The Inspector and Silence ivv-5

by Håkan Nesser

  He couldn’t remember, and of course, it didn’t matter.

  He allowed another few minutes to pass, but nothing else happened. Just the information given in the telephone directory and those two comments – and when he opened his eyes again, he was aware that it was barely more than a mere suspicion.

  He drank the remains of both bottles of beer. Then started ringing round and arranging meetings for the next day.

  When he had finished, he read two more chapters of Klimke, took a shower and went to bed.

  The telephone rang at two minutes past seven the next morning.

  It was Reinhart, but before the chief inspector had time to tell him to go to hell he had taken command.

  ‘Have you a television set in your room?’

  ‘Yes…’

  ‘Switch it on then! Channel 4.’

  Then he hung up. Van Veeteren fumbled for the remote control, and managed to press the right button. Three seconds later he was wide awake.

  As far as he could judge it was the routine morning news bulletin. An excited newscaster. Flickering pictures of a building on fire. Firefighters and sirens. Very realistic interviews with soot-covered senior officers.

  He recognized it immediately. The camera even paused for a few seconds on the abusive graffiti he had seen with his own eyes only the other day.

  Murdering bastards and so on.

  Practically everything was in flames, and the chief officer of the fire brigade thought there was little chance of saving anything of the building. So they were concentrating on stopping the blaze from spreading to adjacent buildings. There was quite a strong wind blowing. It was finito as far as the church was concerned, he reckoned.

  But apart from that, everything was under control.

  Arson?

  Of course it was arson. The alarm had been raised at four in the morning, the fire brigade had arrived twenty minutes later, and by then the whole building was ablaze.

  No doubt at all that it was arson. Perhaps that was understandable, in the circumstances…

  Van Veeteren switched off. Remained in bed for half a minute more, thinking. Then put on a shirt and some trousers, took the elevator down to reception and sent a fax to Wicker’s Travel Agency in Maardam.

  Cancelled his package holiday due to begin on the first of August.

  Then he went back up to his room and took the longest shower of his life.

  33

  From a purely physical point of view, acting Chief of Police Kluuge was a wreck by this morning.

  When he got off his bicycle outside the police station in the fresh morning air, he was puffing and panting, his heart was pounding wildly, and unfortunately things were just as bad as far as his mind was concerned. He recognized that this was hardly surprising: the last three nights he had slept for less than ten hours all told, and obviously one was always bound to come up against a limit eventually. Or a brick wall.

  We must bring this case to a conclusion pretty soon, he decided. Two more days like these and I’ll have to take sick leave.

  But then again, there were only five more days to go before Malijsen came back on duty, so perhaps it would be best to stick it out, no matter what.

  Incidentally, Kluuge thought as he fiddled with the various locks, it’s odd that he hasn’t been in touch at all. No matter how isolated it is at the lake where he’s fishing, it’s surely impossible to imagine that he hasn’t heard anything about what’s been going on? There can’t be a single person in the whole country who doesn’t know what’s been happening in Sorbinowo during these hot summer weeks. Very strange.

  And odder still, of course, if you happen to be the real chief of police for the area.

  But of course, Malijsen was Malijsen. He’s probably dug himself in and is waiting for the Japanese hordes to arrive, Kluuge guessed, wiping the sweat from his brow.

  He met Suijderbeck in the entrance, on his way out.

  ‘Aren’t you going to attend the run-through meeting?’

  ‘Ciggy break,’ muttered Suijderbeck, and spat into the flower bed. ‘I’m just nipping to the news stand and I’ll be back before you’ve even had time for a pee.’

  Nice guy, Kluuge thought. Good camaraderie and a good atmosphere, just like they said it should be at police college. He entered his office, which had recently undergone several changes as far as the furniture was concerned, in an effort to keep up with the requirements of the investigation. But his desk was still there, and he flopped down behind it after greeting the others.

  Servinus was in his usual place, as were Tolltse and Lauremaa, plus one of the latest newcomers – Detective Inspector Jung from the Maardam police. The other newcomer, the somewhat strange Inspector Reinhart, was smoking his pipe through the open window, and Chief Inspector Van Veeteren’s chair was empty, as usual.

  Ah well, Kluuge thought when Suijderbeck reappeared. We’d better get going, then.

