The G File (30 page)

‘And he didn’t say anything about ringing again later?’

‘No, he didn’t . . . Anyway, I don’t know what you think about this, but at least I’ve filled you in. It was that intendent who urged me to contact you . . .’

‘Excellent,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘Thank you. It’s absolutely right that you should come to me. Intendent Münster made a completely correct judgement.’

He picked up the sheet of paper and studied it for a while in silence.

‘These figures,’ he said. ‘14.42 . . . It looks like a departure time. A train or a bus.’

She nodded.

‘Presumably. That’s what Intendent Münster thought as well . . . So maybe he’s gone off somewhere. But for heaven’s sake, this was such a long time ago!’

‘And he didn’t say anything about where he was calling from? He couldn’t have been at home, could he?’

‘He could have been absolutely anywhere. Torben is sure that he didn’t say a word about where he was.’

‘You don’t happen to have one of those . . . what are they called? Caller somethings?’

‘Caller-ID. No, unfortunately not.’

Van Veeteren leaned back and thought. Belle Vargas finished her coffee and seemed to be wondering if there was anything else she could add, or whether she should thank him for his hospitality and leave. He watched her out of the corner of his eye while thoughts meandered through his brain.

‘Damn it all!’ he muttered eventually. ‘After fifteen years. But then again . . . then again, it’s not certain that it means anything at all. He’s a bit obsessed by this Hennan business, you said?’

‘On and off, at least. I imagine that he might well have become so . . . so incredibly enthusiastic if he really had caught on to something . . . I’m not sure if you understand how—’

‘I certainly do,’ interrupted Van Veeteren. Cleared his throat and sat up straight on his chair. ‘Don’t underestimate me, intuition is my speciality. I was responsible for the Barbara Hennan investigation in 1987, and I met your father several times. I shall get in touch with Intendent Münster, and we shall see what we can do about this. Am I right in thinking that your father has never gone missing like this before?’

‘Never,’ said Belle Vargas emphatically. ‘I’m sure something must have happened to him, and I’m extremely grateful that you are taking the trouble to help me. My father is a . . . a quite insignificant person, if you see what I mean.’

‘Insignificant?’ said Van Veeteren. ‘Ah well, not everybody has the distinction of wallowing in the spotlights. But don’t expect too much. Let us hope that there is a straightforward explanation, and that we find your father in good condition.’

She nodded. Stood up, shook hands and left the bookshop. Through the display window he watched her turn up the hood of her jacket to fend off the pouring rain, and hurry off in the direction of Kellnerplejn.

When she had disappeared behind a furniture van outside Gestetner’s, he finally pinched his arm. It hurt.

A straightforward explanation? he thought five seconds later. Maarten Verlangen in good condition?

He realized that he didn’t really believe in either possibility, and when he locked the street door he had a sudden attack of dizziness. He sat down on one of the reading chairs.

G? he thought. Yet again?

The last round?

These were only words that drifted into his head instead of thoughts, he knew that, and he felt a need to hold them at bay. They were too heavy for the slight suspicion that had suddenly emerged inside him. The vague feeling that the only case he had failed to solve in over thirty years of police work might have a verse as yet unsung, despite everything – a suspicion that would never keep afloat if he started examining it in detail, hoping, and planting words.

Caution! he thought. Don’t start creating illusions, you bookseller!

He stood up and pulled down the curtain across the door. Went back to the inner room and his armchair. Dug out the bottle of port and a glass from behind the row of Schiller and Klopstock, and filled it to the brim. Made himself comfortable in the armchair and lit the cigarette he had made during his conversation with Belle Vargas but never got round to lighting – and as if to order, the moment he closed his eyes and made himself defenceless, that old image from the gym appeared in his mind’s eye.

The frozen image from the gym itself with Adam Bronstein rolled up inside that stinking mat – and then another image from a few minutes later. A devilish moment.

