The Unlucky Lottery (13 page)

She started the car and set off for the town centre. It was turned five o’clock, and the town seemed to comprise approximately equal amounts of exhaust fumes, damp and darkness – a mixture that corresponded pretty well with her own state. She stopped at Keymer Pleijn and did some shopping at Zimmermann’s – yoghurt, juice and fifteen grapes: that was more than enough after the rye sandwiches, she told herself – and when she parked outside her temporary refuge in Gerckstraat, she was convinced that there were only two things in the world that could put her back on her feet.

A long, hot bath and a large cognac.

Fortunately both these phenomena were within the realm of possibility, so she switched on her soul again and clambered out of the car. She broke with her usual practice and took the lift up to the fourth floor, and even began to hum some modern ear-fodder she must have heard on the car radio or in Zimmermann’s.

When she opened the lift door, the first thing she saw was Claus. He was sitting on the floor outside her flat, with a large bouquet of red roses in his lap.

He stared at her with blank, worn-out eyes.

‘Ewa,’ he said.

The sandwiches made their presence felt. Hell’s bells, she thought. I don’t have the strength for this.

She slammed the lift door closed again and went back down. Half-ran over the paved area outside the entrance door and had just managed to sit down in her car again when he appeared in the lit-up doorway.

‘Poor you,’ she mumbled as she rummaged for the ignition key. ‘I’m sorry, but I just don’t have the strength.’

Then she started the car and drove away to look for an acceptable hotel.

Münster was dreaming.

At first it was all perfectly innocent. Some sort of party with cheerful people in their gladrags, drinks in their hands and laughter in their faces. He recognized several of them – both colleagues and good friends, of himself and Synn. Only the premises seemed to be unfamiliar: a confusion of various rooms, staircases and corridors. And then, gradually, a hint of something unpleasant began to insinuate itself into the dream. Not to say frightening . . . He went from one to another of these cubbyholes, each one smaller than the last, darker, occupied by increasingly unknown men and women up to more and more dodgy business. And all the time he kept bumping into people who wanted to speak to him, to drink a toast with him, but he felt unable to stay in any given place for more than a couple of minutes . . . There was something beckoning to him, something he was looking for, but didn’t understand what it was until he was there.

He entered yet another room. It was dark, and at first he thought it was also empty – but then he heard a sound. Somebody whispered his name. He went further in, and suddenly he felt a woman’s hand on his chest. She huddled up to him, and he knew immediately that it was for her sake that he was here. Exclusively and only for her sake.

She was obviously naked, and it was obvious that they were going to make love. She led him to a low, wide bed in front of a fire which had almost burned out, but the embers were still glowing . . . Yes, it was obvious that they were going to make love, and he knew almost immediately that the woman was Ewa Moreno. Her eyes like halved almonds, her small, firm breasts that he had never seen before but nevertheless had always known that they would look exactly like this . . . And her skin reflecting the glowing embers – no, nothing could be clearer. In no more than a second he was also naked, lying on the bed, and she was astride him, guiding him into her eager pussy, and he watched her gleaming body raising and lowering itself, and it was ineffably blissful. Then he noticed the door slowly opening without really registering it . . . until he saw his children, Bart and Marieke, standing there watching him only a metre away, with their serious and somewhat sorrowful eyes.

He was woken up by his own cry. Synn stirred restlessly, and he could feel the cold sweat all over his skin like an armour plate of angst. He lay there motionless for a few seconds, then slid cautiously out of bed, tiptoed into the bathroom and showered for ten minutes.

When he returned to the bedroom he saw that it was a quarter past four. He lifted the duvet and crept down to lie close to Synn’s warm back. Close, very close.

Then lay there, holding her tightly, without sleeping a wink all night.

Something is happening, he thought.

It mustn’t happen.

16

Wednesday felt like a funeral in a foreign language. He almost crashed the car twice on the way to the police station, and for a while seriously considered driving back home and going to bed instead. He had just flopped down at his desk, propping up his head with his hands, when Jung knocked on the door.

‘Have you got a spare moment?’

Münster nodded.

