DeFraan didn’t act like a strangler, in fact. Didn’t sound like a murderer.
Didn’t act like a strangler?
Van Veeteren shook his head at that amateurish judgement. ‘We need to be clear that even a criminal usually acts normally’ — that was a rule that old Borkmann had inculcated into him many years ago. ‘In certain circumstances it can even be impossible to distinguish between a bus-load of psychopaths and a totally harmless collection of unimpeachable citizens,’ he had maintained, and grinned characteristically. ‘For instance, a gang of undertakers on a Sunday outing.’
Van Veeteren smiled to himself when he realized that he had remembered it word for word.
He didn’t sound like a murderer!
Borkmann would have laughed at that wording. You can never tell. Van Veeteren decided to leave the professor in the heart of darkness, and instead to look a little more closely at the information about him that Winnifred had found on her computer.
Needless to say it concentrated on academic qualifications. Examinations passed. Posts held. Published books and articles. Symposiums and conferences deFraan had attended, research projects he had been involved in. Van Veeteren skimmed quickly through all that. Noted that his doctoral thesis had been entitled Narrative Structures in Popular Fiction, and that he had been Professor of English at Maardam University since 1996. Before that he had spent four years as a lecturer at the considerably less venerable seat of learning in Aarlach, which is where he had studied as a student.
The more personal data took up about half the second page, and stated among other things that he was born in Lingen on 7 June 1958. That he had been married, but had been a widower since 1995, that he had no children, and lived at Kloisterstraat 24.
That was about all. Van Veeteren read through the whole document from start to finish once again, to see if there might possibly be something — the tiniest detail or circumstance — that might suggest he really was the man they were looking for. The Strangler. The notorious and elusive lunatic who had murdered three people with his bare hands.
The murderer with a capital M.
He looked up and contemplated the well-dressed man standing in front of the whiteboard. He was writing something now: several book titles with publication dates. Could these hands. . this hand (which had a plaster on the back of it, Van Veeteren noted automatically) — could these fingers that were now holding the blue marker pen and writing these letters, in a different situation and in certain circumstances wrap themselves round a woman’s neck and. .?
It seemed absurd. He had met wolves in sheep’s clothing many times during his career, but this seemed too ridiculous for words.
The private detective sighed and checked his watch: there were twenty minutes of the lecture still to go. He was longing for something to drink.
In order to give himself something to occupy his mind he took Strangler’s Honeymoon out of his briefcase and started thumbing through it. He had started looking for it in the beginning of December, and eventually received a copy from Dillman’s in London in the middle of January. He’d read it, but not thought much of it.
It was just that damned name that haunted him.
Kerran. Benjamin Kerran.
He found it difficult to associate it with that neatly dressed academic berk holding forth from his pulpit. Very difficult.
No matter what Borkmann might have had to say.
Two of the female students — a short, plump, dark-haired one and a tall, blonde girl with a ponytail — had aspects of Trollope to discuss with deFraan, and Van Veeteren had to wait for a while before he could have a private word with the professor. But the girls finished eventually — although it was clear that they would have liked to carry on rather longer, but lacked the ability. Both the intellectual capability and the feminine guile, it seemed. They thanked him excessively and at great length, put their pens and notebooks away in their rucksacks, curtseyed and sauntered out of the room. DeFraan adjusted his glasses and looked attentively and enquiringly at Van Veeteren.
‘Excuse me, but do you have a moment?’
DeFraan smiled and put his lecture notes away in a yellow plastic folder.
‘Of course.’
‘Thank you. My name is Van Veeteren. I’m joint owner of Krantze’s antiquarian bookshop in Kupinskis gränd.’
‘What’s your problem?’
‘I accepted a book the other day that baffles me a bit, and I wonder if you can help me. With the author, mainly. Henry Moll. I’ve never heard of him.’
He handed over the somewhat worse for wear paperback. DeFraan examined it for a couple of seconds with one eyebrow raised, adjusted his glasses again, looked at the title page and checked the copyright details and year of publication.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I’ve never heard of it. But lots of books of this sort were published in the twenties and thirties. Why are you interested in it?’
‘I read it and rather liked it.’
‘Really?’
DeFraan looked first at the book, then at Van Veeteren, with an expression that might have indicated scepticism or derision.
‘It’s not exactly high-quality literature,’ said Van Veeteren, trying to look embarrassed (without succeeding, as far as he could judge), ‘but there’s something intriguing about the plot, and the main character. . the murderer.’
DeFraan didn’t react. He started leafing somewhat nonchalantly through the book.
‘Benjamin Kerran. Do you recognize the name?’
‘Kerran?’
‘Yes.’
DeFraan closed the book and looked at his watch.
‘No. I’m sorry, but I don’t think I can be of any help to you in this matter, herr. .?’
‘Van Veeteren.’
‘Van Veeteren. I have a meeting in ten minutes, so if you’ll excuse me. .’
Van Veeteren took the book and put it into his briefcase.
‘Ah well,’ he said. ‘Thank you for your time anyway. And thank you for an interesting lecture.’
‘You’re welcome,’ said deFraan, leaving the room unhurriedly.
Van Veeteren followed him even more slowly. At the bottom of the imposing marble staircase, the steps worn and made shiny by the feet of masses of students for the last century and a half, flanked by unadorned columns, he found a cafeteria. He recalled having been there before — not a century and a half ago, but perhaps forty years. He sat down at an empty table with a cup of coffee and a cigarette, and tried to analyse the situation.
God only knows, he thought. Maybe, but maybe not.
That was as far as he got. It wasn’t possible to get any further.
But the contest had begun, that was clear.
It took Winnifred less than ten minutes to find the dissertation. She didn’t have a copy in her office, but after a visit to the departmental library she returned with a light-blue book in her hand. Its full title was: Narrative Structures in Early Twentieth Century English Popular Fiction. Van Veeteren thanked her, put it next to Henry Moll in his briefcase and left Maardam University to its fate, whatever that might be.
He bought a lunch sandwich (without olives) at Heuwelinck’s and was back in the bookshop before half past one. He sat in the kitchenette, and while slowly eating the sandwich and drinking a bottle of Bettelheim dark beer, he started reading.
When both the sandwich and the beer were finished, he gave up, and looked at the index instead, at the end of the dissertation.
There it was.
Moll, Henry p. 136
He looked up the page referred to.
Thirteen lines, neither more nor less, were devoted to Henry Moll. Strangler’s Honeymoon was mentioned, as were two other titles. In positive if quite neutral terms.