The Devil's Sanctuary (26 page)

DANIEL WONDERED
if he had heard right.

“He’s
here
?”

“Yes,” the hostess said. “He was asking after you in reception yesterday. Didn’t he get hold of you?”

His heart was beating wildly, but his face remained expressionless. He had become very good at keeping his facial muscles under control.

“We must have missed each other,” he said. “I was out all day yesterday, and my cell phone was switched off. When did he get here?”

“Sometime yesterday morning. I wasn’t on duty then. Check with reception.”

The hostess went out to join her colleague. Daniel hurried to open the door again, stuck his head out, and asked, “Where is he now?”

“I suppose he spent the night in one of the guest rooms. I’m sure you’ll find him.”

As soon as the morning patrol had left he went over to Marko’s cabin and banged on the door.

“It’s only me. Your neighbor,” he shouted.

There was a groggy noise from within in response.

“Did you notice if anyone was trying to get hold of me yesterday?” Daniel asked through the closed door.

The groggy noise sounded like “No.”

“No one knocking on my door?”

“No.” Clearer and more annoyed this time.

No, of course not. Marko was a nocturnal creature who spent all morning asleep.

Daniel went back into his cabin and switched on his cell phone. He had several missed calls and three voice mails from a number he didn’t recognize. With sweating fingers he tapped in the code to listen to his messages, then held the phone to his ear and waited breathlessly.

“Hey, bro.”

It was Max’s voice. He could tell instantly.

“Where are you? I’ve been sitting on your step for two hours now and I’m starting to get fed up. Look, I’m really sorry I was gone so long. But I’ve had terrible problems. I’m just happy I survived in one piece. I’ll tell you all about it later. I’m never going to have anything to do with the Mafia again. Hope you haven’t been having too bad a time. Well, I suppose you’ve worked out what sort of place this is now. Maybe I did sketch over the details a bit, but you’d never have agreed otherwise. And it really wasn’t supposed to take as long as this. What was I going to say? Oh yes. I’ll sit here for a bit longer, then I’ll push off.”

There was a click and the message was over. Daniel had hardly caught his breath before the next message began, received an hour and a half later. The same familiar, strained voice said, “Do you know what I really hate? People who always have their cell phones switched off. It’s so
fucking
arrogant. Well, I’m with a bloke called Adrian Keller. Maybe you know him? He’s the only person I socialize with here, actually. Big on nature. Falcons and stuff. A bit reserved. He hates the rabble in the village, just like me. Anyway, that’s where I am at the moment. Can you come out here, Daniel? Right at the end of the valley. The way we cycled, you know. Just a bit farther on. Call me when you’re on your way and I’ll come and meet you. The guy’s got loads of traps and stuff around the house, so you have to take care. Stick to the road.”

The third message had been received at quarter past two at night, and the tone was very annoyed: “Where the fuck are you? I’m starting to get worried about you. Come out here so we can get this figured out.”

Daniel checked the number of the incoming calls. He dialed it. There was no answer.

He had no desire whatsoever to visit Adrian Keller’s isolated house. But if that was where Max was? His brother was capricious. He could quickly change his mind and leave. If he really did intend that they should switch back again, it was best to hurry.

DANIEL WAS
crouched over the handlebar of one of the clinic’s mountain bikes, pedaling through the valley so hard that the sweat was pouring off him. He passed the leper cemetery with its crooked crosses at high speed and raced along the forest road that led up to Tom’s cabin, until he reached a bridge that crossed the river just where it reached the valley floor.

He was now in the wild western part of the valley where the loners lived, where you only came at your own risk. The hosts never patrolled out here with their electric carts. The patrols were handled by armed guards who did their rounds in vans.

Daniel had a rough idea where Adrian Keller’s house was. During the course of a long day out with Corinne she had showed him the narrow side track that led to his house and warned him against going up there. She had also pointed out the two large villas at the top of the grassy slope. The top one, the larger of the two, was Kowalski’s. The one below was Sørensen’s. Beside each house was a garage; Kowalski and Sørensen both had cars. Not the latest models, admittedly, but still. Private cars. No other residents in Himmelstal had cars. Bicycles and mopeds were the commonest form of transport here. Most people had no transport at all and just borrowed the clinic’s bikes when they needed to. Cars were mainly the preserve of the staff.

He stopped at the end of the track leading to Keller’s and called the number he had been called from. No answer. Were they still asleep? It was just after nine o’clock. Max had evidently been up late last night judging by the time of his last message, and of course Keller had been out with his falcons at dawn. So maybe they were tired now.

If Max had left Keller’s cabin and gone back to the clinic, Daniel would have bumped into him. Unless he’d taken the little track at the very top of the slope. But why would he do that? He’d asked Daniel to come to Keller’s house, after all. He ought to have called if there were any changes, although with Max you could never be sure.

He put his cell phone away, swung his leg back over the bike, and steered it onto the track and up the winding slope that led to Adrian Keller’s house.

The day that had started so clear and frosty had turned gray. Veils of wet mist were sweeping the valley, making his clothes damp.

