Oscar had been missing for more than twenty-four hours and they were still without a single relevant witness statement or any contact with the alleged kidnappers. His backpack’s location on the boat dock could indicate that he had been taken out to sea. PC had gotten the chief superintendent to grant assistance from the emergency management agency, whose search and rescue units and divers were now heading out on the water. The navy’s helicopter could make it about an hour in the air over Copenhagen Harbor before it got dark. The alert had gone out to the various caretakers and attendants of the forts and islands, lighthouse keepers and pilots up the coast on both the Danish and Swedish side of the strait. The Swedish Search and Rescue Services in Malmö had offered their assistance. A search on Danish soil didn’t get any bigger than this. However, none of it would help if someone was holding Oscar hostage indoors.

“Oh, man, that Carlsberg looks refreshing! Skål!” Anette appeared beside him and took a long drink of her beer. “I just got a call on my way in—the door-to-door didn’t turn up a thing. No one has seen Oscar since he left school yesterday.” She glanced over her shoulder and raised one eyebrow as a comment on the bar’s party mode. “Any clues on the letter?”

“Let me see… Yes, Clausen just wrote.” Jeppe tapped his phone and opened the crime scene technician’s email. “The paper is run-of-the-mill white twenty-pound bond copy paper, and the text has been printed on an ink-jet printer, not a laser printer. The font is Times New Roman. There is a faint roller mark on the top of the page suggesting that it was printed on a large machine, not one for home use. Likely the kind of copy machine or printer you would find in any business office.”

“Or at a school,” Anette suggested. “Fingerprints?”

“A few. They found both Henrik’s and Malin’s. But unfortunately the others aren’t clear enough to be used. You know how it is with prints on paper.” Jeppe put away his phone and smiled at an older couple who had started dancing in front of the bar. There was something liberating about the unrestrained atmosphere around them, so innocent and untroubled by their concerns. “Esther de Laurenti confirmed that the quote is from a book by Oscar Wilde. I’m going to stop by her place tomorrow to hear more.”

Anette shook her head and drank again.

“What kidnapper leaves a quote from a book before forcing the victim onto a boat? I don’t believe that piece of paper has any connection to Oscar at all.”

“Unless he wrote it himself?” Jeppe suggested. “Fifteen-year-olds can be quite… cryptic.”

She gave him a knowing look and said, “I’m damn sure you were when you were fifteen. Cryptic and a pain in the butt.”