The Dead Mountaineer's Inn: (One More Last Rite for the Detective Genre)

14.

Hinkus was already awake. He was standing in the middle of the room with his suspenders dangling, wiping his face with a large towel.

“Good morning,” I said. “How do you feel?”

He glanced at me warily; his face was a little swollen, but for the most part he looked pretty good. All traces of the mad hunted ferret that I’d seen only a few hours ago had disappeared.

“Fine, more or less,” he muttered. “Why am I locked in here?”

“You had a nervous breakdown,” I explained. His face twitched slightly. “Nothing awful. The manager gave you an injection and locked you in so that no one would bother you. Want to go to breakfast?”

“I’m coming,” he said. “I’ll have my breakfast and get the hell out of here. And I’m taking my deposit back. A vacation in the mountains…” He balled the towel up and threw it aside. “Another vacation like this and I’d go nuts. Tuberculosis or no tuberculosis… Where’s my coat, anyway? And my hat…”

“On the roof, probably,” I said.

“On the roof…” he muttered, hoisting his suspenders. “On the roof…”

“Yes,” I said. “I’m sorry, that’s some bad luck… But we’ll talk about it later.”

I turned and walked towards the door.

“There’s nothing to talk about!” he shouted angrily at my back.

No one was in the dining room yet. Kaisa was arranging the sandwich plates. I greeted her and chose a new seat for myself: back to the sideboard, face to the door, directly beside Du Barnstoker’s seat. I had barely sat down when Simone came in wearing a thick, colorful sweater. He was freshly shaven, with puffy red eyes.

“What a night, Inspector,” he said. “I didn’t get even five hours’ sleep. My nerves were a wreck. I can’t get rid of this smell of dead flesh—that pharmaceutical stench, you know what I mean? Like formaldehyde…” He sat down, picked out a sandwich, and then looked at me. “Did you find anything?” he asked.

“That depends on what you mean,” I said.

“Aha,” he said, and laughed uncertainly. “You don’t look well.”

“Every man wears the face he deserves,” I said, at the exact second that the Barnstokers came in. They looked fresh as daisies. The uncle sported an aster in his buttonhole; the dome of his bald head shone in the midst of silver-gray curls; Brun was wearing glasses, as before, and her nose was still brazenly raised. Uncle rubbed his hands together as he approached his seat, looking searchingly at me.

“Good morning, Inspector,” he sang gently. “What an awful night! Good morning, Mr. Simone. Don’t you agree?”

“Hi,” muttered the kid.

“What I wouldn’t give for some cognac,” Simone said with a sort of wistfulness. “But that wouldn’t be right, would it? Or would it?”

“I don’t know, to be honest,” said Du Barnstoker. “I wouldn’t risk it.”

“How about you, Inspector?” Simone said.

I shook my head and sipped the coffee that Kaisa had set in front of me.

“Too bad,” said Simone. “Then I would have had a drink.”

“And how are we doing this morning, my dear inspector?” Du Barnstoker asked.

“The investigation is on track,” I said. “The police have the key in hand. Many keys. The entire ring, in fact.”

Simone started cackling as usual, but then immediately made a serious face.

“No doubt we’ll have to spend all day indoors,” said Du Barnstoker. “No leaving, I assume.”

“Why not?” I replied. “Do whatever you want. The more so, the better.”

“Escape is futile, anyway,” said Simone. “There’s the avalanche. We’re locked in here—for a while, too. It’s an ideal situation for the police. I, of course, could escape via the cliffs…”

“Then why don’t you?” I asked.

“In the first place, because I can’t get to the cliffs through the snow. In the second, because what would I do once I’d gotten there?… Listen, gentlemen,” he said. “Why don’t we take a walk down the road—let’s see for ourselves what Bottleneck looks like…”

“You have no objection, Inspector?” Du Barnstoker asked.

“No,” I said, as the Moseses came in. They looked fresh as daisies too. That is to say, Madame Moses looked like a daisy, like a peach, like the sun itself. As for Moses, he was the same withered old rutabaga as before. He made his way past us without saying hello to anyone, gulping from his mug, and then slumped into his chair to stare dismally at the sandwiches in front of him.

The crystalline voice of Mrs. Moses rang out. “Good morning, gentlemen!”

