The Seventh Child (72 page)

What it means?
For a moment, the poet sat pensively, forlorn, under his top hat. Then he said,
I can only say the words that are already written, that are already in the story. They cannot be changed.

After hearing this, Nils sat for a long time with his head lowered, until finally the poet took pity on him. He said, in a whisper as fine as the squirrel’s fur against the tree bark above his hat, reiterating what the photographer thought was so important:
But one day the little girl down in the Darkness heard her story told to an innocent child, who broke into tears upon hearing it. “But won’t she ever come back up?” the child asked, and the answer was “No, she’ll never come back up!” Then much time passed, long and bitter, and the child grew old and was about to die, and in that very second it imagined the poor girl again and cried inconsolably for her. Its tears and prayers resounded like an echo under the ground, down in the hollow, empty shell that surrounded the imprisoned and tormented soul. That very instant a ray of sunlight reached into the abyss and melted the little girl’s petrified form. An angel from God was crying over her, and a little bird swung zigzag up to the world of humans
…
she was free.
You could tell that the poet himself was choked up.

Nils interrupted him for the third time, and this time almost angrily: “It’s no use, old poet, because I don’t understand it. You’ll have to interpret it for me.”

Interpret it?
Maybe it was the poet’s voice, or maybe a muddled whisper in the leaves. There was a long pause; the squirrel darted around the gravestone and disappeared. It sounded as though it had been received with a heavy breath from inside the earth, but then everything grew quiet again. The cemetery was empty.

For a long time, Nils stood listening to the wind rustle in the trees. Finally, he realized that both the wonderful words and the poet were gone. He hadn’t wanted to put up with Nils’s insistence that he break the etiquette of fairy tales—and now Nils would never get his answer.

He’d
have to ask his parents without having any idea how they might respond.

“That’s what happened. There’s no doubt about it, and it’ll be returned to sender.”

The words were uttered without the least hesitation, and the national minister knew right away that Carl Malle, his ally for half a century, was right.

They had been discussing the latest development in the Kongslund Affair for more than an hour. After the discovery of the retired chief inspector’s body in the harbor, Malle had written the main points of the case on a slip of paper, which he had shown only to the minister before burning it in a giant porcelain ashtray that bore the party monogram.

In his last years as homicide chief inspector—and later in his retirement—the dead inspector had been obsessed with the mysterious death of a woman on a deserted stretch of Bellevue Beach in 2001. His widow had confirmed as much to Malle. The logical connection to the Kongslund Affair could no longer be denied. The dead woman had carried a photo of Kongslund in her pocket, and according to the homicide chief inspector’s widow, this picture was what had prompted him to make the fatal decision to resume the case after the Kongslund stories began appearing in the media.

There was no longer any doubt. The dead woman had to be Eva Bjergstrand.
She’d
come to Denmark no less than seven years earlier and had probably gone to see Magna. Whether
she’d
been able to do so, Malle didn’t know. Magna might very well have discovered her fate, because Malle’s investigation suggested that Eva Bjergstrand’s death had been mentioned in the local paper, the
Søllerød Post
, a few days later.

If Magna’s letter package had really been sent to Australia—as the unstable Oceka grocer swore it had—then to whom did she send it?

Of course, it was possible that Eva had a secret ally in Australia, but they had no way of knowing about that, so the other possibility was far simpler—and more disturbing. Malle explained, “If she sent the Protocol in a package to Australia
…
addressed to Eva
…
to Eva’s old address in Australia—which she knew no longer existed—then that would be very cunning. And that’s how Magna was. The package would be returned to sender, to
her
that is. Because Australia is such a distant and vast country, it would take a while before the mail service would give up on delivering the package to the addressee, and at that point the Kongslund Affair would have long since blown over. Nobody would be able to find the Protocol. Not even if
we’d
been given permission to search her home—which might have been what she feared. The Protocol just needed to be gone—as quickly as possible—but it also needed to be returned!”

“But what the hell is in that damn
…
?” The minister broke off in the middle of his question, as though he didn’t want to utter the book’s name.

“
Everything
,” Malle said. “
Everything
is in it.”

“
Everything
…
? Damn, Carl, where the hell
is
that package? It’s been a long time
…
”

“It might take some time yet. First it had to be sent across the globe. Then the Australian mail service would have to search for the addressee
…
it might take months before they give up
…
and return the package.”

“At which point—”

“Yes, at which point it’ll end up with Marie, since she is Magna’s heir.” Malle came to his ominous conclusion without hesitation.

“But that can’t happen.” The national minister leaned closer and whispered, “Can’t we get INTERPOL to
…
?”

“Under no circumstances. We can’t risk anyone else opening that package and finding the Protocol. And if any police authority finds the package and officially returns it to Denmark, it won’t go to us but to investigators at police headquarters.”

His point was abundantly clear to the minister.

“Could we find it at the postal service before they expedite it?” Ole Almind-Enevold asked, having grown considerably paler over the course of their conversation, which was something of a common occurrence in the past few weeks. “They might have it already.”