  ‘We’d better get going, then,’ he said, logically enough.

  ‘Not a bad idea,’ said Reinhart.

  ‘I have to say,’ Servinus admitted, ‘that I feel pretty disgusted when people start burning down churches. Despite my deep-rooted atheism.’

  ‘Yes, they’re going too far now,’ Kluuge agreed.

  ‘The mob’s taking over,’ said Lauremaa. ‘We really must get this case solved PDQ – you all heard what the psychologist said on the television, I take it? This kind of thing always inspires copycat actions… And we know how pyromaniacs operate, don’t we?’

  ‘Yes indeed,’ said Reinhart. ‘But bollocks to what’s happening in Stamberg. They have their own police force there, we can assume.’

  ‘Yes, I think so,’ said Suijderbeck. ‘And this means that we’ll probably lose about fifty reporters, so perhaps we don’t need to spend all day weeping.’

  ‘Anyway,’ said Reinhart, ‘I’d like to be informed about what’s been happening. Let’s get the gen first.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Kluuge, stretching himself. ‘I suppose it could be summed up by saying that all our guesses have been confirmed. Katarina Schwartz had been dead for nearly two weeks when she was found – round about 16 July they reckon. As I understand it, that fits in well with other information we have. Tolltse?’

  Inspector Tolltse leafed through her notebook.

  ‘That’s right,’ she said. ‘We – Inspector Lauremaa and I, that is – have spoken again to five of the girls, and it seems that Katarina Schwartz went missing round about then. Probably a day or so earlier, the 14th or 15th, but they are all pretty bad at dates. None of them has been keeping a diary, and there doesn’t even seem to have been a calendar out there. Not where the girls lived, at least.’

  ‘Beyond time and space,’ muttered Servinus.

  ‘What about the circumstances?’ wondered Reinhart impatiently. ‘We can assume that she disappeared at a certain time of day, surely. Or did she just dissolve bit by bit?’

  ‘Yes, there were various circumstances,’ Lauremaa confirmed. ‘In the first place they wanted everybody to forget that she’d ever been at the camp. It must have been her disappearance that the anonymous woman phoned about the first time, but right from the start the organizers and the girls denied that there had ever been more than twelve girls at the camp. It’s not easy to understand the motive or the logic in that – personally I reckon it shows more than anything else that Yellinek is as mad as a hatter – but when the girls finally started to admit that there had in fact been a Katarina Schwartz among them until, let’s say 15 July a few more facts began to emerge as well.’

  ‘What, for example?’ Reinhart asked.

  ‘Times, to start with,’ said Tolltse. ‘She vanished during the night. Went to bed as usual in the evening, but wasn’t there the next morning.’

  ‘Is that definite?’ Suijderbeck wondered.

  ‘Definite,’ said Lauremaa.

  ‘For Christ’s sake!’ said Suijderbeck. ‘That must mean that whoever did it must have dragged her out of bed, more or
less. Doesn’t that narrow the possible candidates down pretty drastically?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Lauremaa. ‘Unless she went out of her own accord, of course.’

  ‘Went out?’ said Suijderbeck. ‘Why the hell would she want to go out?’

  Lauremaa shrugged.

  ‘Don’t ask me. It’s not impossible, but it does seem a bit improbable.’

  ‘There’s not a lot in this case that has any connection with probability,’ said Servinus. ‘Carry on.’

  Tolltse turned a page.

  ‘There’s another little thing,’ she said. ‘It may be of no importance, but you never know. There had evidently been some sort of controversy that Katarina was involved in. Marieke Bergson indicated something of the sort, by the way – the first girl that Chief Inspector Van Veeteren interrogated.’

  ‘Controversy?’ said Reinhart. ‘What sort of controversy?’

  ‘Something between her and Yellinek,’ said Lauremaa. ‘She had misbehaved somehow or other. Said something to him; it’s not clear what, we haven’t managed to get the details out of any of the girls.’

  ‘They’re obviously a bit scared that they might get picked on as well,’ explained Tolltse.

  ‘Aha,’ said Reinhart. ‘A little rebel in Paradise, eh?’

