Tsing-Boum (22 page)

A woman preferring to be thought of as a girl; past thirty but girlish directly the men were about. Tight black ski trousers and excessively brilliant orange sweater, which the nails were
going to match when she had finished them. Quite pretty if you like the kind of dark hair that looks just a bit greasy no matter how often you wash it. Well plucked eyebrows, orange lipstick and a faint moustache. Inquiring, slightly startled look.

‘I didn't hear you coming.'

‘I left the car further back,' vaguely.

She was a bit spiteful about being taken by surprise.

‘I'm afraid there's no flying today,' in a flouncy voice as though it were his fault.

‘No,' agreed Van der Valk cheerfully. ‘Lousy weather.'

Perhaps he was a customer; better put a foot foremost. ‘Can I help you?' Standard receptionist brightness.

‘Boss about?'

‘I'm afraid he's in Antwerp. Was there something?'

‘Like to talk to him – or somebody.'

Pooh – selling something.

‘Are you a traveller?' His clothes were ordinary, and didn't look prosperous: he didn't behave like a traveller somehow, but they had all sorts of approaches.

‘You're Dutch – we get plenty of Dutch gentlemen. But you're from Western Holland – I can hear,' coquettish. ‘I don't think we know you, do we?'

‘You aren't all alone here, are you?' She was a little scared.

‘Certainly not. The chief mechanic's about and Mr Bos is to and fro all the time – but he has plenty to do – could you tell me what your business is exactly?'

Mr Bos! Why hadn't he thought of it?
Bos
is a wood in Dutch – or Flemish. At a pinch, a forest, but they don't have forests in Flanders.

‘I'm particularly anxious to see Mr Bos.'

She didn't like his look and rose hurriedly, casting a look about to make sure there was nothing pinchable. Better lock the drawer with the stamps and the petty cash.

‘Well, I'll see if he has a minute.'

She undulated through the inside door, towards the end of the building which he had guessed from outside was someone's living quarters. He was nervous despite himself. Laforêt, he was quite sure, was not the type to wear a gun. He himself had
no gun. But it might not be that easy. He had brought his walking stick; he balanced it between his knees in a nervous fiddle.

Fellow was doubtless reading a magazine with his feet up; he could hear the murmur of voices. The girl came back in.

She had got her confidence back; Mr Bos must have decided he was harmless. And he didn't look like a policeman, save to a certain kind of eye, like DST – or Mr McLintock!

‘He'll be with you just as soon as he can,' pert. He fished a cigarette out.

‘Smoke?'

‘Oh – those French ones – no thanks. I only smoke Luckies really.' To put him in his place! She might be meat for a flyfly boy, but not for a fellow who was just a fellow.

‘Oh yes,' she was saying, looking negligently for her nailfile, ‘we have lots of business men from Maastricht, Roermond – even Eindhoven. We've six planes of our own, you know. And several private planes. And Mr – well, he's from the big pharmaceutical factory – he's bought a Mystère jet and he's going to stable it here. We're turning people away for flying lessons.'

‘Really.' He hoped he sounded impressed.

‘We have a plane for sale if you're interested.' He was nervous, and he had a sudden wish to shut her mouth.

‘No, but I'm engaging girls to make up a planeload for an oil sheik.' She gave him a look designed to be lethal and began a noisy clatter at her typewriter. The door behind her opened and a man came in.

The description didn't help at all, but he knew it was Laforêt at once. He was in sporting flyfly costume; whipcord trousers, ankle boots, rollneck sweater, a sheepskin jacket negligently slung on the shoulders and a Stetson hat. And Laforêt knew him too for what he was – he was sure of it.

‘Any calls?' in a crisp bossy voice. But stupid – he could have asked that in the inside room, couldn't he? Giving himself confidence.

The girl pointed her chin at Van der Valk.

‘Just this gentleman, who won't tell me his business.'

‘Oh.' The eyes that glanced briefly over were blue, bird-bright.
The face was lined around the jaw, reddened and tanned by wind, but not blurred or bloated, and one could still see the young officer.

‘Surely Pete's finished the test on that motor.'

‘He wasn't satisfied with the wiring or something. He's gone for coffee, I suppose.'

