Angel in the Shadows Read online

  ‘Ever heard of a deus ex machina?’ asked Paul as he pushed his chair back. ‘Well, this is one.’

  He sat down in front of his laptop, in anticipation of things to come.

  6

  It was pitch-black on the deserted road. She was surprised at the lack of wind. Warm raindrops fell on her body, the leaves on the trees and the tarmac. She walked in the direction of the moaning, unable to determine whether it was a human or an animal sound.

  In the light of the moon, which briefly crept from behind a cloud, she saw a motionless heap in the middle of the road. A dog hit by a car, it flashed through her mind. But dogs don’t moan like that. It wasn’t until she got closer that she saw it wasn’t an animal.

  ‘Ma peshtet amadam.’ ‘I’m coming,’ she heard herself say.

  She knelt down beside the boy, lifted him up in her arms and carried on walking without really knowing where.

  She felt the helpless rigidity of his body. But she was afraid to look at his face, not yet ready to confront the truth. Bathe him, scrub him clean, rub him dry and put him to bed – that’s what she wanted to do. Then she’d tell him the story: of the young, blond soldier on a river bank, coming eye to eye with the river goddess, who caused him to drown when he tried to swim to her.

  He’d ask why she let the soldier drown. Of course he would. Because he’d be speaking again, moving his lips that were no longer blue. And then she’d explain to him that only in death are lovers together forever. Later, when he was all grown up, he’d understand.

  After this thought, she finally looked at him.

  He stared at her like the girl at the foot of her hotel bed had done. With eyes devoid of any questions.

  Then she cried herself awake and felt two warm hands grabbing hold of her. And Aninda’s sleepy voice.

  ‘Valentina?’

  She didn’t respond. After kicking the sheet away, she crawled out from under the mosquito net, sat on the edge of the bed and wiped the sweat from her body. Aninda flashed past like a ghost before returning with a glass of water in her hand.

  ‘Drink up.’

  She heard the crackling of a plastic strip and swallowed a tablet in blind faith. Then Aninda sat down next to her, leaned in and wrapped a comforting arm around her.

  ‘Can you hear them?’ she asked. Farah listened to the rustling outside. ‘Those are bats. They’ve just given birth, and now they have to go out hunting every night to feed their young. The courtyard is teeming with insects and butterflies.’

  They sat silently and listened.

  ‘My name is Farah.’ She could hear herself say it, as if someone else was activating her vocal cords. ‘I’m a journalist. And I’m on the run.’

  Aninda stared at her.

  ‘On the run from what?’

  ‘It’s a long story.’

  ‘We’ve got time.’

  Once Farah started talking, she couldn’t stop. She talked about her childhood, which had been as sheltered as the big house with the walled garden in Kabul. A childhood with a mother who worked as a lawyer and a father who, as Interior Minister, had his offices in the presidential palace.

  ‘The palace had a large courtyard and part of it had been laid out as a butterfly garden. I used to go as often as I could. The last time I was there … I heard the roaring. It’s a sound I’ll never forget. At first I thought it was thunder, but I couldn’t see any clouds. Then they emerged – the planes. They circled above the palace a couple of times before dropping their bombs … I don’t remember how I got away but I dream about it to this day. Body parts flying through the air, walls collapsing, debris, dust and blood everywhere, screaming and shouting, and yet I’m flying down the marble corridors as if I’ve got wings. I fly outside, towards the light.’

  She fell silent, rested her head in the hollow of Aninda’s left shoulder and blinked back her tears.

  ‘Everybody in the palace, including the President’s children, were lined up against the wall and shot dead. So was my father. Their bodies were never recovered. Pencak Silat is the only thing that binds me to him, to that time when I was happy, truly happy. I’ve long forgotten what it means to be happy. All I feel is pain when I think back on that time. I don’t want to look back any more. I want to forget everything. It’s what I’ve been doing for more than thirty years. But one evening not so long ago, I saw this Afghan boy in a hospital. He was lying on a stretcher, seriously injured. He’d been dressed and made up to look like a girl and he was draped in jewellery. He whispered “Padar”. Father. And in his eyes I saw a mortal fear. It was the same fear I’d felt so often as a child, after those planes dropped their bombs. The boy was a part of me that I’d spent my whole life pushing away. His story was my story.’

