The Insult (23 page)

‘Oh,’ she said, ‘it’s you.’

She stepped out into the sunlight. Her eyes were dull and her face looked thin. Her brown ringlets were tied back with a piece of chicken wire.

He stood in front of her and began to remember her out loud. He remembered every time he’d ever seen her in his life, starting at the bridge eight years before. He described where and when each meeting had taken place, how the weather had been on each occasion and what she’d looked like, not just the clothes she was wearing, but the smallest details – how long her hair was or whether she had a graze on her knee. If she’d spoken to him – or to anyone else, for that matter – he recalled the words for her. If she hadn’t spoken, he told her whether she’d smiled or not, and what kind of smile it was. At last he reached the most recent encounter, which was still happening, of course, and he told her what he’d remembered so far – the April sun, the wind, her faded dress, the wariness he saw in her, the split in her lip (had someone hit her?), the baby sleeping in her arms, her first three words.

Afterwards, she was silent for a moment, then she looked at him in an entirely new way and said, ‘That’s the best present anyone ever gave me.’ Then she looked off into the trees for a long time.

They didn’t talk much after that, but he wasn’t uncomfortable sitting on the porch with her. He didn’t think she wanted him to go. He felt he fitted cleanly into the air beside her. They could’ve been two staves in a fence.

The next time he sat on her porch, three days later, she turned to him with the baby in her arms and said, ‘Sometimes I think I’m going to drown the both of us.’

Her eyes moved to the trees and the shallow pond that lay beyond the clearing, just an area of grey light on the ground. ‘Better to be done with it,’ she murmured. ‘No one will have me now, not with a child.’

He had to wait until his heart slowed down. He remembered the exact look of the trees and the temperature of the air.

‘I would,’ he said. ‘I’d have you.’

She stared at him, and then she laughed. He didn’t know what she meant by the laughter. For a moment he feared that the rhyme might follow it.
Jan Jan The Memory Man
… But the laughter stopped and she was still staring at him.

‘Why don’t you marry me then,’ she said, ‘and take us away from here?’

Leaves whispered at the edge of the clearing and the sun went in.

‘Marry me, Jan Salenko.’

Salenko cleared his throat, then looked across at Munck. ‘I’m sorry. I ran on a bit.’

Lifting his glass, he finished his brandy. I finished mine, too. I knew something Jan Salenko didn’t. His ex-wife, Karin, had told me how the child had happened. We were the same, I was thinking, Nina and I. We’d both come close. With me it was a bullet. With her, that shallow pond beyond the trees.

‘Another drink, Mr Salenko?’ Munck said.

‘Thank you, no. I should be going. My bus …’ He rose out of his chair.

When he’d gone, I looked at Munck.

‘I’ll have one,’ I said.

‘This case,’ Munck said.

He had something on his mind. I waited. The brandies arrived.

‘You knew her pretty well,’ he said, ‘didn’t you.’

‘I don’t know about well.’ I swirled my new drink in its glass. ‘I told you. I only met her in November.’

‘She took drugs.’

‘Probably.’

‘Probably?’

‘I never saw her take any.’

‘No, of course not.’ Munck drank. When the brandy went down, it made a sound that doves make when they’re nesting – a kind of muffled squawk. ‘She was a stripper, wasn’t she?’

‘As far as I know, she worked behind the bar.’

‘In a strip club.’

‘In a club that has dancers,’ I said, ‘sometimes.’

He let that go. Cradling his drink, he peered down into it. ‘She slept around.’

‘She slept with me,’ I said. ‘That’s all I can be sure of.’ I leaned forwards. ‘What are you getting at, Munck?’

‘I’m just telling you what they’re saying at the precinct.’

It was another example of Detective Munck’s technique. He could say anything he liked in that soporific voice of his, the worst thing he could think of, and then he could step back with his hands raised and disown it all. It allowed him to provoke you and remain your friend.

‘They’re saying, girls like her, they disappear.’

I drank some of my brandy. It was very smooth. I thought it must be imported.

‘Down at the precinct they’re saying she’s probably gone off somewhere. Be a hooker, something like that. Make some money.’ He mentioned a port in a neighbouring country that was famous for its red-light district. ‘They’re saying, girls like her, that’s what they do.’

I swallowed some more brandy. Definitely imported.

