Authors: Isadora Bryan
Tanja steeled herself; there was no way she was going to be talked into an
enhancement
. This was all about putting things back to how they’d been.
‘Ms Pino,’ he said. ‘How good to see you again.’
He made it sound like they were old friends. But this was only Tanja’s second visit, and the other time she’d seen a different doctor. It wasn’t only police officers who shared information amongst themselves, she supposed.
‘Hi,’ she said.
Voorhies led her along a steel walkway to his office. The double-height atrium was open-plan, and Tanja felt quite exposed; it was almost a relief to get behind closed doors.
Voorhies invited her to sit, pointing at the chair with a felt tip pen.
He sat on the edge of his white plastic desk, a little god on his cloud. ‘So tell me again why you are here?’
‘Doesn’t it say in your file?’
‘Of course,’ he agreed. ‘But I like to have my patients reiterate what they are looking for at each consultation. The last thing I want, you see, is to be seen to be exerting undue pressure.’
‘It’s my nose,’ Tanja said. ‘It isn’t getting any straighter.’
‘Right.’
‘And there are times when I just can’t seem to get enough air in my lungs.’
‘And –?’
‘That’s it.’
‘Oh.’ He frowned, as if her reason for having the surgery was rather uninspired.
Tanja folded her hands in her lap, feeling the need to explain. ‘Given my line of work –’
‘You’re a police officer?’
‘Yes.’
The surgeon moved closer, tapping the pen to his tooth as he peered down at Tanja. ‘It’s a very pretty nose,’ he said. ‘Potentially!’
‘I’m not bothered about that, Dr Voorhies. I just want you to straighten it out.’
‘Of course. But what if I were to tell you that I might also – how shall I put this – take the opportunity to endow it with a more personable quality?’
Tanja blinked. ‘How can a nose be personable?’
‘It’s an expressive device, as much as the eyes; it’s a vital building block of perceived character.’
‘It’s just a nose, surely?’
‘Hardly,’ he disagreed. ‘So, I could give it just a hint of a welcoming up-turn, perhaps narrow the septum a little, and maybe engineer, say, a ten per cent flare of the nostrils.’
He made it sound as if Tanja’s body were guilty of something; that he should be able to quantify the extent of its deficiency so precisely only made things worse. ‘What’s wrong with my nostrils?’ she demanded.
‘Nothing. They are perfectly average.’
‘Well, that’s good enough for me.’
‘Well, I admire your self-confidence, madam!’ Voorhies smiled, and glanced, for the briefest second, at Tanja’s ring finger.
‘Would I be off work for long?’ Tanja asked.
‘No.’
She folded her hands in her lap, only to unfurl them and drum her fingers on the arms of the chair. ‘Self-confidence? What do you mean by that?’
Voorhies shrugged, precisely, surgically; a neat trick for a gastropod. ‘May I be frank?’
‘Yes. Please.’
He looked up at the ceiling, blowing a patter of air through his cheeks. ‘It is no mystery that ladies like to look their best. Hence the preoccupation with makeup, and so on. I see you are wearing lipstick, and foundation.’
‘Not much. So –?’
‘So,’ he expanded, ‘it is no coincidence that people like me are sometimes known as
cosmetic
surgeons. What we do is very much a part of that same aesthetic. May I?’
He didn’t wait for an answer. He reached out, his felt tip pen streaking a line onto Tanja’s face. And another. Another. He murmured sweet surgical nothings as he drew, painting a picture of Tanja’s face, before and after.
And there was a hypnotic quality to it, like going to the hairdresser’s. Tanja felt her eyes start to grow heavy–
Her eyes snapped open. ‘No,’ she said, pushing his hand away with a determined shove. ‘I’m happy as I am. Happy with myself. I don’t need to change. To be changed.’
She snatched a paper towel from the side, and hurried away to find a bathroom.
*
Anders Wever beckoned to Pieter across the floor. Pieter set down his case file, and moved over to the Chief’s office.
‘This is Professor Scholten,’ the chief inspector said, extending a hand towards a smartly, if soberly, dressed middle-aged woman, who was seated beside a thin, sharp-boned man who seemed tall, even when sitting down. ‘And this is Hoofdinspecteur Dedrick van Kempen. They wish to speak to you about the case.’
Pieter shook the hands as they were offered. ‘Pleased to meet you both. But shouldn’t we wait for Detective Inspector Pino?’
