Death of a Hawker

3

LouisZilver's room was almost as bare as the dead man's room one floor below, but it had a different quality. The commissaris, who hadn't spent as much time with Abe Rogge's body as Grijpstra had, didn't notice the difference. He just saw another room in the same house, a room with a bare wooden floor and furnished with a neatly made bed and a large desk, cylinder-topped, showing an array of cubicles, stacked with papers in plastic transparent folders, and a bookcase covering an entire wall. Grijpstra defined the difference as a difference between "neat" and "untidy." Zilver had to be an organized man, or boy rather, for he wouldn't be much older than twenty. Grijpstra observed Louis, squatting patiently opposite his interrogators, and noted the large, almost liquid, dark eyes, the delicately hooked nose, the tinge of olive in the color of the skin stretched over high cheekbones, the long blue-black hair. Louis was waiting. Meanwhile he wasn't doing much. He had crossed his legs and lit a cigarette after placing an ashtray in a convenient place so that the commissaris and Grijpstra could tip the ash of their small cigars into it. The ashtray fascinated Grijpstra. It was a human skull, molded in plastic, a large hole had been left in the cranium and a silver cup fitted into the hole.

"Brr," Grijpstra said. "Some ashtray!''

Louis smiled. The smile was arrogant, condescending. "Friend of mine made it. He is a sculptor. Silly thing really, but it's useful so I kept it. And the meaning is obvious. Memento mori."

"Why do you have it if you think it's silly," the commissaris asked. "You could have thrown it out and used a saucer instead." The commissaris, who had spent the day in bed to ease the pain in his legs which had almost lamed him during the last few weeks, was rubbing his right leg. The hot needle pricks of his acute chronic rheumatism made his bloodless lips twitch. The commissaris looked very innocent. His shantung suit, complete with waistcoat and watch chain, seemed a little too large for his small dry body, and his wizened face with the carefully brushed, thin colorless hair expressed a gentle exactness.

"The man is a friend of mine, he often comes here. I think it would hurt him if I wasn't using his work of art. Besides, I don't mind having it around. The message of the skull may be obvious but it's true nevertheless. Life is short, seize the day and all that."

"Yes," the commissaris said. "There is a dead man in the house to prove the saying's worth."

The commissaris stopped to listen to the noises downstairs. Feet were clomping up and down the bare steps. The photographers would be setting up their equipment and the doctor would be getting ready to start his examination. A uniformed chief inspector, his jacket soaked and caked with soapstone powder, stomped his way into the room. The commissaris got up.

"Sir," the chief inspector said. "Anything we can do for you?"

"You have done enough today it seems," the commissaris said mildly.

"We haven't had any dead men outside," the chief inspector said. "Not so far, anyway."

"We have one here, one floor below. Got his face bashed in, hit by a stone or something, but we can't find the stone or whatever it was in his room."

"So my constables were telling me. Maybe your man was a reactionary, somebody the red mob outside may have disliked."

"Was he?" the commissaris asked Louis Zilver.

Louis grinned.

"Was he?"

"No," Louis said, carefully stubbing out his cigarette in the skull's silver cranium. "Abe didn't know what politics were. He was an adventurer."

"Adventurers get killed for a number of reasons," the chief inspector said, impatiently tapping his boot with his truncheon. "Do you have any use for me, sir?"

"No," the commissaris said, "no, you go ahead, I hope the situation is getting a bit better on the square."

"It isn't," the officer said. "It's getting worse. We are getting fresh crowds now, young idiots who come in screaming and dancing. I better get back."

Grijpstra watched Louis's face as the officer left the room. Louis was showing his teeth in the way a baboon does when he feels threatened. "It seems you are enjoying yourself," Grijpstra said.

"It's always nice to see the police get a beating,'' Louis said in a low voice.

Grijpstra bristled. The commissaris made a gesture. "Let's forget the Newmarket for a while. Tell us about the incident in this house. What do you know about it?"

Louis had lit a new cigarette and puffed industriously. "Esther found the body close to five o'clock this afternoon. She screamed. I was here, in my room. I ran downstairs. I told her to phone the police. Abe had been in my room an hour before Esther found him. He was right here, talking to me. There was nothing wrong with him then."