When . . . when they are already on their way from the scene. When G has closed the gym door and is walking off, and when it has occurred to him how he will be able to save the life of Adam. He pauses in the schoolyard, pretending that his shoelace has come undone and needs tying. He crouches down among the red and yellow autumn leaves next to one of the bicycle stands and pretends to be tying a knot – and things proceed exactly as he had hoped: G doesn’t stop and wait for him, merely glances in his direction and continues walking towards the school gate with the others.

But then, suddenly, his courage fails him. Instead of staying where he is, allowing G and the others to pass through the dark gate, and then going back into the gym – instead of doing what he knows he ought to do, he stands up and hurries after them.

He’s not the one who rolled Adam Bronstein up in the mat.

It’s not his responsibility.

It’s not . . .

He opened his eyes and the image disappeared.

Is that why I hate him? he wondered. Is it because he implicated me in his guilt? Made me guilty for the first time fifty years ago?

He looked at the clock. It was a quarter past six . . . and he suddenly remembered that they were expecting guests: two of Ulrike’s children, his own grandchild Andrea and her mother. Ulrike had thought of serving up a paella, and no doubt needed his assistance in the kitchen.

He could feel a longing for her, a longing to be in the kitchen with her, each with a glass of Chianti and with the smell of bread baking in the oven. A very strong longing.

Good Lord, he thought. I’m sixty-five years of age, but as lovelorn as a teenager.

He stood up and left the bookshop.

Late that night he telephoned Münster. He hadn’t spoken to him – nor to any other of his former colleagues – for several months, and it felt almost as if he were intruding. It was remarkable, but that’s the way it was.

It transpired that Münster had no information about Verlangen over and above what he had already heard from Belle Vargas. They had issued a Wanted notice the previous day, but as yet – after rather more than twenty-four hours – they had not received a single response. He agreed to meet Van Veeteren in a few days’ time to discuss the situation: if anything significant turned up in the meantime, Münster promised to inform the
Chief Inspector
immediately.

The intendent never actually used the words, but nevertheless Van Veeteren could hear them – as plain as day – on the tip of his tongue.

The
Chief Inspector
.

I would have retired last autumn if I’d stayed on in the force, he thought. Perhaps it was the intention that I would fit in another round with G after all. Perhaps that is what the director had intended all along?

Was that possible? The director?

He shook his head and tried to rinse away the thought with a mouthful of Chianti.

But it wouldn’t go away.

It was six months since he had last met Münster – and ten months since they had last played badminton – but it turned out to be an unexpectedly memorable meeting even so.

The intendent had been in bed with flu as recently as that same morning (38.3 degrees the previous night) and was a walking corpse. Van Veeteren had no difficulty in winning the first set 15–10, and at 10–3 in the second Münster was forced to throw in the towel, having been sent staggering from corner to corner like a fatally wounded quarry by his ruthless opponent.

‘Personally, I’m on rather good form,’ maintained Van Veeteren as he gave his defeated opponent a helping hand back to the changing room. ‘But perhaps I don’t need to mention that.’

Münster was breathing hard, but did not respond. Van Veeteren spent a few seconds trying to think of something sympathetic to say, but failed and thought it was better to say nothing. They showered, got changed and sat down in the cafeteria to drink a beer in one case and ice-water in the other, and to talk about Maarten Verlangen.

‘What the hell’s going on?’ wondered Van Veeteren. ‘Might there be something in it, do you think?’

Three days had passed since Belle Vargas turned up at the antiquarian book shop, and Verlangen was just as missing now as he had been then. Münster drank half a litre of icewater, and looked doubtful.

‘As I understand it, it’s not possible to think anything,’ he said. ‘We made a few inquiries about Hennan, just as you suggested, Chief . . . Or rather, we
tried
to make some inquiries.’

‘Meaning?’

‘We didn’t discover anything at all, despite the fact that Krause hammered away at the keyboard until his fingers nearly dropped off. He’s not the type to have a website, that Hennan character.’

‘That doesn’t surprise me,’ said Van Veeteren.

‘He seems to have left the country a few months after the trial – in 1987, that is. After having collected the insurance money, of course, and . . . well, since then there has been no trace of him. Buenos Aires or Calcutta or Oslo? He could be anywhere in the world, all we can do is guess.’