  ‘Could be,’ said Lauremaa. ‘Thinking for yourself – critical thinking – wasn’t exactly something encouraged as part of their spiritual education. In any case, Yellinek evidently had a private meeting with her the evening before she went missing.’

  Nobody spoke for a few seconds. Then Suijderbeck cleared his throat and leaned forward with his elbows on the table.

  ‘So both of them… I mean both these poor little girls had strayed slightly from the straight and narrow, is that it?’ he said. ‘Clarissa had said something she shouldn’t have done to the chief inspector, right?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Kluuge. ‘There’s some common ground there.’

  Silence for a few seconds. Then Servinus slammed his fist down on the table.

  ‘Yellinek!’ he groaned. ‘If I had that fucking creeping Jesus in here I swear I’d have poured boiling lead into his arsehole by now!’

  ‘Harrumph,’ said Kluuge. ‘Perhaps we’d better move on. Or do Tolltse and Lauremaa have anything more to add?’

  ‘No,’ said Lauremaa. ‘Except that we think we saw Chief Inspector Van Veeteren in a restaurant. When we were in Stamberg, talking to the girls, that is.’

  ‘Really?’ said Suijderbeck ‘Did you see what he was gobbling?’

  He didn’t get an answer, so he lit a cigarette instead.

  ‘As for bodily injuries and that kind of thing,’ Kluuge resumed, ‘we’ve already been through that. Nothing new has cropped up. What happened seems to have been more or less the same in both cases. Still, I don’t suppose anybody thinks we’re looking for two killers?’

  ‘No, nobody,’ Servinus assured him.

  ‘Then perhaps we should concentrate on the Sunday evening,’ Kluuge suggested. ‘We seem to have got a bit of new information, I gather. Which of you…?’

  He looked at Reinhart and Jung.

  ‘Let Jung do it,’ Reinhart proposed. ‘Otherwise he’ll drop off to sleep.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Jung. ‘Well, if we combine my results and Reinhart’s, we can probably draw several conclusions. It looks like Oscar Yellinek went missing from Waldingen quite early on Sunday night. If the information is correct – the stuff we got from that Moulder girl and Ulriche Fischer – it seems most likely that he left the camp shortly before ten o’clock. He talked to the girls for a few minutes after evening prayers, and then left, presumably heading for those rocks where Belle Moulder had left Clarissa Heerenmacht four hours earlier, or thereabouts. After that, nobody seems to have seen him.’

  ‘What you say seems to contain quite a high proportion of guesses, doesn’t it?’ said Servinus, looking doubtful.

  ‘Of course,’ said Reinhart, ‘but we usually guess right. Everything depends on how much credibility we give to Miss Fischer’s performance, but if we combine that with what the chief inspector managed to get out of that other woman – what’s her name?’

  ‘Mathilde Ulbrecht,’ said Kluuge.

  ‘Yes, that’s right. If we add the two lots of fragments together, they do point in a certain direction: they don’t seem to know where the hell he is.’

  ‘So all that about him meeting God and being given a mission, and that he was on probation, was just cobbled together by the women?’

  Reinhart shrugged.

  ‘Why not?’ he said. ‘The main aim was probably to keep the girls quiet, I presume. Yes, I think this makes sense.’

  Silence again.

  ‘What about the third woman?’ Tolltse asked. ‘Madeleine Zander. Maybe we shouldn’t forget that there are three of them. It seems a bit presumptuous to lump them together all the time. Of course they give the impression of sticking together, but there’s nothing to say that there aren’t cracks behind the united front. Loads of cracks, perhaps.’

  ‘And deep ones,’ said Servinus. ‘Personally I think it goes against nature to believe that three women can stick together like this. And keep silent as well.’

  ‘Sauna philosophy,’ said Lauremaa.

  ‘Men’s sauna,’ added Tolltse.

  ‘Except when they’re trying to trample all over a man, of course,’ said Servinus.

  Kluuge began to look worried.

  ‘Anyway,’ he said, trying to change the subject, ‘I think I’m inclined to agree with Reinhart in this case. It does make sense. The question is simply: where does it get us – the women not knowing anything about where he is? What do you think?’

  Nobody thought anything, for at that moment the door opened and Miss Miller came in.

  ‘Sorry to interrupt,’ she said. ‘There’s a telephone call for the chief of police.’

