by Pieter Aspe
“Thank God we’re still awake,” she jested. But Van In paid no attention to her remark and raced upstairs. She followed at his heels.
“Call all the hospitals?” she heard him ask when she arrived in the living room.
Before he had the chance to say: do you know how many hospitals there are in Belgium, Charlotte said: “Start with the university hospitals, and if they can’t help we can try the general hospitals.”
“Presuming, of course, that the young man actually suffers from Marchand syndrome,” Van In responded, unconvinced.
“Marfan, with an ‘f”,’ she corrected.
Van In realized he couldn’t openly ignore her request.
“I’ll get my men onto it at seven. If need be, we can ask the ministry to involve the local police, have them call the hospitals in their region. Yes, you’re right … no stone unturned. I’ll do my best,” he said. “And try to get a couple of hours sleep yourself. We still have a pile of work ahead of us tomorrow … I mean later.”
Hannelore looked at him questioningly when he returned the receiver to its cradle.
“It only gets really tricky when the parents start playing detective,” he sighed.
He brought her up to speed in a few words.
“Do you think there’s anything in it?”
Van In shrugged his shoulders.
“The country’s crawling with tall guys wearing glasses.”
Bertrand Delahaye woke up with a throbbing headache. In all the excitement, Laurent had given him too much sedative.
The first thing he saw through the unsightly dormer window was a twinkling starlit sky. He was lying on a bed and it wasn’t his own, he thought. It wasn’t even his own room.
Bertrand wanted to jump up, but a physical stupor overpowered him. He heard something jingle. It was as if he was being sucked onto the mattress. It took him three tries before he was able to stand, and only then with difficulty. He took a few unsteady steps, but was suddenly held back by an invisible hand. His arm was attached to something and his wrist hurt. He felt helpless and couldn’t make up his mind whether to return to the bed or stay where he was.
Something was making it difficult to think, although it also seemed to stop him from panicking. He had a vague awareness that something bad had happened to him, but he didn’t really care. If only the pounding in his head would go away.
The chain was firmly attached to the wall. He tugged at it a few times, but it only aggravated his headache. He sat on the edge of the bed, resigned to his situation.
His eyes got used to the darkness and he squinted around the room. It was empty apart from the bed. The walls were made of wood and there was a rectangular carpet on the floor. When he stood up again and walked around the bed, he bumped into a chemical toilet. His parents brought something similar when they went camping; that’s why he recognized it immediately.
His head began to spin and he had to sit. He recorded everything in his mind without thinking about it. He had no idea what time it was and just sat there staring listlessly into space. A strip of light under the door suddenly caught his attention. He heard someone shuffle along the corridor on the other side. He heard a key turning in the lock. Strangely enough, he wasn’t afraid.
“I’ve brought you some cookies and lemonade,” said Laurent in a gentle tone when he walked into the room. “You have to stay here for a couple of days, but don’t worry; your parents have been informed.”
Laurent placed the bottle and the cookies on the floor within Bertrand’s reach.
“There’s no need to be afraid. Nothing’s going to happen to you.”
“Can you put the light on?” asked Bertrand. “It’s so dark in here.”
Laurent groped for the light switch. The bare forty-watt light bulb was still enough to make him blink.
Bertrand got to his feet and shuffled toward the lemonade and cookies. The bald old man didn’t look dangerous.
“If you want, we could play a game of checkers or chess,” Laurent suggested. “Unless you want to get some more rest.”
Bertrand was surprised by the strange suggestion, and it confused him.
“You kidnapped me. You were in the police van. I recognize you.”
He snatched the cookies and lemonade as he spoke and then pulled back onto the bed.
Laurent didn’t move a muscle, but simply looked on as Bertrand gobbled up the cookies and guzzled down the lemonade.
The pounding in his head slowed down as he ate. The haloperidol was wearing off, and the first emotion to surface was rage, blind rage.
“Let me out of here,” he screamed. “You’ve no right to keep me locked up like this.”
He grabbed the bottle and held it threateningly in the air.
“It’s the only bottle of lemonade I have,” said Laurent calmly. “If you smash it, you’ll have to drink water all day long.”
“Why didn’t you buy more bottles, then?” Bertrand yelled. He lowered the bottle. Besides, it had a French label and it tasted a lot better than the lemonade at home.
“I’ve got chocolate too,” said Laurent. “If you’re still hungry, I can get you some.”
Bertrand placed the bottle on the floor close to the bed. The old man’s friendliness was irritating him. Was this an abduction, or what?
“Is it Cote d’Or?” he asked in an arrogant tone of voice.
“It is, actually,” the old man smiled. “Wait, I’ll be right back.”
While Laurent made his way to the kitchen, Bertrand checked the handcuff. A protective strip of foam had been taped around his wrist before they cuffed him. The chain was roughly seven feet long and was attached to a wrought-iron ring built in to the exterior wall, which, unlike the others, was made of stone. The ring and the chain combined were easily strong enough to hold a bull in check.
When the old man returned, he had more than chocolate with him. The chessboard was under his arm.
“I brought the chessboard just in case,” he said almost apologetically.
