The Rattle-Rat

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The Commissaris, wandering about his elegant office, was not content. A Frisian dies. In Amsterdam. What was the next move? Would he go to Friesland? Why look far away if it happened here?

Because there was this new car and he wanted to drive along the Great Dike? He could indulge himself, but there was also the necessity to sniff about here. He could delegate the local search to his very best men and take off himself. The commissaris pushed out his thin lips. He attempted to whistle.

"The other way round," he mumbled sadly. His best men were enjoying themselves in Ding…Dingjum. And bothering the widow. He got up and wandered over to his desk, looking for an article in the Police Gazette. "Instructions for Superior Officers." He read the relevant passage. Make sure your temperament, skills, interest, and competency fill the job. Wasn't he supposed to be good at interviewing old ladies? So why wasn't he interrogating Mrs. Scherjoen?

His leg glowed and hurt. He rubbed the painful spot, not too hard, for that would increase the trouble. Suppose he went home and immersed his painful body in hot water spiced 37 with herbs? He might as well; maybe this wasn't a day for work.

He limped to the corridor. The uniformed girls in the computer room looked up. "Sir," they said. "Ladies," the commissaris said. He was given a chair. He thought. The policewomen waited.

"Douwe Scherjoen," the commissaris said.

"Adjutant Grijpstra asked us to check him out, sir," a constable first-class said. "There's nothing on Scherjoen."

"How good is your computer?" the commissaris asked.

"Our computer," the constable first-class said, "knows everything."

"So what would the computer tell us if you activated it with the key words 'Friesland' and 'crime'?"

'Too much, sir. It would tell us about all the wrongdoings of all the Frisians, it would go on forever."

"And what if you limited it to Frisian crime in Amsterdam?"

"It would still go on and on."

"Let's see," the commissaris said.

The constable first-class typed in the two words. The commissaris watched the screen. A small green square trembled.

"Well?" the commissaris asked.

"The computer is searching, sir. It will tell us about its findings any minute now, at incredible speed."

The little green square trembled.

"Well?" the commissaris asked.

The constable first-class pressed a few buttons.

"It's broken," a constable said. The constable first-class stared at the girl. "Down," the girl said nervously. "That's what I meant. Honestly. The computer is down."

"Not broken?" the commissaris asked.

"Just down," the constable first-class said. "It'll be up in a second, it just fell down a little."

"When will it be up again?"

"It could take a while," the constable first-class said. "This does happen now and then. I'll phone and the supplier will send an engineer. He may be busy for an hour or longer- it does take longer once in a while. Maybe the terminal is down too, then we'll have to wait a little while longer."

The commissaris was back in the corridor. He used a wall phone. "Can you find me that Frisian detective, what's his name now? Fokkema, maybe?"

"He's in Spain sir, on holiday, with sick leave added. Detective Fokkema may be away for a while."

"Any other personnel of Frisian origin around?"

"I wouldn't know, sir, did you try the computer?"

The commissaris was back in his room. He thought. Frisian. Frisian what? By happenstance a Frisian cop sees something, and a Frisian park official sees something too?

He picked up the phone.

"Please, dear, Constable First-Class Algra of the Red District Station, and afterward I'd like to speak to Chief Wiarda of Municipal Parks."

His secretary couldn't find either party; Algra had gone off somewhere and Wiarda hadn't yet returned.

They won't know anything either, the commissaris thought; he thought a little further. Frisian convicts, locked up in jail somewhere? Who could locate Frisian convicts? The computer? Hurriedly he changed thoughts. The new thoughts were pushed back by something else again, burped up from memory. "Jelle Troelstra," his memory kept repeating.

"Who?" the commissaris asked.

"You know," his memory insisted.

"I don't."

"SS?" his memory asked.

Right, the commissaris thought, for now he did remember. A limping SS man at large. In 1945, that was a long time back now. Troelstra had fought on the Eastern Front, had been released from duty because of serious wounds, had returned to Friesland just before the liberation, and was wanted afterward by the Dutch police on charges of treason. Traitor Troelstra. The suspect didn't want to be shot, so he hid with relatives, and was seen by neighbors. The neighbors alerted the local police, and Troelstra fled to Amsterdam, where he hid again, this time in a girlfriend's house, at the Old Side Alley. Tired of being hunted, Troelstra asked the girlfriend to phone the police to tell them that he would be ending his life, but would like to talk to someone first, a qualified authority preferably. The commissaris was an assistant inspector at the time and answered the call in person. He took a streetcar. The girlfriend opened the door. Jelle was in bed, with a German pistol in his hand. Jelle Troelstra, ex-hero. The commissaris nodded. Not a bad chap at all, rather an idealist, but on the wrong side, of course. Misdirected loyalty. Hitler, a devil masquerading as an angel, Troelstra saw that now. And subject hadn't committed atrocities, because he was a decent fellow, quite incapable of evil deed.