  ‘Not now,’ Kluuge began. ‘I said that-’

  ‘I think this is important,’ said Miss Miller.

  ‘All right,’ Kluuge sighed. ‘I’ll take it in your office then.’

  He apologized and left the room.

  ‘Well,’ said Suijderbeck when Kluuge returned. ‘Was that the murderer calling to give himself up?’

  ‘Not quite,’ said Kluuge.

  ‘Why are you so white in the face?’ Servinus asked. ‘Are you not feeling well?’

  ‘Green,’ said Suijderbeck. ‘I’d say it was more of a green shade.’

  Kluuge sat down.

  ‘That was Mrs Kuijpers out at Waldingen,’ he explained. ‘She says they’ve discovered another body. Or rather, her dog has.’

  ‘Oh my God,’ said Tolltse.

  ‘Another one?’ said Reinhart. ‘What the hell…?’

  ‘Those fucking lap dogs?’ said Suijderbeck.

  ‘That’s not all,’ said Kluuge. ‘She seemed pretty sure whose body it was as well.’

  ‘Who?’ said Lauremaa.

  ‘Oscar Yellinek,’ said Kluuge with a sigh. ‘I assume the name is familiar to you.’

  SIX

  31 JULY TO 1 AUGUST

  34

  The fourth person to lose his life as a result of the Pure Life camp in the Sorbinowo forests this summer was a certain Gerald deGrooit.

  DeGrooit was fifty-seven years old and for more than twenty years had been news editor on the Telegraaf – the last three years as editor-in-chief. He had a wife and two children, and the reputation of being a good husband and father, experienced and competent at his job, albeit a bit irascible when things grew too stressful in the office. The heart attack that put an end to his journalistic career and his life was no real surprise to his close circle of workmates. Being responsible for coverage, despite being short-staffed on account of people being on holiday, of two explosive events like the burning down of the church in Stamberg and the discovery of the murdered priest in Sorbinowo – on the very same day, dammit! – well, it was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

  The Telegraa
f was probably the only newspaper in the country that didn’t have a reporter present at Waldingen that scorching-hot Wednesday.

  Inspector Reinhart claimed that he had never seen so many bloody hacks gathered together in one place before. While the crime scene team was still crawling around in the taped-off area in the lunchtime heat, searching for clues, he estimated the comparative strength between the forces of law and order on the one hand, and the fourth estate on the other, to be about 25 to 75.

  In percentage terms, that is. In actual numbers it was around double those figures. Twenty officers from the uniformed police in Oostwerdingen, Rembork and Haaldam had been hastily called in; the less than successful investigative patrol was on duty again, and together with the senior officers, doctors and technicians, they made a pretty good fist of justifying claims made by all the extra television and radio broadcasts that the police had turned out in full force. If it really had been a hallmark of the Pure Life (ever since the court proceedings against the sect) to keep a low profile, such aspirations were shattered on an almost parodic scale. In one news bulletin after another throughout the afternoon and evening, reporters trumpeted the latest developments in Waldingen, Sorbinowo and Stamberg. Half a dozen psychologists and behavioural scientists of various schools of thought pronounced sagely on this and that – as did also a handful of criminologists, a bunch of sect members (not necessarily linked with the Pure Life), two bearded religious scientists, an ex-pyromaniac and a bishop on holiday.

  It wasn’t much worse at Waldingen itself. At a comfortable walking distance from the place where the body had been discovered (some five hundred metres west of discovery point number one and about six hundred metres from the so-called bathing rock), various temporary installations were set up for the convenience of all concerned: two practical portable toilets (one for each sex), a stall selling beer and soft drinks, a sandwich bar and two hot dog vans. Sorbinowo had flexible and well-practised routines for dealing with sudden influxes of tourists.

  An initial press conference (later re-broadcast in a hundred and eleven other media outlets, somebody worked out) was held between two o’clock and half past on the terrace of the manor house at Waldingen, and was anything but a success. On several occasions such unvarnished criticisms were made of the investigation team that Inspector Suijderbeck felt obliged to give a thorough dressing-down to a radio reporter of overblown proportions, both mentally and physically – in such terms that he was later reprimanded by no less a person than the Minister of Justice himself.