Over the High Side (3 page)

‘Was he dishonest?'

She made her mind up quickly.

‘Well – he's dead, poor Vader – I suppose I can forget about oh, loyalties, and the whatdyoucallum, the necessary deceptions – it wouldn't be a lot of use now. But one can't really answer that simply: I suppose yes, you'd call him dishonest, but you'd have to call him honest in the same breath.'

‘Moral and immoral.'

‘He had high principles, which he would die rather than infringe,' her warmth a scrap edged, as though stung by his indulgent tone.

‘Like for instance always marrying his mistresses?'

As a match will sometimes sputter as it is struck, before flaming, she gave again a tiny flicker of laughter before regaining her gravity.

‘There's a great deal more to it than that,' severely, so that he too had to laugh a little in his turn because yes, certainly, he bet there was!

‘Who are the girls?' he asked suddenly.

‘Why do you ask that?' astonished.

‘I was with him in the ambulance. He was still alive, a little, for a few minutes. He spoke – that is to say he uttered. “The girls” – twice, nothing more.'

‘A last effort to keep his grip.' She was crying now, but not noisily, a steady trickle of tears that did not disrupt her calm; left her calmer, in fact, because less strung up. ‘He was very attached to life: I've never known anyone so – difficult to kill.' She looked dismally into the distance at the back of Van der Valk's head. ‘He was often ill – he used to get bronchitis every winter, and very often pneumonia, but he had colossal recuperation. He was tremendous fun, you know … the girls; they all live in Belgrave Square.'

‘Isn't that in London?'

‘I suppose so, but not that one. This one's in Dublin. I used to live there myself once,' with a moment of nostalgia. Another of Martinez' little surprises.

‘What does it mean then, the girls?'

‘His daughters – there are three of them.'

‘And they all live there – a sort of Martinez colony?'

The idea, and his tone of voice, as though he could not take
all this altogether seriously, seemed to strike her rather as though she had never thought of it that way before.

‘Well there's a sort of family bond – a strong sense of attachment – I mean they're all married women, around my age, we were more like sisters, in a way …' She broke off in some confusion, whether because it was embarrassing or else too complicated to explain he could not tell.

‘Madame, there is one question which you haven't put to me, which surprises me a little, so I will put it to you.'

‘Which is?' seeming puzzled.

‘Who it was that killed him.'

This flustered her: she reddened and lost countenance, as though the main point had been forgotten, like doing an hour's shopping in a store, and then discovering one has forgotten one's purse.

‘I've simply no idea,' in a great hurry to get the words out. ‘No notion; I simply can't understand it.' Self-possession had vanished; she was floundering.

‘I can't suggest any reason at all,' she gabbled on. ‘I mean he might have had enemies in the sense of people who disliked him, or envied him – but I can't see – I mean one doesn't kill people. I'm expressing myself very badly: he could be sarcastic, snubbing, very fierce sometimes, even rather cruel – but that's all I meant. Mortal enemies, that's the word I wanted, not mortal enemies.'

‘And of course you didn't kill him yourself.' A police remark made in a police voice, as if making in a joke a nasty suggestion that yes she had and somehow he knew all about it.

She recovered her dignity, and smiled politely.

‘I don't think you can be serious, Commissaire, or if you are I don't quite know what you mean. If you mean actually kill him like that, with a dagger – well, I don't know exactly when he was killed, you did say around four o'clock, I was here all afternoon. I can't prove it because I was alone. I ironed some shirts, I pressed a suit – no, I did go out a moment to buy some eggs, and tomatoes, you can ask the shop. No – I can prove it – I was here when you rang up; I answered the phone. I suppose in a story I might have had time to do it and get back very quickly, in a helicopter or something.'

‘That kind of story is for laughing at,' politely.

‘Then you mean you don't believe I killed him but perhaps I wanted to kill him, did I have a reason for killing him, something like that?'

‘Partly,' in the agreeable, almost joky voice. But she was now very much on her dignity.

