by Cathy Ace
Bernard sat bolt upright and looked annoyed. “He told me he inherited the house—which cannot be correct. I see that now. I did not know he had given money to Hannah for anything. I thought he allowed her to live in his home cheaply because she ran a good place for him to drink, and to use almost as a second home. It was where he spent most of his days, when he wasn’t sleeping or painting. I knew he loaned Willem money to buy his shop, however.”
“Is there anything else he told you when you two were alone?” I added, trying to get something useful for Bud.
“Yes. You are making me peel back the years, and I am remembering. On the night I was telling you about earlier—the one when he also told me about his national service—I recall him speaking about the paintings Van Gogh did of the baby Marcelle Roulin. Do you know them?”
I nodded. “He did several.”
I dare say my dislike for the paintings showed on my face a little, because Bernard said, “I hope the baby wasn’t as ugly as Van Gogh made it look. Jonas only noted it must have been difficult to paint a baby, because they squirm so much when they are held. I couldn’t imagine Jonas knowing how it felt to hold a baby at all, and that was the only time he said anything to me about children. It was something like, ‘You have to really love a baby to be prepared to do anything with it, including holding it. They are wriggly little creatures, and they grow up to be snot-nosed little tattletales.’ Something like that. Not word for word, of course. Then he cried a great deal. I wonder now if he was speaking of your mother. Though the tattle tale thing isn’t particularly flattering, I suppose.”
Bud didn’t respond, so I did. “Thanks, Bernard. Anything is better than nothing. We were hoping you’d be our best chance for insights into Jonas and his life. Willem Weenix’s daughter Els told us you were the youngest of the Group, and probably would remember most. We met with Greta van Burken at lunchtime and she wasn’t at all helpful. In fact, she declined the two-artist piece Jonas had picked out for her, so we took it back to his studio. It was a rendering of Caravaggio’s Salome with the Head of St. John the Baptist in the style of Botticelli. Quite beautiful.” I wondered how he’d react.
“Ha! Great idea for a gift for that woman. Sounds just like her to turn her nose up at a good piece like that. Probably thought it was too much of a novelty to be given wall space,” said Bernard. “I don’t know why she ever joined the Group, and I could never fathom why anyone put up with her. But I was the last, and the youngest, and when I joined I was always aware of…something, some sort of bond they all had that I never really understood. The Group meetings ran out of steam about fifteen years or so after I joined them. Everyone kept in touch, of course, and there were half-hearted get-togethers. Everyone had a family or a career by then, so it was just Jonas, his wonderful talent, and me as a final hanger-on, I suppose. It was fun while it lasted, though. When the Group did meet, we’d all take our painting supplies and sit in a park, or off on a dyke, or even in a bar or facing a restaurant, and sketch, draw, and paint for hours. Peace would reign until the wine or the beer took effect, then we’d pack all our painting kits away and allow ourselves to talk about art instead of making it. If you want to tell your mother about her brother, Bud, tell her he pulled together, and kept together, a group of people who had little in common, that I could see, except a love of art, and he helped them keep that flame alive, and burning in their lives forever. Visiting galleries with a group of people who are knowledgeable about art, and have strong opinions about it, is incredibly stimulating. We did that a great deal too, as well as creating art. You can tell her that. It is not an unimportant thing to have done. I know my life was richer, and still is richer, because of it.”
“Thanks, I appreciate that,” said Bud with feeling. We could both sense it was time to go, so he added, “I’ll just call our driver, who’s gone off to the beach. We should leave. We have to see Johannes Akker next.”
“He’s just down the coast,” said Ana. “He is the only one I have met—though Bernard has pointed out Greta van Burken at the Concertgebouw when we have been there. Johannes has retired. He is much older than Bernard.” She smiled indulgently at her husband. “It is the time of year when he has his grandchildren to stay. I expect you’ll meet them.”
“He’s on his way. Five minutes,” said Bud, holding up his phone.
“I wonder if I might use your loo before I leave?” I asked. Bud raised his eyebrows, indicating his unceasing surprise at the apparently poor capacity of my bladder, so I ignored him.
