From Bruges with Love

by Pieter Aspe

  Van In wisely held his tongue. Her mood had clearly changed for the better, but he still didn’t figure it was time to ask her to issue a warrant for Linda Aerts’s arrest.

  Mdina is the jewel of Malta—no ifs, ands, or buts. The old Moorish-looking city dominates the island’s arid interior like a much honored holy place on a hill.

  Brooks parked his Land Rover—he detested Japanese cars—on the square dividing the historic capital from the more modern town of Rabat.

  “As I mentioned yesterday, there’s only a handful of Flemish expats on Malta,” he said with the self-assured air of a Brit in exile.

  Brouwers was still a little groggy from the Jupiler. They had lavishly celebrated their reunion the night before—he with beer, Brooks with red wine. “And a good thing too.” Brouwers sighed.

  If his hypothesis was right and Aerts was indeed on Malta, it was only a question of time before he traced him and took him out. Once the job was done, Brooks would bring him to Sicily in a speedboat. In exchange for the favor, the ex-commando had offered his friend a commission of one thousand Maltese pounds. It was a lot of money, but crumbs compared to what he’d have had to pay to persuade a Concorde pilot to fly faster that Mach 2.2.

  “Plets has lived here for more than fifteen years,” said Brooks. “If anyone knows anything about Flemish people on the island, he’s your man.”

  The sudden clatter of hoofs took Brouwers by surprise. A cheerfully decorated coach raced past the Land Rover, missing it by inches. A middle-aged couple waved enthusiastically, as tourists are inclined to do. The coachman droned dutifully on, but the couple in the back weren’t interested in his story. Brouwers noticed the man pour a drink for his wife—a triviality, but it moved him. A happy retirement in the company of a woman was a dream he would never experience.

  “Most people in Mdina are pretty well-off.”

  Brooks grabbed Brouwers by the arm. The myth that Belgians were insatiable beer drinkers was highly exaggerated. His friend didn’t look well at all. “Most of them are descendants of old Maltese families. The city is an open-air museum that attracts hundreds of thousands on a yearly basis.”

  Brooks steered Brouwers across the sun-drenched square. It was so hot that even the tourists had sought shelter in the meager shade of a solitary palm tree, where it was at least ten degrees cooler.

  Both men entered the massive gate. The city was surrounded by a tall fortified wall that sucked up the Mediterranean heat like a cactus in the desert. The moat had been filled in, and a bunch of well-tanned teenagers were enjoying a snappy game of soccer. Mdina was more of a fortress than a city—imposing and invincible.

  Jeroen Plets was Flemish and heavyset, with a beer belly and blushing cheeks. He had the air of a contented gentleman farmer who didn’t need to work and hadn’t for years. When Brouwers explained in West Flemish that he was looking for a fellow countryman on the island, Plets invited them in with a gesture of welcome. Brooks knew Plets’s wife was native Maltese. They had met twenty years ago at a jewelry fair in Milan. Plets was a buyer back then for a renowned Antwerp jeweler. His bride to be was heading the Maltese delegation and presenting her own exquisite collection. It was love at first sight. They courted by correspondence and phone for sixteen months and vowed eternal fidelity in the winter of 1979. She now supervised fifteen jewelry shops on the island. The fast-growing tourist market hadn’t done the enterprising couple any harm, and their exclusive den in Mdina was clear proof, if any was needed.

  “We haven’t had someone from the old country on a visit for ages.” Plets laughed. “Is this your first time on Malta?”

  Brouwers nodded.

  “Jane, we have visitors!” their host shouted in evident good spirits.

  Jane turned out to be a heavy-boned, slightly timid woman. Her smile, on the other hand, was more disarming than the best-trained photo model.

  She greeted Brouwers and Brooks each with a solid handshake. Her fingers were bedecked with the most magnificent silver rings Brouwers had ever seen. “May I offer you some white wine?” she asked without imposing herself.

  Brouwers was dying for a glass of water. He was normally pretty reserved when it came to alcohol, and he had already broken the rules twice in the preceding week.

