The Girl in the Fog Page 5

  ‘Your hypothesis is persuasive,’ Vogel agreed.

  Mayer, though, wasn’t the kind of person to let herself be bought off with sweet talk. ‘I know your methods, Vogel,’ she said. ‘I know you like the limelight. But you won’t find any monster for your sideshow here in Avechot.’

  Vogel tried to change the subject. ‘The operations room is a school gym, my office is in a changing room. The men I have at my disposal have no expertise in this kind of case and are ill-equipped. I’d like a forensics team to go over every inch of the street where the girl disappeared. Maybe we’ll confirm your hypothesis and be able to rule out anything else.’

  Mayer let out an amused little laugh, then turned serious again. ‘Do you have any idea what would happen if news got out that the police suspect it was a kidnapping?’

  ‘There won’t be any leaks,’ Vogel assured her.

  ‘How can you have the nerve to ask me for a forensics team when you don’t have a single lead?’

  ‘There won’t be any leaks,’ Vogel repeated in a firmer voice.

  Borghi saw a darker vein appear on Vogel’s forehead. Up until now, he hadn’t seen him lose his composure.

  Mayer seemed to get off her high horse. Before walking away, she looked both of them in the eye. ‘This is still a missing persons case, don’t forget that.’

  As they drove back to the gym, there was absolute silence in the car. Borghi would have liked to say something, but he was afraid that if he spoke he would unleash the anger that Vogel had been holding in from the start.

  At that moment, Borghi glanced in the rear-view mirror and again saw the black van. It was following them.

  This didn’t escape Vogel, who lowered the sunshade and used the little vanity mirror to check the road behind them. Then he closed it again with an abrupt gesture.

  ‘They’ve been tailing us since yesterday,’ Borghi said. ‘Do you want me to stop them?’

  ‘They’re vultures,’ Vogel said. ‘They’re scavenging for news.’

  Borghi didn’t understand at first. ‘You mean they’re reporters?’

  ‘No,’ Vogel replied immediately without looking at him. ‘They’re freelance cameramen. As soon as they sniff the possibility of a juicy story, they rush to the scene with their cameras, hoping to get some footage they can sell to the networks. Reporters don’t waste time on missing girls unless there’s the likelihood of foul play.’

  Borghi felt stupid, only now realising that Vogel had already noticed the van that morning, and even the day before, outside the Kastners’ house. ‘What are these vultures looking for, then?’

  ‘They’re waiting for a monster to emerge.’

  Borghi was starting to understand. ‘That’s why we went to the river this morning … You wanted them to think we’re going to start searching for a body.’

  Vogel said nothing.

  Borghi didn’t like this silence. ‘But you just told the prosecutor there wouldn’t be any leaks.’

  ‘Nobody likes to look bad when the public are watching, Officer Borghi,’ Vogel said curtly. ‘Not even our Signorina Mayer, believe me.’ He turned to look at him. ‘To find Anna Lou, I need resources. By itself, an appeal from the parents isn’t enough.’

  With these words, Vogel put an end to the discussion. They didn’t touch on the subject again until they reached the operations room. But during the ride, Borghi had got a clear idea of Vogel’s intentions. At first, the special agent’s behaviour had struck him as cynical, but now he could understand its logic. If the media didn’t take an interest in the case, if the public didn’t decide to ‘adopt’ Anna Lou, their superiors wouldn’t grant them the necessary resources to conduct the most through investigation possible.

  As Vogel withdrew to his own office in the changing room, Borghi went out again. His destination was a nearby hardware shop. When he got back to the gym, he distributed cellophane packages containing house painter’s overalls.

  ‘What do we have to paint?’ one of the men asked in a jokey tone.

  Borghi ignored him. ‘Just put them on and go to the river.’

  ‘To do what?’ the other man asked, surprised.

  ‘We’ll talk about it when you’re there,’ was Borghi’s evasive reply.

  That evening, it had started to snow. Not an abundant fall, just a light dusting that vanished upon contact with surfaces, like a mirage.

