Outsider in Amsterdam

\\\\\ 5 /////

He found Grijpstra in Piet Verboom's room, reclining on the low settee, hands folded on round belly, a belly that had lately formed itself, bulging over Grijpstra's slipping belt, and that was being kept in some check by irregular gymnastics in Headquarters' sportsroom.

Grijpstra opened one eye. "Ha," he said. "Did you come to help me?"

"Yes," de Gier said.

"With what?"

"With thinking," de Gier said.

"Grijpstra closed his eye.

"That's all right," he said, "but try and be as quiet as you can. There's nothing worse than loud thinking. And sit down somewhere."

De Gier looked around. The chairs didn't look very inviting and Grijpstra had the settee. In the end he selected three cushions and arranged them close to the wall. He closed his eyes.

An hour passed. Grijpstra breathed deeply, his mouth had lost its usual energetic expression and drooled slightly. De Gier had slept for a while but his head wasn't properly supported and he had waked up again. He smoked, stared, and saw vague, ever changing scenes and pictures in which the images of TMrese and the girl in the bus, in various stages of undress, recurred. Grijpstra's mouth opened a little more and suddenly a sorrowful and very loud snore broke through the peace of the room. De Gier got up and stretched his back. He considered shaking Grijpstra awake but changed his mind. He thought of a more subtle approach. A set of small bongo drums in a corner of the room suggested it. He picked up the instrument, tiptoed to the settee, sat down on the floor, looked at the relaxed and helpless head of his superior, and hit the right bongo drum with a strong movement of his flat hand while the other veered quickly on the left drum.

Grijpstra leaped from the settee.

"Sha," Grijpstra said, "bongo drums. Where did they come from?"

"Some search," de Gier said. "They were in the room. You must have seen them before."

Grijpstra thought while he rubbed his face. "True. I had them in my hands even, to see if there was anything inside them."

He put out his hand and de Gier gave him the drums.

Grijpstra studied the instrument with some distrust. He was used to larger drums in Headquarters. He vaguely tapped the right drum, rubbed the skin, and hit it with his knuckles, near the edge. Slowly a rhythm was being formed, quietly, pleasantly even, consisting of dry short plocks. While he played he looked at de Gier, invitingly almost and de Gier understood. He felt in the inside pocket of his coat and found, in between his two ball-points, wallet and comb, the leather case containing his flute, the flute he had been carrying since Grijpstra had begun to play drums again. De Gier had been a promising musician as a boy, playing the recorder in the school's orchestra and had even specialized somewhat in medieval religious music, but he had given it up in exchange for sports and hanging around at street corners in the company of pimply friends exchanging tall stories. At the police school he had thought of music again but had been stopped by the prospect of becoming part of the police band, parading in the rain. But when Grijpstra had found his drums de Gier had been inspired as well and had bought himself a secondhand flute, and brought it out, after much hesitation, during an early morning solo in which Grijpstra had excelled in delicate rustles and taps, and he had blown a long thin note.

Grijpstra hadn't even looked up but he had heard all right and immediately the drums filled the space that the weaving flute left open and since then they had often played together.

Grijpstra didn't look up now either. De Gier's flute was neither thin nor hesitant now, but strong and free and Grijpstra had to go down to the depth of his heavy soul to find the inspiration necessary to follow his artful friend. De Gier was on his feet, bent slightly, shoulders hunched, he had closed his eyes. The bongo drums formed a well connected base, fairly loud and extremely simple, and the flute was now very courageous, shrilly wavering between two notes, shrieking almost. One shriek was so loud, and so breakable, that nothing could follow it.

Grijpstra paused and waited, very straight on the settee.

The flute came back, with a lovely round sound and the two little drums were with it.

Neither of the two had noticed the opening door. They hadn't seen van Meteren come in and they hadn't seen van Meteren leave again. They didn't notice his second entry either and they were so far gone that they didn't stop when the third player hit his wooden instrument, a tree trunk, hollow and with a long split in its surface. The sound of the jungle drum was hypnotic, magical, deep yet sharp and fitted in and even became the center of the melody. Both Grijpstra and de Gier played around the new sonorous vibration and raised the theme until they could go no further and until van Meteren, with a high-pitched yell and a final groan of his tree trunk, broke the interlinking sounds and they looked at each other, silently, and utterly surprised.

"What was that?" Grijpstra asked softly.

Van Meteren shook himself from his dream and looked at them with a laugh.

"I heard you both play so nicely and I thought my contribution might go with it. This is a drum from the forests of New Guinea. My mother's grandfather used it as a telegraph, to pass messages to the next village. It can also be used to make music. And our witch doctors have other uses for it. Whoever knows the drum well can create moods, influence others. You can lame the enemy with it but if you do you take a risk. A grave risk. The power may turn around and strike you down and you have to be well protected. The drum can kill its owner, or drive him mad, and you rush off into the jungle, hollering and beating your chest."

"You're not serious," de Gier said.

