The Weeping Girl

by Håkan Nesser

  And where had the girl gone to on the Sunday morning, when she took the bus from the youth hostel to Lejnice? Had she been to visit somebody? If so, who?

  Questions breed worse than rabbits, Moreno thought, and washed her face in cooling water. Are there no hypotheses I can come up with? Any assumptions? Any wild guesses? What’s going on here?

  But unfortunately she was bereft of ideas. Although a new thought occurred to her from a different direction.

  The dead body that had been buried in the sand.

  A thirty-five-year-old man. Lying there for a week, if what Struntze said was correct. That meant it must have happened last Sunday, surely.

  Connection? Moreno thought again.

  What bloody connection? she thought soon afterwards. I’m thirsty.

  She made her way through the warm, dry sand and bought a Coke in a little kiosk that seemed to be strategically placed to repair dodgy fluid balances in walkers between Lejnice and Port Hagen.

  She returned to the waterline, drained the can and dumped it in a rubbish bin evidently placed there in accordance with the same strategy.

  She checked her watch. It was ten minutes to five, and in the distance, in the quivering afternoon light, she thought she could make out the pier and the boats off Port Hagen.

  About an hour left, she thought. Unless it’s a mirage. I’m not getting anywhere with all these thoughts. And I don’t want to start thinking about Franz Lampe-Leermann. Anything but that.

  What was it that Constable Vegesack had said, incidentally? That there hadn’t been a murder out here for thirty years?

  Now they had two missing persons and an unidentified body in the space of a single week. Surely that was a set of circumstances worth investigating rather more closely?

  But instead of considering any more unanswered rhetorical questions, Inspector Moreno began to think about what measures she could possibly take in the next few days. If she was going to have to stay here until Thursday.

  And she was.

  If for no other reason than to pay for the repairs to the car of her former boyfriend (fiancé? bloke? lover?).

  He wasn’t sitting there waiting for her when she finally arrived at Tschandala – more tired and dehydrated than she could ever have imagined when she set off.

  It was five minutes past six. The military green Trabant was parked outside the gate with an envelope tucked under a windscreen wiper and Montezuma asleep on the roof.

  But no Mikael Bau: he would have been sitting out on the terrace if he’d been at home, she knew that. She took the invoice, left Montezuma to sleep in peace and went inside to pack her things.

  No letter, no message, nothing to indicate that he had returned from Lejnice at all, when she came to think about it.

  So be it, thought Moreno when she had finished packing. She remained standing in the kitchen while wondering whether to write anything herself, but in the end decided not to.

  I can’t raise enough inspiration, she thought.

  But I’ve plenty of perspiration. And I’m tired and dirty – I hope the shower in my luxurious guest room works.

  She took her suitcase and her rucksack, and started walking to the bus stop. It was a quarter to seven, a bus was due at five minutes to, if she had read the timetable rightly.

  It must be the same bus as passes the youth hostel, it suddenly struck her. She wondered how many drivers there were.

  27

  20 July 1999

  Constable Vegesack’s girlfriend was called Marlene Urdis, and the previous evening they had made a solemn promise not to make love that night. Two nights in succession and another session in the afternoon would have to suffice.

  According to plan, they had gone to bed and fallen asleep before eleven o’clock – but a few hours later she rolled over and came a bit too close, and off they went again. But what else could one expect? They had been apart for three weeks (Marlene had been in Sicily with a girlfriend of hers, a combined working trip and holiday paid for partly by a glossy monthly magazine specializing in travel and interior decor and such-like), and the separation had left a sort of void, an erotic vacuum that needed to be filled and balanced out retroactively. They needed to make up for every missed opportunity, the sooner and more thorough, the better.

  You only live once, after all – if that.

  But it feels a bit odd even so, Vegesack thought as he drained his second cup of black coffee at about half past seven the next morning. And tiring. If they carried on like this much longer, he would have to take sick leave. Marlene was on summer vacation from her architecture studies, and could stay in bed all morning; but it was his duty to turn up at his office in the police station, and try to stay awake with the aid of every means of assistance available.

