Hakan Nesser - The Inspector and Silence

‘Yes, I do.’

‘Can you write it down for me?’

He slid a notepad and pencil over the table. Marieke Bergson wrote down the details, her tongue in the corner of her mouth. When she’d finished she slid the pad back again. The chief inspector examined her round, school-girlish handwriting for a few seconds before continuing.

‘So, she’d done something silly, you said. Can you tell me any more about that?’

Marieke Bergson hesitated and bit her lip.

‘She swore at Yellinek She had the devil in her body… I thought it was a bit odd, although I knew her; the others thought so as well. We were supposed to pretend she’d never been there.’

‘Why?’

‘I don’t know, but I suppose it was right. She’d been silly, she had the devil inside her, and it was best to forget her. I could hardly remember that she’d ever been at the camp until yesterday, when

…’

Her voice died away. The chief inspector waited, but she said nothing more.

‘Can you remember when exactly Katarina Schwartz disappeared?’

Marieke seemed to be working it out.

‘Two weeks ago, I think. Maybe a bit less. You lose track – time doesn’t pass in the usual way when you’re at Waldingen.’

Van Veeteren suddenly had the feeling that he’d like to continue cross-questioning this teenaged girl for several hours, but he realized he would have to resist the temptation to put her under too much pressure. He needed to prioritize, to take the most important matters first; then he could probably try to penetrate the shadowy side of the Pure Life later on, when there was time and opportunity.

‘Yellinek,’ he said instead. ‘Do you know where Oscar Yellinek is?’

The girl shook her head.

‘You don’t know?’

‘No.’

‘When did he disappear?’

‘The day before yesterday.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes. He wasn’t there on Monday morning. He’d been called away.’

‘Called away?’

‘Yes.’

‘What do you mean by that?’

‘The Lord had called him, and he needed to be away from the camp for a few days.’

She took a few more sips of Coca-Cola, and the chief inspector closed his eyes for a couple of seconds.

‘When on Monday?’

‘In the morning. He wasn’t there for morning prayers. Sister Ulriche took them instead. Then she told us that God had appeared to him during the night and given him a task. It was important that we should be firm in our faith, and remain pure and worthy in his absence.’

‘Pure and worthy?’

‘Yes.’

‘I see…’ Van Veeteren searched for the right words. ‘And what exactly does that mean?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Marieke Bergson.

‘Nor do I,’ said the chief inspector. ‘What do you do in order to show that you are pure and worthy?’

The psychologist raised a warning finger, and Marieke suddenly looked to be on the verge of tears. She wrung her hands and stared down at her shoes again. Van Veeteren hastily changed track.

‘When did you last see Yellinek?’

‘Sunday… Yes, Sunday evening.’

‘What were you doing then?’

‘It was evening prayers. Before we went to bed.’

‘And he didn’t say anything then, about having to go away?’

Marieke looked up, then averted her gaze again.

‘No, it was late at night when he met God, as I’ve said already. But Clarissa wasn’t around. We wondered a bit, but he didn’t say anything about her. He just said that the final struggle was here, and that we should be strong and pure.’

‘The final struggle?’

‘Yes.’

‘What did he mean by that?’

‘I… I don’t know.’

‘So, it was on Monday morning you found out about Clarissa Heerenmacht and also about Yellinek’s task?’

‘Yes – although we knew about Clarissa already. That she was no longer around.’

‘Don’t you think it seemed a bit odd? That the two things happened at the same time, I mean?’

‘No.’

‘But I expect you talked about it?’

‘No, we had to…’

‘Had to what?’

She suddenly lost control. Marieke Bergson slid off the chair and collapsed in a heap on the floor. Covered her face with her hands and drew her knees up to her chin in a sort of twisted foetus position. And slowly a low-pitched, plaintive sobbing emerged from her body, a whimpering – unarticulated despair that he realized must come from chasms deep down in her thirteen-year-old soul. Just for a moment he had the impression that she was play-acting, but he dismissed the thought.

Poor kid, he thought. What have they done to you?

The psychologist hastened to go to her assistance. Started caressing her arms, back and hair in long, gentle strokes. When the girl had recovered somewhat, but was still curled up and lost in her own personal hell, the woman looked up at Van Veeteren.

‘Well then,’ she said. ‘Are you satisfied now?’

‘No,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘How the hell could I be satisfied?’

That evening he had dinner with Suijderbeck.

Servinus had returned to Rembork to spend the night with his wife and four children, but Suijderbeck had no such ties and preferred to retain his room at the City Arms hotel, where he’d already stayed for one night.

And it was in the dining room of the City Arms hotel that they sat down to eat. Right at the back in a smoke-filled corner of the packed, sepia-brown restaurant with tablecloths that had once been white and crystal chandeliers that had always been glass. Suijderbeck seemed to be even glummer than usual, and Van Veeteren began to feel a spiritual affinity.

‘How were things at the loony bin?’ he asked, when they’d finished ordering their meal.

‘Hilarious,’ said Suijderbeck, lighting a cigarette. ‘If it were up to me, I’d leave the harridans there for the rest of their lives. There’s no doubt that they’ve got the qualifications.’

‘Hmm,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘They’re still not saying anything, I take it?’

‘Pure autism,’ said Suijderbeck. ‘The worst of it is that they are so damned superior as well – they are martyrs, and nobody else is worth a toss. They all radiate contempt.’

‘The Lord’s chosen few?’

‘Something like that. They already know everything, don’t need to condescend. Even though they have no contact with one another, I’ll be damned if they don’t have some kind of telepathic communication. How are things with the girls?’

‘One has started talking.’

‘So I’d heard. Did you get anything useful out of her?’

Van Veeteren shrugged.

‘More or less what we’d expected, you could say. The girl seems to have disappeared some time on Sunday afternoon. And Yellinek the same night, presumably. Then they muzzled the youngsters. The big question, of course, is what the hell happened, and we don’t know much more about that than we did before. But there seems to be another girl who’s gone missing, just as we thought.’

‘The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away,’ said Suijderbeck. ‘What do you think yourself?’

The waiter came with two beers.

‘I don’t know,’ said the chief inspector. ‘I’ll be damned if I know. Cheers.’

‘Cheers,’ said Suijderbeck.

When they had drunk, they sat in silence for a while. Then Suijderbeck sighed deeply and said:

‘There’s only one thing we can do, I suppose.’

‘What’s that?’ wondered Van Veeteren.

‘We’ll have to find out if he was screwing the girls as well.’

The chief inspector wiped the cutlery with the table cloth.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I suppose we’d better do that.’

‘What happened to your leg?’ he asked when they had begun tucking into their main course.