The Inspector and Silence

by Håkan Nesser

  He had been advised by the registration authorities that Ewa Siguera did not live in Stamberg. He had also asked Lauremaa and Tolltse to confront the confirmation candidates with her photograph, but as far as he could tell nobody had come up with any helpful information.

  The plot thickens, he thought with a feeling of bitter self-satisfaction. Then he removed a chewed-up toothpick from his mouth and shook his head. Oh shit! he exclaimed, I’m a travesty of a police detective! Of myself. Am I looking for a murderer, or for a woman? In the warmed-up cold sweat on my face? One with chestnut-brown hair . . . ?

  After an hour’s fruitless search, he called Reinhart and passed the task on to him. Asked him to track down Ewa Siguera and report back the moment he found her. There had been other possible paths to follow, of course, but as he suspected that the inspector was simply twiddling his thumbs while waiting for his holiday to begin – or devoting himself to his beautiful and newly married wife – he might as well be made to do something to earn his wages.

  Reinhart had little in the way of objections. He promised loyally to get in touch as soon as he discovered anything. Within the next twenty-four hours at most.

  So his assumptions about Reinhart’s thumbs and his wife had been an accurate guess, the chief inspector thought.

  ‘And how are things with the bloodhound himself?’ Reinhart had asked. ‘Sunbathing, swimming and fishing all day long, eh?’

  ‘You’ve forgotten the wine and the women,’ Van Veeteren informed him.

  He began with the Finghers, as he could see that they were at home.

  He only managed to say hello to Mrs Fingher, a sinewy farmer’s wife in her fifties – she was on her way to look after a grandchild, she announced, as she hurried past him in the direction of an old, hand-painted Trotta parked on the road outside the house – but both Mr Fingher and his son Wim seemed to have plenty of time for a chat.

  ‘It’s mainly Sunday evening I’m interested in, this time round,’ explained the chief inspector after they had settled down on garden chairs under a shady chestnut tree.

  ‘Sunday evening?’ said Fingher. ‘Wim, go and fetch a couple of beers. Would you like a Pilsner, Chief Inspector?’

  ‘I wouldn’t say no,’ said Van Veeteren, and the son went back into the house.

  ‘Why?’ asked Fingher. ‘What do you want to know about Sunday evening?’

  ‘Can you tell me what time the party from the summer camp arrived, and if anything unusual happened?’

  Fingher tried to remember, and his son arrived with the beers.

  ‘No, everything was the same as usual, as I recall it. What do you think?’

  He looked at Wim, who merely shrugged.

  ‘What time?’ asked Van Veeteren.

  ‘Seven, maybe half past. Around then. As usual.’

  Wim Fingher nodded in agreement, and all three took a swig of beer. It was unusually sweet, and Van Veeteren wondered if it might be home-brewed. There were no labels on the bottles, so it wasn’t out of the question.

  ‘Good,’ he said. ‘Was Yellinek with them?’

  ‘Eh? Yes, of course.’

  ‘And four girls?’

  ‘Yes, four.’

  ‘Do you recognize the one who was found murdered?’

  Fingher nodded solemnly.

  ‘By Christ, yes. She’d been here several times, just like the other three. This is a right bloody mess, if only I’d had any idea I’d have . . .’

  ‘You’d have what?’ wondered Van Veeteren.

  ‘Huh, I’ll be buggered if I know. Castrated that damned black-coated bastard, for instance. I’m damned if I know how anybody can send their kids to a place like that. We only have Wim here, but if I had a daughter I swear I’d lock her up if there was anybody like him around . . .’

  His anger suddenly seemed to put a lid on his words, and he fell silent. Van Veeteren took another swig and allowed a few seconds to pass before continuing.

  ‘Did you notice anything special about him last Sunday?’

  ‘That bastard,’ said Fingher. ‘No, I don’t think so. What do you say, Wim?’

  Mathias emptied his glass in one swig.

  ‘No,’ said Wim. ‘I only saw him in passing, but he seemed the same as ever.’

  ‘Nothing unusual about the girls either?’

  Wim shook his head. His father belched.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘They just stood there holding on to the cart, as usual.’

