The Mammoth Book Best International Crime Read online

  “I want champagne,” says Elisabeth. “How come they’re not open?”

  I untie Heinz. “I feel sorry for you.” Ulrich kicks the bicycle rack in front of the snack bar. He swears and hops around on the other leg. His face glows redly. Then he makes a fist and hits one of the glass panes in the door. It shatters.

  “Let’s get out of here,” I say.

  In the car, Ulrich winds the safety belt around his hand. He has a cut on the back of it.

  “Idiot,” I say. There’s a packet of Kleenex lying on the dashboard. I toss them over the back of the seat to him.

  13

  We take Heinz and Elisabeth home and drive the car back to the hotel by the train station in Voerde.

  In our room, I unroll toilet paper and wind it around Ulrich’s belly, fingers, hand and big toe.

  “At least we’ve got the car,” he says.

  “Won’t get much for it if we sell it.” I take off my clothes and get into bed. It’s too warm for Ulrich under the covers. He lies on top of the bed like a lump of dough. “Tomorrow I’m going to kill him,” he says.

  I turn out the light.

  “You know,” I say after a while, “there oughta be a sign for the snack bar out on the highway.”

  “And a couple of flags out in front of the place,” says Ulrich.

  “Did you see, they didn’t even have ice cream.”

  Ulrich tosses restlessly. “You can’t get by these days just on sausages,” he says. “You’ve got to have Turkish döner sandwiches and hamburgers, that’s what works. And soup – you’ve got to have soup, too.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I used to work in a snack bar.”

  “Honest?”

  “Yeah. That was a good time. You’ve got to have salads, too. I was good at those. They’re easy. And I even introduced lunch plates. The place was really hopping then! But then I spilled the fryer grease all down my leg, and quit.”

  “You can do all that?”

  “Sure. And crêpes, you need crêpes. Those are really good, lemme tell you.”

  I reach for the switch and turn the light on again.

  “Listen, Ulrich,” I say.

  “I know,” he says. “We’ll take the snack bar.”

  Translation by Mary W. Tannert

  When He Finally Came

  Inger Jalakas

  Okay! So I’m no angel. It’s not like I’m exactly evil either. I just have this anger inside of me. I don’t really know where it comes from. Maybe it’s my damned father haunting me. He’s just the way he is and he could drive anybody crazy.

  I don’t know.

  I suddenly just get really mad sometimes. When I get provoked, the anger bubbles up and takes control of my thoughts. Once in a while, I might have a tendency to go too far. But between my bouts of anger, I’m as gentle as a lamb. I really am.

  Anyway, what happened this summer might have been a bit too much. I guess I crossed the line. Yes, I did. I have to admit it. But the gods know I had good reason. Damned workmen! I have to say it.

  You know, I live alone. I always have. I’ve had a relationship or two over the course of the years, you understand. But they just ran out of steam. Or, more accurately, I did away with them when they showed their true, feeble-minded sides. I ended the relationships, I mean, not murdered them or anything.

  “You have to take the bad with the good,” a girlfriend of mine used to say. She’s married. I’m not. Never in my life would I stand to be bullied like she is. Nope, it’s best to keep to oneself. Definitely. Just as long as I have peace, I’m as serene as can be. Harmonious. I like to stick to my normal routines. And the incident this summer would never have happened, if the ventilation system hadn’t broken down in the house where I live.

  It’s a beautiful old house from the turn of the previous century. I have a wonderful apartment on the top floor, with a view out over the roof tops. On clear days, I can see all the way across town. Although I don’t know how much shoddy work they did when the house was renovated. In any case, things are breaking down all the time, and this summer the ventilation went. In July. In the middle of the worst heat wave. We had more than thirty degrees, both inside and out. And for once there wasn’t even a breeze, so it didn’t help to have a window open, either. Yes. You must remember how hot it was.

  “A thunderstorm blew out the system,” the real estate manager explained, when I finally located his cell phone number and got ahold of him. He was on vacation.