"What do you mean?" van Meteren asked.

'This influence, this power," de Gier said.

Van Meteren smiled gently.

"And what about you? What about your flute? What about the adjutant and his drums? What do you think you were doing? Making music?"

"Sure," de Gier said, "we were making music. Nothing to it. Boom boom. Squeak squeak. Lots of people do it. To amuse themselves."

"But then you are changing your mood, aren't you?" van Meteren asked. "You are creating something, surely. Something new I mean, something that wasn't there before. Perhaps this new something is innocent. But you might, with the same effort, create something dangerous, a little evil force, which sneaks away from you and does what you intend it to do."

Grijpstra laughed.

"You are in Holland, van Meteren. Cheese, butter and eggs. Tulips. Windmills keeping the swamp dry. Nice crumbly potatoes and thick gravy. Gray porridge, so thick that you can hardly stir it. But all right, if you like we will be sorcerers and witches. We'll catch the murderer by creating a vibration."

"Yes," de Gier said, "and the vibration will rush off, and suddenly, hats, it will catch him and bring him to us. And when he is close enough we'll hand him the ballpoint and he'll sign his confession."

"In his own words," Grijpstra added, "and clearly enumerating all the elements of the crime as it is listed in the law."

Van Meteren relaxed.

"But the music was O.K., wasn't it?" he asked.

"Yes," de Gier said, "rock group The Bopcops," and he looked at his watch. "Six o'clock. I'll have to go home. To feed the cat."

"You'll have to take the bus," Grijpstra said. "We have no car."

"Bah," de Gier said. "It's rush hour. The buses will be full. Bodies sweating all over you."

"Where do you live?" van Meteren asked.

"In Buitenveldert. Why? Do you have a car?"

"No," van Meteren said, "the parking police pay modest wages. But I do have a motorcycle."

De Gier wasn't enthusiastic. He detested the motorized bicycles cluttering the capital's streets by the thousands but he didn't want to offend his incongruous colleague.

"That'll be very nice," he said, "if you can spare the time."

"As long as you'll be back soon," Grijpstra said. "I am going to have dinner at the Chinese restaurant on the Nieuwedijk, next to the bare-bottom cinema. I'd like you to be there at seven-thirty. Can you make that?"

De Gier nodded and followed van Meteren.

They crossed the busy thoroughfare and van Meteren led the way into the large court of the monstrous Land Registry Office opposite the Haarlemmer Houttuinen.

"They let me park her here," he said. 'They wouldn't have anything to do with me when I asked them but it was all right when I showed them my police card."

"Must be a new bicycle," de Gier thought, "a Kreidler, I suppose, with a fifty cc engine. Half a dozen of them are stolen every night."

They found the Harley-Davidson under a corrugated iron roof.

De Gier stopped. He recognized the model, a 1943 Harley of the Liberator type, which he had seen for the first time when the Allied armies rushed into Holland. He had been a twelve-year-old boy, waving at the side of the road, and a large American military policeman had waved back at him, firmly in the saddle of the gorgeous monster guiding a dozen halftracks loaded with cheering troops. The motorbike seemed to be in prime condition, spotless, white, its chromium plated exhaust gleaming in the sparse light of the large dark court.

"You like her?" van Meteren asked.

"Beautiful," de Gier said, and meant it. "Where did you get her?"

"From a junkyard, for a couple of hundred guilders," van Meteren said.

"We used them in the New Guinea police and I was trained on a similar machine, many years ago now. When I bought the wreck she was in very sad shape and it took me almost two years to strip and rebuild her again. The spare parts are very expensive so I tried to use all the old parts, but it was a lot of work. The gearbox was the worst part of the job, I had to replace it in the end, after having wasted a month on the bastard. And the leather sidebags are new, of course, or rather, unused. I bought them from an army dump and the leather had dried out and begun to crack. I must have used kilos of fat to restore them."

He kicked the Harley off her standard and began to push her out of the courtyard. The machine was so heavy that it was quite an effort to push her up the slight elevation toward the street.

"A little patience now," van Meteren said. "I'll start her up."

De Gier followed the process with interest. The clutch had to be kicked down. There was no spring to the clutch so that it couldn't resume a neutral position but would have to be adjusted continuously. On the tank an air-stopper had to be unscrewed and pulled up. Choke. Regulation of the ignition by turning the left handlebar. Gas pushed back by turning the right handlebar. Kick the starter four times, giving a little gas each time, to suck petrol into the two cylinders. Turn the key on the tank. Push the choke back but not quite back.

"Now," said van Meteren.

He kicked the starter again and the engine came to life, with a soft but powerful gurgle.

"Do you have to do all that?" de Gier asked surprised.

"Yes," van Meteren said. "If you forget any of the movements you can kick the starter till your sweat fills your shoes. I can do it a lot more quickly but I saw you watching me so I went slowly. It can be done in a few seconds, and even a few seconds is a long time in New Guinea, especially when someone is firing at you with a bren gun."

