The Pilgrim Conspiracy by Jeroen Windmeijer

Author:Jeroen Windmeijer [Windmeijer, Jeroen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780008379179
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2020-04-03T17:00:00+00:00

Chapter 26

Willem Rijsbergen sat at home in his living room. A copy of a well-thumbed murder myster rested in his lap.

In his right hand, he held a tumbler into which he had poured himself a finger of whisky. He rolled the liquid around in the glass, focusing on the subtle changes in its golden yellow colour as it caught the light.

For years, Rijsbergen had toyed with the idea of turning his own experiences into stories after he retired. He could publish a new adventure every six months, like a Leiden version of Baantjer, the former policeman who had penned a hugely popular series of detective novels set in Amsterdam.

Customers in bookshops would eagerly ask, ‘Is the new Rijsbergen out yet?’

He had always kept this ambition a secret – only his wife Corinne knew about it.

The series would be loosely based on his own life, although, because he had dealt with so few murders, he would have to invent a fictional crime for almost every book. But he could use the things he’d seen and done during his long career to add atmosphere to his stories and give them an air of authenticity.

But this case is different, he thought. What title would I give this story? ‘Master in Death’, perhaps?

He drained his glass and reached for the bottle of Lagavulin to pour himself another dram.

His thoughts turned back to the investigation. They had started by establishing who was innocent, crossing name after name off the long list that they had compiled at the beginning of the investigation: the non-members who had been at the open evening, Tony Vanderhoop and his delegation, the members of the lodge, and even the loosely affiliated members of the protest groups that Sven and Stefan were connected to.

Herman van der Lede had been in custody for six weeks now. He had appeared to misspeak when Rijsbergen and Van de Kooij had visited his wife, the only woman who had put herself forward as a candidate in the election of the new chair of Loge Ishtar.

Just before the detectives had left, Herman had mentioned the square and compasses, information that he almost certainly could not have had if he was innocent. Herman had refused to tell them how he knew about it. Even more telling was his refusal to say another word after he’d realised that he’d already said too much.

Herman’s wife Jenny swore up and down that her husband couldn’t have been involved in the murder. But she was also unable to explain how Herman could mention details that had not been made public, or why he’d remained tight-lipped ever since.

The investigation had – to use the bureaucratic term – been scaled back soon after Herman van der Lede’s arrest. Most of the staff who had been working on the investigation had been reassigned to other, more urgent cases.

‘You know as well as I do, Rijsbergen …’ his boss had said to him. He hadn’t looked at or spoken to Van de Kooij once during the exchange.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.