Mind's Eye (10 page)

22

The telephone call was put through from the switchboard to the duty officer only minutes before he was due to be relieved.

In fact, he ought to have been relieved several hours previously, but Widmar Krause’s young wife had started to feel labor pains in the early hours of the morning, and it was her first pregnancy. Erich Klempje had no alternative but to stay on duty. He’d started his shift as early as nine p.m. the previous night, but isn’t that what colleagues are for?

He was only staying on until the emergency was over.

There was no question of her giving birth already, but getting to the hospital and waiting and then the examination followed by getting back home again all took time.

He noted it down automatically in the black folder.

11:56 Incoming call from Majorna.

“Police. Sergeant Klempje. How can I help you?”

At that very moment the doors were flung open and in marched two constables, Joensuu and Kellerman, dragging with them a whore from V-Square high on drugs.

“You can only have me one at a time!” she yelled. “And it’s double price for bleeding police bastards!”

Although the whore was small, and the combined weight of Joensuu and Kellerman must have been upwards of 450 pounds, they were obviously having trouble in propelling her to the cells. Blood was pouring from scratches on one of Kellerman’s cheeks, and Klempje suspected that the whore would not be totally unmarked if they could get her into a dark corner.

“Kiss my ass! But brush your teeth first!” she screeched, landing a well-directed knee between Joensuu’s legs.

Joensuu cursed and bent double. Klempje sighed and put his hand over the receiver.

Two probationers who had been writing reports came to assist, and before long the whole group was out of earshot.

For Christ’s sake, Klempje thought. If I don’t get some sleep soon I shall start crying.

He returned to the telephone call.

“Yes, what do you want?”

“This is J.M. from Majorna. This is J.M. from Majorna.”

Oh no! Klempje thought.

“Yes, I’ve made a note of that. What’s it about?”

“I’d like to speak to…I’d like to speak to…”

Silence. Klempje shook his head. The voice was monotonous, but tense. It sounded as if he was reading out something he’d learned by heart.

“Yes?”

“I’d like to speak to…”

“Who do you want to speak to? This is the police here.”

“I know that,” said the voice. “I want to talk to the unpleasant one.”

“The unpleasant one?”

“Yes.”

“Who is the unpleasant one? This place is teeming with unpleasant police officers,” said Klempje, suffering from an attack of disloyalty to his colleagues.

“The worst of them all…He’s big and his face is purple and he swears. I want to speak to him.”

“Okay, I’ll make a note of that.”

“Is he there now?”

“No.”

“Thank you.”

The caller hung up. Klempje sat for a few seconds with the receiver in his hand. Then he also hung up and went back to his crossword.

Two minutes later Krause appeared.

“Thank God for that,” groaned Klempje. “Well?”

“Nothing,” said Krause. “False alarm.”

“If it hurts, it hurts, I suppose.”

“Klempje, when it comes to pregnant women you are a greenhorn.”

“You can call me a buffalo if you like, as long as I can get some sleep now.”

“Anything special?”

Klempje thought for a moment.

“No. Some madman or other rang from Majorna just a couple of minutes ago and wanted to talk to what he called the unpleasant one. Funny, eh? Who do you think he could have meant?”

“V.V.?”

“Who else?”

“What was it about?”

“No idea. He hung up. And Joensuu and Kellerman are down in the cells wrestling with a whore on cloud nine. Holy shit, but what a glamorous life we lead!”

Klempje staggered out and Krause took his place in the glass booth.

The unpleasant one? he thought. Majorna?

He thought for a moment, then called the fourth floor.

No answer.

He tried Münster.

No answer there either.

Oh, what the hell? he thought and took a paperback out of his inside pocket.
Parenting.

23

The letter arrived in the afternoon mail.

Without giving it a second thought he put it in his pocket; he had a number of things to do that couldn’t wait, and he might just as well read it when he got home. He might have wondered in passing what it could be: he didn’t often receive mail at work, and this letter seemed to be private.

He then forgot all about it, of course, and it wasn’t until he was feeling around in his jacket pockets for laundry tokens that he discovered it. He used a mechanical pencil to split it open and took out a sheet of paper folded twice.

It was only one single line. But it was clear enough.

The first few seconds, his mind was a complete blank. He stood there motionless, leaning over the desk, his eyes nailed to the words.