He made an inviting gesture and de Gier climbed on the back part of the double saddle, van Meteren slid onto the front part and the machine took off at once. De Gier looked at the old-fashioned gear lever attached to the tank and thought of the BMW he once used to ride himself and the easy footgear that he could move with a flick of the toe. But van Meteren handled the cumbersome gear with the same ease.

De Gier was frightened. A motorcycle gives no protection. Only the skin envelops your life, the merest touch of a car or a lamppost and your leg is gone, your shoulder crushed or your skull split.

But his fear went when he realized that this was the best trip he had ever made through the city of Amsterdam. Van Meteren chose the grachts and sidegrachts and rode, without the slightest shock, through the narrow streets. He took no risks and the machine slithered through the rush-hour traffic. At every traffic light they were the first to take off and the Papuan never seemed to use his brakes, approaching the stoplights in gear and guessing the exact moment when the lights changed. A car that ignored their right of way was avoided in a supple curve and de Gier, pressed against the small body of his host, felt no irritation with the thoughtless or offensive driver who had endangered their lives. An obstacle, skillfully passed, no more.

When, at the end of the Beethovenstreet, the heavy traffic thinned out, van Meteren allowed the Harley to pick up speed and de Gier saw, when he looked over the Papuan's shoulder, that they were doing almost a hundred, but there was no danger, there were no sidestreets and de Gier watched the fat reed-plums, bordering the canal, flashing past him as a solid curtain and felt free.

The Harley slowed down and de Gier pointed at the large block of flats that contained his small apartment. Van Meteren changed into neutral and turned the key. The motorcycle approached the front door in silence. The Harley was in very good repair indeed, de Gier thought. He couldn't detect the slightest rattle or squeak anywhere in its complicated engine.

"Very nice," de Gier said. "Thanks a lot. Only the motorcops ride like that but they use BMW's and Guzzi's. I wonder if they could duplicate your performance on a Harley."

"Of course they can do that," said van Meteren. "I have ridden other makes when I was with the New Guinea police. Each brand has its secret, but you can solve them within a week and if there are any faults you can make use of them. The Harley is a little slow but makes up for it by its reliability. You can risk all sorts of maneuvers on the Harley that you shouldn't even think about on another cycle.

"Come in a moment," de Gier said. "I have some beer in the fridge and you can drink it while I feed Oliver, but be careful with the cat. He isn't to be trusted and if he can't attack you straight away he'U wait for an opportunity and while he waits he looks very innocent, as if a mouse wouldn't melt in his mouth."

He was glad he had warned van Meteren for Oliver was in a bad mood. De Gier had always kept the cat inside and Oliver had become neurotic. His twisted mind still loved de Gier but anyone else was considered as legal prey and of the few visitors de Gier had entertained lately at least two had left with bleeding ankles.

Oliver flattened himself when he saw van Meteren and began to growl, making his tail swell up at the same time. Van Meteren dropped to his haunches and scooped the cat off the floor, turning him upside down in the same movement. He caught the cat in his forearm and shook him gently, talking to the surprised animal in a gentle and smoothing voice.

"You are a sweet little cat, aren't you? A crazy silly animal? A crazy animal who hates large people, don't you?"

Oliver purred and closed his eyes.

"God, Christ Almighty," said de Gier. "He has never done that before."

"He does it to you doesn't he?" van Meteren asked.

"Yes, but he has known me since he was eight centimeters long and white all over. He needs a lot of love, that cat, and he'll bite me if I don't spend half an hour a day stroking and fondling him, but so far I have been the only person who could really touch him."

"Cats are marvelous animals," said van Meteren, who had put Oliver back on the floor, "great comedians."

Oliver tried again and attacked van Meteren's trousers, trying to gash a hole into the cloth. Van Meteren ignored him. The Siamese gave up and stalked into the kitchen, pawing the refrigerator and howling for his daily helping of chopped heart.

Grijpstra faced the chief inspector in the Hindist Society's restaurant. The chief inspector listened, while Grijpstra, limiting himself to the official language of a police report, summed up the events of the day.

"So you allowed her to go to Rotterdam?" the chief inspector asked.

"Yes sir," Grijpstra said.

"Let me see now," the chief inspector said and looked at the cast-iron ceiling of the restaurant, studying the golden garlands of stylized flowers. "She admits she hates him. She admits that she threw a heavy book at his head. You even have that in writing, nicely signed. A bruise, it could be attempted manslaughter. I'll have to look at the doctor's report again. And seventy-five thousand guilders are missing. And she is pregnant with Piet's child. And he never did anything for her and everything he gave her she had to return."

"Yes sir," Grijpstra said.

"Yes sir," the chief inspector repeated. He was still looking at the ceiling.

"Well, all right," said the chief inspector. "When we need her you'll be able to find her, I suppose. And we are short of cells. And she is pregnant."

Grijpstra said nothing.

"You still think it was murder?"

"I don't know, sir."