  ‘Hmm,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘Will you promise to contact us if you should think of anything? Anything at all that might seem tasty.’

  Tasty? he thought. I’m losing my way with words.

  ‘Of course,’ said Fingher, scratching his head. ‘Obviously we’ll do anything we can to help. But I have to say I’m fucked if I know what you’re after.’

  Van Veeteren ignored the criticism.

  ‘Last Monday, then?’ he asked instead. ‘I assume Yellinek wasn’t here then, in any case.’

  ‘Correct,’ said Fingher. ‘Only one of the women came on Monday.’

  ‘No girls?’

  ‘Not a single one.’

  ‘Did she explain why?’

  ‘Explain? Did she hell. Just stood there looking like a fart in a bottle, trying to be posh – as if she was God’s mother’s cousin or something.’

  Van Veeteren cleared his throat.

  ‘You’re not religious yourself, I take it, Mr Fingher.’

  ‘No fucking chance,’ said the farmer and belched again.

  ‘Same here,’ said his son.

  The chief inspector emptied his glass.

  ‘Ah well, thank you,’ he said. ‘I won’t disturb you any longer. But do get in touch if you think of anything . . . As I said.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Fingher, and began shepherding the chief inspector back to the road.

  ‘Sunday evening,’ he said, fixing the twelve-year-old with his eyes.

  The girl, whose name was Joanna Halle, was gazing down at the table and rubbing her wrists nervously.

  ‘Sound a bit more friendly, perhaps,’ whispered the young psychologist into his ear.

  ‘Would you like to tell me a bit about what you were doing last Sunday evening?’ Van Veeteren tried again. ‘When you were down by the rock, swimming.’

  ‘We were swimming,’Joanna Halle explained.

  ‘I see. Who, exactly?’

  ‘There was me and Krystyna and Belle. And Clarissa.’

  ‘And you were swimming?’

  ‘Yes,’ said the girl.

  An intelligent conversation, this, Van Veeteren thought. Gliding along as if on rails.

  ‘Were you friends, the four of you?’

  ‘Yes . . . No, not exactly . . .’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Don’t they teach pupils how to speak in school nowadays? he wondered.

  ‘We were just . . . sort of.’

  ‘Really? What time was it when you were there, roughly speaking?’

  ‘I don’t know, but we were back at six o’clock in any case, that’s when we have dinner.’

  ‘Did anything special happen when you were down there by the rock?’

  ‘No – what do you mean, something special?’

  ‘I don’t know. What did you talk about?’

  ‘Nothing special.’

  ‘You didn’t fall out?’

  ‘Fall out?’

  ‘Yes. Do you understand what that means?’

  ‘Yes, but we don’t fall out at the Pure Life, only Other people do that.’

  ‘Are you telling me the truth?’

  ‘Clear.’

  Clear? the chief inspector thought. I’d better arrest more children so that I can learn how to communicate with them.

  But Marieke Bergson and the others hadn’t caused any problems of that kind, so he decided for the moment that it was Joanna Halle who was a bit hard to get through to. Not himself.

  ‘Were all four of you together all the time?’ he wondered.r />
  ‘Can’t remember.’

  ‘Do you remember how you left there?’

  Joanna Halle seemed actually to be thinking for the first time.

  ‘I was with Krys,’ she said.

  ‘Krystyna Sarek?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So Clarissa and Belle Moulder were together?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘But you don’t know?’

  ‘Yes, they were still there when we left. Or at least, Belle was.’

  ‘But you didn’t see Clarissa when you left the rock?’

  ‘Yes, she must have been there.’

  ‘Come on, you must make your mind up. Was Belle on her own or were they both there when you and Krystyna left?’

  ‘They were both there.’

  ‘Sure?’

  ‘Clear.’

  The chief inspector sighed and glanced at the psychologist, but she looked as inscrutable as a potato in glasses. Das Ding an sich, he thought grimly. The thing in itself.

  ‘But you didn’t see Clarissa later on at all?’

  ‘No . . . No, I didn’t.’

  ‘Do you remember if you saw Yellinek at all when you got back here?’

