by Cathy Ace
“We hope you enjoy the portrait Jonas painted of you. It was his special wish that you should have it,” I began. “It’s a shame you can’t give us any insights into his life. He was a talented artist and we understand the Group of Seven thrived because of him.”
Greta van Burken sighed. She plopped her napkin on top of her food. “The Group of Seven was an excuse for drinking and debauching, with long, boring discussions about art as a cover. I enjoyed my proper art lessons, and I became a good watercolor painter. Most of the others had no talent, but they pretended to play at art very well.”
“Jonas organized lessons, life classes, opportunities for people to develop their skills,” I said.
“Opportunities to look at naked woman, then drink until they fell over, or fought.”
“You belonged to the Group. You took part in it all.”
“Only while it was worth it.”
“Worth it in what way?”
Greta paused. “In ways I choose to not explain to you.” She looked at Bud. “You were police, no?”
Bud looked proud. “All my life.”
She shrugged. “Then that is all I have to say.”
The waiter brought the check, which Bud insisted upon paying, and we left, carrying the unwanted painting. Our hurried walk back to Jonas’s house gave me time to comfort Bud, try to regain my composure—despite getting sweaty all over again—and think through what Greta had said. Or, rather, what she hadn’t said. Another one who didn’t like the police?
I was relieved when Bud pulled his cell phone from his pocket, stopped to take the call, and rested the painting against his legs. I could tell it was important news. I waited, standing in the swirling Saturday throngs of locals and tourists, hoping it was good news—which in this case could mean many things.
The Man in the Street
“THANKS,” SAID BUD, WINDING UP his call. “I owe you.” He put the phone back into his pocket and picked up the painting. I was quivering with anticipation.
“So?” I urged, cantering to keep up with Bud, who was striding off. “What did ‘John’ say? Was it natural causes as the result of an accidental fall, or what?”
“Not news about Jonas, but about Dirk van der Hoeven,” replied Bud. He sounded as disappointed as I was.
“How can that be? Is it easier to get hold of old records than new ones?”
“I guess so. Anyway, he says he should have news about Jonas in a couple of hours. We’ll have to wait.” He sounded resigned.
“What about Dirk, then? Heart attack in the garden, as Pieter told us?”
“More or less.”
“What do you mean? Surely it either was or it wasn’t?”
“He suffered a massive cardiac arrest, says the autopsy, but there was some question about where it happened, because the body had been moved. In the filed statements, Menno said his mother called him; he rushed to their home, found her dragging his dead father into the house from the garden, so he finished the job. Medics arrived on the scene and pronounced. They took Dirk’s remains for examination. Paperwork says heart. He had a history of high blood pressure and high cholesterol, and he smoked like a chimney, apparently. His doctor wasn’t surprised that it had happened, nor his family. Note on the file said Marlene accompanied his body to the hospital and kept telling his corpse that she’d warned him.”
Pulling on Bud’s arm to get him to pause, I was silent for a moment—largely because I was out of breath and not enjoying the feeling of sweat trickling down my back. Finally, I said, “What had she warned him about, I wonder? His poor lifestyle choices? Or that he shouldn’t have done something that made someone want to kill him?”
Bud shook his head and looked at me with sad eyes. “All I wanted to do was fulfill my uncle’s wishes, and be able to go back to Mom with some knowledge she could cherish about the guy. Instead, there’s all of this…I don’t know, this atmosphere of things not being what they appear to be. I don’t like it.”
“When we’ve delivered the last of the pictures we’ll still have days of our visit left. We can get to the galleries, be a couple of relaxed tourists enjoying the architecture and history of the place. We can linger over a beer in an open square and talk about history, art, and culture—even tulips—to our hearts’ content. Let’s just push on through, and we’ll come out the other end unscathed, I’m sure. This is all about being able to give your mom something she can cling to other than a sad memory of a missing brother—a hole in her life. We can do that, Bud, if we persevere. Let’s hope we turn up some real insights into Jonas that show him to have been a wonderful person. I’m sure we will.”
“You are a terrible liar, Cait. Something for which I am grateful. We both know neither of us will rest until we’ve worked out what’s going on in the background. It might well be that Jonas fell to his death and that, for once, we’re spared the problem of finding a killer. This goes almost deeper than that for me—this is now about understanding the story of a blood relative’s life. Mom is getting on, but you’re right: even at this stage in her life she deserves something to hang on to that is more than her childhood memory of a brother who left her behind. I was hoping we’d meet at least one person in whom Jonas had confided about why he did that. Then she might get some closure. It seems he kept himself to himself, and all we have are some stupidly cryptic comments he’s made in letter after letter. It’s not enough, Cait.”
“You want justice for your mom, don’t you?”
“You can call it that if you like. What I really want is to understand why he did what he did. Then I can tell her. I’m beginning to care less about what he made of his life after all. Unless, of course, something comes to light that suggests nefarious activities on the part of one or more of the Group of Seven.”
“Greta made it clear she wasn’t going to say anything much because she knew of your background as a cop. Who do you think told her that? Menno? Do you think they’re all still in touch with each other and are throwing up a smokescreen?”