  “That’s very kind of you, ma’am,” said Brooks, saving his friend from an unforgiveable blunder. On Malta, refusing such an offer would have been a humiliation.

  Jane smiled and disappeared as the men planted themselves in cushioned wicker chairs scattered around the courtyard. The historical building’s patio fulfilled its purpose to perfection, as it offered shade and refreshment.

  “Make yourselves at home, gentlemen,” said Plets, still clearly delighted to have visitors.

  His wife took care of refreshments, setting a tray on the table and leaving the rest to her husband as an exemplary hostess should. She seemed exceptionally sweet in her long cobalt-blue dress, which subtly camouflaged a number of surplus curves. The curvaceous Maltese looked like a well-fed Arabian princess. Her gray eyes were intelligent, and the stunning jewelry with which she was adorned jingled with every movement.

  Plets took a chilled bottle of white wine from the ice bucket and served his guests.

  Brooks leaned back in his chair and tasted the excellent vintage. He was familiar with Maltese hospitality and was looking forward to a lazy afternoon.

  “You mentioned that you rarely have Flemish visitors, Mr. Plets,” Brouwers commented. “No family or friends then?”

  Brooks noticed Jane’s eyes cloud over. Plets was just as ruffled. He raised his glass without answering and stared for several seconds at the deep blue sky through the sparkling wine. The dancing kaleidoscopic colors seemed to interest him more than his guest’s inquiry.

  “I presume you still have contacts back home,” Brouwers cautiously insisted.

  “No, I don’t,” said Plets dryly.

  Brouwers sensed the unease and tried desperately to pick up the pieces.

  “Please excuse my indiscretion, sir.”

  “My family rejected me twenty years ago,” said Plets after a nerve-racking silence. The confrontation with the past had torn open old wounds, but he had no reason whatsoever to conceal the truth. “You couldn’t have known that, of course, but take it from me, the man you’re looking for isn’t family.”

  “The thought hadn’t entered my head, Mr. Plets.”

  Brouwers deftly capitalized on the new turn in the conversation. “The man I’m looking for is a notorious crook, and I have reason to believe he’s somewhere on the island. It seemed logical to assume that a man on the run from the law would seek contact with his fellow countrymen. According to Jonathan, you’re one of the few Flemish people living on Malta, so—”

  “I understand, Mr. Brouwers,” Plets interrupted. “But believe me, you’re the only other Flemish person I’ve seen around here in the last ten years.”

  Plets rubbed the stubble on his chin. Brouwers reminded him of his family. The notorious crook Brouwers was looking for suddenly acquired Plets’s complete sympathy.

  Jane lifted the skirt of her dress and crossed her legs. Brooks thought it was time to be going.

  “I’m not claiming you know the man,” said Brouwers, trying to put a good face on the situation. “But Malta is a small island. Perhaps you’ve heard rumors?”

  “If you want rumors, then Amand’s your man.”

  “The restaurant owner on Gozo?” asked Brouwers.

  Plets nodded. “If anyone can help you, Amand can. He knows every foreigner on the island.”

  Jane refilled the glasses and returned the bottle to the ice bucket upside down, a clear signal that she considered the visit to be over.

  Fifteen minutes later, Brooks and Brouwers drove off in the swelteringly hot Land Rover heading for Gozo, the second largest island in the Maltese archipelago.
/>   “What did I do wrong, Jonathan?”

  “Just bad luck,” said Brooks. “I didn’t know the family thing was so sensitive.”

  “Next stop Gozo, I suppose.” Brouwers sighed.

  Brooks glanced at his watch. “No problem,” he said enthusiastically. “Gozo’s crawling with good hotels.”

  Brouwers didn’t ask why Brooks wanted to spend the night on Gozo, but he wasn’t in any hurry.

  Chief Inspector Dirk Baert was feverishly thrashing his keyboard when Versavel arrived.

  “Good morning, Sergeant.”

  Versavel ignored his superior’s greeting and didn’t reciprocate with the usual “How are you?” He wasn’t in the best of shape himself. For the first time in almost forty years, he hadn’t shaved, and he’d been wearing the same shirt for two days in a row.