‘Two, if you need them.’

Jung sat down.

‘You look tired.’

‘What did you want?’ asked Münster.

‘Well,’ said Jung, squirming on the chair. ‘Nothing much really, just a thought that struck me.’

‘Really?’

‘Hmm,’ said Jung. ‘Er, I was thinking that the simplest solution to this Leverkuhn business would be that Bonger did it.’

Münster yawned.

‘Go on,’ he said.

Jung braced himself.

‘Well, I thought that Bonger could have gone home with Leverkuhn, for instance . . . or called round later, it doesn’t really matter which . . . and killed him. I mean, they had been arguing outside Freddy’s, and if Bonger lost his temper, it could well be that he lost control of his senses, as it were.’

‘You think so?’ said Münster.

‘I don’t know. But at least that would explain why he’s disappeared, wouldn’t it? At first I thought he had jumped into the canal when he sobered up and realized what he’d done, but of course he could equally well simply be in hiding. He must realize that he would be under suspicion. What do you think?’

Münster pondered for a moment.

‘Okay,’ he said. ‘God knows, it’s certainly a possibility. There’s nothing to say that’s not what happened in any case.’

‘That’s exactly what I thought,’ said Jung, looking pleased with himself. ‘I just wanted you to bear it in mind.’

He stood up.

‘Thank you,’ said Münster. ‘If Hiller agrees to let me have you for a few days, you could follow it up – check possible pals and acquaintances and so on. Regarding a hiding place, that is.’

‘I’d be glad to,’ said Jung. ‘Although he doesn’t seem all that cooperative just now, Hiller . . . Something to do with that dwarf. But let me know if he gives us the okay.’

When he had left, Münster went to stand by the window again. Pulled up the blind, rested his forehead against the cool glass and gazed out at the completely unchanged town, which hardly seemed to have had the energy to get out of bed either.

Bonger? he thought. A dead simple solution. But why the hell not? Maybe he should do what Van Veeteren used to say: always do the simplest thing first. It’s so damned easy to miss a checkmate in one move!

Then he looked at the clock and saw there was less than twenty minutes to go before his meeting with Marie-Louise Leverkuhn. He armed himself with coffee, pen and notebook. Sat down at his desk again, and tried to concentrate.

‘To tell you the truth, we’re having difficulty in coming to grips with this case, fru Leverkuhn.’

She made no reply.

‘Nevertheless, we must work on the assumption that there is a motive behind the murder of your husband, that there is something in his background or general circumstances that has resulted in this terrible crime.’

It was a heavy-handed opening, but he had decided to take that line. Marie-Louise didn’t move a muscle.

‘There is only one person who can know about such things, and that is of course you, fru Leverkuhn. Have you had any thoughts about such matters in the last few days?’

‘None at all.’

She stared vacantly at him.

‘You must have been thinking about what has happened.’

‘I suppose I’ve been thinking about it, but nothing has come of it.’

‘Have you talked to many people you know?’

She shook her head.

‘I don’t know all that many people. My children. Emmeline. A few neighbours.’

‘But can you give me the names of your closest friends? Apart from Emmeline von Post, that is. That you and your husband used to socialize with.’

She looked down at the floor. Aha, Münster thought. So that’s how it is. That’s where the problem lies.

The most shameful thing in life, he’d read somewhere, was not having any friends. Being on your own. You can be as stupid as they come, a racist, a sadist, obese and stink like a skunk, a practising paedophile – but you have to have friends.

‘We didn’t socialize much,’ she said without looking up. ‘He had his friends, I had mine.’

‘No mutual friends?’

She shook her head.

‘What about relatives?’

‘Our children,’ she said again.

‘You don’t have any brothers or sisters?’

‘No, not any more.’

‘Who did your husband use to meet, apart from the gentlemen at Freddy’s?’

She thought for a moment.

‘Nobody else at all, I think. Maybe herr Engel now and then.’

‘Ruben Engel? In the same block of flats?’

‘Yes.’

‘And what about you?’ Münster persisted. ‘You used to meet fröken von Post a few times a month. Who else?’