  The temperature had gone down several degrees, but inside the roadside restaurant it was pleasantly warm. As usual, there weren’t many customers. A couple of lorry drivers sat at two different tables, eating in silence. The only sounds were the voice of the elderly proprietor giving orders in the kitchen, the clicking of the billiard balls and the muffled sounds of the TV set above the counter, broadcasting a football match that nobody was watching.

  The third customer in the restaurant was Borghi, who was sitting in one of the booths over a bowl of vegetable soup, tearing small pieces off a slice of bread, dropping them in the bowl and then collecting them with his spoon. As he did this, he kept checking the time on his mobile phone.

  ‘Everything all right?’ the waitress asked in the tone of someone who is obliged to be polite. She was wearing a red scarf and a little amethyst crucifix over her uniform. Borghi had noticed a similar crucifix on the mayor’s tie pin. He assumed it was the emblem of the brotherhood.

  ‘The soup’s very good,’ Borghi replied, attempting a smile.

  ‘Would you like me to bring you anything else?’

  ‘I’m fine for now.’

  ‘Then would you like me to get you the bill?’

  ‘I’ll wait a while longer, thank you.’ He didn’t have long to wait now until his appointment.

  The waitress walked away without insisting, returning sadly to the counter. Another evening with not many tips. Borghi felt sorry for her. She was almost certainly a wife and mother. Her face bore evident signs of weariness. Maybe this wasn’t her only job. But there was something else. The woman kept adjusting the red scarf she wore round her neck. God alone knew what those in the brotherhood thought of husbands who beat their wives, Borghi thought.

  He should have called Caroline. That day, they had exchanged only texts. She was with her parents now and Borghi wasn’t worried, but she kept asking him when he would be coming home. The truth was, he didn’t know. And he didn’t think he even wanted to very much. There were too many things to do, everything had to be reorganised in preparation for the child’s arrival. In the last few months, Borghi had had to make a whole series of decisions, one after another. To rent a larger apartment, refurbish it, put in furniture. He had changed cars, choosing a second-hand model that could transport the new family comfortably. He’d had a lot of expenses to meet and occasionally felt a kind of panic, especially now that Caroline had given up her job and was entirely dependent on him. He hated to upset her, and whenever she complained that he worked too hard, he couldn’t just reply that with a daughter on the way and only one salary coming in he had no alternative.

  He took out his mobile phone but once again put off calling his wife. Yet again, he checked the time. He wanted to be sure that his idea had borne fruit.

  It was exactly eight o’clock. His appointment.

  After a while, the lazy atmosphere in the restaurant suddenly came alive. It happened when the owner changed channels on the TV and raised the volume. The billiard players interrupted their game and the two lorry drivers turned towards the screen. A small group formed beneath the TV set, including the kitchen staff.

  It was an item on the national news. Borghi recognised the banks of the river that ran through the valley of Avechot. The footage had been shot from the bridge that spanned it. He saw his men, all in painter’s overalls, moving around in the mud beside the river. They were looking down on the ground, pretending to collect finds and put them in plastic bags which they then sealed, respecting to the letter the instructions he himself had given them.

  ‘The case of young Anna Lou has taken an unex
pected turn,’ said the voice of the newsreader. ‘Officially, the police are still treating this as a missing persons case, but this afternoon some technicians from the forensics team carried out a search along the river.’

  Even though nobody was looking in his direction, Borghi tried not to betray his satisfaction. The trick had worked.

  ‘We have no idea what they were searching for,’ the newsreader continued. ‘What we do know is that they have removed a number of finds which Special Agent Vogel, famous for solving several major cases, has defined as “interesting” without any other comment.’

  At this point, Borghi got up from the table, went to the cash desk and paid his bill. In spite of his wretched police salary, he would leave the waitress a large tip.

  27 December

  Four days after the disappearance

  The van, which contained a fully equipped control room, was parked in the little square in front of the town hall. Outside it, a technician with a mass of dreadlocks gathered in a ponytail was laying cables. All around, crates of equipment. And a folding chair with the name Stella Honer on the back of it.

