Just a Corpse at Twilight

Chapter 2

Schiphol's departure hall, postmidnight, was empty but for splendidly uniformed military policemen and Israeli agents in jeans and loose jackets. The young woman behind the counter, looking him straight in the eye, wanted to know why Grijpstra insisted on flying El Al. Grijpstra said it: "I'm not Jewish."

He remembered wartime, Grijpstra, Sr., coming home confused after seeing German troops rounding up Jewish citizens on the Dam Square in Amsterdam's center, to transport them to death camps. Grijpstra's dad had been asked for his ID too. He'd said it: "I'm not Jewish."

Was that bad now?

"You said it," the El Al clerk said. "I didn't ask."

"I was reading your mind," Grijpstra said. "I'm a private detective, Ma'am, I sometimes do that. I have a friend in America who is in some trouble. I'm going to help him out."

The clerk checked her screen. "That's why you booked in such a hurry?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Your friend's trouble?"

"Psychological, ma'am." Grijpstra smiled. "Not to worry. Besides, his grandmother was Jewish."

She smiled too. "What's this Jewish?"

"Because you're concerned," Grijpstra said. "You don't want your plane to be blown up, you want to know I'm okay."

"Are you okay?" the clerk asked.

"Oh yes," Grijpstra said.

"So what's your friend's trouble?"

Grijpstra sighed. "Money maybe?"

"He doesn't have money?"

"He has lots and lots of money," Grijpstra said. "He's free of needs. It's hard to be free of needs."

"Your friend is religious?"

"No," Grijpstra said.

"It sometimes helps to keep busy."

"Are you religious?" Grijpstra asked.

"No," the clerk said. "My husband is. He says he's got to be to face the riddle. Do you face the riddle?"

"I'd rather look the other way."

"What if it won't let you?"

"Then it makes me crazy, ma'am."

"Do you have lots and lots of money?"

"Some," Grijpstra said.

"So you're free of needs?"

"Some," Grijpstra said, "but the vacuum doesn't worry me that much. It's beauty that makes me crazy. I try to get it by painting upside-down ducks on canals. I also try to play it on drums."

"Do you ever get it?"

"No," Grijpstra said. He also said that he wasn't carrying any arms or explosives and hadn't accepted any parcels from strangers. She didn't check his luggage.

"You believe me?" Grijpstra asked.

"Some," the clerk said. She smiled.

She looked Egyptian. He thought he'd seen her as a sculpture between hieroglyphics in a museum in Leyden. She had long black hair, an olive skin, very large eyes, and softly carved lips. He asked her. She said her folks had come from Egypt.

The Boeing, rumbling up to the runway, was accompanied by two armored trucks with machine-gun turrets sticking out of their backs. Inside the plane a movie was starting up: Robert Redford in Cuba. Grijpstra watched, listening to music on another channel: Bill Evans on piano, Eddy Gomez on bass. The piano right hand was strong, like a solo horn almost, and the bass-Grijpstra thought that the instrument's bridge had to be moved up to provide such cello-like sounds-answered the piano's questions a little, coming up with questions ofits own too, so that the harmo- nious dialogue might deepen. Robert Redford's tropical landscape setting was both romantic and fearful, depending on whether the camera focused on beautiful people on unpolluted beaches or on propeller warplanes strafing beautiful people on unpolluted beaches. Grijpstra liked the architecture of the Cuban mansions and the sultry actress who duetted, as Mr. Gomez's bass became her voice here and there, with Robert Redford, whose pleasing profile took on sound in the sensitive jazz piano's notes. The attractive actress could be proud of her country, and she was being very hospitable, very ready to share.

Grijpstra slept, seeing a sultry Lorraine sharing the magic of the Maine coast with de Gier, then woke gasping as she got kicked down a cliff for her troubles.