44
“I’ll be damned if this whole affair isn’t a genuine Greek tragedy,” said Van Veeteren, closing the car door. “There’s an inevitability about it from the very beginning. As you know, incest was regarded as one of the worst sins you can possibly commit. Nothing less than a crime against the gods.”
Munster nodded. Backed out of the parking lot.
“Just imagine it,” said Van Veeteren. “You’re thirteen, fourteen years old. The early stages of puberty. You’re sensitive and as vulnerable as an open wound. A boy on the way to becoming a man. The first tentative steps. What’s the first thing you identify with?”
“Your father,” said Munster. He’s been through this himself, he thought.
“Right. And what does your father do? He drinks like a fish and demeans himself. He hits you. He really beats you up, not just once, but night after night, perhaps. He tortures you, he insults you. Your mother is too weak to intervene. She’s as scared of him as you are. You pretend it isn’t happening. You keep quiet and let it carry on, keeping it inside the family. You are defenseless. You have no rights: he’s your parent and he’s fully within his rights. You’ve nowhere to turn to, nowhere to find consolation-apart from one person. There’s only one person who can comfort you. . ”
“Your sister.”
“Who also gets beaten sometimes, but not nearly so often.
She is there, she’s a bit stronger than you are, a little less wounded. She’s there in the room you share when you finally get away from him. Let’s say you’re fourteen years old, both of you. You lie in bed together, and she consoles you. You snuggle up to her and she protects you. She places her healing hands on your body. . you’re fourteen years old. . you hold tightly on to each other, you feel safe in each other’s arms, and you can hear him ranting and raving. He sets on your mother instead, demands his conjugal rights. . Hell and damnation, Munster!”
Munster coughed tentatively.
“It’s night now and you are naked. You’re fourteen, you’re brother and sister. There’s nothing wrong in what you do, Munster-who the hell is going to blame them for it? Who apart from the gods has the right to condemn these two children for the way things turn out? For becoming lovers? Who, Munster? Who?”
“I don’t know,” said Munster.
“Can you understand what she gave him?” said Van
Veeteren, taking a deep breath. “To be able to come to a woman when you are beaten and degraded and worthless. .
To a woman who is your lover, your mother, and your sister.
All at the same time. Is there any love that could be stronger than that, Munster? Just imagine being in love for the first time, and everything is perfect from the very start. . That love, that relationship is so strong that it must be more durable than anything else you will ever experience in the rest of your life. . Hell and damnation, Munster, what chance did he have?”
“How long did that go on for?” Munster asked.
“Two or three years, I’d have thought. He seems to be a bit vague about exactly when it began. Most likely it was just as strong on both sides for quite a long time. I think Eva eventually managed to escape from it-not because she really wanted to, but because she knew it was wrong. Forbidden.
Impossible to keep going.”
“But for him it was just as impossible to stop,” said Munster.
Van Veeteren lit a cigarette.
“Yes, but she rejected him. What went on in that household, both while the father was still alive and afterward. .
well, I’d rather not think about it, Munster.”
“And then there was Paul Bejsen,” said Munster.
“Yes. Perhaps it was no more than an attempt from her side; I don’t think she was really in love with him. She probably took him to demonstrate that what had been was now over and done with, beyond recall. And Rolf, well, he. .”
“Bided his time,” said Munster.
“You could say that, yes,” said Van Veeteren. “He waited for an opportunity to show how serious he was. And when that party took place, he saw his chance.”
“He waited out there on the moor,” said Munster.
“Exactly. Wandered around in the darkness hoping for an opportunity. Like a werewolf, almost.”
“Did he tell you all this as well?”
Van Veeteren nodded.
“Yes. Telegram style, mind you. That was almost twenty years ago. The statutory limitation is twenty-one years-so we’d be able to prosecute him for that murder as well, if anybody thought there was any point in doing so.”
“And Eva forced him to go away?”
“Yes. She gave him an ultimatum. Either he disappeared or she would turn him in. Put yourself in his situation, Munster.
He committed murder, not only because he was jealous, but also to demonstrate how strong his love was. And she rejected him. I think he came close to committing suicide during those months; he hinted as much. And during the early part of his exile as well. Perhaps. .”
“. . it would have been just as well,” said Munster, finishing the sentence for him.
“Have we any right to think that?” Van Veeteren asked.
“Have we?”
Munster made no reply. Glanced at his watch. A quarter to six.
“What time does the plane leave? Half past seven?”
Van Veeteren nodded.
“I have to check in an hour in advance.”
“We’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
Neither of them spoke for a few seconds, but Munster could sense that they needed to go through everything.
“What about this Ellen Caine?” he said.
“Ah, yes,” said Van Veeteren. “He got by for eight years-
pretty remarkable, that, to say the least, but he got a grip on himself. Settled down in Toronto, drifted from one job to another, but kept himself afloat. Until he met a woman. He claims she was the one who went running after him, rather than the other way around, and that’s probably right. In any case, she was unable to give him a fraction of what he received from Eva. God only knows what goes through his mind when it comes to sex and women, Munster. But he demands the impossible, because he has experienced the impossible. Then he killed Ellen Caine because she let him down. I don’t know if she left him, he didn’t want to speak about that. Perhaps he couldn’t cope with being a lover, perhaps there was an ele-ment of good old honest jealousy involved. Anyway, he killed her. Threw her off a viaduct in the path of a long-distance truck. It never occurred to anybody that it was anything but an accident, or possibly suicide. Nobody knew he was anywhere in the vicinity.”
“Why did he change his name?”
“I think he’d started to think about coming back to Europe with a new identity. As early as that, after the Ellen business. In 1980 or thereabouts. He moved to New York, in any case, became an American citizen after a few years, and changed his name to Carl Ferger. He seems to have led a more or less normal life. Superficially, at least. But nevertheless, it’s a riddle, Munster. What made him come back here in January 1986?
Not even he can give an explanation.”
“The determinant, perhaps?” said Munster with a faint smile.
“What?” exclaimed Van Veeteren in surprise. “God Almighty, I do believe Inspector Munster has begun to catch on to a few things! Whatever, he came back here, tracked down Eva, and started pestering her. In every possible way, no doubt. Presumably the very fact of suddenly being in her vicinity became more or less unbearable for him. That’s what he says, at least. Naturally, he was extremely jealous of Berger; but the worst thing was the