He listened to Troelstra in those late days of 1945, and encouraged him somewhat, telling him he wouldn't be shot, that he might still live a useful life and that the punishment would be bearable, since subject was turning himself in. Self-confessed traitors were sent to the colonies then, to New Guinea, the enormous island in Indonesia's utmost East, a Dutch possession still, and much in need of roads. Subject would have served there and been returned in due course.

The commissaris picked up his phone again. "Dear?"

"Sir?"

"Please, Jelle Troelstra in… Anjum. Try to locate the man. If he isn't listed, try any other Troelstra in Anjum and ask where we can find Jelle. Is that understood? If you please?"

"You said it at the beginning, sir. One 'please' will suffice."

"At your service," the commissaris said. "You're welcome."

The phone rang. "Yes?"

"Mr. Troelstra lives in Amsterdam, sir. He's on the line now."

"Mr. Troelstra?"

"Yes," a gravelly voice said.

"You'realive," the commissaris said. "I'm pleased to hear that. It's me, the policeman who fetched you in '45. Your girlfriend called and we had a talk. Do you remember?"

"And you're a commissaris now?"

"And I would like to talk to you."

"I've got a cafe\" Troelstra said. "In my girlfriend's house. She left last year, for good, because of cancer. I'm still around for a little bit."

"May I visit? Will that be all right?"

The two men observed each other attentively, in the dark narrow barroom. "Jenever?" Troelstra asked.

"If you please," the commissaris said, "and one for you too."

Their glasses touched and tipped. The jar tipped for the second time, but this time the commissaris merely sipped and Troelstra followed his example. The commissaris liked the cafe; all of its contents dated back many years, to a tangible past. He caressed the stem of his tulip-shaped glass.

"You were polite to me," Troelstra said. "I remember that. A little human decency and understanding, there wasn't much of that around then, but with you it stuck. It kept me going in New Guinea, if I wasn't down. I got pretty ill there."

"Were you sent home ahead of time?"

"Malaria," Troelstra said. "It gets you by spells. We all had it, and when the fever went down we were back at work."

"Bad, was it?"

"Not too bad," Troelstra said. "Have you come to fetch me again? War crimes are never forgiven, but I didn't commit any crimes. I fought the Soviet Bolsheviks. It would be okay now, but in those days it wasn't done yet."

"I came for some information," the commissaris said, "about a Douwe Scherjoen."

"He doesn't come to this bar."

"The name is known to you?"

"I've heard of Scherjoen," Troelstra said. "This place isn't set up for Frisians only, but they all know who I am, and when they come I speak our language, not that I talk a great deal; they prefer me to listen."

"I was born out there, in Joure," the commissaris said.

Troelstra nodded. "You said that last time, so I could trust you some. You told me I should stay alive. Tell me again, why did I have to stay alive?"

'Because there's a point to living."

"You still think so?"

"I was young," the commissaris said. "I put it a little simply. You were young too. I got through to you, didn't I?"

Troelstra's hands pushed his sunken cheeks further inward. His calm eyes stared at the visitor. "This Scherjoen, was he the corpse in the paper this morning?"

"Yes," the commissaris said. "He was shot in this neighborhood and burned afterward, in a dory, or so we think; there wasn't much left of him."

"Sometimes," Troelstra said, "it doesn't pay to try and outthink the others." He grinned. "There are too many of them. What rule did he break?"

"We don't know much yet." The commissaris put his glass down after a carefully measured sip. "We do know that the deceased lived in Dingjum, could spend money, that's about it. What do you know?"

"He sold sheep," Troelstra said, "to Morocco, Turkey, Algeria. Frisian sheep. More than are ever officially counted in all of Friesland. Sheep look a lot alike. There's too much administration these days, but maybe the sheep still slip through."

"But he never came here?"

"Other sheep dealers come here, and they talked about him. The dealers like to visit the Red Quarter. Leeuwarden, our capital, used to have a nice quarter of its own, but now they have to slide down the Great Dike, all the way down to Gomorrah here. Here we can satisfy most any desire."

"In our lower regions?" the commissaris asked. "And what did Douwe's colleagues have to say about him?"

"They didn't like Douwe."

"Jealousy?"