  In other words, coffee. The heartblood of tired men, as the Great Man Chandler had put it.

  And a murder, he reminded himself.

  And perhaps also that attractive detective inspector. She had got her teeth into that old Maager business, God only knows why. Ah well, it’s good that there are things to occupy oneself with, he thought optimistically as he took his bicycle out of its stall. There might be enough to keep him awake today as well.

  Always assuming he didn’t fall off his bike on the way to the police station, and he didn’t usually do so.

  Chief of Police Vrommel hadn’t turned up for work yet today, but fröken Glossmann in the office, and one of the probationers – Helme – were present and correct as usual.

  Plus a blonde well into her thirties who seemed to have spent at least a hundred hours lying in the sun this last week. She was sitting opposite Helme at his desk, chewing at her cerise lower lip while Helme wrote something down in his notebook.

  ‘Ah,’ he said when he saw Vegesack appear in the doorway. ‘This is Damita Fuchsbein. She’s been waiting for a quarter of an hour, but I thought it was best if you or Vrommel took care of her.’

  Vegesack shook her hand and introduced himself.

  ‘What’s it all about, then?’ he asked.

  ‘That dead body on the beach,’ said Helme in a stage whisper before Damita Fuchsbein had stopped chewing her lower lip.

  ‘I see,’ said Vegesack.

  He looked at the clock. A few minutes to eight. Vrommel rarely put in an appearance before nine. Perhaps he might turn up a bit earlier today, in view of the situation and the circumstances . . . There was supposed to be a summary session with colleagues from Wallburg as well. But why wait?

  Why indeed. He nodded, and invited the woman to move over to his desk. Asked her if she’d like a cup of coffee, but she shook her head. There was a rustling sound from her dry locks of hair.

  ‘Well,’ he said, clicking his ballpoint pen. ‘What do you have to say for yourself?’

  ‘I think I know who it is.’

  ‘The man on the beach?’

  ‘Yes. I heard about it last night, they said you hadn’t identified him yet.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Vegesack, wondering quickly if he knew her. He didn’t think so, but he was far from certain. Both her hair and her skin could well be very different in colour, depending on the time of year. In any case, Damita Fuchsbein seemed to have a hobby that was very much in tune with the times, and one she made no attempt to hide. Her body.

  ‘Who is it?’ he asked.

  She cleared her throat and blinked a few times.

  ‘Tim Van Rippe,’ she said. ‘Do you know who that is?’

  Vegesack wrote the name down in his notebook. Thought for a moment, and said that he didn’t think he knew who that was.

  ‘He lives out at Klimmerstoft. Works at Klingsmann’s. How should I put it – we haven’t exactly been having a relationship, but we see each other now and again. And we’d agreed to go to Wimsbaden last Monday . . . To the music festival. But he never turned up. I’ve been ringing and trying to get hold of him all week, but he hasn’t answered.’

  Her voice was shaky, and Vegesack realized that she was on
the point of crying underneath her elastic exterior.

  ‘Tim Van Rippe? Have you any special reason for thinking that it’s him? Anything more besides the fact that he’s been difficult to get in touch with?’

  Damita Fuchsbein sighed deeply and adjusted her hair.

  ‘I’ve spoken to quite a few others who’ve been trying to contact him. Nobody seems to have seen him since Sunday – last Sunday, that is.’

  ‘Does he have a family?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Any relatives that you know of?’

  ‘He has a brother in Aarlach, I know that. His father’s dead, but I think his mother’s still alive. But she doesn’t live here either. I think she married again, and lives in Karpatz now.’

  Vegesack noted it all down.

  ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘We’d better go and take a look. Do you think you’re up to it? It might be a bit unpleasant.’

  Talk about understatement, he thought.

  ‘Where is . . . Where’s the body?’

  ‘Wallburg. The forensic medicine centre. I can take you there – we’ll be back here in an hour and a half.’

