The Inspector and Silence

FOUR
23-28 JULY
16

The forest was dense and full of brushwood.

He saw no sign of any animals or humans, but he could hear church bells ringing in the distance. Perhaps that was meant to give him the guidance he needed. But the chimes were faint and thin; they also seemed to shift slightly from one moment to the next, and the sound of his own steps in the blueberry sprigs and his heavy breathing constantly threatened to drown out the bells. He was forced to stop occasionally, cup his hand to his ear and listen for the peals; and every time he paused it was even more difficult to shake off the feeling that he’d been going round in circles, and was in fact standing on exactly the same spot as a few minutes previously.

Under the same aspen; that pale body of the little girl with the dark patches seemed familiar, to say the least. Or perhaps the whole forest was full of murdered teenagers, although that seemed undeniably somewhat exaggerated. He wiped the sweat off his brow with the sleeve of his jacket, and hurried on his way, stumbling over stones and fallen branches and tufts of grass. At last the bells were beginning to sound louder. A few minutes later he came to the edge of the forest and could see the church in the valley below, by the dark river. The last of the congregation were making their way in; he spurted down the final slope and just managed to slip inside as the heavy door started to close.

It was his own wedding; nevertheless he could feel no relief at having just made it in time. Only a certain sad feeling of resignation weighing down on his forehead and shoulders as he stood right at the back in the gloom, trying to recover his breath. His bride was already in place in front of the altar, waiting there in her wedding dress of pale, unbleached cotton; but her shock of hair was a promising chestnut-brown colour. He wasn’t sure if this was good or bad, on the whole. The congregation was lost in some sort of prayer, it seemed, and the bells were still chiming loudly as – with considerable dignity – he walked down the central aisle towards his future wife. When he glanced furtively in each direction, he could see that there wasn’t a single person he knew in the pews. Nothing but stern, unfamiliar faces, row after row of them; and nobody paid him the slightest bit of attention.

He finally reached the altar and placed his hand hesitantly on the bride’s shoulder; she spun round with a start so violently that the cheap wig she was wearing slipped to one side – and he could see that it was Renate. The same old Renate as ever, damn her, and with a sly smile on her lips she hissed: ‘Yesss! Now I’ve got you! This time you won’t get away!’ And when, filled with despair and justified anger, he turned to the priest – who had just washed his hands in a chalice of veined marble and was about to begin the rituals – he saw that the man had long, mouse-coloured hair and taped glasses, and realized he was in cahoots with the bride. There was no doubt about that at all. They were smiling at each other, the priest and the bride, and he had to acknowledge that the game was lost. The whole forest was full of dead girls, he was going to have to marry Renate again under the auspices of this accursed pagan prat, and no matter how desperately he searched through his suit pockets he couldn’t find his police pistol. The fact was of course that he’d forgotten it in some desk drawer in his office at the Maardam police station, as usual, and as he sank down in resignation – in a ridiculously long slow-motion sequence – to kneel beside his triumphant bride, the bells became even louder.

Swelled and contorted themselves in polyphonic variations that would have driven the old master Bach into a state of delirium, and eventually became so bizarre and unbearable that he realized he would have to put a stop to it all if he were not to lose the very last dregs of his sanity.

He stretched out a hand, lifted the receiver and answered.

It was Kluuge.

The chief inspector sat up and cleared his throat so loudly that he missed whatever the sergeant began by saying.

‘What did you say?’

‘Good morning, Chief Inspector,’ Kluuge repeated. ‘I hope I didn’t wake you up?’

‘Of course not,’ said Van Veeteren, as usual, and fumbled for his wristwatch on the bedside table.

‘It’s half past eleven,’ Kluuge informed him. ‘I thought we’d better get going, so I’ve summoned the others to a meeting at two o’clock, to run through what’s happened so far.’

The others? Van Veeteren wondered – but then he began to recall what had happened during the night, and who had been present. A rapid subtraction suggested he could hardly have slept for more than four hours, and how Kluuge could sound so damned bright and cheery was a mystery. He preferred not to think about the possibility of it having to do with age and general condition. Not just now, at least. He cleared his throat again.

‘Sounds good,’ he said.

‘At the police station, naturally,’ said Kluuge. ‘But there’s something I’d like to consult you about first, Chief Inspector.’