I glanced at Simone, who was glancing at Mrs. Moses, somewhat suspiciously, it seemed. Then he shrugged spasmodically and grabbed his coffee.

“What a charming morning,” Mrs. Moses continued. “Look how sunny it is! Pity poor Olaf that he isn’t alive to see it!”

“We’ll all be there someday,” Moses barked suddenly.

“Amen,” concluded Du Barnstoker politely.

I looked at Brun. The girl was hunched over with her nose buried in her mug. The door opened again and Luarvik L. Luarvik appeared, accompanied by the owner. The owner smiled gloomily.

“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen,” he said. “Please allow me to introduce Mr. Luarvik Luarvik, who joined us last night. He suffered an accident on the road, and naturally we would not refuse him our hospitality.”

Mr. Luarvik Luarvik indeed looked like a man who had suffered a terrible accident and was very much in need of hospitality. The owner had to take him by the elbow and literally push him into my old seat next to Simone.

“Very nice to meet you, Luarvik,” Moses croaked. “There are no strangers here, Luarvik—make yourself at home.”

“Yes,” said Luarvik, looking with one eye at me, and with the other at Simone. “Wonderful weather we’re having. A real winter…”

“Nonsense, Luarvik,” Moses said. “Less talk, more eating. You look exhausted… Simone, would you mind telling the one about the maître d’ again? He ate someone’s filet, if I remember right…”

At that moment, Hinkus finally appeared. He walked in and immediately stopped. Simone started telling the story about the maître d’ again, and while he was explaining that said person had not eaten any filet, that in fact quite the opposite had happened, Hinkus stood in the doorway, and I watched him, trying at the same time to keep an eye on the Moseses. I did, but that didn’t get me anywhere. Mrs. Moses ate her cookies and cream and listened admiringly to the troublemaking bore. Mr. Moses did turn one bloodshot eye in Hinkus’s direction—but he did so with complete indifference, and then returned to his mug. Hinkus, on the other hand, was having a hard time controlling his expression.

At first he looked completely dazed, as if someone had hit him over the head with an oar. Then his face became clearly overcome with joy, a sort of excitement—he even smiled suddenly, just like a child. Then his smile turned into an evil grin and he stepped forward, clenching his fists. But to my great surprise, he wasn’t looking at the Moseses. He was looking at the Barnstokers: first in confusion, then with relief and excitement, and finally with spite and a sort of gleeful malice. He caught me looking at him and relaxed slightly, lowering his gaze as he went over to his seat.

“How are you feeling, Mr. Hinkus?” Du Barnstoker asked, bending forward considerately. “The air here…”

Hinkus glared at him with insane yellow eyes.

“I’m all right,” he answered, sitting down. “But then how about you—how are you feeling?”

Du Barnstoker leaned back in his chair in surprise.

“Me? Thank you…” He looked first at me, then at Brun. “Perhaps I have said something wrong… touched on… In that case, I beg…”

“Didn’t work out, did it?” Hinkus continued, furiously stuffing a napkin into his collar. “Fell through, didn’t it, old man?”

Du Barnstoker was in a state of complete confusion. All talk at the table had stopped, everyone was looking at him and Hinkus.

“Really, I’m afraid…” The old magician clearly had no idea what to do. “I was only inquiring after your health, nothing more…”

“Of course, of course, we’ll drop it,” Hinkus responded.

He took a big sandwich in both hands, maneuvered a corner into his mouth and proceeded to chew on it without looking at anyone else.

“There’s no need to be rude!” Brun said suddenly.

Hinkus glanced briefly at her and then immediately looked away.

“Brun, my child,” said Du Barnstoker.

“B-blowhard!” Brun said, striking her knife against her plate. “Maybe if you drank less…”

“Gentlemen, gentlemen!” the owner said. “All this is foolishness!”

“Don’t worry, Snevar,” Du Barnstoker said quickly. “This is nothing more than a little misunderstanding… Nerves are strained… The events of the night…”

“Didn’t you hear me?” Brun asked menacingly, pointing her black lenses at Hinkus.

“Ladies and gentlemen!” the owner interjected authoritatively. “Ladies and gentlemen, if I could have your attention. I am not going to talk about the tragic events of last night. I understand: yes, nerves are strained. But let us remember, first of all, that the investigation into the unfortunate fate of Olaf Andvarafors is safely in the hands of Inspector Glebsky, who, by a happy coincidence, happened to be in our midst. Secondly, we must not be enervated by the fact that we find ourselves cut off from the outside world…”

Hinkus stopped chewing and raised his head.

