Pascal Mercier - Perlmann's Silence

Police. He would have to call the carabinieri. He hadn’t thought about that for a moment until now. In the world of Perlmann’s thoughts over the past hour only Leskov had existed, and his colleagues in the background, and the dawning awareness that the planned accident also affected the rest of the world to some extent, the public world of laws and courts, and newspapers, bathed everything in a harsh, icy light. Perlmann took off his shoes, sat down at the head of the bed with his knees drawn up, and pulled the blanket up to his chin. That position was something unfamiliar, something alien that made him realize how far removed he was from himself already.

Whether he hadn’t left the car in gear when he stopped, that would be the first question. Of course he had, he would reply. How else could he have got out? Besides, after thirty years of driving experience, you would do that automatically at such a spot. It would have to sound irritable, cranky. Leskov must accidentally have knocked it into neutral when, wide as he was, he bent over to reach for something. At the very same moment as he, Perlmann, turned round and, with his hand still on the zip of his trousers, noted that the car was rolling forwards, Leskov’s head had appeared behind the glass. Perlmann, of course, had started running, although with a feeling that it was all in vain, but the car had tipped over before he could reach the spot.

They wouldn’t be able to prove anything, nothing at all. They could reproach him for not having pulled on the handbrake, because such clumsiness on the part of the passenger was always a possibility. But that was a rebuke for lack of care. It couldn’t be turned into an accusation of murder by negligence. Criminal prosecution would only be a possibility if someone stood up and said: ‘Signor Perlmann, you are a liar. The truth is that you reached into the car again after you got out and took the car out of gear yourself, and that means murder.’ But that would remain an unfounded accusation that no examining magistrate and no state prosecutor could put into effect. Because it mustn’t be forgotten: There wasn’t a single visible motive. If questioned, his colleagues would be able to report nothing but the great regard – reverence, in fact – with which Perlmann had always spoken of Leskov.

Or would suspicion sprout within the group? Would the telegram and Perlmann’s rather striking reaction to it become connected with the accident? Would Evelyn Mistral remember his corpse-white face?

But even if one put the two things side by side in one’s mind: even discreetly one couldn’t make anything of them. Because once again it was true that there wasn’t the merest hint of a motive as far as the others were concerned. They couldn’t know anything about the poison of deception that pulsed within him.

Even so, at the scene of the crime he would have to avoid anything that could give rise to suspicion. Perlmann became aware of his stomach and, shivering, pulled the blanket still further up. First of all, the place in question would have to look like a spot where it would seem natural to stop in order, as he would say, to step outside for a moment. But it couldn’t just be any old lay-by where one didn’t obstruct the traffic. It would have to be a place that invited one to park facing the abyss; ideally a place with a beautiful view. ‘I parked like that quite automatically,’ he would say. ‘It was the best way of viewing the panorama.’

And then there was the question of terrain. If it were tarmac, brake marks wouldn’t be an issue. With soil, gravel or sand, on the other hand, he would have to be careful. Just by the edge of the cliff, where he would really stop, there could be no skid marks, because that was where the car, according to his story, had started rolling without a driver. A little way back from there, on the other hand, at the place where he had supposedly been standing, there would have to be the usual brake marks. That made the sequence of movements clear: he would have to leave the road and drive in a circle until the hood was at right angles to the edge of the cliff. Then, at a natural distance from the edge, he would brake until the car was at a standstill and turn off the engine, before rolling very gently to the abyss, quickly tapping the brake pedal in such a way that no skid marks were produced.

Under the blanket, Perlmann involuntarily made the corresponding movements: putting down the clutch with his left foot, pumping quickly and very, very gently with his right – it could really only be the hint of a push – and at last, along with the last touch on the brake, carefully letting off the clutch, so that it too didn’t produce a skid mark. Perlmann, who had leaned forward as he concentrated on these delicate movements, sank back again. He was as exhausted as if he had just made a gigantic physical exertion, and for a while there was nothing inside him but an oppressive, baleful void.

He gave a start. Witnesses. Of course there must be no witnesses. Before he made the crucial, fatal movement and knocked the car out of gear, he would have to straighten up and make sure by looking along the road in both directions that no one was coming. If a car was in view, he would have to wait. They would be agonizingly slow, those last seconds of Vassily Leskov’s life. Perlmann would have to assume an innocuous pose. He could put a cigarette in his mouth and then throw it away as soon as the car was out of view. He didn’t dare to think that Leskov might get out while this was happening, or that another car might stop next to them. What happened then would be almost unbearable: sequences of movements and an exchange of words, whole scenes, in fact, with a ghostly lack of presence, because in his eyes the only reason for them to take place was so that they would, in a sense, clear themselves out of the way and thus free up a segment of time in which the murder could actually take place.

The road would have to be remote; a quiet stretch that hardly anyone would be driving along on a November day. There would be a certain degree of surprise that he had not driven Leskov – who had already travelled from St Petersburg – to the hotel by the quickest route to the hotel, along the highway. But Perlmann could say that Leskov was more excited than tired from his journey, and had suggested a detour. No one could accuse Perlmann of lying and, without any other causes for suspicion, nor would anyone want to.

He needed a map. They would have one at reception. Perlmann looked at his watch: a quarter to eleven. Giovanni would be on duty again, and that was fine by him: the more unsympathetic and indifferent the person he asked (indirectly) to help him with his murder plan, the better. He threw back the blanket, slipped into his shoes and was almost at the door when he stopped, then hesitantly came back and sat down on the arm of the red armchair. So far he had only developed his plan in his mind, silently, under the blanket. Now he was about to take the first step to implementing it. A murderer preparing for his deed. The icy feeling of self-alienation that surrounded this thought was numbing, and for a while Perlmann lingered motionlessly in nameless despair.

Then, when he put a cigarette between his lips, he avoided looking at the red lighter and picked up the hotel matchbook again. He needed to recall to mind the reasons that compelled him to this terrible plan, and assure himself of their constraining character. But every attempt at concentration ran immediately aground, and all that remained was the dull, rather abstract conviction that there was no going back – a conviction that had the aftertaste of being forced, but which was nonetheless firm for that. At last he stubbed out his half-smoked cigarette and walked to the door with movements that felt lumbering and mechanical.