‘Then apart from the idea being revolting, disgusting – you wouldn't care about that –' her tone said that he was no longer intelligent ‘– no, the answer is no.' Proudly, bitterly, the pale, slightly protuberant eyes no longer so pretty but glaring with anger and pain at the infliction of a gratuitous wound. He had to break this tension.

‘I'm not so unimaginative as to think you a splendid suspect just because I've nobody else. You were closest to him, you knew him best; it's in him I'm really interested. I want two things, essentially. I will ask you to come to my office tomorrow, to help one of my men piece together all you can recall of his doings and movements this last fortnight, shall we say? His telephone calls, letters, meetings, conversations.'

‘But I don't know the half – I couldn't remember anyway. I'd get it all wrong.'

‘Very likely you will, as anybody would: we're used to that. A patient man used to such work will help you. Memory plays one tricks – just a matter of disentangling it.'

‘I'll do what I can. I don't see that it's likely to be much use. I've told you nothing of his business because I know nothing – I didn't listen when he talked on the phone, say – I had no curiosity about it, so it left no print on my mind.'

‘The second thing,' disregarding all these explanations and justifications, which were common form, ‘is that I want your authorization to go through all his papers, and perhaps take some away, here and at his place of business.'

‘I don't think he had one, really. He was just one man. He always worked alone.'

‘He had cards printed with an address in the Harbour Building. It's true – though only on the strength of one phone call – that they don't seem to know him there.' She was again a scrap confused, but not disconcerted.

‘I told you – there were all sorts of little shifts and pretences,
and some you might think a bit dishonest, whereas really they were only pathetic.'

‘This particular little shift seems so very easily penetrated.'

‘No, you don't understand, I think. There was actually – is actually – a friend of his who works there, who took messages and things – I really don't know his name. Oh, do try and understand. He never talked about business. When it went well it was unimportant, contemptible somehow, and when it went badly it was humiliating. I know a couple of names. The papers – well, even if I said you couldn't have them you'd only go and get a mandate or a warrant or whatever you call it.'

‘Yes, probably I would.'

‘Then take what you like. They're in the bureau there. It's locked, but he carried the keys.'

‘We found them.' It was the most solid piece in the room, and too large for it: a large old-fashioned ‘ministry' bureau.

‘It wasn't that he didn't trust me,' she went on, pathetically, ‘but he was terribly orderly, and meticulous, and couldn't bear things being touched.'

‘I have everything here.' Van der Valk opened his briefcase, and handed back the sad, luxurious contents of Mr Martinez' pockets: the plaited straw cigar-case – empty – and the sterling cigar-cutter. A gold clip – Mexican twenty-dollar – holding so slim a fold of ten-gulden notes; a leather key-holder. Door-key, street-door, yes, bureau. Ignition key, with a Mercedes plaque, the three-pointed star a flashy gold on silver. ‘I've a man looking through the town for this car which must be parked somewhere.'

Her smile was acid. ‘Just for show, Commissaire. He used to play with it ostentatiously, or pretend to forget it on people's desks – he hadn't a car at all.'

‘I see.' Yes, he felt sympathy, and again admiration. A man of seventy-six!

‘The tram stops ten metres from the door. I need hardly tell you the trains are frequent and efficient.'

‘Have you a suitcase, Madame, for these papers? You'll get them back in a week or two. Any that may appear relevant to our inquiry will be photostatted, but no originals will be
taken or indeed any paper used without your knowledge. I'll give you an official receipt.'

‘Very well,' in the resigned, half-dazed tone in which most people acknowledge this bureaucratic claptrap.

‘Are you going to stay here by yourself? You could go to friends, you know.'

Her desolate look held courage. ‘I do have friends – but I prefer not to trouble them. I am an adult woman; I prefer to sleep in my own room and my own bed; I shan't be frightened.'

The bureau was apple-pie; paper classifiers, neatly labelled. One drawer, marked ‘girls', held four bulging folders labelled ‘Lotte', ‘Agnes', ‘Agatha', ‘Anastasia'.

‘These are the ladies of Belgrave Square?'

‘Three – Lotte is older, she lives in Venezuela, I hardly know her, met her once on a trip to Europe with her husband – he has some vaguely diplomatic post: they're rich. The others I know, of course.'

