by Håkan Nesser
Indifference? Contempt for men in general?
Or was she sitting there and wondering whether to increase the pressure on the trigger slightly? He thought it looked like it. Now, he thought. The time has come.
But nothing happened.
‘Don’t get any ideas into your head!’ she said after a while. ‘Don’t get any ideas at all. If you start getting awkward I’ll shoot you without further ado.’
For a moment he tried to imagine what it would feel like when the bullet entered into him.
Pain. A brief, white-hot pain of course – but where? Where would it begin, where would it spread to, and would he lose consciousness before he was actually dead?
Would it be all over in one second, or five?
He suppressed the thought. No matter what happened, there was no need to experience it twice.
‘Linden,’ he said again. ‘How did you manage that?’
She dropped her cigarette end on the ground and stamped it down into the soft soil. Changed her position on the fallen tree trunk. If I can get close enough to her, he thought, I can attack her with the spade.
One chance in a hundred, but those are the best odds I’m ever going to get.
‘She was a whore,’ she said. ‘Her name was Betty Fremdel – we collected her from Hamburg.’
‘Hamburg?’
‘Yes. We needed to go abroad, of course, so as to avoid the risk of anybody putting two and two together. We spent several weeks up there before we found her. But there are quite a few of her sort around the Hauptbahnhof . . . Even a few who are not drug addicts – or there were at that time at least. Once we had chosen her, it was easy.’
‘What did you tempt her with?’
‘Making a film. Pornography, of course. We didn’t give her any details, but we paid her well . . . Very well. And discretion was the order of the day, needless to say: she wasn’t allowed to tell anybody what it was all about, or where she was going . . . She didn’t know herself, naturally. All she knew was that she was going to be away for a few days, making a film.’
She paused and seemed to be thinking it over.
‘I collected her up in Oostwerdingen and drove her down to Linden. I was wearing a blonde wig, it never dawned on her how similar we looked . . . I had made a point of dying my hair the same awful reddish tint as hers . . . And I even had a copy of her tattoo done on my arm – no, as I said, it was all pretty straightforward. And we’d waited a month before setting it up as well.’
She fell silent again. Van Veeteren thought over what she had said, but couldn’t think of any comment to make.
‘She was encouraged to wander around the house for an hour or two and drink a fair amount and leave fingerprints all over the place. Eventually we climbed up into the tower where we were going to take a few pictures . . . we’d set up a camera there. She got undressed and put on the swimming costume. I stood behind the camera and pretended to film her, and as she stood there posing and showing herself off, I gave her a shove. I went down to check that she was dead, then I drove off and kept out of the way. Nobody had any doubt about it being me who was lying there at the bottom of the swimming pool. Did they?’
Van Veeteren stood up straight.
Good God, he thought. So incredibly straightforward. So brilliantly simple. Was it really possible?
‘Did they?’ she said again.
He realized that it was indeed possible. He recalled that they had tried to get dental records from the USA, but had never received anything. Not as far as he could remember, at least. No, she was right. Nobody had been in any doubt about it being Barbara Hennan lying there in that damned empty swimming pool. Nobody at all.
And that was why he was going to die?
After fifteen years of pondering, he now had the solution to the G File. He had received it from the murderer herself, and the price was going to be his own life.
It was as if there were a sort of justice in that.
Some logic, at least.
‘What about the identification?’ he asked nevertheless, mainly in order to keep the conversation going.
His final conversation.
‘Surely you remember that,’ she said. ‘I wasn’t present personally, but according to my husband everything went according to plan. As everybody suspected him of the murder, the question of the identity of the dead body was never raised. Verlangen swallowed everything – lock, stock and barrel. We had thought that he might be able to help us with the identification, but it wasn’t needed. It was enough with Jaan and that awful woman next door.’
‘Yes, I remember her,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘Fru Trotta. But he identified you fifteen years later instead, didn’t he? Verlangen, that is.’
She gestured that he should continue digging, and he took hold of the spade once more. He had removed the surface layer now. Dug down a few centimetres and not yet encountered an impossible root or large stone. It will be obvious that this is a grave, he thought. Maybe they will find me one of these days, and move me?
‘Yes, he did,’ she said. ‘It cost him his life and two others besides . . . And she hasn’t been resurrected, that prostitute. Can you see any point in him starting rooting around again?’
Van Veeteren had a fleeting memory of something he had discussed with Bausen years ago. During the axe-murderer case nine years ago.
About equations that should be left unsolved.
Chess games that should never be concluded.
Bausen had maintained that there were quite a lot of such phenomena, and that they had to be accepted. He had not been so sure.
And now here he was with the solution to the G File (Equation? Chess game?), and his own death was baked into the answer. Like that of Verlangen and G himself.
Yes, there was a certain logic in it. A necessity in a diabolical pattern.
Or was it a quite trivial pattern? And a quite banal evil? Why exaggerate things?
‘I hated him,’ he said. ‘Your husband, that is. I take it you know that he raped his little sister regularly for five years? He killed a little boy when we were at school as well.’