‘They’re saying, girls like her, forget it. They’ve got it coming, they’re asking for it, they get what they deserve.’ He paused for breath. ‘Are they right?’

‘Munck,’ I said.

‘That’s what they’re saying.’ He shrugged, then he emptied his glass. ‘You want another?’

‘No. I think I’ll go now.’

He ordered one for himself.

‘What else are they saying?’ I asked him.

‘They’re saying she could’ve been killed. That wouldn’t surprise them, a girl like her. That wouldn’t surprise them at all.’

I lifted my glass to my lips, but there was nothing in it.

‘Sure you don’t want another?’ Munck said.

‘I’m sure.’

‘You loved her, didn’t you.’

I nodded.

‘She told you it was over.’

‘Yes.’

He paused long enough for me to hear the whole line of a song that was playing on a radio somewhere.

‘You want to know what they’re saying, Martin? I’ll tell you what they’re saying. They’re saying you could’ve done it.’

That night, at one o’clock, I unlocked the door to Loots’ car and climbed into the driver’s seat. I turned the steering-wheel from side to side, just to get the feel, the weight of it. I tested the pedals with my feet. Down to the floor they went, resisting; up they sprang again. I moved through the gears once or twice. The transition from second to third was awkward; you could end up in fifth, if you weren’t careful. Then I was ready to fit the key into the ignition. When was the last time I’d driven? A Thursday evening, almost a year ago.

I’d called round on Loots after my drink with Munck. Loots didn’t know I was coming, and his enthusiastic welcome startled me. I was still labouring up the stairs when he leaned over the banisters and shouted, ‘Blom, there’s someone here I want you to meet.’

On the landing he took my arm and led me into the apartment and down the corridor. He stopped me in front of his cork-tiled wall.

‘I want to introduce you to Juliet,’ he said. ‘She’s going to be my assistant.’

Juliet was a sex dummy, one of those plastic inflatable models with a mouth shaped like an O. She stood against the cork tiles with a look of shock on her face. I knew exactly how she felt. I’d been there myself.

‘What do you think?’ Loots said.

‘Does she have any experience?’

Loots laughed.

‘Why Juliet?’ I asked.

‘She’s beautiful – and young …’

I reached out and touched her. Her breasts were small and sharp, like ice-cream cones. ‘Loots,’ I said, ‘you’re going to have to buy her a bikini.’

He thought that was funny, too.

I explained why I’d dropped in. I wanted to know if I could borrow his car. ‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘I’m not going to do the driving.’

Loots chuckled at the idea.

‘I’ve got someone to drive me,’ I said, leaving a silence that seemed suspicious, loaded with unanswered questions.

‘And who’s that?’ he asked, as he was supposed to.

I acted a little shy about it. ‘You remember that woman at the wedding –’

‘The one who stood you up?’

‘That’s her.’

‘And now she’s seen the error of her ways?’ Loots was shaking his head. ‘How do you do it, Blom?’

‘It’s only for tonight,’ I said. ‘I’ll bring it back first thing in the morning. Anyway, you won’t be needing it. You’ll be quite happy here – with Juliet.’

I was grinning as I turned the key in the ignition.

The first part was more difficult than I’d expected. It was the lights of other cars, their headlights as they came towards me: they literally blinded me for a moment. I had some problems with spacial relationships as well, though perhaps I was simply adjusting to a car that wasn’t mine. I turned out of Loots’ street, making for the Ring. I passed the blue neon sign of the Saskia Hotel, the Royal Gardens and the floodlit Doric columns of the National Philharmonic. I crossed the river west of the city centre. From the elevated road I could look down on the community housing of the 15th district: tower blocks and parked cars and meaningless areas of grass. Sometimes I thought I was driving too
slowly. At other times I felt as though I was going to hit something or get pulled over. But nothing like that happened. In twenty minutes I was easing into the slow lane on the motorway and heading north.

