15
PC Jung looked at his watch and sighed. He had arranged to meet Madeleine Hoegstraa at her home at four o’clock, and rather than arrive too early he had decided to spend three quarters of an hour in a bar in her neighborhood in the outskirts of Groenstadt. The drive there had gone much faster than he’d expected, and needless to say he was well aware that the key was his deep-seated fear of arriving too late for anything at all.
He sat down at one of the window tables with a large cup of Bernadine. The curtains were semi-transparent, and he could see blurred images of passersby: Just for a moment he had the impression of watching an old surrealistic movie. He shook his head. Movie? Good God, no! Exhaustion, that’s what it was. The usual setup: cops too shattered to keep awake.
He stirred his hot chocolate and started sketching out questions in his notebook instead. Now that he started examining it more closely, it dawned on him that it was really a vocabulary book full of French verbs, and he realized that he must have put it in his briefcase after testing Sophie on her homework the other night.
Sophie was thirteen, getting on for fourteen, and the daughter of Maureen, whose company he’d been keeping for some time now.
Quite a long time, to be honest, even if opportunities to be together were few and far between. And as he sat there waiting for time to pass by, he started to wonder a bit vaguely if anything serious would ever come of it. Of him and Maureen, that is. Tried to work out if that was really what he wanted.
And above alclass="underline" Did Maureen want it?
Maybe it was better if she didn’t. Better to leave the cake uncut and just pick off a currant here and there when he felt like it. As usual, in other words. The same old routine.
He sighed once more and took another sip.
But he liked Maureen and liked being together with Sophie in the evenings and helping her with her math lessons. Or French, or whatever it happened to be. It had only happened three or four times so far, but it had struck him that for the first time in his life, he had been playing the role of father.
And he liked it. It had a sort of dimension he hadn’t experienced before. That gave him a feeling of equilibrium and security and stability, things that hadn’t exactly featured prominently in his life hitherto.
Not clear precisely what that meant, but even so.
Sure is, he muttered to himself—and at the same time, he wondered where on earth he had picked up such a silly expression.
But when he thought about those unassuming evenings, the simple and yet awe-inspiring task of taking on a bit of responsibility for a growing child—well, he had to admit that he hoped that one of these days Maureen would pop the question.
Ask him to stay on. Throw his hat into the ring. Move in and make a family of them.
On other days the same idea could frighten him to death. He was well aware of that and would never dream of raising the matter himself. But the thought was there all right. A sort of secret wish, something close to his heart whose delicacy or frailty was so sensitive that he never dared to pick it up and examine it in detail. Never really come to grips with it.
The fact was that life had its cul-de-sacs; and needless to say, it wasn’t always possible to turn back and retreat.
What the hell am I on about, he thought.
He checked his watch once more and lit a cigarette. Another quarter of an hour. He wasn’t exactly looking forward to interviewing Mrs. Hoegstraa. As far as he could make out, he was required to cross-question an upper-class lady of the old school. A privileged and spoiled woman with an abundance of rights but no corresponding obligations. That’s the impression she had given on the telephone, at least. Mind you, it wasn’t at all clear how this fitted in with Verhaven.
Verhaven had never been a member of the upper classes, surely.
No doubt she would pin him down, no matter what. Note his characteristic young man’s smell of tobacco and cheap aftershave lotion. Stained trousers and dandruff on his shoulders. Sum him up, then make sure to keep him at arm’s length. Imply that people of her social standing regarded the police as servants. That was something they had committed themselves to and thrown their weight behind aspects of society that had to be maintained: money, the fine arts, the right to dispose of one’s wealth as one sees fit—and so on.
Fuck it all, he thought. I’ll never get over this. I’ll always be standing here with my dirty cap in my hand, and I’ll keep on bowing to my superiors as long as I live.
I’m so sorry to impose on you. So sorry that I have to ask you a few questions. So sorry that my dad was sacked by the printing works and drank himself to death.
Oh dear, I’m so sorry, your ladyship, I must have got it wrong. Of course, I want to be buried in the pet cemetery with all the dogs. That’s where I belong!
He emptied his mug of hot chocolate and stood up.
I worry too much, he thought. That’s my problem.
I hope she doesn’t serve up chamomile tea, he thought.
Mrs. Hoegstraa kept the safety chain on and examined his ID through the narrow crack.
“Sorry about that; I try to be very careful,” she said as she opened the door wide.
“You can never be too careful,” Jung said.
“Please come in.”
She led him into a living room overfilled with furniture. Invited him to sit in one of the pair of plush armchairs, like thrones in front of the fire. There was also a glass-topped table teeming with cups and saucers, scones, cookies, butter, cheese and jam.
“I always drink chamomile tea myself,” she said. “For my stomach’s sake. But I don’t suppose that would appeal to a man. Would you like coffee or a beer?”
Jung sat down feeling relieved. He had evidently misjudged this plump little woman somewhat. His worries had been exaggerated and originated from inside himself. As usual, perhaps.
This lady was human, no doubt about that. She exuded warmth.
“I wouldn’t say no to a beer,” he said.
Perhaps there was something else about her, he thought as he watched her head for the kitchen. Something he was well acquainted with.
A bad conscience, no less?
“Fire away,” he said. His notebook with the questions he’d planned to ask could wait a bit. He might not even need to produce them at all.
“Where shall I start?” she asked.
“At the beginning, perhaps,” he suggested.
“Yes, I suppose that would be best.”
She took a deep breath and settled down in her chair.
“We have never been in close touch,” she said. “You will obviously have gathered that we severed all connections after these…this murder business. But to tell you the truth there wasn’t much contact before that either.”
She took a sip of tea. Jung put a slice of cheese on a cracker and waited.
“There were three of us siblings. My elder brother died two years ago, and I’ll be seventy-five this fall. Leopold was an afterthought, as they say. I was seventeen when he was born. Both Jacques and I had left home by the time he started school.”
Jung nodded.
“Then my mother died. He was only eight. He and Dad were the only ones left.”
“In Kaustin?”
“Yes. Dad was a blacksmith. But at that time he was away fighting the war, of course. They gave him special dispensation to go home six months before it was all over, to look after Leo. I helped out a bit, but I was married and had my own children to look after. Lived in Switzerland, so it wasn’t all that easy to drop everything and do one’s bit. My husband ran a company in Switzerland, and I was needed to make a contribution there as well.”
Oh yes, Jung thought. A guilty conscience, as usual.
“But you didn’t live in the house your brother eventually bought? Not then, when you were a child?”
“No, we lived in the village. The smithy has closed down, but the house is still there.”