  ‘Yellinek?’

  ‘Yes. Will it be easier if I ask every question twice?’

  The psychologist glared at him.

  ‘No, that’s not necessary,’ said Joanna Halle. ‘No, I didn’t see Yellinek until we went to the farm.’

  ‘So you’re saying you were one of those who went to collect the milk last Sunday evening?’

  ‘Of course. It was my turn.’

  She looked at him in a way he realized was meant to express mild contempt.

  ‘Who else was there?’

  She thought for a moment.

  ‘Krys and the sisters.’

  ‘The sisters?’

  ‘Yes, Lene and Tilde.’

  Van Veeteren nodded.

  ‘Let’s go back to the rock where you went swimming. Did you notice anybody else while you were there?’

  ‘No, we were the only ones there.’

  ‘No other grown-ups either?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And nobody else you recognized?’

  ‘No, I said there was only us there.’

  ‘How long were you there?’

  ‘I dunno . . . Not all that long.’

  ‘Did you notice if Clarissa was worried at all?’

  ‘No . . . No, she was the same as usual.’

  ‘And there was nothing else about her that made you think?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘She didn’t say she wanted to be on her own, or anything like that?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And there wasn’t anybody who was nasty to her in some way or other?’

  ‘We are never nasty to one another, I’ve already told you that.’

  No, you little goose, the chief inspector thought as irritation threatened to get the better of him. But the fact is that Clarissa Heerenmacht met her murderer some time after you’d returned back home – and it could possibly have been you.

  ‘Are you thinking of leaving this church now?’ he asked.

  Joanna Halle’s face turned a deep red, and he couldn’t decide if she was angry or embarrassed. Neither could she, it seemed, and so she burst out crying instead.

  ‘Thank you, that’s all,’ he said, and hastened out into the sunshine, with the psychologist’s eyes sticking daggers into his back.

  It was three-quarters of an hour later, when he pulled into a petrol station just outside Sorbinowo, that he realized the fourth estate had by now caught up with the police.

  SEX PRIEST ON THE RUN!

  it said in bold print on the billboards.

  NEW CLUE IN THE GIRL MURDER!

  He wondered for a moment if somebody had leaked the information to the press, but then he realized that the information must have come from the girls who had already left Waldingen – and perhaps also the Pure Life – behind them.

  Ah well, he thought. Time to put on a false moustache and hide away in the woods, I reckon.

  There’s a time for everything.

  21

  On Friday, when they met to assess progress on the Clarissa Heerenmacht case, the temperature in acting Chief of Police Kluuge’s office was 33 degrees Celsius. And it was still only morning; it was also the first time the whole investigation team had assembled in the same place.

  ‘We are presumably the only idiots in town who are sitting indoors,’ said Suijderbeck.

  ‘Presumably,’ said Servinus.

  In addition to the pair of officers from Rembork, those present comprised the two female inspectors from Haaldam – Elaine Lauremaa and Anja Tolltse – plus team leader Kluuge and the consultant, Chief Inspector Van Veeteren from Maardam police. Six individuals in all. The team leader was wearing shorts, but that was not obvious when he was sitting at his desk.

  ‘The media have been making a bit of a meal of it,’ said Suijderbeck, producing a copy of Neuwe Blatt, which devoted its front page and two more full pages to developments in the Sorbinowo forests.

  And to the Pure Life. Speculation was rife in all the media regarding the absent spiritual leader and goings-on in the sect. The old lawsuit had been dug up, deserters had expressed their opinions with no beating about the bush, and one of the television channels had come close to flouting its own conventions regarding decency and decorum in a report on one of the girls who had left the camp and returned home – a starkly realistic, high-pressure interview with timid, stuttering parents and a red-eyed tearful thirteen-year-old trying to make their way from their car into their own terraced house on the outskirts of Stamberg.

  ‘Well, so what, for Christ’s sake?’ said Servinus. ‘Of course they’re going to write about it! What more could they ask for? Summer. Murder. Young girl. Mad priest! If they can’t sell extra copies on the back of a witch’s brew like that, I reckon they might as well throw in the towel, and start devoting their attention to Country Life instead.’