  “Oh, yeah?” I said. “And why don’t you get the fan turned on again?” I was entitled to wonder, don’t you think? Yes. He promised to take care of it, even though he was on vacation. Someone would come. And soon.

  I was satisfied with that, and returned to the sofa, and my life of panting.

  And so that day passed. And the next. I hadn’t seen hide nor hair of any repairman. And it was still just as hot. It was impossible to do anything during the day, and impossible to sleep at night.

  That I am a writer, is relevant to the story. You see, I sit at home and write. Normally, anyway. In that heat it was impossible. I mostly lay around, suffering, with a wet cloth covering my face.

  Finally, I dragged myself off the sofa, and called the real estate manager again. This time I was a bit more harsh with him. And with every right, if you ask me.

  “It’s in the middle of summer holidays,” he said. “It’s difficult to find a repairman.”

  “Yes, but my God! This is an acute situation. It’s more than thirty degrees in here!” I pointed out to him.

  The damned idiot had the nerve to say that he was suffering with me.

  “You are? Really?” I replied. “In that case, perhaps you’ll do something to fix the problem. Immediately.”

  But no one came.

  After one more sleepless night, I called again. This time I got mumbling and vague answers, when I asked if he’d been able to reach any repairmen. Of course he hadn’t. Now, I was beginning to get really irritated. I have better things to do than nag such people day after day. In the end he promised to contact someone as soon as we hung up.

  So I hung up and waited. Fruitlessly. No repairman in sight that day, either. I was getting desperate, by now. A week in a baking hot sauna had really worn me out. So I called to complain again.

  “Where are you?” I asked. “You seem to have it nice and cool.”

  I could hear happy voices in the background and the tinkling of a glass with ice cubes in it, which he must have been holding in his hand. The question seemed to make him nervous. He was hesitant to answer it, anyway. Instead, he swore that he would immediately see to it that a repairman came out.

  Believe it or not, the next morning my doorbell rang. Outside of it stood the strangest looking little man, with wild hair and extremely thick glasses. He asked me to open the door to the fan room.

  “It’s locked,” he told me.

  The request was astonishing, in my opinion. Why did he think I had the key? It would be the real estate manager that had that. I’m no real estate manager. And when I had gotten so far in my explanation, he turned around and left.

  “Hello!” I yelled after him. “Wait! Don’t go! Let’s call him,” but he got into the elevator and disappeared.

  So, of course I called, myself. You understand. A woman answered. The wife, presumably. Or maybe it was his mother, how would I know. At least, she had the same last name. She lied, anyway, that much I’m certain of. When I asked for the real estate manager, she maintained that he wasn’t there. I didn’t believe her. In any case, I explained the situation to her, and she didn’t seem very interested. She was short with me, in fact. Rather dismissive.

  Her snotty attitude irritated me to such a degree that I threw the phone on the floor. That was pretty dumb, you understand, because it broke. As a result, I had to go out into that tropical heat and buy a new one.

  When I got home again, I pondered about what I was going to do. I suddenly remembered that I have a frien
d who works for the phone company, and that the real estate manager’s cell phone had a number she could trace. I called her right away, and promised her the moon and stars if she would do it. You can do that nowadays. The telephone company can see where the signals come from. You must know about that. Of course, it isn’t legal, but we’re friends, and all. No matter, she did it. The phone was located in a summer cottage area a ways outside of town. As soon as I got the address, I drove there.

  What a ruckus. I found him in a lawn chair with a large whisky within his reach. He wasn’t happy. The fact is, he was terribly rude. Went on and on about how I was harassing him during his well-deserved vacation, and threatened to have me charged with disturbing the peace. That was the dumbest thing I had ever heard and I told him so.

  “Do you really think I would drive all the way out to these obscure boondocks if I didn’t have to? It’s your own damned fault. If you had done what you promised, I wouldn’t be standing here. Fix the problem!” I said.

  Loudly.

  After that I went back to my car and drove home. And wonder of wonders, that little man stood outside my door again the next morning. With the key.

