Stenl?se, Thursday 5.26.2016
I hereby donate my body to organ donation and research. Best regards, Rose Knudsen
“I simply don’t get it, Assad. Why would she commit suicide somewhere where she can’t be found if she wanted to leave her organs for transplants and her body for research?”
Assad shook his head. They looked at each while they tried to find a logical explanation.
“If you want to donate your organs, you don’t poison them with lethal medication, and you certainly don’t go into hiding. So what’s the deal with this?” Carl waved the piece of paper in the air.
Assad scratched his head as if that could help him work it out. “I don’t get it. Maybe she had a change of heart and decided to do it somewhere else.”
“Does that seem logical to you? What does someone do who wants to commit suicide and also donate their organs to help others? You make sure you’re found quickly, which is what I assume she hoped would happen. But where is she, then? And why didn’t she take her phone so she could say where she was? It doesn’t make any sense.”
Carl picked up the phone and tried to turn it on. The battery really was dead, just like he had suggested to Lars Bj?rn.
“I wouldn’t mind seeing what’s on here. Do you think she had a charger somewhere?”
They searched among the chaos. It was hopeless, like looking for the infamous needle in a haystack.
“She had a charger in her office, Carl.”
He nodded. There wasn’t much more they could do here.
—
“I notice you’ve just been in Rose’s apartment. Is she okay?” asked a woman on the walkway when they locked the door.
“Who’s asking?” asked Carl.
She gave him her hand. “My name is Sanne and I live a couple of doors down.” She pointed.
“Do you know each other?”
“I wouldn’t say that, but we say hello. I saw her the other day and told her that Zimmermann is dead. Is she ill? I noticed she’d been away for a while, and she didn’t seem like her old self.”
“When was this?”
“Last Thursday. The day Kevin Magnussen crashed his Renault into a wall. I love Formula One, and especially Kevin. And I had just heard the news when I met Rose. I remember it clearly.”
“Rose isn’t at home just now. Do you have any idea where we might find her?”
She shook her head. “No, she didn’t really have much to do with the rest of us in the building, except Rigmor as far as I know. Anyway, I haven’t been at home all weekend.” She pointed at a roller suitcase next to her. “I’ve been visiting my family.”
She smiled and looked like she wanted them to ask her what the occasion had been, but they never did.
“Shouldn’t we file a missing person’s report?” asked Assad on the way down to the car.
“Yes, we should. But . . .” He hesitated for a moment. Just like Assad, he was shocked by Rose’s suicide and organ donation notes. Although there were indications that she might have changed her mind, you never knew with someone who was mentally ill. And Rose was, whether they were willing to admit it or not. Carl looked at Assad with a serious expression. “But if we do it, everything about Rose will come out in the open. And what if she’s just sitting in some hotel trying to clear her head? Then we’ll have destroyed her career.”
“You think so?” He sounded surprised.
“Yes, it’ll be more than difficult for her to return to her old job if all her secrets get out. Bj?rn would never accept that. He does things by the book.”
“That wasn’t exactly what I meant, Carl. Do you think there’s a chance she’s sitting somewhere trying to clear her head? Because if that’s the case, Carl, then she might still be considering suicide. I think we do need to file that missing person’s report.”
Assad was right, and it put them in a difficult position. Carl sighed as they walked past the parked cars. There was a woman sleeping in a small Ka a few cars away from theirs.
He wished it was him.
46
Monday, May 30th, 2016
Jazmine was at her wit’s end. Denise had been gone for hours without checking in. What the fuck was she doing? And what did she imagine Jazmine should do? Denise had forbidden her to call because it might give her away if she was hiding. But what about her? The woman out there in the bathroom was moaning. She looked really off-color, had nasty red blotches on her thighs, and her fingers were almost blue.
To be honest, she was really worried that if she gave her water she might choke on it due to her weakened state.
Jazmine didn’t like thinking about it because if the woman died they would suddenly be guilty of double murder. They would be facing lifetime sentences, and that would mean that life was over. What could she do when they released her at forty-five without an education and with the sort of record she could never shake off? Would she even be able to save up for anything in prison, like a ticket to the other side of the world or something like that? Could she ever become anything other than a prostitute? She certainly didn’t want that, but what else would there be? If Denise didn’t return within an hour or two she would just make a run for it. She would take all the money and get the hell out of here. It would be Denise’s own fault.
She gathered the money and put it in a canvas bag of the sort old ladies thought were chic thirty years ago. No one would suspect that it contained anything but crap. And then she would take the S-train to the central station and take the Vejle bus from Ingerslevsgade. There was one leaving at around ten, which she could easily catch.
Once she was in Jutland, she would have many more opportunities to continue south without being caught—and south was where she was headed. Out of the country. Far away. Just disappear and never come back. A discounted green ticket to Berlin with Abildskou Buses cost only one hundred and fifty kroner, and from there she could go anywhere in the world. Right now she was particularly tempted by Italy. It was swarming with beautiful men who liked girls like her, and place names like Sardinia and Sicily sounded spellbinding.
Now the woman out there was whimpering again, but sounding weaker and weaker.
Jazmine tried to focus on something in the room that could distract her from what was going on in the bathroom.
“Should I or shouldn’t I?” she said quietly to herself a few times before going to the kitchen to get a glass of water. One last time and then she would leave the rest to fate.
She had just leaned in over the steel sink to fill the glass when she heard someone knocking on the door to the next-door apartment.
Jazmine lifted the kitchen curtain slightly to look out and immediately pulled back when a dark man on the walkway looked in her direction.