“To hide what?” snapped Bud.
“I thought your theory about drug trafficking held a good deal of water.”
“I’m not so sure now.”
“Why?”
“I also asked my buddy to look into all the people who belonged to the Group.”
I shouldn’t have been surprised. Bud’s nothing if not thorough. “And?” was all I said.
“Willem had been a person of interest in several cases, as his daughter told us. Often hauled in when dodgy art showed up around the city. But the others? Clean as the proverbial whistles. I didn’t expect Jonas to turn out to be some sort of superhero, but I’d hoped for more than this vision of him. It seems he was an unfulfilled man with a temper, who tramped around the world looking for a connection with dead artists he idolized, ignoring the obvious talent he possessed while living his life in dead-end jobs. It seems such a shame he didn’t do more with his art. He was really good, wasn’t he? I’m not just saying that because he’s a relative—and, of course, I don’t know art like you do—but everything we’ve seen that he painted, it’s quite something, right?”
I assured Bud he wasn’t exaggerating the quality of his uncle’s work. We’d arrived back at Jonas’s house, so we’d nipped inside, deposited the piece Greta hadn’t wanted, and picked up all four pieces we needed for the two appointments we had ahead of us. Bud checked his watch. “Frans is late again,” he observed. We were standing on the front doorstep when the car arrived. This time it was a graphite gray saloon, and the driver wasn’t Frans.
The dark-haired driver in his thirties who emerged from the vehicle appeared to be of Middle Eastern descent, if not birth, and he spoke with a distinct English accent. It was a surprise.
“Good afternoon. I am Farhad, your driver,” he announced as he opened the car door for me.
“No F
rans today?” I asked, wriggling into the leather-scented interior.
“Not today. It’s his family day. He looks after his mother, who is not at all well. She might not have long.”
I felt a bit guilty that I’d thought of Frans only as a mildly irritating driver. Then I reminded myself that he had, in fact, been a mildly irritating driver, but that we all have our responsibilities in life and I couldn’t be expected to guess at everyone’s. It helped. A bit. With this in mind I decided to make an effort to be a little more interactive with Farhad and opened with, “Your accent is English. Is that where you’re from?”
As we negotiated the cobbles and crowds I could see Farhad smiling—not sitting directly behind him was helpful. “What a delightfully polite way to ask that question,” he said. “Many people ask where I’m from and are surprised when I say Norwich, England. They expect something much more exotic, and not in a good way. They want to work out if they can trust me.”
“Well, I’m Welsh, so I suppose the answer might be no,” I quipped.
“Ah yes, the lingering sleight of being invaded and subjugated by another race almost a millennium ago,” said Farhad, with good nature. “I feel that too. My family moved to England from Iran back in the seventies. I was born in Norwich, went to university in Bristol, and now live here.”
“When did you come here? And why?” I asked. Bud wriggled uncomfortably in his seat as we gathered speed along the boulevards that would lead us away from Amsterdam and toward the coast, where Bernard de Klerk lived.
“I am a linguist. I worked for several years at the international courts at Den Haag, as a translator. I met a girl there, fell in love, and we moved to Amsterdam for her work. She has a good position as a programmer at the European headquarters of a car manufacturer, quite near the airport. I still pick up a bit of translating work now and again, online mostly, but this driving keeps money coming in on a more regular basis, and they like to use me because they have such an international clientele.”
“Speak many languages?”
“Dutch, German, French, Italian, Russian, Hungarian, Swedish, Finnish, Spanish, Cantonese, Mandarin, Japanese, and Greek. As well as, of course, Armenian, Iranian, Arabic, and Hebrew.”
“Impressive,” chimed in Bud. “Covers pretty much the whole world.”
“I’m working on Hindi, Korean, Senegalese, and Thai now,” said Farhad proudly. “It’s fun.”
“Good for you,” I said with feeling. “Expanding what you can offer might get you more translation work.”
“I doubt it,” said Farhad.
“Why not?” I was intrigued.
“My name. Farhad Massoud Nasrin will not inspire great confidence in a world where many are afraid of Middle Eastern connections. Would you want that name associated with your company’s online secrets?”
“I’m sorry,” I said, feeling it.
“All I can do is my best. My mum taught me that,” said Farhad. “My girlfriend is from a long line of Dutch people. They’ve welcomed me with open arms. That’s the most important thing, and they all support us in what we’re trying to do.”
“Which is?”
Farhad laughed. “Saving up to get married, put down some real roots, and start a family. Same as most people.”
Bud and I exchanged a meaningful glance. Love, family, happiness—common human desires.
“About how long is it likely to take us to get there?” asked Bud. “I’d like to phone ahead to confirm our ETA.”
“I’d think about an hour from now. We’re already beyond the A10, Amsterdam’s ring-road, and once we’ve passed the A5 intersection things should get quieter. However, I’ll warn you now that, because it’s a summer Saturday, we might have missed the traffic going out to the coast, but we might hit it coming back in. There’s a big family fun holiday center at Zandvoort aan Zee, which is just along the coast from where we’re headed—Bloemendaal aan Zee. It’s not a day-pass place, but Saturday is when many people head for home, or check in for a stay. However, although we might avoid those rushes, that entire stretch of coast is busy in the summer. People take their bicycles to ride the trails. When we head off to Noordwijkerhout we should be okay, but let’s hope everyone stays at the beaches for an evening around a fire pit, and we can beat them back into town.”