There was an exchange of looks. ‘I’m afraid I have no time for that,’ Scholten said. ‘I have to be back at the university. I am sure you will pass on my findings to her.’
‘You’ve come up with something already?’ Pieter enquired, lowering himself into the free seat. He leant forward, intrigued. This sort of thing fascinated him.
‘I’ve drawn up a preliminary sketch, yes,’ Scholten replied. She handed a sheet of paper to Pieter.
He read,
Type:
Organised / Non-social
Motive:
Lust, with probable element of mission-orientation (revenge?)
The woman is addicted to sex with younger men, the process serving to counteract her age-related insecurities. She’s between 45 and 60. A risk-taker, with a fierce temper, who obsesses over her appearance. She’s highly intelligent (IQ> than the median O/N archetype of 123), and probably works in a high-stress environment. The mutilation of the eyes indicates a sadistic edge, and suggests a degree of subconscious self-loathing, in that she doesn’t want anyone to bear witness to her nudity.
Pieter set down the paper. He tried to seem cool about it, but it was tricky. This was
real
police work. He thought that maybe he should congratulate the professor on her efforts, but was aware that it might sound a bit lame, coming from a novice. ‘This should prove very useful,’ he said.
‘Let’s hope!’ Scholten said.
‘It tallies with your own hypothesis, then, Kissin?’ van Kempen asked. ‘I know you must have a few ideas. Your scores at the Academy – very impressive.’
‘Thank you, sir.’ Pieter swallowed. ‘Well, I suppose I had been thinking along the same lines, more or less.’
‘Good!’ said Scholten. ‘There’s nothing worse in my line of business than dealing with a sceptic.’
Van Kempen brushed a speck of dust from his trousers. ‘Like Detective Inspector Pino, for instance?’
Scholten shrugged. ‘Maybe. But in her case I would say she has earned the right to be sceptical. She’s been in the job a long time.’
‘Haven’t we all,’ van Kempen said. ‘But some of us try to keep an open mind.’
‘Even so.’
Pieter found that he was already warming to this neat woman. Whatever her intellectual capabilities, there was solidity to her, a down-to-earth humility, which he found reassuring.
Van Kempen, on the other hand, seemed to have his own agenda. Pieter wasn’t sure he liked him at all.
‘So, Professor,’ Pieter asked, ‘do you think our killer is more likely to be closer to forty-five, or sixty?’
She smiled. ‘What, fifteen years too broad a span for you? And please, call me Antje.’
‘Well, a lot can happen in that time, I suppose,’ Pieter observed.
Scholten nodded. ‘True. And I will probably come up with a tighter focus, soon enough.’
‘And if you had to give an answer now?’ van Kempen wondered.
‘I’d say… somewhere in the middle!’
Pieter dared another question. He was conscious of his inexperience, but he was naturally curious. ‘Do you think the age is significant?’ he wondered. ‘In a physiological sense, I mean.’
‘What are you getting at?’ Wever asked.
‘Oh, it’s probably nothing,’ he answered. ‘But I was just wondering if our killer might be, well, you know, menopausal.’
Scholten shrugged. ‘Perhaps. And it’s certainly true that hormonal changes can be tricky for some women. But it would have to be a fairly severe case of night sweats to make you want to go out and kill a man.’
Wever grunted. ‘You should see my wife. Our bed is like a paddy field, most nights. I’ve begged her to try the HRT, but she won’t. Says it’s cruel to horses.’
‘It is,’ Scholten said. ‘Exceptionally.’
Wever sniffed. ‘Of course, it’s a great comfort to know that some broodmare is happy in her paddock, when my dinner is sliding off the walls, and the wife’s crying on the floor.’
‘You are a paragon of sympathy,’ van Kempen said.
‘I need my dinner,’ Wever countered. ‘Specifically, I need it on a plate. But look, is there anything else you can tell us, Antje?’
‘Not at the moment. I’ve a few more statistical analyses to run. Dedrick here has offered me access to some fairly powerful computers. There are a lot of case histories on file, and doubtless further correlations to be drawn.’
‘We studied the work of a few profilers at the Academy,’ Pieter said. ‘Thomas Bond – he worked on the Jack the Ripper case, didn’t he? And then there was Langer, who drew up the Americans’ strategic profile of Hitler. And Howard Teten, and –’
Pieter stopped. Scholten was looking at him with that same amused half-smile. He struggled to hold back the blush: the professor was the leading criminal profiler in the country, and if the Academy hadn’t yet seen fit to include her work on the syllabus, then that was bound to change soon enough. She must think him a fool.