"What's your connection with Abe and Esther?"

"I am a friend. I got to know him on the market, the Albert Cuyp Market. I bought a lot of beads from him once, kept on going back for more. I was trying to make a structure, an abstract figure which I was planning to hang from the ceiling. Abe was interested in what I was doing and came to see me where I lived. I had an uncomfortable room, small, no conveniences, no proper light. He was buying this house and suggested I move in with him. And we used to go sailing together. His boat is outside, moored next to that big houseboat you can see from the window. A clapped-out little yacht. He would take it out when there was a good wind but he found it difficult to handle by himself."

The commissaris and Grijpstra got up to look out of the window. They saw the sixteen-foot plastic sailboat.

"It's half full of water," Grijpstra said.

"Yes. Rainwater. He never bothered, just hosed it out when he wanted to go sailing. The sails are downstairs; it only takes a few minutes to rig the boat."

"What about that houseboat?"

"It's empty," Louis said. "Been for sale for a long time. They want too much money for it and it's rotten."

"Somebody could have stood on the roof and thrown whatever it was that hit Abe," the commissaris said thoughtfully. "Why don't you go down, Grijpstra? Perhaps the police in the street saw somebody on the houseboat."

"What was that nasty remark you made about the police just now?" the commissaris asked when Grijpstra had left the room. "You told Esther to telephone us when the body was found, didn't you? So we must be useful, why sneer at something which is useful?"

"The body had to be taken care of, hadn't it?" Louis asked, and his eyes sparkled. "We couldn't dump it into the canal, it would foul the water."

"I see. So you called the garbage men?" Louis dropped his eyes.

"But your friend is dead, his face is bashed in. Don't you want us to apprehend the killer?" Louis' face changed. It lost its sparkle and suddenly looked worn and tired. The sensitive face became a study in sadness only kept alive by the luster of the large eyes.

"Yes," Louis said softly. "He is dead, and we are alone."

"We?"

"Esther, me, others, the people he inspired."

"Did he have enemies?"

"No. Friends. Friends and admirers. A lot of people used to come and see him here. He threw parties and they would do anything to be invited. He had lots of friends."

"And in business? Was he popular in business as well?"

"Yes," Louis said, staring at the plastic skull in front of him. "King of the Albert Cuyp street market. Very popular. All the street sellers knew him. Bought from him too. He was a big businessman you know. We used to bring in cargoes from Eastern Europe and a lot of it was sold to the market. Lately we were doing wool, tons of wool, for knitting and rug making. Wool is expensive stuff nowadays.'"

"We?" the commissaris asked.

"Well, Abe mostly. I just helped."

"Tell us about yourself."

"Why?"

"It may help us to understand the situation."

Louis grinned. "Yes, you are the police. I had almost forgotten. But why should I help the police?"

Grijpstra had slipped into the room and taken his place on the bed again. "You should help the police because you are a citizen," Grijpstra boomed suddenly, "because you are a member of society. Society can only function when there is public order. When order has been disturbed it has to be maintained again. It can only be maintained if the citizens assist the police. The task of the police is to protect the citizens against themselves."

Louis looked up and laughed.

"You think that's funny?" Grijpstra asked indignantly.

"Yes. Very funny. Textbook phrases. And untrue. Why should I, a citizen, benefit by what you, in your stupidity, in your refusal to think, call public order? Couldn't it be that public order is sheer boredom, a heavy weight which throttles the citizens?"

"Your friend is dead downstairs, with a bashed-in face. Does that make you happy?"

Louis stopped laughing.

"You are a student, aren't you?" the commissaris asked.

"Yes. I studied law but I gave it up when I saw how sickening our laws are. I passed my candidate's examinations but that was as far as I could go, I haven't been near the university since."

"What a pity," the commissaris said. "I studied law too and I found it a fascinating discipline. You only have a few years to go. You don't want to finish your studies?"