‘I’d rather not,’ muttered Van Veeteren. ‘Presumably he’s acquired several new wives as well . . . It’s been fifteen years, after all. And I assume you’ve also drawn a blank with Verlangen?’

Münster poured some more water into his glass, and breathed heavily.

‘Indeed. But he’s certainly not in Calcutta. Krause checked that train time, or whatever it was . . .’

‘It was a train time,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘Possibly a bus, but I don’t think that’s likely. Aeroplanes leave at times ending in five or ten. From Sechshafen, at least . . . Or rather, that’s when they are supposed to leave, which isn’t exactly the same thing . . . But never mind that, we’ll say it was a train time.’

‘That’s all right by me,’ said Münster. ‘But in any case, there is no train due to leave Maardam at 14.42. Nor one due in at that time, in fact. Not according to the timetable, at least.’

He rummaged around in his inside pocket and produced an envelope.

‘But as we are equipped with computers nowadays, well . . .’

He handed the envelope over to Van Veeteren.

‘What’s this?’

‘A compilation,’ said Münster. ‘As you reckoned it was a train time, we looked up train times. On one sheet of paper you have all the stations in the country at which a train was due to leave at eighteen minutes to three. On the other sheet, stations where trains were due in at that time.’

Van Veeteren folded out the sheets of paper and eyed the columns with the names of the stations somewhat sceptically.

‘For Christ’s sake . . .’ he said. ‘What am I supposed to do with this?’

Münster flung out his hands.

‘Don’t ask me. It only took a minute to get it, according to Krause. Anyway, that’s as far as we’ve got so far.’

‘Drink up that bloody water, and let’s get out of here,’ said Van Veeteren.

A few days later, a Tuesday morning right at the beginning of May – and after having struggled with dreams involving G in one way or another for three nights in a row – he had had enough. He telephoned Belle Vargas and asked to meet her again. There was no other possible solution.

It transpired that she was working as a physiotherapist at a private clinic just a few blocks away from Kupinskis gränd, and her lunch hour was at twelve. Van Veeteren suggested one of the pavement cafes in Kejmer Plejn since it was such fine weather, and she thought that was a splendid idea.

She sounded rather hopeful, he thought as he hung up. He hoped she didn’t think he would be able to give her some news about her father.

Indeed, he hoped instead that she might have something to tell him.

But that was not the case. Maarten Verlangen was still just as much missing without trace as he had been for over a month now – or about roughly half that time if one accepted the telephone call to his grandson Torben as the last sign of life.

So no real reason for optimism, thought Van Veeteren: but at least it was lovely weather. A warm breeze and twenty degrees or more in the shade. They found a table just underneath the statue of Alexander; and when they had settled down and ordered their food, he could see that she had given up.

It was as simple as that. Belle Vargas had decided that her father was no longer alive. And that decision had given her a sort of strength – it was paradoxical, of course; but he recognized the phenomenon from his time as a detective chief inspector.

For sorrow is easier to bear than uncertainty.

In the long run, at least. There is no attitude you can adopt to cope with uncertainty. No method for handling it, he thought. But death is surrounded by rituals.

‘I know he’s dead,’ she said, as if to confirm his unstated suspicions.

‘Perhaps it’s best to assume that, yes.’

She looked at him with an expression of mild surprise. He realized that she had expected him to suggest that he wasn’t.

‘I want . . . I mean, it seems to be important that we find him.’

‘Of course.’

‘We spoke about this the other day, my husband and I . . . He had read somewhere that the burial ceremony is the oldest symbol of . . . well, of some kind of civilization. That we take care of our dead, and all that.’

‘No doubt about it,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘Besides, it’s the only time in life that content and form coincide absolutely. It most certainly is important.’

He could see that she didn’t really understand what he had said, but didn’t bother to spell it out.

‘I have a little request,’ he said instead.

‘A request?’

‘Yes. If you still want me to do what I can in connection with this case. Don’t expect anything, though. I’m an old man and out of practice – five years in a dusty old antiquarian bookshop doesn’t exactly spruce up your abilities, you must have no illusions about that.’