“How did you know I played chess?” asked Bertrand suspicious.
Laurent shrugged his shoulders.
“I just did,” he said. “But if you don’t want to play, I’ll leave you in peace.”
If Bertrand agreed to a game, he would at least have some company. But if he said no, the old man would leave and that would give him a chance to get rid of the foam under the handcuff and try to wriggle his hand out of the thing. The old man didn’t look strong. Without the chain, he figured he had a good chance of overpowering him and freeing himself.
Bertrand checked the cuff. Laurent saw him but paid no attention. He knew the boy would never be able to break loose.
“You’re sure I’ll be home in two days?” Bertrand asked hesitatingly.
“Absolutely, my boy.”
“Go on, then, but I play white.”
“Fine by me. Do you mind if I sit beside you? Otherwise I’ll have to fetch a table and a stool, and I have problems with my back.”
Laurent had almost given himself a hernia dragging Bertrand from the van.
Bertrand took the chessboard and the pieces. Laurent sat down on the bed. The joint in his left knee cracked like a dry twig.
15
VAN IN RACED UP THE stairs to his office on Sunday morning at five past seven to be greeted by Beheyt, D’Hondt, and Hannelore. She had had just as late a night as he, but she looked sprightly and awake nevertheless.
“Good morning,” he said in an upbeat tone.
Beheyt barely looked up. He had a hefty pile of paperwork in front of him on the table, through which he was nervously browsing. D’Hondt was standing at the window and responded to Van In’s greetings with an indefinable gesture.
“A splendid day, Commissioner, don’t you think?” said Hannelore in the best of spirits.
“Any news on the precise location of the abduction?” asked Van In when no one appeared to have anything to say.
“We’re guessing somewhere near Boudewijn
Park. A couple of the boy’s friends saw him at the roller-skating rink around one-thirty,” said Beheyt without lifting his head. “There’s been no reaction to the appeal we broadcast on the radio. BRTN and VTM have promised a breaking news broadcast this morning at eight.”
“You never know,” said D’Hondt indifferently.
On the floor above, De Kee was on the phone with the district commandant of the local police. The man was far from happy about Assistant Commissioner Van In and the way he had been leading the investigation.
De Kee listened with patience to the enraged commandant. Everyone knew that the local police had much more experience and know-how and that serious crimes like kidnapping were always assigned to them and the judicial police.
It took the man a couple of minutes to say what he had to say. De Kee then tried to calm him down.
“I’m afraid the decision was made at a higher level, Jacques,” he said mealy-mouthed. “Public Prosecutor Lootens appointed the taskforce in person. It was the public prosecutor himself who assigned Van In to head up the investigation. And if it’s any comfort, he didn’t appoint an investigating magistrate.”
“That doesn’t surprise me,” the district commandant grumbled. “Everyone knows that Lootens and investigating magistrate Creytens can’t stand the sight of one another.”
De Kee grinned. Gossiping about magistrates was a favorite police pastime.
“I can only advise you to contact Public Prosecutor Lootens. I’m told he’s spending the day in Knokke. But there’s nothing stopping you from joining us here. We have an evaluation lined up for eight. You’re welcome to be part of it.”
De Kee returned the receiver to its cradle with a bogus smile.
The phone started to ring before he had let it go.
“Your lordship, always a delight to hear from the mayor’s office.”
De Kee leaned back in his chair and enjoyed the warmth of the sun’s first rays.
Minutes later, Van In was developing the impression that he was talking to the wall.
“I just heard from Sergeant Versavel that no one in the neighborhood of Boudewijn Park noticed anything unusual. If my information is correct, the local police interviewed no fewer than four hundred people.”
D’Hondt nervously rearranged his tie and released his adam’s apple from his pinching collar.
“And they’re still interviewing,” he said. “Someone has to have seen something, surely!”
“If we assume that the boy was kidnapped near Boudewijn Park,” Hannelore observed matter-of-factly, “then what about the bicycle?”
“Mr. Vanmaele took it apart to the last bolt. Nothing, zero. All we know for sure is that it’s the boy’s bike. And we questioned people near Oostkamp where it was found,” D’Hondt added despondently. “I presume efforts to hunt down the young kidnapper also failed to produce results,” he scoffed.
“That’s what I was trying to explain yesterday, Captain.”
Van In was, by now, tired and highly combustible. “On the face of it, the kidnappers have taken a number of incredible risks. If we presume they’re not being protected by some kind of magic force, then we have to face the fact that the entire operation has been prepared with precision. Long-legs is safe and sound, believe you me. We shouldn’t underestimate the brain behind all this.”
“I wholeheartedly agree.” Beheyt suddenly woke up. “According to my profile, based among other things on the two faxes, the older kidnapper must certainly have enjoyed a university education. If you ask me, he’s an engineer or a mathematician. I wouldn’t be surprised if he specialized in probability calculus or statistics. I also think we’re looking for someone who has spent several years as a sort of recluse, living well outside the city. It would surprise me if he was actually capable of violence.”
Van In nodded in agreement. D’Hondt didn’t quite understand where Beheyt was getting all this information.
