Hard Rain

\\\\\ 14 /////

"How?" De Gler asked. "By being the police. We can find anybody."

"Shuhure," Carl said, beckoning the adjutant and the sergeant into his loft. "If they're spahastic."

"Okay," Grijpstra said. "It was easy, Mrs. Jongs gave us the name of your street. We just asked around the neighborhood. Nice place you have here."

Carl lived in the top-floor loft of a large old house; the loft had its own front door and a steep staircase unbroken by landings. De Gier wandered about the vast space, weaving his way through the statuary that showed up everywhere. "You've been busy. This is great stuff."

"How's Mrs. Johongs?" Carl asked, leaning against a full-sized standing lion that growled near the door. The structure, looking fairly realistic, had been made from slabs, probably leftovers from sawn logs. The animal appeared to smile and had raised its tufted tail in a gesture of jolly eagerness.

"Mrs. Jongs is fine," Grijpstra said. "You may meet her a little later. She's staying with our chief."

"You're aharresting me?" Carl asked.

"No," de Gier said. "We'd like you to come with

139 us, though. Maybe you should take some clothes. We believe you're in danger and would like to ensure your safety."

"Amazing," Grijpstra said, looking at a row of large insect heads, displayed on a wall like hunting trophies. "This must be a mosquito. What are those wavy things coming from the eyes?"

"Not eyeyes," Carl said. "The eyeyes are on top and the si-hides of the hehead, those things are an… an…" He was bending sideways, contorting his mouth, his elbows jerked backwards, but the word still wouldn't come out.

"Antennae?" Grijpstra asked. "I see. Most expressive. This is some collection."

Carl, dressed in spotless jeans and a short-sleeved striped shirt, took the adjutant to the back of the room, where a microscope had been set on a table painted a meticulous white. A glass box held some dead moths. Carl held up a large magnifying glass. "Vehery beautiful."

"You catch them?"

"The spihider does." Carl pointed at an open window covered with cobwebs. He produced a pair of tweezers and took out a dead fly, steadying his hand with the other. "I hahaven't made a flyhy yet."

De Gier was looking at another table, covered with carpenter's tools, jars of nails, and a pot of glue bubbling on a hot plate. Heaps of broken boards, twigs and dried stalks, odd-shaped rocks and pebbles, flanked the table. "How do you get all this stuff?"

"I fihind it," Carl said. "Keeheeps me busy."

"You on welfare?"

"Noho."

"But you don't do regular work," Grijpstra said.

"This isn't reh-reh-reh… gular work?"

"Yeah, sure," Grijpstra said, "this is expressive stuff, really. I envy you your talent." He looked around the huge room again and concentrated on the skeleton of a horse assembled out of material that was probably charred plywood, remnants of a gutted building, perhaps, cut to size by a saber saw; the cadaverous animal seemed to prance in high spirits. The adjutant smiled widely and encompassed all the sculptures and other artful displays in a sweep of his arm. "This is something else again, but you don't make money on it, do you?"

"I dohon't neeheed to."

De Gier brought out a pack of tobacco and offered it to Carl. "Noho thanks, my hahands tremble." Carl found a packet of cigarettes among his tools and lit one. "My fahather sends money."

"That's nice," Grypstra said.

"Noho," Carl said. "Dahad never comes here. Because I'm spahastic."

"And your mother?"

"Noho, she's a Buhuddhist."

"The compassion of the Buddha?" de Gier asked.

"Noho," Carl said. "She lihives in a coh-coh-comm…"

"Commune?"

Carl nodded gratefully. "Vehery hoholy." He frowned furiously. "Fuhuck her."

De Gier admired a huge bird, swooping down from the ceiling, with wings made out of black garbage bags and a long beak twisted from sharp wires. "That's my mohother," Carl said. "My fahather's over there." De Gier walked over to the indicated corner. He stepped back when he saw a human figure sitting on a chair.

"Shit," de Gier said. "Look at this, Adjutant." Grijpstra ambled over. "Shit," Grijpstra agreed. Carl had outdone himself. The other figures all had a surrealistic touch-they were funny in a way, even the leering spider and beetle faces, even the bird of prey -but the sitting man, reading a newspaper, was horribly plain and ordinary, wearing a real suit, shirt, and tie. The meticulously sculptured wooden body implied, in its attitude, a complete self-centeredness, accentuated by the arrogantly tilted head that peered at columns of figures from deeply recessed eyes. The paper was the Financial Times and there was a satisfied sneer on the man's thin mouth; evidently the shares he owned had done well that day. The suit, tailor-made out of superior tweed material, fitted the figure perfectly. "I tohook the suhuit," Carl said. "Dahad had thrown it out. Shoehoes too. Everything."

