Zen and the Art of Murder

  “Are you in pain?”

  “No, just tired.”

  She closed her eyes and thought of the dead man. She saw him hurrying over to the Mégane from the side, then the passenger window shattered and he vanished. She couldn’t recall his voice, only what he’d said. The pain, the panic in his words. Shit, you’ve really got to get me to Steiner! Fucking hell! She hadn’t intended to kill him, but she felt no sympathy or remorse.

  Then the dead man was standing in a garden and he looked like Landen. Beside him stood Pham. They were holding hands and gazing at Louise. They seemed to be waiting for her.

  16

  Her father was waiting for her at the hospital, sitting in the same chair as the day before, wearing the same suit. She could tell that he hadn’t slept well. It made her dizzy to think that he had lain in the Anatol bedclothes. In a more hostile tone than she had intended, she said, “Papa, there’s something we’ve got to discuss.”

  He nodded.

  She sat on the bed. “I want you to move to a hotel.”

  “A hotel?” In astonishment he said, “-otel.”

  Slowly she lay down. Her shoulder throbbed, and only now did she realize how exhausted she was. How feeble and dispirited. Ever since her little, wicked friend had bored its way inside her she felt she was losing the will to revolt against the course of things. It had cut a swath inside her where despondency and apathy were now thriving. An unfamiliar awareness of her impotence.

  She heard her father stand up. Then she felt his hands on her feet. He untied her laces and took off her shoes.

  She looked at him. “Thanks.” From his expression she tried to work out whether he’d detected Anatol in her apartment. Tidied away her underwear, discovered her supplies of alcohol, glimpsed the abyss.

  “Can I ask you something, Louise?”

  “If you have to.”

  “Where were you?”

  She mulled over whether to tell him about the Vosges. About how she’d thought of his family and Gérardmer on the way there. But she was too tired and said simply, “Away on duty.”

  He sat on the bed beside her and stared at her left shoulder, which was as bulked up as a rugby player’s. “I don’t want to press you, Louise, but what does away on duty mean? I haven’t a clue about what you do. I know you work for Kripo and I know your rank and your colleague, Herr Lederle. But I’ve no idea what your office looks like, what cases you’re working on or what precisely your tasks are.”

  “I never got the impression that these things interested you, Papa.”

  “Because I never asked. I knew you were a policewoman and that was enough, because I thought I knew what that meant. I was impressed, reassured and proud—it’s a hugely important profession. More important than anything I’ve ever done. The idea that you were fighting crime for the rest of us gave me such admiration for you. My daughter is a policewoman.” He smiled. “Whenever I read in the paper that the Kehl police had solved a crime I always thought, Louise is a policewoman in Freiburg. She keeps the peace in Freiburg. I never thought that she might die doing it.”

  “But I’m not dying, Papa.”

  She slid gingerly off the bed and went to the window. Outside everything was white, but it wasn’t snowing. The sun reflected harshly on the snow-covered roofs and icy squares of grass. Out of the blue she found herself wondering if Chervel and Justin were interrogating the people they’d arrested. If Steiner was talking. If the Liebau task force had found more clues.

  “I don’t want to stay in a hotel,” her father said from the bed. “I want to stay in your apartment. I feel I can get to know you better that way. And that we have a close relationship.”

  “Papa—”

  “Please let me stay, Louise.” He sounded solemn.

  She turned to face him. Louise didn’t want to think about these things. All that mattered to her now were Pham and the other children. Maybe Richard Landen too. She had no energy for anything else.

  She nodded.

  After her father had left, Louise fell asleep. With lunch came a doctor she had never seen before. He said, “We’re going to take a look at that wound this afternoon, and if everything’s OK you can go home tomorrow. Enjoy your lunch.”

  She sat up and took hold of the cutlery. “I don’t want to go home yet.”

  He laughed. “Our food’s not that great.” Raising a hand in farewell, he left.