Then his brain started working. Slowly and methodically. Yet again he was surprised by how he could be so worked up and yet so calm at the same time. How he could simultaneously feel his blood seething and also let his thoughts coldly and objectively glean the reality behind this letter.

He examined the postmark. Yesterday’s date.

Looked more closely. A few letters were illegible, but it must be Willemsburg.

That fitted. That’s where he was incarcerated. Everybody knew that. A few had even been to visit him.

He stretched out on the bed and switched off the light. Felt the prickling sensation in his gut, but was able to keep it under control without difficulty. The question was…?

The question was so easy to formulate that it was almost embarrassing.

Were there any more letters?

Were there any more letters?

He went to the kitchen and opened a beer. Sat by the window. Drank a few long swigs and blinked away the tears that beer always gave him.

With the certainty of a sleepwalker he produced the answer.

No, there were no more letters.

He had been at home for three hours. Nobody had phoned. A delay of that length would have been inconceivable. No, there were no other letters.

He drummed his fingers on the bottle.

There was just one other possibility…. His brain was working lightning-fast now…. The possibility that it took longer for letters to be delivered to police headquarters. They might receive a letter tomorrow. That was a possibility. It had to be faced up to.

He took another swig. Jackdaws were cawing outside the window. His mind wandered to Hitchcock and
The Birds,
and there was something attractive about that memory, something that appealed to him—but perhaps now wasn’t the right time to be thinking about that.

But if…if there was another letter, already written and posted…irrevocably…it must arrive by tomorrow. Tomorrow at the latest.

Tomorrow. If he hadn’t heard anything by noon tomorrow, he was safe.

That was the answer. He raised the bottle to his mouth and emptied it. Looked up at the sky over the rooftops. Darkness was falling fast; no doubt there would be another star-filled sky tonight. He wondered vaguely if that would be an advantage or a disadvantage.

But the final answer was still in the offing even so. He had waited and been patient. Bided his time.

He took a deep breath. The prickling sensation in his gut was strong and pleasant now. Almost erotic.

It was time.

24

He woke up and couldn’t remember his name.

That had happened before, he was sure. He had a memory of another morning.

But now it was night. A shaft of pale moonlight enveloped the foot end of his bed, and draped a figure standing there.

It was a woman, no doubt about it. Her silhouette was outlined clearly against the window, but her face was in darkness.

“Diotima?” he whispered out of the blue, he didn’t know why. It was just a name that floated up to the surface of the well of forgetfulness. Somebody he missed.

But no, surely it wasn’t her?

She came closer. Walked slowly around the head of the bed, came around to his right side. Raised her arm, and something glinted in her hand….

Mitter…Janek Mattias Mitter…He remembered just as the pain cut him in two.

And before the scream had time to leave his mouth, a pillow had been pressed down over his face. He groped around with his hands, tried in vain to grasp his visitor’s wrists…. But he lacked the strength, and pain pumped white-hot glowing waves out of his chest and stomach.

I am nobody, he thought. Nothing but a colossal pain.

The last thing to come to him was an image.

An old picture, something he might have drawn himself once. Or taken from a book.

It was an image of death, and it was a very personal truth.

An ox.

And a swamp.

This was his life. An ox that had fallen into a swamp.

Sinking slowly down into the mud. Sinking slowly into death.

When night came, a calm and starry night, only his head was still above ground, and the last thing…the very last thing to disappear, was the ox’s surprised eye, staring up at the myriad stars.

That was the final image.

And when night closed in over the eye, everything became nothing.

II

Friday, November 20–Sunday, November 29

25

“Rooth, would you mind asking Miss Katz to bring us a few bottles of soda water, please!”

Hiller removed a strand of hair from his jacket collar and eyed the assembled police officers.

“Where’s Van Veeteren? Didn’t I say that everybody was to be here at five o’clock? It’s three minutes past. The press conference is at six on the dot, and we need to know exactly where we are by then. This is a shitty situation if ever I saw one!”

Reinhart stood up.

“I’ll go and fetch him. He’s busy scaring the life out of a psychiatrist.”

Münster leaned back and tried to see out the window. The chief of police’s office was on the fifth floor, and was generally called either the Fifth Column or the Greenhouse. The former referred to the enemy in our midst, the latter to the occupier’s partiality for potted plants. The picture window looking out over the southern part of the town allowed in such a generous intake of warm light that a wide array of azaleas, bougainvillea, and all manner of palms were able to flourish. So successfully that the intended panoramic view had long since been replaced by an almost impenetrable wall of greenery.

