Two thoughts entered my head. One was that people had surely died, and I was lucky not to have been one of them.
The other thought: whoever was attempting to free Edouard Tailleur hadn’t needed Rem Lottman kidnapped to try and do so.
34
AMSTERDAM MANEGE
I didn’t need to go to hospital. I was fine – just shaken. Twenty minutes and a cigarette later, I was driving myself to Amsterdam, unable to resist listening to the news on the radio. It came in instalments: Tailleur had been taken to hospital under heavily armed guard. He was in intensive care. The attempt to rescue him had killed the driver of the van carrying the bomb, and seriously injured one of the ICC’s security guards. Hospital staff needed to amputate one of Scissor Man’s legs.
There’s some justice left out there, I thought, pulling up and parking in front of the IJ Tunnel 3 police station.
Stefan was sitting in the squad room. A radio was on, competing in volume with the whir of an old electric fan.
‘Didn’t expect to see you back,’ he said, looking surprised.
‘Neither did I.’
He looked at me more closely. ‘Are you OK?’
The heat of the blast had reddened my face and singed my eyebrows.
‘It was hot in Brussels,’ I said. ‘Any luck finding Lesoto?’
‘Not yet. He’s not attempted to enter Holland or Belgium again.’
I eased myself into my roller chair. ‘What about Sheikh Yasan?’
‘Nothing to report there either.’
‘Then what about down south? Any developments in Tilburg?’
Stefan flipped through his notes. ‘The kidnappers have demanded a ransom in four currencies.’
I turned sharply, wincing as my shirt collar rubbed blistered skin. ‘How do you know this?’
‘Radio.’
‘This came through the media?’
‘Yes.’
‘It’s the Heineken kidnapping, move for move. What’s the total ransom amount?’
‘Approximately fifteen million euros, at current exchange rates.’
‘How did I know you were going to say that amount? Next they’ll be calling themselves the “eagle” and us the “hare”; telling us to put a congratulations notice in the personal-ads section of the newspaper…’
Those had been the tactics used by Heineken’s kidnappers to control and humiliate us.
‘You don’t buy it?’ Stefan said.
‘I’m not sure what I buy,’ I replied. ‘But there’s something off about that photo, for one thing.’ I went to De Telegraaf’s website and pulled up the image of Lottman. ‘Don’t you think it’s been manipulated?’
He came over to look at it over my shoulder. ‘Boss, your hair looks burned.’
‘Like I said, it was hot in Brussels. Look – there’s a shimmer of light, if I can call it that.’ It seemed familiar somehow. ‘Yet in every other respect it looks like he’s in some kind of dark room.’
Stefan went back to his own desk and started typing.
‘It’s more like a rippling of light, isn’t it?’ he said.
I felt a jolt in my chest. ‘That’s what it is: the rippling effect of light reflecting off water.’
‘But why’s it there?’ Stefan asked.
We sat in silence, staring at our screens.
‘There’s no water near Tilburg,’ I said.
‘There must be ponds, fountains, paddling pools,’ Stefan mused. ‘Perhaps Lottman was photographed through a window, with some body of water outside. I bet the investigative team is looking closely at that.’
‘Hoi oi,’ a cheery voice said. It was Liesbeth. ‘Are you OK?’ she asked, after seeing the state of me.
‘Remind me to pack some sun cream next time. Who are those for?’
She was carrying a little tray of tompouce.
‘Dessert.’ She shrugged. ‘I picked them up on my way back from lunch. Want one?’
‘I see how it goes around here when I’m away: tompouce in the afternoon, the radio blaring away…’
‘How else would we hear what’s going on?’ Stefan said.
‘Aren’t you supposed to be on holiday with your wife and daughter?’ Liesbeth said, helping herself to a slice coated with pink icing. As she bit into it, a pink smudge appeared on her nose, which she quickly wiped away.
I was tucking into one myself, trying to prevent the custard cream squishing sideways as I bit down on the pastry, when my phone rang. I thought it might be Petra asking after my whereabouts – I’d neglected to call her – but the number on the screen was Belgian.
‘Officer van der Pol? It’s Leonie in Brussels.’
I forced myself to swallow.
‘Have you heard the news from The Hague?’ she asked.
‘I have. I was there when it happened.’
I got up and walked into the corridor, Stefan and Liesbeth munching slowly as they watched me go.
‘Tailleur just died in hospital,’ she said.
‘That’s one less violent criminal to worry about.’
‘The International Criminal Court will repatriate his body.’
‘Good for them. Are you OK?’
‘I think so. It looks like Tailleur and his men were not the reason Rem disappeared, then.’
‘That’s a reasonable assumption.’
Her voice became quieter. ‘So what’s the real reason he went missing?’
‘Ransom is the official theory.’ I shook my head; it just didn’t feel right. ‘It’s what we’re all trying to find out.’
Leonie was silent.
I looked out of a small window at the road leading into the IJ tunnel; traffic trundled obliviously in each direction.
‘Before – when I asked you if he seemed depressed – you said that you didn’t feel you knew him that well. Was there anything you left out?’
