difficult to resist the pleasure of doing so. Van Veeteren had come here simply to establish an impression-surely there was no more to it than that? For even if he had every confidence in Munster’s judgment, much more so than Munster could ever have imagined, there was always a little chance, a possibility that Van Veeteren might notice something. Something that might require a special sixth sense to pick up, an advanced sort of intuition or a particular kind of perverted imagination. .
And if nothing else, four eyes had to be able to see better than two.
That boy, for instance. Was it possible that he was a little bit on the old side for the circumstances? No doubt it would be an idea to check the dates when he had an opportunity. For if it really was the case that the new Mrs. Berger had been pregnant before the old Mrs. Berger had made her final exit, well. . That would surely be of some sort of significance?
Andreas Berger looked more or less as Van Veeteren had imagined him. Trim, easygoing, about forty; polo shirt, jacket, corduroy trousers. A somewhat intellectual air.
The prototype of success, Van Veeteren thought. Would fit into any TV ad you cared to name. Anything from aftershave and deodorant to dog food and retirement insurance. Very pleasant.
Dinner took an hour and a half. Conversation was easy and unexceptional, and after the dessert, the wife and children withdrew. The gentlemen returned to their cane armchairs.
Berger offered his guest a range of drinks, but Van Veeteren was content with a whiskey and water, and a cigarette.
“I need to be able to find my way back to the hotel,” he said by way of explanation.
“Why not stay the night with us? We’ve got bags of room.”
“I don’t doubt that for a second,” said Van Veeteren. “But I’ve already checked in, and I prefer to sleep where my tooth-brush is.”
Berger shrugged.
“I have to get up rather early tomorrow morning as well,”
said Van Veeteren. “Would you have any objection to our coming to the point now, Mr. Berger?”
“Of course not. Don’t be afraid to ask, Chief Inspector. If I can help in any way to throw light on this terrible tragedy, I’d be only too pleased to do so.”
No, Van Veeteren thought. I’m not normally accused of being afraid to ask questions. Let’s see if you are afraid of answering them.
“How did you discover that Eva was being unfaithful?” he asked to start with.
It was a shot in the dark, but he saw immediately that he had scored a bull’s-eye. Berger reacted so violently that the ice cube he was in the process of dropping into his glass landed on the floor.
“Oh, bugger,” he said, groping around in the shaggy carpet.
Van Veeteren waited calmly.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
It was so amateurish that Van Veeteren couldn’t help smiling.
“Did you find out yourself, or did she tell you?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Inspector.”
“Or did somebody else tip you off?”
Berger hesitated.
“Who has told you about this, Inspector?”
“I’m afraid we shall have to stick to the rules, Mr. Berger, even if you have served me a delicious dinner.”
“What rules?”
“I ask the questions, you answer them.”
Berger said nothing. Sipped his drink.
“You really have been most hospitable,” said Van Veeteren, making a vague gesture that incorporated the food, the wine, the whiskey, the open fire, and all the other things Berger had provided: but your thinking time is now over!
“All right,” said Berger. “There was another man. Yes, that’s the way it looked.”
“You’re not certain?”
“It was never confirmed. Not a hundred percent.”
“You mean that she didn’t confess?”
Berger gave a laugh.
“Confess? No, she certainly didn’t. She denied his existence as if her life depended on it.”
Perhaps it did, Van Veeteren thought.
“Can you tell me about it?”
Berger leaned back and lit a cigarette. Inhaled deeply a few times before answering. It was obvious that he needed a few seconds to plan what he was going to say, before starting to speak. Van Veeteren acceded to his wish.
“I saw them,” Berger said eventually. “It was the spring of 1986, March or April or thereabouts. I saw them together twice, and I have reason to believe that they carried on meeting occasionally until the middle of May, at least. There was something. . Well, I could see it in her, of course. She wasn’t the kind of woman who could keep a secret, you might say. It was sort of written in her face that something was wrong.
Anyway, I suppose you understand what I mean, Inspector?”
Van Veeteren nodded.
“Can you say exactly when it all started?”
“Easter. It was the Thursday before Easter in 1986. I don’t know the date. It was one of those cases of sheer coincidence-
I’ve thought a lot about that afterward. I saw them in a car, during the lunch break. I had to drive through the center of town in order to meet a researcher in Irgenau, and they were diagonally in front of me, in another car. . ”
“You’re sure it was your wife?”
“One hundred percent.”
“And the man?”
“Do you mean what did he look like?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know. He was driving. Eva was sitting next to him; I could see her in profile when she turned her head to talk to him, but all I could see of him were his shoulders and the back of his neck. They were in the right- hand lane, ready to turn off; I was going straight on. When the lights changed to green, they turned right. I had no chance of following them, even if I’d wanted to. I think. . I think I was a bit shocked as well.”
“Shocked? How could you know that she was being. .
unfaithful? Wasn’t it possible for your wife to be sitting in somebody else’s car for some perfectly innocent reason?”
“Of course. That’s what I tried to tell myself as well. But her reaction when I asked her about it was quite. . well, it left no room for doubt.”
“Meaning what?”
“She was extremely upset. Claimed that she had been at home all day, and I was either mistaken or lying and was trying to destroy our relationship. And lots of other things along similar lines.”
“And it’s not possible that she might have been right?”
“No. I started to query what I’d seen, naturally. . But after a few weeks, we were back there again. A colleague of mine saw them together in a cafe. It was most distressing.
He mentioned it in passing, as a sort of joke, but I’m afraid I lost my cool.”
“What did Eva have to say this time?”
“The same as before. That was what was so odd. She
denied everything, and was just as upset as the previous time, said that my colleague was a liar, claimed she’d never set foot in that cafe. It was so flagrant, the whole thing; I thought it was beneath her dignity to lie, as you might say. And to lie over and over again. I told her it was much more difficult to cope with the lies than with her infidelity. The odd thing was that she seemed to agree with me.”
