Hakan Nesser - Hour of the wolf

‘I have a date with a certain Oscar Smaage,’ he said. ‘Convener of Verhouten’s Angels. You stay here and see if we have any unsolved deaths. Missing persons as well… It’s not certain that it has anything to do with the hospital, even if there’s plenty to suggest it might have.’

‘Okay,’ said Moreno. ‘I hope Smaage has something to contribute, though I can’t see what. I think everything depends on one thing, in fact.’

‘Thursday?’ said Reinhart.

‘Yes. What the hell happened last Thursday evening? It seems obvious that’s when he was supposed to hand over the money. Or what do you think?’

‘Definitely,’ said Reinhart. ‘It would be remarkable if nobody turns up who’s seen or heard about them — or one of them at least — after the handover. We just need to bide our time. Have some patience — didn’t somebody recommend that some time ago?’

‘I think you’re wrong,’ said Moreno.

It took her no more than an hour to find what she was looking for. In any case, she felt instinctively that it was right, when the name came up on her computer screen. Her heart missed a beat, and the hairs on her forearms stood on end — those were usually sure signs.

Tell-tale signs of female intuition. Hers at least.

Wim Felders, she read. Born 17.10.1982. Died 5.11.1998. Or possibly 6.11. Found by a passing cyclist on road 211 between Maardam and the suburb of Boorkhejm at six o’clock in the morning. The investigation carried out by the traffic police (headed by Chief Inspector Lintonen) showed that he had probably been struck by a vehicle and died after hitting his head against a concrete culvert at the side of the road. A Wanted notice had been publicized in all the media, but no perpetrator had come forward. No witnesses of the accident. No suspects. No tip-offs. The guilty driver had disappeared and refused to make himself known.

She remembered the incident. Recalled reading about it, and seeing reports in news bulletins on the television. The sixteen-year-old-boy had been on his way home to Boorkhejm. He had been visiting his girlfriend somewhere in the town centre, and was assumed to have missed the last bus.

He had evidently been walking along the side of the road in bad weather, both fog and rain, and been hit by a driver who had fled the scene.

It could have been anybody at all.

It could have been Clausen.

Keller could have passed by shortly afterwards and seen it all. Or been sitting next to Clausen in the passenger seat, if they knew each other… Although so far there was nothing to suggest that they did.

A road accident?

That was certainly a possibility. When she began thinking about how probable it seemed, she noticed that she found it difficult to feel certain. Perhaps it was no more than a coincidence, a fleeting fantasy: but in any case, the thread needed to be followed up until it broke.

Intuitively, she knew that this was exactly what had happened. She had found the first link. No doubt about it.

She saw that it was now half past five, and wondered what to do next. Decided to go home and phone Reinhart later that evening. If it could be established that Clausen had been driving home from the town centre on that day, at that time — on evidence supplied by Wim Felders’ girlfriend they knew that the accident had happened shortly before midnight — well, there could be no more doubts.

How it would be possible to establish or be certain that Clausen had been driving the car was another thing altogether: but as they had already linked him with two other murders, perhaps that didn’t matter.

On the other hand, if he had indeed been in central Maardam that evening, surely he must have met somebody? Somebody who could provide evidence.

Let’s hope it wasn’t Vera Miller, she thought. It would be better if it were those angels, whatever they were called. Verhouten’s…?

But more important than all that was finding Clausen. Naturally.

And Keller.

Having got that far, Ewa Moreno switched off the computer and went home. However she looked at it, she reckoned she had done a good day’s work.

She had just completed the phone call to Reinhart when there was a ring on her door.

Half past eight, she thought. What on earth…?

It was Mikael Bau, her neighbour in the flat directly below hers.

‘Do you fancy a bite to eat?’ he asked, looking miserable.

Bau was in his thirties and had moved into Falckstraat only a few months ago. She didn’t know him. He had introduced himself when she bumped into him on the stairs the first time, of course, but since then they had merely said hello when they happened to pass each other. Three or four times in all. He looked rather handsome, she had decided from the start. Tall, blond and blue-eyed. And with a smile that seemed to have difficulty in suppressing itself.

But just now he was serious.

‘I’ve made a beef stew,’ he explained. ‘A sort of boeuf bourguignon — it’s all ready, so if you’ve nothing against it…?’

‘It’s a bit out of the blue,’ said Moreno.

‘I can understand that,’ said Bau. ‘Er… I didn’t plan to invite you, but my fiancee dumped me just before it was ready to eat. Please don’t think that…’

He couldn’t find a satisfactory way of finishing the sentence. Moreno didn’t know what to say either.

‘Okay, thank you very much,’ she said in fact. ‘I don’t think I’ve eaten today, as far as I can recall. Can you give me a quarter of an hour to have a shower first? It’s not too difficult to keep stews warm.’

He smiled now.

‘Good,’ he said. ‘I’ll expect you in a quarter of an hour.’

He went back downstairs, and Moreno closed the door.

Is this how things happen? she wondered, but dismissed the thought immediately.

To add to his good looks and polite behaviour, Mikael Bau proved to be an excellent cook. Moreno was full of admiration for the stew, which she ate to her heart’s content; and the subsequent lemon sorbet had precisely the subtle touch of tartness that the recipe usually promises, but the dish rarely delivers.

A man who can cook? she thought. I’ve never met one of those before. He must have a skeleton in his cupboard. She would have dearly liked to ask him why his girlfriend had dumped him; but there was no real opportunity to get as intimate as that, and he didn’t raise the subject himself.

Instead they talked about the weather, the block of flats and the neighbours. And their respective jobs. Bau was a welfare officer, so there were a few points of contact.

‘God only knows why I chose to get involved with the seamy side,’ he said. ‘I won’t go so far as to say that I don’t enjoy it, but I don’t think I’d make the same choice today. Why did you become a police officer?’

Moreno had asked herself that question so many times before that she no longer knew if there was an answer. Or ever had been. Things just turned out the way they did, that was all there was to it; she suspected the same applied to lots of people. Life just turned out the way it did.

‘I think quite a lot comes down to pure chance,’ she said. ‘Or at least, to decisions made without an awful lot of thought. We have less control than we think we have… That we pretend we do have is another matter.’

Bau nodded and looked thoughtful.

‘But it could be that we land up where we belong even so,’ he said. ‘I read the other day about the billiard ball theory — are you familiar with it? You roll along over a level, green surface among lots of other balls. The speeds and directions are fixed, but it’s not possible to work out in advance what’s going to happen… when we collide and change direction. Everything is predestined, but we can’t predict it — there are simply too many contributory factors. Well, something like that.’