‘What the hell?’ exclaimed Van Veeteren. ‘It’s in the newspaper — do you want me to go and fetch it?’
She hesitated a moment.
‘Not just now. I think we ought to get a bit more sleep, no matter what. . Then we can talk it over when we wake up again. Come back to bed and give me a hug.’
Van Veeteren had several valid objections on the tip of his tongue, but after a brief internal struggle he gave up and did as he was bidden.
11
In the early hours of Monday morning he dreamt about a train hurtling at high speed through the world and running over hordes of black cats with white patches; and early the following morning he woke up in a cold sweat after being chased through a deserted and unlit town by a mad, bearded priest with a gigantic dead swallow in his mouth and a carpet-beater in his hand.
The message could hardly be clearer, and when Ulrike had left for work at about half past eight, he telephoned the Maardam CID.
After the obligatory wrong connections, he finally got through to Münster.
‘That priest,’ he said.
‘What priest?’ wondered Münster.
‘The one that died. Who fell in front of a train.’
‘Oh, him,’ said Münster. ‘I know nothing about it. It was Moreno who took charge of that.’
‘Moreno?’
‘Yes. Why do you ask, Chief Inspector?’
Hell and damnation, Van Veeteren thought. Four years have passed, and he still calls me that. No doubt it will say Chief Inspector on my gravestone.
‘Sorry about that,’ said Münster, who had drawn conclusions from the silence in his receiver. ‘I obviously have trouble in getting used to it.’
‘Never mind,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘Can you put me through to Moreno?’
‘I can always try,’ said Münster. ‘But I don’t think there was anything for us to worry about. No suspicious circumstances at all. I suppose you don’t want to tell me why you’re ringing?’
‘Quite right,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘Put me through to Moreno now.’
Detective Inspector Ewa Moreno was not in her office, but he eventually caught up with her via her mobile in a car between Linzhuisen and Weill. It was true that she had been dealing with the case of the priest who fell under a train — and what Münster said was also true, i.e. that there was no reason to suspect anything out of the ordinary.
Apart from the possibility that Gassel might have done it of his own free will, that is. The train driver had been interrogated, but had noticed nothing unusual apart from a person appearing out of nowhere and suddenly falling down in front of the engine. Obviously, it had been a traumatic experience for him — every train driver’s nightmare — but Moreno had not managed to squeeze anything else out of him, despite talking to him for two hours, she said. Or trying to talk to him.
Van Veeteren pondered for a moment. Then he asked if she might possibly have time to indulge in a glass of beer with him that evening at Adenaar’s: and she had.
What’s he after? she wondered.
He didn’t want to go into that over the phone, but promised to do so while they were enjoying their beers.
She turned up a quarter of an hour late, and what struck him immediately was how beautiful she was. The most attractive inspector in the whole world, he thought. She seemed to get prettier and prettier as the years went by: he wondered what kept her in the force, and how old she actually was. No more than thirty-five in any case. A year had passed since he saw her last, in fact — in connection with the deplorable case involving Intendent deBries — and the situation then had been so awful that even an attractive woman had been unable to distract attention from the horror of it all.
‘I’m afraid I’m a bit late, Chief Inspector. I hope you haven’t been waiting for too long.’
‘Go to hell,’ he said. ‘Drop that Chief Inspector crap or I’ll have an epileptic fit.’
She laughed.
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘It takes time to get used to it.’
‘Four years,’ Van Veeteren pointed out. ‘Is it all that difficult to get used to it over four years?’
‘We police are a bit slow to catch on,’ said Moreno. ‘As is well known.’
‘Hmm,’ said Van Veeteren, beckoning to the waiter. ‘You can say that again.’
‘So, Gassel,’ said Moreno after they had ordered. ‘What’s it all about? I have to admit I was a bit curious.’
Van Veeteren scratched his head impassively and took out his cigarette machine.
‘I don’t really know,’ he admitted. ‘I started to smell a rat, but no doubt it has to do with my age and impending Alzheimer’s.’
‘Shall we take a bet on it?’ Moreno asked.
Van Veeteren fed tobacco into the machine and said nothing for a while.
‘He came to see me,’ he said eventually. ‘That’s the rat.’
‘Came to see you?’ said Moreno. ‘Gassel came to see you?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
‘I don’t know. I never got round to talking to him, unfortunately. I had an appointment at the dentist’s, and the following day I was flying to Rome with Ulrike. You’ve never met her, but she’s my better half. . Much better, in fact. Anyway, that was three weeks ago — just over, to be precise: we agreed to meet when I got back, but now he’s dead. It could be pure coincidence, of course, but you sometimes wonder.’
Moreno said nothing, but a furrow appeared in her brow.
‘I did get a hint of what he wanted, though,’ said Van Veeteren. ‘He wanted to get something off his chest.’
‘Get something off his chest?’
‘Yes. Somehow or other. He’d evidently got to hear of something that came within his duty of confidentiality and so he couldn’t tell me what — a confessor who wanted to confess, as you might say.’
‘Confession?’ said Moreno. ‘But he wasn’t a Catholic priest.’
Van Veeteren lit his cigarette.
‘No,’ he said. ‘But as far as I can make out most other denominations use a sort of modified variation of confession. I suppose they’ve begun to understand that our conscience can sometimes become too heavy to bear.’
Moreno smiled.
‘Didn’t he say anything else?’
Van Veeteren shook his head gloomily.
‘Not as far as I remember. But he did make a decidedly nervous impression, and that’s what worries me. If it hadn’t been for that damned olive stone, I’d have sat down and listened to what he had to say, of course.’
‘Olive stone?’ said Moreno. ‘Now then, Chief. . Now you’re talking in riddles.’
‘I broke a filling on an olive stone,’ explained Van Veeteren, pulling a face. ‘The same day as we were due to fly to Rome. . or the day before, to be precise. That was why I had to go to the dentist’s. My fangs are in pretty good shape apart from that.’
‘I don’t doubt that for a second,’ said Moreno, deepening the furrow in her brow somewhat.
The waiter came with the beers. They drank a toast, then sat in silence for a while.
‘Do you think there’s something illegal lurking in the background? Is that what you’re saying?’
Van Veeteren inhaled deeply, then peered through the smoke as he breathed out.
‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘It’s impossible to say, but he’d picked me out in order to take me into his confidence because of what I was — a former chief inspector. Former, kindly take note of that. It was no coincidence — if I remember rightly, he let slip that he’d promised not to go to the police, that was the point. So what the hell could it be all about, if there wasn’t something illegal going on?’
Moreno shrugged.
‘Who knows?’ she said. ‘What do you think? Your intuition is not exactly an unknown concept, after all.’
‘Bah,’ muttered Van Veeteren, taking a swig of beer. ‘I don’t think as much as a chicken’s fart. Perhaps it’s the latest fad in the criminal underworld to go to confession, how should I know? But what about you, Inspector? Have you no suggestion to make? I assume there must have been some sort of investigation?’