The boy shrugged. "Why should I? If I become a master at law I may find myself in a concrete office somewhere working for some large company or perhaps even the State. I don't particularly want to join the establishment. It's more fun shouting at the street market or driving a truck through the snow in Czechoslovakia. And I am not after money."

"What would you do," Grijpstra asked, "if somebody rolled your wallet?"

"I wouldn't go to the police if that's what you mean."

"And if someone murdered your friend? Didn't you tell Ester to phone us?"

Louis sat up. "Listen," he said loudly. "Don't philosophize with me, will you? I am not used to arguing. I accept your power and your attempt to maintain order in a madhouse and I'll answer any questions you may ask as long as they relate to the murder."

"You mean that humanity consists of mindless forms groping about?" the commissaris asked dreamily as if he hadn't really been listening. He was looking at the trees outside the window.

"Yes, you've put it very well. We don't do anything, things happen to us. Abe has found his death just now, like a few million black people have found their death in Central Africa because the water ran out. There's nothing anybody can do about it. My grandparents were thrown in a cattle truck during the war and dumped into some camp and gassed. Or maybe they just starved to death, or some SS man bashed their heads in for fun. Same thing happened to Abe and Esther's family. The Rogges stayed alive because they happened to survive; their lives weren't planned, like the deaths of the others weren't planned. And the police are pawns in the game. My grandparents were arrested by the police because they were Jews. By the Amsterdam municipal police, not the German police. They were told to maintain order, like you are now told to maintain order. That officer who was here a minute ago is merrily bashing heads now, on the New-market Square, half a kilometer from here."

"Really," Grijpstra said.

"What do you mean, really?" Louis shouted. "Are you going to tell me that only part of the police worked for the Germans during the war? And that most of your colleagues were on the queen's side? And what about 4he queen? Didn't she send troops to Indonesia to bash villagers on the head? What will you do if there's another war? Or a famine? It may happen any minute now." He coughed and looked at Grijpstra's face, ominously, as if he wanted the adjutant to agree with him.

"Or the Russians may invade us and impose communism. They will take over the government in The Hague and some minister will tell you to arrest all dissidents. And you will maintain order. You will send blue-uniformed constables armed with rubber truncheons and automatic pistols, helmeted perhaps, and carrying carbines. You'll have proper razzias with armored trucks blocking the street on each side. It's not unlikely you know. Just go outside and have a look at what's happening on the Newmarket Square right now."

"Who are you blaming?" the commissaris asked, tipping the ash of his cigar into the plastic skull.

"No one," Louis said quietly. "Not even the Germans, not even the Dutch police who took my grandparents away. Things happen, I told you already. I am not blaming things either, it's just that this idealizing, this reasoning, sickens me. If you want to do your job, if you consider your activity to be a job, do it, but don't ask me to clap my hands when you make your arrest. I don't care either way."

"It seems you are disproving your own theory," the commissaris said. "You refuse to do as you are told, don't you? You don't want to fit in. You should perhaps be finishing your studies so that you can join society on the right level, but you are working on the street market instead and driving a truck in some faraway country. But you are still doing something, working toward some goal. If you really believe what you say you believe, it seems to me you should be doing nothing at all. You should be drifting, pushed by circumstances of the moment."

"Exactly," Louis said. "That's what I am doing."

"No, no. You have some freedom, it seems to me, and you are using it. You are deliberately choosing."

"I try," Louis said, disarmed by the commissaris' quiet voice. "Perhaps you are right. Perhaps I am free in a way and trying to do something with my freedom. But I am not even very good at trying. I would never have done anything on my own. I was rotting away in a dark room, sleeping until two o'clock in the afternoon every day and hanging about in silly bars at night, when Abe found me. I just tagged on to Abe. It happened to me. He practically took me by the scruff of the neck and dragged me along."

"Didn't you say that you were making some structure out of beads? You were doing that before you met Abe, weren't you?"

"Yes, nothing ever came of it. I threw the whole mess into a dustbin one day. I had meant to create something really unusual, a human shape which would move in the wind or the draft. I was trying to make a body out of copper wire and connect the wire with thin plastic threads and string beads on the threads. The body would glitter and show life when it moved, but it wouldn't be moving itself, only acting when forces beyond its power played with it. Unfortunately I am no artist. The idea was good but I only managed to string a lot of beads together and waste a year."