  Damita Fuchsbein seemed to be at a loss for a second or two, then pulled herself together and clasped her hands in her lap.

  ‘Okay. I suppose I don’t have any choice.’

  It was Tim Van Rippe.

  If one could believe what Damita Fuchsbein said, that is: and of course there was no reason to doubt her tear-soaked identification. Together with the pathologist himself, an incredibly overweight Dr Goormann, and a police nurse, Vegesack spent some considerable time consoling the devastated woman, and he began to wonder if she was in fact on rather more intimate terms with the dead man than she had admitted so far.

  Perhaps, perhaps not, Vegesack thought. No doubt that would become clearer in due course. While they were sitting in Goormann’s poky little office, supplying a steady stream of paper handkerchiefs to Fuchsbein, Detective Intendent Kohler turned up: he was one of the two Wallburg officers who had been loaned to Vrommel as a result of the discovery of the dead body on the beach. He was a reserved, thin-haired man in his fifties, and immediately made a positive impression on Vegesack. He undertook to track down and make contact with Van Rippe’s relatives – his brother in Aarlach and his mother in Karpatz, if one could believe the information Fuchsbein had provided while she was still able to talk.

  Although there was no reason to doubt that either.

  Vegesack took care of fröken Fuchsbein. Escorted her gently out of death’s visiting room and treated her to a cup of coffee and a glass of calvados in one of the cafes in the square before they got into the car and set off to return to Lejnice.

  He drove her to her home in Gloopsweg, and promised to telephone her later that evening to see how she was.

  Don’t go and lie down in the sun again, he thought, but he didn’t say so.

  By the time he returned to the police station it was ten past eleven, and Chief of Police Vrommel had just started a small press conference in connection with yesterday’s macabre discovery on the beach. Vegesack sat down on a vacant chair behind a dozen journalists, and listened in.

  Yes, the police were working all out.

  Yes, they had every reason to believe that a crime had been committed. It was difficult to die a natural death in that way, and then dig oneself down into the sand.

  Yes, they were following several lines of investigation, but there was no principal line. Extra resources had been moved in from Wallburg.

  Yes, the leader of the investigative team was the chief of police himself; but there was no suspect, and they were still awaiting the results of certain technical tests.

  No, the dead man had not yet been identified.

  I ought to have rung him from Wallburg, Vegesack thought.

  Moreno was woken up at a quarter to seven by the sun shining into her face. She had pulled down the old-fashioned dark-blue roller blind before going to bed, but at some point during the night it must have felt tired and rolled itself up again. Very discreetly, it seemed, as she hadn’t been woken up by any noise.

  She sat up in bed and thought for a while. Then dug a pair of shorts, a vest and a pair of trainers out of her rucksack, and set off.

  To the beach, of course. But southwards this time, in order to avoid any intrusive memories of bodies in the sand and abandoned lovers. (Blokes? Boyfriends? Fiancés?)

  It was a lovely morning, she felt that immediately. The beach was deserted, the sea mirror-like, and after only a couple of hundred metres she had to ask herself seriously why she didn’t begin every day of her life in this way. Was there any possible argument against it?

  Well, perhaps a windy morning in January had a different sort of charm. And of course there was a distinct shortage of seaside in central Maardam.

  She turned back after twenty minutes, and was back in Dombrowski’s at a quarter to eight. Took a shower and had breakfast in the company of a couple of morning newspapers in the shady garden. There were reports on the discovery of the body in both of them – especially in Westerblatt of course, which was the local paper – and as she read, drank coffee and chewed sandwiches made with thick slices of home-baked bread, cheese and paprika rings, she tried to sort out her programme for the day.

  It wasn’t straightforward. Above all she would presumably have to be discreet in the way in which she worked together with the Lejnice police. There were special circumstances, of course, but it was perfectly obvious that Vrommel was not interested in any kind of cooperation. Not at all. One might well ask why, but that could wait until another time. It would be better to stick to Vegesack – and probably best to leave it until the afternoon, she decided. If for no other reason than giving herself the chance of doing something off her own bat. And to be honest, Vegesack could do with a bit of time in order to get down to work, even if he had so far displayed no great desire to get stuck into the investigation.