‘OK then, Daisy, just see you catch up on those instruction schedules.' Daisy! – she would be called Daisy …

‘Well, Mister – er?'

‘Van der Valk is my name.' He would have read the Dutch papers, which announced pompously that Divisional Commissaire Whosit was in charge of the Mystery Slaying. But he held himself steady.

‘Shall we go in the bar?'

‘Good idea.'

There was nobody in Members Only, where a cleaning woman had given ashtrays a wipe with a damp dishcloth and done some desultory dusting. But the lino was polished and the coffee machine gleamed bright and expectant. Laforêt took his hat off; the fair hair was undimmed, thick, still wavy, cut a lot longer than it had once been. He didn't look French in any way, and his accent was not French, though there was something about his Dutch, as though he were a Luxemburger. Perhaps he was. The furrows of the tanned face wrinkled loosely.

‘Whisky?'

‘A little.'

‘That all right?'

‘Thanks, Lieutenant.'

‘So you know.'

‘More by accident than anything.'

‘How did you find out? They weren't … I should have thought … especially anxious to – to …'

‘Spread it abroad – no, not very. Luck, obstinacy, quite a bit of cheek. And running about. I didn't get as far as Pau, but I wasn't far short, one might say.'

‘Cheers.'

‘Cheers.'

‘Who did you see?'

‘Voisin.'

‘Ah.' He remembered Voisin.

‘He was extremely nice. And very anxious that there should be no injustice.'

‘Yes,' reflectively. ‘Yes, he's an honest fellow.'

‘Things have changed, you know. It's a long way to Hanoi.'

Laforêt shrugged. It was a silly remark. Not to him it wasn't.

‘They knew where I was? I am surprised that they should take the trouble.'

‘No. Nobody knew. I asked DST.' There was a flash from the eyes.

‘No, no – they weren't and aren't after you. Just a file from a long long way back – there was a certain hostility towards the military over Algeria.' Laforêt almost smiled. ‘And you know how it is with files – some tidy-minded bureaucrat discovers it exists and then he wants to put a stamp on the back and send it down to the cellar. It's been in the attic all these years, and I was the – what d'you call it – catalyst?'

He nodded; he was very calm. Possibly too calm. He drank some whisky. And I am much too tense, thought Van der Valk, and drank some too.

‘Shall we talk about Esther Marx?'

‘You've come – to arrest me?'

‘I've no official power to do so. You'd prefer to go with me to the Belgians? Or just come back to Holland in the car.'

‘You seem very sure.'

‘I'm not sure of anything. If I'd been sure I would have sent a van with two gendarmes and a piece of paper.'

‘But I suppose it points very strongly.'

‘Till we learn something new. Perhaps, for instance, you could tell me where you were, what you were doing, things like that.'

‘Tell …' Laforêt's voice was contemptuous. ‘You want things proved, with witnesses and things.'

‘A judge would. I only act on a reasonable presumption. That exists. I want to know more. That would be better in my office, say.'

Laforêt was holding his glass, leaning relaxed and loose
against the bar, staring out of the window at the soggy fields and the concrete strip, seeming quite uninterested in what Van der Valk said or did. He probably is quite uninterested, came the thought. Who was it said it? – a type who saw visions.

‘I could escape,' dreamily.

‘You could cause a certain amount of unnecessary trouble,' agreed Van der Valk. ‘I doubt if you'd find it worth the pain.'

‘You don't seem worried? I'm among friends, here.'

‘What would be the good of my being worried? And what is the use of our asking one another these questions? I'm obliged to ask you one formal question. You did kill her? In fact I'm even obliged to put it formally, since I am a police officer on duty and under oath. François-Xavier Laforêt, do you admit killing Esther Zomerlust Marx, with or without intending to do so or planning any such action?'

‘Zomerlust … yes … yes … I suppose so.'

‘However stupid these things seem it helps in the long run. What you mean is that it's not as simple as that.'

Shrug.

‘Just so. You'll find we won't insist on its being simple. We aren't under martial law.'

‘No? Years of prison – or mental homes – come to the same thing. Why talk about it? Why explain it? What good can that possibly do?'

‘The decision is neither mine nor yours,' sharp. The eyes looked dopily at him, as though the few drops of whisky had been full of nembutal. ‘Here.'