Münster sighed and observed the chief of police instead. He was rotating back and forth on his swivel chair. Moving papers, adjusting his tie, brushing dust from his midnight-blue suit…. These were all telltale signs: press conference! And it wouldn’t be just newspaper reporters and photographers eager for details, but radio and television newshounds as well. Münster had seen a broadcast van park in the courtyard down below half an hour or so earlier. Presumably they were busy with cables and light meters in the conference room. Hiller was no doubt right.

This really was a shitty situation.

“Van Veeteren, can you fill us in on the current situation,” said Hiller when everybody had finally turned up. “I have to meet the press in forty-five minutes….”

“No,” said Van Veeteren. “I have a headache. Münster can do it.”

“Oh, okay,” said Münster, taking out his notebook. “From the beginning?”

The chief of police nodded. Münster cleared his throat.

“Well, it was 7:10 a.m. when we received an emergency call from Majorna, the psychiatric hospital out at Willemsburg.”

“We know that,” said Hiller.

“Reinhart and I arrived there at seven-thirty-five, together with Jung and deBries. The victim was lying in his bed in Ward 26B. We cordoned it off, of course. The other patient had already been moved to another room.”

“Very sensible,” muttered Van Veeteren.

“Anyway, the dead man was Janek Mitter—we both recognized him, and it was obvious what had happened. The whole bed was full of blood, and there was a lot on the floor as well.”

He leafed through his notebook.

“According to Meusse, who arrived ten minutes later, the cause of death was internal injuries and loss of blood caused by three deep stab wounds, one of which had sliced right through the aorta. Death appeared to have been more or less instantaneous, a few seconds at most, and Meusse estimated the time of death at somewhere between three and half past three.”

“The hour of the wolf,” said Van Veeteren. “The time of nightmares and death.”

“How come the press got to the scene before we did?” Hiller asked. “Yet again,” he added.

“Tip-off from the staff,” said Reinhart. “One of the nurses had a girl staying the night with him—a hack with
Neuwe Blatt.
They’d spent the night screwing in his apartment in the staff quarters, so she was only a three-minute walk away. Pretty, incidentally….”

“Hmm,” said Hiller. “Go on!”

“Rooth and Van Veeteren arrived half an hour later,” said Münster. “Along with the forensic team. They ran a fine-tooth comb over the place, of course, but there wasn’t much to find.”

“Really?”

“Apart from what was obvious, that is. The murderer had entered the room, killed the victim—a scary sort of knife, apparently, double-edged, some kind of hunting knife; there are so many variations of that type of thing nowadays. Anyway, the murderer left through the window and down the drainpipe….”

“I thought all the patients were locked up,” said Hiller.

“Not necessary,” said Rooth. “Not with the sophisticated drugs they have nowadays—although they have bars on the first- and second-floor windows. The drainpipe held on this occasion, but the next one to try it will probably fall to his death: three of the anchor brackets have come loose.”

“We’d better inform the murderer,” said Reinhart. “We can’t have him falling and hurting himself.”

“Any fingerprints?” Hiller asked.

“Not a trace, and no marks where he landed, either. There was a paved path at that particular point.”

“Are we allowed to smoke?” Reinhart wondered.

“Sit next to the window,” said Hiller.

Reinhart and Rooth changed places. Reinhart scraped out the spent contents of his pipe into a flower pot. Van Veeteren gave him an approving nod.

“Carry on!” said Hiller.

Münster closed his notebook again.

“There were four people on night duty—on Ward 26, that is. Four rooms make up that ward. It’s the same on the first and second floors.”

“Wards 24, 25, and 26, each on a different floor,” explained Rooth. “A, B, C, and D in each of them. Twelve rooms in all in that building. Two beds per room, eight in each ward; but some were empty. That happens occasionally, every other year or so—somebody is cured, or dies, and so there’s a vacancy.”

“But there are plenty of loonies waiting in the queue,” said Reinhart, finally getting his pipe to burn.

“So twelve staff on night duty?” Hiller wondered.

“Yes,” said Münster. “Two awake and two asleep on every ward. We’ve interrogated all twelve, especially the ones on Ward 26, of course. And…well, it seems pretty clear what happened.”

“Really?” said Hiller, and stopped rotating his watch around his wrist at last.

