The girl nodded.
‘Just three weeks now. I live in an apartment.’
‘Ah.’ The only apartments he knew of were from the subsidized housing, so he added: ‘Let me guess: number 27?’
She nodded and cast her eyes downward, blushing.
‘And you live at number 72. I thought that was a funny coincidence.’ She stuttered with embarrassment. He thought she was adorable.
‘We’ve already got the digits of our house numbers in common. And a fondness for animals too, I suppose?’ His smile relaxed her.
‘I’m so happy I can have Zeppos. I take him out for a walk every day, and when I’m not home I put him in the courtyard.’
Jan nodded.
‘You’re doing the right thing. A spaniel’s terribly cute, but he needs plenty of exercise. A lot of people forget that. They buy a dog and make him spend his whole life in a doghouse. And then they’re surprised when he keeps the neighborhood up all night.’
He rolled his eyes as a sign of rapport. The girl giggled.
‘I take him out every day, rain or shine, sleet or snow.’
‘Good heavens, don’t tell me you drag poor Zeppos through snowstorms?’
In just a second her cheeks and neck went blood-red.
‘No, no,’ she stuttered, her hands folded in a cramp that seemed even more painful than his own hand-wringing as he fretted over the garden. Startled by her reaction, Jan turned to the computer.
‘I’ll just open a new file, and you can tell me what’s up with your dog.’
He hoped she would get over his misplaced joke by the time he had entered her data. The program had finally finished loading—it took forever, it was high time he got a new computer—when the front door slammed shut and he heard the clatter of high heels. The kitchen door shut a bit too loudly, he thought, a sign that his wife did not expect anyone besides him would hear it.
‘There, the program’s loaded.’ He brought his hands to the keyboard. ‘I already have your address,’ he winked, ‘but perhaps you could also tell me your name.’
He had typed just three letters of her first name when the high heels approached. The door to the practice swung open and Catherine appeared half in the doorway. Still, after fifteen years of marriage, her stylish beauty took his breath away. His stomach knotted up when her long blonde hair glided over a shoulder.
‘I’ve got sirloin for later,’ she said. He nodded, and only then did she notice the young woman sitting motionless in the chair. The dog had turned toward her and inquisitively wagged its tail.
‘Oh, you’ve got a visitor. I’ll leave you to it, I’m just going out. Don’t worry about dinner, I’ll be back in time.’
Before she closed the door she said ‘good day’ to the statue that appeared to be riveted to the chair. She suggestively raised her eyebrows.
◆
Panic gripped his heart. The melody of Magda’s voice told Walter she was expecting an answer, but he hadn’t been listening. He was engrossed in a newspaper article about a court case that would start in September. ‘The trial of the century,’ screamed the headlines in boldface. A policeman in Ieper had murdered five people in cold blood. Even a year after the fact, he remained remorseless. The international media had got hold of it, and soon enough heads rolled: the Chief of Police and the Interior Minister. The Ieper court had moved the trial to the Expo Hall on the outskirts of town to accommodate the onslaught of press and public. The newspaper interviewed a female expert in criminal profiling who had been called in by investigators. She was quick to note that the local police had bungled the case, like a bunch of amateurs. And that the murderer had brilliantly misled her too, which still caused her sleepless nights.
Walter folded up the newspaper and leaned forward, his arms crossed on the table. He would have been happy to admit his inattentiveness to his wife, but he feared that the punishment for his crime would, as usual, be disproportionate. First a half-hour lecture, and then being made to do the washing-up on his own. He waited for the tirade, but it did not come. Magda batted the dust from the candlesticks on the window sill and simply repeated what she had just said: ‘Something’s up with Herman.’
Walter recalled Herman’s pallid face and vacant look. Magda glanced over her shoulder and saw his attentive posture as a sign to continue. She appeared to be conducting an orchestra with her feather duster. There were no candles in the candlesticks. Candleless candlesticks, what could possibly be more useless?
‘It’s hardly surprising, what with all Claire puts him through. I saw her the other day in yet another new dress. She’s got enough outfits for three a day. And all those trips, they must cost him a fortune. And have you had a good look at that car of theirs?’
Herman’s Audi Q7 was a luxurious behemoth, but Walter was not all that interested in cars. He much preferred the bicycle. Magda drove a second-hand Citroën C3, although she regularly dropped hints that an Alfa Romeo or a Volkswagen would suit her better.
‘It is pretty showy, that car,’ he conceded.
‘Showy?’ She let the foolish word sink in. ‘Now that’s an understatement. It’s a car for multimillionaires! Just think how much pâté and sausages he’d have to sell! And it’s never enough for Claire. Always more and more and more. It’s killing him.’ Walter nodded. He kept quiet, because Magda was on a roll, and she always saved the best for last. She laid the duster on the table and put her hands on her hips. Although he and Magda were the only ones in the room, she lowered her voice.
‘He’s drinking. I noticed it this morning at the shop. He could barely stand up. He was trembling and sweating like an … alcoholic.’ She spat out the last word.
‘It can’t be as bad as that,’ Walter ventured, but she cut him off.
‘Of course it’s as bad as that. You should have seen it! Incidentally, there was no summer pâté either. Oh, excuuuuse me: “Bra-cke’s Blaas-hoek Pâ-té” was sold out. He’s slipping, Walter.’
‘And I even asked him to put aside a piece for you.’
‘Ah, yes,’ Magda sighed, and in that sigh Walter recognized her long-standing frustration that he never got his act together. He couldn’t even manage to reserve a slab of pâté from the local butcher. She took the duster from the table and vanished into the kitchen.
‘There’s a new girl living at number 27.’ He counted the seconds before she reappeared in the doorway. It never took her longer than four.
‘What’s that?’
‘There’s a new girl living at number 27. Saskia Maes. I delivered a letter for her this morning.’
She let the words sink in. Then she shrugged her shoulders.
‘You mean that pathetic skinny thing? She’s been there for three weeks. You’re miles behind, as usual.’
He blushed.
‘It was a letter from the insurance company in the city.’
She did not miss a beat.
‘She’ll be in debt with them, no doubt.’ And then added: ‘Does that Negro still live there?’
‘His name is Bienvenue. Last week I delivered a package for him.’
‘A package?’
‘I don’t know what was in it. There was no return address.’
‘Shady business.’
‘He does odd jobs for the town council. And he always nods politely when he cycles into the city.’
‘Well,