The Midas Murders (5 page)

A respectable gentleman sitting near the door savored his favorite monastery beer. Van In looked for a place far from the couple with the hungry baby.

“What can I get you?” asked the waiter, bordering on the impolite.

In the course of the day, Van In drank just little enough to avoid getting stewed and having to stagger home, and just enough to be able to cope with confronting Hannelore. It was the only way to suppress the inferiority complex that seemed to have embedded itself in his genes. He had tried alternative methods, but none of them worked and he had given up the fight years ago. He had managed to conceal his pathological shyness from the outside world, more or less, but intimates knew that Van In tended to avoid problems when the opportunity arose and preferred to withdraw into a corner and sulk. As far as he himself was concerned, the planned confrontation with Hannelore was a courageous initiative.

He waited for her outside the brand-new, exorbitantly costly courthouse near the Kruispoort, another of Bruges's surviving medieval city gates. She finished work at around six-thirty most days; today was, fortunately, no exception.

In the parking lot, she had the appearance of a transparent nymph in a dark primeval forest. She was wearing a tight gray ankle-length skirt and a short leather jacket with padded shoulders. The transparency was the result of a set of headlamps from someone's car ruthlessly penetrating the lower part of her skirt, exposing the contours of her well-trained legs with exceptional clarity.

“Hello, Pieter. It's been a while.”

He walked to meet her and kissed her chastely on the forehead.

“Everything okay?” he inquired sheepishly.

“Were you expecting a lecture?” she jested. He didn't dare put his arm around her shoulder.

“I took a day off today, and I thought to myself….”

“A day off sick, you mean.” Her eyes flashed mischievously.

“A day off sick, then,” he admitted reluctantly.

“I had Guido on the line this morning,” she said apologetically. “Of course, he couldn't have known that you would be fit enough to spend the afternoon haunting the courthouse parking lot.”

She unlocked the passenger side of her Renault Twingo and let him get in.

“You'll catch your death,” she said with concern.

Van In was blue from the cold. His thin cotton suit stuck to his body like a frozen sheet. Hannelore started the engine and cranked up the heater.

“It only takes a couple of minutes,” she said.

“Are you still mad at me?” he asked, trembling.

“Of course not, Pieter. Actually, I'm happy to see you. I have a bunch of things to tell you, and when I couldn't reach you at home or at the office….”

Jesus, he looked like shit. She leaned toward him, threw her arm over his shoulder, and pressed her cool lips against his mouth.

“That's what I call a real kiss,” she grinned when Van In's stuffed-up nose forced him to prematurely interrupt the embrace. “Feeling better?”

Van In nodded. The carillon bells chimed in unison in his head. Hannelore checked the heating vent and swished the melting layer of snow away with the central windshield wiper. She caught sight of Examining Magistrate Joris Creytens in her rearview mirror, gaping in the direction of the Twingo. The tight-fisted magistrate was carrying a leather briefcase, cracked and dog-eared.

“That's not his style,” she scowled. Van In hadn't a clue what she was talking about.

“Take a discreet look behind you. Do you recognize him?”

Van In saw Creytens scraping the windshield of his dilapidated Mercedes with a plastic spatula. “Creytens, alias the Miser,” he sneered. “Stingier than his shadow. Of course I know him.”

Hannelore laughed heartily at his remark, and Van In was happy to have her next to him.

“Starting to thaw a little?” she inquired.

“Slowly but surely. I'll call for help if it gets too hot.”

Hannelore usually ignored his feeble allusions, but this time it didn't seem to bother her. She rewarded him with a kiss. “Want a smoke?”

“Sure.” He had run out of cigarettes hours earlier.

“So you're not angry?” he whined like a spoiled husband.

Hannelore took a puff of his cigarette and carefully shifted the Twingo into first.

“I
was
angry, Pieter Van In, and you know it good and well. You were completely loaded when you appeared at my parents' place at Christmas.”