"Right," Grijpstra said. "So Abe got you out of your mess. He may have got others out of their messes. But now he has been killed. The killer may want to kill other people like Abe."

"Rubbish."

"Pardon?"

"You heard me," Louis said sweetly. "Rubbish. Rot. Abe got killed because some force moved somebody's arm. The force was a haphazard force, like the wind. You can't catch the wind."

"If there's a draft we can find the crack and block it," the commissaris said.

"You can jail the instrument," Louis said stubbornly, "but you can't jail the force which activated the instrument. It's beyond you and the effort is silly. Why should I help you waste your time? You can waste it on your own."

"I see," the commissaris said, and looked at the trees again. There was no wind and the last rays of the sun were reflected in the small oblong mirrors of the young leaves.

"Do you really? You are an officer, aren't you? You direct the police?"

"I am a commissaris.* But if your theory is right I am only pretending to direct a shadow play which doesn't exist in reality. You are not original but you probably know you are not. Other people have thought of what you are thinking now. Plato, for instance, and others before him."

"There have been clever shadows on the planet,"

Louis said and smiled.

"Yes. But you have helped us nevertheless. We know a little about the dead man now and we know a little about you. We are simple people, deluded probably, as you have pointed out already. We work on the assumption that the State is right and that public order has to be maintained.

"And we work with systems. Someone, some human who meant to harm Abe Rogge, has killed him. He had the opportunity to bash his face in and he thought he had a reason to do it. If we find somebody who had both the opportunity and the motive we will suspect him of a crime and we may arrest him. You, Louis Zilver, had the opportunity. You were in the house at the right time. But from what you have told us we may assume that you had no motive."

"If I was speaking the truth," Louis said.

"Yes. You have told us he was your friend, your savior in a way. He got you out of a rut. You used to spend your time lying in bed all morning and drinking all evening and trying to make a beady man all afternoon. You weren't happy. Abe made your life interesting."

"Yes. He saved me. But perhaps people don't want to be saved. Christ was a savior and they hammered nails through his hands and feet."

"A hammer," Grijpstra said. "I keep on thinking that Abe was killed with a hammer. But a hammer would have made a hole, wouldn't it? The face was bashed in over a large area."

"We'll find out what killed him," the commissaris said. "Go on, Mr. Zilver. You interest me. What else can you tell us?"

"Tell me," de Gier said, still holding Esther's hand, "why was your brother killed? Did he have any enemies?"

Esther had stopped crying and was caressing the table's surface with her free hand.

"Yes. He had enemies. People hated his guts. He was too successful, you see, and too indifferent. He was so full of life. People would worry and be depressed and nervous and he'd just laugh and go to Tunisia for a few weeks to play on the beach or to ride a camel to a little village somewhere. Or he would sail his boat onto the great lake. Or he would take off for the East and buy merchandise and sell it here and make a good profit. He was a dangerous man. He crushed people. Made them feel fools."

"Did he make you feel a fool?"

"I am a fool," Esther said.

"Why?"

"Everybody is. You are too, sergeant, whether you want to admit it or not."

"You were going to call me Rinus. O.K., I am a fool. Is that what you want me to say?"

"I don't want you to say anything. If you know you are a fool, Abe wouldn't have been able to hurt you. He used to arrange dinner parties but before anyone was allowed to eat anything, that person had to get up, face the assembled guests and say, "I am a fool."

"Yes?" de Gier asked, surprised. "Whatever for?"

"He enjoyed doing things like that. They had to state that they were fools and then they had to explain why they were fools. Some sort of sensitivity training. A man would say 'Friends, I am a fool. I think I am important but I am not.' But that wouldn't be enough for Abe. He wouldn't let the man eat or drink before he had explained, in detail, why exactly he was a fool. He would have to admit that he was proud because he had some particular success, a business deal for instance, or an examination he had passed, or a woman he had made, and then he would have to explain that it was silly to be proud of such a feat because it had just happened to him. It wasn't his fault or merit, you see. Abe believed that we were just being pushed around by circumstances and that man is an inanimate mechanism, nothing more."

