Munster's Case

by Håkan Nesser

  That remained in the photo album of her memory. And other scenes as well.

  She checked her watch and wondered if there was any point in driving back to the police station. Or in calling and informing them about what Paul Holt had said. In the end she decided that it could wait until tomorrow. After all, everything seemed to confirm what they had guessed must be the facts. Marie-Louise Leverkuhn had used Central Station as a storage depot for a few days, or a day or so at least, before finally disposing of the butchered caretaker’s wife in Weyler’s Woods. Simple and painless. A neat solution.

  On the way home she stopped to check the buses leaving Central Station. It fit. There was a bus. Number sixteen. It ran every twenty minutes during working hours. Once an hour if you preferred to work under the cover of darkness. Nothing could have been simpler.

  But she would wait until tomorrow before reporting this. Unless Intendent Münster got in touch during the evening: that would obviously present an opportunity to report then.

  It could well be an advantage to have something concrete to talk about. She had started to feel like she was standing with at least one foot on the wrong side of the border. That border you had to stake everything on not crossing—not least because all the roads over it were one way only. Once over it, there was no going back.

  In my next life I’m going to be a lioness, Moreno thought, and made up her mind to sublimate all her desires and indeed the whole of the world by jumping into the bath and having a long soak in jujuba oil and lavender.

  “You again?” said Mauritz Leverkuhn.

  “Me again,” said Münster.

  “I don’t get the point of all this,” said Mauritz. “I’ve got nothing more to talk to you about.”

  “But I have quite a lot to talk to you about,” said Münster. “Are you going to let me in?”

  Mauritz hesitated for a moment, then shrugged and went into the living room. Münster closed the door behind him and followed. It looked the same as it had that morning. The same advertising leaflets were lying in the same place on the table, and the same glass was standing beside the easy chair on which Mauritz was now sitting.

  But the television was on. A program in which four colorfully dressed women were sitting on two sofas, laughing. Mauritz pressed a button on the remote control and switched it off.

  “Yes, indeed,” said Münster, “I have a lot to talk to you about. I’ve been talking to your sister this afternoon.”

  “Ruth?”

  “No, Irene.”

  Mauritz made no reply, didn’t react.

  “I spent several hours at the Gellner Home, in fact,” said Münster. “You’ve been lying to me.”

  “Lying?” said Mauritz.

  “Did you not say this morning that you hadn’t been to see her for over a year?”

  Mauritz emptied his glass.

  “I forgot about that,” he said. “I went to see her last autumn, I’m not sure when.”

  “Forgot?” said Münster. “You were there on Saturday, October twenty-fifth, the same day your father was murdered.”

  “What the hell has that got to do with it?”

  He still didn’t seem to have made up his mind what attitude to adopt, and Münster realized that his head must be spinning now. But surely he must have been expecting another visit? He must have known that Münster would return sooner or later. Or had the flu and the fever stopped his mind from working?

  “Can you tell me what you and Irene talked about last October?”

  Mauritz snorted.

  “It’s not possible to talk to Irene about anything sensible. You must surely have noticed that if you’ve been visiting her?”

  “Maybe not in normal circumstances,” said Münster. “But I don’t think she was in her normal state that Saturday.”

  “What the hell do you mean by that?”

  “Do you want me to spell out what she told you?”

  Mauritz shrugged. “Go on,” he said. “You seem to have a screw loose. Have had all this time, come to that.”

  Münster cleared his throat.

  “When you arrived at the home, she had just finished a therapy session, isn’t that right? With a certain Clara Vermieten. You saw her immediately afterward, and then … then she began talking about things from your childhood, things you had no idea about. Concerning your father.”

  Mauritz didn’t move a muscle.

  “Is it not the case,” said Münster, “that on that Saturday afternoon you discovered circumstances you knew nothing about? Circumstances which, to some extent at least, explain the occurrence of Irene’s illness? Why she became the way she is now.”

  “You’re out of your mind,” said Mauritz.

  “And isn’t it a fact that this news affected you so deeply that to a large extent you took leave of your senses?”

  “What the hell are you sitting there babbling on about?” said Mauritz.

  Münster paused.

  “What I am talking about,” he said eventually, as slowly and emphatically as he could, “is that you discovered that your father had been abusing both your sisters sexually throughout the whole of their childhood, and that as a result you got into your car, drove down to Maardam, and killed him. That’s what I’m talking about.”

  Mauritz was still sitting there motionless, with his hands clasped in his lap.

  “I can understand your reaction,” Münster added. “I might have done the same if I’d been in your shoes.”

  It’s possible that those were the words that made Mauritz change his tune. Or at least, to give way slightly. He sighed deeply, wiped the sweat off his brow, and seemed to relax.

  “You can never prove this,” he said. “You’re being ridiculous. My mother has admitted to doing it. If it’s true what you say about my father, she had just as good a reason for doing it as I had. Don’t you think?”

  “Could be,” said Münster. “But it wasn’t her that did it. It was you.”

  “It was her,” said Mauritz.

  Münster shook his head.