  “We received some important information on William Aerts yesterday,” said Baert after a moment or two. The silence irritated him. He also thought that Van In and Versavel were being unprofessional.

  “I tried to reach you all day yesterday,” he added with an accusatory tone.

  Versavel sniffed at his armpit and made a face. He then focused his attention on the coffee machine.

  “William Aerts took a chartered flight last Tuesday to Rome. Don’t you think we should follow up on this, Sergeant? If you ask me, people who leg it in a hurry have always got something to hide.”

  “Leave the decisions to Van In,” Versavel growled. Baert was right, of course, but Versavel preferred to die than admit it.

  “Can we expect the commissioner today?”

  “Do me a favor, Baert?”

  The chief inspector turned. “A favor, Sergeant?”

  “Shut the fuck up, and leave me in peace,” Versavel snarled.

  Baert reacted like a man with Parkinson’s. He wanted to move, but his limbs refused to listen. When he finally managed to get to his feet, the door flew open. Van In thought for a second he’d walked onto a film set where the director had just roared “Cut.”

  “I forgot my ID card, and the clown at reception wouldn’t let me in.”

  Versavel grinned. Van In used the same excuse at least once a week.

  “A rookie?”

  “Still wet behind the ears.” Van In sighed, shrugging his shoulders. He tossed his jacket at the coat stand, ignoring Baert, and poured himself a cup of coffee. Since one or another idiot introduced the concept “sense of civil insecurity,” the various police forces across the country had been competing with one another for new recruits. The public had to feel safe, and that meant more uniforms on the streets. The next idea would be a private cop for every family. No one gave a damn about serious crime. That was reserved for the TV.

  “Who was it?” asked Versavel.

  “Robocop thirty-six or thirty-seven. Jeez, Guido. I can’t tell them apart anymore.”

  “The boys at the desk are only doing their job,” Baert protested. “People used to walk in and out of the station unchallenged. It was high time something was done about it.”

  He was referring to the new security procedures Chief Commissioner De Kee had set up at the entrance to the building­. Visitors had to identify themselves at reception, and the staff had to use a card with a magnetic strip that opened the bulletproof-­glass door.

  “Then they should have done a better job,” Van In sneered.

  Everyone knew that the bulletproof-glass door had been wrongly mounted. One tick with a hammer and the whole thing would shatter into a thousand pieces. To make matters worse, the door between reception and the hallway was made of pressed cardboard. A sturdy toddler could force it open with no trouble. And if that didn’t work, someone could grab a riot gun from the arms room, which was next to reception and thus outside the “secure” zone.

  Baert swallowed the critique in silence. His fingers trembled above his keyboard. His brain manufactured a strange hormone cocktail that transformed his blood into a churning mountain stream. “William Aerts has been spotted in Italy,” Baert hissed. “But no one appears to give a shit.”

  “Hmm.” Van In sniffed. “I have to admit that our friend William has pretty good taste, but Hannelore insists on Portugal. Sorry, Baert.”

  Versavel stared at his boss in disbelief. One day Van In was going to go too far and Baert was going to explode like an overinflated balloon.

  “Let’s go, Guido. Poirot here has work to do. First stop home to collect my ID.”

  Versavel didn’t hesitate. Before Baert had the time to recover from his second surprise, the two men were chuckling in the corridor.

  Van In parked the Golf on Burg Square, a privilege granted only to the police and a handful of apparatchiks. He loosened his tie and tossed the choking thing onto the backseat.

  “De Kee’s expecting me in his office at eleven,” he said nonchalantly. “But first we need to talk.”

  “So you don’t trust De Kee either.”

  Versavel tapped the dashboard as if he were playing an invisible piano.

  “Dirk Baert is a sucker, and they say suckers can be vindictive. It wouldn’t surprise me if our chief inspector is reporting back to the big boss every day, and the very thought drives me up a wall,” said Van In.

  They wrestled their way through an almost stationary sea of people blocking access to Blinde Ezel Street like a herd of dull-witted cattle.

