everything else! The Chief Inspector ’s son has been murdered: if somebody shoots the minister of home affairs or somebody rapes the Pope, those cases are mothballed until we’ve solved this one. Is that clear? Have you understood? Does anybody object? In which case he or she had better apply for a move somewhere else without more ado! Fuck, fuck, fuck! Off the record, that is.’
‘I agree,’ said Rooth.
Presumably everybody else did as well. At any rate, nobody spoke up. The atmosphere round the table was already stuffy. Reinhart had managed to cram four extra chairs into his office — there were plenty of larger rooms in the police station of course, but nowhere else where he could smoke to his heart’s content: since their daughter was born he had come to an agreement with his wife only to smoke outside their home.
Anyway, there were seven officers leading the investigation. Inspectors Moreno, Rooth and Jung. Constable Krause, just as young and promising as usual. Intendent deBries and a newly appointed Detective-Sergeant Bollmert, on loan from Aarlach until Intendent Munster returned from his duties in connection with the official inquiry: Munster was taking it easy after being stabbed in the kidney while on duty ten months ago. And working too many long hours.
Plus himself, of course: Chief Inspector Reinhart, as he now was. Although whenever anybody spoke about the chief inspector, they were never referring to him — unless Chief of Police Hiller was trying to be ironic, or even simply amusing. The Chief Inspector always meant Chief Inspector Van Veeteren, who had been in charge of the Maardam CID for fifteen years, and its leading light for twice as long as that. But for over two years now he had descended from the Judicial Parnassus in order to freewheel down the path to his retirement as part-owner and shop assistant in Krantze’s antiquarian bookshop in Kupinskis Grand.
And good luck to him: nobody begrudged him the peace and quiet and the books, and nobody failed to miss him with a mixture of fear and trembling, respect and admiration.
And now he was once again involved in a case. The Chief Inspector. In the worst possible way… Not as a victim, but very nearly. His son had been murdered. Bloody hell! Reinhart thought. Bloody, fucking hell! Many times during his so-called career he had thought that things couldn’t get any worse, nothing could be worse than this. But what had happened now was indeed worse. More infernally awful that he could ever have imagined.
I must try to suppress my personal fury, he thought. Must try to keep it at arm’s length, otherwise it will only get in the way.
‘We must try to ignore the involvement of The Chief Inspector,’ he said. ‘The way in which we are personally involved in this case through him. We must go about things in exactly the same way as we would do in any other case… Although we can give it the highest priority, of course. We must solve it. Or there’ll be hell to pay. But we must be professional.’
He fumbled around and eventually produced the right sheet of paper from the piles on the table in front of him, and cleared his throat.
‘Erich Van Veeteren was killed by two blows to the head with a blunt instrument. Either of the two blows could have been fatal. Especially the second one, which hit the back of his head, Meusse says
… He ascribes to it a touch of professionalism. The weapon seems to have been rather heavy… Made of metal and with no protruding edges — perhaps a piece of piping or something of the sort. We haven’t recovered it.’
‘A pity,’ said deBries. ‘It would have made things easier.’
Reinhart stared at him for a moment before continuing.
‘Time: Tuesday evening. In view of observations made in the Trattoria Commedia, probably shortly after 18.15. It seems that the killer struck in the car park, then dragged his victim into the bushes. The body lay there until Saturday, when we received a tip-off from a telephone caller. We can only guess what happened to whatever the victim had in his pockets. Either the murderer took them himself, or somebody else did. The somebody else could well be synonymous with our anonymous telephone caller. Clues? Leads? Motives? Not a thing! Any comments?’
‘Was there any trace of drugs in his clothes?’ wondered Sergeant Bollmert. Presumably in an attempt to make an impression, Reinhart thought. The ruddy-faced sergeant had only been in post in Maardam for a couple of weeks, and was especially keen to distinguish himself. That was nothing to hold against him, of course.
The fact that he had never met The Chief Inspector could perhaps also be seen as an advantage. Given the circumstances.
‘Not in his clothes,’ said Reinhart. ‘Not in his blood, not in his hair or nails. We can no doubt confirm that his girlfriend was telling the truth about that. It’s a pity he didn’t tell her what he was going to do out at Dikken, so that we could have had her word on that as well.’
‘The fact that he didn’t do so suggests that whatever he was going to do wasn’t entirely above board, don’t you think?’ said Rooth. ‘He said nothing about it to the girl, nor to Otto Meyer, whose boat he had been working on earlier that afternoon.’
‘Didn’t he even say he was going to Dikken?’ asked Moreno. ‘To that Meyer character, that is.’
‘Nope,’ said Jung. ‘Just that he’d have to leave at half past four as he had a little job to do.’
‘Job?’ said Reinhart. ‘Did he actually use that word?’
Jung nodded.
‘We pressed Meyer pretty hard on that point. Yes, he called it a “job”. No doubt about it. Anyway, he left the boathouse down at Greitzengraacht a few minutes after half past four. They’d been doing some sort of refurbishing work in the cabin, and the intention was that they’d continue this week. It’s a pretty smart boat, I have to say — eighteen metres, six bunks, teak panels, bar cupboard, the whole caboodle. Meyer’s a bloody crook, of course, but one of the socially acceptable kind, nothing for us.’
‘And he didn’t have anything more he could tell us?’ asked Reinhart.
‘Not a squeak,’ said Rooth.
Jung shrugged and looked apologetic. Reinhart sighed.
‘Brilliant,’ he said. ‘Our case is about as substantial as a vegan on laxatives. Has anybody anything else to add?’
He knew the answer already, but looked round the room even so and tried to seem optimistic.
‘The address book,’ said deBries in the end.
‘Precisely,’ said Reinhart. ‘On the ball as usual. How’s it going?’
DeBries thrust his arms out wide and narrowly missed hitting Rooth on the chin.
‘No need to converse in semaphore, you bloody idiot,’ said Rooth.
Bollmert laughed nervously.
‘It’s going like clockwork,’ said deBries, unrepentant. ‘There are a hundred and forty-six private individuals listed in the book, and about fifty institutions or similar. Plus a dozen or so incomprehensible entries — crossings out, vague scribbles and suchlike. He’s evidently had the book for six or seven years, that’s what his girlfriend estimates anyway — although she’s only known him for three. She’s been able to identify thirty-five people so far: we’ll start checking tomorrow.’
‘Are there any people the pair of them knew who aren’t in the book?’ asked Jung.
DeBries shook his head.
‘Not really. He’s been pretty scrupulous, it seems. A bloke they met at a party only a few weeks ago is duly listed, for instance.’
‘Hmm,’ said Reinhart. ‘So you reckon the murderer is in there somewhere, among all those names?’
‘If it was somebody he knew, there’s a pretty good chance.’
‘Good,’ said Reinhart. ‘You have Moreno, Krause and Sergeant Bollmert to help you — and make bloody sure you are careful and don’t miss anything. Meet ’em all face to face and record every single conversation. A bit of idle chatter on the phone isn’t good enough, remember that. Prepare a list of questions to ask them all, and show it to me first. What their alibi is for last Tuesday, and so on. No kid gloves, right? Is that clear? It’s all we’ve got to go on for the time being.’
‘Crystal clear,’ said deBries. ‘I’m not an idiot.’
‘That can be an advantage sometimes,’ muttered Reinhart. He lit his pipe and blew a few thick clouds of smoke over those present.
‘What about this girlfriend of his?’ said Jung. ‘Hadn’t we better have a session with her? About the last few days, what they were doing and so on?’