  “Incidentally, why did you visit your sister on that particular Saturday?” he asked. “Was it because your girlfriend had just left you? The time scale seems to fit.”

  Mauritz didn’t reply, but Münster could see from his reaction that the guess was probably spot-on. It was the same old story. Just as when a game of patience is about to be resolved, and the cards seem to turn up in a predictable order.

  “Shall I tell you what happened next?” he asked.

  Mauritz stood up with difficulty.

  “No thank you,” he said. “I want you to leave immediately. You are coming out with a mass of sick fantasies, and I have no intention of listening to you any longer.”

  “I thought you had just agreed that Irene really did tell you this?” Münster said.

  Mauritz stood there for a few seconds, swaying back and forth indecisively.

  “Your mother caught you in the act, didn’t she?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Did she come home while you were stabbing him, or did you meet her on the way out?”

  I’d give a fortune for his thoughts right now, Münster thought. Surely he’ll give up?

  “I suspect there are a few other things you don’t know about,” said Münster. “About what happened next, that is.”

  Mauritz stared at him for a few blank seconds again. Then he sat down.

  “Such as what?” he said.

  “Fru Van Eck,” said Münster. “Did you see her that night, or was it just she who saw you?”

  Mauritz said nothing.

  “Have you any explanation for the murder of Else Van Eck? Did your mother tell you what happened? I’m asking because I don’t know.”

  “You know nothing,” said Mauritz.

  “Then I’ll have to speculate,” said Münster. “But it’s only of academic interest. Fru Van Eck saw you when you came to Kolderweg to kill your father. She told your mother she’d seen you a few days later. I’m not
certain, but I assume she tried to use that knowledge to her own advantage. To earn money. Your mother reacted in a way she had never expected. She killed Fru Van Eck.”

  He paused for a few seconds, but Mauritz had no comment to make. He knew about it, Münster thought.

  “She killed the caretaker’s wife. Then she needed a few days to butcher the body and get rid of it. Then, when all was done, she confessed to the murder of your father, so that we would stop investigating and you would go free. A cold-blooded woman, your mother. Very cold-blooded.”

  “You’re out of your mind,” said Mauritz for the second time.

  “Obviously she couldn’t confess to the murder of Else Van Eck as well because she wouldn’t have been able to give a motive. It all fits together, you see—I think you have to admit that. She commits one murder, but confesses to another one: perhaps there is some kind of moral balance there. I think that’s the way she thought about it.”

  Mauritz muttered something and scrutinized his hands. Münster watched him for a while without saying anything. He’ll crack any minute, he thought. I don’t have the strength to sit through all this again at the police station. I simply don’t have the strength.

  “I’m not sure either why she committed suicide in her cell,” he said. “But it’s not difficult to sympathize with her. Perhaps it’s not difficult to understand anything of what she did. She was protecting you from being discovered as the murderer of your father, and she murdered another person in order to continue protecting you. She did a lot for your sake, Herr Leverkuhn.”

  “She owed a debt,” Mauritz said.

  Münster waited, but there was no continuation.

  “A debt for what your father did to your sisters, do you mean? For allowing it to happen?”

  Mauritz suddenly clenched his fists and thumped them down on the arms of the chair.

  “Hell and damnation!” he said. “He made Irene go mad and she didn’t do anything to stop him! Can’t you understand that he didn’t deserve a natural death? The bastard! I’d do it again if I could. I was prepared to accept responsibility for it. I was going to do so, and that’s why …”

  He fell silent.

  “Why she committed suicide?” asked Münster. “Because you were thinking of confessing?”

  Mauritz stiffened, then seemed to crumble, and nodded weakly. Münster took a deep breath and closed his eyes. Opened them again and looked at the figure slumped in the chair opposite him: he tried to decide what he really felt about him.

  One of those losers, he thought. Yet another one.

  He must have been damaged by his childhood, even if it didn’t make itself felt as dreadfully as in his beloved sister.

  Those accursed, inescapable birthmarks that could never be operated away. That could never be glossed over or come to terms with.

  And that accursed, pointless evil that kept on asserting itself, over and over again. Yes, he felt sorry for him. He would never have believed it an hour ago, but he did now.

  “Are you going to arrest me now?” said Mauritz.

  “They’re waiting for us at the police station,” said Münster.

  “I don’t regret a thing. I’d do it again, can you understand that?”

  Münster nodded. He wanted comfort and understanding now. Münster recognized the situation. Oftentimes, it wasn’t confirmation of a justified crime that would provide the release the perpetrator was longing for, but words. Being able to talk about it afterward. The ability to explain his actions face-to-face with another person. A person who understood, and a face that could tolerate the reflection of his desperation.

  Oh yes, it had happened before.

  “It would be wrong for a bastard like him to complete his life without being punished.… To get away with something like that.”

  “Let’s go now,” said Münster. “We’ll talk about the rest at the station.”

  Mauritz stood up. Wiped the sweat off his brow again and breathed deeply.

  “Can I just go to the kitchen and take another pill?”

  Münster nodded.