  That afternoon the young, round senior doctor arrived with a junior doctor and a nurse, and eagerly unwrapped her bandage. In the evening the lunchtime doctor returned to say that the inflammation had gone down, the wound was healing well. She would have to take it easy, two weeks’ rest at home, physiotherapy, I hope we never meet again, laughter, all the best, two manicured hands taking hers and sending her back out into the snow.

  At 9:00 a.m. the following morning Lederle came and drove her home. When she saw her father waiting on the pavement her mood plummeted. In the elevator she almost asked him if he remembered Filbinger.

  A few things had changed in the apartment. Her houseplants were shining, her books neatly ordered and her items of furniture stood at right angles to each other, or to the walls. There were no dirty clothes on the floor, no fluff or hair. The apartment of a quiet, meticulous person in control of their life. “Welcome home, my child,” her father said.

  She curled her lip.

  First she looked in her bedroom. The bedclothes had been changed. By the half-open window was a clothes horse with whites hung up to dry. A sheet and some underwear. Her underwear.

  The bathroom had been cleaned too. No used towels on the edge of the tub, no hair in the hairbrush or drain. No spare sanitary pads by the sink.

  She went back into the sitting room.

  Her father was standing beside the sofa, an odd glint in his eye. She vaguely remembered that this was what he looked like when he was happy. “Sit down,” he said.

  She drew the curtains and sat. Had he discovered her stash of spirits? Would he try to stop her drinking? Would she have to drink in secret in her own apartment?

  “Fancy a coffee? I bought some milk.”

  She nodded.

  Her father filled the coffee machine with water. Instead of opening the cupboard where she kept the coffee he went to the fridge. Of course! Coffee belonged in the fridge. Besides Filbinger, that too had been a bone of contention in the seventies.

  “I was in Günterstal recently.”

  “On duty?”

  She gave him a reluctant smile. “So to speak.”

  “I can hardly believe there’s crime in Günterstal.” Her father poured milk into a pan, set it on the burner and switched the stove on. His familiarity with her kitchen was suffocating. It turned the kitchen into his kitchen, the apartment into his apartment.

  She said, “Filbinger lives in Günterstal.”

  “Filbinger?”

  “Hans Filbinger.”

  He nodded vacantly. Did he really not remember? Or did he not want to remember? Did he not want her to remind him?

  She turned away. On the coffee table was Henning Mankell’s The Fifth Woman. Near the middle pages was a scrap of newspaper—her bookmark. At the beginning was a piece of notepaper—presumably her father’s bookmark. She took a deep breath, in and out. She needed something to drink.

  In the cupboard beneath the sink were the vodka, the bourbon and the ţuică. In the tiny pantry was some red wine. In the bathroom cabinet was a half-ounce bottle of Jägermeister. But in front of her father? She couldn’t bring herself to do it. Not yet.

  On the answering machine flashed five messages. Five calls in a week. More than there used to be in a month. She shuffled over to her right, turned the volume control down and pressed play.

  One from Anatol, one from Enni and three from Landen. Three people she hadn’t met until a week ago. Anatol said, “Hey, where are you?” Enni said, “Are you breathing regularly, Inspector?” Landen said, “You left so suddenly.” His last call was from the day before. He
asked about Taro and whether she was now on leave. He wanted to say goodbye as “they” were flying to Japan on Friday.

  Friday was tomorrow.

  She deleted the messages.

  Nobody picked up at Tommo/Landen. After the sixth ring it went on to the answering machine. She hung up and turned to her father.

  “Hans Filbinger, Papa. It was because of him that you and Mama kept yelling at each other.”

  “No, that’s not how it was. We didn’t keep ‘yelling at each other.’”

  “What?”

  “You might say we had a difference of opinion. You ought to know that at the time it was no longer possible to have a normal conversation with your mother. Perhaps that’s why you . . .”

  She leaped up. Her father froze. “I need the bathroom,” she said.

  The Jägermeister was where it belonged.

  To be on the safe side she cleaned her teeth afterward. Then she went back to the sitting room, and said, “What do you mean it was no longer possible to have a normal conversation with her?”