“Our cellars are full, gentlemen!” the owner continued vehemently. “Every imaginable provision, and even a few unimaginable ones, are at your disposal. And I am sure that when a rescue party breaks through the blockage and reaches us in a few days, it will find us…”

“What blockage?” Hinkus asked loudly, looking around wide-eyed. “What the hell is this?”

“Yes, please excuse me,” the owner said, bringing a hand to his forehead. “I completely forgot that a few of our guests might not know about this event. To be brief: at ten o’clock last night, an avalanche blocked the Bottleneck and cut off telephone service.”

Silence descended over the table. Everyone was chewing and staring at their plates. Hinkus sat with his mouth open—once again, he appeared completely dumbfounded. A melancholy Luarvik L. Luarvik chewed on a lemon, biting into it skin and all. Yellow juice ran down his narrow chin and onto his jacket. My jaw was cramping, I took a sip of coffee and announced:

“If I might add the following: two small gangs of lowlifes have, for some reason, chosen this hotel as the place to settle their accounts with one another. In my current informal capacity, I can take only limited steps. For example, I can gather evidence for when the official police from Mur get here. This evidence has, for the most part, been gathered already, although I would be very grateful to any citizen who gives the investigation any new information. Furthermore I want to make it known to all good citizens that they are out of danger and free to conduct themselves in whatever way they please. As for those persons who make up the abovementioned gangs, I advise them to cease their activities, so as not to worsen their already hopeless situation. I would like to remind you that our isolation from the outside world is relative. Some of you here already know that two hours ago I availed myself of an offer of Mr. Snevar’s and sent a message via carrier pigeon to Mur. Now I expect the arrival of a police plane at any hour, and for that reason remind those persons who are involved in criminal activities that timely confession and repentance would significantly improve their lots. Thank you for your attention, everyone.”

“How interesting!” Mrs. Moses exclaimed delightedly. “That means that there are bandits in our midst? Oh, Inspector, please give us a hint! We’ll guess it!”

I glanced over at the owner. Alek Snevar had turned his expansive back on his guests in order to carefully wipe the shot glasses on the sideboard.

Conversation did not resume. Spoons clinked quietly in their cups, Mr. Moses breathed noisily over his mug, drilling his eyes into everyone in turn. No one was giving themselves away, though anyone who had reason to think about their fate was thinking about it. I had let a healthy ferret into this chicken coop, and now just had to wait for something to happen.

Du Barnstoker was the first to stand up.

“Ladies and gentlemen!” he said. “I call upon all good citizens to put their skis on and go on a little excursion. The sun, the fresh air, the snow and a clear conscience will surely help fortify and calm us. Brun, my child, come along.”

One after another the guests pushed their chairs back and got up from the table to leave the room. Simone offered his arm to Mrs. Moses—apparently, his memories of the previous night had vanished utterly under the influence of the sunny morning and a thirst for sensual pleasure. Mr. Moses pulled Luarvik L. Luarvik up from the table and stood him up; Luarvik followed behind him, shuffling his feet as he chewed mechanically on his lemon.

Only Hinkus was left at the table. He was eating intently, as if he intended to fill himself with enough fuel to last a long time. The owner helped Kaisa gather up the dishes.

“Well, Hinkus?” I said. “Shall we talk?”

“About what?” he said gloomily as he ate an egg with pepper.

“About everything,” I said. “As you can see, you won’t be going anywhere anytime soon. And there’s no need to hang around on the roof anymore, right?”

“We’ve got nothing to talk about,” Hinkus said grimly. “I don’t know anything about your case.”

“About what case?” I asked.

“About the murder! What else…”

“But there’s still the Hinkus case,” I said. “Are you done? If so, let’s go. We’ll go to the pool room: it’s sunny in there, and no one will disturb us.”

He didn’t say anything. He chewed his egg, swallowed, wiped his mouth with his napkin and stood up.

“Alek,” I said to the manager. “Do me a favor, come down and sit in the lobby where you were yesterday—understand?”

“Understood,” said the manager. “You got it.”

