Munster looked up the number, and half an hour later, Van Veeteren got through to Caen.
“Caen.”
“Eduard Caen?”
“Yes.”
“My name is Detective Chief Inspector Van Veeteren. I’m phoning from Maardam, in the Old World.”
“Yes?”
“I’d like to ask you a few questions. I’m sorry we’re so far apart.”
“What’s it about?”
“Eva Ringmar. I assume you are familiar with that name.”
There was silence for a few seconds.
“Well?”
“May I remind you of my oath of professional secrecy. . ”
“The same here. May I remind you that I have the authority to summon you to Europe for interrogation, if I want to.”
“I understand. Let’s hear it, then. What do you want to know?”
“A few minor details. In the first place, did you have an affair with her?”
“Of course not. I never had an affair with any of my clients.”
“So that’s not the reason why you immigrated to Australia?”
“Don’t be silly, Inspector! I really have no intention of answering that kind of. .”
At that point the connection was lost. Van Veeteren thumped the receiver on his desk a few times, and after a short intermezzo in Japanese, Caen was back on the line.
“That kind of what?” asked Van Veeteren.
“Insinuation,” said Caen.
“I’m looking for a murderer,” said Van Veeteren, unmoved.
“A man. Can you give me any suggestions?”
There was a pause.
“No. .” Caen said hesitantly. “No, I don’t think I can. To tell you the truth-can I rely on you, Inspector?”
“Of course.”
“To tell you the truth, I didn’t get anywhere with her. But she got better even so. The reason I was brought in was the problems caused by the death of her son. . But there was something. .”
It sounds as if he’s weighing every single word, Van Veeteren thought. Does he have any idea of what it costs to phone halfway across the world?
“What?”
“I don’t know. There was something hidden. She didn’t bother to pretend-that there wasn’t anything, I mean. Perhaps it wasn’t possible to hide it. There was something she didn’t tell me about, and she was quite open about that fact.
Are you with me? It’s not easy to explain this over the telephone.”
“She had a secret?”
“To put it simply, yes.”
“A man?”
“I have no idea, Inspector. No idea at all.”
“Give me a clue!”
“There’s nothing else I can say. I promise you!”
“What the hell did you talk about?”
“Willie. Her son. Yes, we talked almost exclusively about him. She used me as a means of remembering him. I have a son myself, about the same age as hers, and she liked to compare. . We often pretended that Willie was still alive; we talked about our sons and discussed their futures. That kind of thing.”
“I see. . And she got better?”
“Yes, she did. Those meetings in Maardam were not justified at all from a therapeutic point of view, but she was insistent. I liked her, and she paid my fee. Why should I turn her away?”
“Why indeed, Mr. Caen? What was your impression of her husband, Andreas Berger?”
“Not much at all. We never met, and she didn’t say much about him. She was the one who wanted a divorce. . It was due to the accident, no doubt about that; but don’t ask me how. I think he wanted to keep her, even when she was at her worst.”
Van Veeteren pondered that.
“I thought you had arrested a suspect?” Caen said.
“He’s been tried and sentenced,” said Van Veeteren.
“Sentenced? Has he admitted it? Then why are you still-”
“Because he didn’t do it,” interrupted Van Veeteren. “Can I ask you to do something for me?”
“Of course.”
“If anything occurs to you, no matter how insignificant it might seem, would you please get in touch with me and tell me? You have my number, I take it?”
“No, I don’t think I have.”
“Didn’t you receive our fax?”
“Your fax? I’m afraid I haven’t checked the fax machine for a week or more. I’m on holiday, you see.”
“On holiday in November?”
“Yes, it’s early summer here. Seventy-five degrees, the lemon trees are in bloom. . ”
“I’ll bet they are,” said Van Veeteren.
21
When Lotte Kretschmer woke up on Sunday, November 15, she decided almost immediately to put an end to her affair with her boyfriend, a twenty-one-year-old electrician from Susslingen by the name of Weigand. The decision had been maturing inside her for several weeks, but now the time had come. As usual, Weigand was lying asleep beside her, his mouth wide open, and as she didn’t want him to stagger through the next few days in ignorance of such an important decision, she gave him a good shaking, woke him up, and explained the facts.
They had been together for eight months, it’s true; but even so, she hadn’t reckoned with the argument, the tears, and the accusations taking up the whole day.
When she eventually set off for work at about seven o’clock that evening, she felt that what she needed more than anything else was twelve hours of sound sleep. Instead, she was faced with twelve hours of night duty.
This is mentioned as an explanation, not as an excuse.
However, when the evening round of medication took place at nine o’clock, Janek Mitter-along with several other patients-was not given the usual mild sedative antidepres-sants, but instead was required to swallow two multivitamin tablets enhanced with ten vital minerals plus selenium.
Both types of pill were pale yellow in color, round in shape and coated with sugar, and were stored in the same cupboard.
This is not mentioned as an excuse either.
There was no lack of repercussions. Instead of falling into a deep and dreamless sleep, Mitter was surprised to find himself lying wide awake in his tubular-steel bed, gazing out through the window at a starry sky almost as dense as the one that night in Levkes. He remembered that November was the ideal month for astronomers, and that his birthday must have come and gone-because it was on the occasion of his fourteenth birthday that he had been given the telescope by his father.
Where was it now?
It took a while to work that one out. But he managed it. It was with Jurg, of course. Jurg had kept it in his room when he was staying with Mitter, but he’d taken it with him when he moved to Chadow.
So, he could still remember some things.
Various other details cropped up then faded away again as he lay there; some from long ago. . memories of