"There's no news from the detectives who are hunting the two drug dealers. Or rather, there is some news. One of the detectives phoned me. According to the underworld there can't be any connection between the drug fellows and the murder. Nobody has ever heard of Haarlemmer Houttuinen number five."

"But that's the address where we found them," Grijpstra said in a flat voice.

"Yes," the chief inspector said. "Perhaps they were members of the Society. There must be a list of members somewhere. Did you see it?"

"No," Grijpstra said. "I think Piet pocketed the membership fees. I'll have to check with the accountant if the fees were part of the Society's income. Probably not. I did find a tearbook with membership certificates but there are no stubs. Piet just grabbed the twenty-five guilders each time and gave the new member his bit of paper. He didn't like to pay tax."

"Who does?" the chief inspector said. "Very clever man, our Piet."

Grijpstra grinned.

"Something funny?" the chief inspector asked.

"For a clever man he made rather a stupid picture, dangling from his own beam on a piece of rope."

The chief inspector grinned as well.

"So why would he have needed all that money?" he asked. "Perhaps he wanted to get away. The accountant claims that he might have had to pay some fifty thousand in taxes and fines. And according to the two boys and the two girls, and also to van Meteren, he didn't believe in the Society anymore. Perhaps he wanted to disappear and leave the Society as an empty hull, mortgaged up to the hilt and in debt to its suppliers. With seventy-thousand he might have made a new start. He has lived in Paris so he must be adapted to living in other surroundings than Amsterdam."

"Possibly," Grijpstra said, "but he never left. He died, and the money is gone."

The chief inspector looked around the room.

"Funny atmosphere here, don't you think? Did you see the statue in the corridor downstairs? There are other statues as well. There is a proper Buddha statue somewhere upstairs."

"Very nice statues," Grijpstra said.

"A matter of taste. A chap sitting still all the time. So what? Is it recommendable to sit on your arse all day contemplating God knows what? Floating thoughts? Dirty dreams? One has enough of that, without sitting still."

He looked at his hands on the table.

"But it is a quiet pastime. Yes. Perhaps we are too busy. Perhaps we should have some of those statues in Headquarters, to teach a lesson to the colleagues who want to solve everything right away. Perhaps it is better to sit still and wait. Perhaps the right thought will bubble up. You can't trace where it comes from but it is there, right in front of you. Has it happened to you?"

Grijpstra thought and nodded, hesitatingly.

"Perhaps. A sudden spark, very fast. Too fast sometimes for it is gone before you can grab it. All you know is that you knew it, for a very short moment, but you have forgotten again."

"It'll come back later," the chief inspector said, "when you least expect it, sometimes."

"Perhaps," said Grijpstra.

"So what now, Grijpstra?"

"I am going to have dinner at a Chinese restaurant with de Gier."

"And where is de Gier?"

"Gone home to feed the cat."

The chief inspector laughed.

"Gone home to feed the cat," he repeated. "A clear motivation. I like that."

The mention of the word "dinner" made him finish the conversation. Grijpstra took him to the front door. A black Citroen was parked on the sidewalk, an impassive constable at the wheel. The chief inspector will be a commissaris soon, Grijpstra thought.

Janwillem Van De Wetering

Outsider in Amsterdam

\\\\\ 6 /////

IT WAS SEVEN-THIRTY SHARP WHEN DE GIER CAME INTO the Chinese restaurant. Grijpstra sat in one of the booths at the side, behind a glass of beer and his notebook. He was scribbling, connecting a number of circles. Each circle had a name.

"You see that I often come on time?"

Grijpstra mumbled something.

"And what conclusions is the master-mind drawing?"

Grijpstra connected two more circles.

"Well?"

"Ach," Grijpstra said, "what do I know? Bits and pieces, that's all I have. They all connect, but then anything does. I see the connections but I don't understand them. And what can I be sure of? The only fact we have so far is the book that girl of yours threw. The constables who are searching the house haven't found anything, except some dead mice. The search is still on. The detectives who are grubbing about in the underworld haven't found anything either. The theories we have come up with aren't very satisfactory. You helped me thinking today. Have you thought of anything?"

De Gier sat back and looked at the red lamps decorated with worn tassels. The owner had made use of the talents of a compatriot artist and there were some Chinese landscapes painted on the peeling plaster of the walls. One of the scenes was religious. A pagoda, or temple, inhabited by gods. Fat gods with bulging bellies, overpleasant smiles, bald heads and obscene female breasts. One of them had a thin beard. Fat tubby babies were crawling all over them.

"Well?" Grijpstra asked.

"Bah," said de Gier.

Grijpstra looked up. "I thought you liked Chinese food."

"I do," de Gier said, "but I was thinking. And I haven't come up with any good theory. The best one I have heard so far is the chief inspector's. We shouldn't think of murder straight off. Murders are rare in Amsterdam. It was suicide. A lot of the facts we have fit in, and the fact I like most is that he looked so neat."