He quickly wiped his hands off on the towel, and went out. I opened the door to the billiard room and let Hinkus go in first. He entered and stopped, standing with his hands in his pockets, chewing a match. I took one of the chairs lining the wall, stood it in the middle of the sunlight and said, “Sit.” Hinkus hesitated a second, then sat and immediately squinted. The sunlight was in his face.

“An old police trick,” he mumbled bitterly.

“That’s the nature of the job,” I said, and sat in front of him on the edge of the billiard table, which was out of the sun. “So, Hinkus, what happened in there between you and Barnstoker?”

“What about Barnstoker? What could have happened between us? Nothing happened. I don’t know anything about him.”

“You wrote the note threatening him?”

“I didn’t write any note. But I will write a complaint. For torturing a sick man…”

“Listen, Hinkus. In an hour or two the police will fly in. The experts are coming. I have your note in my pocket. It won’t be too hard for them to determine that you wrote it. Why aren’t you talking?”

With a quick movement he shifted the match he was chewing on from one corner of his mouth to the other. Kaisa was clattering dishes in the dining room, singing something out of tune in her thin voice.

“I don’t know anything about a note,” Hinkus said finally.

“Stop lying, Finch!” I shouted. “I know all about you! You’re in trouble, Finch. And if you’re looking to get off under section 72, you’d better get in line with paragraph D! Make a frank confession before the official investigation begins… well? How about it?”

He spat out the match, rummaged around in his pockets and pulled out a crumpled pack of cigarettes. Then he brought the pack up to his mouth, pulled a cigarette out of it with his lips, and thought.

“Well?” I said.

“You’re confusing me with someone else,” Hinkus answered. “Someone named Finch. I’m not Finch. I’m Hinkus.”

I leaped off the pool table and held the gun under his nose.

“What about that? Do you recognize that? Is it yours? Speak up!”

“I don’t know anything about it,” he said grimly. “Why are you harassing me?”

I sat back down on the table, lay the gun next to me on the felt and lit a cigarette.

“Think about it,” I said. “Think fast, or it’ll be too late. You slipped a note to Barnstoker, and he gave it to me—naturally, you didn’t expect this. Your gun was taken away, and I found it. You sent your boys a telegram, but they didn’t get here on time because of the avalanche. And the police will arrive in two hours, at most. Do you see what I’m saying?”

Kaisa poked her head in at the door.

“Can I get you anything? Or is everything all right?” she asked.

“Go on, Kaisa,” I said. “Go.”

Hinkus was quiet; he fumbled around intently in his pocket, before pulling out a box of matches and lighting the cigarette. The sun was scorching. Sweat had appeared on his face.

“You made a mistake, Finch,” I said. “You messed up. Why go after Barnstoker? You frightened the poor old man half to death… Did they really order you to keep him here at gunpoint? Moses! Moses must have been the target! You colossal idiot, I wouldn’t hire you as a janitor, let alone give you such a responsibility… And your scum friends are going to get you for this, Finch! Which means that there’s only one thing left to do…”

He didn’t give me a chance to finish my lecture. I was sitting on the edge of the pool table, smoking as I dangled one leg, the other resting on the floor, like an idiot smugly watching smoke rise through a sunbeam. Suddenly Hinkus, who was sitting on the chair a few steps away from me, leaned forward and grabbed my dangling leg, twisting it sharply as he pulled on it with all his strength. I had underestimated him, frankly. I slid off the pool table and crashed to the floor, all ninety kilograms’ worth of face, stomach and knees.

As to what happened next, I can only guess. Basically, after about a minute I came to my senses and found that I was sitting on the floor, my back against the pool table, with my chin split open, two loose teeth, blood running into my eye from my forehead and my right shoulder aching unbearably. Hinkus was lying nearby, crumpled and holding his head in his hands—standing over him, like St. George standing over the prostrate dragon, was Simone the grinning hero, holding a piece of the longest and heaviest pool cue in his hand. I wiped the blood from my forehead and stood up. I was reeling. I wanted to lie down in the shade and sleep. Simone bent down, picked the gun up off the floor and handed it to me.

“You were lucky, Inspector,” he said, beaming. “Another second and he would have broken your head. Where did you fall? On your shoulder?”

I nodded. I couldn’t speak: the wind had been knocked out of me.