The cigarette tasted bitter. He had rehearsed the scene over and over in his head.

“But that was three months ago,” she added reproachfully.

“Eleven weeks,” said Van In, on his high horse.

She ignored his nit-picking correction. “And you're probably wondering what my folks thought about you snoring on the sofa.”

“Did I snore?”

“You shook the house,” she exaggerated. “My dad had to turn the TV up, and even then he had trouble following his favorite soap. But my mother took a liking to you.”

“Really?”

“Mother likes just about everybody,” she teased.

“Don't kid around with me, Hanne.”

“Your wish is my command, sir.”

“Hanne!”

“Fine. Plans for tonight?”

Van In took an irate drag on his cigarette and shook his head.

“Excellent, because—”

“You've got a bunch of things to tell me,” he finished for her.

“Praise the Lord. Van In awakes.”

She narrowly missed a couple of cyclists on Lange Street who were unashamedly taking up half the road. One of them shook his fist in rage.

“I assume you don't have much worth eating in that castle of yours, Pieter Van In.”

He only had five hundred francs in his pocket, and the way she was looking at him didn't bode well.

“Look at the birds in the sky. They don't plant or harvest, and yet….”

“What about the Greek in Ezel Street?” she suggested enthusiastically. “And don't worry, it's on me. Or did I misread the hint?”

Van In straightened his stiff spine and took another cigarette without asking.

“A date?” she asked.

He loved Hannelore but hated capitulating without putting up a fight. An icy silence filled the Twingo.

“Okay,” she said lightheartedly. “For the last time:
Ego te absolvo.
Or don't you believe in female priests?”

Van In tried to control himself, but when she elbowed him hard in the ribs he could no longer contain his laughter.

“Finally,” she sighed. “I thought you'd never give in.”

“On one condition,” he grinned. “That we finish with a nightcap at my place.”

A
T THE
G
REEK, THEY HAD
flambéed filet of lamb with greens and cream sauce … divine. Niko, the owner, treated them to a table near the fire. Van In could hear the sound of crunching car wheels outside and presumed it had started to snow again. The atmosphere was perfect.

They enjoyed every bite of the juicy roasted meat, and Hannelore made sure the carafes of house wine kept on coming.

“I wanted to have a word about the murder on Blinde Ezel Street,” she said between gulps.

“Murder?”

He divided the last four slices of meat between their plates. Hannelore promptly returned a slice.

“Did Fiedle snuff it?” he asked.

“He succumbed to his injuries this morning. The public prosecutor appointed Examining Magistrate Creytens to the case; but when I heard you were the investigator, I was curious. That's why I tried to call you earlier.”

“There are stiff penalties attached to bribing a police official,” Van In teased. “But for a portion of baklava, you can have the lot.”

“If I were in your shoes, I wouldn't be too cheerful, Pieter Van In. The magistrate was furious when he heard you couldn't be reached today. He handed the case over to the Federal Police without taking a breath.”

“So much the better. And he did the right thing. I'll be grateful until the day I die.”

“I don't get you, Pieter. You rarely get the chance to investigate a murder, and all you can say is ‘so much the better'?”

“The German was still alive when we started the investigation. And who says he was murdered? The man was drunk as a skunk. It was snowing; the streets were icy. Maybe he just slipped,” Van In responded matter-of-factly. “Anyway, I've got more than enough on my plate.”

“There you go again. The perpetual underdog.”

He ignored the sarcasm and popped the last chunk of lamb into his mouth.

“I've heard they appointed a certain commissioner Croos to head up the investigation,” she continued nonchalantly.

The maneuver had the desired effect. Van In almost choked.

“Wilfried Croos?”

“Do you know him?”

“You bet I know him.” Van In reacted like a schoolgirl to a bee-sting. “Everyone knows the dumbest commissioner in the Northern Hemisphere.”

“Mmm, I wouldn't call him dumb,” said Hannelore, straightening her face and hiding it behind a glassful of wine. “Macho and arrogant, perhaps, but dumb?”