  Blonde, elegant, aggressively beautiful, with a touch of make-up that emphasised her large dark eyes, Stella was sitting comfortably, gazing with absent-minded curiosity at the technician, her feet propped up on a camera with the logo of the network for which she worked, her splendid legs outstretched and calves crossed, set off by shoes with vertiginously high heels. And to think that at school in the village where she grew up she hadn’t been a favourite with the boys! Strangely, they had shunned her, even though she was prettier than most of the girls. For years, she had wondered why. It wasn’t until much later that she had realised men were actually a little scared of her. That was why she tried at times to seem like a bit of an airhead. Not to win them over, but to entice them so that she could then snap their heads off.

  There was only one man she had never managed to trick that way.

  She saw him walk slowly towards her through the morning mist, his hands deep in the pockets of his cashmere overcoat and a strange smile on his face.

  ‘Here’s the man who’ll tell us what we’re doing here!’ she said in a triumphant tone to the technician. ‘This place doesn’t go with my shoes.’

  ‘I’m sorry you’ve had to come such a long way, Stella,’ Vogel said in greeting. His tone was sardonic. ‘I’m sure you had something much more important to occupy your time. I seem to recall a report of yours about a man who killed his wife … Or was it his fiancée? I can’t remember … All these murders are so alike.’

  Stella smiled with the air of someone who can take sarcasm and give as good as she gets. She waited for Vogel to draw level with her, then threw a glance over her shoulder at the technician. ‘You know, Frank, this man has already managed to convince everyone that there’s a monster out there, even though he doesn’t have a single shred of evidence.’

  Vogel listened with an amused expression on his face, then also turned to the technician. ‘You see, Frank? That’s what journalists do: they manipulate the truth to make you appear worse than they are. But Stella Honer is the queen of correspondents. When it comes to location reports, nobody can touch her!’ Then, again looking at Stella: ‘Isn’t it a bit chilly for you to be out in the open?’

  ‘Precisely. A missing girl? Come on now! If I have to freeze my butt off, I want to do it for a real story. But I don’t see any story here. I’m going home.’

  The technician, who hadn’t said a word and wasn’t even interested in their conversation, went back inside the van, leaving them alone.

  Stella dropped her caustic tone and went on the attack. ‘Where is your kidnapper, Vogel? Because, frankly, I don’t believe there is one.’

  Vogel was unfazed. He knew it wouldn’t be easy to convince Stella, but he was well prepared. ‘A single road leading in and out of the valley. At one end, a speed camera, at the other the security camera over a petrol pump. We’re checking all the vehicles that passed through and taking a look at their owners. But I already know it’ll be completely useless.’

  Stella seemed puzzled. ‘Why go to all that effort, then?’

  Vogel took the first rabbit out of his hat. ‘To demonstrate my theory, which is that the girl never left here.’

  Stella was silent for a moment too long, a sign that the case was starting to interest her. ‘Go on …’

  Vogel knew he should be grateful to Borghi for the fact that Stella had gone to the bother of coming all the way up here. It had been a brilliant idea of the young officer’s to get all those overalls. The boy knew what he was doing. But now it was up to the master to play his role. He resumed speaking in an emphatic tone. ‘A remote valley. But one day, they discover a miracle under these mountains, a miracle called fluorite. So normal people become suddenly rich. A place where everybody knows everybody else, where nothing ever happens. Or rather, things do happen, but nobody talks about them, nobody says anything. Because the custom here is to hide everything, even wealth. You know what they say, don’t you? Small community, big secrets.’ It was a perfect introduction, and now, to reinforce his story, Vogel put his hand in his coat pocket and took out the diary Anna Lou’s mother had entrusted to him. He threw it at Stella, who caught it in mid-air. Stella first looked at it for a moment, then started leafing through it.

