Hakan Nesser - Mind's eye

The guidance counselor said nothing. Sat down carefully on the edge of his desk.

“Have you, or have you not, had an affair with a pupil during this last year? Even screwed her here in school. .”

No answer. The guidance counselor swallowed and held on to his beard.

“It’s not you I’m after, for fuck’s sake!” said Reinhart. “I’m on the tail of an even bigger shit. You have ten seconds, then I’m taking you to the police station!”

The guidance counselor let go of his beard and tried to look Reinhart in the eye.

“Yes,” he said. “It. .”

“Thank you,” said Reinhart. “That’s enough.”

He went out and slammed the door so that the noise

echoed down the corridor.

“Knock the door down!” ordered Van Veeteren.

“We have people who can pick locks,” said Munster.

“No time,” said Van Veeteren.

“There’s usually a janitor,” said Munster.

“Knock the door down, I said! Do I have to do it

myself?”

Munster sized it up. The door was ideally located, no doubt about that. Farthest away from the staircase. He’d have a run of a good eight meters. Van Veeteren stepped to one side.

“Give it all you’ve got!”

Munster barged into the door, shoulder first. There was a loud creaking noise, from both the door and Munster, but that was all.

“One more time!” said Van Veeteren.

Munster charged again, with just as little result.

“Fetch the janitor!” said Van Veeteren. “I’ll wait here.”

After ten minutes Munster returned with a thin man wearing an overall and a flat cap.

“Mr. Gobowsky,” explained Munster.

A circle of discarded toothpicks had formed around Van Veeteren’s feet, and Mr. Gobowsky eyed it critically. Then he asked to see Van Veeteren’s ID.

The bastard had been to the movies, it seemed.

The apartment comprised two small rooms and an even smaller kitchen, and it took them about five seconds to establish that the tenant had flown. Van Veeteren slumped down into an artificial leather chair.

“He’s done a runner,” he said. “We’ll have to set off a nationwide alert. This guy is going to bankrupt the police force. Munster, you stay here and root around! I’ll send somebody to help you.”

Munster nodded. The chief inspector turned to the janitor, who was loitering in the hall, eager to know what was going on.

“Did he have a car?” Van Veeteren asked.

“A blue Fiat,” said Mr. Gobowsky. “A 326, I think.”

“Where did he usually park it?”

“In the lot outside.”

Mr. Gobowsky nodded in the direction of the courtyard.

“Come with me, please, and see if it’s still there,” said Van Veeteren. “We’ll leave the inspector here.”

“Wait!” shouted Munster, just as they were passing

through the door. “Look at this!”

He held out a little photograph in a frame. Van Veeteren took it and examined it.

“Eva Ringmar,” he said. “A few years younger, but it’s her, sure as hell.”

“No more doubts, then?” said Munster.

“Have I ever had any doubts?” said Van Veeteren, leaving Munster to his fate.

“Carl Ferger, yes,” said Reinhart. “Came here in 1986, presumably, possibly a year or so earlier. Send the faxes immediately!

And tell them we need answers PDQ, if not sooner, the moment they find him! Stick on red flags and express labels and Interpol and whatever else you have in that line! And make sure you inform me, or one of the others, the moment you get an answer! Is that understood?”

Widmar Krause nodded.

“One to the immigration office, and one to the other side, okay?” Reinhart repeated. “Let them fight to see who wins!”

Krause left the room. Reinhart looked at the clock. A quarter past twelve. Looked at Van Veeteren, who was slumped over the desk.

He looks like a half-finished stuffed animal, Reinhart thought.

“Where do you think he is?” he said.

“Probably lying low and dossing down in a motel somewhere,” said Van Veeteren. “Not a bad idea, in fact. Do you know that some shit-heap woke me up at four-thirty this morning? Let’s go and have lunch.”

“By all means,” said Reinhart. “But not the canteen.”

“No, Christ no,” said Van Veeteren. “If we have nothing else to do but sit and wait, we might as well go somewhere a bit classier.”

“Good,” said Reinhart. “Let’s go to La Canaille and leave the number with the switchboard. But what if it’s Klempje on duty?”

“No chance,” said Van Veeteren. “He’s still in exile.”

The turnaround came with the twelve o’clock news.

He’d slept for three hours in a parking lot. Curled up under a blanket on the backseat, and woken up because he felt cold.

Before driving off he’d switched on the radio, caught the middle of the news, and heard that he was wanted by the police.

Nationwide alert. Carl Ferger. Suspected of three murders.

Traveling in a blue Fiat, registration number. .

He switched it off. For a few seconds, time and the world stood still. Blood was pounding hard in his temples. His hands grasped the steering wheel so tightly that his knuckles turned white.

He’d been rumbled. Was wanted by the police.

Hunted.

He was on the run.

It took a while for it to sink in.

Three murders?

He couldn’t help laughing.

Which ones, he could ask them. Yes, he’d try to remember to ask them that, if they caught up with him. Excuse me, you fucking police bastard, he’d say. I’ve committed six murders.

Which three am I suspected of?

The windows had misted over from his breath. He wiped them clean with his handkerchief. Opened the driver’s window slightly, looked around. The parking lot was empty, apart from one long-distance truck some fifty meters ahead of him.

A blue Fiat. . Oh, fuck! Why had he turned off the radio?

He switched it on again, but there was only music.

What else did they know?

Where did they think he was?

Nationwide alert. What did that mean? Roadblocks?

Hardly. He’d driven more than 300 kilometers since leaving Maardam. If they knew roughly when he’d left, they must realize that he could be more or less anywhere by now.

But how?

How the hell had they found him out?

He started the car. Drove slowly past the truck and onto the freeway.

It must have been Liz. That fucking whore. Something had gone wrong, but he didn’t understand how they could link her with the others. The bitch! If only he’d listened to his inner voice from the start. . The voice that had warned him, told him to steer well clear of her, of that tart. That fucking bitch.

Nothing more than a fucking bitch.

He would never repeat that mistake, at least. And let’s face it, it was only reasonable for the police to agree that he’d performed a public service in ridding society of the likes of Liz Hennan. He’d nothing to reproach himself with in her case.

The others were not so good. They’d been driven by a different kind of necessity. But now wasn’t the time to sit back and take stock.

Action was called for now. Something had clicked-he’d sensed it coming, hadn’t he? His intuition had saved him yet again-why else would he have run away? It was just the same as it had been with Ellen. .

Ellen. That was twelve years ago now. She’d also been a tart, no doubt about that. A disgusting little tart, just like Liz.

He could see them both in his mind’s eye, just as horny, just as desperate for it. .

He stepped on the gas. Saw from the gauge that he’d soon need to fill up. Why did he keep seeing them? Their naked bodies, their quivering pussies. . He had no time to waste on them now. He must get a grip of essentials, not dillydally with these disgusting images. He must be ready. Must be on his toes, do the right thing, and it was urgent now.