“So you find the asshole attractive,” Van In snorted. “Do you know what they call him? ‘Bull's-Eye' Croos. Even his mother-in-law isn't safe.”

Hannelore tried not to laugh. “I know you too well, Pieter Van In. Let's cut the crap.”

Van In grinned like a kid watching the postman hit the saddle of his bike the wrong way.

“Order the baklava,” he said provocatively. “And spill the beans.”

“The public prosecutor's insisting on an in-depth investigation. Turns out Herr Fiedle was a prominent businessman.”

“There we go again,” Van In cursed. “The Kraut gets preferential treatment. I wonder if the public prosecutor would be putting on the same amount of pressure if Fiedle had been Moroccan. You can tell him from me that I'm not going to lose any sleep over a dead German.”

“Pieter, behave yourself,” she chided.

A couple of diners stared at them indignantly from another table. Niko, the Greek, whose Dutch was excellent, stood behind the bar and grinned. The SS had taken his father hostage during the Second World War and executed him in cold blood. He didn't give a shit what the other customers thought about Pieter's remarks.

“Didn't you know that Germany's most famous son was actually an Austrian?” said Van In at the top of his voice, intentionally.

The couple at the table beside them laughed heartily, although they had appeared as indignant as the rest moments earlier.

“Have you heard the one about the two Germans ordering a couple of martinis on a terrace in London after the war?”

Van In was on a roll now. Half the restaurant pricked up its ears.

“To avoid drawing attention to themselves, they order in English. The waiter nods and asks: ‘Dry?' ‘Nein: zwei,' the Krauts answer in unison.”

While Hannelore thought the punch line was actually quite funny, she still did her best not to laugh. “That's no way to conduct a conversation,” she said, unamused.

“Come on, Hanne. It was a joke!”

“That's what you always say, Pieter Van In.”

Niko appeared with a generous portion of baklava. “On the house,” he smiled.

“Fiedle worked for Kindermann,” Hannelore began after they each took a bite, “one of the biggest tour operators in Europe. He was staying at the Duc de Bourgogne, a hotel on Huidenvetters Square. Croos had his men go through Fiedle's suite, and they found some unusual photos.”

She leaned forward and fished a gray-brown envelope marked “Ministry of Justice” out of her handbag.

Michelangelo's Madonna
, he wanted to say.

“What do you think?” Hannelore spread out about a dozen photos on the table.

“A German with a penchant for the polders. So he likes the Belgian lowlands. Should I find that suspicious?”

Van In clearly recognized the characteristic silhouette of a Flemish farmhouse and the street lamps along the motorway. The motorway in question connects the port of Zeebrugge with the hinterland, cutting through the protected landscape like a carbonized rattlesnake.

“So?” she asked, curious to hear what he had to say.

Van In examined the photos. They were recent and seemed to be perfectly innocent.

“To be honest, Hanne, I can't see the connection. If you ask me, they're just souvenirs.”

“What about this one?” She produced a yellowing monochrome photo from her handbag.

“Aha, the
Madonna
. Did you also find that in his hotel room?”

“You know good and well where it came from,” she growled.

Van In plunged his fork into the baklava once more, and Hannelore waited patiently until his mouth was empty again.

“So Croos has the file and everything in it?”

“Creytens insisted,” she whispered. “A good thing Leo made a couple of copies on the side. Croos is protecting this file as if his life depends on it. And I don't like it.”

“Correct me if I'm wrong, but did the public prosecutor happen to ask you to keep an eye on Creytens?”

Hannelore nervously fumbled a cigarette from the pack. She was on the verge of blushing.

“You have the right to remain silent, of course,” Van In grinned when she didn't answer his question. “But as I said earlier: everyone wins if the Federal Police take over.”

Hannelore filled her glass and summoned the waiter. Leading Van In down the garden path was proving to be trickier than she'd expected.