"Ah yes," Grijpstra said. "I know what you mean. The Japanese suicide, wasn't it. You wash up and tidy yourself before you do it. You think he may have meditated a while in front of the little altar in his room, where we found traces of burnt incense?"

"Yes," said de Gier, studying the menu. "He may have been depressed for some time but he still needed a last push, and the girl throwing the dictionary at him set him off."

"And the money?" Grijpstra asked. "The seventy-five red backs. Where are they?"

"Blackmail. Or somebody stole it before he committed suicide. Another reason to do it. Or, but perhaps that's too far-fetched, he destroyed the money to put suspicion on somebody else, somebody we would suspect of having murdered him."

"Brr," Grijpstra said, "no. Let's not be too subtle."

"It could be, couldn't it?"

"No," Grijpstra said.

"Let's eat then."

De Gier had been given his beer and was blowing into the froth.

"Maybe you are right. I can't see him destroying money. Like putting it into one of these gray plastic rubbish bags we have nowadays and giving it to the garbage man. Nobody ever opens those bags. But Piet wouldn't destroy money. He liked money."

"But he may have been blackmailed."

"Severy-five thousand is a lot of blackmail. What had he done? What can anyone do in Holland nowadays that he could be blackmailed for? Even murder will give you no more than a few years in jail."

"Ha," Grijpstra said. "Weren't you telling me the other day that even twenty-four hours in jail is more punishment than any man should take?"

"True, true," de Gier said. "Forget it. Let's eat."

They ordered and de Gier started eating the moment the waiter placed the food on the table. He tore the fried meat off the thin sticks with his teeth, broke a piece of shrimp-crackers and grabbed the noodles, all at the same time.

"Easy," Grijpstra said. "You are sharing this meal with me.

"You are right," de Gier said with his mouth full.

"Easy is the word. We shouldn't rush so much. This case will solve itself, all we have to do is sit around and watch it. That's what the chief inspector told me this…"

Grijpstra didn't finish his sentence and de Gier looked up.

"What now?" de Gier asked.

Grijpstra's face had frozen.

"Look behind you," he said.

De Gier looked around and froze as well.

"Shit," de Gier said, and jumped. Grijpstra jumped at the same time. They both pulled out their pistols and they were both running toward the door but de Gier got there first. Grijpstra had run into the waiter, and the waiter and his tray were still falling when Grijpstra got into the street and saw de Gier running after their victim, a tall thin Chinese by the name of Lee Fong.

Poor Lee Fong was having very bad luck that day, the culmination of a lot of bad luck that he had had to put up with during his short stay in Holland. Ever since he had deserted his ship he had nothing but misadventure. He had lost at gambling and been arrested for pushing drugs. He had wounded a guard while escaping from jail. He had quarreled with the acquaintances who had hid him. This was the day he would leave the country. He should have stayed in hiding until the last minute but he had risked a short walk in order to buy a last good meal. And now he had run into two plainclothes policemen.

He shouldn't have hesitated when Grijpstra looked at him. There are a lot of photographs policemen have to remember and Chinese look very much alike to a Dutchman. But he had hesitated and touched his knife, a long nasty blade that he kept in a special pocket in his jeans. That one movement had caused Grijpstra to act. And now Lee Fong had de Gier after him and de Gier was gaining.

Lee took a corner and found himself in an alley, called the Ramskooi. The Ramskooi is a cul de sac. Lee thought he had no choice. He stopped, turned and pulled out his knife. De Gier stopped too and kicked. A good kick from a long leg will remove any knife. De Gier had learned at least three grips to disarm a knife fighter but they were all complicated, consisting of several movements. And he would have had to drop his pistol. He preferred holding on to the pistol. Lee Fong put up his hands as Grijpstra came panting.

The Ramskooi is a short alley and there are three bars in it. The bars' occupants were spilling into the street.

De Gier handcuffed Lee Fong and the crowd stared, and muttered. Grijpstra entered the first bar and telephoned the central radio room. Within seconds a siren began to whine. Within two minutes a white VW turned into the alley. Within three minutes it had left again, carrying de Gier and Lee Fong. The crowd was still muttering and Grijpstra dabbed at his forehead with a large dirty handkerchief. The crowd stopped muttering and returned to the bars and the next flood of beer.

"Sir," a small voice said.

Grijpstra, on his way to the restaurant, looked down. A seven-year-old boy was walking next to him. A Negro boy, very black.

"Yes, friend?" Grijpstra said.

The boy grinned, flashing large, white teeth.

"Are you a policeman, sir?"

"I am," Grijpstra said pleasantly.

"Can I see your gun please?"

"Guns are not for showing," Grijpstra said.

"No," the boy said smiling, "they are for shooting."

"You are wrong there, you know. Guns are for keeping in leather holsters, here." Grijpstra patted the holster under his jacket.

"What had the man done, sir?"

"Fighting," Grijpstra said. "He is a bad man. He fought with a knife and he hurt somebody."

"I fight too," the boy said.

"With a knife?"