She didn’t react. Not as far as he could tell, at least. And he reminded himself that he was standing there talking to Lady Macbeth. Perhaps she had known about the little sister, perhaps not.
‘My husband didn’t hate you,’ she said after a lengthy silence. ‘He was merely contemptuous of you – so am I. You mustn’t think that all this talking will do you any good.’
‘Did you kill Philomena McNaught as well? Or was it him?’
She suddenly looked scornful. As scornful as a bad actor at an unsuccessful audition.
‘Together,’ she said. ‘We did it together. She was a terrible woman. Dig now, I’m growing tired of waiting.’
He thought for a moment. Then did as he was bidden.
Münster pulled up, switched off the engine and prayed a silent prayer. Glanced at Rooth, who had spent most of the six-minute drive from See Warf to Wackerstraat biting his nails and asking him to drive faster.
Rooth took his fingers out of his mouth and opened the door.
‘No messing about,’ he said. ‘Let’s go, for Christ’s sake.’
They walked abreast over the flagstones leading to the front door. Münster could detect no sign of life anywhere, just a vague feeling of sickness pulsating inside him. On the outside a pale, early autumn morning: dawn-grey, luke-warm and not a breath of wind.
A morning just like any other. He assumed that some people here and there in this well-heeled part of town must be up and about. It was almost seven o’clock: no doubt some house-owners were in the shower while others were sitting at the breakfast table with the newspaper spread out in front of them, trying to raise enough energy to face up to a new day. Yet another one.
It was difficult to judge the situation inside the Nolans’ house, but Rooth placed his finger on the doorbell button and held it there for five seconds – surely that ought to arouse some kind of reaction.
&
nbsp; But it didn’t. Münster and Rooth stared first at each other, then at the brown-stained wooden door while they waited. But nothing happened.
Rooth tried ringing again.
Marched nervously on the spot as they waited once again.
‘Nix,’ said Münster. ‘Either she’s not at home, or she doesn’t want to see us. What shall we do?’
Rooth was about to ring yet again, but desisted.
‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘What do you think?’
Münster tried to shrug, but found he was so tense that he couldn’t.
‘We could check with the neighbours,’ he suggested. ‘Find out if they’ve seen anything.’
‘What would they have seen?’
‘The Chief Inspector, of course . . . or his car, at least. Isn’t that what we want to know about?’
Rooth suddenly looked dejected.
‘Yes, I suppose so. But we don’t want to start knocking on doors, for God’s sake! I think we should go in.’
‘Go in?’ said Münster, cautiously trying the door handle. ‘It’s locked.’
‘I didn’t necessarily mean through the door,’ said Rooth.
‘Really?’ said Münster, pondering for a couple of seconds. Then he took out his mobile.
‘What are you doing?’ asked Rooth.
‘Ringing deKlerk. I think he ought to have a say in this, in any case.’
Rooth scratched his head as Münster keyed the number.
‘Just inform him,’ he said as deKlerk answered. ‘That will suffice – tell him we’re going in. Don’t let him start humming and hawing and making a decision, that will only waste time unnecessarily.’
Münster nodded. Rooth started walking round the house, looking for alternative entry points.
51
He dug a few spadefuls in silence. His back ached more with every movement now, but in view of what lay in store he simply ignored it. As long as I’m in pain I’m still alive, he told himself. He had started sweating as well, but didn’t want to take off his jacket. A diffuse idea of it being cold down in the ground was in the back of his mind: presumably that was what held him back.
‘You needn’t have involved Verlangen,’ he said. ‘It would have worked even so.’
‘Rubbish. Jaan had good reason to punish him . . . And besides, he was necessary, of course.’
He suspected that she was reluctantly keen to convince him of that. As if she felt a need to justify her actions, despite everything.
‘Why?’
‘To divert the attention of the police. Jaan G. Hennan had murdered his wife, his wife had suspected something was amiss and turned to a private detective who nevertheless was unable to save her life. That was how you were supposed to see the situation, and that is how you saw it. Was there ever any suspicion that the victim might have been somebody else?’
He didn’t reply, but he felt pangs of conscience inside himself. She’s right, he thought. That possibility never occurred to us. Not to me nor to anybody else. Only to a drunken private detective fifteen years later. That’s the way it was.
Not especially flattering.
It serves me right, he concluded. This finale is an appropriate conclusion to the whole messy business. It ought to start raining as well.
But that was evidently not the forecast for this September morning. Not for the short time he had left, at least. It was almost full daylight now – but no sun, and in no circumstances would it manage to shine into the little clearing before getting on for lunchtime. By then it would all be over and done with.
So just a pale, featureless sky. No wind, no signs. He dug a little deeper without speaking. It occurred to him that he liked the smell of soil, despite everything.
‘Who was Liston?’ she asked suddenly.
‘Liston?’
‘Yes. Verlangen went on about somebody called Liston. He was supposed to have received money from my husband.’
Van Veeteren straightened his back and leaned with his elbows on the spade handle.
‘I’ve no idea.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘My word of honour. How did you meet, by the way?’
‘Who?’
‘You and Hennan.’
She hesitated for a few seconds, then decided to tell him that as well.
