Geens curled his upper lip, exposing his teeth like a wild animal ready to attack.
“Jasper was in love with her. He wanted to start a new life with her in a better world. I told him that just such a world existed and he believed me. They planned to set out for it together.”
Hannelore groaned. She wanted to go to the restroom. The instinct to push was so powerful it was making her dizzy. Not while he’s here, she thought. Please God, don’t disgrace me.
“I gave them the recipe for a perfect death,” said Geens. “Two measures of tetramethylammonium pyrosulphate. No one would be any the wiser. But the idiot screwed up. Trui took a double dose by accident.”
Geens related the entire story. Jasper had mixed the toxin with Coke and left the bottle in the refrigerator. Trui drank the whole thing unawares. Jasper panicked and dumped the body in the ditch.
“Then Jasper paid me a visit. What a state he was in.”
Van In tried to follow Geens’s train of thought. He had read enough stuff about sects to know that such things happened. According to them, committing suicide was a passage to a better world, to a new and more complete life.
“And you ordered him to cover up his tracks.”
Geens nodded.
“They believed in me, Commissioner. Jasper jumped out of a window a couple of days later, then Jonathan appeared with your head on a plate.”
“Because you gave them drugs.”
Saartje bit her bottom lip. Why was Van In trying to wind this madman up?
The crisis meeting seemed to be taking forever, and Guido was having trouble controlling his impatience. If they didn’t do something soon, he would make a move himself. Did those big shots realize they were dealing with a psychopath? Geens had at least eleven deaths to account for and he knew that there was no chance of clemency. If they kept talking like this, Hannelore, Pieter, and Saartje wouldn’t stand a chance. Geens would take them all out, then turn the gun on himself.
Guido marched into the room and cleared his throat.
“The drugs part was easy,” Geens said proudly.
Van In raised his eyebrows.
“I drew on the supplies Delrue and his men brought in. Every time they asked me to analyze the stuff, I swapped the heroin with sugar and the ecstasy pills with fakes. They were due to be destroyed, after all.”
The circle was complete. Van In felt the saliva in his mouth dry up. He realized that Geens’s confession had a meaning. The man wanted to be famous one last time. Next step, a bullet through everyone’s head, including his own.
“So you were the mysterious informant who tipped off the federal boys,” he said.
“Bravo, Commissioner.”
Geens’s finger curled around the trigger.
“Delrue was onto me and I had to do something to distract him. That’s why I told you about the tetramethylammonium pyrosulphate. It put me beyond suspicion. And none of my disciples, not even Frederik, knew my real identity.”
“In the meantime, you got on with your plans for the mass shooting.”
“Masyn was a billionaire, Commissioner. I did it for the money. And now you’ve told me Frederik’s been arrested. So you took it from me. You shouldn’t have done that.”
Geens was getting agitated. His hand trembled. As a child he had suffered from hunger and hardship. His God-fearing parents had worked their fingers to the bone to save enough money for college. A degree would guarantee a carefree life for their son, they thought. But his mother died of tuberculosis in 1954 when he was only thirteen, his father two years later, and the juvenile court had entrusted him to the sisters at Suffer Little Children.
One of the sisters caught him with his hands under the blankets one night. She caned him hard on the belly and did irreparable damage. The duty doctor kept his mouth shut, and the sister got away with it. The sisters had humiliated him until he was twenty-one years of age, then they had thrown him out onto the street without a cent. But in spite of everything, he had succeeded in becoming a lab technician. He was good at his job, but to no avail. Like the sisters, his superiors treated him like dirt and gradually robbed him of the last crumb of respect he had tried to maintain. Society spat him out, and he refused to accept it. Only money could soften the pain, but even that had been stolen from him when Masyn was arrested. Both God and Satan had abandoned him. Geens had nothing left to lose. Death was the only honorable alternative.
Van In tensed every fiber of his body. Geens was only a couple of feet away. It had to work.