  ‘Twenty-third of March,’ she read aloud. ‘Today I went with my friend Priscilla when she took her kitten to the vet. The vet gave it its annual vaccination and said it should go on a diet …’ She turned to another page. ‘Thirteenth of June: along with the boys from the brotherhood, we’re preparing a recital about the childhood of Jesus …’ She leafed through more pages. ‘Sixth of November: I’ve learned how to make bead bracelets …’ Stella closed the little book abruptly and looked pensively at Vogel. ‘Kittens and bracelets?’

  ‘Were you expecting something different?’ Vogel asked, amused.

  ‘These are the things I would have written if my mother had been in the habit of sneaking a look at my diary …’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Don’t pull my leg. Where’s the real diary?’

  Vogel seemed pleased with himself. ‘You see? I was right: a religious family and an upright girl … But when you dig, something always comes out.’

  ‘You think Anna Lou Kastner had something to hide? A relationship with someone older, maybe even an adult?’

  ‘You’re going too fast, Stella,’ Vogel said, laughing.

  Stella looked at him suspiciously. ‘But you wanted me to read this so that I should think … Aren’t you afraid I might spread the rumour that there’s something murky in the girl’s life? The public would like that.’

  ‘You’d never do it,’ Vogel replied confidently. ‘The first rule of our profession: sanctify the victim. Monsters aren’t so monstrous if people start to think: “Hey, that one was asking for it!” Don’t you agree?’

  Stella pondered this for a moment. ‘I thought you still had a grudge against me because of the Mutilator.’

  Yes, it was true: he did have a grudge against her over the case that had lost him a good deal of his prestige and credibility. The ‘Mutilator’ had been a disaster in terms of strategy. Even though, when it came down to it, Vogel had had his reasons for acting as he had, they were too complicated to explain. And the public hadn’t understood. ‘I’m not the kind of person to bear a grudge,’ he assured her. ‘So – have we made peace?’

  Stella, though, knew the true purpose of the armistice. ‘You want me here because you know that then the other networks will follow suit.’ She pretended to think about it a while longer, even though she had already made her mind up. ‘But you will give me an exclusive on every development in the investigation, won’t you?’

  Vogel had known she would try to negotiate. First he shook his head, then he said, ‘I’ll give you a twenty-five-minute head start on the competition.’ He said it in the tone of someone making a final offer.

  Stella pretended to
be indignant. ‘Twenty-five minutes? That’s nothing.’

  ‘It’s an eternity, and you know it.’ Vogel looked at his watch. ‘For example, you have twenty-five minutes with that’ – indicating the diary – ‘before I put it with the case evidence.’

  Stella made to protest, but in her mind the countdown had already begun. She got out her mobile and started photographing the pages of Anna Lou Kastner’s diary.

  *

  By 11 a.m., Stella Honer had put together her first report from Avechot for the morning bulletins. Not far from Anna Lou’s house, a permanent location had been set up from which she would tell viewers all about the latest developments in the investigation. At midday, the network’s main news magazine programme joined Stella to be updated in real time about the case.

  That afternoon, Vogel gathered the officers on his team in the school gym for another briefing.

  ‘From now on, things are going to be different,’ he announced to a very attentive audience. ‘What will happen next will be crucial in solving the mystery of Anna Lou Kastner’s disappearance.’

  Vogel certainly knew how to inspire his men, Borghi thought.

  ‘This isn’t just a local case any more. The whole country has its eyes on Avechot now, and on us. We can’t disappoint them.’ He repeated these last words, as if to emphasise that if they didn’t find the culprit it would be their fault. ‘Many among you must be wondering how the attention the case is getting in the media might benefit us. Well, the bait’s been set, now let’s hope that someone falls into the trap.’

  From the way they were listening to him, Borghi realised that things really had changed. Three days ago, they had regarded him as an intruder who had come up here to tell them how to do their job and stick his nose in their business. A conceited big-city officer looking for fame on the back of their efforts. But now they saw him as a guide, a man able to bring the nightmare to an end and, above all, someone ready to share the glory with them.