“Wait a second,” Simone said and ran into the dining room, tossing the broken cue on the table.

I walked around to the other side of the table and sat in the shade so I could see Hinkus. He was still lying there motionlessly. A real son of a bitch, though he didn’t look like much… Yes, gentlemen, a gangster in the best Chicago tradition. But what was he doing in our respectable country? And just think: Zgut and I make the same salary. They should shower him with gold!… I pulled a handkerchief out of my pocket and carefully dabbed at the cut on my forehead.

Hinkus started groaning; he rolled over and tried to stand up. He was still holding his head. Simone returned with a carafe of water. I took it, somehow made my way to Hinkus and poured some on his face. Hinkus growled and removed one of his hands from his head. His face was pretty green again, though that was understandable now. Simone squatted down beside him.

“I hope I didn’t overdo it,” he said, worried. “I didn’t have time to think, you know.”

“Don’t worry about it, old man, everyone will be fine,” I raised my hand to pat him on the shoulder, and groaned in pain. “I’ll take it from here.”

“Should I leave?” Simone asked.

“Not at all, I think you’d better stay. Otherwise he might turn the tables again. Get some more water… In case there’s any fainting…”

“And brandy!” Simone said enthusiastically.

“Right,” I said. “That’ll bring him around quickly. Only don’t tell anyone what’s happened.”

Simone brought some more water and an open bottle of cognac. I pried Hinkus’s mouth open and poured in a neat half glass. I drank the other half myself. Simone, who had presciently brought in a second glass, drank with us. Then we dragged Hinkus over to the wall and leaned him up against it. I poured more water out of the carafe over him and slapped him twice on the cheeks. He opened his eyes and took a loud breath.

“Another brandy?” I asked.

“Yes…” he whispered hoarsely.

I gave him another glass of cognac. He licked his lips.

“What did you mean about the seventy-second ‘D’?” he said intently.

“All in good time,” I said.

He shook his head and winced.

“No, it won’t work. It’s life for me.”

“Wanted and listed?” I said.

“Bingo. Now I only want one thing: to avoid the gallows. And by the way, I’ve got a pretty good shot. I didn’t have anything to do with Olaf, you know that, and what else is there? Illegal possession of a weapon? You’ve still got to prove that I had it on me…”

“How about assaulting a police officer?”

“Well, that’s what I’m talking about!” Hinkus said, carefully feeling the top of his head. “As far as I’m concerned, there wasn’t any attack: there was only a full confession before the beginning of the official investigation. What do you think, chief?”

“I haven’t heard any confession yet,” I reminded him.

“You will,” said Hinkus. “But you have to promise me, in the presence of this physicist. The seventy-second ‘D’—promise?”

“All right,” I said. “Let’s say it was a fight on personal grounds, due to intoxication. That is, you were intoxicated and I tried to reason with you.”

Simone snickered.

“What about me?”

“You helped me handle him… All right, enough jabber. Talk, Finch. And think twice before lying to me—you’ve knocked two of my teeth loose already, you bastard…”

He just looked at me with his yellow eyes. Then he started talking.

“It’s like this,” he began. “The Champion sent me here. You never heard of Champ? Of course you have… So two months ago Champ dug up this guy. Where and how he dug, I don’t know. I don’t know his real name either. We called him Beelzebub. It fit, he gave us the creeps… He only worked two jobs with us, but these weren’t easy lifting by any means, and he did them clean, beautiful… Well, you know all about it. The Second National Bank was one, the armored car full of gold bars was the other. You know about those, huh, chief? There you go. Unsolved cases, and even the police know that the guys you’ve locked up don’t have anything to do with it. Anyway, he did these two jobs for us and then suddenly decided to cut us off. Why he did this, that’s another question, but our little Beelzebub ran away, and they sent us to intercept him. To find out where he was, to get him in our sights and then whistle for Champ… If worst came to worst, we were supposed to finish him off on the spot. I was the one who managed to corner him here, and there you have my full confession.”

“All right, then, which one of our guests is Beelzebub?”

“Well. that’s where I blundered, as you so correctly put it, chief. I figured it was the magician, Du Barnstoker. In the first place, he’s got those magic tricks. In the second, I thought, ‘If Beelzebub wanted to go around incognito, how would he disguise himself?’ Without making a fuss, I mean—then I saw it: a magician!”