Malle stood and leaned against the fake fireplace the ministry’s interior decorators had affixed to the northern wall, complete with brass hinges and a stained green oak mantle. “I’ll see what I can do, Ole. But this can’t get out. That’s absolutely crucial
…
None
of this can get out.”

“If that package ends up with Marie
…
she’s completely unhinged. For God’s sake, Carl. If she opens that book and reads the truth
…
Magna’s truth
…
that loony woman
…
” Even the nation’s second most powerful man didn’t dare finish the thought.

And as usual, his old war buddy didn’t try to reassure him. “You’re right, Ole. You’re entirely right. If she reads what’s in the Protocol—we’ll all go down—the whole gang.”

A strange choice of words,
the minister thought.

31

FINAL ATTEMPT

June 30, 2008

I think the People’s King would have been happy to see the seven of us together at Kongslund. As a child, the old monarch had been brutally separated from his mother, the loose Princess Charlotte Frederikke, whom his father exiled to Horsens, forbidding her from ever seeing her son.

There is really no doubt that his motherless childhood had a significant impact on his later decision to abandon absolute monarchy, listen to the people, and accept the introduction of democracy. I think that as a king he let his childhood grief manifest itself in his body, which then refused to plant the seed to allow the continuation of the royal Oldenborg family. And in this way he exacted a gruesome revenge on his father and all his ancestors. He left no heir. Increasingly, he sank into a state of mental darkness that only his life’s companion during his final years was witness to. He never saw the completed Kongslund.

The last absolute monarch sat for long days, one after the other, fishing for carp at the Deer Garden.

I happened to hear the doorbell before anyone else because I was sitting in Susanne’s office with the door open.

The chrome bust of Sir Winston Churchill, given to the orphanage for its effort during the Resistance, was still standing on Magna’s old desk, shiny as new. This was where I was when I gave Asger the name of his “biological mother”—and this was where Magna sat when she talked to the adoptive parents she so discreetly controlled and followed in the years following their adoption. For the sake of the children, of course.

I went down and opened the door, and in front of me stood a short, stocky man.

“My mother is dead.” The message was astonishingly simple—and impossible to misinterpret.

He was around fifty, I guessed, and his voice seemed familiar to me. Or maybe it was just the tone and the faint Jutland accent, the origins of which I couldn’t determine.

“I’m Marie Ladegaard. Maybe you’ve come to the wrong address,” I said as politely as I could.

“No, no
…
” For a second the voice sounded almost panicky. “I’m sorry, it isn’t
…
I’m talking about Dorah
…
about Dorah Laursen from Helgenæs.”

I held my breath.

Then he added: “I’m her son.”

Now it clicked, and I had to go to great pains not to show my surprise. The man on the doorstep was the mysterious son whom the governesses at Kongslund, according to Dorah, had given her to replace the one they’d taken from her five years earlier. This was the son I had mercilessly ordered Dorah to explain everything to—what little she knew—about both his background and his incomprehensible and mysterious arrival in her home.

I didn’t know what it meant. The only thing that really interested me at this point, two months after the Kongslund Affair had begun, was the answer to the question:
Who was Eva’s lost son?

Clearly it couldn’t be this man.

I summed up my confusion about everything in a brief and not particularly clever reply. “Dead?”

He responded immediately. “Yes, her neighbor found her.
She’d
fallen down the cellar stairs.”

I hadn’t seen any cellar stairs when I visited, and I hadn’t imagined that such a small and low-ceilinged house even had a cellar.

“Her neck was broken.”

I didn’t say anything, but in my mind’s eye I saw the scared, hunched woman and imagined her lying there at the bottom of the stairs with her short, thick neck broken, bent at a sharp angle, her dead eyes staring into the nothingness.

I closed my own eyes.

“The police think it was an accident.”

“That’s what they think?”

“Yes. But I’m not so sure.” His voice had grown deeper and contained a strange mixture of anger and peace.

“But why are you coming to see me?” I said, rather more coldly than I meant to.

“Because my mother told me all about you
…
and Kongslund. She told me about everything that happened. Now I wish
she’d
never done that.”

I stood dumbstruck for a moment. “You had a
right
to know,” I said.

“That’s not the same thing.”

“The same thing as what?”

“As what I’ve been thinking about since. That piece of information changes everything.”

“Children have a right to know their origins, and that knowledge must never be kept from them.” I realized my tone was too earnest for the situation at hand, but it was crucial not to give in on this very point.

I think he sensed my stubbornness, because he abandoned the topic abruptly. “I’m afraid
…
I just wanted to know if you’ve heard anything.”

“If I’ve heard anything?”

“Yes—did something happen? Might someone have
…
maybe what she knew somehow
…
?” He stopped in the middle of his fragmented inquiry.

“I don’t see how the information she told you, because it was her motherly duty to do so, could be connected to her death today,” I said.

“Yesterday,” he said.

“I see, yesterday. Nothing has happened here that might be connected.” I hoped my tone was convincing. Because of course something had happened. Knud Taasing had visited Dorah three days earlier.