  She talked about her investigation into the hit-and-run, about the unexpected developments, about Valentin Lavrov’s involvement.

  ‘I had a contact in the Dutch police force who told me about a link between Lavrov and a Dutch minister. My boss came up with a plan that enabled us to get close to Lavrov quite easily. The businessman is known the world over as an avid art collector, so we asked him to be the guest editor of a special art supplement. When he agreed, we made an appointment and I flew to Moscow.’

  Then she talked about the hostage-taking at the university, about the YouTube clip of her jihad statement.

  ‘Sometimes it’s better to be dead …’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘What Lavrov did is worse than murder,’ Farah explained. ‘He let me live, all right, but he violated my identity. The person I was no longer exists. He’s turned me into a criminal, someone perceived to be a danger to the state. To the outside world I’m now a jihadi.’

  Aninda was silent. ‘Maybe it’s your karma,’ she finally said. ‘You’re fleeing what’s chasing you, but the more you flee, the more it comes after you. And one day … one day it will catch up with you. And then you’ll have no choice but to turn around and look it straight in the eye.’

  ‘I don’t think I can,’ Farah whispered.

  ‘That’s what you told yourself once upon a time,’ Aninda said. ‘And you’ve come to believe it. Do as your heart tells you, not as your fear dictates.’

  Her restless, pounding heart. The rustling of the bats among the leaves of the weeping fig. Her finger tracing each line in the palm of Aninda’s hand. Everything felt as intense as those childhood nights when she sneaked out of her room and climbed up into the apple tree to watch the stars. Sitting a few metres above the ground, she was closer to them, yet the sight of the universe made her feel as small as a fly. Still, all her childlike worries, all her fears, became irrelevant, because she knew the stars would always be there for her – tiny and remote, yet a constant presence.

  ‘How come you’ve got such blue eyes?’ Aninda asked.

  ‘I’m Afghan. And the north of the country, the Chitral Valley, is home to the Kho. They’ve got blue eyes; some even have blond hair. Myth has it that they’re descendants of Alexander the Great’s soldiers. My mother said that her father came from the Chitral Valley, although she herself had brown eyes. It skips generations, she once told me.’

  She snuggled up against Aninda. The mosquito net hung like a transparent shield between her and the outside world, while the night kept all danger at bay.

  She had no idea how mistaken she was.

  7

  Newton had provided the proof: white light was the sum total of all colours. If you looked through a prism, you could see what was invisible to the naked eye. Over the course of his career, this was how Radjen had cross-examined many suspects and how he’d observed Ewald Lombard during his interrogation. Behind the white light of his ministerial façade, Radjen had seen a range of dark colours hiding.

  Ewald Lombard, concluded Radjen, was a man of two worlds. In one world he was the successful standard-bearer of the Ministry of Economic Affairs. But in another world, in a dark-coloured spectrum of self-hatred and a growing sense of guilt, he was a man enslaved
by his own paedophilic urges.

  Radjen wanted at all costs to expose this man to the public, but until now he’d been thwarted at every turn. To make matters worse, immediately after he’d returned to headquarters from his confrontation with Lombard, he was told to report to his superior, an anxious-looking Commissioner Kemper.

  ‘I just received the preliminary conclusions of the investigative report from the Security and Integrity Office,’ Kemper said, as he looked up from the document he had in front of him. Kemper had the appearance of a stern diplomat. His healthy lifestyle and athletic build made him look younger than he was. He preferred to wear his glasses perched on top of his close-cropped head.

  ‘Are those my walking papers?’ Radjen joked.

  Kemper grimaced. He was all too familiar with his chief investigator’s blunt approach. He yanked the glasses from his head – body language that made Radjen nervous. He’d rather be given the verdict on how he’d failed in the matter of the dead prisoner Kovalev in straight terms. No distracting gestures, no diplomatic bullshit.

  ‘Basically, Detective Diba is being held responsible for the death of the Russian,’ Kemper said. ‘Traces of DNA on Kovalev’s head match Diba’s DNA.’

