Håkan Nesser - The Inspector and Silence

Borkmanns Point

The Return

Minds Eye

Woman with Birthmark

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Translation copyright 2011 by Laurie Thompson

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Pantheon Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York. Originally published in Sweden as Kommissarien och Tystnaden by Albert Bonniers Frlag, Stockholm, in 1997. Copyright 1997 by Hkan Nesser.

Pantheon Books and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Nesser, Hkan, [date].

[Kommissarien och tystnaden. English]
The inspector and silence : an Inspector Van Veeteren mystery / Hkan Nesser; translated from the Swedish by Laurie Thompson.
p. cm.
Originally published in Swedish as Kommissarien och tystnaden.
eISBN: 978-0-307-37982-5
1. Van Veeteren, Inspector (Fictitious character)Fiction. 2. MurderInvestigationFiction. 3. SwedenFiction. I. Thompson, Laurie, [date] II. Title.
PT 9876.24. E 76 K 6613 2011 839.7374dc22 2010029632

www.pantheonbooks.com

Jacket image J. A. Kraulis/Masterfile
Jacket design by Brian Barth

v3.1

Imagine a twelve-year-old girl.
Imagine her being attacked, raped and
murdered. Take your time.
Then imagine God.

M. Barin, poet

The girl in bed number 12 woke up early.

A summer morning. The gentle light of dawn sneaked in through the inadequate curtains. Started thawing out the night, a bit at a time. Levering up the darkness out of corners, prying into the other girls innocent dreams. Their contented sniffling. She lay there for a while, listening to them. Trying to identify them. Kathrine was lying on her back as usual, snoring gently through her open mouth. Belle was hissing like a snake. To her right, Marieke was puffing away; one arm was dangling down by the side of the bed, and her mop of red hair was spread like a fan over her pillow. A drop of saliva trembled in the corner of her mouthperhaps she should creep over to her and use a corner of the sheet to wipe it away? But she desisted.

She would have liked to tell Marieke what she was going to do. Marieke if nobody else. Say something; leave a message, anything. But she still hadnt made up her mind the previous evening. Shed been hemming and hawing. It wasnt an easy decision to make. Shed lain there, brooding over it, tossing and turning and making the iron-framed bed groan and creak until well into the nightboth Marieke and Ruth had wondered if she was ill, and Belle had begged her several times to stop making such a racket.

Belle was a bit of a pain, but her dad was a close friend of Yellineks so it was advisable to keep well in with her. Thats what they said, at least. But then, they said all kinds of things at the Waldingen camp.

Anyway, shed been tossing and turning. She had no idea when shed eventually fallen asleep, nor did she know what time it was nowbut her body was telling her that she hadnt had all that much sleep. In any case, now the moment had arrivedand, ah well, shed better get up. Her internal alarm clock had worked as it always did; but, of course, there was no reason it should continue to keep her awake. No reason at all.

She carefully folded back the heavy duvet and sat up. Dug out her jeans, T-shirt, and sneakers from the bedside cupboard and dressed quickly. Noticed that the pain in her stomach had returned, but brushed it to one side with the aid of her anger.

Her anger and sense of justice.

She scraped together the rest of her belongings in controlled haste: it wasnt easy to find room for everything, but she managed it. She fastened her rucksack and crept out. The door creaked as usual as she opened it, and some of the steps sighed unhappily when she trod on them, but in less than half a minute she was outside.

She scampered over the dew-laden grass and up toward the edge of the forest, stopping only when she had crossed over the little ridge and descended into the first of the hollows. Out of sight of the buildings, and out of reach.

She paused for a while among the blueberry bushes, shivering in what remained of the chilly night air while she worked out points of the compass and directions. Noticed that her teeth were chattering. If she kept going straight ahead through the trees, she must sooner or later come to the road, she knew that. But it was a long way. Even if she managed to stick to a more or less straight line it would take half an hour at the very least, and of course it wasnt certain that shed be able to avoid going around in circles. By no means certain. She had lived in cities all her life: being close to nature among all these trees was not the environment she was used to.

She was playing away from home, you might say.

In normal circumstances she could have said a prayer, of course. Prayed to God and asked Him to stand by her and help her along her way, but it didnt seem right this morning.

Not right, and somehow not really honest.

God had started to look different recently. Yes, thats more or less what it seemed like. Become big, difficult and unapproachable, andeven if she didnt like to accept the thoughta bit frightening. The gentle bearded grandad figure of her childhood was swathed in shadows.

In darkness.

And now that she came to think about it, she realized that it was because of that very darkness that she was standing here among the blueberry bushes, wondering what to do next.

Hesitating and fighting against her fear and her anger. And her sense of justice, as already mentioned.

Yes, that was why.

The terrain sloped down to the right. Toward the lake and the winding dirt road leading to the Finghers farm, where they took it in turns to go every evening to fetch the milk. And potatoes and vegetables and eggs.

Always in a group of four, with one of the rickety carts, and with Yellinek in the lead. Nobody could really understand why it was necessary for Yellinek always to be there when they went to the farm. Surely one of the sisters could have done it? Although it could have been to protect them from danger. Thats probably why. The Finghers farm was the only contact they had with the Other World, as Yellinek used to call it in his talks, the ones he held every morning and evening.

The Other World?

Now Im standing in the Other World, she thought. Ive only ventured a couple of hundred yards into it, and already Im not sure which way to go. Perhaps everything really was like Yellinek said it was after all? Perhaps it really was Yellineks God who was the real God, and not her ownher kind and forgiving and almost a little bit childlike God, full of joy?

The hell it is, she muttered to herself with another shudder, this time mainly to reinforce her thoughts. Whats the point of a God who isnt gentle and kind?

But what she would do if she did eventually manage to get to the main roadwell, that was something neither she nor either of the Gods could answer.

Something will turn up, as her grandma used to say. Ill think of something. She cast one more glance back over the ridge, toward the buildings: all she could see sticking up over the trees was the very top of the pointed roof of the dining room.