The Perfidious Parrot

by Janwillem Van De Wetering

  Grijpstra took command. “Get us out of here, sergeant.”

  “That is understood, adjutant. At your orders.”

  De Gier clicked his rear lights on and off so the driver of the chasing van would believe that the Cadillac was suddenly braking. He did indeed think so. In order to avoid a collision the felt-haired driver stamped on his own brake and the sudden loss of speed caused him and his companions to lunge forward and strike their heads against the van’s windshield. The Cadillac, meanwhile, increased speed. De Gier twisted his wheel a little in order to give the impression that he was about to make a sharp turn to the left, then made his car turn all the way to the right. Another feint? Yes, the car made a left U-turn. The complicated maneuver unsettled the pursuing van. It slipped off the tarmac, plowed through a row of trash cans, skidded into a field, destroyed thorn bushes, veered off a palm tree, collided with car wrecks and turned over slowly.

  The commissaris finally understood the road map and guided de Gier to a highway where the Cadillac joined steady traffic on a Miami bypass. Cars in parallel lines were driven by neat old men wearing straw hats.

  “If you keep following Route 1 signs,” the commissaris told de Gier, “we’ll reach the Everglades soon.” He read the reverse side of his map. “Ibis and giant white heron, eagle and bear, panthers even, and then we’ll cross those bridges you mentioned, Grijpstra, between two bodies of water, connecting a long stretch of islands, terminating in Key West.”

  Grijpstra had inserted a CD into the opening in the car’s dashboard. Four stereo loudspeakers emitted the sound of the trumpet of Wallace Roney. “So What?” The outskirts of Miami flashed by. Skyscraping hotels mirrored each other in a thousand windows. The Cadillac moved smoothly. Peace had returned. “Yes, indeed,” the commissaris said, closing his eyes for a moment to be able to concentrate on Herbie Hancock’s piano. The notes were impeccably clear, Roney’s trumpet entered again and guided the commissaris to gain insights. Just for a split second he almost knew what everything was about.

  The commissaris, hands folded on a slightly protruding stomach, head resting on velvet covered foam rubber upholstery, snored softly. Grijpstra thought dreamily about two supertankers moored to each other, one spouting, one sucking. Could such an event have happened? Robber tankers sidling up to victim tankers. Pirates jumping from one deck to another. A machine gun rattles. Pumps and tubes being dragged across gunwales. Sailor Michiel bleeds to death. Captain Souza raves and rants in his cabin. Nobody pushes the emergency button? No SOS signals flash through cyberspace? No Coast Guard cutter approaches at full speed? Nothing but empty sea and sea gulls hacking into the squirming flesh of a foully murdered young hero? De Gier switched the Cadillac into cruise control, fifty miles per hour, the speed limit announced on signs along the two lane road. Swamps stretched to the horizon on both sides, an expanse of flat greens and yellows with an occasional cluster of bushes and pines. White and gray herons and egrets waded thoughtfully, cormorants and crows sat on telephone and electrical lines, an osprey peered down from a large untidy nest built on a giant billboard showing a leggy and breasty woman sipping whiskey, the same glossy color as her hair.

  De Gier listened to the jazz trumpet, trying to play each note in his mind along with the performing genius. Grijpstra listened along, drumming on his knees, softly, because the CD’s percussion was soft too, especially while swishing the cymbals although there were quick rattles on the tom-drums because a drummer remains a drummer.

  “Heh,” sighed Grijpstra ecstatically.

  How pleasant it all can be, de Gier thought contentedly.

  The Everglades receded into forgotten background. Speedboats left futuristic white stripes upon the azure water. Pelicans accompanied the car, like policemen riding Harley-Davidsons around a limo transporting a governor on tour. Beach houses hid under palm trees. Key West was approaching. The figures indicating distance became lower and lower. Key West would be Mile Zero.

  De Gier wanted to eat but Grijpstra and the commissaris were dozing happily. The CD player performed Duke Ellington’s “Caravan.” He moved cruise control up to 60 mph. Grijpstra mumbled and the commissaris sighed. “Caravan,” de Gier knew, was inspired by a camel caravan trotting. Little bells sounded while the animals, in the joy of motion, rhythmically moved their long legs in unison. The ideal journey, de Gier thought, keeps going. The ideal traveller forgets departure, ignores destination. None of the moving images matter—he does not wish to stay, he is not afraid to leave them. He enjoys the passing show.

