Søren Mølgård

Søren Mølgård is a former resident of Ølene who reappears in the investigation of Frank as a drug-using, socially adrift witness. Others describe him as a former friend who has fallen into difficulty; when Carl and Assad meet him, Søren confirms that Frank was controlling and says that he left rather than submit to Frank’s direction. His brief part in the case links the alternative community’s recollections of a failed former member with a firsthand account of Frank’s character.

Background and Life at Ølene

Søren had lived at Ølene for a time and was remembered by someone who knew him there as one among several people who later entered the alternative world. In that person’s account, others from Ølene had managed to make a good life in that milieu, whereas Søren lacked the talent to do so. The distinction is not an objective assessment of his abilities: it is the judgment of a former associate, who dismisses him as an incidental visitor rather than a significant member of the community.

That same account says Søren tried to become a numerologist, like Birtemaja, but did not understand what lay at the heart of the practice. The speaker presents the group’s worldview as dependent on a degree of order that Søren could not grasp. The failed attempt thus marks more than an unsuccessful occupation: in the eyes of his former associate, it shows that he never acquired the framework that gave the community’s alternative pursuits coherence. The account is dismissive, and the novel offers no independent measure of Søren’s abilities or understanding.

Estrangement and the Commune

When asked whether she remained in contact with friends from Ølene, Søren’s former associate named him as the exception. She said he had gone badly downhill and that she had dropped him because of his drug use, which she regarded as incompatible with the work and values of her circle. Her response establishes a broken social connection as well as a contrast between the order the group claims to value and Søren’s increasingly unstable circumstances.

She recalled that he had moved to a commune with followers of the Asa faith, south of Roskilde. In her view, the move may have been what he needed to avoid deteriorating further. The information is tentative rather than a confirmed account of his present life: she speaks from memory, and no further details about the commune or Søren’s situation there are supplied. It nevertheless complicates her dismissive description of him. Though she has cut contact and considers him unsuccessful, she can still imagine that a different community might offer him some protection from his decline.

Questioning About Frank

Carl would have preferred that Søren receive advance warning before the investigators arrived. When Bue introduced Carl and Assad as investigators from Copenhagen Police Headquarters, Søren appeared red-eyed and spaced out, and seemed more frightened than the situation warranted. He looked around his small, low-ceilinged living room, apparently checking whether drugs had been left in view. The room’s hashish smell and Carl’s dry observation about the chillums make Søren’s drug use immediately present in the encounter rather than merely reported background.

Asked about Frank, Søren recognized the name and gave a divided assessment: he thought Frank was a jerk, though he had not quite made up his mind. The qualification matters. Søren does not present himself as a settled judge of Frank, but he does supply a concrete grievance: Frank always had to dictate everything, and Søren refused to put up with it. He left. His account makes Frank’s need for control visible through its consequence for someone who resisted it, while leaving the nature and timing of their association unspecified.

Narrative Role

Søren’s appearance is brief, but the change in perspective gives the investigators more than the secondhand portrait of a failed Ølene acquaintance. The earlier account reduces him to drug use, an unsuccessful attempt at numerology, and a lack of talent; under questioning, he becomes a witness able to describe why he separated from Frank. His unsettled state makes the encounter uncomfortable, yet it does not erase the relevance of what he says.

The contrast between the two accounts remains unresolved. Søren’s former associate treats his life as evidence that he failed to find a place in the alternative world, while Søren’s own explanation focuses on Frank’s insistence on dictating matters. The narrative does not establish whether either account is complete, nor does it provide a later outcome for Søren. His contribution is narrower and more precise: he places himself among the people who would not accept Frank’s control, and identifies that conflict as the reason he left.