"And people had to admit it to him all the time?"

"Yes, that was the only way to start doing something." "So they could do something after all?"

"Yes, not much. Something. Provided they admitted they were fools."

De Gier lit a cigarette and sat back. "Shit," he said softly.

"Pardon?"

"Never mind," de Gier said. "Your brother must have annoyed a lot of people. Did he ever admit he was a fool himself?"

"Oh, yes."

"And he really thought he was a fool?"

"Yes. He didn't care, you see. He just lived for the moment. A day consisted of a lot of moments to him. I don't think he cared when he died either."

"These friends he had, what sort of people were they? Business friends from the street market?"

Esther adjusted her hair and began to fiddle with the coffee machine. "More coffee, Rinus?"

"Please." She filled the apparatus and spilled some coffee on the floor.

"Allow me," de Gier said, and picked up a dustpan and a brush.

"Thanks. Are you married?"

"No, I live by myself, with my cat. I always clean up immediately when I make a mess."

"Friends, you said. Well, he often had friends from the street market in the house, and students would come, and some artists. And journalists, and girls. Abe attracted women. And Louis, of course, you have seen him in the corridor, haven't you. Where is he anyway?" "He is upstairs with my colleague, Adjutant Grijpstra, and the commissaris."

"That little old man is your chief?"

"Yes. Can you describe some of his friends to me? I'll need a list of them. Did he have any special friends?"

"They were all special. He would get very involved with people, until he dropped them. He wasn't concerned about friendship, he always said. Friendship is a temporary phenomenon; it depends on circumstances and it starts and ends like the wind. He would annoy people by saying that, for they tried to attach themselves to him."

"Some case," de Gier said.

Esther smiled, a slow tired smile.

"You remind me of the constables who came here a few days ago," she said. "They had the wrong number. Our neighbors had phoned. An old man was visiting them and the man suddenly got ill and collapsed. The neighbors had phoned for an ambulance but the police came as well, to see if there had been any violence, I suppose. The woman next door was very upset and I went there to see if I could be of some help. The old man was obviously dying. I think he had had a heart attack. I overheard the conversation between the constables."

"What did they say?" de Gier asked.

"The one constable said to the other, 'Hell, I hope the old bugger doesn't croak. If he does we'll have to write a report on it,' and the other one said, 'Never mind, he'll die in the ambulance and, the health officers can take care of it.'"

"Yes," de Gier said.

"That's the way you people think, isn't it?"

"Not really," de Gier said patiently. "It's the way it sounds to you. You are involved, you see. The dead man is your brother. If a friend of mine dies, or if my cat gets run over, or if my mother gets sick, I'll be upset. I assure you that I will be very upset."

"But when you find my brother in a pool of blood…"

"I am upset too, but I keep the feeling down. I won't be of much help if I crack up, will I? And this looks like a strange case. I can't figure out why your brother was killed. Perhaps Grijpstra has seen something. You were here all afternoon, weren't you? Did anybody go up to his room?"

"No. Louis came in but I heard him pass the room and go up the second staircase to his own room."

"The Straight Tree Ditch is not a very busy thoroughfare," de Gier said, "but there must be people moving about in it. It would be possible to climb into the room from the street but it would be a real risk. Nobody has reported anything to the constables in the street, for they would have come in to tell me about it."

"Perhaps someone threw something at Abe," Esther said. "He could have been looking out at the canal. He often does. He stands at the window, the window is open, and he stares. He goes into a trance that way and I have to shout at him to break it. Somebody threw a stone at him perhaps."

"The stone would have fallen in the room or bounced off and got back to the street. The constables would have found it. A bloody stone in the street. I'll go and ask them."

He was back in a minute. "Nothing. I asked the men upstairs as well. There is a man from the finger-print department. He says there is nothing in the room either. No weapon, no stone."