‘Nobody else,’ said Marie-Louise.

‘Are you sure?’ said Münster. ‘No former colleagues, for instance? You were working at that department store until a couple of years ago, isn’t that right?’

‘Fröken Svendsen,’ she said. ‘Regina Svendsen. We sometimes used to go out together, but she moved to Karpatz a few years ago. She found a new man, an old school friend who had also found himself on his own.’

‘Do you have her telephone number?’

‘No.’

Münster made a note and turned over a page.

‘Tell me about your coming home last Saturday night.’

‘I’ve already done that several times.’

‘This will be the last time,’ Münster promised.

‘Why?’

‘You never know. Things sometimes come back to you that you overlooked shortly after the event. Especially if you were in shock.’

She looked at him. Somewhat annoyed.

‘I haven’t overlooked anything.’

‘You came home at a few minutes past two, is that right?’

‘Yes,’ said fru Leverkuhn.

‘And the entrance door was standing ajar?’

‘Yes.’

‘The door to your flat wasn’t locked, right?’

‘I’ve already said it wasn’t.’

‘Did you see anybody? In the street or on the staircase, or in the flat?’

‘No.’

‘You’re sure?’

‘Of course.’

‘So you went inside and discovered that something was wrong?’

‘Yes.’

‘How?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘How did you know that something was wrong?’

She thought for a moment.

‘There was a smell,’ she said.

‘Of what?’ Münster asked.

‘Blood.’

Münster pretended to be making notes while waiting for her to say more. But she didn’t. He tried to recall the smell of blood, and established that it was distinctly possible that she could have detected it. If his memory served him rightly, he had read somewhere amongst all the information about her that, like her daughter, she had worked for a few years as a butcher. She presumably knew what she was talking about.

‘You went into the room?’

‘Yes.’

‘And switched the light on?’

‘Yes.’

‘How did you react when you saw what had happened?’

She paused. Sat in silence again for a few seconds, then sat up straight and cleared her throat.

‘I stood there and felt like throwing up,’ she said. ‘It sort of came in waves, but then it stopped. So I went back out to report it.’

‘You set off for Entwick Pleijn?’

‘Yes, I’ve told you already.’

‘Were there many other people about?’

She shook her head.

‘I don’t remember. I don’t think so. It was raining.’

‘Did you go all the way to the police station?’

She thought that over again.

‘No. There were no lights in the windows, I could see that from the other side of the square.’

‘And so you turned back?’

‘Yes.’

‘And went the same way back home?’

‘Yes.’

Münster paused.

‘Shall I tell you something odd, fru Leverkuhn?’ he said.

She didn’t answer.

‘You say you walked nearly two kilometres through the town, and so far not a single witness has come forward to say they saw you. What do you say to that? I mean, the streets were not completely deserted.’

No reply. Münster waited for half a minute.

‘It’s not the case that you’re lying, is it, fru Leverkuhn?’

She looked up and stared at him with mild contempt.

‘Why on earth should I be telling lies?’

To save your own skin, for instance, Münster thought; but that was naturally an extremely dodgy thought, and he kept it to himself.

‘Had he fallen out with any of those old friends?’ he asked instead.

‘Not as far as I know.’

‘With herr Bonger, for instance?’

‘I don’t even know which is which of them.’

‘Have they never visited your flat?’

‘Never.’

‘But you knew that they had won some money, I take it?’

He had been leading up to that question for some considerable time, but it was difficult to draw any conclusions from her reaction.

‘Money?’ was all she said.

‘Twenty thousand,’ said Münster.

‘Each?’ she asked.

‘All together,’ said Münster. ‘Five thousand each. But that’s still quite a lot.’

She shook her head slowly.

‘He never mentioned that,’ she said.

Münster nodded.

‘And you still haven’t noticed anything missing from the flat? Apart from the knife, that is.’

‘No.’

‘Nothing at all?’

‘No . . . Mind you, I haven’t seen any trace of five thousand.’

‘They haven’t collected the money yet,’ said Münster.

‘That would explain it,’ said fru Leverkuhn.