  ‘That isn’t one hundred per cent proof that Diba actually smashed Kovalev’s head against the table,’ Radjen said. ‘It could have been an act of desperation on Kovalev’s part and perhaps Diba tried to stop him.’

  ‘That’s possible,’ Kemper said. ‘And, of course, there are people who claim we never landed on the moon.’

  Radjen couldn’t help but smile at Kemper’s dry humour.

  ‘Besides,’ Kemper continued, ‘phone records reveal that Diba had regular contact with Kovalev for almost two years. And then I still haven’t mentioned the four-figure sums that were regularly transferred from a Luxembourg bank to Diba’s private account. Whether you believe in moon landings or not, Diba was working for Kovalev too.’

  ‘What’s the finding on Detective Calvino’s involvement?’

  ‘He’s being held responsible for restraining Kovalev during his interrogation.’

  ‘Kovalev was armed and dangerous.’

  ‘Once someone is frisked and dumped in a jail cell, they’re no longer armed and dangerous. Calvino will get off in this matter. But regarding another matter …’ Kemper nonchalantly placed his glasses on the desk and frowned at Radjen.

  ‘Did you advise Calvino to go to Moscow to see if he could arrest Lombard there?’

  ‘It was his suggestion,’ Radjen replied. ‘But I gave him the green light. On the condition that he didn’t go as a detective on active duty, but as a private citizen. Calvino paid for his round-trip ticket out of his own pocket. Legally, he’s done nothing wrong.’

  ‘For God’s sake,’ Kemper responded. ‘It just proves how far you’re prepared to go to get Lombard.’

  ‘Since when is there something wrong with that?’

  ‘Since the polls for the upcoming elections show that at least one third of the Dutch populace will likely vote for Lombard’s party, while we’re jumping through hoops to put this guy behind bars. What the hell happened at the ministry this morning?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Lombard has filed an official complaint against you.’

  ‘On what grounds?’

  ‘Slander and intimidation.’

  Kemper grabbed his glasses and balanced them on his nose. He needn’t have bothered, because, after leafing through the report for a few seconds, he looked up at Radjen again.

  ‘While this report is somewhat forgiving about your responsibility in the Kovalev case and Calvino’s failed attempt to arrest Lombard in Moscow, I know that the Board of Police Commissioners is looking for a scapegoat. Thanks to the tone of this morning’s interrogation, you’ve eliminated all the competition. Congratulations.’

  ‘Listen, Kemper, we’ve known each other a long time. The night of the raid on Lombard’s home office, I saw images on his computer that made my stomach turn. And then there’s the boy from the hit-and-run. The chauffeur placed Lombard in the car at the time of the accident, and Kovalev’s initial statement placed him at the scene as well. For God’s sake, what more do we need to haul this guy in?’

  ‘Proof,’ Kemper said.

  ‘Proof that was destroyed last week by a hacker, an explosion and a so-called suicide,’ Radjen said.

  ‘I’m aware of that too, damn it,’ Kemper sighed. He placed his glasses back on top of his head with a firm but clumsy gesture. He stared, seemingly mindlessly, at the wall behind Radjen. An illustration of despair and powerlessness.

  ‘And why a scapegoat?’ Radjen asked.

  ‘I’ve received an official request to put someone else in charge of your current MIT case,’ Kemper finally said.

  Radjen stared at Kemper in silence; Kemper returned the look.

  ‘It isn’t a request I can ignore.’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘I’ll have to take it into consideration, damn it.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘I’ll need some time to do this.’

  ‘How long?’

  ‘Three days at least. Is that enough?’

  ‘The world was created in seven days,’ Radjen said, as he stood up. ‘Why can’t we solve a murder in three days?’

  ‘I’ll make it five,’ said Kemper. ‘And do whatever you think is necessary.’

  ‘Better yet,’ said Radjen, who’d turned in the doorway, ‘I’m going to do something a gentleman should never do.’

  ‘And what’s that?’

  ‘Destroy a lady’s alibi.’

  Fifteen minutes later, Radjen exited the ring and drove on to the A1 motorway in the direction of Amersfoort, while beside him Esther thumbed through Melanie Lombard van Velzen’s file.