“Of course. I will show you,” said Ana. For such a large house I was amazed, once again, at how narrow the loo cubicle was, because that’s all it could be called. One thing of note within it was a tiny pen and ink drawing in sepia tones hanging on the wall. The frame was at least four times the size of the artwork, so I peered at it, going so far as to put on my specs. It was skillful; it suggested features rather than defining them, and had an unmistakable air about it.
Back at the front door, where the three had gathered I asked, “Is that a genuine Rembrandt in your downstairs loo?” As I spoke, I suspected I’d never have a chance to utter that sentence again.
Bernard smiled. “Jonas told me it was, and I chose to believe him. There’s no signature, of course, but Rembrandt rarely signed his sketches or even his finished drawings. The figure resembles one of the women in his etching Three Beggars at the Door of a House, I admit that much, but as for if it is truly by the hand of the man himself? Who knows? It is thought that he made thousands of sketches and drawings, and many hundreds are known. But this one? Let us enjoy it for what it is. I believe it is real.”
“And Jonas gave it to you. He must have thought highly of you,” I said.
Bernard paused, then said, “I think he liked me. I was never a real insider in his Group, yet he treated me with generosity and kindness. I will have a great deal of joy from the paintings he has bequeathed to me. I am sorry I did not see more of him in recent years. I understand he went out less and less, and, of course, I have been busy with my life.”
“And work,” chimed in Ana, just as I saw Farhad appear at the car.
“Time to leave,” I said. “Thanks for your hospitality and your insights into Jonas.”
“I truly appreciate it,” added Bud.
As we walked toward Farhad, I whispered to Bud, “The Group met in the army? That was news. Bernard was right: he might have been invited into the Group, but there was an inner door that they kept closed to him. I wonder if Johannes will be able to tell us more about this Charlie, or their time in service. We must confront him with our new knowledge.”
“You know that’s what they call cocaine sometimes? Charlie,” said Bud, but I didn’t have time to answer because Farhad opened the car door for me.
Tulip Fields Under a Summer Sun
“I WONDER IF IT’S CHANGED much,” I said as we hit the road, the air conditioning blasting away the heat that had built up in the stationary car.
“Do you know Noordwijkerhout?” asked Farhad.
“Yes, sort of. I spent a couple of months there one summer peeling bulbs. I was a student at the time and it was a holiday job. Back in the eighties,” I replied.
“Some of these places don’t change,” said Farhad, “but I think you might notice quite a bit of new development there. I hear coastal areas are more popular now. People have bought second homes, or have moved out of the more built-up areas. A lot of people work online now. More women are entering the workforce, and new technologies allow them to be at home to raise their children and work as well. It’s an interesting shift in the Dutch economy.”
“It was a nice place,” I said to Bud and Farhad. “I liked it. It felt both rural and coastal. Lots of bulb fields, of course.”
“We’ll be there soon enough. If you would like to call ahead again, Mr. Anderson, it should take us about forty-five minutes, at most.�
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“Thanks, Farhad, I will,” said Bud.
True to his word, about forty minutes later we slowed to a crawl as we approached the house as shown on Farhad’s GPS. “This should be it,” he said, stopping.
“Good system,” I said.
“I should hope so,” replied Farhad, grinning, “it’s the one my girlfriend works on with the car manufacturer. She excels at her job.”
“I don’t know how long we’ll be this time,” said Bud. “No beaches here, but I’ll call you, okay?”
Once again, Bud and I hauled a pair of paintings toward a front door. This time there was no path and no front garden—the large house had a proper Dutch roof, with tiles coming down to just above the front door, and was right on the street. The bright yellow door opened and we looked down to see a child of about five years of age peering up at us. My spirits fell. I’m not good with kids.
“Is your grandpa home?” asked Bud.
The child swung on the handle, looking blank.
“Grootvader? Opa?” I said. The child ran away screaming.
“What did you say to her—him, whatever it was. I couldn’t tell, could you?”
“Long blond curls with a green T-shirt and shorts? Could be either. All I said was ‘grandfather’ a couple of different ways. Not my fault it ran off.”