"Abe was a strange man and he died in a strange way," Esther said, "but there will be some technical explanation. There always is, for anything."

"Nothing is stolen, is there?"

"No. There is no money in the house, except what Abe keeps in his wallet. The wallet is still there, in the side pocket of his bush jacket. I saw the bulge. The pocket is buttoned. He usually has a few thousand guilders in it."

"That's a lot of money to keep in one's pocket."

"Abe always had money. He could make it much faster than he could spend it. He owns the warehouse next door; it's full of merchandise, and it never stays there long. There is cotton cloth in it now, bought just before the cotton price went up, and a whole floor stacked with cartons of wool, which he is selling in the street market."

"There is no connection between this house and the warehouse next door is there?"

"No."

"No secret door?"

"No, sergeant. The only way to get to the warehouse is via the street. The courtyards in the back are separated by a high brick wall, much too high to climb."

Grijpstra and the commissaris were coming down the stairs. De Gier called them in and introduced the commissaris to Esther. Two health officers were maneuvering their stretcher up the stairs, they had come with the Water Police launch.

"I'll go upstairs," de Gier said. "I think we would like to have the contents of the pockets before the body is taken away. You'll be given a receipt, Miss Rogge."

"Yes," the commissaris said. "We'll be off for a while now but we may have to come back later. I hope you don't mind the intrusion on your privacy, miss, but…"

"Yes, commissaris," Esther said. "I'll be waiting for you."

The atmosphere in the street was still eerie. A siren wailed in the square nearby. A fresh platoon of riot police came marching up the narrow quay. Two launches of the Water Police, their foredecks packed with leather-coated constables ready to disembark, were navigating carefully between the moored houseboats and the launch preparing to take Abe Rogge's body aboard.

A young man, exhausted, was being run to the ground on the other side of the canal. Gloved hands grabbed his wrists and the detectives could hear the handcuffs' click and the man's sobbing breath.

"Where to, sir?" Grijpstra asked.

The commissaris was watching the arrest. "Hmm?"

"What now, sir?"

"Anywhere, a quiet place somewhere, a pub, a cafe. You go and find it. I am going back into the house a minute. When you find a good place you can telephone the Rogge house. The number will be in the book. Terrible, isn't it?"

"What, sir?"

"That manhunt just now. These riots bring out the worst in everyone."

"They weren't manhandling him, sir, they only made an arrest. The man has probably wounded a policeman in the square. They wouldn't go to so much trouble to catch him otherwise."

"I know, I know," the commissaris said, "but it's degrading. I have seen men hunted down like that during the war."

Grijpstra had seen it too but he didn't say anything.

"Right, run along."

"Sir," Grijpstra said and tapped de Gier on the shoulder.

"So where to?" de Gier asked. "Do you know anything here? The pubs will all be closed and I wouldn't want a police conference in a pub here right now anyway." Grijpstra was staring at the policemen across the water. They were marching their prisoner to a Water Police launch. The prisoner wasn't resisting. Three men going for a walk.

"Hey."

"Yes," Grijpstra said. "The only place I can think of is Nellie's bar. It will be closed but she'll open up if she is in."

"Don't know the place."

"Of course you don't."

They read the sign together. It said "If I don't answer the bell don't bang on the door for I won't be in." They read it three times.

"What nonsense," de Gier said finally. "If she isn't in she won't mind us banging on the door."

Grijpstra rang the bell. There was no answer. He banged on the door. A window opened on the second floor.

"Fuck off. Do you want a bucket of dishwater all over you?"

"Nellie," Grijpstra shouted, "it's me."

The window closed and they heard steps.

"It's you," Nellie said. "How nice. And a friend. Very nice. Come in."

The lights were switched on and they found themselves in a small bar. The only color in the bar seemed to be pink. Pink curtains, pink wallpaper, pink lampshades. Nellie was pink too, especially her breasts. De Gier stared at Nellie's breasts.

"You like them, darling?"

"Yes," de Gier said.

"Sit down and have a drink. If you buy me a bottle of champagne I'll give you topless service."

"How much is a bottle of champagne?"

"A hundred and seventy-five guilders."

