I replied, as was the truth, that we had not found a key ring of any size, and that she would of course have been told if we had removed anything from the house.
There was silence on the line between us for a moment. Total silence.
‘But…’ Sandra Schelderup eventually said, when the silence became unbearable. Then she went on in a hesitant voice.
‘But it is not here. So someone must have taken Magdalon’s key ring. And it has keys to all the rooms, cupboards and cars here at Schelderup Hall on it, as well as keys to several other people’s homes. Magdalon liked to have keys to the homes of as many of those close to him as possible; it was part of his need to control.’
I felt a chill spread through my body and straight away asked which other keys were on the ring. Sandra Schelderup said that she believed he had the keys to both his sons’ homes, his sister’s and his ex-wife’s, possibly also Herlofsen’s, but probably not to his mistress’s and almost certainly not to the Wendelboes’.
I promised to follow this up immediately, and the first step in doing this was to ask Sandra Schelderup if she would like police protection at the house. She wavered, but then said that it was not urgent. It was perhaps more important to warn the others as soon as possible. I agreed with her and therefore finished the conversation. I did, however, add that she should give my regards to Maria Irene, which she promised to do.
I still did not trust Sandra Schelderup. Though she did seem to be getting better as the investigation went on. But I was by now already dialling the first number.
It did not take long to phone around. Mr Wendelboe confirmed that Schelderup did not have a key to his house – ‘not even during the war did he have one’. He denied any knowledge of the missing key ring on the part of himself and his wife.
Synnøve Jensen stated simply that her dead lover had not had a key to her house. Magdalon had at one point asked to have a key, but had unexpectedly backed down when she explained that she only had one and reassured him that her door would always be open for him: all he had to do was knock.
Ingrid Schelderup was at home and sounded relatively calm when I spoke to her. She confirmed that her former husband had a key to her flat. He had asked for it shortly after their divorce and she had not wanted to say no. For many years, she had hoped that he would one day use it but, alas, that had never happened, she added with a mournful sigh. Ingrid Schelderup promised to put on the safety chain, and, if possible, to change the lock in the morning. In the meantime, she would be very grateful for police protection. She was still shaken by the events of the past few days, so I arranged fora policeman to go to her house before I phoned anyone else.
