Holger Munch peeled off the thin latex gloves and went outside on the terrace to have a cigarette. Christ Almighty, what a start to the day. Two girls in one day? He lit his cigarette and peered into the house through the window. The crime-scene technicians were still at work, and the girl’s father had been driven down to police headquarters in Grønland. They had yet to trace the mother, as the father had been in shock and had made little sense. It would appear that the two of them were no longer together, that they had separated, that it was his week with the daughter, that the mother had gone to a cabin with some female friends where there was no cell coverage. The glass in the French windows to the terrace had been smashed. There were traces of blood on the ground floor, on the stairs, and in the little girl’s bedroom. Andrea. Someone had taken her from her bedroom. Munch took a deep drag of his cigarette and tried to fight off a budding headache. He called Mia. She answered after only a few seconds.
“What have you got?” Munch asked her.
“Karoline Mykle, aged six, missing from her home.”
“Any sign of a break-in?”
“No, the key was under the mat.”
Dear Lord. Munch heaved a sigh. Under the mat. Did people still do that these days? “Blood?”
“Traces of blood from the passage and into the bedroom.”
“Parents?”
“Cecilie and John-Erik Mykle. Neither of them has a record. He works on the oil rigs. We’re trying to contact him. She’s a teacher.”
“A teacher?”
“Yes, but it’s not her. She’s in a state of complete shock. I’ve sent her off to Ullevål Hospital. She didn’t even know where she was. She kept saying she didn’t have time to talk to us. She had to take Karoline to nursery school.”
“I see,” Munch said.
“We’re about to start door-to-door inquiries to ask if anyone saw anything.”
“Yes, that’s what we’re about to do as well,” Munch said.
“ALPHA1 procedure on this one?”
Munch nodded.
“Holger?”
“What? Yes, I want everyone working on this. Everyone. And when I say everyone, I mean everyone. I want them to check every single road, every fucking footpath, understand?”
“Understand,” Mia said, and ended the call.
Holger took another deep drag of his cigarette. His headache was arriving with a vengeance. Some water. He needed fluids. And food. His phone rang again.
“Yes, Munch here.”
“It’s Gabriel Mørk. Is it a bad time?”
“Depends what it is,” Munch growled.
“You know that private job you gave me?”
Munch rubbed his forehead.
“The code,” Gabriel continued.
Munch sifted through his memories before the penny dropped. The math puzzle he’d been unable to solve. The one the Swedish girl had sent him on the Net.
“Did you crack it?”
Munch walked back inside the house. He took care not to contaminate any of the bloodstains or touch anything. The technicians were still at work.
“I think I understand what it is, but I need more.”
“What do you mean, more?”
“Do you want to talk about it later?”
Munch walked through to the front of the house, went outside, and lit another cigarette. They had moved the police tape farther down the street now. Keeping the press at bay for as long as they could. He dreaded reporting the latest developments to Mikkelson. Two dead girls. No suspects. And now another two were missing. There would be hell to pay down at Grønland.
“I think it’s a Gronsfeld,” Gabriel said.
“A what?”
“A Gronsfeld cipher. A code language. It’s a variant of Vigenère, but it uses numbers rather than letters. However, I need more. Did you get anything else?”
Munch struggled to concentrate. “More? I’m not sure. What would that be?”
“Letters and numbers. The way Gronsfeld works is that both parties, both the sender and recipient, possess the same combination of letters and numbers. It makes it impossible for an outsider to crack the code.”
“I can’t think of anything,” Munch said just as Kim walked through the gate. “We’ll have to do it later.”
“Okay,” Gabriel said, and hung up.
“Anything?” Munch asked.
Kim shook his head. “Most people are out at work at this time, so we’ll do another round in the early evening.”
“Nothing? Damn, surely somebody must have seen something?”
“Not so far.”
“Do it again,” Munch said.
“But we’ve just—”
“I said do it again.”
The young police officer nodded and walked back out through the gate.
Munch was just about to return to the house when Mia called again. “Yes?”
He could tell from her voice that they had discovered something.
“It’s a woman,” was all she said.
“We have a witness?”
“A senior citizen living right opposite. Trouble sleeping. He looked out his window, he thinks it was about four o’clock in the morning. Saw someone hanging around a mailbox. So he went outside to check.”
“Tough senior.”
“Absolutely.”
“What did he say?”
“He shouted at her. She ran away.”
“And he’s quite sure that it was a woman?”
“He’s a hundred percent sure. He was only a few meters away from her.”
“Bloody hell.”
“I told you so, didn’t I?” Mia said eagerly. “I knew it.”
“Yes, you told me so. Is he with you now?”
“We’re bringing him in.”
“See you at the office in ten minutes?”
“Sure,” Mia said, and hung up.
Munch did not exactly run, but it was not far short. A woman. He quickly got behind the wheel and drove toward the cordon. There was a sea of flashes when he passed the huge crowd of journalists and reporters. At least they had something for the vultures.
A woman.
Munch placed the blue flashing light on the roof and drove to the city center as fast as he could.