TE22 Potpourri

Heidi Amsinck

My Name Is Jensen

Nothing felt right.

day he was just there, shrunken and tortoise-like in his brown suit, with an unlit cigar in his mouth, haunting the corridors of the newspaper like the spectre of journalism past. By default, he had become Dagbladet’s obituary writer. No one of note died without Henning writing about it. He had a vast number of ready obituaries on file, including, rumour had it, his own. Jensen liked Henning.With no interest in trivial conversations, hewasoblivious tothebacklashagainstherreturn fromLondon as a staff reporter. He walked into her office without knocking, hit the light switch and headed straight for the paper coffee cup on her desk, shaking it to check for remains. ‘Margrethe was asking after you,’ he said, raising the paper cup to his mouth with trembling hands. Jensen made a face as Henning drained the cup without any outward sign of disgust. ‘She told me to tell you that Frank is going to write the feature now, and that you should go home and think about how you intend to make a living when you no longer work here,’ he said, looking past her with his rheumy eyes, as if reciting a poem off by heart. Frank Buhl. Crime writer in clogs. He must have loved being handed such a juicy story, even better seeing as she had shown 173 ‘That’s from yesterday.’

She found the photos she had taken on the dead boy. No sign of a struggle or agony in his features. The peaceful look on his face was at odds with the violent injury to his body. And if he had been turned away from the hostel, why had he chosen to stay inMagstrædewith his back against adoorwhen therewere nooks and crannies nearby offering more shelter and privacy? If he was begging and sleeping rough, how come he was so well dressed? Had he written the address of the shelter on the scrap of paper himself, or had someone given it to him? And how was it even possible to be stabbed in the streets of a big city without anyone discovering it till hours later? Not that she would tell her boss that to her face. Margrethe had called five times in the past hour alone, chasing for her eyewitness feature, without Jensen having had the nerve to pick up the phone. She looked up at the familiar sound of shuffling footsteps approachingheroffice.HenningWürtzenwasoneof the former editors-in-chief immortalised on thewall inMargrethe’s office, thoughyouwould scarcely recognise him fromhis photograph. Some of the older reporters remembered him retiring in the early 2000s, but no one recalled when he had come back. One 172 Margrethe was wrong: it wasn’t a great story. Not yet.