by Pieter Aspe
The telephone kept ringing. Instead of massaging his knee, Vandaele caressed the lid of his piano. The instrument represented everything he had dreamed of as a child. That was why he had waited until his father was a month in the grave before he bought it. No one had ever disturbed its snow-white keys, and no one ever would.
“Lodewijk Vandaele.”
“Jos Brouwers.”
Vandaele breathed a sigh of relief. “Mission accomplished I presume?” he inquired, his voice shaky.
A brief silence followed.
“Well?” Vandaele insisted.
It was the first time in his life that Brouwers had to admit failure. He fumbled for the appropriate words. “Aerts is an exceptionally slippery customer,” he said bluntly. “I was right about him being on Malta …”
“So you let him get away.”
“Someone must have tipped the bastard,” Brouwers protested.
Vandaele was less angry than he pretended to be. William had always been docile, accommodating. The boy had given him hours of unforgettable pleasure. Vandaele was actually proud that his little darling had managed to outsmart the likes of Brouwers. “Don’t worry, Jos. Perhaps I was a little premature in my judgment. William would never betray me. I’m certain of that.”
Vandaele started to cough, choking on his own saliva. Brouwers pulled the phone from his ear and stared at it. The old man sounded as if he was on his last legs.
“I wouldn’t be so sure, Mr. Vandaele. William Aerts turned himself in to the federal police at the airport. It wouldn’t surprise me if he—”
“Your money’s waiting for you, Jos. Assignment over.”
Brouwers made some quick calculations. He didn’t give a damn about the rest as long as the old bugger paid. “I’ll be there in an hour,” said Brouwers.
Buffel collected the key to the school archive from the parish priest in the company of Hannelore. The priest had no objection when the former teacher explained why he needed it. He was more interested in Hannelore’s graceful charms.
“You may well be right,” said Buffel as they turned into Ezel Street. “In those days we assumed that children would automatically be given the surname of their fathers at school. But with so many pregnancies out of wedlock, I suppose it’s possible they used their mothers’ names.”
Hannelore supported the elderly teacher on her arm. Van In followed a couple of yards behind the strange couple. The joint venture between Hanne and Buffel was plainly platonic, and if it wasn’t, he certainly didn’t begrudge the old Lazarus his res-erection.
The elementary school where Yves Provoost, Johan Brys, and William Aerts had learned to read and write was in a dismal state. Wilfried Buffel hadn’t been near the place for the better part of ten years, but he had no trouble finding his way to the tiny room in which the files on generations of children had been stored, left to survive the ravages of time.
“Ah-choo!”
Hannelore sneezed full-force as Buffel threaded his way through the dust-covered stacks. Van In tried to make himself useful by illuminating the piles of paper with his flashlight.
Buffel seemed to know what he was doing, as if he’d stopped maintaining the archives only the day before. Hannelore shifted piles of files at the elderly teacher’s request.
“Take the flashlight,” said Van In, swapping roles with Hannelore. “All this work isn’t good for a woman in your condition. We don’t want you overexerting yourself.”
By the time Buffel shouted “1964,” Van In had the feeling he’d shifted five tons of paper.
The teacher produced a pocketknife and cut the string holding the pile of papers together. “Desmedt, Dirk and Dani,” he said after a second or two. “Father: Desmedt, Jozef; mother: Baert, Lutgart. Civil status: divorced.”
Hannelore shivered as she popped the key into the front-door lock. Her thin jacket offered little protection from the creeping fall chill. While the deceptive noon temperatures created the illusion of a late summer, the evenings tended to be a disappointment. Hours in a dusty archive hadn’t done her any good either.
“Shall I warm up some wine?” Van In suggested obligingly. Hannelore scuttled inside and curled up on the sofa. Silence is also an answer, Van In thought. He grabbed a plaid blanket and tucked her in.
“Dirk and Dani Baert,” she said, her teeth chattering. “Now I understand why every turn we took was a blind alley. Baert knew we were looking for his brother.”
Van In placed two glasses of piping-hot wine on the coffee table. “I’m beginning to think that Dani is Herbert and that our chief inspector Baert killed Provoost in revenge for what they did to his brother,” he said dejectedly. “If this leaks to the press, it’ll turn Bruges upside down and inside out.”
“I can see the headlines …” she said.
Van In handed her a glass just as the phone rang. He cursed, put down his glass, and hurried into the kitchen.
“Hello.”
“Sorry to disturb you so late, Commissioner, but …”
“Something wrong, Herman?”
Van In recognized the voice of the officer on duty. Herman Tant sounded nervous, and that wasn’t his style.
“It’s about a certain Aerts,” he said, not giving too much away.
“What about him?”
Van In acted dumb. Tant didn’t know what to say next. He was beginning to feel sorry he had let himself be talked into calling the commissioner in the first place.
“Well?” said Van In impatiently.