A moment later a gray-haired, bespectacled man, his stooped shoulders covered by a vivid blue cardigan—which seemed completely unnecessary given the warmth of the weather—appeared and smiled nervously. He was so red in the face that he looked as though he needed to be in shirtsleeves, and he was almost as wide around the middle as he was tall. I suddenly realized how few overweight Dutch people we’d met on our trip, and wondered if it was all the cycling that kept them trim.
“Come in, please. My granddaughter Kari called me. You were quicker than we all thought. I am Johannes. My wife, daughter, granddaughters, and their father are in the garden. Would you like to join us for something cool to drink?”
“Thanks, but I suggest we sit in here. There’s no need to bother your whole family. In fact, I believe you would prefer things this way. It’s you we’ve come to see and talk to,” said Bud.
We all sat, and Bud unwrapped the pictures. Without ceremony, he just plopped the sheets off and there they were. It made a change to the rigmarole we’d been through before. “My Uncle Jonas bequeathed these to you. We are simply delivering them. When we spoke on the phone I asked if there was anything you could share with me about Jonas, because my mother wants to find out about and understand her long lost brother. Have you thought of anything? Was he kind? Good? Interested in anything other than art? Did he have a happy life?”
Johannes Akker looked a bit taken aback by Bud’s bluntness, and I was too. It really wasn’t like him at all. I’d seen him interview dozens of suspects with equanimity and patience over the years, but now? Bud sounded thoroughly irritated, as though trying to get through something he wanted finished. Fast.
Johannes sat opposite us looking at his portrait, which showed him as his namesake, Vermeer’s Geographer. Despite his flabby jawline, I could tell he was grinding his teeth. His eyes flitted from the portrait, to Bud, to me, then to the two-artist piece, which was a representation of Van Gogh’s Landscape with a Carriage and Train in the style of Cezanne.
“I loved him like a brother,” he said, almost in tears. “I miss him very much.”
This was the first person who’d shown any real emotion about Jonas’s death; it was all the more remarkable because it was coming from a man who, apparently, hadn’t been Jonas’s closest friend, and who’d hardly been mentioned by any of the other Group members. Biting my tongue, I allowed Bud to take the lead, which meant he said nothing.
“I thought he was the most gifted artist I ever met. Just look at this portrait. It is a masterpiece. Every bit as good as the original. Better, because he painted it for me. It is immediately my most precious possession. And this piece? It is a miracle. See how he’s mixing styles? He was such a clever man.” He dabbed at his eyes with a large pocket handkerchief as the rolls of fat beneath his chin quivered.
For a man who’d spent his life working in the seemingly dry profession of transportation planning and logistics, he seemed pretty highly strung. I studied Bud watching him, certain my husband was up to something.
“Is that it?” snapped Bud. “This is at least more emotion than anyone else has displayed for a dead man they all claim was their friend for years, but you speak of nothing but his talent. What of the man himself? And what of your connection to him? You’re not just upset he’s dead, Johannes, you’re frightened. I can tell. You’re a respectable man, a father, a grandfather,” continued Bud. “You don’t want your family to know the truth about the Group, do you? Has word reached you that I have spent my life in law enforcement, and that Jonas knew it when he asked me to visit you all, distributing paintings as a way to meet each and every one of you?”
Johannes sagged. “Greta telephoned me. She…warned me you would be asking about Jonas. She told me I must not say anything.”
The man gave himself up to sobbing. It appeared Bud had correctly identified the weakest link in the fence that had been built around the truth by the Group.
“What was your Group’s dirty little secret, Johannes? Drugs? Porn? What?”
Johannes looked around in panic. “Please do not shout like this. My family must not hear. They must not know.”
“It’ll all come out,” warned Bud. I’d seen him like this before, using the most forceful part of his persona to intimidate people he felt could be broken. They didn’t know he would never cross the line. Poor Johannes Akker didn’t know anything about him other than he was a cop, and was sitting just a few feet from his precious family. “Tell me about Charlie,” said Bud ominously.