  ‘We need to hurry,’ Radjen said. ‘We have to meet with the pathologist in an hour and she hates tardiness.’

  ‘What did Kemper have to say?’ Esther asked.

  Radjen gave it to her straight. ‘We have five days.’

  ‘Five days for what?’

  ‘Until I’m removed from the case.’

  She looked at him amazed.

  ‘It’s very simple, Esther. Put a minister under pressure to admit his guilt and he’ll do his best to push you aside. Yet Lombard’s actions have only made him more of a suspect. I’m afraid we won’t be getting much sleep for a while; we need to take advantage of every minute we have left. Agreed?’

  ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘All right, then. What do we know about Melanie Lombard van Velzen?’

  ‘Forty-seven. Born in the coastal town of Bergen op Zoom, raised in Eindhoven, eldest of three girls, father was once on Philips’ Board of Directors. Sixth Form College, then … get a load of this.’ She whistled through her teeth.

  ‘Then?’

  ‘The Sorbonne, French Language and Literature. Then Spanish in Salamanca, and, as if that wasn’t enough, Italian in Perugia. Then she got a job as an interpreter.’

  ‘Any children?’

  ‘None.’

  ‘Work?’

  ‘Hasn’t worked as an interpreter for years.’

  ‘Is that it?’ he asked, nodding towards the file on her lap.

  ‘The best is still to come,’ she said. ‘Melanie Lombard was the first Dutchwoman to sail around the world alone, in ninety-eight days. And to add another twist to the tale, the last few years she’s been giving gardening courses. She’s even written a book: The Healing Garden.’

  She closed the file, sighed and looked at him. He sucked in his stomach. ‘The healing garden … Really. I don’t expect that to be of much help to us.’

  ‘She’s come in for questioning before. Answered everything. Fully cooperated in the investigation. But now I want to see how she behaves under pressure. Did she discuss all the details with her husband? Do all the aspects of their stories match? Perhaps she’ll slip up. The problem with things you invent is that you often forget the small d
etails. And we’ll get her on that.’

  With a sharp turn, he took Exit 8 in the direction of Blaricum. The urban landscape gave way to lakes, heathland and forests. They drove along a sloping road through an autumn forest filled with gnarled oaks, pines and stately beech. After leaving the centre of town with its restored farmhouses, they ended up on a tree-lined lane, with freestanding villas peeking out from behind tall hedges.

  The three-storey detached house they stopped at was probably more than a hundred years old and surrounded by a fence. The electric gate was open. Radjen parked the Corolla near the carport beside a red Mini Cooper. On the driveway closer to the house, he spotted a Porsche, a Range Rover, two Aston Martins, and a Citroën 2CV reminiscent of a 1950s French film. They walked around the house and found themselves in a gardener’s paradise, a green utopia where the approaching autumn had barely taken hold and a handful of women in trendy casual clothing were gathered with all kinds of gardening tools.

  Radjen looked around and smelled the scent of roses, but there was also something else pungent in the air. It all seemed too idyllic to be true. He sharpened his senses.

  ‘They used to smear arrowheads with it,’ he heard Esther say. She pointed to one of the small garden signs. ‘Blue monkshood. Contains aconitine. A few milligrams can kill a horse. Really. This isn’t an herb garden, it’s a killing field.’

  Absent-mindedly, Radjen picked some black berries from another bush and was about to pop one into his mouth.

  ‘I wouldn’t do that if I were you.’

  He turned and looked into the chestnut-brown eyes of a woman who was undoubtedly close to fifty, but still a seasoned beauty. She would have been the kind of girl you did anything for in school just to get a chance to give her a lift to a party on the back of your scooter. Her voice had a sensual, warm, smoky edge, probably the result of too many cigarettes, a lot of drinking, or a combination of the two. She had round amber-coloured sunglasses perched on her head and a scarf almost nonchalantly intertwined with her reddish-brown hair, which was a bit unkempt. Her red-and-black plaid flannel lumberjack shirt was unbuttoned rather low. She wore faded jeans and calf-high Hunter wellies.