The Whisperer Read Online Free PDF Page A

picture of a child. A chubby, defenseless little man-cub. His students saw it every day and always grew fond of the picture. When—more or less towards the middle of term—a student summoned the courage to ask him who it was, he challenged them to guess. The answers were extremely varied and fantastical. And he was amused by their expressions when he revealed that the child was Adolf Hitler.
    After the war, the leader of the Nazi movement had become a monster in the collective imagination, and for years the countries that had emerged victorious from the conflict had been opposed to any other vision. That was why no one knew the photographs from the Führer’s childhood. A monster couldn’t have been a child, he couldn’t have had any feelings other than hatred, or a life like that of his contemporaries who would later become his victims.
    “For many, humanizing Hitler meant ‘explaining’ him in some way,” Goran would tell his class. “But society insists that extreme evil cannot be explained, it cannot be understood. Trying to do so means trying to find some kind of justification for it.”
    In the task force van, Boris suggested that the creator of the arm cemetery should be called “Albert,” after an old case. The idea was welcomed with a smile by everyone there. The decision was taken.
    From that point onwards, the members of the unit would refer to the murderer by that name. And day after day, Albert would acquire a face. A nose, two eyes, a life of his own. Everyone would imbue him with his own vision, rather than seeing him only as a fleeting shadow.
    “Albert, eh?” At the end of the meeting, Roche was still weighing up the name’s media value. He moved it around on his lips, he tried to catch its flavor. It could work.
    But there was something else that tormented the chief inspector. He mentioned it to Goran.
    “To tell you the truth, I agree with Boris. Holy Christ! I can’t force my men to pick up corpses while a crazed psychopath is making us look like a bunch of idiots!”
    Goran knew that when Roche talked about “his” men he was really referring to himself. He was the one afraid of coming away without a result. And he was always the one who feared that someone would talk about the inefficiency of the federal police if they couldn’t arrest the culprit.
    And then there was the question of arm number six.
    “I thought I wouldn’t disseminate the news of the existence of a sixth victim for the time being.”
    Goran was disconcerted. “But how will we find out who it is?”
    “I’ve thought of everything, don’t worry…”
      
    In the course of her career Mila Vasquez had solved eighty-nine missing-person cases. She had been awarded three medals and a great deal of adulation. She was considered to be an expert in her field, and was often called in to help, even by other forces.
    That morning’s operation, in which Pablo and Elisa had been freed at the same time, had been called a sensational success. Mila had said nothing. But it annoyed her. She would have liked to admit all her mistakes. Entering the brown house without waiting for reinforcements. Underestimating the environment and the possible traps it contained. She had put both herself and the hostages at risk by allowing the suspect to disarm her and aim a gun at the back of her neck. Finally, not preventing the music teacher’s suicide.
    But none of that had been mentioned by her superiors, who had instead stressed her merits as they were immortalized by the press in the ritual photographs.
    Mila never appeared in those snaps. The official reason was that she preferred to protect her own anonymity for future investigations. But the truth was that she hated having her photograph taken. She couldn’t even bear to see her image reflected in a mirror. Not because she wasn’t beautiful, quite the contrary. But at the age of thirty-two, hours and hours of training had stripped her of every trace of femininity. Every curve, every