Hakan Nesser - Hour of the wolf

‘How’s it going?’

Reinhart sighed, and moved out of earshot of the man who had just become a widower.

‘As you might expect. I think you’d better take over. I don’t know who his next of kin is, but we’d better get somebody here PDQ. We need to talk to him, of course, the sooner the better. But that’s not possible the way things are at the moment.’

‘Okay,’ said Schenck. ‘I can see how things stand. Let’s see what I can do.’

‘Thank you,’ said Reinhart, leaving the room.

When he arrived at the Forensic Laboratory it was more or less lunchtime, so he suggested that they should nip over the road to Fix. Meusse had nothing against that: he took off his soiled white coat and exchanged it for the jacket he’d tossed onto his desk.

Fix bar was just over the street. It was quite full when they entered, but with the aid of a touch of diplomacy Reinhart managed to find a fairly secluded table. He asked Meusse if he would like something to eat, but the pathologist merely shook his bald head. That was not exactly unexpected. If you could believe the gossip it was years since any solid food had crossed his lips. Reinhart ordered two dark beers, sat down opposite him and waited.

‘Well?’ he said. ‘I gather you’ve come up with something.’

Meusse took a deep swig, and dried his lips carefully with his serviette.

‘It’s a circumstance.’

‘A circumstance?’ said Reinhart.

‘Precisely,’ said Meusse. ‘You are obviously paying attention.’

Reinhart let that pass.

‘It’s a decidedly uncertain observation. But I’d like you to bear it in mind.’

‘I see,’ said Reinhart.

‘It’s about those blows.’

‘Blows?’

‘The blows to the side and back of the head,’ said Meusse. ‘There is a concordance with The Chief Inspector ’s boy.’

It was a couple of moments before Reinhart realized that this expression referred to Erich Van Veeteren.

‘Hell’s bells!’ he said.

‘You can say that again,’ said Meusse, taking another drink of beer. ‘Don’t forget that it’s only a superficial observation.’

‘Of course not,’ said Reinhart. ‘I’ve got quite a good memory. Are you suggesting that it could be the same person?’

‘Hmm,’ said Meusse.

‘That the same person killed both Erich Van Veeteren and this woman. Is that what you’re saying?’

‘I’m not excluding the possibility,’ said Meusse after a pause for thought. ‘ That’s what I’m saying. If you listen carefully, I’ll explain… What we are dealing with is a somewhat unusual blow. There’s nothing to suggest that it couldn’t be the same weapon used in both cases, either. A length of iron pipe, for instance. Pretty heavy. I’ve got no comment to make about the blows to the side of the head, apart from the fact that the killer was right-handed. I’m basing the concordance on the blow to the back of the head. Broke the cervical spine in both cases. Hit more or less exactly the same place. Causing instant death. It could be a coincidence, of course, but I thought you ought to know.’

‘Thank you,’ said Reinhart.

He sat quietly for a while, trying to clarify the reasoning for himself by drawing a column of vertebrae in the notebook on the table in front of him. It wasn’t all that successful.

‘But there were several blows to the side of the head this time?’

Meusse nodded.

‘Three. Quite unnecessary. The blow to the back of the head would have been sufficient, but that assumes that the victim was the right way up… as it were.’

‘Would you say it was professional?’ Reinhart asked.

Meusse hesitated before answering.

‘Whoever delivered the blow must have known what to aim at, and what the result would be,’ he said. ‘Is that what you mean by professionalism?’

Reinhart shrugged.

‘There could well be two different killers,’ said Meusse. ‘Or there could well be just the one. I just wanted to keep you informed. Thanks for the beer.’

He emptied his glass and wiped his mouth again.

‘Hang on a minute,’ said Reinhart. ‘I want a judgement as well. Nobody could be better placed than you to give it. Are we in fact looking for the same killer? There’s no bloody point in summoning me here and then just offering me an either-or.’

Meusse contemplated his empty glass with a furrowed brow. Reinhart beckoned a waiter and ordered two more beers. When they had been delivered the little pathologist stroked the palm of his hand over his bald head and gazed out of the window for a while. He must have dreamt about becoming an actor, Reinhart thought. When he was young… Two or three hundred years or so ago.

‘I don’t want to pass a definite judgement,’ said Meusse eventually. ‘But I wouldn’t be sitting here telling you this if I didn’t have certain suspicions… Provided there’s nothing to prove that it’s not the case, of course.’

‘So highly probable?’ said Reinhart. ‘Is that your opinion?’

‘I just wanted to do my bit,’ said Meusse.

They sat for a while in silence, drinking their beer. Reinhart lit his pipe.

‘There are no connections between Vera Miller and Erich Van Veeteren. Not as far as we know, at least — but we haven’t been looking for any, of course.’

‘You only need one,’ said Meusse. ‘But that’s not my job.’

‘Absolutely right,’ said Reinhart. ‘Anyway, thanks for this, we’ll see what we can make of it.’

‘Let’s do that,’ said Meusse, standing up. ‘Thanks for the beers.’

‘There is no course in Aarlach,’ said Moreno, sitting down opposite Reinhart. ‘At least, not at the weekend for nurses, every week. How is he?’

‘Fragile,’ said Reinhart. ‘I’d put money on that Aarlach business being a bluff. He doesn’t want to go home, Wollger. He’s lying downstairs in Schenck’s office: a good friend has been to see him, but Schenck had already tranquillized him. Poor sod. The parents are coming this evening — two seventy-five-year-olds coming by car from Frigge. His parents, that is. We haven’t been in touch with hers yet. We’ll have to see how it goes, but no matter what happens we have to get him on his feet so that we can talk to him. Tranquillized or not.’

‘So she was being unfaithful to him, was she?’ said Moreno. ‘Are we to take that for granted?’

‘I’d have thought so,’ said Reinhart. ‘Why else would she lie to him and disappear every Saturday?’

‘There could be other explanations.’

‘Really? Give me one.’

Moreno thought for a moment, then put off answering.

‘What’s he like?’ she said instead. ‘Naive?’

Reinhart stroked his chin and looked thoughtful.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Naive’s probably the right word. Van Berle, that good friend of his, didn’t have much he could tell us about his wife, in any case. She’d evidently entered his life quite recently. She used to live in Groenstadt. Van Berle and Wollger are childhood friends, or so he maintains. He was the one Wollger used to go to the pub with while his wife was out getting screwed by somebody else. If that was what she was doing.’

‘Hmm,’ said Moreno. ‘Perhaps there’s another side to the coin as well. But what the hell does this have to do with Erich Van Veeteren? I don’t get it.’

‘Nor do I,’ said Reinhart. ‘But you know what one of Meusse’s guesses is usually worth.’

Moreno nodded.

‘What do we do now?’

Reinhart stood up.

‘We do this,’ he said. ‘Jung and Rooth talk to her workmates and friends. And relatives, if we can find any. You and I will have another try with Wollger. I think we might as well go down and see him now. There’s no point in waiting for his mum and dad to come — or what do you think?’