All the blood drained from Johannes Akker’s face. He aged considerably in a moment. I knew he was going to come clean. “It was an accident. Honestly it was. He was very drunk. We couldn’t believe it had happened again.” He looked around and whispered, “He was high on drugs, too. We told him not to go, to stay and sleep it off, but he wouldn’t listen. Someone should have gone after him, stopped him, but we didn’t. None of us wanted to; we were having fun. We were young, you see? We didn’t find out until an hour later. Greta had stayed at the party when he left, because they’d had a huge lovers’ quarrel. You might call it a fight, in fact. Eventually she left to go home, and that was when when she found him. She was in a bad state when she came back to get us, and we all went to see if he was really dead, as she had told us. Sadly, there was no question about it. He was limp. His eyes staring. He wasn’t injured at all, just dead. He must have overdosed; that’s what we all thought at the time, and it’s what I still believe happened. It was too late for him, but not for us. We argued about what to do. Jonas said we should call the police, that we couldn’t do the same thing again. This time we had to involve the authorities, he said. But we voted, and Jonas lost. We were afraid they’d find out about the other time, you see. So we did the same again—we took all the stuff he had in his pockets, anything that could identify him, and pushed him into the water. We knew he would drift. He wouldn’t be traced back to us. And afterwards…afterwards none of us said a word. Not to each other. Not to anyone.” His whole body shuddered with sobs. I could tell one handkerchief wasn’t going to be enough.
Bud’s eyes glittered with triumph. “What was Charlie’s full name? When did this happen, exactly?”
“Charlie de Groot. September 1957. Long ago, but it’s like it was yesterday. We were so young. I know Jonas was right. We all always knew he had been. He was right the first time too.”
“Tell me more about the first time,” pressed Bud.
Johannes Akker looked as though he couldn’t take any more, but Bud leaned forward in his chair—an ordinary chair, in an or
dinary sitting room, which felt anything but ordinary.
“All right, I’ll tell you,” whimpered Johannes. You’d have thought Bud had raised his hand, but all he’d done was lower his voice.
“It was 1950, the first time. And that was an accident too.” He bit his lip. “We had been drinking then, also. No drugs that time. We were in the army, you see. The man who died—no, no, he was only a boy—we dared him to keep up with us. He couldn’t, so we laughed at him. He stood up and drank down a whole bottle of…something evil. A spirit of some sort, I think. Cheap, of course. We didn’t know there was anything wrong at first. We thought he was just drunk. Although we’d seen him about at our camp, we didn’t really know him, but we all left the bar together in any case—brothers in arms, you understand—and we slept in a field, under the stars. When it was time for us to go back to the camp the next morning, we found he was dead. Pieter, Charlie, Dirk, and I argued with Jonas about it. He said we must be honest about it, but we disagreed. We stripped the body and threw it into a canal. We burned the boy’s uniform and went back to our duties. When the lad didn’t report back after leave, the officers acted as though he was a deserter. None of us ever said anything. We…I never heard if his body was found.”
Johannes Akker seemed to have run out of tears. His ruddy complexion was ashen.
“It’s what…it’s what held us together,” he added. “All through our time at the camp, and afterwards. We were bound together by it. Forever. When we all got out and returned to our civilian lives, we all felt the need to gather, even though we couldn’t talk about it. It was in that way that Jonas brought us all to art. That became our reason for meeting up. Whenever we got together it was always as though the dead boy was with us. I…I didn’t even know his name. He was just another young man in uniform drinking at the same bar as us that night. When Charlie died too, it was as though we were cursed.”
“You were cursed?” I exploded. “What about the men who died? Especially the nameless boy. What about his family? Thinking he’d walked away from his responsibilities, never to return? What of the ‘curse’ you all placed upon them? Never knowing what had happened to him.” I couldn’t help but be angry because Johannes Akker wasn’t showing any remorse; he was only sorry for himself, and afraid that what he’d done was about to ruin his comfortable life. I could feel myself heating up from the inside out. I looked over at Bud, who seemed utterly calm, except for his clenched fists.