‘I don't smoke, thanks.' And we don't commit any fancy suicides either, thought Van der Valk. Let's kick this personage in the pants a bit before he starts this withdrawal lark. If he wants to be schizo let him wait till we're out of the bushes.

‘Sit down, here, with me, at this table. I don't want that fool girl listening at the door. Make it look like a business deal.'

‘She's typing,' with a thin smile.

‘Look, Sam, there's only one way to handle these occasions and that is to treat them like a hire-purchase agreement. Sit down and I'll sell you accident insurance.' He got his notebook out, after looking in two or three pockets, and a pen. It didn't
serve any purpose, but it introduced a slight sense of reality – and that did serve a purpose.

‘You Dutch,' said Laforêt tolerantly.

‘Yes. We Dutch. Question number one – why a machine-gun?'

Laforêt sat down, put his elbows on the table, felt leisurely in his pocket, and produced a stick of chewing-gum, which he unwrapped slowly and bit on with firm white teeth. The teeth reminded Van der Valk of Esther Marx. He didn't want to mention Ruth, but if this boy needed a bucket of ninety-degree alcohol over his head he would get it.

‘Why a machine-gun?' he said again slowly.

‘It's the big fellow's.'

‘Talk sense.'

‘He likes guns. He collects them. I haven't any. It was a recent acquisition of his – he was playing with it one day here on the field. It was lying about and I took it. Seemed suitable.'

‘What did you do with it?'

‘Brought it back here of course.'

‘You mean it's still here?' Narrowly.

‘Place is full of guns,' in a tranquil tone. ‘You want it?'

‘By and by.' Thanks, he didn't want any games with guns. Nice of the fellow, though, to give him the information!

‘Just who is the big fellow?'

‘He's a bastard,' coolly. ‘If you really want Esther's murderer, and if you don't mind a friendly word of advice, you'd do well to take him. You can take me too, of course,' he added, as though that had no importance one way or the other. Play acting, thought Van der Valk.

‘Don't feed me fantasies, it leads us nowhere. Let's get back to your trip. Very well, you took the gun. You took your car. That's yours, the Fiat outside?'

‘He's real enough. He's no fantasy.'

‘And you're accusing him? And where is this sinister personage?'

‘In Antwerp – or he could be anywhere. He trots about, buying cheap and selling dear.'

‘And he lives here?'

‘He owns the place.' Laforêt was staring out of the window
again. ‘And forgive me for telling lies – he's not in Antwerp – here he comes now.' But Van der Valk was not taking his eyes off his man.

‘He's got a sleigh and reindeer?'

‘Listen.' From outside, the buzz of a small plane could be heard. The buzz faded as the plane made its circuit, grew again as it came in to touch down, swelled to a vroom which cut off abruptly. Laforêt and Van der Valk watched one another's face: the one was set in sharp hard lines, the other soft, placid and not at all that of a man who has just admitted murdering his one-time mistress. If it were possible he was amused.

‘The big fellow,' he said softly.

Van der Valk looked. A modern, smart little plane, brightly painted, equipped with gadgets, refinements, and considerable comforts for four persons. A massive figure, relaxed and commanding, got out with a golf-player's agility and came walking over in an easy swagger. The tense hardness left Van der Valk's face and changed to a broad ironic grin. Light soft footsteps passed along the passage, went into the office. Laforêt got up without hurrying and got the whisky bottle off the bar.

‘No thanks.' He did not take any himself either, but stayed standing with his hands in his pockets and his air of being an interested spectator. The mumble of voices had started with jokes, gone on to the ‘Any calls?' stage, grown suddenly in intensity, died away to nothing. The soft footsteps sounded harder and then softer on the matting of the passage. The door creaked.

‘Good morning, Mr McLintock,' said Van der Valk gently.

‘Mr McLintock,' said Laforêt, entertained. The big man stood still for a moment sizing things up. His thick silver hair looked as benign as ever, but the smooth tanned face was ten years older and twenty years of suspicion nastier. He walked over slowly towards the bar, picked up the whisky bottle and busied himself holding a glass up to the light to make sure that it was clean. Van der Valk struck a match to light a cigarette.