"No sir. With my hands." The boy showed his small fists. "But my brother fights with a bicycle chain. He says he will teach me. It's very difficult, he says."

Grijpstra stopped and faced the boy.

"My name is Uncle Hans," Grijpstra said. "Now you go and tell your brother that he shouldn't fight with a bicycle chain. It isn't difficult and it it isn't nice. If he wants to fight he should learn judo. You know what that is? Judo?"

"Yes sir," the boy said. "I have seen it on the TV. And my teacher at school is a judo fighter. He has a brown belt but he wants a black belt. He practices all the time."

"That's good," Grijpstra said. "Maybe you can learn from him. You know what judo fighters do before they start fighting?"

The boy thought, then he smiled.

"Yes, sir, I know. They bow to each other."

"You know why they do that?"

The boy thought again, a little longer this time. "They like each other? They've got nothing against each other?"

"Right," Grijpstra said. "Run along now."

"Goodbye, Uncle Hans," the boy said.

A minute later Grijpstra found himself cursing. The curses, strung together shaping an eight syllable malediction of some force, mildly surprised him. He had stopped in front of a small display window, part of a shop halfway between the dead end alley and the Chinese restaurant. He wondered what might have caused this sudden burst of harsh and indecent verbal violence. The objects in the small shop window? He identified the objects: three sets of dentures on a shelf, guarded by a fat cat, asleep and heavily motionless on a second shelf, placed above the first. But he knew that the unexpected appearance of false teeth would be unable to upset him. He owned a set of false teeth himself and the daily early-morning sight of them grinning from the waterglass on his washstand had never yet unnerved him, on the contrary, he thought his teeth to be both handsome and useful. The cat perhaps? But Grijpstra liked cats, even if he wouldn't admit the fact to boastful and sentimental cat-keepers like de Gier.

It was his attempt at education, he thought, and pushed his solid shape into motion again. The small boy he had lectured just now hadn't really been impressed. He had probably been frightened into agreeing. The display of firearms, the running feet, the suspect's knife, de Gier's kick, the handcuffs, the siren of the patrol car, the uniformed constables grabbing the prisoner. It's the war all over, Grijpstra thought. The kid will have his bicycle chain and join the free fight. Just give him a few more years.

Grijpstra was back in the restaurant. Their food was still on the table. The waiter smiled uneasily.

"Hey you," a fat woman said.

"Madame?" Grijpstra asked.

"You know what you did?"

"Yes," Grijpstra said. "I ran into the waiter. I am sorry."

"You a policeman?" the fat woman asked.

"Yes."

"That fellow you went after, what happened?"

"A criminal," Grijpstra said, "on the run. His photograph is in all the police stations. Dangerous. Armed with a knife. Had to grab him."

"Did you?"

"My colleague has got him. He is on his way to the cell now."

"You made a mess of my clothes, you know that?"

Grijpstra got up and looked at the woman's dress. It was stained badly.

"A whole plate of noodles. And my husband here got an egg roll on his head. And the girl over there got soup all over her. And you should have seen what you did to the waiter. He had to change his jacket."

"I am sorry," Grijpstra said again.

"You should pay something, maybe," the woman said.

"Ah, don't listen to her," the husband broke in. "She is having you on. The dress had to be dry-cleaned anyway and I got the egg roll on my hair, it's thick enough still."

"Are you all right?" Grijpstra asked the girl who had got soup over her.

The girl smiled shyly. "Yes."

"Women," the husband said. "A policeman got shot last year. Dead he was. And she is talking about her clothes. You might have been shot too."

"He only carried a knife," Grijpstra said.

"Or knifed. Maybe that's worse."

"It's O.K.," the fat woman said. "But next time run around the waiter. He's a small chap, you could easily have avoided him."

"Women," the husband said.

"Shut up," the fat woman said.

"Yes dear," the man said.

"Would you two like a beer?" Grijpstra asked.

"Yes," the woman said and smiled at him.

The waiter brought the beer and refused payment.

"On the house," he said and smiled. He still looked very nervous.

"I wonder what he is hiding," Grijpstra thought. "No papers, that's for sure. And a friend of Lee Fong." He looked at the waiter's face, trying to remember it. Perhaps he should drop a hint at the Aliens Department. Perhaps he should not.

"There's enough trouble in the world," he thought.

Ten minutes later de Gier came in. The waiter brought a fresh plate of noodles and some fried vegetables.

"So?" Grijpstra asked.

"It's O.K. They've got him in the cell. A lot of charges against him now. The fool shouldn't have drawn his knife. I phoned the chief inspector and he seemed pleased for once. He asked me to congratulate you."

"Me?" Grijpstra asked.

"Don't be modest," de Gier said. "I can't stand it. You spotted him, didn't you?"

"Ah, yes," Grijpstra said, "and then you caught him. Because I told you to."

"You never told me anything."

"I would have," Grijpstra said, "if I had had a little time."

"Well," de Gier said and smiled nastily, "you got the waiter."