He jumped off the bicycle and stopped a hundred feet away. Kowalski’s black Mercedes was parked in front of the house. Adrian Keller’s reputation as a recluse seemed to be something of an exaggeration.

In a large cage covered with chicken wire the falcons sat on dead trees shrieking loudly and mournfully into the fog. Maybe their cries announced his arrival, because while he was standing there wondering if he ought to go any closer or turn back, the door suddenly opened and Adrian Keller peered out.

Daniel led the bicycle a bit nearer. He was careful to stick to the middle of the track.

“Is my brother here? He phoned and said he was with you,” he called.

Keller didn’t answer but gestured to him to go in.

Daniel hesitated. Then he went up to the house, leaned the bicycle against the railing, and went up the steps toward Adrian Keller.

It took a little while for his eyes to get used to the gloom inside, because the window shutters were closed. Unlike most of the buildings in the village, the house hadn’t been built recently in a picturesque old-fashioned style. It seemed properly old, had probably been here since before the start of the Himmelstal project.

Kowalski and Sørensen were sitting at a table under a low-hanging lamp. In front of them were plastic bags of white powder and a set of scales. Sørensen looked up.

“So, you’re in so much of a hurry you had to come up here?”

“I got a message from my brother. He said he was here,” Daniel said, his voice wavering.

Sørensen looked at Kowalski and Keller.

“What’s he mean?”

Keller shrugged his shoulders.

When Daniel looked to his left he saw a large horizontal mirror that reflected the whole room like a picture. He could see them all inside the gold frame: Kowalski and Sørensen in the limited light from the lamp, Keller as a fuzzy figure away in the gloom, and he himself, at the moment staring wildly out of the center of the picture, red and sweaty after the bike ride. The scene made him think of a seventeenth-century Dutch painting, of characters caught at a fateful moment, where every detail is loaded with meaning.

Kowalski pulled down the glasses that had been perched on his head, placed a fold of paper on the scales, and poured out some powder from one of the bags. He was squinting through his glasses in concentration, peering at the scales and carefully tapping out a bit more powder. The stone in his ring reflected the light from the lamp in tiny red sparkles.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, but you’ll have to wait,” he said calmly. “We’re not done here yet.”

He opened a small self-sealing plastic bag, carefully poured the measure of powder inside, and closed it. Daniel realized this was the morning delivery from the pigeons and falcons, being divided up into portions to sell. He shouldn’t have seen this. But it was too late now.

“How much do you want?” Sørensen asked.

“I don’t want any. If my brother isn’t here, I think I’d better go again.”

Wrong answer.

Kowalski raised his eyebrows, leaned across the table, and said with genuine curiosity in his voice, “What do you really want?”

Asking for Max had been a mistake. Daniel had to change tactics.

“What does it cost?” he said, taking out his wallet.

“What?” Kowalski inquired in a friendly tone of voice.

“That,” Daniel said, pointing.

“I don’t know what you mean. There’s nothing here.”

Kowalski had put the bag down on the table and pushed his glasses up onto his forehead again. Sørensen grinned and massaged his shoulder.

“Unless you can see something?” Kowalski went on.

Wrong again. Daniel shook his head and put his wallet away.

“Cocaine? Is that what you were thinking of?”

Daniel turned his head to avoid seeing the white bags and once again was met by the mirror image of the room. The men with their scales, he himself in the middle, and Keller in his corner.

But something had changed since the previous picture: Now Keller was holding a large hunting knife in his hand. He was holding it limply, it wasn’t a threatening gesture. Maybe he’d had the knife in his hand the whole time without Daniel noticing.

Kowalski put his glasses back down on his nose again, put the fold of paper back on the scales, and, with great concentration, began to pour a trickle of powder from the bag. The falcons were crying in their aviary outside. Short, hoarse cries, full of angst and despair.

“There’s a chance that someone might offer you the opportunity to buy something like that sometime,” Kowalski said thoughtfully as he opened a fresh self-sealing bag. “But I don’t have a clue what it costs.”

“No,” Daniel muttered.

“And it certainly doesn’t come from here.”

Kowalski looked at him over the frame of his glasses, stern and serious as an old schoolteacher.

“No, no,” Daniel repeated.

He thought he could hear laughter somewhere. Or was it crying? It must be the falcons. But the sound didn’t seem to have come from the aviary outside. It appeared to be coming from inside the house, somewhere to his right, close but still muffled. If it weren’t impossible, he would have sworn it was coming from the mirror.

His eyes darted around the room. He saw some small splattered stains, as if a shower of dark liquid had hit the wall and dried there.

“I have to go,” he whispered. “Excuse me.”

He walked toward the door. The men at the table watched him in silence. Slowly and carefully he walked past Adrian Keller, who was standing there like a cardboard cutout with his knife. Daniel looked at the short, broad blade. He felt weightless and unreal.

And then he went completely rigid. Outside the house echoed a scream that was unlike anything he’d heard before. Full of angst, heartbreaking, and very high, as if it came from something very small.

“A child!” he gasped. He turned toward the three men in the room. “That was a child crying!”

