Free The Square of Revenge by Pieter Aspe Page A

official residence. The people who lived in the place had the right to call themselves respectable citizens. It was overflowing with doctors, realtors, cash-rich businessmen, bank directors, and the privately wealthy. An aristocratic title was particularly appreciated in the Grote Thems, although Rotary and Kiwanis adepts, knights of the Order of Malta, and Opus Dei supernumeraries could also count on considerable respect.
    It took Van In the better part of ten minutes to find Degroof’s house. The street layout in the Grote Thems defied logic. It was as if its stuck-up residents wanted to give the impression that they each lived on a street of their own. He finally found what he was looking for after circling the neighborhood a couple of times.
    Degroof lived in a mock-farmhouse, the typical habitat of moneyed folks who had built their homes in the nineteen seventies. Back to nature was the slogan in those days, and everyone who could afford it bought themselves an expensive plot of land and built their own rustic palace outside the city.
    Degroof was no exception. He had spared neither money nor effort in the realization of his megalomaniac copy of a simple farmhouse. Two architects earned close to a half million francs each on the project. The result was in keeping with the financial investment: a monstrosity made of expensive custom-made brick, with three garages, oak gates, and window shutters. In the middle of the impeccable lawn, there was a kidney-shaped pond in which a couple of swans swam in obligatory circles. Well-trained, thought Van In, sarcastically.
    The VW Golf hobbled up the cobblestone drive, and Van In parked it in front of one of the garages. Before he had the chance to ring the bell, a young man, twenty or thereabouts, opened the front door. He was wearing an immaculate black suit and a bow tie, clothing that immediately betrayed his position in the household. His dark-brown skin, plump lips, and mysterious black eyes left no doubts as to his ethnic origins. It was well known that people weren’t averse to a little cheap household labor around these parts.
    “Assistant Commissioner Van In,” he introduced himself with just a hint of authority. “I have an appointment with Mr. Degroof.” The Indian conjured an indefinable smile. His pearly white teeth left Van In jealous.
    “Moment please, sir,” said the butler, almost accent-less, leaving him waiting at the door.
    Van In felt uncomfortable in his suit. The collar of his shirt pinched and his tie was too tight. In spite of the early hour, it was already quite warm. They had forecast rain on national TV the day before.
    The Indian reappeared in less than a minute.
    “Mister Degroof can see you now,” he said in what was close to a subservient tone. He bowed like a jackknife and gestured to Van In that he should go inside.
    The hallway was substantially bigger than Van In’s bedroom. Expensive Tibetan rugs graced the floor. Van In recognized them because he had been dreaming of buying one for years. He was crazy about their brown and ochre shades and simple geometric motifs. But that was where any agreement between his taste and Degroof’s ended.
    The walls were plastered with paintings in heavily gilded frames, mostly rural conversation pieces by unknown nineteenth-century “masters.” The crystal chandeliers hanging from the ceiling with its artificial buttressing of recuperated oak beams were completely out of place.
    The butler led him through a double door into the lounge. The room was at least six hundred square feet, and here, too, kitsch ruled the roost: a leather country-style lounge suite, Chinese porcelain in faux-antique displays, a leopard-skin rug in front of an open hearth lined with Delft tiles, more crystal chandeliers, medallion wallpaper, Val Saint-Lambert, bronze and copper metalwork. It almost turned Van In’s stomach.
    An enormous glass sliding door filled the left wall and gave out onto a terrace-cum-garden. Ghislain