“Aerts says he wants to speak to you and that it’s urgent. I …”
Hannelore threw off the plaid blanket. Van In looked as if he’d just been granted a divine revelation.
“Are we talking about William Aerts?”
Hannelore shuffled closer.
“Yes,” said Tant, relief evident in his voice. “The federal boys at the Zaventem airport arrested him a couple of hours ago. He refuses to speak to anyone but you. He says it’s a matter of life or death.”
Van In gestured that Hannelore should listen in.
“Tell them I’m onto it, Herman. Where is he right now?”
“In Brussels, Commissioner.”
Van In knew what that meant. If he followed official channels, it would take a week before he got to speak to Aerts. He hung up and called De Kee. The chief commissioner wasn’t at home. Van In listened patiently for the answering machine to say its piece. “For urgent matters call the police, it says.”
Hannelore took the receiver. “Pour me another glass of wine,” she said with a smile.
While Van In continued with the task at hand, Hannelore called Prosecutor Beekman. He had promised to help where necessary. Ten minutes later they received a response. Beekman ensured Hannelore that the federal police would transfer William Aerts to Bruges under escort early the following morning.
“Satisfied?” she asked with a provocative grin.
Van In filled both glasses. “What would I do without you, Hanne? I’m deeply in your debt.”
She smiled like the Mona Lisa and returned to the living room with her head held high. “There’s a simple way to pay it off!” she shouted. “I left my wine in the kitchen. If you bring it to me, we’re even.”
Van In obeyed without question. He had often wondered how women managed to transform their men into submissive chimps. Now he knew. “Thanks, sweetheart. A cigarette for the queen of Sheba?”
Van In scurried back to the kitchen and grabbed a clean ashtray from the counter and a block of semi-matured cheese. He deserved a snack for all his efforts.
Jos Brouwers parked his Renault in front of his client’s villa. Discretion was no longer important. He had failed, and that meant Vandaele would never employ him again. But the money would be waiting for him as the old man had promised. He was a man of his word.
The ex-cop turned
up his collar and hurried across the lawn to the front door. The curtains were closed, but he could still see yellowish slivers of light through the gaps.
Brouwers rang the bell as a cutting wind whistled around his legs and whipped up the fallen leaves. He waited patiently for Vandaele to open the door, but there seemed to be no movement inside, so he made his way to the window and drummed on the glass with the tips of his fingers. Still no sound, only that of the wind howling over the polder.
He cursed under his breath and returned to his car. He always kept a little box in the glove compartment with the tools he needed to pick locks.
Vandaele was sitting at the piano, his head slumped over the keyboard. A disgusting slime dripped from the keys. Brouwers retched when he spotted chunks of black tissue in the dark-red pool of blood. The old pedophile’s face was contorted with pain. Vandaele was dead. He had vomited up his rotten lungs and choked in his own filth.
15
Chief Commissioner De Kee hung his spotless overcoat on the coat stand, brushed some imaginary dust from his shoulder, shook Van In’s hand, and positioned himself by the window. The situation was precarious. Van In had called him half an hour earlier, and he had immediately jumped into his car.
“When can we expect him?” the chief commissioner asked.
“Eight thirty,” said Van In.
De Kee turned to the window, his face riddled with concern. The Belgian judicial system had taken some serious blows in the past year. If Van In was right and Chief Inspector Baert was responsible for the death of Yves Provoost, his corps’s image would have to absorb the damage. De Kee had always spoken about my men. As far as he was concerned, a blot on the escutcheon of the Bruges police was a personal slur. In that sense he was particularly aristocratic.
“And the other one?”
“Around nine,” said Van In. “The federal police commander in Brussels promised he would have William Aerts on the road by eight a.m.”
Van In lit a cigarette. It was his office, and he didn’t have to ask his superior for permission.
“Is there some connection between the two?”
“They know each other from elementary school,” said Van In.
“And you’re certain that Dirk Desmedt and Dirk Baert are one and the same person?”
“The dates of birth match. If you ask me, Dirk Baert took his mother’s name once he turned twenty-one.”
De Kee started to pace up and down. He hoped Van In was wrong about the chief inspector.
“The details are in his file,” said Van In, holding out a gray-green folder. “Dirk Baert went to school in Ezel Street, and he has a brother by the name of Dani.”
De Kee waved his hand in disinterest. He would only be making a fool of himself if he were to insist on confirming the details.
Dirk Baert sensed something wasn’t right when he walked into Room 204. De Kee’s presence so early in the morning was about as exceptional as a visit by the crown prince to a swinger’s club.
“Good morning,” he said without looking up.
“Take a seat, Desmedt.”
The sound of his old name hit Baert like a battering ram. “What do you mean, Chief Commissioner?”
“You know exactly what I mean, Desmedt. You’re in deep shit, and the rest of the corps with you.”
Baert took a seat. His legs felt like limp strings of spaghetti. De Kee had cut the umbilical cord with a single razor-sharp swipe. From now on he was on his own. “So I hated my father enough to change my name. You make it sound like I committed a crime.”
