“Don’t be silly,” he said. “Please join me.”

Heloise noticed that the table was set for two people.

“You’re sure you don’t mind me taking your seat?” She glanced over at the woman who had let her in.

“No, please, go ahead,” the woman said, gently pushing Heloise toward the empty seat. “I actually have a couple of things I need to take care of anyway.”

She pulled the chair out for Heloise, who thanked her and sat down.

The woman left the kitchen, leaving Heloise alone with Kenneth Vallø.

“Is that your girlfriend?” Heloise asked, nodding after her.

Kenneth Vallø’s head bobbed up and down and side to side in a way that indicated, Both yes and no.

“Miriam is my aide,” he said. He stared intently at Heloise and was quiet for a few seconds. Then he said, “What’s on your mind?”

“Nothing. Or, well, I was actually wondering how it could be that a man like yourself, a man of great wealth, has chosen to remain here in Herlev?”

“As opposed to moving where?” he asked. “To Luxembourg? Provence?”

“Well, yeah. Or to Rungsted …”

He laughed. “Rungsted? Why in the world would I want to move to Rungsted?”

“I don’t know,” Heloise said, smiling, accepting the bread basket that he held out to her. “Isn’t that where people go to live once they’ve made some serious dough?”

She helped herself to a piece of rye bread. The middle was still a little moist and warm, and the bread smelled of malt.

“I was born and raised here,” Kenneth said. “My family lives just around the corner, as do most of the people I care about. Here, try the herring. It’s good,” he said, and pushed the porcelain bowl over to her. “I don’t see any reason to leave. Do you?”

Heloise shrugged. “Not when you put it like that, no. But most people I know dream of winning the lottery—or creating a tech start-up that they can sell to the Chinese for a fortune such as yourself—so that they can get away, away from the life they’re living, away from the town they were born in.”

She bit into the open-faced sandwich she had made herself and almost groaned in delight.

“Mm. Wow, this is good.”

“Yes, it is, isn’t it? It’s the bread. Miriam trained as a baker. You should taste her raspberry muffins.”

Heloise smiled. Raspberry muffins? Had Vallø chosen her as his aide for her baking skills? Almost certainly.

“I’ll have to try them someday,” she said, taking another mouthful of herring.

“Well, so what brings you here, Heloise Kaldan?” Kenneth asked, leaning back in his chair. “I assume that you’re not here because you are interested in the tech industry.”

“What makes you say that?”

He smiled and shrugged. “Just a guess,” he said, reaching for a beer without taking his eyes off her.