  “I’m going up to fix it now,” he said. And he did. In a way. That strange little man is certainly clever at something, but ventilation systems weren’t it. The fan came on again, but the only speed it had was maximum. It was impossible to adjust it or turn it off. The result was that I now had a hurricane in my apartment.

  It was so bad that I almost preferred the heat.

  I went up to the fan room to tell him about the mistake, but the door was locked, and the light was switched off. I could see this when I peeked through the keyhole. He’d already left.

  There was nothing to do but call my dear real estate manager again. I used the code to hide my number, just in case he was screening his calls. He, himself, answered and moaned when I presented myself. I ignored the moan, told him how things stood, and calmly wondered if it might have been better to send a competent repairman. He didn’t appreciate the question.

  “Why don’t you try to find a repairman, yourself, in the middle of the summer,” he hissed at me.

  “Gladly,” I replied. “Will you come here and open the door, if I do?”

  He hung up on me. Endlessly rude, if you’ll pardon my saying so. I was so indignant that I fainted. Well, almost, anyway. I collapsed to the floor, hitting my head on the computer keyboard, as I went down.

  It happened to be turned on, I had obviously forgotten to turn it off, after my last attempt to write a few lines. Unfortunately, I managed to hit the delete button. An entire chapter was erased. A week’s work. That did nothing to improve my mood.

  After that the days passed in much the same way. I called and complained. He lied and played for time, had worthless explanations, or couldn’t be bothered to answer my questions. I couldn’t even think about working. I have to have peace and quiet when I create.

  The nights were worse than the days. Now, I couldn’t sleep because of all the noise. Hour after hour, I lay tossing and turning, never able to fall asleep.

  Two weeks passed before the real estate manager returned to work from his wonderful vacation. By then I was totally worn out. I realized he was back when it suddenly got quiet. At least for a little while. Then the racket started up again.

  I carefully opened my door and listened up the stairs. Yes, heavy wooden shoes could be heard tramping around up in the fan room. I had soft slippers on my own feet. I would never have considered disturbing my neighbors with wooden shoes.

  I’m not an evil, or bad person, as I’ve said before.

  Just when I stood there, weighing whether or not to drag myself up the stairs, the tramping stopped. I waited and listened. But no, he had stopped walking around. The only sound was the roaring of the fan. Now, I had no choice. I had to go up and see what he was up to.

  I quietly snuck up the stairs. There he lay sleeping, slumped against the green fan housing. He was tanned and bloated and reeking of several days’ drunkenness. His tool box was by his feet and there were tools spread out all over the floor. Screwdrivers and wrenches, measuring sticks and hammers. Everything in a big mess. There was nothing orderly about the man.

  “What are you doing?” I asked him. “Have you fixed the problem?”

  He jumped and blinked drowsily.

  “Fell asleep, I guess,” he muttered. “I’m tired.”

  “Tired! When you finally come, you’re tired? What in the hell do you think I am? I haven’t been able to sleep in weeks?” I said. Quietly, so as not to disturb the neighbors.

  Then I beat him to death with his hammer.

  Interrogation ended 2:27pm, 8 September, 2003.

  Interrogating officer: Criminal Inspector Margaret Nordin, District Police in Gothenburg.

  Translation by Susan Loyd

  An Angel Is Speaking

  François Rivière

  Today, 14 January 2003, I am celebrating the fifteenth anniversary of my death. A somewhat solitary and even derisory celebration as I am the only one to be actually surprised that I am still alive . . . but you must find me rather confusing and I will try and clarify matters for you.

  Let’s start at the beginning. My name is Anthony Valleau, but since the winter of ’86 I am better known as “Little Tony”. Yes, you remember now: Little Tony who drowned one sad evening in the Seugne, that muddy tributary of the Charente river, a three-year old innocent victim in a mighty drama that fed the French judicial chronicle for months, if not years . . . What? Tony Valleau isn’t dead! What are you talking about? Well, what I am talking about, dear friends, is a ballad of the forgotten, the remains of a terrible case, over which still hangs a troubled mystery scotched with mad rumours, an affair that over the years has become as notorious as those of the Dominici farm or Bruay-en-Artois.