We talked for another couple of minutes, but I didn’t reveal any more information. The last thing I needed was this naive man interfering.

“All right
…
” he finally said.

“My condolences,” the trite phrase dropped from my mouth despite my intention to avoid such phony sentiment.

“Thank you,” he said flatly before taking his leave.

As soon as I closed the door, I began calling the others to tell them about Dorah’s death. I didn’t say anything about her son. First I called Knud, who said he would tell Nils. After the brutal scene the other day, he clearly didn’t like the idea of me calling his friend.

Then I called Peter, who didn’t pick up, and finally Susanne, who grew quiet when she heard the news. She was at her house in Christiansgave and hung up without saying good-bye. Orla, Severin, and Asger were already here, and now Susanne was on her way.

Despite my apprehension about Dorah’s mysterious fall, I was in high spirits in a way I hadn’t been for years.

This was the day I’d been waiting for all my life, however banal that may sound.

Tonight, for the first time, all seven children would be reunited at Kongslund. The way I’d planned ever since writing the anonymous letters to my old companions. We would be sitting in the sunroom, here in Magna’s house, each in our own body but with our special, shared consciousness—just like when we sat under the Christmas tree and were immortalized in an almost fifty-year-old photo.

Today, we were just as connected by fate as
we’d
been that Christmas day in 1961.

We’re sitting around the old glass-topped table in the sunroom. A strong wind blows from the sound. The wind lashes against the roof, making the wood creak.

At first there’s an awkward silence, and everything feels at once natural and ceremonial; an embarrassing sentimentality has snuck up on each of us, causing us to avoid eye contact for a few minutes.

Somehow, despite his sudden and strange illness, Peter Trøst is present—supported by the crutches he needs to support his weakened legs. He had insisted to his doctors that he could not stay in the hospital, and, reluctantly, they let him go. He intends to return to the TV palace and the desperate Professor immediately, probably to observe the station’s total breakdown at close range.

Severin and Orla sit next to him on the sofa, both with their heads bowed, while Asger—not surprisingly—leans back and stares at the ceiling as if it were made of glass, giving his eyes access to the darkness and the universe above.

Nils Jensen sits stiffly in one of the antique, high-backed mahogany chairs that Susanne has put out for him, and I think he is trying to show us that my revelation hasn’t knocked him off his feet. Not anymore. Susanne seems withdrawn; from her perch in a deep, plush lounge chair, she sips her exquisite oolong tea with half-closed eyes.

I study the small party from a semi-dark spot between the sofa and Asger’s chair and recall the words in Eva’s letter that started it all:
I can only envy them their innocence and their happy eyes under their elf hats. If one of them is mine, and I am certain that is the case, you didn’t write to tell me, and of course I know why. They must have all been adopted during the months that followed.

Of course, an eighth person is present—Taasing—and he’s the one who breaks the uncomfortable silence with a little speech that is at once self-important and consciously practical.

“There’s something I need to mention right off,” he says, “before we go into the details of the Kongslund Affair. My sources in the ministry suggest that the police will visit your families either today or tomorrow
…
the five remaining adoptive families, Asger’s, Peter’s, Susanne’s, Severin’s—and then of course yours, Nils.”

Nils looks alarmed, and instantly I know why. His parents still don’t know what I told their son. He hasn’t dared to confront them with the truth they’ve kept from him—and now he realizes that he will have to, very soon.

I can tell that Taasing has reached the same conclusion, and that’s why he emphasizes Nils’s name. I don’t think Nils has forgiven me the knowledge I passed on to him. None of the others would have told him, I realize.

“As for the public, well, everyone thinks the Kongslund Affair is over and done with,” Taasing continues. “But there are some who are pursuing the case—and we know why. The ministry—and not least Almind-Enevold—wants to find Eva’s child, which is also his child. And it wants to erase any evidence of what they’ve done; it was all very illegal and completely immoral, even by today’s standards. At best they tried to steal a child from a pardoned murderer whom they then deported to the other side of the planet; at worst they were involved in a more comprehensive business for many, many years, one that all but guaranteed Kongslund’s very existence. The business essentially helped certain wealthy and powerful men
who’d
given in to their desires and were facing unwanted consequences.
That
is a really neat story.”

“If it is true.” Strangely enough it is my own voice—and in that moment I immediately feel Susanne’s eyes look up from the rim of the cup and study me. She must possess the same skepticism as I do when it comes to rushed judgments about the past. But she doesn’t say anything.

“Those who’ve yet to ask their adoptive parents the crucial question will have to do so tonight, before the police beat them to it. I understand that Susanne, Asger, and Peter have all received negative responses. Severin too.” This is Taasing’s way of discreetly pointing out that he only needs Nils Jensen to complete this part of our private investigation.

Nils remains stiffly seated, the way an unjustly accused man would in front of his jury. But he can’t hide, and he knows what he needs to do. He’s the last possible candidate—and by far the most likely.