“I don’t have a crystal ball,” said Beheyt. “We imported profiling from the States. The FBI organizes an annual course for foreign police agencies. I’ve just completed such a course and I can assure you, I was just as surprised as you at first.”
“To what extent is such a profile reliable?” Van In was curious to know.
“In a lot of cases the broad lines are amazingly accurate, although we have to account for the fact that we’re dealing with Americans. Europeans tend to be a little less predictable.”
“So what makes you think that the older man is a mathematician or a statistician?” Hannelore asked. “If you’re right, and we presume the man is older than seventy, then we only have to call a couple of universities. I can’t imagine there were too many math or statistics graduates in the nineteen forties.”
“That sounds like an excellent idea, Miss,” said Beheyt. “But let me answer your question. The entire procedure followed in both the attack on the jeweler and the abduction suggests that what we would call risks are in fact measured and deliberate steps in their plan. If I’m wrong, then according to the laws of probability they would have to have made at least one mistake, perhaps more. Take the attack on the jeweler. They went to work before midnight in a brightly lit space. They had to have known that someone would see them.” Beheyt rummaged through his papers and pulled out a couple of pages.
“The Dutch couple and the other witness described the older man in very different ways, but the only thing they agreed on was his long gray hair. Everyone knows that the majority of men over seventy have short hair or are either balding or bald. The long gray hair is far too conspicuous. I’m pretty certain it was part of a disguise. We can also say the same about the young man’s beard, another point on which the witnesses were agreed.”
Beheyt peered around the room with a look of victory on his face.
“And there’s plenty more where that came from. Commissioner Van In should be congratulated for anticipating a number of my conclusions intuitively.”
“Thank you, Professor.”
Van In decided to thoroughly revise his opinion of the professor. Hannelore beamed and D’Hondt bit his nails.
“I’ll order my men to call the universities immediately,” said Van In with enthusiasm.
“And if he lives in the countryside, it might make sense to check if any remote properties have been rented out short-term in the last couple of weeks,” D’Hondt said, determined to show that he had a contribution to make.
“The professor said he’s been living in the countryside for some time. If he’s holding the boy in his own home, we haven’t got a snowball’s chance of locating the place unless we identify the man first,” said Van In in what came close to an arrogant tone. “And don’t forget, he’s alone with the boy. He’ll probably stay holed up for the next few days. If the house looks occupied, no one will suspect anything.”
“But no one knows if he’s alone. There might be other people involved.”
D’Hondt was nervous, and nervous people say stupid things.
“Out of the question,” said Beheyt, flatly putting an end to the discussion.
Now it was Van In’s turn to explain Charlotte Degroof’s hypothetical diagnosis to the others.
“Versavel and his men are calling round the university hospitals. A five-man team has taken responsibility for the other major hospitals.”
“How long have you known this?” D’Hondt snorted.
“Since last night, Captain.”
“And you waited until now to tell us. I thought we had agreed to contact one another if there were new developments.”
“I have a couple of photocopies to make,” said Beheyt, not interested in witnessing an exchange of words between Van In and D’Hondt.
The situation frustrated him enormously. As an expert, all he could do was draft a hypothetical profile of the perpetrators and wait. Maybe he had been a little too quick to draw conclusions. No further negotiations were planned with the kidnappers. His job was done, more or less. The rest was in the hands of the detecti
ves.
If he had had to choose between the orthodox Van In and the proud local police captain, he would have opted for Van In, no competition.
“Have you scheduled a visit with the parents later?” asked Hannelore. She sensed that D’Hondt was about to explode, and she wanted to alleviate some of the tension. D’Hondt got the hint and reluctantly made himself scarce.
“Deleu’s with them right now,” she added.
“Then they’ll be in need of a visit,” Van In grinned. “Poor bastards are having a hard enough time as it is.”
Beheyt bumped into Versavel in the corridor. The sergeant almost knocked him over.
“A new tip has come in,” he shouted before the door was fully open.
Versavel pointed to the phone. “We have a potential witness to the abduction on the line. You can take the call here.”
Van In lunged at the telephone on his desk.
The witness told his story for the second time in less than fifteen minutes.
The day before around two P.M., he was driving on the ring road near Bruges’s windmills. A couple of hundred yards before the traffic lights he noticed a Ford Transit belonging to the local police parked on the cycle path. He slowed down, thinking it was a speed trap. To his surprise, he saw a policeman rip off the reflective orange strip running along the side of the vehicle. It was only then that he realized that there was no light bar on top of the van and there was no sign of the police logo or the emergency number usually found on the sides. He thought it was a bit strange, so he checked in his rearview mirror after driving past.
The van had pulled onto the road, and he had seen an elderly man in civilian clothes at the wheel. The Ford Transit overtook him just after the lights.
“Was the policeman wearing glasses?” Van In asked.
“Yes.”
“And he was taller than most,” Van In repeated as the witness provided a reasonably good description of Daniel Verhaeghe. Beheyt will be pleased, he thought to himself. The alleged policeman had no beard.
The witness hadn’t noted the vehicle’s plates, but when Van In asked if there was anyone else in the Transit his answer was formal.