  “I presume we’re looking for a quiet café terrace,” Versavel figured.

  “Needs must, my friend. The Duvel supply at home has dried up, so I’m forced to be unfaithful.”

  “Huidenvetters Square?”

  “Too much yackety-yak, Guido. I prefer l’Estaminet at this hour of the day.”

  Van In wormed his way through a horde of hysterical Spaniards. A well-mannered family man who was just about to take his best ever video shots called him every name in the book. Van In didn’t give a damn. He had walked into the occasional cameraman’s field of fire on purpose.

  Queen Astrid Park is sometimes referred to as the green lung of Bruges, a nickname it doesn’t really deserve since it has little more to offer than a dozen unhealthy trees, a silted-up pond, and two hundred square yards of parched grass. Van In couldn’t help agree as he walked past the listed facade on the Pandreitje, an adjoining street. The old prison had been demolished five years earlier, and the undeveloped land had been transformed into a cheerless parking lot after a political wrangle that seemed to take forever. The ad hoc urban intervention hadn’t done anything to improve the view of the park. The city fathers might just as well have planted a power station on Burg Square. But the disharmony between nature and commerce offered one positive advantage: tourists avoided the place like the plague.

  It was pleasantly warm on l’Estaminet’s covered terrace. A group of about fifteen handicapped youngsters with almost as many supervisors had commandeered the lion’s share of the tables. The atmosphere was friendly and good-natured. Van In reveled in being surrounded by real people for once. A young man with palsy treated him to a huge grin. His face was covered in chocolate sauce, and it clearly delighted him.

  Van In chose a table in the corner of the terrace, and Versavel joined him. Like Van In, he too enjoyed the sight of the handicapped youngsters having such fun.

  “I wanted to have a word about the Pamela Anderson connection,” said Van In, coming straight to the point.

  Versavel was a stranger in the hetero world, and Van In could read it in his eyes.

  “The silicon boobs, Guido.”

  Johan, the proprietor of l’Estaminet, wiped the table with a damp cloth. Unlike Versavel, he knew exactly who Pamela Anderson was, and her silicon boobs didn’t bother him in the least. “Two Duvels?” he asked.

  “A Perrier and a Duvel,” said Van In when Versavel waved the offer aside.

  Johan beat a professional retreat. He wasn’t in t
he habit of eavesdropping on his clients’ conversations.

  “The prostheses are no use to us, Guido. There’s no way we can trace where they came from. All they tell us is that our Herbert was a transsexual, and that sheds a whole new light on the case. Until yesterday we presumed Herbert was a man and his connection with the orgies at the Love was unclear. But as a woman, he fits perfectly into the little network Vandaele and his consorts created. Whores get bumped off every day.”

  Versavel nodded. He had to admit yet again that Van In’s intuition was not to be mocked. The commissioner had been following the right tracks from the outset. Herbert’s death had a direct link with the parties at the Love.

  “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” asked Van In as he curled his thirsty lips around the frothy Duvel Johan had just served.

  “That things got seriously out of hand at one of those parties?” asked Versavel.

  “Gold star, my boy! Front of the class!” Van In grinned.

  One of the handicapped girls responded to his grin with a fitful grimace. The young man with the face full of chocolate sauce was sitting beside her. A supervisor wiped his mouth, which he clearly didn’t like. He stamped his feet and demanded another ice cream. Paid charity was clearly an ersatz solution, but Van In still admired the patience with which the supervisors interacted with the youngsters in their care. If he had been a believer, he would have said a prayer there and then, and begged God for a healthy baby.

  “I can’t imagine too many sex-change operations were carried out in Belgium in the eighties,” said Versavel. “I’m guessing only a couple of places were equipped back then for that kind of business. Why not have Baert call the university hospitals. We’ll know who Herbert is before the day’s out.”

  “Baert’s already called every specialist in Flanders,” said Van In. “And besides—”

  “You don’t trust the man.”

  “How did you guess? If Dirk Baert identifies Herbert, he’ll be on the phone to the press in a heartbeat to take credit for a breakthrough in the investigation.”

  “Ask Carine then.”