Hakan Nesser - The Inspector and Silence

Van Veeteren thought for a moment.

‘Finding the murderer,’ he decided. ‘Yes, that would improve your situation quite a bit.’

‘I’ll make a note of that as well,’ said Reinhart. ‘If you phone this evening, I’ll give you a report. By the way, to be serious for a moment…’

‘Yes?’

Three seconds passed.

‘I don’t like this business at all.’

‘Nor do I,’ said Van Veeteren.

Another pause, presumably while Reinhart fumbled after his pipe and tobacco.

‘Child murderers like these are the worst set of bastards I can think of.’

‘All the more reason to make sure we catch them,’ said the chief inspector.

‘Exactly,’ said Reinhart. ‘I’ll do whatever I can. By the way, what are our colleagues like?’

‘They’ve passed the test,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘Suijderbeckis probably the best.’

‘The one with the wooden leg?’

‘Yes.’

‘Okay so long for now,’ said Reinhart and replaced the receiver.

The woman eyed him first for quite a while through the peephole in the door, and made him hold up his ID in front of the tiny hole before starting to unlock. This complicated procedure took another half-minute, and he began to wonder if she was quite right in the head.

But perhaps they’re all like this, he thought, when she’d finally finished and he was able to step inside the cramped vestibule. All the mutton-heads in this naively sanctimonious flock.

But then again, given what certain newspapers had written and the contents of some graffiti, maybe there were good grounds for barricading oneself in these days. If you wanted to avoid coming in excessively close touch with the Other World. Who was he to judge?

Her handshake was cold and damp. She led him into the living room and invited him to sit down on a flowery sofa in front of an oval table laid with tea and cakes.

‘Help yourself,’ she said, in a shaky voice.

‘Thank you,’ said Van Veeteren.

She poured out some pale-looking tea from a pot, and he observed her furtively. A slim and somewhat anaemic woman. Forty plus, he guessed. The same sort of anaemia as displayed by the Three Graces in Sorbinowo, he noted, and wondered what it could be due to.

A state of spirituality that was on the way to suffocating all bodily functions and needs? The triumph of the will?

Or was it just his usual prejudices and traditional thoughts about gender roles? Hard to say. Nevertheless Renate turned up briefly in his mind’s eye. Glared reproachfully at him and disappeared.

‘Can you tell me something about your church?’ he wondered. ‘What you do, how you are different from other communions, that kind of thing.’

She put her cup down on the saucer with a clinking noise.

‘Well…’ she began and cleared her throat several times. ‘We believe in the living God.’

‘I see,’ said the chief inspector with an encouraging nod.

‘In the living God.’

Van Veeteren took a cake.

‘Jesus is in our midst.’

‘Yes, I’ve heard that said.’

‘Anybody who has seen the light of faith…’

‘…?’

‘It’s a blessing to be a part of it.’

‘So I gather,’ said the chief inspector. ‘And how long is it since you joined the Pure Life?’

‘Two years,’ she said without hesitation. ‘Two years, two months and eleven days. It was during the spring campaign that Christ revealed Himself to me.’

Van Veeteren took a sip of tea, which tasted like warm water with a hint of mint. He swallowed it with some difficulty. Looked up and eyed the picture on the wall behind the woman’s back instead. Quite a large oil painting featuring a group of people dressed in white in front of light-coloured birch trunks and a pale, slightly shimmering sky. Porridge, he thought. Against the light. Anyway, carry on, for God’s sake!

‘You can’t possibly imagine what it’s like,’ explained the woman, now with a fresh dose of unctuousness in her voice. ‘You really can’t! If you really understood what it was like to live in the light, you would break away from your old way of life this very day.’

‘Hallelujah,’ said Van Veeteren.

‘Eh?’

‘Excuse me. Can you tell me about Oscar Yellinek instead? I take it you know what’s happened in Waldingen.’

The woman clasped her hands in her lap, but said nothing. Her lively optimism had vanished into thin air. He realized that he’d offended her. Already.

‘Have you ever been there?’

She shook her head.

‘What have you to say about Yellinek?’

‘Oscar Yellinek is our leader.’

‘I know that.’

‘He’s our link with the living God.’

‘How?’

‘How? Well, he has contact because of his purity and his nobility.’

‘I understand,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘Do you know where he is just now?’

‘No.’

‘But you know that he’s run away from the camp at Waldingen?’

‘Yes… No, not run away.’

‘What would you call it, then?’

‘He’s simply following the voice of God.’

‘The voice of God?’

‘Yes.’

‘Have you read what’s being written in the newspapers? A lot of people think it’s Yellinek behind the murders.’

‘That’s impossible. That’s all lies and slander. Some people are full of jealousy and malice, that’s why they say things like that. Christ was also persecuted…’

The roses of indignation were coming into bloom all over her neck and cheeks. The chief inspector waited for a few seconds, trying to catch her eye.

‘Are you sure about this?’

‘Oscar Yellinek is a holy man.’

‘And that gives him the right to protect a murderer, does it?’

‘I don’t understand what you mean.’

‘Don’t you? It’s the easiest thing in the world to understand. Do you agree that these girls are dead?’

‘Yes, I assume-’

That they have been brutally raped and murdered?’

‘Yes, but-’

‘Do you think it would be right to allow their murderer to go free?’

‘No, of course not-’

‘So how can you defend the only people who could give us information about it all by choosing not to say anything? Go on, I’d like to have an answer to that question.’

She said nothing.

‘Do you know where Oscar Yellinek is?’

‘Me?’

‘Yes.’

‘Of course not.’

‘Do you think it’s right to say nothing?’

‘I don’t want to talk about this. I think-’

‘The murderer is still free because the Pure Life refuses to cooperate with the police,’ the chief inspector persisted. ‘You are all hand in hand with criminals, killers, and… and with the devil himself. There are some people who believe that you are Satanists, did you know that?’

She didn’t respond this time either. Van Veeteren said nothing. Leaned back in his chair and observed her silent confusion for half a minute. Realized he had overstepped the mark, but it was far from easy to adapt to every single situation. He changed track.

‘Are you acquainted with the three women who were present at the camp? Ulriche Fischer, Madeleine Zander and Mathilde Ubrecht?’

She shrugged half-heartedly.

‘A bit.’

‘What do you mean by that?’

‘We all belong to the same family.’

‘In the Pure Life?’

‘Yes.’

‘But those three are not among your closest friends?’

‘I mix more with some of the others.’

‘Have you any friends who are not members of your church?’

She hesitated for a moment.

‘Not real friends, no.’

‘So you abandoned all your circle of acquaintances when you discovered Jesus two years ago, is that it?’

‘No, you don’t understand…’