‘I knew he wanted to kill me. I could see it in his eyes.’
The rape victim had at last reached the point where she could find words for what had happened.
Ole Nyborg Madsen listened with full concentration. The girl continued.
‘He wasn’t at all like the person in the café. He was suddenly quite different. From the moment we got into the flat he changed.’
Her body was slight and her whole nature shy. It surprised him that anyone had even noticed her, but then it had started on the net. There you could be whoever you liked and make people believe all sorts of things.
‘He started to attack me as soon as we were in the door,’ she continued, her voice thick with emotion now. ‘I tried to push him off me, but that made things worse. He locked the door so that when I tried to escape, it was easy to stop me.’
With some embarrassment she added, ‘I’d also had quite a bit to drink.’
‘You couldn’t know he would rape you,’ Ole put in.
She shook her head. ‘Nope.’
‘What happened then?’
‘He dragged me into the bedroom and pushed me onto the bed. And then he did it.’
Ole Madsen scrutinised his patient. There wasn’t a lot of her. She would have been an easy victim. She didn’t exactly exude self-confidence, either, but then who did in situations such as these? But she was a typical victim. A textbook example of the kind of girl a rapist should choose. Not very strong, no will power and no self-esteem to speak of. Just a little girl needing love and a bit of fun.
‘Did you put up a fight?’
‘A bit.’ Then she shook her head. ‘I was too scared. I knew he’d kill me if I didn’t do as he said.’
‘How?’
She stared at him with large eyes, as though the crime had already been committed. ‘I think he wanted to strangle me.’
She told him the details and he asked questions to make sure everything came out into the open, like drawing out a septic tooth.
All the time his thoughts followed parallel tracks. There were many ways of killing and he had to choose one that was the most appropriate and the most satisfying. He had come to the conclusion that he had to see the eyes and he had to see some kind of understanding in them. Simply killing was pointless. There had to be a confrontation first, he was convinced of that. Nanna’s murderer should experience fear. He should realise it was a punishment and that he wasn’t going to get off lightly. Strangling, perhaps. That was one possibility and the physical proximity appealed to him. Feeling skin in his hands and the throb of the pulse getting fainter. Looking into his eyes and seeing life ebb away. Close contact.
‘… Fucking slut, he called me.’
Sobs shook her slender frame and bored their way into his brain, bursting his fantasies. He passed her the box of Kleenex, feeling mean-spirited. She had wrung out her soul and he hadn’t caught the last part.
‘In some strange way, he was right,’ she sniffled, and he knew he had arrived at the core. The attendant guilt. The feeling of being soiled, of being broken.
‘Why do you think that?’ he asked.
She peered up at him with big eyes. ‘I wanted it. Somehow I wanted it, too.’
‘You didn’t want to be raped, though, did you? You didn’t want it to hurt.’
‘But sex. I wanted that.’
‘Is there anything wrong with that?’
She shrugged. ‘Perhaps I just got what I deserved.’
Foolish child. He almost lost patience on the spot, but still managed to get her to see the light before the session was over. Thick as a plank. She was right. Sometimes it did seem as though they deserved it; as though he was wasting his time trying to build something in people who didn’t have the capacity for it. The rape wasn’t her fault. But for Christ’s sake, she could show a bit of anger, some vengeance, prove that she was a human of flesh and blood and not an anaemic rag doll who let others do as they wished with her.
There was a knock at the door and Maibritt came in. ‘Have you seen the paper?’
He shook his head. She put it under his nose. ‘It’s terrible. Now they’ve kidnapped a paedophile who’s just served his time.’
He read the article and stared at the photograph. It was a still from a film. Grainy, not very sharp and the colours were on the pale side. But the fear in the man’s eyes stood out. Yes! That was exactly how it should be.
‘Poor man,’ said Maibritt.
‘Do you think so?’
She looked at him in surprise. ‘That? No one deserves that,’ she said. ‘Being held hostage and not knowing whether you’ll live or die. That’s insane. How can you ask?’
He smiled to ease the tension. ‘No, of course not. You’re right,’ he said, but couldn’t help adding that the paedophile wasn’t exactly innocent. The man had abused his own daughter. He hoped someone would cut his bollocks off.
‘He’s paid his debt to society,’ Maibritt pointed out again.
Ole carried on regardless. ‘Nine months. For destroying his daughter’s life.’
She just gaped at him. Then she turned her back on him and left. From her reaction he could see she was concerned about him.
He was, too.