"I am a policeman," de Gier said.

"I know you are, darling, but the police pay a hundred and seventy-five guilders too. I hate corruption." "Do you ever have any policemen in here?"

Nellie smiled coyly and looked at Grijpstra.

"You?" de Gier asked.

"Sometimes," Grijpstra said, "but I don't pay. Nellie is an old friend."

"And you get topless service?"

"Of course he does," Nellie said briskly. "What will you have? It's a bit early but I'll mix you a cocktail. I don't serve straight drinks."

"No, Nellie," Grijpstra said. "We want to use your bar for an hour or so. Our commissaris wants a quiet place to talk; there will be some others as well. Do you mind?"

"Of course not, dear." Nellie smiled and bent over the bar and ruffled Grijpstra's hair. The breasts were very close to de Gier now and his hands twitched. "The bar is closed tonight anyway," Nellie crooned. "These damn riots are bad for business. I haven't seen a customer for two days and my runners can't get anyone through the roadblocks."

Her lips framed a snarl. "Not that I would welcome any customers these days, not with all this tension about."

"And you still dress like that?" de Gier asked, and stared.

Nellie giggled. "No. I wear jeans and a jersey, like everybody else, but I don't want Grijpstra to see me in a jersey. He is used to me like this, so I slipped on a dress."

"Wow," de Gier said.

Nellie patted her breasts. "Disqualified me for a Miss Holland contest once. I had too much, they said. But they are good for business."

"Do you have a license for this place?" de Gier asked.

Her face clouded. "I thought you were a friend."

"I am curious, that's all."

"No, I don't have a license. This isn't a real bar. It's private. I only entertain one or two clients at a time. The runners bring them in."

Prostitution, de Gier thought, straight prostitution. He knew there were bars like Nellie's bar but he hadn't come across one yet. Grijpstra had and he hadn't told him. He looked at Grijpstra and Grijpstra grinned. De Gier raised his eyebrows.

"Nellie had trouble once and I happened to answer the call."

"That was a long time ago," Nellie said and pouted. "You were still in uniform then. I haven't seen you for a year; you are lucky I am still here." She groaned. "That's the way it is. The nice ones are busy and they don't pay and the bastards take far too much time, but they pay."

De Gier could imagine what the bastards would be like. The stray tourist, the lonely businessman. "Want a nice woman, sir, something really special? Cozy place? All to yourself? A little champagne? Not too expensive? Let me show you the way, sir." And an hour, two hours maybe, three hours at the most later, the bastard would be in the street again with a stomach full of fuzz and a light head and a light wallet. She would squeeze them in stages. A pink spider in a pink web. And out the minute they were dry, out into the street. And the runner would be waiting and slip in for his cut and rush out again, to catch the next fly.

"How's business, Nellie?"

She pulled in her underiip and bit it. "Not so good.

The guilder is too high and the dollar too low. I don't get them as I used to get them. It's Japanese now and they make me work."*

A majestic woman, tall and wide-shouldered, with long red hair framing the green slanting eyes. De Gier could feel her strength. The strength of a voluptuous snake.

"Who is your friend, Grijpstra?"

"Sergeant de Gier," Grijpstra said.

"Nice. Very nice. I don't often see handsome men nowadays; they are getting scarce." The green eyes became innocent.

"Careful," Grijpstra said. "He has a way with ladies."

She giggled. "Don't worry, Grijpstra. I prefer your type, warm and heavy and fatherly. Handsome men make me nervous. They don't really need me and I hate it when I am not needed. Well, gentlemen, what can I do for you?"

"Let me use the phone," Grijpstra said.

She pushed the phone across the counter of the small bar and suddenly leaned over and kissed him full on the mouth. Grijpstra returned her kiss and reached out and patted her buttocks. De Gier looked away.

^* The ranks of the Dutch municipal police are constable, constable first class, sergeant, adjutant, inspector, chief inspector, commissaris, chief constable.

^* The ranks of the Dutch municipal police are constable, constable first class, sergeant, adjutant, inspector, chief inspector, commissaris, chief constable.