The Elephant Keepers' Children (40 page)

“What the hell are you talking about, lad? Are you completely mad? Of course I'm not. All that's in the past. I'm reformed. Religion is a disturbance of the brain.”

He pauses, clearly intent on continuing. But I've been close to stealing the ball.

“The Grand Synod is all to do with the innards of the great religions. It's the first attempt ever on such a scale to open up a dialogue among madmen and mystics about the possibility of their being something unifying behind those faiths. The lunatic idea they've taken into their heads is to investigate whether their various religious understandings might share some common foundation. And to that end they've brought in neural scientists and psychologists. What the floaters are afraid of is that the different religions should discover themselves to have more in common than they thought. And if they do, fundamentalism loses its legitimacy. No one's likely to feel threatened by a person who's basically as deranged as themselves. That's what's brought them together.”

He gulps a mouthful of air and returns to his chair to finish his lunch. He doesn't actually lick his plate, but my feeling is that's only because he's got company. From the larder underneath the desk he now produces a chocolate cake.

It's big enough to give pleasure to an entire parish council. Albert Winehappy considers it closely for a moment and decides there's enough for all three of us. He cuts me and Pallas Athene two wafer-thin slices.

“You're a sportsman,” he says to me. “It's in your file. You need to watch your weight.”

“What about yourself?” says Pallas Athene.

I can tell from Albert Winehappy that he is suddenly placed under pressure. It's now glaringly obvious that the quickest way of freaking him out would be to go for the cake.

“With your profession,” he says, “you need to keep yourself slim and attractive. And this, I'm afraid, is a calorie bomb.”

He stuffs the cake into his mouth and swills half a liter of coffee from a thermal mug, then delicately brushes away the crumbs from his beard with a serviette.

“What about my mother and father?” I ask him.

And then he says something that bowls me over.

“Your mother and father are upstanding citizens. They called and reported an explosive device. Concealed within the underground security box into which the jewels will descend in case of fire, vandalism, or attempted theft. The bomb squad were deployed immediately and took care of it all. I met with your parents. Your mother has done a splendid job of security. Decent people, both of them. Keen. Polite. Law-abiding. How
the hell they managed to produce children like you is a mystery. But then again, the brain can be affected during a pregnancy. Your headmaster even states as much in the report. Water on the brain, wasn't it?”

Cautiously, I endeavor to open and close my mouth. It works, though only just.

“So there's no warrant out on them at all?”

“Who? Your parents? Why the hell should there be? More likely they'll be given a medal. Either that or a hundred million for having saved the valuables. That should be enough for them to get you and your sister a babysitter. Maybe they should inquire about bringing the Hells Angels in for the job. Cheers!”

He downs another half liter of frothy special brew.

“Why did they have to remove us from our home?” I ask. “And how come Hans was to be arrested?”

“Request of your parents. So they'd know you were safe.”

Among the first team of Finø FC, the Pastor's Peter is renowned for his Oriental inscrutability. So you can't tell by looking at me. But inside, I'm combusting. And the reason is that Mother and Father most certainly did not have us banged up with blue wristbands on for our own safety, because our safety was never threatened by anyone but themselves. The reason was so we wouldn't be able to pick up their trail.

“And my sister?” I ask.

Albert Winehappy's expression turns grave.

“We've four thousand police officers on the streets. Civilian reinforcements from Sweden, Norway, Germany, and the
United States. Close on seven thousand in all. We've got surveillance helicopters and coastal patrols, and we're backed up by the civil defense and the fire brigade. As we speak, her picture has gone out and the search has been initiated. We're going to fucking find her!”

We're sitting in the Jaguar
overlooking the square and the Nyhavn waterfront. We've called Hans and Ashanti, and it turns out they never got any farther than a lovers' bench with a view of the harbor, and now they've met up with us here. We've told them everything. Pallas Athene starts the car and I realize she's now driving differently from before, as though somehow she's absent, which would be understandable considering how quickly she has been introduced into our family.

Personally, I feel so low as to be bordering on despair. My in-depth religious studies in the company of Tilte have time and again brought to our attention that all the great masters recommend viewing any suffering one might be fortunate enough to experience in terms of a godsent opportunity, and all of them stress the notion that one should savor the experience and make sure not a drop is spilt.

This is easier said than done, and even the smallest measure of success will render it impossible to retain control of anything else at the same time, one's limbs, for example, and now my hand appears from out of my pocket with a small rectangular piece of card in it. This is what I found tucked
between the framed pictures in Conny's modest abode, just before everything took off, so I never actually got the chance to examine it. I do so now, discovering it to be a business card with a crucifix embossed on it. Next to the crucifix are the words
Catholic University of Denmark
. The address alongside says
Bredgade
. And below it is that very Danish of names,
Jakob Aquinas Bordurio Madsen
.

What now happens inside me is difficult to explain and impossible to excuse. But a flash of madness zips through my brain. And the question that follows like a clap of thunder is this: What can the fact that this business card was found in Conny's apartment mean, if not that Jakob Bordurio, the puma of Ifigenia Bruhn's Dancing School, has set his sights on Conny and is now stalking his prey?

I know what you're going to say. Was I not dealing spiritually with my grief at Tilte being gone? And if that was the case, then how come I'm now spinning scenarios about Jakob and Conny all of a sudden? Of course, you'd be quite right, and the only thing I can say in my defense is that of all the demons depicted in the great religions, jealousy is and always will be captain of the team.

But the very next instant I relax. Because the business card must have been put there by Tilte. And Conny is fourteen, whereas Jakob is seventeen, and no historical precedent exists whereby Conny has chased an older man. So common sense prevails, and the question now is why Tilte would have left it behind. Because Tilte, as I have already mentioned, isn't
one for dropping things, and everything would seem to indicate she left it for me to find.