The bright lights were all behind me now. I stepped on the accelerator. If a car got too close, I tilted the rear-view mirror so it couldn’t dazzle me. The motorway climbed into the hills and darkened. People always claimed this stretch of road was dangerous – but what was dangerous for everybody else was safe for me. I relaxed my neck and shoulders, leaning back against the headrest, straightening my arms. My white cane and dark glasses were lying on the floor behind my seat. If I was stopped, I’d give the police a false name and address (though not the same as the ones I’d given Arnold). If they tracked me down, I’d deny all knowledge of the incident. I’d look shocked, incredulous. ‘I’m blind,’ I’d say. ‘How on earth could I be driving?’ I’d be staring past the policeman’s shoulder and I’d be smiling at nothing. My head would probably be wobbling, too. ‘I can’t drive,’ I’d say. ‘There must be some mistake.’

The road was still climbing and I had to shift into third. There were patches of fog now. I felt as if someone was hurling rags at me; it made me want to duck. I took the next exit, a two-lane road that twisted eastwards through the hills. There wouldn’t be much traffic on it; I’d have it to myself. And it was then, as I saw the empty road ahead, the unbroken darkness on either side, that I had an inspiration. Obvious, really. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t thought of it before.
Turn the headlights off.
If only Visser could’ve seen me! With his earnest face and his Stalinesque moustache. My laughter filled the inside of the car.

For a while I just drove, not thinking at all. What a relief it was to be out of the city – away from the wide, grey streets, away from the grime and the decay. I was in a trance, half-dreaming, when I saw a car swing round the bend, its lights full-beam. It was in the middle of the road and heading straight towards me. At the last minute it swerved, tyres shrieking. I watched its tail-lights yo-yo in the rear-view mirror. Shake a soft-drinks can and pull the ring. That’s some
indication of how my heart felt then. I could only suppose the driver hadn’t seen me. Still, nothing had come of it.

Not long afterwards a huge, veined leaf slapped on to the windscreen. I jumped, then grinned. I was wondering how they’d write that sound in Victor’s comic-books. SHLOK! maybe. Or WHAP! I stared at the leaf: a deformed hand, with five attempts at fingers. My dream was happening to leaves. There was a fizzing in my chest again. That narrow miss, and then the leaf. WHAP! I turned my wipers on and sent it skimming back into the night.

Slowly my thoughts spread sideways.

So. I was a suspect now. I could see how Munck (or Munck’s colleagues) might have arrived at that conclusion. I’d been the last person to see Nina alive. Add to that, I’d tried to make a run for it in the hotel (after registering under a false name). And I’d behaved suspiciously when called upon to identify her car. I even had a motive. It was an old motive, one of the oldest there was, but it was good enough. She’d told me she was leaving me. She’d said it was over. Jealousy, resentment, wounded pride – that was all it took. The circumstantial evidence was overwhelming. Once, when I was working in the bookshop, I’d picked up something on aircraft technology. I’d only read a few pages, but one passage had always stuck in my mind – a description of the computer targeting system in certain fighter planes. The target appeared on a screen, with four white lines round it. The white lines formed a square known as ‘the kill box’. Whatever lay inside the square could be destroyed by the aircraft’s missiles. That I was thinking of it now was no coincidence. It didn’t necessarily have to do with being annihilated. It was simply the idea that you could be targeted by forces that were beyond your control. Nina had disappeared and I was thought to be responsible.

I was up in the hills. Up in the hills and heading east. I’d opened the window and cold air was rushing through the car. In the rear-view mirror I saw papers rise up off the back seat like a flock of ghostly birds. They whirled about, they jostled one another. A big brown envelope dipped past my shoulder and flew out into the night. I watched it
shrink in the darkness behind the car; I hoped it wasn’t anything important. I took a deep breath and breathed out slowly. The air was so fresh. It had an aromatic edge to it. I wasn’t sure if it was fir trees releasing resin or some herb that happened to be growing wild.

Nina had disappeared.

I pulled the car off the road. I shifted into neutral, put the handbrake on, switched off the engine. Behind me I heard the papers settle. Buttoning my coat, I opened the door and got out.

There was the city, far below. A loose collection of lights, milky and blurred, as if seen through frosted glass. Over to my right, the motorway – one long illuminated line, bright as the past that I’d forgotten. My new life was the gloom on either side of it, the darkness between roads. I could sense a headache forming, the amorphous shape of it – a pressure. I emptied two pills on to my hand and swallowed them.

Nina.

I was the one she’d left. I should’ve been the only one who was missing her. But suddenly there were dozens of us, all missing her in different ways: Karin Salenko, Jan Salenko, Greersen, Detectives Munck and Slatnick, Robert Kolan …