Bud made the call, and we settled in to enjoy the scenery. Holland is so flat, it’s remarkable. Not for the first time, I was glad Bud and I would be returning to our home halfway up a little mountain. The sky looked ominously infinite us as we drove along. I felt it was pressing us down against the brown, unpopulated land, ribboned with gray roads, and dotted with vehicles that glittered in the summer sun. It reminded me of one of Hopper’s paintings, rather than any of the Dutch masters. Once we glimpsed the much more appealing glint of the sea on the horizon, I felt my spirits lift.
The traffic slowed as the road narrowed, and I could sense Bud’s anticipation rise with my own. We were about to meet Hannah’s ex-husband, Bernard de Klerk, the last to join the Group of Seven, and the one Willem Weenix’s daughter had told us might be our best source of information about Jonas. I allowed myself to feel hope—sometimes a bad sign.
The Glass of Wine
JONAS’S DECISION TO PORTRAY BERNARD de Klerk as the man offering a glass of wine to the young woman in Vermeer’s painting had struck me as interesting; it was the only painting that wasn’t a portrait of just one subject. I wondered why he’d done it. I’d given the piece a great deal of examination, noting that Bernard’s face was portrayed as being much more vivacious than the original, and I secretly hoped he might not want it, because, of all Jonas’s pieces, it had appealed to me the most. His attention to detail when capturing the room in which the scene was set was breathtaking, and I felt it was a piece I could live with at home.
“If it’s all right with you I’ll leave the car here, outside the house, and I’ll walk to the sea in my shirtsleeves. I might even get myself an ice cream,” said Farhad with a grin. “I could be back here in moments, when you call my number,” he added. “We’re just a short way from the beach.”
I looked up at the imposing house. It was old, and had seemingly been surrounded by much smaller, more modern dwellings as the area had been developed.
Before we were even halfway up the long path that led to the front door, it was opened by a man in pale blue linen pants, rolled up above his ankles, a white, open-collared linen shirt, and a face that was tanned and smiling. “You must be Bud and Cait. Welkom. Come, come,” he said. He rushed to take the painting from my arms, then ushered us into his home.
My first impression was of the sea. It seemed the house was built in a spot where a little niche in the bay brought the beach around a corner until it was directly behind the rear of the building. Two sets of French doors across the back of the house gave a view of a strip of vividly green grass, pale sand, and the dazzling blue and white sea. The décor used the same colors, minus the green, so the entire place felt light, airy, open, and welcoming.
A barefoot woman with ash-blonde hair and wearing a white linen shift joined us. “Welkom, welcome,” she said. “I am Ana, Bernard’s wife. Let me offer you something to drink. It’s a warm day.”
With the sea breezes flowing through the house I felt refreshed and invigorated. “You have a wonderful home,” I said, hoping my voice didn’t betray my envy or awe.
“It’s just the summer house,” said Bernard lightly, “but we like it.”
I tried to not roll my eyes. Summer house? I could happily sit and watch the storms, and even thoroughly enjoy the rain, in such a place. It was pretty much as close to a dream house as I could imagine. I tried to stop noticing it and focused my attention on the matter at hand. This was made even more difficult when we all settled at a huge circular scrubbed-wood table beside the open doors, with the sounds of seagulls and the surf to mesmer
ize me.
Gathering myself, I noticed that Ana seemed to be a good deal younger than Bernard, whom I judged to be in his mid-sixties. She looked to be about my age—late forties—but her skin was tight, her firm throat told me she’d never been overweight, and her hair was lustrous. She wasn’t tanned like Bernard, but had a honey glow about her. I tried not to be jealous of my gracious hostess and her house.
While nibbling on cashews, we drank icy beers as she and her husband marveled at Jonas’s work. I enjoyed seeing the painting in full sunshine too, and, as I looked, I gasped aloud. I can’t help it sometimes.
The de Klerks didn’t notice my gasp, but Bud did, and raised his eyebrows in query.
I leaned in and whispered to him, mumbling as Ana and Bernard exchanged admiring remarks about Jonas’s talent. “Look at the girl’s face in the picture. It’s a young Hannah. I didn’t notice before.” Bud squinted, then his face showed he could see it too.
“Do you like it?” I asked our hosts.
The couple turned to face us. Ana’s expression was one of amazement and delight. Bernard looked puzzled and a little concerned. Having spotted Hannah in the picture, I thought I knew why.
“It’s so beautiful,” said Ana. “It will be like having our own masterpiece.”
“It’s very…Jonas,” said Bernard, obviously not wild about having himself and his first wife depicted in a setting that spoke of love, courtship, and the efforts of a young man to get a young woman interested in him—and maybe drunk as well. I wondered if he’d accept the picture, and judged that his wife’s reaction would make it difficult for him to do otherwise. Would the second wife recognize the first wife? Indeed, was Ana his second wife?