“You’ve mixed something up here,” I said. “A magician, okay, I get that. But Barnstoker and Moses are fire and water. One’s skinny and tall, the other’s squat and fat.”

Hinkus waved his hand.

“I’ve seen him look different at different times, sometimes fat, sometimes skinny. No one knows what he looks like normally… You got to understand, Chief: Beelzebub’s not an ordinary guy. He’s a sorcerer, a werewolf! He has power over dark forces…”

“Baloney…” I said.

“Right,” Hinkus said. “Naturally no one’s going to believe it who hasn’t seen for himself… Like for example, this broad he travels with—who do you think she is, chief? With my own eyes I saw her wrench a two-ton safe out of the wall and carry it along the eaves of a building. She had it under her arm. She was small then, puny, nothing to her—a kid, a teenager like this Barnstoker girl… but with these arms, two meters long—no, three meters…”

“Stop lying, Finch,” I said sternly.

Hinkus waved his hand and looked frustrated, but then he perked up again.

“Well, all right, then,” he said. “Maybe I’m lying, maybe I’m not. But then excuse me for mentioning it, but I did manage to get the best of you with my bare hands, Chief, and here you are, a big guy, a guy who knows how to fight… So just ask yourself, who could have taken care of me that way, as if I were a baby, and shoved me under the table?”

“Who?” I asked.

“She could! Now I get how it all happened. He recognized me—must have remembered me, the bastard. And when he realized that I was sitting up on the roof, and wasn’t going to let him leave the building alive, he sent his girl up to get me. He made her look like me, too!”—Hinkus’s eyes grew wide with horror—“Mother of mercy, there I was, sitting, and here it is standing in front of me, that is, there I am, standing, naked, a corpse, eyes dripping… How I didn’t kick the bucket right then out of sheer terror, I have no idea. I blacked out three times, I swear… The weirdest part was, I drink plenty, but I don’t get drunk, it’s like I’m pouring it out on the ground… But then somehow he knew that something isn’t right with me, in my skull I mean, that I’d gotten it from my old man. He used to imagine weird stuff too, and then he would grab his gun and start to shoot… Beelzebub must have decided to either drive me nuts or scare me until I passed out, so he could slip away. And when he saw that it wasn’t working, well, then he decided to use force…”

“So why didn’t he just kill you?” I asked.

Hinkus shook his head.

“He can’t. I mean, why else would he tie me up? When we hit the armored car, you know, we had to get rid of its protection first. Guys got worked up, and it looked for a second like he’d gotten blood on his hands—Beelzebub, I mean… But he could lose all of his infernal power if he took a human life. Champ told us that. Otherwise why would we be tracking him down? God forbid!”

“I see…” I said uncertainly.

Once again, I was in the dark. Hinkus was undoubtedly psychotic—as he himself had admitted. But there was a method to his madness. Within the frame of his craziness all the means eventually became ends—even silver bullets had a place in the picture. And all of it seemed to be interwoven in some strange way with things that had actually happened. The safe from the Second National Bank really had disappeared astonishingly into thin air, baffling everyone. The experts shook their heads, the only tracks leading from the scene of the crime were found on the eaves of the building. And witnesses to the armored car robbery had persistently repeated under oath—as if they’d all agreed on it beforehand—that it had begun when a man grabbed the armored car under its carriage and flipped it on its side… God only knew how to explain it all.

“What about the silver bullets?” I asked, just in case. “Why’s the gun loaded with silver bullets?”

“Come on,” Hinkus explained condescendingly. “Lead bullets aren’t any good against werewolves. Champ made some up beforehand, just in case. He showed them to Beelzebub and said, ‘Rock the boat, and here’s how you’ll die. Remember that.’”

“But then why did they stay in the inn?” I said. “They tied you up and then stuck around…”

“That I don’t know,” Hinkus admitted. “That I don’t understand myself. When I saw Barnstoker this morning, I was flabbergasted. I thought they’d have taken off a long time ago, vanished without a trace… Huh, it wasn’t Barnstoker, of course, but at the time I thought it was Barnstoker… Yeah, Beelzebub is here, but why he stayed, I don’t know. Maybe he couldn’t get through the avalanche either? He may be a wizard, but he’s not God. For example, he can’t fly, everyone knows that. Can’t walk through walls either… However, that woman with him—or whatever it is—could clear up any obstruction in a second. Instead of hands, he could’ve attached scoops to her, like a dump truck’s, and that would’ve been it…”

I turned to Simone.