  But perhaps one couldn’t expect him to have done so, Moreno thought. Bearing in mind the recent return of his girlfriend. But at least he had promised to investigate whether anybody had been to visit Maager at Sidonis. Or telephoned him. It had to be of crucial importance to get that sorted out as quickly as possible.

  As she was thinking that, her mobile rang.

  It was Mikael. They had spoken for a quarter of an hour the previous evening. Nothing very profound, but at least they had found an appropriate pitch at which to communicate with each other, which had to be good news.

  And he hadn’t said a word about being in love with her.

  Now he was ringing just to say that he intended to pay Kluivert, Kluivert and Sons’ bill himself: he had thought the matter over and concluded that he had been unfair. After a short discussion, she let him have his way.

  When they had hung up, she remained seated for a while, thinking. She realized that she was having difficulty in suppressing a grim smile, but then took out her notebook and wrote down three questions.

  What the hell has happened to Mikaela Lijphart?

  What the hell has happened to Arnold Maager?

  What the hell am I poking my nose into this business for, instead of enjoying my holiday like any normal person?

  She stared at the questions and drank up the rest of her coffee. Then she wrote down a fourth question.

  What the hell can I do today in order to find an answer to any of these questions?

  She thought for a while longer, until she had decided on Plan A. It was five minutes to nine. Not a bad start to a day.

  The woman who opened the door reminded her of a fish.

  Perhaps it was something to do with her looks, or perhaps it was the smell. Probably an unholy alliance of both, with each sensual reaction reinforcing the other.

  ‘Fru Maas?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Moreno introduced herself and asked if she might come in for a chat.

  No, she may not.

  She asked if she could treat her to a cup of coffee and
a glass of something somewhere. Maybe in Strandterrassen?

  Yes, she could.

  But not in Strandterrassen. There were too many capitalists and other schmucks there, explained fru Maas, and instead led the way to Darms cafe in the bus square. Honest people could sit here at a pavement table and watch the crowds in the square. If you got tired of that, you could always watch the pigeons.

  It was congenial, in other words. What the hell did she want?

  Moreno waited until the coffee and cognac had been served, then explained that she was a private detective looking for an eighteen-year-old girl. And that it was linked in a way with the tragic happening concerning fru Maas’s daughter Winnie. Sixteen years ago, she thought it was.

  ‘Private filth?’ said Sigrid Maas, downing the cognac in one gulp. ‘Go to hell!’

  Bitch? Moreno thought. I have a lot to learn.

  ‘I’ll make it easier for you,’ she said, cupping a protective hand round her own glass of cognac. ‘If you answer my questions truthfully, and cut out the nonsense and insults, you’ll earn yourself fifty smackers.’

  Fru Maas glared at her, her mouth a mere narrow strip. She didn’t answer, but it was obvious that she was weighing up the offer.

  ‘You can have my cognac as well,’ said Moreno, removing her hand from the glass.

  ‘If you diddle me, I swear blind I’ll kill you,’ said fru Maas.

  ‘I shan’t diddle you,’ said Moreno, checking in her purse to see if she really had that amount of cash with her. ‘How could I?’

  Fru Maas didn’t answer, but lit a cigarette and moved the glass of cognac closer to her.

  ‘Fire away!’

  ‘Mikaela Lijphart,’ said Moreno. ‘She’s the daughter of Arnold Maager, who murdered your daughter. A girl aged eighteen, as I said – she was only two when it happened. My first question is whether she’s been here to see you during the last few weeks.’

  Fru Mass inhaled deeply and sniffed at the cognac.

  ‘Yes, she’s been,’ she said. ‘Last Sunday, I think it was. ‘God only knows why she came, God only knows why I allowed her in – the daughter of that bloody swine who ruined my life. I suppose I’m too kind-hearted, that’s the problem.’