‘Maybe we will talk about it at a later date,’ she said, not unkindly. ‘But for now, I have a class to teach.’ She nodded to each of the men in turn, then left.
Van Kempen stood, and clapped Pieter on the shoulder. ‘Well done.’
‘For what, sir?’
‘For coping so well. It can’t be easy, this being your first case and so on.’
‘Oh, Detective Inspector Pino is looking after me!’
Van Kempen smoothed an errant lock of dark hair. ‘She is? Well, good for her.’
‘Will that be all, for now, then, sir?’ Wever asked, with studied neutrality.
‘I think so,’ the superintendent answered. ‘But do you think you could have one of your people send me copies of everything you have so far, Wever? I’d like to go through the statements and so on. Oh, and I’d like to run your trace evidence through our own lab, if that’s all right with you.’
‘In case we’ve missed something?’
‘I’m not suggesting that at all. But if I am to be involved with this case, then there are certain procedures I must follow.’
Van Kempen left. Wever watched him go, then slowly subsided back into his seat. He must have been carrying himself quite stiffly, Pieter supposed.
The Chief said something under his breath.
‘Sir?’
‘Tanja is going to go mad,’ Wever said.
‘At van Kempen?’
‘Could be him. She has no particular care for rank, after all. Or maybe it’ll be Scholten. Or me! Anyone she feels is undermining her.’
‘She can be quite intimidating,’ Pieter said carefully.
Wever seemed surprised. ‘I thought you were getting on with her quite well.’
‘Oh, I am. At least I think I am. All things considered.’
‘So you’ll tell her everything that was said here?’
Pieter frowned. ‘Is there anything I should be keeping secret, sir?’
Wever turned his grey eyes on Pieter. ‘What if I were to say, yes?’
‘Then I suppose I would have to follow orders.’
‘Gladly?’
Pieter shook his head. ‘No. Not gladly.’
Wever snorted. ‘General point: don’t believe all that stuff they tell you when you join, about your duty to the Queen, and the constitution, and your superiors. Your greatest loyalty is to your partner. Never forget that.’
Wever’s phone rang. ‘Yes? …I see. Okay.’
Wever’s look said it all. He placed a forefinger and thumb either side of his nose and closed his eyes. It was the grey morning after the black night before, and there had been another murder.
Tanja received the call just as she was leaving the clinic. Three in five days? The frequency of the killings was startling. This woman was
driven.
Theo Gentz’ apartment was housed in a large, grey-stone block on Valkenburgerstraat, not far from the Oosterdok. As she pulled up, she was greeted by Pieter, who had just arrived himself. And not only Pieter – van Kempen was there, too, and Wever. And Christ – here came Antje Scholten, coasting to a halt in a BMW. A full coven.
The profiler was looking a little pale, which Tanja found quite amusing. Antje had admitted in the past to being squeamish. Tanja wished Janssen were there: he might have run a secret book on the professor’s ability to hold onto her breakfast.
‘I’ve cancelled my seminar,’ Antje said. ‘It will probably help if I get a close-up view of the crime scene.’ She took a deep breath. ‘It’s a necessary part of the process.’
A little voice in Tanja’s mind cautioned her to hold her tongue. She ignored it. ‘Really? I don’t recall you getting too close to the Butcher’s victims.’
‘I was never free to do so,’ Antje said, her eyes momentarily hard. ‘And I saw the photos. I did what I could.’
‘Good for you, then.’
Tanja pretended she hadn’t noticed Wever’s look of warning, and turned to Nelleke van Wyk, who was busying herself with a roll of crime tape. Once again, the angry little hamster-woman had beaten them all to the scene. There were rumours, as yet unfounded, that she knew of a secret labyrinth of tunnels beneath the city.
‘So what do we know?’ Tanja asked.
‘Body was found by Theo Gentz’s flatmate,’ Nelleke answered, directing her response to Wever, rather than Tanja. ‘He always spends the weekend with his girlfriend in Rotterdam, and comes back Monday morning.’
‘Where is he?’ Wever asked.
‘In hospital, sir,’ Nelleke replied. ‘With concussion I believe. He fainted soon after calling us, and banged his head.’
It took even longer to suit up on this occasion, Wever seeming to take an age to ease his increasingly comfortable body into the white coverall. Karl Visser and his crew turned up in the intervening period, and set about their business in typically wordless fashion. There was much of the ant in their collective mind; they presumably communicated through chemical release.