“It was some time before we realized, of course. We had to check with the day staff as well, but everybody seems to agree. There was a visitor who stayed behind.”

“Stayed behind?” said Hiller.

“Yes, she arrived at about five o’clock—visiting hours last until half past six. But that woman stayed behind, and everybody forgot about her.”

“A woman?” Hiller asked.

“Yes, that’s what they say,” said Reinhart, blowing a smoke ring that slowly sailed in the direction of the chief of police.

“But it could have been a man, of course.”

“Huh. What the hell are their routines?” Hiller asked, wafting away the smoke ring. “Do we have a description?”

“Eight,” said Münster. “They are more or less in agreement. Quite a tall woman with thick, dark hair and glasses. Duffel coat and jeans. Only three of them spoke to her, but another five saw her. Including a patient. He’s prepared to swear on oath that it was a man dressed up as a woman. The rest are not sure.”

“Van Veeteren, what do you think?” Hiller asked.

“I agree with the loony,” said Van Veeteren. “But he’ll have to look after the oath himself.”

Hiller clasped his hands in front of him on his desk.

“So this…person…remained hidden inside the building until…three o’clock, half past three in the morning. Then murdered Mitter, and climbed out through the window? It sounds a little on the cold-blooded side, don’t you agree, gentlemen?”

“You can say that again,” said Reinhart.

“As callous as it comes,” said Rooth. “It’s like a damn B-film more than anything else…”

“The other patient,” interrupted Hiller. “The one sharing the same room. What did he have to say?”

“Nothing,” said Münster. “He slept like a log, I don’t think he even woke up when they carried him out.”

“Very fancy drugs they have nowadays,” said Rooth.

“Remember
The Cuckoo’s Nest
?” asked Reinhart.

Hiller looked at the clock.

“A quarter of an hour to go,” he informed everybody.

“Can’t you keep the hacks waiting for a while?” asked Reinhart.

“Even if we can’t do anything else, at least we can make a point of being punctual,” said Hiller, glaring at Reinhart’s pipe. “Besides, I gather it’s a live broadcast.”

“Well, I’ll be damned,” said Rooth.

“Okay,” said Hiller. “Van Veeteren, what clues do we have? What theories are you working on? I couldn’t care less about your headache.”

Van Veeteren removed his toothpick from between his lower teeth, broke it in two, and laid it on the shiny table in front of him.

“Do you want to know what you ought to say, or what I think?”

“Both. But perhaps we can take your private thoughts afterward. Give me some pearls to cast before the swine.”

“As you wish,” said Van Veeteren. “An unknown person has entered Majorna and killed Jonas Mattias Mitter, who was found guilty of the manslaughter of his wife a few weeks ago. He was being looked after in Majorna because of his frail mental condition. There is nothing to suggest that the two deaths are connected in any way.”

“I can’t say that, for Christ’s sake!” roared Hiller nervously, wiping his brow.

“Say that there is a connection, then,” Van Veeteren suggested. “It makes no difference to me.”

There followed a few seconds of silence. The only sounds came from Reinhart’s pipe and the chief of police’s rotating wristwatch.

“Was Mitter innocent, then?” asked Rooth.

Nobody answered.

“So it’s the same person that committed both the murders?” Rooth continued.

Van Veeteren leaned back and stared up at the ceiling.

“He was an amusing devil, I must say,” he said eventually. “There’s only one thing that surprises me: that he didn’t try to contact us instead, if he’d remembered something.”

“What do you mean?” said Hiller.

“You mean…” said Reinhart.

Van Veeteren nodded slowly.

“…that Mitter tipped off the murderer?” said Münster.

“But not us?”

Van Veeteren said nothing.

“How could anybody be so damned stupid?” Reinhart wondered.

“You try spending some time in the loony bin and let them fill you up with drugs, and see how smart you feel after a week of that,” said Rooth. “If it’s as V.V. says and Mitter managed to beat a hole through his memory loss, what the hell did he think he was playing at? I have to say I have my doubts.”

“No, it’s as I say,” said Van Veeteren with a yawn. “But we don’t need to quarrel over it. You’ll see in the end.”

Hiller stood up.

“It’s time. Van Veeteren, I want a word with you afterward.”

“By all means. You’ll find me in the canteen. There’s a program on the box that I don’t want to miss….”

Hiller adjusted his tie and hurried out through the door.

“A shitty situation if ever I saw one,” he muttered.