The Snowman ( PDFDrive )

‘I doubt it,’ Mathias said. ‘I think the rules say that sort of thing has to be destroyed if no one takes
over the practice. But if it’s important I’ll check of course.’
‘Thank you.’
Harry drove past the Vinderen tram stop. A glimpse of a ghost fluttered by. A car chase, a collision,
a dead colleague, a rumour that it had been Harry driving and he should have been breathalysed.
That was a long time ago. Water under the bridge. Scars under the skin. Versicolor on the soul.
Mathias called back after a quarter of an hour.
‘I spoke to Gregersen – he was the boss of Marienlyst. Everything was deleted or destroyed, I’m
afraid. But I think some people, including Idar, took their patient data with them.’
‘And you?’
‘I knew I wouldn’t go into private practice, so I didn’t take anything.’
‘Can you remember any of the names of Idar’s patients, do you think?’
‘Some maybe. Not many. It’s a while ago, Harry.’
‘I know. Thank you anyway.’
Harry rang off and followed the sign to Rikshospitalet. The collection of buildings ahead of him
covered the low ridge.
Gerda Nelvik was a gentle, buxom lady in her mid-forties and the only person in the paternity
department at the Institute of Forensic Medicine at Rikshospitalet this Saturday. She met Harry in
reception and took him through. There was not much to suggest that this was where society’s worst
criminals were hunted. The bright rooms, decorated in homely fashion, were rather testimony to the
fact that the staff consisted almost entirely of women.
Harry had been here before and knew the routines for DNA testing. On a weekday, behind the
laboratory windows, he would have seen women dressed in white lab coats, caps and disposable
gloves, bent over solutions and machines, busy with mysterious processes they called hair-prep,
blood-prep and amplification, which would ultimately become a short report with a conclusion in
the form of numerical values for fifteen different markers.
They passed a room fitted with shelves, on which lay brown padded envelopes marked with names
of police stations around the country. Harry knew they contained articles of clothing, strands of
hair, furniture covers, blood and other organic material that had been submitted for analysis. All to
extract the numeric code that represented selected points on the mysterious garland that is DNA and
identified its owner with a certainty of ninety-nine point many nines per cent.
Gerda Nelvik’s office was no larger than it needed to be to accommodate shelves of ring files and a
desk with a computer, piles of paper and a large photograph of two smiling boys, each with a
snowboard. ‘Your sons?’ Harry asked, sitting down.
‘I think so,’ she smiled.