  De Gier vaguely thought of food again. Key West, according to the leaflets, was Lazy Gourmet Heaven. There would be the stone crab that offers its tasty fighting claw and grows a new one when thrown back after amputation. There would be the differently tasty lobster tail. There would be giant shrimps, there would be fish of all colors, sizes, tastes, denominations. And Florida’s mainland would provide tossed salads, fruits covered with whipped cream, vegetables for the thus inclined.

  A special dish would be ragout of conch, a humongous shellfish, an endangered species not caught in U.S. waters but Key West’s supply is ample for the nearby Bahamas and the Antilles don’t mind robbing their part of the ocean in exchange for dollars. Then, eventually, there would be key lime pie, the ultimate association of lemons, eggs, crust and cream.

  “Hunger,” groaned the gradually waking Grijpstra. “Maybe a little taste of something?” the commissaris whispered from the rear seat. He studied a new map. “Key West already? Cross the bridge, de Gier, turn left onto Roosevelt Drive, turn right onto Duval Street, second block on the left. There is a restaurant called Lobster Lateta.”

  “Hotel?” Grijpstra asked.

  “Eggemoggin Hotel,” the commissaris said. “Lots of stars. Eat first. Shall we do that?”

  Food was served on the restaurant’s sidewalk terrace with a view of Duval Street. Shopping tourists, in slobby-snob attire, wandered along on the sidewalks; restored antique cars moved slowly along well-kept tarmac. Female bikers thundered along at five miles an hour. The riders, dressed in identical orange bib-overalls over brown T-shirts, wore First World War steel helmets. Some were hardly able to reach their machines’s handlebars. A heavily made-up desiccated old woman rode a rickshaw pulled by a body builder with a gold painted chest and a bamboo penis holder, aggressively pointing forward. A singlefile jazz band goose-stepped slowly along, one foot on the sidewalk, one foot in the gutter. The leader was a Native American wearing a feathered hat and playing the trombone. The band consisted of white and black musicians. It played a passable version of Monk’s “Rhythm-A-Ning.”

  The commissaris saw Stewart-Wynne’s jeep as it came roaring along, before his companions did. Time slowed down, as it had done before when he faced a life-threatening situation, but then there had been evil on the other side: a criminal holding a gun, a fight on a railway platform—he had almost been pushed under a train. He had faced death in illness too, to the point where he had detached from his body and floated up from a hospital bed and looked down on Katrien’s head and noticed her first gray hairs. He had despaired then, thinking she might need him, and gone back to fight those lethal microbes, greedy, out to tear the flesh off his bones. Now the threatening image seemed friendly. The commissaris liked jeeps. He remembered American troops driving down an Amsterdam street in a jeep, the first Allied soldiers he had seen during the liberation. He wanted to welcome the square engine hood, the chromium plated headlights.

  The deadly machine hurled closer. The bright blue vehicle hit the Cadillac, parked correctly on the other side of the street, sideways. The jeep bounced off. The Englishman hung onto the steering wheel for dear life. His mouth was wide open. He was probably shouting. The jeep hit other parked cars, grinding their fenders with its own, causing clouds of sparks. The jazz band tried to scatter but merged again and poured itself into an ethnic art gallery, bumping into African tribal sculptures and sliding about on Oriental rugs. The rickshaw shot into an alley, where it broke its
carrying poles and jettisoned the old woman. The body builder climbed a palm.

  The commissaris, using the uncommonly long length of what had to be only a split second, chose to forget his lame leg for the moment. He jumped across the table and shoved Grijpstra, chair and all, to the side. Grijpstra’s foot was in the jeep’s way, he shrieked while pulling it back. De Gier, aware of the danger before Grijpstra was pushed over, shoved guests out of the way of the roaring jeep—then, to save himself, ran into a decorative garden at the rear of the restaurant and fell into a shallow goldfish pond that was partly covered with water lilies in flower. The jeep, having climbed the wooden steps leading to the terrace, followed de Gier, splintering furniture in its path. “Out of the way!” yelled John Wayne, with a British accent. (The commissaris mentioned that later: because of the slowing down of time, he had been able to notice how “put on” the all-American cowboy’s voice seemed.) “Wayayayayay …” Stewart-Wynne screamed with his last breath. The jeep entered the goldfish pond too, as it was vacated by de Gier, and was suspended from its rock wall, all wheels spinning. De Gier turned the car’s ignition key. A fearful silence became filled with groans and curses. Guests picked each other up. A woman, raised by the commissaris, wailed about irreparable damage done to her hand-painted silk dress. She pointed a shaking finger at Stewart-Wynne’s limp body. “I hope that drunk hurt himself.” She narrowed her eyes and asked, “Or do you think he is stoned?” She mimed inserting a pill into her mouth. “Some mind-altering substance? Maybe he was out of it?”