"It's the little things in life that give us our pleasure," Grijpstra said. "You pay the bill."

"Is it my turn again?"

"I paid last week."

"Four rolls and two cups of coffee," de Gier said. "Six or seven guilders. This must be over twenty."

"You are the youngest," Grijpstra said, "don't argue."

"No," said de Gier, and paid the bill.

"Got anything yet?" Grijpstra asked, addressing a young constable who was moving casks in the cellar of Haarlemmer Houttuinen number 5.

"Perhaps," the young constable said. "These casks contain some sort of paste. I believe it is called mizo and they make soup with it. I ate it once in one of these health-food restaurants. The taste isn't too bad if you don't eat too much of it. Innocent stuff anyway but this is different. I picked it up on the floor."

He showed a few crumbs of a sticky dark brown substance. "It looks like mizo but it is harder. I think it is hash."

"You roll your own cigarettes?" Grijpstra asked.

"Sure," the constable said. "You want some cigarette paper?"

Grijpstra mixed a little of the substance with cigarette tobacco, cutting it up with his stiletto. De Gier lit the cigarette for him and Grijpstra took a deep puff and exhaled the smoke. They all sniffed.

"Hash," they said simultaneously.

"We'll send it to the lab to make sure," Grijpstra said, "but it's hash all right."

"Good work," de Gier said to the constable, who looked pleased, but he didn't think much of the find. A few crumbs of hash on the floor meant nothing. Of course these people would smoke hash. Johan, or Eduard, or the girls, or Piet himself, or van Meteren perhaps. And they might drop a little on the floor. Why not? To smoke hash is hardly punishable. To stock and sell it is a crime. If they could find a cask full of the stuff…

"You opened all the casks?" he asked.

"All of them. We had to cut the ropes and pry the lids open with a knife. Nothing but soup paste in there. We prodded them and took samples from the bottom and the sides. Soup, that's all."

"Anything else?"

"Nothing," the constable said, "but it's a hell of a mess here. Dirty. Dead mice and all. And they call it a restaurant. Bah."

"You are still young," Grijpstra said. "The world is held together by dirt. Don't think of it or you'll never eat again."

Before leaving the cellar he stopped and turned around. "I'll tell you something else. Female bodies can be very dirty too. Did you ever think of that? If you would only consider…"

"I don't want to know," the constable said.

De Gier laughed and climbed the stairs. A detective tapped him on the shoulder.

"You got a minute?"

De Gier followed the detective to the restaurant. "You found something?"

The detective shrugged. "Perhaps."

"So?"

"Well, you'll have to decide. You are in charge, aren't you?"

"Grijpstra is in charge."

"That's what I mean," the detective said. "You and Grijpstra, same thing."

"Oh yes?" de Gier asked irritably. "I am a separate entity, you know. We aren't a Siamese twin, you know."

"All right," the detective said. "You are separate. You want to hear what I have to tell you?"

"Please," de Gier said.

"In van Meteren's room, that Papuan gent, we found some funny things."

"I know," de Gier said. "I saw the room. A wild boar's skull, a jungle drum, a collection of twigs and shells and stones and some funny dolls."

"Exactly," the detective said, "and a Lee-Enfield rifle, well kept and wrapped in an oiled cloth, but no ammunition."

"Hey," de Gier said, "he shouldn't have that."

"Right," the detective said, "but the fellow is on the force and he had no ammunition. He told me that he used to be with the New Guinea state police and that he kept the rifle as a souvenir, when the Indonesians took over. He didn't want to surrender his weapon. A patriot. He took it apart and smuggled it in, and the customs didn't notice. Now do I grab him or not? To own a firearm is a crime nowadays. It'll cost him his job and maybe his unemployment benefits. He'll have to pay a fine and his name will be in the books forever."

"What have you done so far?" de Gier asked.

"I told him to report to the armory at Headquarters and ask them to pour aluminum into the barrel, then he can keep it. But I also said that the final decision rests with you. So I can still grab him if you give the word."

"O.K.," de Gier said, "let's do it your way. But tell him to report to the armory this week. If he hasn't been there in seven days' time we'll still grab him."

"Yes, boss."

"And write an unofficial report with a copy for the armory sergeant."

"Yes, boss."

"And don't call me boss."

"No, boss," the detective said.

Grijpstra came into the restaurant, accompanied by a young woman and a little girl.

"Allow me to introduce you."

"De Gier," de Gier said. "You must be Mrs. Verboom."

"Mrs. Verboom has come straight from the airport," Grijpstra said. "This is Yvette. Yvette is very tired, aren't you?" The little girl smiled.

"We mustn't keep you, then," de Gier said. "Can we take you anywhere? Do you have a place to sleep?"

Mrs. Verboom smiled sweetly.

"Don't worry about us," she said. "My father is downstairs with the car. He'll take Yvette home and I'll go there later. I thought you might want to see me right away."

"Yes, that would be a good idea," de Gier said. "This officer will take your daughter down to the car."

