lost the advantage of surprise, and the more she looked at him, the less afraid she was. The mask was no advantage to him in a fight; on the contrary it limited his view. Slowly she inched towards him with her feet angled and her body slightly leaning forward, as she aimed a kick towards his testicles. As if he was reading her thoughts, he hitched up his sweater and took out her pistol.

“She will follow him to his car.”

The pistol was pointed firmly at her abdomen, and at that distance he could not fail to hit. She did not answer him, Jeanette Hvidt’s howling behind her stopped, and only the low-frequency hum of the computer broke the silence.

“She will follow him to his car, otherwise he will shoot her.”

If it was courage or anxiety that drove her she never knew. Perhaps it was simply desperation, or possibly she had unconsciously registered how unprofessional it was to stick a pistol in the waistband of your pants, as if they were playing cops and robbers.

“Do you really know how to shoot a gun like that? Have you even released the two safeties? That’s a police pistol you’re holding, a kind you’ve never had in your hands before, I can see.”

Her voice probably shook, she could hear it herself, but the words were said. He took another step backwards and turned the pistol while he observed it as best he could through the holes in his mask.

“She must not say such things to him.”

“I’m not a stupid little goose you can scare with your childish devil facade.”

“She does not say such things, she will get the staff.”

“I can’t see any staff, Andreas. You must have forgotten it.”

He stamped on the floor.

“She is not saying that. I can’t… he will… ”

She was no longer afraid of the gun, which was now limply pointing at the ground. Her disdain about the safety had hit the bull’s eye. Again she started to inch forward, while she mocked him venomously.

“You’re messing up your performance. Think if your father saw you now, how he would laugh. See, he was a man who knew how to take a girl… did you get that, little Andreas?… take a girl, but you’ve seen that yourself, of course, so you’re not unaware of it. You on the other hand are nothing more than a shell of a man, an overgrown boy who caused his mother to get beaten, because you… ”

Falkenborg let the pistol drop and left the room. Immediately after that she heard the key being turned in the lock.

Without wasting a second she gathered up the pistol and discovered to her annoyance that there were no bullets in it. The next priority was the window. If she got out quickly he would not be able to catch her before she reached the forest. That idea wouldn’t work, though; the window was blocked from outside. She shoved and pounded on the window frame with all her strength, to no end. Plan C was the computer. She turned it off by pulling out the plug, then turned it on again and restarted the machine, after which all the power in the house went out.

In the darkness she sat down on the floor, her limbs shaking and her heart galloping in a wild ride. She forced herself to think. Her reaction was normal, she knew, and the most important thing was not to feel like a victim. She had won the first round, but now the situation had again turned to his advantage. He had the initiative and the chance to get another weapon besides, this time one that was more effective.

For a while she considered trying to block the door, but ended up only setting a chair under the door handle. In the darkness it was difficult and would hardly hold him up for long. Then she pulled the curtain from the window without fearing that he was standing outside. The mask didn’t scare her any more, only the man inside was dangerous. The rain had stopped, and a pale moon illuminated the night, but there was no trace of Falkenborg. Then she caught sight of her car out in the driveway and happened to think about the extra keys in the desk drawer. In the moonlight she found the drawer and felt her way to the keys, which she put in her pocket. Then she pulled one curtain down, tore a solid strip off and folded the fabric around her right hand, while she squeezed the ceramic mug. She smashed the pane with five hard, quick blows, which removed most of the glass from the frame, and without deliberating jumped outside on to the garden path.

When she hit the ground, she quickly unwrapped her hand, let go of the mug and seized a long shard of glass, around which she folded the strip of curtain. Then she got up, looked around and called with the full force of her lungs.

“Well, Andreas, are you coming to fight with me, you disgusting wretch. What about it?”

Determined, but without hurrying, she went over to her car, opened the door and got in. As soon as she was inside, she locked the doors, after which she set her weapon on the passenger seat and put the keys in the ignition. Her foot did not encounter the pedals however, but instead hit something unfamiliar and soft. She reached down, picked it up, and saw her dead cat staring at her through the plastic wrapped around its little head.

Pauline Berg was able to suppress her instinctive horror and force herself to look quickly out of the rear window. She turned the key, heard the engine start, thought that it smelled like a hospital in here without understanding why, looked back one last time and this time stared directly into his grotesque countenance. The rag over her mouth and nose struck her mercilessly a moment later. The last thought she had was that he was much too strong.