Hakan Nesser - The Inspector and Silence

Van Veeteren washed down the remains of his salmon with half a glass of beer. Kaalbringen? he recalled. Chief Inspector Brausen? The axe murderer…

He suppressed the memory. Gazed out over the lake, and the clusters of children romping around on the beaches. Summer camps, he thought instead. The whole area is infested with summer camps, of course. A few unpleasant memories from his own childhood began to stir, but he managed to bite their heads off.

‘But you didn’t go in and take a closer look?’ he asked. ‘When you were driving past anyway?’

‘No,’ said Kluuge. ‘I didn’t.’

‘Why not?’

‘I thought I’d better wait until you arrived. I’d called them earlier, and they said there was nobody missing.’

Great, Van Veeteren thought. That’s what I call socking it to ’em.

‘I see,’ he said. ‘Perhaps we ought to drive out there and take a look even so. The lion’s den and all that.’

Kluuge nodded enthusiastically. Sat up straight and gave the impression of being ready to set off without delay.

‘Calm down,’ said the chief inspector. ‘All in good time. We must first see if we can get a decent dessert at this place.’

‘I suppose you’re snowed under with work, are you?’ the chief inspector asked when they got back to the chief of police’s apricot-coloured office. (Apricot? Van Veeteren thought. I bet the bugger painted it himself!)

‘Well,’ said Kluuge. ‘I’ve got loads of reports and suchlike to see to.’

Van Veeteren dropped a toothpick behind the radiator.

‘Okay, I suggest you try to find out a bit more about that sect. Call the police in Stamberg and hear what they have to say, that’s probably easiest. I’ll take care of Waldingen myself, if you don’t mind. Do you have their number, so that I can give them a ring first?’

Kluuge wrote it down on a scrap of paper.

‘I think I’ll book myself a room for the night as well, to make sure that we can get to the bottom of this. Can you recommend anywhere?’

Kluuge hesitated.

‘The City Arms or Grimm’s,’ he said eventually. ‘The City Arms is probably a bit higher class, but Grimm’s is located by the edge of the lake. A hundred metres or so from Florian’s, where we had lunch. Not quite as good, but still…’

‘Grimm’s will be fine,’ said the chief inspector, standing up. ‘You can give me a buzz if anything crops up, otherwise I’ll see you here tomorrow morning.’

Kluuge stood up and shook hands.

‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I’m grateful to you for taking this on.’

‘No problem,’ said Van Veeteren, leaving Sergeant Kluuge to his fate.

The room was a most unfortunate mixture of old and new, but there was an ample bath and a balcony with a pleasant view over the lake and the village climbing up the slope towards the edge of the forest on the far shore. Van Veeteren moved in, put his suitcase in the rickety wardrobe and dialled the number to Waldingen.

Still no answer after ten rings, so he replaced the receiver. Turned his attention instead to the map that Kluuge had provided him with. Waldingen wasn’t a village even, the sergeant had explained, it was really only the name of that old summer camp for children – built sometime in the twenties – but nevertheless it was named on the map. A little black square next to a road branching off from a bigger road that ran round two little lakes before joining up with the main road again.

Forty or fifty kilometres into the forest, in other words. Hmm. He folded up the map and tried the number again.

Still no answer. He checked his watch. Five past three. The sun was still blazing down over the lake. His room was in the shade, but even so the temperature was approaching thirty-five degrees. He sat there for a while, in two minds about what to do next.

What the hell should he do?

Then he remembered that he’d noticed some sort of outdoor dining area under capacious parasols facing the lake. He dug out Klimke’s Neutral Observations from his case, collected his pack of cigarettes and left the room.

Two dark beers and four cigarettes later he made another attempt to call Waldingen, with the same negative result.

What the hell are they up to? he wondered. If they are taking care of a gang of teenage girls, surely the least they can do is to man the telephone.

Or had Kluuge been so shit-scared that he’d supplied the wrong number?

Van Veeteren rang directory enquiries: the number was correct.

He checked his watch.

Half past four. Now what?

A shower, and then a slow stroll through Sorbinowo, he decided. Preferably along a few shady alleys, if there were any. In order to work up an appetite for dinner, if for no other reason. That visit to God’s chosen flock would have to wait until tomorrow, no matter what. He didn’t fancy the idea of heading off into the forest without having established contact first.

But never mind that. If he was hoping for a case that would keep him occupied for the next two weeks, the last thing he wanted was to rush things.

He undressed and marched into the yellow-and-blue bathroom.

For Christ’s sake, he thought.

Then he showered in complete darkness for the next ten minutes.

The drive to Waldingen took thirty-five minutes. The last six or seven kilometres involved a narrow and decidedly bumpy dirt track that seemed to be about as infrequently used as his own sexual urges. The forest was dense and aromatic, settlements were few and far between. When he emerged from the trees and drove out to the lake and the buildings used for children’s camps, he noted that since he’d left the main road he couldn’t have passed more than four farms, and he hadn’t met a single vehicle driving in the opposite direction. He drove into a space marked out by a few sunlit pine trunks, and parked his car.

A woman dressed in a grey and white sari came to greet him, before he’d had the chance even to get out of the car. Or rather, it looked like a sari, but when he looked more closely he could see that she was wearing a length of thick, unbleached cotton cloth. Her skin, hair, lips and eyes were about the same colour, and Van Veeteren had a fleeting vision of a bowl of porridge left out of the fridge overnight.

Forty-five, he decided. A bit dotty. Man-hater.

‘Chief Inspector Veeteren?’ she said, proffering a somewhat limp hand.

‘Van Veeteren. Yes, I phoned you last night. I wanted to speak to Mr Yellinek.’

‘Come with me.’

She led the way to the horseshoe-shaped building that embraced an overgrown grassy patch with islands of blueberry sprigs and wild raspberries. The dark brown, substantial wooden buildings with newly fitted tin roofs comprised a main house that was quite large, with two storeys, a veranda and chimneys, and a smaller one on each side – simple, rectangular boxes from a much later date. The lake was on the other side of the road, only fifty metres or so away, and when he glanced in that direction he became aware of the naked bodies on the shore.

A dozen or so girls, paddling in the shallow water or sitting in the sun on towels, chatting away to one another.

But no splashing about. No noise, no giggling and shouting, no carefree laughter. In their midst he noticed two other women, dressed in exactly the same way as the one in front of him. He paused in mid-stride, and observed the painting – that’s what it was, no other word would suffice – while associations raced in torrents through his mind.

But nothing stuck Only a feeling of somewhat worrying admiration. And when the man on the veranda cleared his throat, Van Veeteren turned his back on the scene and wiped it from his memory.

‘Welcome to our abode.’