I don’t believe that Yellinek would do such a thing.
VV:
What do you think of Oscar Yellinek?
MU:
He’s a great man.
VV:
What do you mean by that?
MU:
He is in contact with Eternal Life and the One True God. It is a blessing to be in his vicinity.
VV:
Do your fellow sisters think the same way?
MU:
Of course.
VV:
I see. And your confirmation candidates?
MU:
I’m sure they do. You notice it as soon as you come into close contact with him.
VV:
Really? Can you give me an idea of the form the teaching takes?
MU:
Yellinek talks to the girls. We pray together. We try to cast out evil thoughts and purify ourselves.
VV:
How?
MU:
In various ways. By means of certain exercises. By prayer. By letting ourselves go…
VV:
What do you do when you let yourselves go?
[Silence for a few seconds.]
MU:
I don’t want to talk about this with outsiders. It’s easy to misunderstand. You have to be initiated in order to see it in the right way, it needs training…
VV:
Do you make love to Oscar Yellinek?
MU:
We live in intense harmony and intimacy.
VV:
Even sexually?
MU:
We are biological beings, Chief Inspector. We don’t impose the same limits as you do, that’s the difference between the Pure Life and the Other World.
VV:
The Other World?
MU:
The world you live in.
VV:
What have you to say about Yellinek being in prison for indecency and other crimes?
MU:
Jesus Christ was crucified to redeem our sins.
VV:
Do you compare Oscar Yellinek with Jesus Christ?
MU:
Of course.
[Another, quite long silence, apart from a noise that sounded like a heavy stone being pushed over the floor. It was some time before Van Veeteren realized that it wasn’t a stone, but a groan. Coming from him.]
VV:
Do your confirmands also live in intense harmony and intimacy with Oscar Yellinek?
MU:
Of course not. Not in the same way.
VV:
But the girls are sometimes naked in his presence.
MU:
It’s not the way you think it is, Chief Inspector. We are surrounded by ill will and slander, just like…
VV:
Like what?
MU:
Just like the first Christians.
VV:
So you compare yourselves to the first Christians?
MU:
There are a lot of similarities.
[Silence. Then the scraping sound of a chair. A match being lit and then blown out.]
VV:
Thank you, Miss Ubrecht. I don’t think I have any more questions to ask you.
‘For Christ’s sake!’ muttered the chief inspector, hopping over the conversation with Madeleine Zander, the woman he had spoken to the first time he visited Waldingen. I can’t face the same drivel all over again! he thought. The only things about her that were different from the others were that she had been a member since the very start, and that she had been married. Madeleine Zander was the eldest of the three – forty-six years old – and she had a grown-up daughter from a marriage that presumably lasted just long enough to conceive her and bring her into the world, the chief inspector thought.
Well, not really thought: hoped, rather.
Later – in the car on the way back to Sorbinowo – he had tried to recapitulate and home in on any signs of disharmony between the three women – envy, jealousy or something of that sort – but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t recall any such indications in his interviews.
But then again, he had hardly set out to trap them. On the contrary. He had behaved in a friendly and gentlemanly manner all the time. Just as he always did. So perhaps it was best not to pass judgement.
That could apply to the whole of this damned business, he thought. If it were just a crime novel, it would probably be best for it to remain unwritten – it contained so little of substance.
Mind you, the same could be said of rather a lot of things.
However, here he was, no matter what. Two hundred kilometres from Maardam and eleven days from Crete.
There are waiting rooms and there are waiting rooms, he had just read in Klimke’s meditations. But trains no longer run from most stations.
He decided to investigate that situation as far as Sorbinowo was concerned. He had only seen the station from a distance, but it hadn’t seemed especially lively.
Just as an indication, that is.
He had spoken to two of the girls, and after some thought had chosen to take them together rather than
