‘Keeping them informed is one thing,’ Karen says. ‘But Jon Bergman claims you promised they could be there when we go in, too.’

‘Yes, that’s correct. We made a deal with DTV, and in return, we get a few hours to prepare talking points. We don’t even know if she’s dead or alive yet, and this could turn hairy very fast. And I mean for everyone involved.’

Karen picks up on the veiled threat and says nothing.

‘Letting them ride along is damage limitation,’ Stolt continues. ‘Otherwise, they’ll publish right now, and it’ll be hell for us.’

‘But if I call Jon Bergman and tell him what we have now, they’re going to head down to Frisel on their own. That will be hell for us.’

‘You’re obviously going to have to tell him as little as possible. Just say a tip has come in and we’re preparing an intervention without giving away the location. Pick him up on the way, at least that way you know where he is.’

‘But—’

‘The decision has been made. Sorry, Eiken, but this is how it’s going to be. We’re buying time, that’s all.’

*

Karl buys them another ten minutes by turning into a twenty-four-hour petrol station while Karen is on the phone with Johan Stolt. Now, he places a sticky wrap filled with something that looks like chicken salad and a can of Coke in her lap.

‘Eat,’ he says and takes the paper off his own wrap.

She eats. Three bites, drinks. Says nothing. Karl already knows what she’s thinking.

Then she makes the call.

Chapter 59

59

The moment the ferry casts off, they spot the helicopter hovering overhead for a moment before continuing south. Two police cars and an ambulance are parked in front of them, ready to turn on their sirens and race towards Graase on Frisel’s south side the moment they disembark. Aside from uniformed officers, one of the cars holds Cornelis Loots and the other Astrid Nielsen. Given the choice of delaying the ferry five minutes so the dispatched medical doctor could make the same one or getting the units that were ready over as quickly as possible, the latter had won out.

It had taken them forty-two minutes to identify the exact location of the youth camp where Billy Formby had, in all likeliness, spent his summers ten years previously. It would probably have taken half that if it hadn’t turned out that the Church of the Covenant had run not one but two youth camps on Frisel back in the day. The first one, just south of Sande, had been replaced after a couple of years by a considerably bigger one, four miles further south, at something called Roper’s Farm.