"Of course," Troelstra said. "But maybe more than just jealousy. Douwe wasn't too straight. Broke his agreements, or changed them later on, not quite what Frisians expect of each other."

"Would any of your clients be a shooting man?"

"I am a traitor," Troelstra said, "but I don't really like squealing too much."

"Scherjoen was shot from the rear."

Troelstra lifted the jenever jar. The commissaris nodded. He had lunched lightly and the strong gin made his body tingle. His leg no longer hurt; on the contrary, the usually sensitive nerves seemed to be alive with calm energy. How enjoyable it would be to be just a little drunk forever. Doesn't alcohol addiction exclude all other desires? The thought wasn't new to him. To simplify life's motivation should be an excellent short-term goal. Whoever is interested in alcohol can afford to forget about everything else. Any new day begins with the necessity to drown the hangover, and once that's done time flows on joyfully again. It wouldn't work out in the end, he knew that too, but the idea was still exciting. To realize the wish would be easy enough. He could retire and get up late and go to bed early and be smashed in between. With a bit of discipline, the change shouldn't be hard.

"One more?" Troelstra asked.

"No, thanks."

"Coffee, freshly made?"

"If you please."

Troelstra handled his coffee machine with the slow, exact movements that are the result of long practice.

"How old are you, Troelstra?"

They shared the same age.

"You know," Troelstra said, "I once shot a prisoner in Russia, from the rear. The Russian never knew what happened to him. He was talking to a tree, and the next thing he was out."

"No!" the commissaris said, shaking his head in disbelief.

Troelstra nodded thoughtfully. "He had gone mad. We were out on patrol. I was in charge of the squad. Frisian boys, every one of them. There were hardly any Frisians fighting for the Germans, but the few that went out there were under my command. Good fellows, steady, courageous, supermen, all specially picked for SS training. We were liberating the world. Civilian Russia was the worst place I had ever seen-starving people in hovels, suppressed by a terrible system; we didn't know then that we were making it even worse. Suddenly there was that Russian soldier behind us, with a rifle, hand grenades on his belt; quite a young man still, and he had lost his mind. He was yelling at us and pointing at the clouds. We took his weapons and he never noticed. He was singing by then. We tried to send him off, for a prisoner would slow us down; we were about to attack."

"Yes," the commissaris said.

"I was the sergeant," Troelstra said. "I was supposed to know what to do. My men were looking up to me. The Russian was stamping on the snow, screaming some ditty, frothing at the mouth, eyes popping out of his head. We were close to the enemy, and he was giving our position away."

"Yes," the commissaris said. "I could have some more coffee."

"Java Mocha," Troelstra said. 'Too good a brand for this place but I'm getting too old to make a profit."

"Yes?"

"I took that Russian along," Troelstra said, "with my arm around his shoulders, friendly-like, I was his older brother. He pulled away and ran into the trees; when I found him again, he was talking to an oak."

"You shot him?"

"Yes."

"And that's the way Scherjoen was helped out?"

"I wouldn't know," Troelstra said slowly.

An old man shuffled into the caf6, in a dirty raincoat and frayed trousers. "Jelle, a lemonade today."

Jelle poured soda, holding the gin jar in his left hand. The old man studied first the jar, then his own trembling hands, clutching at the counter. "Yes, go ahead."

The gin joined the lemonade in the tall glass. Jelle lifted the jar but didn't replace it. "Right," the old man said. The jar tinkled again. The man drank. He put the glass down. "Aaah," the man said happily.

"I only meant," Troelstra said to the commissaris, "that things are often not quite what they seem. So I betrayed my country. Maybe I did. Maybe it wasn't meant that way."

"You meant well?"

"Things had to get better, didn't they?" Troelstra asked. "And they got worse. Isn't that the human way? We mean well and we become active and we go down even further."

"In the beginning • • •"

"… there was God." Troelstra scratched his chin. "But where did He go? I sometimes think about that a bit."

The man in the dirty raincoat rattled his glass. "Same again, Jelle." Jelle poured from bottle and jar. The man's toothless smile widened. "Nice day today."

Troelstra and the commissaris said that the old man was right.

"It's all so easy," the old man said, "but I keep forgetting, and it takes a few glasses to remember it again. To keep it easy can be rather tricky."

"You generally succeed?" the commissaris asked.

"I've got a strong character," the old man said. "I never stop trying. No matter what they do to me. They won't knock me over."

"Let's have the bill," the commissaris said.

Troelstra looked out the window. Shadows moved through the street, dating back to a far past. Comrades-in-arms? A dying Russian? Wild men, with bones through their noses? An assistant inspector who didn't handcuff the traitor and took him to Headquarters in a streetcar?

