The King of the Rainy Country by Nicolas Freeling Read Free Book Online Page B

towers of the Cathedral and the leggy stilts of the Rhine bridge.
    Van der Valk didn’t want beer, especially not on a cold and dirty day in March. He cast around the bar looking for something else. Schnapps, horrible sweet vermouth, the German imitation champagne called Sekt … He saw a dusty bottle on the shelf, of a shape he recognized. Gentian, by heaven. It suited his mood exactly.
    â€˜How d’you serve it?’ asked the barman dubiously.
    â€˜Put some ice in an ordinary water glass. Now fill it half full.’
    â€˜First time I’ve ever done one.’
    Van der Valk sat in solitary state, with the headlines on the Naked Beauty, and waited for Inspector Stössel.
    â€˜Ha. Beer?’
    â€˜No beer. I’ve only just got up. Coffee.’ Everybody was drinking coffee in Köln today – Ash Wednesday.
    â€˜Pot of black coffee for two,’ Van der Valk told the waitress, standing bored jingling the change in her apron pocket.
    Heinz Stössel was like a large unsmoked ham, pale, solid, salted. Fat but firm and healthy. Without his reading glasses he looked dumb, which had deceived many; when he put them on, which he did to drink coffee with, he looked like a wicked and intelligent Roman senator. He stirred his coffee and looked at the Rhine with distaste.
    â€˜She’s not in there, anyway. Nor in the woods. How serious are you about this?’
    â€˜She was seen with the man.’
    â€˜Yes. Right here. Drinking sekt. She was in her costume. The barman looked, because she’s pretty, you see. Man is much vaguer – thin, ordinary clothes, described as elegant. When a barman says elegant what do you read into it?’
    â€˜Suppose that instead of being abducted and raped and maybe knocked off and shoved in a rabbit-hole somewhere she deliberately vanished.’
    â€˜But what supports that? Nothing in her character or behaviour to suggest it. The rabbit-hole’s a lot more likely, I’m afraid.’
    â€˜Look. I have a man. Exceedingly rich. Eccentric. A nervous type. He has gone, just gone like that. There’s a possibility of a rabbit-hole there too, but I can’t get along with it. Supposing he were here. I’ve nothing to prove it but he might have been. The vanishing of my man and the vanishing of your girl might be connected. Too much of a coincidence.’
    Stössel sipped his coffee. If he was contemptuous of this his face did not show it.
    â€˜Yes, but what have we got to show any connexion? Where are your photos? That barman is the one right there – that’s why I brought you to this dump.’
    Van der Valk spread photos on the counter. The barman looked.
    â€˜Well … I suppose it could have been. I didn’t really look thatclose at him. Like him, all right. I couldn’t honestly say for sure though.’
    â€˜What good is that?’ asked Stössel heavily, back at the table.
    â€˜None at all. Just a crazy notion. I’m quite prepared to admit it’s crazy. There’s something off key all the same about the way this girl vanishes.’
    â€˜You mean she’s not the type quite. Neither is she the type to go running off with your millionaire.’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜Let’s see those photos.’
    He tossed the packet on the table; one slid, a little; the edge of the one above it cut the hairline off.
    â€˜Looks like Jacques Anquetil,’ said Heinz stolidly. Van der Valk leaned over, and gave a laugh and a shrug.
    â€˜I knew it was like somebody. Couldn’t think who.’
    â€˜The hair changes the whole shape.’
    â€˜And if you’re thinking of a millionaire you don’t think of a bicycle champion.’
    The German got up and walked over towards the counter, still stolid.
    â€˜It changes things, though … Listen,’ to the barman. ‘You’ve heard of Jacques Anquetil?’
    â€˜Of course.’
    â€˜Think carefully. Take your time.