De Gier felt the gold wristwatch. "Did he throw out his watch too?"

Carl smiled. "I stohole it, he's gohot soho many."

"What does your dad do?" Grijpstra asked.

"Sehells oil to Sohouth Africa."

"You've got friends, Carl?"

Carl turned toward de Gier, twisting his mouth. "Fuhuck friends."

"But you were friendly with Jimmy, and the black dude, and the lady."

Carl shrugged.

"So why did you hang out with them?"

Carl wandered away, his arms swinging awkwardly, his feet pointed toward each other. "You loved the lady?" Grijpstra asked gently.

Carl stopped and turned slowly, and his arms, the hands twisted inward, jerked up. "Sohome. Jimmy was okay. The black duhude muhmugged me, that's hohow we met. I foho… foh… "

"Followed him?"

"Right. Becauhause of the papers in my wallet. Wahanted them back."

"And so you met the lady?"

"Right."

"But your friends are all dead now," Grijpstra said. "Didn't you get some junk too? In pay for the robbery? Whoever gave that to you meant to kill. That's why we're here."

"To ahaharrest me?"

De Gier was rolling another cigarette. "No, Carl, you have to believe us. You're not under arrest. If you don't want to cooperate, we'll leave you be, but we found you easily enough and so can they. I mean Heul and young Fernandus, the guys who were trying to pester Mrs. Jongs out of her house. There are probably others. IJsbreker was shot-he never committed suicide, we know that now. I think you know it too. You're not charged with any crime, but we think you can lead us tp the killer."

Carl was looking through his magnifying glass at the dead fly.

"We'll take you to a private home," Grijpstra said. "Mrs. Jongs is there already. We believe her to be in danger too."

Carl looked around. "Mayhaybe you're the kihillers."

De Gier put his police card on the table. Carl read it. "Mayhaybe you're poholice killers."

"Police killers," Grijpstra said, still looking at Carl's father scrutinizing the Financial Times. "You think a cop shot the banker?"

"Dohon't know fohor shuhure."

"Weren't you in IJsbreker's house?"

"Wohon't say."

"So you were," de Gier said. "We thought you weren't. Did you want to help the lady? Where did the paintings and vases go?"

"Dohon't know."

Grijpstra studied a wolf's head about to chomp down on a fluffy toy bunny that was peering innocently from between its captor's ferocious fangs. "This is fantastic. We should get you an exhibition somewhere. The Museum of Modern Art would be interested, I think. Doesn't the commissaris know the director there?" He looked at Carl. "The commissaris likes your work. He's seen the rhino's head and Mouse. Those pieces are safe."

"The comm… comm…"

Grijpstra mentioned the commissaris's name.

"Hah," Carl said.

"You've heard of our chief? You'll be staying at his house, in Queen's Lane, not far from here. That's where Mrs. Jongs is now."

"The commissaris has a nice wife," de Gier said, "but she doesn't care for art. The adjutant here paints. She hangs his painting in dark corners. They're sort of gruesome."

"You payhaint?" Carl asked Grijpstra. "What?"

"I'm not very good," Grijpstra said. "A Sunday dabbler. I'm always mixing up the wrong colors. Like now, I'm doing this waterscape, it needs canal greens. The ducks are all right, I've got the ducks drawn in."

"The ducks haven't got any flesh on their faces," de Gier said.

"I got the ducks right," Grijpstra said, "but I need this pale green for the water and I can't mix it."

"Greeheens?" Carl asked. "I got some." He led Grijpstra to a shelf holding an array of jam jars, each filled with dried shredded plants. "Seehee the frog there?" The frog, assembled from scrap wood, had been sprinkled with green dust.

"That stays on?" Grijpstra asked. "Do you glue it?"

"Yehes."

Grijpstra picked up the frog gingerly.

"Why not?" de Gier asked. "You can fish up some water weeds, dry them, and glue them on. You can do anything you like."

"Perhaps," Grijpstra said slowly. "Yes, that might be an idea."

Carl smiled. "You're welcohome."

"Yes." Grijpstra touched Carl's shoulder. "Thanks."

"We'll be going, then," de Gier said. "Please come along. If you don't like it at the commissaris's house, we'll bring you back. Okay?"

"Yehes," Carl said.