Van In had expected a different reaction. It looked as if Baert wasn’t going to be a pushover. “So you admit your real name is Dirk Desmedt?”
It was important to formulate questions during an interrogation that obliged the suspect to answer with “yes.”
Baert nodded.
“Did you have a brother named Dani?”
Van In used the past tense on purpose.
“Yes,” said Baert.
“And Dani is dead?”
“Dani disappeared. He left for the Netherlands twelve years ago, and I haven’t heard a word from him since.”
“Not a word?”
“Nothing.”
“Commissioner Van In just wants to help you, Baert,” De Kee interrupted. “If you tell him the truth, we can add a note to the report that you made a full confession of your own free will. That can make a hell of a difference in court.”
“I don’t understand what kind of confession you want from me, Chief Commissioner. But I can’t deny that I’m familiar with the law,” said Baert.
Van In and De Kee exchanged a meaningful glance.
“You’ve got three hours to think it over, Baert,” said Van In as he punched in the number of the duty officer. “If you haven’t made a decision by then, we’ll be forced to hand the case over to the prosecutor’s office.”
The chief inspector bowed his head. Why didn’t they arrest him? he thought in desperation.
“Hello, Herman. Van In here. Can you spare someone reliable for a couple of hours?”
Herman Tant checked the duty roster.
“Bart Vermeulen’s around until one p.m.”
“OK. Send him up.”
Prosecutor Beekman, Hannelore’s immediate superior, was one of a new crop of magistrates. In contrast to his predecessors, he hadn’t been recruited from a pack of mediocre lawyers who had joined the party for lack of clients. He was forty-two but still looked relatively boyish when the light was right. That was because he had consciously chosen to drop the obligatory gray suits his colleagues insisted on wearing for the sake of decorum. Beekman wore a sports jacket most of the time and even left his tie at home on occasion.
“Make yourself at home, Hannelore,” he said invitingly.
The prosecutor’s office was airy and fresh, and lacked the usual shelving weighed down by piles of musty dossiers. Beekman had even had the mandatory portrait of the king and queen reframed at his own expense in a more modern style.
“Officer Neels’s disappearance worries me,” he said.
Hannelore relaxed in a cozy sitting area by the window. The windowsill was full of cactuses. Beekman evidently liked spiky green. “Me too,” said Hannelore. “But we turned the place over yesterday and found nothing. I’m afraid we’re back at square one.”
“And what does Van In think?”
“Pieter has enough on his plate with the other cases. He’s convinced the interrogation of the two suspects is the only way to expose Vandaele’s network. He’s also pretty sure it will lead him to Carine Neels.”
Beekman ran his finger over his right eyebrow. “Let me put my cards on the table, Hannelore,” he said. “I got a call yesterday from the prosecutor-general asking me to slow down on the Herbert and Provoost killings.”
Hannelore was aware that Beekman was sticking his neck out by sharing this information. Under normal circumstances, arrangements between a prosecutor and the prosecutor-general were not intended for the ears of young deputies like herself. “What does slow down mean?”
“The deep freeze,” said Beekman flatly.
“You can’t be serious, Jozef.”
She always used his first name in private conversation.
“And I’m not finished.”
Beekman ran his finger over his left eyebrow. “The request to brush the case under the carpet comes from none other than the minister of foreign affairs. He’s afraid an investigation into a long-forgotten murder will be damaging for his party.”
“The asshole,” Hannelore thundered. “He was one of the boys who used the Love every other week.”
“According to reports, other politicians were also involved,” he said with caution.
“And now the bastards have to be spared.”
If Hannelore hadn’t looked up to B
eekman as she did, she would have stormed out of his office in a rage. “Tell me, Jozef. What do you honestly think of that bunch of losers?”
“Technically speaking, the prosecutor-general is my immediate superior,” he said with a hint of a grin.
Hannelore was happy she hadn’t marched out in anger. “Technically,” she sniggered. “That sounds promising.” Beekman may have appeared unconventional, but he was still ambitious.
“Don’t misunderstand me, Hannelore. I can’t help you officially. On the contrary. I should be telling you off right now.”
“I’m pregnant, Jozef. I could have you on child abuse if you’re not careful.”
Beekman couldn’t stop himself from glancing at her belly. “You’ve been saying that for three months already. In our business we need evidence.”
Hannelore was grateful for the compliment.
“There’s little I can do officially, but off the record, you’ve got carte blanche. I don’t give a shit who’s involved in the case. Call me if you come up with something. I promise to turn West Flanders on its head if I have to.”
“Even if the minister is involved?”
“If you have strong arguments, I won’t hesitate.”
“And if the prosecutor-general uses his veto?”
Beekman snorted disdainfully. “The magistrature isn’t what it used to be, Hannelore. If you provide solid evidence, the prosecutor-general will change his tune soon enough.”