We turn right and pass a long, narrow park. At the end of the street we can see the harbor. Basker grizzles. He's worried about Tilte, too. I turn the business card over in my hand, and on the back Tilte has written the figure
13
in pen.

Thirteen is Tilte's lucky number. She says it's a lot better than it's rumored to be. She was born on the thirteenth and is very pleased with the rectory's address, which is Kirkevej 13, and Count Rickardt, who has conducted extensive research in numerology, has at length explained a great deal of matters whose details I am no longer able to recall but that all have to do with how well Tilte is suited to the number.

But why that should prompt her to write it down on the back of Jakob's business card is a question to which I find no immediate answer.

“We need to make a detour,” I say. “To Bredgade.”

And then a number of things happen in quick succession.

The first of these is that Pallas Athene wrenches the steering wheel, pulling the Jaguar up onto the pavement and slamming on the brakes. We come to an abrupt halt amid the sound of squealing tires and the waft of burnt rubber.

“I've got it,” she says.

What she's got is something we're given no time to grasp, because now someone thumps a fist against the roof of the Jaguar, and not in the manner of a polite inquiry as to anyone being home but rather in a way that would make anyone think
we'd landed in a scrap yard and the Jaguar was now being squashed into a cube. And that sets everything off.

The face of a man inserts itself through Pallas Athene's open window.

The man is seated on what looks like a brand-new Raleigh. He's wearing a suit and a white shirt and tie, bicycle clips keep his trouser legs in place, and his shoes are shiny. On the pannier is a leather case for a laptop, and in his hand a voluminous bunch of long-stalked roses wrapped in cellophane, and now he yells into Pallas Athene's face.

“What the hell do you think you're playing at, you stupid cow! Won your license in a lottery, did you? Never heard of the Highway Code?”

I don't know the man personally. And yet I'd give ten to one he's a solicitor, that he's now on his way home from the office to his apartment in Charlottenlund, that his fiancée is waiting for him, and that they'll soon be married and have two, perhaps three, children and a dog, and then live happily ever after until the end of their days.

It's a project I can only warmly support. Even if I myself am destined to remain alone forever, I can still find pleasure in the happiness of others.

That's why I wish I'd had the time to tell the solicitor about how to keep one's anger in check, a strategy all the great religions recommend and on which they even provide guidance. Unfortunately there's no time at all, because now he's already yelled into Pallas Athene's face.

Hers is the wrong face into which to yell. Her eyes glaze over, and before we know it she's yanked the solicitor through the window by his lapels.

Then she hesitates. She is almost certainly pausing to choose between two equally excellent avenues down which to proceed: Should she break the man's neck or simply begin to tear off his head?

This brief interlude is our chance. Hans, Ashanti, and I grab her, just as it becomes apparent from the look of satisfaction on her face that she has made her decision.

For a moment, I don't think we can hold her back. But then Hans flexes his muscles, and when Hans flexes his muscles all natural movement is suppressed. Slowly, the glaze disappears from her eyes. She looks at the solicitor and returns him through the window onto the saddle of his modest mode of transport.

“On your bike, fat ass!” she says.

He kicks off from the curb, accelerating away without looking back. As far as I can tell, he's unharmed. But I have to say, as many of the great masters have said before me: a solicitor who has looked death in the face is no longer the same solicitor.

Pallas Athene has returned to more or less the same reality as the rest of us. And now she turns to face us.

“Ship horns,” she says.

We listen
. A single horn can be heard in the distance. But it's not something one would ordinarily be inclined to announce to the world. The thought strikes me that Pallas Athene has just been prevented from terminating the life of a male cyclist, and the experience may perhaps render it too hard for such a sensitive system as hers to suppress its spontaneous emotion.

“He rang me up yesterday. Henrik. Wanting me to go to them. I turned him down. Hardly ever do it. Too dangerous. I like to have Andrik around. So they made a booking for the next day. But in the background was the same sound. I live on the harbor myself. It was the sound of horns from the ships.”

“Did you get an address?” I ask.

She nods slowly.

“That's what was odd about it. Normally we know as little as possible about the clients. But in this case he gave an address. To tell me how close it was. An address in the Free Harbor district. Pakhus was the street name, and then a number.”

We hold our breath while she thinks.

“It's gone, I can't remember,” she says, distraught.

Then another man approaches the open window. I put my hand on Pallas Athene's arm. But this is a different scenario entirely.

“I'm sorry,” he says, “only I was just on my way to see you. At the address on Toldbodgade.”

Standing on the pavement with a rosary in his hand, sporting a clerical collar, and looking like a sheikh of the desert, is the pinup boy of Ifigenia Bruhn's Dancing School, my former teammate on the first eleven of Finø FC, Jakob Aquinas Bordurio Madsen.

I pull Jakob into the car
. It's no exaggeration to say the Jaguar is now at bursting point. One has to bear in mind that, strictly speaking, my brother Hans requires a car to himself. But this isn't the right time to complain about the conference facilities.

“I want to speak to Tilte,” Jakob says.

“Too late,” I tell him. “She's been kidnapped.”

He withers in front of our eyes, and this indicates two things to me. First, that he knows something about what Tilte and the rest of us are up to. And second, that although he now has his own business card and has received a message from God, and even if his rosary may not have been idle for a moment since he left Finø, his heart still isn't done with Tilte.

I hold up the business card in front of him.

“She left this behind when they dragged her away,” I tell him. “She must have spoken to you.”

His eyes wander.

“The police,” he says.

“The police have been informed. They're looking for her all over. They've called a search for the van that took her away. We want to find out how much you know.”