‘It was in 1980. A few years before he married Philomena.’
‘I see. So that was a bogus marriage from the very start?’
‘Bogus marriage?’ She burst out laughing. ‘Yes, you could certainly call it that. She was an absolute nincompoop – the fact that she actually got married was something she could thank her lucky stars for.’
‘You had no moral reservations?’
Her smile was now perfectly natural.
‘Morals, Chief Inspector. You are using very weighty language indeed. Nobody mourned the death of Philomena McNaught, believe you me. We shortened her suffering in this world by some forty or fifty years . . . And how many mourners do you expect to attend the funeral of Maarten Verlangen?’
He noted that she was addressing him more formally again. He started digging once more, then remembered something else.
‘Children,’ he said. ‘She had a child, that woman you murdered. Did you know that?’
Her smile turned into a grimace.
‘Some careless prostitutes have children.’
He got the feeling that he had run out of words. She’s not worth it, he thought. Not worth the effort of keeping up this macabre conversation. I mustn’t let her think that I regard her with some sort of respect – like an opponent I take my hat off to.
What if she gets away with this? he suddenly thought. With five people’s lives on her conscience. Mine as well.
Perhaps there are more? – In England, for instance: they had spent some time there, after all. But he didn’t want to ask her about that. Didn’t want to say anything else at all. Or to know any more.
Nevertheless, as he carried on digging he tried to assess how probable it was. That she would get away with it. He realized that his analytical capabilities were not at their best in the given circumstances, but the odds seemed to be very much in her favour. Surely that was the case?
Dammit all, he thought. If these were my memoirs, what a dreadful conclusion that would be. The one and only Chief Inspector lowers the curtain on his only unsolved case by allowing himself to be killed by Lady Macbeth. It’s a good job I shelved my scribbling. A good job that I resigned as a police officer.
But it wasn’t his memoirs or his career that this was all about: it was about his life. Nothing else.
Erich? mumbled a voice somewhere inside him. Are you still looking down at me, my son?
He heard no answer, but nevertheless made up his mind how the final scene would appear. There was no reason to delay things any longer. Time had run out. He could feel the sweat pouring down his back.
One chance in a hundred, he had already decided.
At most.
‘What should we do?’ said Bausen. ‘I have no doubt about that at all. We must send out an urgent S.O.S. message on every damned radio and television channel you can find, asking for information about Van Veeteren and his car. Without delay! This is not just some sort of coincidence, and if there’s anything in what Rooth claims, it could be urgent – absolutely top priority urgent!’
It could also be too late, he thought; but he didn’t say that.
‘All right,’ said deKlerk. ‘I’d already intended to do that, of course. But what else should we do, I meant?’
‘What else?’ muttered Bausen. ‘We must help Rooth and Münster. Check with the neighbours to see whether anybody noticed a blue Opel in Wackerstraat yesterday . . . And we can also cross our fingers – and arms and legs and eyes and everything else. Would you like me to come to the station?’
DeKlerk hesitated for half a second.
‘Yes, please,’ he said. ‘That would be best, I suppose.’
Münster and Rooth entered the Nolans�
�� house via a ventilation window at the back.
They then spent five or six minutes wandering aimlessly around from room to room in the vain hope of stumbling upon something that could give an indication of what had happened.
Always assuming that anything at all had happened.
‘What are we looking for?’ Münster wondered.
‘I’m damned if I know,’ said Rooth. ‘But if you find whatever it is, I’ll let you know.’
‘Good,’ said Münster. ‘I have always admired your ability to explain things.’
Rooth didn’t respond. Münster looked around the spacious living room. There was no trace of Elizabeth Nolan – not as far as they could see, in any case.
Or rather, nothing that suggested where she might have gone. Naturally there were plenty of conceivable legitimate reasons for her not being at home – they had already ascertained that the two cars, the Rover and the Japanese, were in their usual places in the garage and on the drive: but this was a fact that didn’t really throw light on very much. There were buses and trains, for example. Not to mention aeroplanes, if one had reason to travel rather further away. When Münster checked for the third time that fru Nolan was not in her bed, nor hanging in the wardrobe in her bedroom, he began to feel frustrated over the situation.
‘We’re getting nowhere,’ he said to Rooth, who had just come out of the bathroom for the second time. ‘We’re farting around like a pair of idiots. We’re wasting our time here. We must find something more rational to do.’
Rooth shrugged helplessly, and looked out of the window in time to see Beate Moerk and Probationer Stiller getting out of a car.
‘Reinforcements,’ he said. ‘Now there are four of us. Shall we take a neighbour each after all . . . and hope that they haven’t already left for work?’
Münster looked at his watch. It was twenty past seven, and he was still feeling sick. It had got worse, in fact.
‘All right,’ he said. ‘I suppose it can’t do any harm.’
‘Coffee?’ asked deKlerk.
Bausen shook his head and sat down at the desk opposite his thirty-year-younger successor.
‘The S.O.S. messages have been sent out,’ said deKlerk. ‘They’ll be broadcast in news bulletins on the telly and the radio every half hour until—’
