Reinhart also thanked this public-spirited citizen, and thought briefly about his own mother who had passed away at this lady’s age, eighty-seven. That was six years ago, and he recalled that whenever he visited her in hospital during her final months she always thought he was her father rather than her son. Which certainly made their conversations somewhat bizarre — but not without interest even so.
Perhaps that is what ought to happen in one’s twilight years, he thought. A right to populate one’s environment with the people one wanted to be surrounded by, and talk to. So that everything can be cleared up before it is time to pass over to the other side. After all, it was often one’s environment that caused the most distress when one’s memory started dancing around, Reinhart thought as he lit his pipe. Yes indeed. Of course Mum was as mad as a hatter, but she was in no pain.
The third person who phoned in that day with information about Martina Kammerle was also a woman. Her name was Irene Vargas, she was in her forties, if he was able to judge her voice correctly, and he realized immediately that she had information to impart that justified a face-to-face interview rather than a one-dimensional telephone conversation. As he had seventeen irons in the fire at the time, he contacted Münster and arranged a meeting between him and fröken Vargas in the intendent’s office an hour later. Irene Vargas lived in Gerckstraat, a ten-minute walk from the police station, but needed to sort out a few errands first.
Nothing could be simpler.
‘Please sit down,’ said Münster, gesturing towards the visitor’s chair.
Irene Vargas thanked him, and sat down. Looked around the room a little anxiously, as if wanting to make sure she wasn’t locked in. Münster had the overall impression that she radiated an aura of anxiety. She was a thin woman of about his own age, with pale skin, pale hair and pale clothes. He guessed that she was afflicted by some chronic illness — fibromyalgia or a mild form of rheumatism, perhaps — but it could just be because he had read an article about hidden suffering in one of Synn’s magazines the other evening.
In any case, she had not come to talk to him as a patient.
‘You phoned us,’ he began. ‘Chief Inspector Reinhart, who you spoke to, is unfortunately busy and out of his office, but no doubt we can get by without him. My name’s Münster.’
Vargas met his gaze, and nodded somewhat hesitantly.
‘Would you like something to drink? I can arrange for tea or coffee, or-’
‘No thank you, that’s not necessary.’
Münster cleared his throat.
‘Well, if I understand it rightly, you have some information about Martina Kammerle, who was found dead in her home the other day.’
‘Yes,’ said Vargas. ‘I knew her slightly.’
‘We’d be grateful for anything you can tell us,’ said Münster. ‘We’ve found it hard to find anybody who knew her.’
‘Martina was quite a solitary person.’
‘We have gathered that.’
‘She didn’t know many people. She didn’t really know me either, come to that. We met at the hospital three or four years ago. We attended the same little therapy group, but we haven’t seen much of each other since then. . We’re not exactly friends, as they say.’
‘But you did meet occasionally?’
‘Never by arrangement. But we sometimes bumped into each other in town. I’ve never been to her flat, but she did come to my place for tea, three years ago.’
‘Did you talk on the phone?’
‘Very rarely nowadays. More frequently when we first got to know each other — we used to chat a few times a month then.’
‘When did you last speak to her?’
‘In August. That’s why I phoned you. The rest might not be very important — nor this either, perhaps, but. .’
‘In what circumstances did you meet Martina Kammerle in August?’
Vargas swallowed, and stroked a few strands of her sparse hair behind her ears.
‘It was in town. We just bumped into each other, and I mean that literally. It was one evening in the middle of August, the fifteenth or sixteenth I’d guess. I was on the way to the Rialto cinema with a woman friend of mine, and we were a bit late. We hurried round a corner in Rejmer Plejn, and I literally bumped into Martina, who was coming from the other direction.’
Münster nodded encouragingly.
‘Go on,’ he said.
Vargas shrugged.
‘Well, there’s not much more to say, but the policeman I spoke to on the phone evidently thought it was important. .’
‘It certainly is,’ said Münster. ‘Then what happened? Did you stop and talk for a while?’
‘Not really,’ said Vargas with a somewhat guilty smile, as if she now felt she ought to have done. ‘There were only a few minutes to go before the film started, and. . Well, to be honest, I didn’t really want to talk to her. Martina seemed to be a bit high, I could see that, and she could go on a bit. .’
‘High?’ said Münster.
‘I mean manic, of course. Nothing to do with drugs or anything like that. . I assume you know she was a manic depressive?’
‘Yes,’ said Münster. ‘We are aware of that. So you were with a friend. What about Martina? Was she alone, or was she also with a friend?’
‘She was with a man,’ said Vargas.
The way she pronounced the word ‘man’ made Münster suspect that this was a fact she had struggled for some time to come to terms with. Probably without success.
‘A man?’ he said. ‘Did you recognize him?’
‘No.’
‘But you spoke briefly to them?’
‘Not to him. We just spoke about bumping into each other, Martina and I. Laughed a bit and agreed that it was funny. And after ten or fifteen seconds, we continued on our way to the cinema, my friend and I. I’m sorry if you had the impression I had something more important to tell you. I tried to explain that to the chief inspector, but he-’
‘Don’t worry about that,’ said Münster encouragingly. ‘You can never tell what is significant and what isn’t as early as this in an investigation. But let’s concentrate on this man. . Did you have the impression that. . that they were a couple, as it were? Monica Kammerle and him?’
‘I think so,’ said Vargas after a second’s hesitation. ‘But that’s only the impression I got. He might just have been somebody she knew.’
‘And she didn’t introduce him?’
‘No.’
‘You don’t happen to know if she was having an affair at this time?’
Vargas shrugged again.
‘I have no idea. I hadn’t spoken to her for nearly six months.’
‘Do you know anything about other men in her life? After that tragic accident involving her husband, that is.’
‘No. Although she did mention once that she’d been with somebody, but we never discussed it. I don’t think she had any steady relationships.’
‘But occasional ones?’
‘Now and then, yes, that’s possible. I do know she picked up a bloke for a one-night stand once. We were at a restaurant together, and she pulled him. It was rather painful, in fact.’
‘When was that?’
‘Maybe three years ago. . Yes, it was while we were still attending that group.’
‘I see,’ said Münster. ‘Let’s go back to that collision in August — you weren’t introduced to the man?’
‘No,’ said Vargas. ‘As I said, my friend and I rushed off to the cinema.’
‘And you’d never seen him before?’
‘No.’
‘What did he look like?’
She thought for a moment.
‘I don’t really remember,’ she said. ‘Quite tall, quite powerfully built, I seem to recall. But pretty ordinary at the same time. There was nothing especially remarkable about him, in any case. No, I can’t really describe him.’
‘Try,’ Münster urged her.
‘Darkish — well, fairly dark. Between forty and fifty, maybe. .’