“Well,” I said. “What does science have to say about all this?”

The look on Simone’s face surprised me. The physicist was taking it seriously.

“Mr. Hinkus’s arguments contain at least one very interesting detail,” he said. “Beelzebub is not omnipotent. You see that, Inspector? A very important point. And very strange. One would think there would be no laws or limits to the fantasies of such ignorant people, but there are… But then how was Olaf killed?”

“That I don’t know,” Hinkus said firmly. “I don’t know anything about Olaf, Chief. I swear it.” He put his hand over his heart. “All I can say is that Olaf was not one of ours, and if Beelzebub really did finish him off, for a reason I don’t understand… Then Olaf isn’t a person, but some kind of creature, like Beelzebub himself. I told you already, Beelzebub isn’t allowed to kill people. He’s not his own worst enemy—you understand me?”

“Well, well,” Simone said. “So how was Olaf killed, Inspector?”

I briefly laid out the facts for him: the door locked from the inside, the twisted neck, the spots on the face, the pharmaceutical smell. I watched Hinkus the whole time I was talking: he twitched, shivered, his eyes darting all over the place, and finally, asked desperately for another sip. It was clear that all this was new information to him, and that he was so scared he was practically shuddering. Simone frowned deeply. His eyes had grown vacant, and his yellowish, shovel-shaped teeth were barred. When I was finished, he swore softly. He didn’t say anything else.

I took a sip of cognac and treated Hinkus to one too—we were both feeling under the weather. I don’t know how I looked, but Hinkus was quite green; from time to time he touched his head carefully. I left the physicist to his thoughts and started in on Hinkus again.

“All right, Finch—but how did you manage to track him down? You didn’t know beforehand what form he’d taken…”

Hinkus smiled, looking smug despite his greenish tinge.

“You aren’t the only ones who can track people down, Inspector,” he said. “First of all, Beelzebub may be a wizard, but he’s also a fool. He drags that trunk around with him wherever he goes. It’s the only one like it in the world. So all I had to do was ask around until I found out where the trunk had gone. Second, he’s got money to burn… Whatever he pulled out of his pocket, that’s what he paid. People like that are rare, as you yourself know. Wherever he’d been, they only talked about him. There’s no trick to it. Generally speaking, I find who I’m looking for… That Barnstoker turned out to be a mistake—I can’t deny it: the old man pulled the wool over my eyes. Those damned lollipops of his… And then, I go out into the lobby, he’s sitting there alone, thinking that no one was watching him, holding some kind of wooden doll in his hands. You guys should have seen what he was doing with it!… Yup, I messed up with that one, of course…”

“Not to mention that he was always with that woman…” I said thoughtfully.

“No,” said Hinkus. “The woman isn’t necessarily always with him, Chief. When there’s a job to be done, he gets her from somewhere… And anyway, she’s not a woman, she’s some sort of werewolf like him… No one knows where he stows her when she’s not around.”

And then I caught myself: there I was, a respectable, experienced police officer, no longer a young man, sitting discussing werewolves, wizards and sorcerers completely seriously with a partially insane criminal… I looked at Simone guiltily, but found that the physicist had disappeared, and that in his place, leaning against the doorway, stood the owner with his Winchester under his arm, and I remembered all the hints, all the little conversations about zombies, and his fat index finger wagging meaningfully in front of my face. I felt even more humiliated; I lit a cigarette and with deliberate severity turned to Hinkus.

“Enough. Have you ever seen the one-armed man before?”

“What one-armed man?”

“You were sitting next to him at the table.”

“Oh—the one wolfing down a lemon… No, that’s the first time I saw him. Why?”

“Nothing,” I said. “When was Champ supposed to arrive?”

“That evening. He didn’t come. Now I understand: it must have been the avalanche.”

“Then what were you thinking when you attacked me, you idiot?”