  “He won’t get back to it,” the commissaris said, studying the unnatural angle between the driver’s head and torso.

  A police-cyclist arrived. The athletic looking young man wore khaki shorts and a blue shirt above a polished gunbelt hung with law-enforcement paraphernalia, polished boots and high socks. The cop knelt next to the corpse and sniffed at its lips. “I did that already,” de Gier said. “No liquor, but look at this.” He showed the policeman the inside of the jeep, where the accelerator was detached from its hinge. “And here, this isn’t right either.” The brake pedal was pushed in. “The poor fellow had no controls; it’s amazing the steering wheel hasn’t been fussed with also.”

  The policeman stared at de Gier.

  “How come, huh?” de Gier asked.

  “How come,” the policeman asked slowly, “you know so much, huh?” He touched de Gier’s shoulder with a powerful hand. “You stay close, buddy.” He spoke into his radio transmitter. “Sergeant Symonds? Harry here. Situation at Duval and Louisa, Northside. Dead tourist in cowboy outfit at the wheel of a Mount Trashmore rented blue jeep. Lobster Lateta Restaurant, sixty percent destroyed. Quarter of a million collision damage to Duval-parked cars, Darn-Dikes’s bikes, Aunt Tata’s rickshaw, Golden Boy’s genital wear and the Stompers’s instruments. The chihuahua in the ethnic gallery is in a defensive coma. Apart from the driver, nobody seems to be hurt. Amazing, huh? Probable criminal intent and a wise-ass witness. Sergeant? Mind sending the van and some technical backup? And an ambulance for the corpse.”

  “Ten-four,” a musical (veiled, and jazzy, de Gier thought) female voice said. “Thanks, Harry, and out.”

  11

  PORTRAIT OF A COMPANION BIRD

  The commissaris and Grijpstra had a meeting in their suite at the Eggemoggin Hotel. Grijpstra had exchanged the damaged Cadillac at Avis Key West. The commissaris telephoned Carl Ambagt. The FEADship had, Carl reported, just sighted the Bahaman island of Eleuthera. The Rodney was still going slowly. There had been, Carl complained, a blockage of air in the cylinders. The air had been bled out meanwhile. The air had gotten in because of clogged fuel pipes. The clogging was caused because fuel taken on at Bermuda had gummed up. The gumming up was caused by “poop.”

  “Poop, Mr. Ambagt?”

  “Little-animal-poop,” Carl said. Microbes that live in fuel oil only partially consume their daily intake. A residue is excreted by the parasitic organisms as gummy poop. Not, Carl said, an entirely unknown phenomenon; poop in fuel lines has slowed down naval battles. “You never heard of microbe poop? No? It was a first for me too, but here we are, slowed down to five knots.” Carl had gotten his information from his ship’s engineer—twenty years of service with the Royal Dutch Navy. Carl said he believed the entire story was baloney. Some crew member probably forgot to open a fuel line somewhere, so the engine sucked air instead. Diesel engines choke on air. So what to do? Admit guilt? Never. Invent microbe poop.

  “I see,” the commissaris said, puzzled.

  Whatever happened, Carl said, the Rodney would dock in Key West for repairs. Any day now. The Rodney was a perfect vessel but oversights will occur and the ocean does not forgive weakness. Everything would be taken care of in due course. Sometime soon they would all be on their way to the Antilles, to see some action.

  “Not all of us,” the commissaris said and filled his client in about a jeep hitting Lobster Lateta and the Key West Police holding on to de Gier for further questioning.

  “I hope he brought his gloves,” laughed Carl.

  “Beg pardon?”

  It was okay, Carl said, he had to hang up now. The boatswain was reporting seaweed in his vessel’s exhaust.

  Carl sounded nervous. “He has to lower a diver.”

  “Good luck,” the commissaris said.

  “You think de Gier will be arrested?”