‘You'll come to my office then, around nine if that suits you–'

‘What about my husband?'

‘There are a few administrative details but don't worry, that's all quickly cleared up. We'll discuss it tomorrow.'

*

Van der Valk went jauntily down with his suitcase, nobody seeing him, apparently, or showing at least any interest. People did not seek much intimacy with their neighbours hereabouts, and doubtless Mr Martinez had not been one of those men who are pally with the whole block.

He climbed into the car and drove round the corner to the local bureau.

‘Commissaire in?'

‘Yes, sir. Can you state your business?'

‘I have a criminal brigade of my own, son, out in the sticks.'

‘Sorry, sir.'

‘Is it still Mr Keur?'

‘Yes,' a bit soberly. Bit of a tartar with his staff, Harry Keur.

‘See if he's free.' The young man picked his phone up.

‘Sir … Mr Van der Valk … yes, sir … right, sir … He says will you please go on up.'

It was not a man Van der Valk knew well – younger than himself. But in bygone days their paths had crossed often enough for an understanding to exist.

‘Hallo, Harry, how goes it?' Van der Valk was not only older but in the hierarchy superior. But for some years he had been regarded as a half-failure, as a somewhat bizarre and eccentric fellow, and for a while now as ‘a provincial'. Once, in foreign fields, a woman he had been running after had shot him with a rifle, and the resulting disability had disbarred him on medical grounds for further service in Amsterdam. The reaction of his colleagues had been, roughly speaking, ‘That would happen to a fellow like that', and there were a couple who inclined to be patronizing. Was this, now, a bit like the ‘friend' in the Harbour Building, who let Martinez use his address a little?

‘Hi, there,' quite warmly. ‘Good to see you – what's your news?'

‘Oh, only a customer, here in your territory.' He explained: Keur smiled and rang his bell, and within a few minutes a folder was brought in. Van der Valk whistled politely at this smartness. Any civil servant beams at praise of his administration; Mr Keur was pleased.

‘He'd no criminal record – nothing in central archives at least.'

‘No, this is just the usual – requests for information like credit ratings – hm, pretty untouchable, the credit rating, I see. Mm, a heap of doings more or less legal – note here from finance squad; fellow knew his law, skated on the brink a couple of times – but here,' generous, ‘see for yourself.'

Van der Valk reflected that it is difficult to have much private life nowadays. Ask for a bank loan, an insurance policy, a licence for some commercial activity – and information is requested. And a whole dossier is collected of tiny off-white peccadillos, anything from paying your rent irregularly to giving noisy parties. Any criminal proceedings, of course, be it only a misdemeanour like shooting a red light, are there too. Good administrators like Mr Keur have all this stuff on file but Van der Valk also knew that really interesting things are rarely found in these files.

‘Thanks, Harry, and if over and above you'd care to do me a favour I'd like an eye kept on her for a day or two. Not following her, of course, just her movements, any visitors, stuff like that – would that be possible? And by the way, when I rang her up saying police, she started by complaining that if it was that car again she knew nothing about it – does that ring any bells with your boys?'

‘We'll soon find out … Karstens, did somebody ring up a Mevrouw Martinez about a car … Bakker – well, look on his desk … no, just read it out … yes, I see, thanks, no, no need … No, nothing, just a car that was irregularly parked a few days running in the same place, and since it was outside her flat … we can always get the patrolman's report if you want.'

‘Don't bother – if it seems relevant I can always ring up to find the number. Kind of you, Harry.'

‘Remember me to your wife,' said Keur politely.

*

‘What an awful lot of stuff,' said Arlette eyeing the suitcase. ‘Is that all work?'

‘I do hope not – orderly as it is, it would take a week. Give me a drink, would you?'

There was no real correlation between working and drinking. But when things were slack he had leisure, or so Arlette said, to be hypochondriacal, fussy about alcohol and mashed potatoes. Whereas work, meaning anything passing a certain level of concentration and perseverance, meant eating and drinking a lot more with no apparent ill effects. Improved metabolism, said Arlette with a French fondness for abstract nouns.