‘Go ahead,’ said Van Veeteren.

There followed a few seconds of silence.

‘I don’t really know how to put this, but the business of who is responsible and so on…’

‘Responsible?’

‘Yes, I mean who’s going to be in charge of the investigation. Obviously you are the one with the most experience and all that, but even so I thought I ought to volunteer to do it. I mean, I’m the acting chief of police, and so it comes within my remit, so to say.. .’

Excellent, the chief inspector thought. Carry on, young man!

‘… So if you don’t object?’

‘Of course not,’ said Van Veeteren.

‘And I think it would be a pity to disturb Malijsen in the middle of his holiday.’

‘I agree,’ said the chief inspector.

One hundred per cent, he thought.

‘Obviously I hope you will stay on and give us a hand. I mean, you have so much experience…’

‘Naturally,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘No need to say another word about it. Did you say two o’clock?’

‘Yes, two o’clock,’ Kluuge confirmed. ‘And I’ve arranged a press conference for half past four. I’d be grateful if you could be present at that as well, Chief Inspector.’

‘If I live that long,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘I assume nothing significant has happened during the morning?’

‘Not a lot,’ said Kluuge. ‘The women are in isolation at Wolgershuus, as we said, and the youngsters are still at Waldingen. The police nurses have been relieved, and two psychologists are due at one o’clock.’

‘And nobody has said anything?’

‘No. They’re still staying silent. We’ll probably have to discuss how to interrogate them in future. Or what do you think? It’s all a bit tricky…’

‘You can say that again,’ sighed Van Veeteren. ‘But let’s hope it’s just a matter of time.’

‘Could be,’ said Kluuge. ‘But it must be easier to break down a teenaged girl than one of those madwomen.’

‘Be careful about the words you use,’ the chief inspector warned. ‘It can be a good idea to think before you speak to journalists, if nothing else. They like to quote people. Silence can be golden sometimes, not just for members of sects.’

‘Okay,’ said Kluuge. ‘I’ll remember that. I’ll see you in a couple of hours, then.’

‘Yes,’ said Van Veeteren.

‘Thank you,’ said Kluuge once more.

Madwomen? the chief inspector thought when he’d hung up.

He didn’t like it, but whether it was the circumstances or the sergeant’s choice of words that should be stigmatized, he wasn’t really sure.

The thunderstorm blew in from the south-west, from the direction of Waldingen, and as he ate his brunch on the terrace he was able to watch it approaching rapidly over the edge of the forest on the other side of the lake. The flashes of lightning and claps of thunder entertained him for quite some time before the first heavy drops landed on the corrugated plastic roof over his head, and the temperature dropped drastically by at least ten degrees.

The cloudburst lasted for nearly fifteen minutes, but when it was at its height it seemed to him that the surface of the lake below the hotel, previously so misleadingly calm, had been transformed into a maelstrom, nothing less than a witch’s brew, and the far side of the lake disappeared behind a wall of seething, lashing water.

The wrath of the elements, the chief inspector thought. No wonder.

When it had passed over and he had just signed the bill, he could feel how the air had suddenly become more breathable. In big gulps. After a week of suffocating shortages of oxygen in the brain, it was suddenly possible not only to think a clear thought, but to remember it.

I don’t think I’m made for the Mediterranean, unfortunately, he thought grimly as he left the table.

It wasn’t difficult to guess what effect the heavy rain must have had on the efforts of the police dogs at Waldingen. If there were any trails out there in the forest, they certainly wouldn’t be any easier to follow after rain like that.

As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods, he suddenly thought. And when they pull the strings, we dance at their beck and call. They send down buckets of rain, and we stand there with freshly washed faces.

With his briefcase tucked under his arm and two toothpicks wandering around his mouth, he set off towards Kleinmarckt in the centre of the little town. He tried to avoid the rivulets and torrents, but the gutters and grates were not designed to cope with such vast amounts of water, and by the time he reached Florian’s, he was soaking wet well up his shins. But he was surprised to find that this was not an especially unpleasant state to be in – invigorating, rather; and a few minutes later he entered the Sorbinowo police station feeling alert and ready to concentrate. Ready to cope with whatever was thrown at him.

We shall solve this lot of crap as well, he thought. Sooner or later.