  ‘When was the Wanted message for Yellinek first sent out?’ the chief inspector asked.

  ‘Yesterday afternoon,’ said Kluuge. ‘We thought we might as well, since his disappearance had become public knowledge.’

  ‘Quite right,’ said Suijderbeck ‘As a matter of fact, I threatened the Three Sisters with Armageddon yesterday, if they failed to produce him by noon today. But they don’t read any newspapers, so my conscience is clear.’

  ‘What’s all this about a condom clue?’ Tolltse wondered. ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘Harrumph,’ said Kluuge. ‘Perhaps we ought to take matters in turn. The situation out at the summer camp – I take it that’s all over and done with now?’

  Anja Tolltse checked her watch.

  ‘One girl and one psychologist left. And two constables on guard. The girl will be collected in half an hour, assuming they are punctual. And I suppose we’ll be in a position to sum up our efforts out there once that’s done and dusted.’

  ‘Lots of journalists?’ Servinus asked.

  Tolltse nodded.

  ‘There were a few cars around when I left. They generally sneak around and take photos. They don’t approach the girl – although of course there’s nothing to stop them tagging on when the parents come to collect her. If they want another smutty scoop – I mean, a few of the others have been targeted.’

  ‘Brilliant,’ said Suijderbeck ‘An honourable corps of professionals, that lot. I’ll be damned if I don’t stop reading newspapers one of these days.’

  ‘All right,’ said Kluuge. ‘Anyway that search party is combing the woods today as well, looking for the other girl, of course. Let’s hope they don’t find anything.’

  ‘And that they don’t tell the hacks what they’re looking for,’ said Lauremaa. ‘Unless we want it made public that there’s another one missing, that is.’

  ‘I don’t understand why we don’t make a public appeal for information about her,’ said Toll
tse. ‘Wouldn’t it be just as well?’

  Nobody spoke. Suijderbeck shrugged and Kluuge tried in vain to make eye contact with Van Veeteren, who was sitting with his eyes closed and a toothpick sticking out of the side of his mouth.

  ‘Well,’ said the chief inspector eventually. ‘I don’t think it matters much. In any case, she’s not going to be murdered while we sit around not mentioning that she’s disappeared.’

  ‘If she’s dead, she’s dead,’ said Suijderbeck.

  ‘Without a shadow of a doubt,’ said the chief inspector. ‘No, we ought to make contact with her parents first. Shall we go on?’

  ‘The weird sisters?’ asked Kluuge, looking unusually uncomprehending.

  ‘Excuse me,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘It was just a reference. Macbeth. What’s the state of play at Wolgershuus?’

  ‘There’s not a lot one can say,’ said Suijderbeck. ‘All quiet on the western front, if we’re going to be literary. They’re in a world of their own. There might be a tiny bit of hope for Mathilde Ubrecht, but that’s just speculation. Still, if we were to think of picking out one of them for a bit of . . . er . . . special treatment, she’s the one I would recommend.’

  ‘Well, that’s a start,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘Hmm, I think I might take a trip out there this afternoon.’

  ‘I read somewhere that you can inject alcohol into people who are a bit unwilling to cooperate,’ said Servinus. ‘Push up the blood content by the odd percentage point, and it’s usually hard to shut them up.’

  ‘I think we’d better stick to more sober methods to start with,’ said the chief inspector. ‘That seems to be a bit more ethical.’

  ‘Ethical?’ muttered Servinus. ‘I didn’t realize we were playing cricket.’

  The chief inspector smiled inwardly, but it didn’t show on the outside.

  ‘How long can we keep them locked up on the present basis?’ wondered Lauremaa. ‘Don’t we have to charge them soon?’

  ‘Monday,’ said Servinus. ‘If nothing new happens. But none of them has asked for a lawyer, and none of them has said a word about being released, so I don’t know . . .’

  ‘It’s no doubt best to play it by the book,’ said Suijderbeck. ‘If we don’t they could use that against us later on.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said the chief inspector. ‘We should be able to break them over the weekend. Is one of the ladies interested in having a go?’