The detective took the little girl by the hand. "You want to come with me, dear?"

"Are you a policeman?" the girl asked.

"He is a very nice policeman," de Gier said. "Aren't you?"

"Yes, boss," the detective said.

Grijpstra and de Gier studied the young woman. Piet's taste must have been excellent. Th6rese was a good looking girl but this woman, although at least ten years older than her husband's mistress, and worn out by the trip and possibly tension, was a beauty. De Gier admired the long thick blond hair and the sensual, well-shaped mouth. Mrs. Verboom crossed her legs and produced a cigarette. De Gier smiled and lit it for her. She smiled back.

"I hope you don't mind if I am not sad. I didn't love Piet, not for a long time, and I am not really concerned about his death. I didn't want him to the but if he did, well, then he did."

"I understand," de Gier said.

"And I didn't kill him," she said calmly. "I couldn't have if I had wanted to for I was in Paris. I can prove it easily. I'll give you my address in Paris, so you can check it out."

She wrote the address down and de Gier copied it in his notebook. He would have to ask the chief inspector to contact the French police.

"You are now the only director of the Hindist Society," Grijpstra said.

"Some society," Mrs. Verboom said sarcastically, "some nothing. The house is empty and everybody has left, except van Meteren, I hear, and he was never part of the Society. And he is leaving as well, he tells me. And I saw through the Hindist nonsense a long time ago. Piet converted me when I married him, when I still thought he had something to teach." She looked at the policemen.

"But I am interested in the money, I have to look after my child."

"I am sorry, Mrs. Verboom," Grijpstra said, "but I don't think there is any money. Your husband mortgaged the house and I don't know what happened to the money. There's still a chance we may find it but right now there is no trace of it. Perhaps you can sell the house and make something out of it but I think you should contact Joachim de Kater, your husband's accountant."

Mrs. Verboom looked out of the window.

"The bastard," she said. "For years and years I sweated on this house. I even plastered some of the walls and did carpentry. He made me carry bricks, right up to the top floor, he was too stingy to install a proper hoist. And it wasn't just me. We were all idealists, we were going to improve the mental climate of Amsterdam and make people happy by introducing them to the 'real peace.' We were detached! Ha."

The detectives smiled understandingly.

"And now he has blown the lot. What did he do with the money?"

"I wish I knew," de Gier said. 'Then we might also know if your husband was murdered and if so, why. But we can't find anything. Would you know perhaps if your husband ever dealt in drugs?"

"Hash?" Mrs. Verboom asked.

"Hash, heroin, cocaine, speed, pills, any drug at all." Mrs. Verboom shook her lovely head and allowed her cape to slide down from her shoulders. She wore a thin cotton blouse underneath, with the three top buttons undone. She bowed down a little. De Gier saw her breasts, first one, and then, after a charming twist, the other.

"Hmmpf, hmmpf," he said slowly.

"I beg your pardon?" Mrs. Verboom asked.

"No, nothing," de Gier said. "I said hmmpf hmmpf. I have been saying that a lot lately. No specific meaning. Maybe I work too much."

"May be the warm weather," Mrs. Verboom said and laughed. "Drugs you said. Perhaps he did. He had no morals, I know all about his lack of morals. But he wasn't very courageous and drugs is a risky business… I don't know. We did have hash here, a big tin full of hash. He must have bought it wholesale for there was quite a lot in it. But he never sold any as far as I know. We used to have parties with it, he called it concentration exercises, and he would play special music on his gramophone and we had to be quiet. I enjoyed those parties. Once we had some tomatoes on the table and they were very beautiful. It was the first time I saw what a tomato really is like. Or, rather, that's what I thought at the time. The next day it was just another tomato. Hash is very relaxing, you know."

"You still use it?" de Gier asked.

"No. I gave it up when I went to Paris. Nobody offered me any and I felt no need to start rushing around to see if somebody would give me a stickie. I never smoked much of it. Perhaps we had six parties in all. Anyway, I have to work for a living now. I live a very dull life."

"Why in Paris?" Grijpstra asked.

"My mother is French and we have relatives over there. French is my second language. When I left Piet I wanted to make a complete break."

"So your husband gave people the opportunity to take drugs. But did he ever sell any?" de Gier asked.

"I am not sure," Mrs. Verboom said. "We never sold stickies over the bar or in the restaurant. But perhaps he dealt in it in a big way. Some strange types used to come and visit him and he would receive them in his room and lock the door. Perhaps they were dealers."

"We didn't find the tin you mentioned," Grijpstra said.

"Perhaps somebody took it; van Meteren told me downstairs that somebody broke in during the night after Piet's death."

The detectives went on asking but Mis. Verboom began to repeat herself. She mainly talked about Piet. Grijpstra became very sleepy.

"That'll be all Mrs. Verboom," he said. "You must be tired. I am sure you would like to go to your parents." He knew, by now, that Piet had not been the most charming person in Amsterdam.