The man got up and walked around behind the counter. He stuck his head into the back room and bellowed, “Jonna!”

A whiskey voice from somewhere back there replied, “What?”

“Got a customer,” the man called, and shuffled back to his barstool.

Heloise could hear the sound of a glass or a bottle falling over someone back there.

A lanky woman with turquoise hoop earrings appeared in the doorway. Her hair was short and red, and her skin was a lunar landscape of acne scars.

“You need something?” she said to Mr. Goatee.

“You’ve got a customer,” he repeated, nodding at Heloise.

“Jonna Kiel?” Heloise asked.

The woman leaned her head back as if she were looking at Heloise through her nostrils.

“Who wants to know?”

“Are you Jonna Kiel?”

The woman nodded one time and crossed her arms.

“My name’s Heloise Kaldan. I’m a journalist. I work for Demokratisk Dagblad.”

“Uh-huh, that sounds fancy.” The woman smiled. “Have we been nominated for Pub of the Year or something?”

She and Mr. Goatee snickered.

“No, I was just wondering if I could ask you a couple of questions,” Heloise said, walking over to the bar.

“As long as you order something, you can ask me anything you want, sweetheart,” the woman said, gesturing to the bottles behind her. “Then we’ll see if I can answer.”

Heloise shrugged and looked up at the selection. “I’ll have a mineral water.”

“Oh, come on.” The woman shook her head as she made a tsk-tsk sound. “You can do better than that.”

“Well then, make it a … a beer.”

Heloise sat down at the bar while the draft beer was poured.

“That’ll be five hundred kroner,” the woman said with an encouraging smile, and set the glass down so hard that the foam sloshed over the edge and ran down onto the bar.

Heloise looked her in the eye.

The women shrugged in a way that said, Pay or be gone.

“I’m here because I’d like to ask you a few questions about your daughter.” Heloise pulled a five-hundred-kroner note out of her wallet and set it in front of her.

The color drained from the woman’s face. The playful smile she had given Heloise when she asked for the money was gone too.

“My daughter?” she asked, her voice timid.

“Yes, Anna.”

“Did they find her?” The woman blinked a couple of times.

“No.” Heloise hurriedly shook her head.

The woman closed her eyes and exhaled heavily, and Heloise couldn’t decipher whether she was expressing relief or annoyance.

Maybe it was both.

When the woman opened her eyes again, she nodded slightly. Then she slowly reached forward and took the money. Heloise thought for a second that Jonna Kiel was going to ask her to leave, but she didn’t say anything.

“When did you last hear from her?” Heloise asked.

The woman shrugged uncertainly.