‘Such as?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know, I’m just wondering whether he had any weaknesses we weren’t aware of.’
‘Weaknesses?’
‘Gambling, maybe. Or drugs.’
‘He was a senior politician!’
I was silent, allowing a vacuum to form in the conversation.
‘I have to go,’ she said, flustered.
‘Wait, Leonie –’
But she’d gone.
I almost threw the phone to the floor, but I controlled myself and re-entered the squad room.
‘How was The Hague?’ Liesbeth asked.
‘A dead end.’
I sat down.
‘You weren’t affected by that bombing, were you?’
‘Not unduly. Look, do you have that report?’
‘On my interview with Lottman’s mother?’
‘Yes.’
‘It’s in your inbox.’
‘Good.’
I sighed as I opened up my email – the tens of unread messages. One, from Joost, jumped out immediately:
Henk, I’d like to meet to discuss one or two things. Apparently you’re in Brussels? Let me know as soon as you’re back in Amsterdam. That’s not an invitation.
‘Weren’t you supposed to meet the sister?’ Liesbeth was asking.
I was still staring at the email, deciding what to do.
‘Henk?’ Liesbeth prompted.
‘Yes?’
‘Weren’t you going to meet Lottman’s sister?’ she said. ‘Or d’you want me to?’
‘No, I’ve got it,’ I replied, finding the report she’d just emailed and printing it off.
I collected the printout and gathered up my phone and keys from my desk.
‘Where do I find her?’
*
The Hollandsche Manege is an indoor equestrian centre inspired by Vienna’s famous riding school. Bui
lt in the 1880s, it was conceived at a time when Holland’s confidence in the world was riding high. It’s an improbable venue to find in the heart of Amsterdam today.
I drove up the busy thoroughfare of Overtoom, negotiating bikes, trams and everything in-between, deliberating how I would present myself differently from the official investigators, who would surely have questioned Carla Lottman by now.
The weather in Amsterdam was warm – not as hot as in Brussels, but it made the smell of hay and horse excrement less incongruous to me, as I recalled a much earlier impression: of Africa, and the heat there…
Odd, the power of sudden memories.
I approached the entrance to the riding school on leafy Vondelstraat. The other buildings were mostly residential: substantial and finely detailed, just like on the other side of the Vondelpark, where diplomats Lars Pelt and Lesoto had been living until recently. An old man in overalls was scraping the pavement outside the entrance with a spade, making my teeth hurt. There was a little front desk, at which a woman sat glumly. A sign announced that it cost eight euros to enter. ‘I’m here to see one of the pupils,’ I explained, showing my warrant card. The woman didn’t react and I barely had to break stride.
The iron and stone neoclassical structure was far more impressive on the inside, with its finely carved balconies and upper-level seating. The sand in the arena was carefully raked. Over it trotted four white horses in a figure-of-eight. A haze hung in the air that aggravated my sinuses.
Carla Lottman was instantly recognisable from the family resemblance. She didn’t have Rem’s physical bulk but she was ungainly on her Spanish horse – not quite synchronised with the animal’s movements as she rose and sat in the saddle. Her face was gripped with concentration. She shared Lottman’s dark features – eyes, eyebrows. Her hair was tied up under her helmet.
I made my way over to the instructor, who was yelling directions from the edge of the arena.
‘Howdy,’ I said, showing her my warrant card. ‘I need to talk to one of your pupils.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘Not again. Can you at least wait till the end of this exercise? We’ve been working on this all afternoon.’
I shrugged and leaned over the railing. The instructor stood just the other side of it. ‘Carla, quieten your hands and get your heels down!’
Carla’s eyes were downcast. Or was she avoiding mine? She didn’t seem to have a problem with being yelled at – which surprised me, for the sister of a senior Brussels bureaucrat. The scene had the feel of a school pony club from the way the instructor was addressing her, yet it was hardly like Carla was a girl. Perhaps once she’d been a handsome woman; her face now had a sunken, jowly look.
As well as finding out where Carla spent most afternoons, Liesbeth had learned that she didn’t have a job. However, she was involved in a number of charitable causes. For example, she volunteered at the famous Botanical Gardens over on Plantage Middenlaan, which was a stone’s throw from the police station. It would have been a much more convenient location to pay a visit to, I thought.
Like Rem, she wasn’t married.
The instructor strode into the middle of the arena to speak with Carla. I pulled out Liesbeth’s report on the mother, which I’d put in my jacket’s inside pocket. I’d only just unfolded it and read the first paragraph when I heard a loud snort and sensed a horse bearing down on me. Carla glowered from on high.
‘I suppose it’s me you’re looking for,’ she said.
‘I’ve a couple of questions to ask about your brother, if you don’t mind.’
‘Actually I do mind. Did you not think to make an appointment?’
‘I can wait, if you want to finish up –’
‘I’ve told your people all that I have to say. Do you not talk to one another?’
I paused; the horse pawed the sand. ‘I just wanted to quickly go over any contact you had with him in the days leading up to his disappearance –’
‘I’ve explained: I didn’t have contact. We weren’t close.’
I noted the way she used the past tense.