He threw himself forward. The revolver was all that mattered.
Suddenly the room was plunged into darkness. A shot went off, followed immediately by two loud explosions, a flash of light, and a further two shots.
Geens was slumped in his chair, an expanding patch of red visible on his shirt close to his heart. The revolver was lying beside him on the ground. Four Diane Group officers—like Martians with their infrared viewers—blinked as the neon lights flickered back into service. Van In was on the floor. He had hit the side of the metal bed with his chin. Suddenly Hannelore started to moan.
“They’re coming,” Saartje shouted.
Van In scrambled to his feet. He thought he was hearing things. They’re coming? Who’s coming? They got here already.
The delivery lasted twenty minutes. When the first little head popped out, Van In’s eyes filled with tears. He felt helpless and happy all at once.
“Hannelore didn’t want to worry you,” said Saartje with a smile. “It was to be a surprise.”
Dr. D’Hondt cut the cord and placed the baby on Hannelore’s chest.
“It’s a boy,” he said.
Hannelore smiled at Van In.
“You take him,” she said. “I’ve still got work to do.”
The hospital cafeteria was abuzz with cheerful people. Van In lit a cigarette and savored his Duvel. For once it was ice cold.
“Twins,” he said, still finding it all hard to believe. “Who would have thought?”
“Ask Hannelore,” said Beekman.
Everyone laughed: Beekman, Delrue, Saartje, Pattyn, De Kee, the Diane Group officers, D’Hondt, Guido, and Jonathan. The latter had regained consciousness only half an hour earlier. He was still attached to a drip, but you could see from the glint in his eye that he was on the mend. Van In raised his glass.
“Thanks to all of you,” he said with a lump in his throat.
“Thank Guido,” said Beekman. “He held us hostage and threatened to call you if we didn’t do something. And Geens had said he would shoot you all if anyone tried to make contact. We had to make a move.”
Van In got to his feet and walked over to Guido. The two men embraced.
“I sweated water and blood, Pieter. But …”
Van In gave him a kiss. “Would you have called?”
Guido shrugged his shoulders. He had aged five years in less than an hour.
“Another round on the house,” said Beekman.
Drinks were ordered, and everyone returned to their tables. Van In buried his nose in a fresh, frothy Duvel. The brand-new father was proud as punch. They’d decided on Simon and Sarah. Simon and Sarah Van In.
Mr. Simons heard about the hostage incident on the late news. He took off his glasses, crossed to his desk, removed the crucifix from the wall, and hung it upside down from the metal eyelet attached to the bottom of the cross.
Richard Coleyn awoke from a deep sleep, cold and hungover. He shivered and hoped that Father would be home soon.
PIETER ASPE is the author of the Pieter Van In Mysteries. Aspe lives in Bruges, Belgium, and is one of the most popular contemporary writers in the Flemish language. His novels have sold over one million copies in Europe alone.
BRIAN DOYLE was born in Scotland in 1956 and is currently a professor at the University of Leuven in Belgium. In addition to
teaching, he has translated a wide variety of books from Dutch and Flemish into English. In addition to the Pieter Van In Mysteries, his recent book projects include Jef Geeraerts’s The Public Prosecutor (2009), Jacqueline van Maarsen’s Inheriting Anne Frank (2010), Christiaan Weijts’s The Window Dresser (2009), Tessa de Loo’s The Book of Doubt (2011), Paul Glaser’s Dancing with the Enemy (2013), and Bob Van Laerhoven’s Baudelaire’s Revenge (2014). He also translates poetry and literary nonfiction.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Translated from De vierde gestalte, copyright © 1998 by Pieter Aspe
Translation copyright © 2016 by Brian Doyle
Excerpt from Song of Egidius translated by Francis Jones
Cover design by Mauricio Díaz
978-1-5040-3228-5
Published in 2016 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
180 Maiden Lane
New York, NY 10038
www.openroadmedia.com
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