  “She was . . .” Her father stopped, apparently searching for the right words.

  “What was she, Papa?” She sat beside the answering machine.

  “Wait, the coffee.” Her father filled two cups. For several seconds he stared into the pan with the milk. Then he switched off the stove, poured milk into the cups and carried them to the sofa. Like her mother, he hadn’t remarried either. She hadn’t met any girlfriends. Names had never been mentioned. It seemed as if they had destroyed each other for good.

  When he sat beside her she got up. He handed her one of the cups. “She was ill, Louise. Psychologically ill.”

  “Rubbish.”

  “Very, very ill.”

  “That’s such rubbish, Papa.”

  Her father nodded ruefully. She thought of her mother. Of the strength she still had, even after all those defeats. Why in spite of this strength had she always lost? Didn’t it help to suppress or forget your own past? Did you have to change the past, like her father had? She gazed at him. Now he looked quite calm and self-assured. Nobody could pose a threat to him anymore. Doubts no longer existed. All of a sudden she understood that was why her mother failed. The victors are those who wrap themselves up in delusion.

  She put her hands around the cup and turned to the window. “Let’s get one thing straight, Papa. You say you want to get to know me better. I’m fine with that, but I guarantee you won’t like getting to know me better.”

  “Don’t say things like that, Louise. I’m convinced we can talk everything through, however . . . complicated it all is.”

  The telephone rang. She didn’t move. “That’s not what this is about. I’m asking questions, Papa.”

  “What do you mean, ma chère?”

  Ma chère? She turned to face him. He hadn’t called her that since the late sixties. “If you want to be part of my life, you’re going to have to answer my questions, do you understand that, Papa? I ask questions, that’s how I am. I refuse to be satisfied with not knowing or understanding something. I ask questions, OK? And I can immediately think of at least a dozen questions I want to ask you, questions you almost certainly don’t want to hear. Can I be any clearer?”

  Her father didn’t look at her. “Maybe you ought to answer the phone instead.”

  “And after that, Papa? Can we get going with the questions?”

  “Please, chérie, the phone, the ringing is making me anxious.”

  She picked up. It was Bermann. “We’ve got something,” he said. “And I want you to come with us.”

  Her father said nothing as she got ready to leave. He was standing by the sofa, one hand resting on the arm, the other clenched. She kissed him on both cheeks and went out. She imagined he wouldn’t be there when she got back.

  At some point, when she felt like it, she would drive to Kehl and try to make him understand that the past always began in the present.

  That the past was the present.

  17

  Bermann was double-parked with his engine running. “Are you sober?” he said when she got in. Wonderful, she thought: the old Bermann. Not the one who wanted to talk, but the other one, the simplistic, harmless Bermann. The Yin and Yang Bermann. Without using her left arm she strapped herself in. “Where’s Reiner?”

  “At the station.”

  “Why’s he not coming with us?”

  Bermann shrugged. She sensed that there was a reason and he knew it. Lederle was managing the back-room operation on the task force and those officers rarely went out. But Lederle loved going out. “Right,” Bonì said. “Where are we heading?”

  Bermann took his time, not telling her until they turned off for Günterstal.

  That morning Steiner had begun to talk in the presence of his lawyer. Chervel had called Bermann and briefed him on the key points: Asile d’enfants owned a former farm to the south of Freiburg, a couple of miles beyond Horben. Steiner did not know who was there now.

  On Schauinslandstrasse they joined a convoy of a dozen police cars, some unmarked. Bermann overtook them and went out in front. Bonì’s gaze was fixed on Günterstal, which was rapidly getting closer. Mahler, Natchaya, Annegret Schelling, Fröbick, Lebonne, perhaps Berger, she thought. That made six. Maybe there were employees working at the farmhouse. And the Frenchman she had to thank for her little, wicked friend might be there too. “I want a weapon, Rolf.”

  “Yeah, right,” Bermann said.

  “I’m not going anywhere without a weapon.”