  The Valleau Affair, also known as the Tragedy of the Seugne, or again the Abominable Crime in the Charente-Maritime. You all know most of it: on the morning of 15 January 1986, a shopkeeper from the town of Rochefort-sur-Mer walking by the shores of the Seugne river, near the Tarsay hamlet, caught sight of my small body floating across the colourless waters of the unremarkable stream. The police were called and concluded that I had reached my death by drowning in the icy water. Very soon, a forensic examiner uncovered much worse: the three-year old little boy found in the Seugne had previously been strangled. It did not take the policemen long to identify the small body: as soon as they got back to the station which stood at the top of the only hill in the region – these were flatlands full of salty marshes ever lashed by a sharp winter wind – they came across my desolate parents who had come to report my disappearance during the course of the previous night. I had been put to bed around nine o’clock, and then later everyone in the house had gone to sleep only for my mother to discover, around eight in the morning, my horrifying disappearance. At any rate, that is the story that quickly spread throughout the region that morning, causing much consternation and, already, commentary.

  Of course, matters were not that simple.

  The weeping faces and halting words of my dear parents could only lead the police to believe this version of my “disappearance” soon followed by the possibility of a “kidnapping” and soon after of a murder. (The medical examiner at least quickly reassured people that there had been no sign of sexual abuse, which would have made matters even worse.) Earlier I referred to people’s comments, maybe I should have said “gossip”, as the tittle-tattle soon spread like wildfire. But before I return to the unofficial version, which soon took hold thanks to the gutter press which rapidly turned the whole situation into the Valleau Affair, which all France, both with excitement and disgust, would feast on for a long time, I must supply some necessary additional details so that you might better understand what happened in 1986.

  When the drama occurred, in the eyes of the public, our family situation was already a tad spicy. Let us have a look at the protagonists. My father, Maurice, h
ad just turned thirty. My mother, Josyane, and he had been married for seven years, and she had only become pregnant once – I was born in 1983. Papa, who had long worked as a clerk in the town hall, was out of work. Everyone around knew it was because he was an alcoholic. Mama had worked as a cleaner since she was sixteen and also looked after old people. There was talk around Tarsay that her devotion to Madame Duchemin, a childless notary’s wife, was not unrelated to the fact that she had a strong chance to inherit a large share of the woman’s wealth.

  My father had a brother, Germain, who was two years older than him, with whom Josyane had been much in love before settling for the lazier of the two Valleau brothers. Ever since an awkward childhood, there had been bad blood between the brothers: my grandfather, an unscrupulous animal trader well known in the region for his excessive drinking and his boisterous sexual activities, treated both of them even worse than his flock ever since they had been tiny. So, you see how bad my heredity was!

  In the past, the two brothers had always seemed to be quarrelling about one thing or another and, needless to say, Josyane Valleau’s pregnancy had not made matters any better. However, from the very moment the midwife who had assisted in my delivery had left the house, the situation outwardly appeared to improve. Although the brutal bike accident in which Madame Brun, the midwife, succumbed shortly after certainly clouded the event. Some, in town, would later refer to it as a sign of destiny.

  Our house—since sold to a tobacconist couple evidently fascinated by the “Affair” – had been built with the help of half the inheritance from grandmother Valleau; the other half had been used by Germain to build a strictly identical house just 300 meters from the Seugne river. A graceless little stream, though much loved by local fishermen who enjoy hunting for slimy eels that I just find totally disgusting.

  But back to our story, which is no less slimy. I was telling you about my mother: she was something of a tart, and my father and uncle had never quite managed to agree what their respective relationships were with such an openly sensual and versatile woman. Do you get my point? There were strong doubts amongst the family as to who was actually responsible for the much-awaited pregnancy, which had suffered long delays sometimes attributed to the sterility of Josyane Valleau’s husband, Maurice, who was still deeply jealous of his brother despite the outcome of the duel that had opposed them over the body of my mother. In my solitude, I had already often noticed how she personally enjoyed keeping the fires burning between the two Valleau brothers, with a look here or a word there to keep the situation tense.