Hakan Nesser - The Weeping Girl

‘So no police officer asked you any questions at all?’

‘No.’

Baasteuwel suddenly felt that he had no more questions to ask either. Apart perhaps from asking Bitowski if he knew the name of the president of the USA. Or a town in France. Or how much was 11 times 8.

‘That’s all,’ he said. ‘Thank you for the beer.’

‘Eh? What the hell. .?’

‘A joke,’ Baasteuwel explained.

Constable Vegesack was nervous.

It had nothing to do with going behind the back of Chief of Police Vrommel. Not at all. But it was hard to deceive other people. Unpleasant. Especially somebody like fru Van Rippe — her son had been murdered, and now he had to sit here and lie to her. It felt wrong and repugnant, even if what he was going to have to serve up to her was not a pack of outright lies.

It was more a case of keeping a straight face and not telling her the whole truth.

Pulling the wool over her eyes, as they say. But that was bad enough.

‘I don’t understand what’s going on,’ she’d said as she got into the police car. ‘Why do you want to talk to me again? Has something new happened?’

‘Not really,’ Vegesack had replied. ‘It’s just that we need a bit more detailed information.’

‘And because of that you need to drive me to Lejnice and back?’

‘We thought that would be best.’

It was rather more than an hour’s drive from Karpatz to Lejnice, but luckily she decided to keep quiet for most of the time. Vegesack stole a look at her as she sat in the passenger seat, squeezing a handkerchief in her lap. A sixty-year-old woman, over the hill, with a dead son. She blew her nose now and then. Perhaps she’s got hay fever, he thought. Or perhaps it was her grief that was releasing itself in that way. These were difficult days for her, of course. Her son was going to be buried the following week: Thursday, if Vegersack remembered rightly. Cremation was not possible, for technical reasons connected to the investigation. It must be awful for her, that was the bottom line. As if her own life had come to an end, in a way.

Although he found it difficult to imagine what she was feeling. He was relieved that he didn’t need to talk about it.

And uncomfortable at having to pull the wool over her eyes, as said before.

‘Did you know Tim?’ she asked when they’d gone about halfway.

Vegesack shook his head.

‘No, he was a few years older than me. Besides, I’ve only been living in Lejnice since ’93. I come from Linzhuisen.’

‘I see,’ said fru Van Rippe. ‘No, he didn’t have many friends, our Tim.’

‘No?’

‘No. He was a bit of a loner.’

Vegesack didn’t know what to say to that, and she didn’t enlarge on the subject. She sighed and put on a pair of glasses instead.

‘It’s nice weather,’ she said, as if she’d only just noticed that.

‘Yes,’ said Vegesack. ‘Warm and sunny.’

Not much more was said during the rest of the journey. They arrived in Lejnice at five minutes to one and he parked in Zeestraat outside the Westerblatt office.

She looked at him in surprise.

‘The newspaper? What have we come here for?’

Vegesack cleared his throat.

‘It’s full up in the police station, so we’ve borrowed a room from them, that’s all.’

He couldn’t make up his mind if she believed him or not.

Moreno bought a bottle of port for Selma Perhovens, as a thank-you for her hospitality, but she was a bit worried when it came to finding a suitable present for Drusilla. In the end she plumped for a book for so-called young adults that had won several prizes, and a box of chocolates: she had noticed that Drusilla had a rather full bookcase in her room, and she shouldn’t have any trouble in forcing down the chocolates.

Both mother and daughter seemed pleased with their presents, and Moreno left the Perhovens’ home after various exchanges of mutual admiration and promises to keep in touch. She deposited her suitcase at the railway station, had a final sunbathing session on the beach, and at two o’clock — as arranged — she met Inspector Baasteuwel at Darms’ for lunch.

‘Things are warming up,’ said Baasteuwel when their salad had been served, ‘but there’s some way to go before we catch up with the weather.’

‘Do you mean you’re not going to be able to serve me up with the solution?’ said Moreno.

‘I’m afraid so,’ said Baasteuwel. ‘We’ve not quite sorted everything out yet. God only knows how it all hangs together, in fact.’

Moreno waited.

‘And God only knows what’s happened to Mikaela Lijphart. We haven’t had a single response to the Wanted notice — not even the usual loonies who always ring to say that they’ve seen the devil and his auntie. It all seems a bit dodgy — but we’ve checked up and made sure that Vrommel isn’t hushing something up.’

‘What about Maager?’ said Moreno. ‘Have you asked Sigrid Lijphart about that telephone call to the Sidonis home?’

‘Yes, of course. She swears blind it wasn’t her. She hasn’t spoken to him for sixteen years, she claims, and has no intention of doing so for the next sixteen either. A warm-hearted lady, no doubt about that. But I suppose she has her reasons.’

‘Perhaps she’s lying.’

‘Could be,’ said Baasteuwel. ‘I haven’t spoken to her myself, it was Kohler who took care of that. Anyway, Maager is lying in his bed, staring at the same stain on the wallpaper. When he has his eyes open, that is — they had to shovel all kinds of stuff into him in order to help him sleep. But Winnie Maas is a bit more interesting — would you like to hear?’

‘I’m all ears,’ said Moreno.

Baasteuwel drank half a glass of mineral water and steered his fork round two laps of his salad before responding.

‘She wasn’t exactly God’s little angel.’

‘So I’ve gathered,’ said Moreno.

‘Hardly anybody wants to admit that they knew her, in fact. Everybody I’ve spoken to goes into their shell as soon as I start asking questions about her. They simply don’t want to talk about her. They all say that they knew who she was, but nobody has owned up to being a friend of hers. So her role is becoming pretty clear. A young and shameless femme fatale , to over-dramatize it a bit. This damned Bitowski fellow admitted that he’d been in bed with her once — but God only knows how many others were. And she was only sixteen when she died. And nobody seems to doubt that it really was Maager who pushed her over the edge of the viaduct. Nobody at all.’

Moreno thought for a moment.

‘So even if he wasn’t the father of the child, everybody thought it was him?’

‘It seems so. The important thing was that he thought he’d made her pregnant. Not that it was necessarily the truth. She intended to exploit the situation somehow or other, and he put a stop to that. Well, it couldn’t get much more straightforward than that.’

‘What about Vrommel? And that doctor?’

Baasteuwel sighed.

‘God only knows. Even if deHaavelaar really did withhold information, it wouldn’t necessarily be all that important.’

‘Yes it would,’ protested Moreno. ‘He must have had a reason for doing so. And Vrommel must have had a reason for keeping quiet about Vera Sauger. It’s simple logic.’

‘Hmm,’ muttered Baasteuwel. ‘I know. Damn and blast. All I said was that things were beginning to warm up. We’ll sort this mess out eventually, if for no other reason than the fact that I’m determined to teach this chief of police a lesson he won’t forget. He has something on his conscience, and so help me God, I’m going to make him face up to it as well. I promise to keep you informed about the date of the execution. And everything else, of course — if you’re interested.’