“What was I supposed to do?” Hinkus said wistfully. “Put yourself in my shoes, Chief. The police weren’t going to give me any breaks. I’m a wanted man, I’ve earned a life sentence. So I decided: grab the gun, break some heads if I have to, and make my way to the blockage… then I’d either find my own way through, or Champ would pick me up. Don’t think Champ’s sleeping on all this either. The police aren’t the only ones who have airplanes.”

“How many people is Champ bringing with him?”

“I don’t know. No less than three. But of course, they’re the best…”

“All right, get up,” I said, hauling myself to my feet with no small difficulty. “Let’s go, I’m locking you up.”

Hinkus got up, moaning and groaning. We went with the owner down the back stairs, so as not to meet anyone on the way. Nevertheless, we ran into Kaisa in the kitchen. Seeing me, she screamed and hid behind a plate.

“Don’t scream, you idiot,” the owner said strictly. “Get some hot water ready, bandages, iodine… This way, Peter, put him in the storage room.”

I inspected the storage room: it looked fine. The strong, reliable door locked from the outside with a padlock. There were no other ways out—not even a window.

“You’re going to sit here until the police arrive,” I told Hinkus as I left. “And don’t try to do anything, or I’ll shoot you on the spot.”

“There you go,” Hinkus whined. “The Finch is under lock and key, meanwhile that one walks around free, nothing sticks to him… It’s no good, chief. No justice… And I’m wounded, my head hurts…”

I didn’t get into it with him, I just locked the door and put the key in my pocket. I had accumulated quite a number of keys so far. A few more hours of this, I thought, and I’ll have to carry all the keys in the inn.

Afterwards we went to the office. Kaisa brought the water and bandages, and the owner began to straighten me out.

“What kind of weapons are there in the inn?” I asked him.

“The Winchester, two hunting shotguns. A pistol. We have weapons, but which of us are going to shoot them?”

“Right,” I said. “That’s a good question.”

Shotguns versus machine guns. Du Barnstoker against top-notch goons. Anyway, there wouldn’t be any shootouts, I know this “Champ”: he’d just throw some nasty piece of work out of the plane and pick us all off in an open field, like partridges…

“While you were upstairs,” the owner said, deftly washing my forehead off around the wound, “Moses came to see me. He put a sack of money on the table—a sack, Peter, I’m not exaggerating, and demanded that I put it immediately in the safe. He believes, you see, that in such a situation his property is in grave danger.”

“What did you do?” I asked.

“I may have made a slight mistake,” he confessed. “I slipped and told him that you had the keys to the safe.”

“Thanks, Alek,” I said bitterly. “Now he’ll start hunting police inspectors…”

We were quiet. The owner bandaged me up. It was painful, I was starting to feel nauseous from the pain. That jerk must have broken my collarbone. The radio receiver crackled and hissed out the local news. Not a word was said about the avalanche in Bottleneck. The owner stepped back to examine his handiwork.

“Not bad,” he said.

“Thanks,” I said.

He picked up the basin and asked, busily:

“Who should I send you?”

“To hell with it,” I said. “I want to sleep. Take the Winchester, sit in the hall and shoot anyone who comes near that door. I need at least a short hour to sleep, otherwise I’m going to collapse. Damned ghouls. Stinking werewolves.”

“I don’t have any silver bullets,” the owner said shortly.

“Then use the lead ones, dammit! And quit it with your superstition! This gang is leading me around by the nose, and you’re helping them do it… Are there shutters on this window?”

The owner set down the basin, quietly went to the window and pulled the iron shutters closed.

“Good,” I said. “Excellent… Don’t turn on the light… And one more thing, Alek… Put someone… Simone or that girl… Brun… tell them to watch the sky. Explain that it’s a matter of life or death. The minute they see any kind of plane, they should sound the alarm…”

The owner nodded, took the basin and headed towards the door. On the threshold he stopped.

“Do you want my advice, Peter?” he said. “One last piece.”

“Well?”

“Give them the suitcase and let them go straight back to whatever hell they came from. Do you really not understand that it’s the only thing keeping them here?…”

“I understand,” I said. “I understand that very well. And that’s the exact reason that I’m going to sleep here on the hard chairs, resting my head on your damned safe, ready to shoot silver bullets into any son of a bitch who tries to take that suitcase away from me. If you see Moses, tell him that, word for word. Don’t water it down. And tell him that I’ve won prizes for accuracy with a .45. Now go away and leave me alone.”