Was there any other possibility? This must be what consti-tuted the categories of a god.
These patterns.
But if there was no higher force-did it really make much difference?
What about Anselm and the proof of God’s existence?
Hadn’t he always had trouble in seeing the point of it?
He fumbled in his breast pocket for a toothpick, then remembered the state of affairs and lit a cigarette instead.
Wouldn’t the pattern exist even so, in the same way as DNA spirals and the crystals making up snowflakes have always existed, irrespective of whether there has been anyone or anything to observe them?
What does a fractal care about a camera? he asked himself.
Good questions. Recurring questions. He put down his
cigarette, poked listlessly at his fettuccine and took a sip of wine. It was hard to feel really hungry these days, for whatever reason. Whether it was due to the missing piece of bowel or something else.
Justice was another aspect.
Simpler and easier to deal with, he had always thought, even if he had never really needed to put it to the ultimate test.
Despite more than thirty years in the force.
The tool of justice. That was how he needed to regard himself, after all, if he was to be really serious about it. It sounded a little high-flown, even a little pathetic; but it wasn’t something he went on about. It was merely an attitude he adopted in order to motivate himself, but it was a damned important one.
When it came to justifying his own existence and the work he did, he sometimes needed to dig deep, that was something he had learned. Deeper and deeper, perhaps-as if with every year that passed the very foundations became coated with a new and thicker layer of mud and dirt stirred up by the underworld in which he spent every working day.
Something like that anyway.
He still hadn’t found an answer to the key question. He had formulated it several years ago in connection with the G file, and it wasn’t especially complicated: Am I prepared to take things into my own hands when the law and the institutions fail?
If he was standing beside a murderer or some other violent criminal, and knew for certain-with 100 percent certainty-
that the person was guilty, would it be morally more correct to let him go because of lack of proof rather than ensuring that justice was done?
He inhaled on his cigarette.
There were endless special cases, of course, and it was impossible to oversee the consequences. He had been through it all many times in theory, and perhaps he ought to be grateful that he hadn’t needed to put the theory to the test.
It had been a close thing at times, though. Especially then, seven years ago, in Linden.
And there was nothing to indicate that it would become relevant on this occasion, either.
Or was there?
He looked at his watch and saw that it was high time he paid and set off for her apartment, if he didn’t want the nun to have to wait for him.
The apartment was painted white and tastefully appointed.
There was a minimum of furniture; in the living room, which is where she took him, there was only a low couch, two floor cushions and a table, with a bookcase and a prayer bench in a corner. On the walls were a crucifix and two candles in brass holders. And a picture of a church window, probably Chartres Cathedral. That was all.
No television, no armchairs, no knickknacks. The floor was covered by a large dark-colored carpet.
Good, thought Van Veeteren, sitting down on the couch.
Nothing but essentials. The essence.
She served tea from an earthernware teapot. Simple cups, without handles. Thin cookies. No sugar, no milk. She didn’t even ask if he wanted any, but he didn’t, in any case.
She was old, at least fifteen years older than Van Veeteren, but she radiated vitality and alertness like an aura. It was clear that he was facing a person who inspired and demanded respect beyond the norm. The familiar feeling of deference came creeping up on him, the kind he sometimes felt when confronted by deeply religious and serene individuals-people who had worked out the answer to questions he himself had barely been able to formulate. A deference that was just as naturally complemented by its opposite, contempt and loathing, when he met the opposite type: submissive and loudly braying sheep, dominated by the herd instinct, the sanctimonious fellow travelers of hypocrisy.
He had sensed her qualities the moment they shook hands; she was a slim, erect woman with serious- looking brown eyes and a high forehead. She sat down opposite him, sinking onto one of the cushions with a graceful movement reminiscent of a curtsy. It struck him that as she squatted there with her legs hidden underneath her in the Asian manner, she could almost have been a twenty-five-year-old Buddhist woman. But in fact she was a Roman Catholic nun, three times as old as that.
“Help yourself,” she said.
He sipped the aromatic tea, groping for the folder he had placed on the floor beside him.
“I think I must ask you to clarify your intentions once more.”
He nodded. It was obvious that to produce the folder and the form would be an insult. Klimke’s razor, that he had justifi-ably thrown into the face of the chief of police only the other day, now threatened to bring shame upon himself, and nobody else.
“I must apologize,” he said. “My name is indeed Van
Veeteren, but I am not who I said I was. I am a detective chief inspector, stationed in Maardam. My visit has to do with a case that I would prefer not to go into in detail. Will you be satisfied with my assurance that I have the best of intentions, but am dealing with a matter wallowing in evil?”
She smiled.
“Yes,” she said. “It’s to do with Anna, if I understood you rightly?”
Van Veeteren nodded.
“She lived here with you for a few years before she died, I think. From 1987 to 1992, is that correct?”
“Yes.”
“You cared for her and looked after her?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because that is my vocation. That’s the way we work in our order. It’s a way of creating meaning. And love between people. Anna got in touch with us; there are about twenty of us sisters, and I was free at the time.”
He thought for a moment.
“I take it that you became. . quite close to her?”
“We meant a lot to each other.”
“Confided in each other?”
“Of course.”
“Can you tell me about her illness?”
“What do you want to know?”
“Was she confined to bed all the time, for instance?”
It was clear to him that she already knew and had considered in advance what the conversation would be about, but perhaps that didn’t matter.
“She improved.”
“Improved?”
She suddenly became more serious.
“Yes, Chief Inspector. She improved. You are doubtless aware that her wounds were not confined to her hips. There is such a thing as a soul as well.”
“So I’ve heard,” said Van Veeteren with unintentional irony. “What on earth are you hinting at?”
