‘Let’s hear it,’ she said.
He thought for a while.
‘Triple-headed and Satanic,’ he said. ‘Yes, that’s exactly what it is. Would you like a glass of wine?’
‘I think so,’ said Winnifred. ‘As we know, the Devil is triple-headed in Dante already, so all is in order.’
‘In Dante’s time women who knew too much were burnt at the stake. Red or white?’
‘Red. No, it was later than Dante. Well?’
Reinhart got up and went into the kitchen. Poured out two glasses and came back. Lay down on the sofa again and started his narration. It took quite a while, and she didn’t interrupt him a single time.
‘And the three heads?’ she said when he’d finished.
Reinhart took a drink before answering.
‘In the first place,’ he said, ‘we haven’t the faintest idea who did it. That’s bad enough in routine cases.’
‘I’m familiar with that,’ said Winnifred.
‘In the second place it’s The Chief Inspector ’s son who’s the victim.’
‘Nasty,’ said Winnifred. ‘And the third?’
Reinhart paused once more to think.
‘In the third place, he was presumably mixed up in something. If we find a killer, we shall presumably also find that Erich Van Veeteren was mixed up in something illegal. Yet again. Despite what his girlfriend says… That’s unlikely to be something to warm the cockles of his father’s heart, don’t you think?’
‘I understand,’ said Winnifred, swirling her wine round in its glass. ‘Yes, it’s three-headed all right. But how certain is it that he was involved in something illegal? That doesn’t necessarily have to be the case, surely?’
‘Certain and certain,’ said Reinhart, tapping his forehead with his middle finger. ‘There are signals in here that can’t be ignored. Besides… besides, he’s asked to be left alone face to face with the murderer when we eventually find him. The Chief Inspector, that is. Hell’s bells… But I think I understand him.’
Winnifred thought for a moment.
‘It’s not a nice story,’ she said. ‘Could it be much worse, in fact? It sounds almost as if it’s been stage- managed in some way.’
‘That’s what he always says,’ said Reinhart.
11
The police’s appeal for help in the Dikken case was plastered all over the main newspapers in Maardam on Tuesday, exactly a week after the murder, and by five o’clock in the afternoon ten people had rung to say they had been at the Trattoria Commedia on the day in question. Jung and Rooth were delegated to look into the tip-offs, and eliminated six of them as ‘of secondary interest’ (Rooth’s term), as the timing didn’t fit in. The remaining four had evidently been in the restaurant during the period 17.00–18.30, and all four were kind enough to turn up at the police station during the evening to be interrogated.
The first was Rupert Pilzen, a fifty-eight-year-old bank manager who lived in Weimaar Alle in Dikken, and had slipped into the Commedia and sat in the bar for a while. A little whisky and a beer, that’s all. A quarter past five until a quarter to six, roughly speaking. While he waited for his wife to prepare the evening meal — he sometimes indulged in that pleasure after a hard day’s work, he explained. When he had time.
He lifted up his spectacles while he studied the photographs of Erich Van Veeteren carefully. Then stated that he had never seen the man before, neither at the Commedia nor anywhere else, and he looked ostentatiously at his glistening wristwatch. He had presumably planned to pay another well-deserved visit to the bar, which was now becoming less likely a possibility, Jung reckoned.
Was there anything else he had noticed that he thought could be of relevance to the case?
No.
Any faces he recalled?
No.
Had there been any other customers in the bar?
Pilzen furrowed his brow and retracted his double chins into deep folds. No, he had been alone there all the time. Oh, hang on, a woman had come in just before he left. Short hair, about forty, probably a feminist. She’d sat at the bar and ordered a drink. Quite a long way away from him. With a newspaper, he seemed to recall. That was all.
‘If there had been a second bar, she would no doubt have sat there instead,’ said Rooth when herr Pilzen had waddled out on his unsteady legs. ‘You fat slob.’
‘Hmm,’ said Jung. ‘People get like that when they’ve too much money and no lofty interests. You’d become like that as well. If you had any money, that is.’
‘Go and fetch the next one,’ said Rooth.
The next one turned out to be a couple. Herr and fru Schwarz, who didn’t live in Dikken but had been visiting somebody they knew out there to discuss business. Exactly what was irrelevant. On the way back they had stopped off at the Commedia for a meal, a little luxury they granted themselves occasionally. Going out for a meal. Not just to Trattoria Commedia, but to restaurants in general. Especially now, when they had more or less retired. Yes indeed. Just once or twice a week.
They were both around sixty-five, and recognized Erich Van Veeteren immediately when Jung produced the photographs. He had been eating — a simple pasta dish, if fru Schwartz remembered rightly — at a table a few metres away from their own. They had ordered fish. Turbot, to be precise. Yes, the young man had been on his own. He had paid and left the restaurant at more or less the same time as they were being served their dessert. Shortly after six.
Were there any other guests while they were eating?
Just a young couple sitting further back in the restaurant section. They arrived shortly before six and probably ordered that same cheap pasta dish. Both of them. They were still there when herr and fru Schwartz had finished. Half past six or thereabouts.
Had they noticed anything else of interest?
No — such as?
Had they noticed any customers sitting in the bar?
No, they couldn’t see the bar from their table.
Was there anybody there when they passed through on the way out?
Maybe, they weren’t sure. Oh yes, a little man in a dark suit, that’s right. A bit dark-skinned, in fact. An Arab, perhaps. Or an Indian or something like that.
Rooth ground his teeth. Jung thanked them, and promised — in response to fru Schwartz’s pressing request — that they would make sure they had the murderer under lock and key in a trice.
Because it was terrible. In Dikken of all places. Did they recall that whore who was crucified there a few years ago?
Yes, they did — but thank you very much, they must now talk to the next representative of that great detective, the general public.
Her name was Lisen Berke. She was in her forties, and had been in the bar at the Trattoria Commedia between a quarter to six and half past, approximately. She declined to explain why she had gone there — she had the right to go for a drink wherever she liked if she felt like it, for God’s sake.
‘Of course you do,’ said Jung.
‘Or two,’ said Rooth. ‘Come to that.’
‘Do you recognize this person?’ Jung asked, showing her the photographs.
She studied them for three seconds then shook her head for four.
‘He was sitting at one of the tables in the restaurant, between-’
‘Is he the one who’s been killed?’ she interrupted.
‘Yes,’ said Rooth. ‘Did you see him?’
‘No. I was sitting reading my paper.’
‘I see,’ said Rooth.
