The Whisperer by Donato Carrisi Page B

proceed. He probably didn’t want to disturb Veronica Bermann.
    “So, what have we got?”
    Stern was the first to reply with a shake of his head: “There’s nothing in the house to link Bermann to the six little girls.”
    “His wife seems to be in the dark about everything. I asked her a few questions, and I didn’t have the feeling that she was lying,” added Boris.
    “Our men are going over the garden with the corpse dogs,” said Rosa. “But there’s nothing so far.”
    “We’ll have to reconstruct all of Bermann’s movements over the past six weeks,” observed Goran and everyone agreed, even though they knew it would be an almost impossible task.
    “Stern, is there anything else?”
    “No strange movements of money in his account. The biggest bill that Bermann has had to foot over the past year was a course of artificial insemination for his wife, which set him back a fair bit.”
    Listening to Stern’s words, Mila realized what it was that she had felt just before entering the house and then looking at the photographs. Not a presence, as she had thought at first. She had been wrong.
    It was more of an absence .
    What she had noticed was the lack of children in this house, which, with its expensive and impersonal furnishings, was a house created for two individuals who feel destined to remain alone. That was why the course of artificial insemination mentioned by Officer Stern seemed contradictory, since in that place you couldn’t even feel the anxiety of someone expecting the gift of a child.
    Stern concluded his exposition with a quick sketch of Bermann’s private life. “He didn’t use drugs, he didn’t drink and he didn’t smoke. He had a card for a gym and one for a video store, but he only rented documentaries about insects. He went to the local Lutheran church and, twice a month, worked as a volunteer at a rest home.”
    “A saintly man,” said Boris sarcastically.
    Goran turned towards Veronica Bermann to check if she had heard that last remark. Then he turned to look at Rosa: “Is there anything else?”
    “I’ve scanned the hard disk of the home and office computers. I’ve also recovered all deleted files. But there was nothing of interest. Just work, work, work. The guy was fixated on his job.”
    Mila noticed that Goran had suddenly become distracted. It didn’t last long, and he soon returned to concentrate on the conversation. “What do we know about his Internet use?”
    “I called his web server and they gave me a list of the web pages he had visited over the last six months. Nothing there, either…It seems he has a passion for sites dedicated to nature, travel and animals. And he bought antiques online and, on eBay, mostly collectible butterflies.” When Rosa had finished her report, Goran folded his arms again and started looking at his colleagues, one by one. That brief look took in Mila, too, and at last she felt involved.
    “So, what do you think?” he asked.
    “I feel as if I’ve been dazzled,” Boris said suddenly, emphatically underlining the phrase with a hand screening his eyes. “He’s too clean .” The others nodded.
    Mila didn’t know what he was referring to, but she didn’t want to ask. Goran slid a hand over his forehead and rubbed his weary eyes. Then that distraction appeared on his face once again…it was a thought that took him elsewhere for a second or two, and suggested that the criminologist was filing something away for future reference. “What’s the first reason for investigating a suspect?”
    “We all have secrets,” said the diligent Boris.
    “Exactly,” said Goran. “We all have a weakness, at least once in our lives. Each of us has one secret, big or small, that we can’t own up to…and yet look around: that man is the prototype of the good husband, the good believer, the great worker,” he said, marking out each word on his fingers. “He’s a philanthropist, a health fanatic, he only rents documentaries, he has no