The men looked back at him with no change in their expressions. It wasn’t possible that they hadn’t heard it. Adrian Keller’s eyes sparkled like small gray-blue lamps above his high cheekbones.

Daniel tumbled toward the front door and rushed out. The crying had changed to an urgent whining. Where was the child?

A branch in the undergrowth was swinging, dropping a shower of yellowed leaves.

Bewitched, Daniel stared at the wriggling little body dangling among the foliage. A hare. Caught and strangled in one of Adrian Keller’s snares.

Keller came out of the house. He was still holding the knife in his hand, and very calmly, as if this had been his intention all along, he raised it and cut the hare down from the branch.

He went over to the falcons’ cage, unbolted a door in the mesh, and left it wide open. The falcons stayed where they were on the bare branches. They sat there hunched, their heads twitching.

With a flick of his hand Keller sent the hare flying into the yard. The falcons flew out instantly, landed on their prey, and began tearing and pulling at it at once. A couple of them contented themselves with watching the others from the roof of the aviary. Maybe they were the pair that had eaten their fill of pigeons for breakfast.

Keller stood there motionless, watching the falcons eat.

“Just a hare,” Daniel said to himself, taking hold of the bicycle.

He was still trembling, and his legs felt soft as clay. Keller didn’t seem to be paying any attention to him.

Out on the track he pulled his cell phone out and tried to call Max again.

No answer. But he thought he could hear a weak tune somewhere nearby. From inside the house. Or the grounds. The ringing tone from his phone stopped at the same time as the tune. He called again, pressed the phone to his chest to muffle it, and listened to the sound from outside that resumed as soon as he dialed the number. Although it was faint, he was able to recognize it: Schubert’s
Trout Quintet.

So Max’s mobile was somewhere within earshot. But for some reason he wasn’t answering.

Daniel sent a text:
Didn’t see you at Keller’s. Cycling back to cabin.

The distinctive bleep of a text arriving was much clearer than the Schubert tune. Now he could tell where it was coming from: not from the house, but the woods.

Instead of returning to the cabin he put the bike down in the ditch, walked back along the track, and into the woods.

“Max?” he called urgently.

He moved slowly and carefully through the trees, looking down at his feet the whole time. It was dangerous to walk here; the ground was mined with traps and snares.

He could sense the falcons as dark shadows over the forest. One of them darted down toward the trees, disappeared into the rustling leaves, and climbed up into the sky again as if it had taken a dip in the greenery.

He stopped, looked around, and called out once more.

All he could hear was the faint sound of the wind and the short, strange cries of the falcons as they circled above the trees. They were right above him now. He leaned his head back and looked up at the foliage where the falcons were making their dive-bombing swoops.

And now he realized what had caught their interest. High above, hidden in the canopy of leaves, swung a man’s body, dressed in a checked shirt and jeans.

Whoever it was hanging up there had made the same mistake as the hare.

His heart pounding, he crept closer. With each step he inspected the ground before putting his foot down. When he reached the tree he looked up at the snared body to try to see its face. But where the face ought to have been was just a mass of dark meat. Daniel couldn’t even hazard a guess as to what the person had looked like when he was alive.

He took out his cell phone and with trembling fingers pulled up the number Max had called from. He hesitated and glanced up at the swinging body and saw a falcon dive-bombing a greedy crow. With a shudder he pressed to make the call, then stood and listened without raising the phone to his ear.

A moment later Schubert’s melody rang out through the forest.

But it didn’t come, as Daniel had feared, from the dead body up in the tree.

He turned around.

There, in the middle of the woods, on a carpet of fallen leaves, stood Karl Fischer, staring at the screen of his ringing phone with a frown. He was dressed for a hike, with a short coat, a green woolly hat, and heavy boots.

“Ah, there you are in person,” he said, looking up. “What a coincidence. Well, we won’t be needing this then.”

He clicked to silence the phone and put it in the inside pocket of his coat.

Daniel was staring at him in astonishment. He hadn’t heard anyone approaching. How had Karl Fischer gotten there? To judge by the way he was dressed, he had walked. Daniel now saw that he had a walking stick in his hand.

“Was that
your
number I just dialed?” he asked, thoroughly bewildered.

“Of course, what did you want? It’s been a while since we last spoke, but I’ve been very busy with a group of guest researchers. Well, at least we’ve met up now.” Doctor Fischer walked quickly toward him, swinging his stick. “Very unusual to see you in this part of the valley. You’ve been paying Adrian a visit, perhaps? I was thinking of calling in to see him myself. So, what’s on your mind, my friend?”

“There’s something…I mean
someone
up there,” Daniel said in an unsteady voice, pointing up into the tree.

“Really?”

With his hand raised against the sky, Karl Fischer peered upward.

“Goodness, look at that! Isn’t that Mattias Block?” he exclaimed, sounding as if he’d just bumped into an old friend on the street. “So we’ve found him at last!”

When Daniel returned to Keller’s house with Doctor Fischer, Kowalski and Sørensen were standing by the car, ready to leave. Keller was inside the cage, taking care of his falcons.