  He glanced at her. “You’re not going anywhere in any case. You’re not doing anything, do you understand? You’re just watching to see if you recognize anyone. The Thai girl, the Frenchman, whoever. None of us has seen them apart from you. When it’s all over someone will bring you home, and we’ll see each other again when you’re dry.”

  “Fuck you, Rolf.”

  “Not in this life.”

  Louise smiled. It was good to have people like Bermann around. Without them you might not realize the value of people like the roshi or Barbara Franke.

  They passed through the town gate of Günterstal. On either side of it were trams that had been stopped by the police. White winter faces stared out of the windows. In front of the Liebfrauenkirche on the right a group of Japanese tourists had gathered around their tour guide, who was carrying an umbrella. They didn’t look in her direction. Ten days earlier she’d driven along this same street with Niksch and thought of Filbinger, as well as the fact that Niksch wanted to be called “Nikki.” Now Filbinger was no longer important and Niksch was dead.

  Soon afterward Wallmer got in touch over the radio. Bermann must have sent her and Schneider ahead. They were standing, she said sotto voce, a hundred yards from the farm on a narrow forest track. She described the road and the position of the farm. Hilly terrain off the road from Horben to Münzenried. Two buildings close together, surrounded on three sides by trees. Both looked occupied—curtains were drawn and one window tilted open. No animals, no dogs as far as they could make out. No cars. No tire marks on the forest track, but that didn’t necessarily mean anything. It had snowed a lot over the past few days.

  Bermann picked up the radio and said, “We’ll be with you in ten.”

  “Should we take a look around?”

  “No, and don’t let anybody catch sight of you.”

  “We could try to go round the . . .”

  “No, Anne, please stay where you are.”

  Bermann put the receiver back in its cradle.

  “Whose name is the farm registered in?” Louise said.

  “Hans-Joachim Gronen.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “We don’t know yet. Someone who doesn’t live in Germany.”

  “Was Steiner ever there?”

  Bermann shrugged.

  She turned to peer out of the window. Who was Hans-Joachim Gronen? Another fan of the Far East?

  A short, stout man was walking along the pavement. She imagined hi
m as a tall, slim man who had just taken the decision not to fly to Japan tomorrow after all.

  On their way out of Günterstal they passed the buildings of the Kyburg. As ever when she was here, Louise thought of how for five years she’d been called “von Kyburg” and at some point she’d come to terms with it. Unlike Mick. I’ve got a ridiculous name, he’d said before introducing himself to her. And after they’d divorced he had said, You’re lucky, you can get rid of that ridiculous name now.

  On the other hand, Michael von Kyburg: Swiss ancestors, counts related to the Habsburgs, all that had of course impressed the secretaries, cashiers, cleaning ladies, sales girls and waitresses. Maybe the writer too.

  Above all it had impressed her father.

  Halfway to Münzenried they turned off to the left. Bermann reached for the radio again. “We’re almost there. Anything happening?”

  “Nothing. If you ask me they’re waiting for us.”

  “Rubbish,” Louise said.

  Wallmer didn’t seem to have heard her, and Bermann wasn’t paying Louise any attention. Still, it felt good to be sitting next to him. It meant that they, rather than the others, had the initiative. That the ball was rolling. That they might have a hope of finding Pham and the other children.

  Shortly afterward they stopped behind Wallmer and Schneider’s car. The farm was out of sight; they were obscured by a hill.

  As they got out Wallmer and Schneider gazed at Louise in surprise. Wallmer managed a smile, Schneider said, “Hi, Luis.” Even though he was in his late forties he was still the most handsome of the four inspectors at Freiburg Kripo. Servility didn’t appear to have any effect on complexion or attractiveness. It might even be the secret formula.

  She nodded to them.

  “And?” Bermann said.

  “Nothing,” Wallmer replied. “I bet they’ve entrenched themselves in there and are waiting for us.”

  “Rubbish,” Bonì said again.

  Wallmer gave her an anxious look while Schneider’s beautiful Roman brow clouded over. Bermann turned away.