  “Could be.” The commissaris’s aching legs were bothered by an onshore breeze. He lay down and covered himself up with a cotton blanket. Grijpstra rested on the next enormous bed. Together they analyzed the confrontation at Lobster Lateta. Grijpstra’s theory, an arranged simultaneous failure of brake and accelerator, seemed acceptable. The gentleman/cowboy was not drunk. He didn’t look like a substance abuser either. De Gier, before he was escorted to the police van, had reported on its mechanical malfunctions, but the jeep was new with not two thousand miles on the odometer.

  “Not logical as a mishap,” the commissaris concluded.

  Grijpstra’s theory included a “hellish machine,” a Dutch legal term, indicating a device intentionally installed to cause physical harm.

  De Gier entered the room after midnight.

  “Gallivanting?” the commissaris asked.

  The enquiry had taken up some time. De Gier had been told not to leave town and to be prepared to be picked up at any given moment.

  “Trying to be clever,” Grijpstra said. “To the police of all people. To the American police. Don’t you watch movies? They kill you here for being clever.”

  “Sergeant Symonds,” de Gier said, “takes us for big players. Our profiles are wrong. We can’t be tourists. We’re a godfather with two lieutenants. We’re here to be bad.”

  The commissaris sat up. He smiled gleefully. “Is that so?” He rubbed his hands. “So what’s the Key West Police sergeant like?”

  De Gier reported. “Black female, mid-thirties, tall, attractive, lot of strong white teeth, efficient, intelligent, can think for herself.”

  “Did you charm her?” Grijpstra asked.

  “Not the type.”

  De Gier had, after spending over an hour in a badly ventilated cell, spoken the truth to Sergeant Ramona Symonds. He and his two friends were eating lobster tail and stone crab claw at their cozy little table in the classy restaurant when a jeep careened off Duval Street and aimed straight for them. Subsequently, as a former Amsterdam Murder Brigade detective, now self-employed as a private eye, de Gier had alerted Harry, the bicycle-cop, to technical points of interest. Harry, however, seemed to have a personality disorder. An extreme case of paranoia? Or someone who likes to annoy his betters?

  “Harry is a dear,” Ramona said. “So what brings you here, my former colleague?”

  De Gier and his associates, an ex-police non-com and a retired chief-detective, had been invited by the shipping firm of Ambagt & Son to join the directors on their yacht for a journey to the Netherlands Antilles.

  Yes, the invitation was connected to a p
rofessional project.

  No, de Gier could not divulge further information.

  No, nothing illegal. “Really, Miss. No? You prefer to be addressed as Sergeant? Really, Sergeant.”

  What was Ambagt & Son’s business?

  Crude oil in tankers.

  No, no drugs.

  So far the to-and-fro had been easy, rhythmic, a round of table tennis, ping-pong, ping-pong.

  After that some tension occurred. “No kidding,” the sergeant said, straightening her shirt, adorned on the sleeve with three small gold chevrons. “Crude oil? That’s not a big product here in Key West, you know that? And I know the FEADship you mentioned. The Admiraal Rodney, right? She destroyed one of our quays, behind the Hotel Singh, not six blocks from here. That was last year. A FEADship is just about the most expensive type of private yacht that plies our seas. Made in Holland. Just like you.

  “And you live in …” she checked de Gier’s passport, “… in Amsterdam. Isn’t that where heroin is supplied, free of charge, by the city?” Sergeant Symonds rummaged through a stack of papers. “It so happens that I just read something on that. Here. A newspaper clipping, an article on Amsterdam drug use. Heroin Heaven.” She nodded angrily. “Something my kid brother from Detroit would like to try out. It would make him happy.”

  De Gier said that drug trafficking in Amsterdam was illegal.

  “But isn’t the city a hub for the international trade?” Sergeant Symonds asked. De Gier denied it. She didn’t hear his answer as her phone was ringing. She picked up the receiver, listened, thanked the speaker, replaced the receiver. The large brown eyes under artfully curved eyebrows searched de Gier’s face. Her soft voice vibrated. De Gier’s spine vibrated too. He assumed she sang, in a choir in a church perhaps. “The jeep driver was murdered,” the soft vibrating voice said. “You knew that.”

  De Gier knew nothing.

  “Didn’t you tell me just now that you’re a private eye?” the sergeant asked. She curved her thumb and index finger around her eye.