"That won't be necessary," Troelstra said. "I still owe you. You kept me alive. I could experience a few good moments. New Guinea is beautiful, there are some fine birds out there, colorful, with long tails, and flowering shrubs that grow nowhere else. The voyage, there and back, tropical seas, palm trees on beaches, going on for miles. And the cafe here at the end, I don't mind doing this."

"Scherjoen?" the commissaris asked.

"Can't help you there."

The commissaris didn't catch on at once. He wondered whether he should ask.

"Is there something else you can help me with?"

"Last week…" Troelstra interrupted himself and looked at the old man, who was smiling and occupied with rolling a cigarette. "Would you mind moving up?" he asked the commissaris, who got off his stool and followed the coffee cup that Troelstra slid across the counter.

"Last week," Troelstra said softly, "two heavy boys came here to have a few. A certain Ary, small chap and bald, and a certain Fritz, big fellow with a tuft of stiff hair on his big head. Southern types, from the Belgian border. I had some sheep dealers too, well away in the bottle. A Friday it was, when there's the cattle market in Friesland and they had collected some cash, safely tucked away in the purse. The Frisian purse is chained to the neck. It's all cash with us up north, we don't believe in checks and such. We're a bit silly that way."

"Frisians aren't silly," the commissaris said.

"Maybe they are sometimes. Carrying cash into this district? Cash that comes from evading taxes should be well hidden, I believe." Troelstra smiled. "It's silly to pay taxes, of course, especially when the money leaves the country. Hasn't everybody always been after our profits? The Romans, the Spanish, the French, the Germans, we kicked them all out, and then came the Dutch."

"And you were fighting for United Europe?"

Now why did I say that? the commissaris thought. Here he wants to tell me something and I have to argue.

"United Europe," Troelstra's eyelids dropped. "That's the dream. Why shouldn't it come about some day? All together and still apart? America has done it. Why don't we do the same? The State of Friesland, and the State of Germany, and the State of Russia, and so on and so forth? United above our troubles?" He poured more coffee.

"You're too early," the commissaris said. "It'll come if we grant ourselves time."

Troelstra held a finger alongside his nose. "That's what I think now, but I'm still not sure. Maybe the urge to fight is too strong in us. Maybe it's part of human nature. Ever seen little kids play? They'll always invent weapons and bang away at each other. Have you ever seen little kids play peacemaking games?"

"Well…"

"Take the movies," Troelstra said. "I fought too, I know how bad it is. Creep up to a Russian camp and see the enemy eat, or sleep, or shit in a quiet corner, and you still have to mow them down. That can't be right. So why do I go to see future air vessels destroying each other, with humans in them, eh? I enjoy watching that destruction. So how can that be? If it isn't right, I mean?"

"About that bald Ary," the commissaris said, "and Fritz with the tuft."

Troelstra closed one eye. "You don't know either, right?"

"I don't know," the commissaris said.

Troelstra laughed dryly. "Nobody knows, I think. Maybe we just do what we were planned to do, maybe we have no say. I read the paper. There's war all over the place again. Same thing all over."

The commissaris waited.

"Right," Troelstra said. "Here's a fight for you. Ary and Fritz were watching my sheep dealers and licking their chops. Suppose each dealer was carrying some twenty thousand in cash, and you hit them all-then you have a year's good wages. That's hardly enough if the risk is a few years in jail. Ary and Fritz had just come from jail."

"So?"

"So," Troelstra said, "they discussed better possibilities and I listened in a bit, for they kept ordering refills. On the cattle market in Leeuwarden…"

"Hey, hey," the commissaris said. "And the subjects are professionals?"

"Bank robbers," Troelstra said.

"But listen here, at the Leeuwarden market there'll be hundreds of dealers, and there are only two of them."

"It can be done," Troelstra said. "Each dealer has a purse, and if you pull the copper chains, they'll snap. Herd them together…"

"Thanks." The commissaris felt for his wallet.

"No money." Troelstra crossed his arms.

The commissaris put down a note. "Not for me, for your customer over there."

The old man in the dirty coat laughed gratefully. "It's really quite easy."

"You're sure now?" the commissaris asked.

"Have a few drinks with me, sir, and you'll know for yourself." The old man waved an all-explaining arm. "Drink your ignorant self to the center where the mystery lives. Once you see it, everything becomes clear."

"And can you stay there?"

The old man winked. "Follow me."

"I'd rather go alone."

"The method is the same," the old man said. "I'll guide you a bit of the way."

"Perhaps later," the commissaris said, and escaped through the door.