“A coffee and another portion of baklava,” she said, slightly irked.

The Greek smiled and scuttled toward the kitchen.

“There's apparently something wrong with the vegetation in the background,” she hinted.

Van In ran the photo between his thumb and his forefinger.

“Is that so?” he asked naïvely.

Hannelore took the photo and shook her head. “I can see the cogs turning, Pieter.”

“Then stop beating around the bush, Hannelore.”

She gulped. Sometimes he caught her off guard. “I had lunch with Leo,” she confessed. “He'd spent the entire morning trying to reach you, just like I had. He told me you'd had questions about the landscape in the background of the photo.”

“Of course he did,” said Van In resignedly. “I presume the photo's no longer part of the official file.”

“Exactly. It's been removed.” She seemed to take it for granted that he would spontaneously draw the correct conclusion. “Specialists have identified the vegetation in the meantime.”

“That was fast,” Van In observed sarcastically. “And what's the verdict?”

“Stop pissing about, Pieter.”

Van In summoned the waiter and ordered a fresh carafe of wine.

“According to the experts,” she said, “it's pokeweed.”

“A very suspicious plant,” Van In smiled derisively. Tears filled his eyes when Hannelore suddenly pinched his nostrils. “Ouch, that hurts … Jesus!”

The guests in the restaurant were getting their money's worth. Niko turned up the bouzouki music a tickle louder.

“
Ego te absolvo
,” he groaned when she refused to let go.

“Be happy it was just your nose,” Hannelore hissed. She let go, and he massaged his molested nostrils.

“Say a hundred Our Fathers,” she said sternly. Van In pulled back when she threatened to pinch him a second time.

“I'll never laugh at pokeweed again,” he promised, half-serious. “Talk to me. I'm all ears.”

Hannelore grabbed his fork and nibbled at the sweet baklava. “Pokeweed only grows in the Southern Hemisphere,” she breezed.

“And Michelangelo's
Madonna
—”

“Has never been sighted in the Southern Hemisphere, to my knowledge,” said Hannelore self-assuredly.

Van In stuffed the last piece of baklava into his mouth. “So the question is: why would Creytens remove the photo from the file?”

“Precisely. That's what I wanted to discuss with you this evening. Exchange thoughts….”

Van In furrowed his brow and tried to think clearly. Not an easy task after a liter of house jug.

“What do we know about Creytens?”

“Creytens is tainted,” Hannelore whispered. “The public prosecutor's had his suspicions for quite a while.”

Under normal circumstances, magistrates never gossip about their colleagues.

“So you have to keep an eye on him,” Van In said.

Hannelore bit her bottom lip. She had sworn secrecy.

“Don't forget that judges are unimpeachable,” said Van In. “They might dole out the dumbest sentences all their lives, but they remain honorable citizens deserving of our respect.”

“Don't overdo it, Pieter,” she sighed.

“Okay, so Creytens is a corrupt bollocks who manipulates files and withholds evidence. What do you want me to do about it?”

“I admit that we—”

“Jesus H. Even if we find truckloads of kiddie porn in his study, he's still a free man,” Van In retorted. “When you're talking power, examining magistrates are right up there next to God. In the context of an investigation, he can take whatever measures he sees fit.”

“You're right, Pieter. We need to be realistic.”

Van In divided the remaining contents of the carafe between their glasses.

“I presume you're not planning to sleep at home tonight?” he inquired unexpectedly. He was much less reserved when he had alcohol in his blood.

Hannelore looked down, but not out of prudery. “If you'll light your fire and put on
Carmina Burana
.”

“I still have a bottle of Cadre Noir in the fridge.”

“Were those the bubbles you served with the shrimp in October?”

Van In closed his eyes. He was picturing her coming into the bedroom with the ice-cold glasses and the steaming shrimp.

“An unforgettable evening,” he whispered.

He kicked off a shoe and searched longingly under the table for her calf.