The instructor was making her way over.
‘Just one other question –’
But I caught the way that the horse was pinning its ears back. I didn’t know a lot about horses, but I was pretty sure that this wasn’t a good sign. I backed away from the railing before the instructor had a chance to reprimand me further.
I walked up the dusty stairs to the café on the first floor. It was a long, white-stuccoed room with a certain faded glamour. It smelled like a barn. I ordered a cup of coffee and leaned against the once-opulent bar while I waited for my drink.
Carla Lottman had said all she would to me – precious few words – but I’d somehow learned more about Rem’s inner life from those few seconds than in all my enquiries to date, including the occasions I’d spent with Lottman himself. I could suddenly see his childhood, and the world that the Lottman siblings must have inhabited together – no matter how estranged their relationship had become. Unlike when I’d talked to his girlfriend, it felt as though I’d been allowed through the stage door, to the life behind the set of his public existence.
I sat down with my coffee, which tasted weak, and pulled out Liesbeth’s report on the mother. I read it fast the first time, to see what jumped out. Pulling out a pen and clasping the cap between my teeth, I started circling anything of interest.
Lottman’s father had committed suicide forty years ago. Liesbeth had found this out from background research rather than by talking to Mrs Lottman. It lent the suggestion of a curse over the family. Rem had been at Leiden Law School at the time, an accomplishment that the mother had spoken about with pride – as Liesbeth had noted. I’d heard or seen somewhere that Lottman read law; Leiden would have been the logical choice. I was just thinking that it was a short journey from Noordwijk, if I happened to be down that way to visit the mother, when a scream pierced the air. Then a neigh, followed by a general commotion.
I ran through to the gallery that looked down on the arena, almost losing my balance as I leaned over to see what was going on. Lying on the ground – on her back – was Carla Lottman. Through a cloud of dust, her face appeared white. The instructor and a man leaned over her. Carla’s horse was ambling back into the middle of the arena. It must have thrown her.
I ran down the stairs.
The instructor’s eyes widened in surprise on seeing me.
‘There’s nothing to see,’ she said angrily. ‘She’s just winded.’
‘What happened?’
‘The horse spooked,’ she snapped.
It wasn’t the only one.
35
JOOST, REBOOTED
That evening Muriel Crutzen, the Dutch energy minister, made an appearance on NPO1, the public TV channel. She looked elegant in her fitted suit, but its dark charcoal colour gave her a funereal presence. She wore no make-up, and her eyes appeared larger and steadier than usual as she addressed her primetime audience.
I was back at the houseboat, a jenever in one hand, the TV remote in the other. My first thought was: election stunt. The polls were close and getting closer.
‘Good evening,’ she began. ‘I want to bring you the troubling news about Rem Lottman, a great public servant of Holland and my attaché in the Council of Europe. I have known him for many years, and can attest to the great value he has brought to both my office in Brussels and the country as a whole.’
The last words felt freighted with hidden meaning. Did Crutzen know about the favours-for-energy scheme? She would have been one of the first people that I’d have tried to speak with, had the enquiry that Rem envisaged gone ahead. How high did knowledge of the scheme go?
‘The people purporting to be holding Mr Lottman have given us ninety-six hours, or four days, to pay the ransom.’
I sat forward. This was new. There had been no such dea
dline in the Heineken case.
I eyed my old army watch, checking the date and the time.
‘I’m appealing directly to any of you who may know those implicated. I urge you to come forward now and speak with the special investigation team we’ve set up.’
Did they have no clue who the kidnappers were, then? Or was she bluffing? In the Heineken case, we’d identified the gang relatively quickly – only we didn’t know their whereabouts.
I reached for my phone.
‘We are a small country. If we work together, then we can bring about the right outcome. But we must work together. So, please, if you know anything – anything,’ she repeated, ‘about the people responsible for this unconscionable threat, then call one of the following numbers.’
The screen went blue and white, and up flashed two sets of digits: an Amsterdam number and a toll-free one.
I called van Tongerloo.
Crutzen reappeared on the screen, the phone numbers displayed beneath her. ‘Please do this now: it could save lives. Thank you for listening and goodnight.’
‘Frank van Tongerloo,’ he answered.
‘It’s Henk van der Pol.’
A second of silence. I could hear squad-room bustle in the background. In Tilburg?
‘I’m just going into a meeting.’ His voice sounded thinner, reedier. Was the pressure getting to him?
‘Listen, van Tongerloo. Like the minister just said on national television, if you saw it, we need to work together now. I knew Lottman, and I’m back in Amsterdam. Matter of fact, I just met with the sis –’
‘Sorry,’ he cut in, ‘we have to focus, to prioritise.’ Then, as if remembering something, he added, ‘We have the police commissioner from Amsterdam arriving at any moment.’
‘What?’ It was like an electric shock through me. ‘Joost van Erven?’
‘That’s right.’
‘What’s he doing?’
‘Running the Dutch command post, as of an hour ago. I must go.’ The line went dead.
*
I remained sitting there, in silence. Then a key scratched in the lock and turned.
‘Hoi?’
The Harbour Master Page 23