  He left the room, and Münster heard him dropping a tablet into a glass and then filling it with water. Thank God, he thought. It’s all over now. I can wash my hands of this awful business.

  It was too late when Münster realized that the passive resignation displayed by Mauritz Leverkuhn for the last few minutes was not quite what it had seemed. And too late when he realized that the carving knife they had spent so much time looking for in October and the beginning of November had not in fact been thrown into a canal or a trash can. It was in Mauritz Leverkuhn’s hand now, just as it had been during the night between the twenty-fifth and the twenty-sixth of October. He discovered that fact out of the corner of his eye, looking over his right shoulder, felt for his pistol in its holster, but that was as far as he got. The knife blade entered his midriff from behind: he felt an agonizing stab of pain, then he fell headfirst onto the floor without taking the strain with his hands.

  The pain was so acute that it paralyzed him. Penetrated the whole of his body like a white-hot iron drill of agony. Neutralized his ability to move. Annihilated time and space. When it eventually began to ease, he heard Mauritz Leverkuhn leave and slam the front door.

  He turned his head and thought the cool parquet floor felt pleasant against his cheek. Gentle and conciliatory. I’m tired, he thought. This would never have happened if I hadn’t been so tired.

  Before a black wave of oblivion flowed over his consciousness, he thought two more thoughts.

  The first was of Synn: Good, I don’t need to know how things would have turned out.

  The second was just one word:

  No.

  40

  The police station in Frigge had moved since Van Veeteren served his apprenticeship in that northern coastal town. Or rather, they had squeezed a new building into the same block and rehoused the forces of law and order in almost the same place as before. Van Veeteren didn’t think the move had improved anything. The new police station was built mainly of gray concrete and bulletproof glass, and the duty officer was a young red-haired man with prominent ears. Not a bit like old Borkmann.

  Ah well, Van Veeteren thought. At least his hearing ought to be sharp.

  “Reinhart and Van Veeteren from Maardam,” said Reinhart. “What’s your name?”

  “Inspector Liebling,” said the redhead, shaking hands.

  “Chief Inspector Van Veeteren used to work up here actually,” said Reinhart. “But that was probably before you were born.”

  “Really?” said Liebling.

  “At the dawn of recorded time,” said Van Veeteren. “Late nineteenth century. Have you heard anything?”

  “You mean …?” said Liebling, feeling a little nervously for his thin mustache.

  “He ought to be here now, for Christ’s sake,” said Reinhart. “It’s nearly eight o’clock.”

  “Intendent Münster from Maardam,” Van Veeteren explained.

  “Yes, I know,” said Liebling. “Malinowski filled me in when I relieved him. I have the details here.”

  He tapped away at the computer keyboard and nodded his head in acknowledgment.

  “Intendent Münster, yes. Expected to come in with a suspect … but there hasn’t been one yet. He hasn’t turned up yet, I mean.”

  “When did he contact you?” Van Veeteren asked.

  Liebling checked.

  “Five fifty-five,” he said. “Inspector Malinowski took the call. I came on duty at six-thirty.”

  “And he hasn’t called again?” asked Reinhart.

  “No,” said Liebling. “We haven’t heard anything more since then.”

  “Did he give you any instructions?”

  Liebling shook his head. “Only that we should stand by for when he arrived with this … person. We’ve got his number, of course. His cell.”

  “So have we,” said Reinhart. “But he’s not answering.”

  “Damn it!” said Van Veeteren. �
��Give us the address, and we’ll go there! This is taking too long.”

  Liebling printed it out.

  “Krautzweg 28,” he said. “It’s out at Gochtshuuis. Would you like me to come with you? To show you the way.”

  “Yes, come with us,” said Van Veeteren.

  “There’s a light on,” said Reinhart ten minutes later. “And that’s his car.”

  Van Veeteren thought for a moment.

  “Call one more time, to make sure we don’t barge in at a vital moment,” he said.

  Reinhart took out his cell phone and dialed the number. Waited for half a minute.

  “Nothing,” he said. “He might have switched it off. Or forgot to charge the batteries.”

  “Batteries?” said Van Veeteren. “Do you need batteries in those bloody things as well?”

  Inspector Liebling cleared his throat in the backseat.

  “There’s no other car standing outside,” he pointed out. “And there doesn’t seem to be a garage.… Assuming the Audi belongs to your man.”

  “Hmm,” said Van Veeteren. “That’s right. Okay, let’s go in. Liebling, stay here in the car, in case something happens.”

  “Got you,” said Liebling.

  Reinhart and Van Veeteren approached the front door cautiously and listened.

  “Can’t hear a thing,” said Reinhart. “Apart from the bloody wind. Nothing to be seen through the window either. What should we do? Ring the bell?”

  “Try the door first,” said Van Veeteren.

  Reinhart did as told. It was locked.

  “Okay, we’ll ring the bell,” said Van Veeteren. “Do you have your gun?”

  Reinhart nodded and took out his Grossmann. He pressed himself as close to the wall as he could and Van Veeteren rang the bell.

  Nothing happened. Van Veeteren waited for ten seconds, then rang again.

  Nothing.