The Trap

by Rink van der Velde

  He could have added that the adjutant had been looking at him through his binoculars same as always. They’d like to catch him. When he’d be fishing for bass or pike they would always check him for undersized fish. They knew he was a poacher. And they no doubt knew he had a gun and hunted ducks. They wanted to catch him, but they weren’t sharp enough.

  “So you noticed nothing unusual. And what time did you start out this morning?”

  “Around three-thirty.”

  “That’s early.”

  “It takes three quarters of an hour to get there and with no wind you don’t go very fast.”

  “And it was still dark when you got back, we’ve seen that for ourselves.”

  “That’s because of the fog; it gets light earlier usually.”

  “Can you find your bobbers in the dark?”

  “They’re all in a row.”

  “How many did you have out?”

  “A good hundred and fifty.”

  “Were they in good shape this morning?”

  “Yes, I’ve got stones attached to them.”

  “But what if something sails over the top of them?”

  “They usually slide right under the boat. Sometimes one gets dragged off, but a fat eel can do that too.”

  Something had disturbed the shutoff trapnet, though. One of the sticks was crooked. And the turn-net must have got caught on the boat’s keel. But nothing was broken, and the bownets had not been touched. It probably didn’t mean anything. A lot of people were in hiding around the lake and they liked to venture out at night. They would visit the women or just roam around on their own.

  He had no idea what they were after. The first time they had looked for the weapons that had been dropped from airplanes, some of which had landed in the lake. That time the soldiers turned the whole house upside down and had a small army check the area all around. This time they were not after weapons, for he had received no warning from the underground to set the bobbers out somewhere else.

  “You live right on the lake here, and you spend every day on the water. When something happens, you’d be the first to know,” said the policeman.

  “It’s a big lake. I can hardly look over half of it with the naked eye. And from the south side you see nothing, because there’s a long strip of reeds and bulrushes. They say that’s the old road, but you should know that.”

  “You talk a nice line, but you don’t think for a minute that we believe all this,” the policeman said suddenly. He didn’t even look at the officer anymore; he was taking over.

  “You’re right here on the lake, you see and hear everything, but you know nothing.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Do you happen to know there’s a war going on?”

  “We notice little of that around here.”

  Twenty years ago he wouldn’t have taken this sitting down, and not even ten years ago. He nurtured a great hatred for policemen and for all men of authority, and that had not changed. But he didn’t fly off the handle so easily anymore and it wasn’t at all his intention to put up a fuss now. He thought about the boy, and he wanted to be as accommodating as possible. At this point he was ready to treat the men to some coffee.

  “But it is wartime,” said the policeman, “and don’t expect us to be too civil at such a time.”

  “I’ve never been used to good treatment by you guys,” he answered, and added immediately: “I’ve answered every question you asked me, isn’t that right?”

  “You didn’t give the right answers.”

  The policeman did not ask about the boy, and that made him uneasy. It was almost light outside now. Here and there hung a fragment of remaining fog, but a breeze was now coming off the lake.

  The officer got up and went out. The policeman ran after him and they whispered together in the hall. Gryt looked at him, but he kept his eye on the soldier pacing back and forth in front of the window.

  The policeman came in again and said: “You’d better get your coat on.”

  2. A Bay Day

  By the bridge stood a gray truck, with small barred windows on both sides of its high closed box. Two policemen and a soldier stood on guard.

  “Get in,” said policeman Bolhuis, and he dropped the gate at the back. He pulled himself up and sat down on the bench. The three policemen joined him and then the two soldiers got in. The gate stayed down.

  Two soldiers busied themselves with the motorcycle. The thing was covered with mud and the soldiers tried to clean it up as best they could. Halfway down the drive the engine quit and they had to pull the cycle with a rope to the road.

  He could see the bridgekeeper’s house. The shutters were closed and no one stirred. Salverda’s yard also looked forsaken. Salverda had people in hiding.

  He told Gryt that she should put the eel in the container, because they would not let him finish his chores first. He was allowed to take a sandwich along, but the policeman watched while Gryt prepared it. He should have told her to send a message to the eel merchant, but he had thought of it too late. Boonstra was supposed to deliver salt, for he was almost out.

  He must get back to the house as soon as possible. It might get to be a warm day, and if the fish weren’t taken care of, by evening the whole business would be spoiled. He would also have to repair the bownets and get some bait for the bobbers. This interruption came at a bad time, and he said so to Bolhuis.

  Bolhuis just looked at him and said nothing.

  One policeman sat next to him, and the other two sat opposite him. The soldiers sat on the floor in the back, leaning against the side. They were sleepy and yawned, their heads dropping to their chest. The officer must be sitting in front with the driver.

  Two soldiers were pushing the motorcycle and managed to get it started. Then the truck began to move. Bolhuis closed the gate, making it almost dark inside. He watched the two policemen opposite him rolling cigarettes and heard them say to each other that it was going to turn into a nice September day.

  At that moment it hit him. He said: “I’ll be damned.”

  “What’s that?” one policeman asked.

  “Different men, but the same puppets,” he said. “It’s always been that way. You don’t give a damn whether they’re capitalists or fascists, you’ll dance to anybody’s tune.”

  He felt a great fury that made his hands shake, and he broke out in sweat. It was like that time in Beets, when he had yanked a military policeman off his horse and smashed his wooden shoe in pieces on the man’s head; or the time when they had left the peat boss with two broken legs. Or like the incident with the forest ranger in Duurswoude—all those times when he had flown into a rage and done something that would have been better left undone.

  Bolhuis grabbed his shoulder. “That’s enough from you, have you gone off your rocker?”

  He had heard that before too.

  The other two policemen shifted.

  “What kind of character is this, Bolhuis?” they asked.

  “A bad one; I bet they have quite a file on him at headquarters.”

  And then to him: “You’d better repeat that pretty soon, then they can add that to it right away.”

  “I didn’t quite hear it,” said one policeman. “What did he say?”

  Bolhuis should have let his shoulder go, then it would have passed. But now his anger grew. He said: “What kind of guys are you that you let yourself be pushed around to go on a dirty job like this. You …”

  Then he restrained himself.

  “Oh, is that the way it is,” said the policeman who had not heard him.

  He wanted to say more, but he thought about the boy and kept still. Bolhuis got up and fortunately released his shoulder.

  “This is sure going to be held against you, man. You’re going to pay dearly for this.”

  Then he knew that this was going to be a bad day.

  He didn’t want to make trouble. He wanted to get home as soon as possible, and that was worth a lot to him, much more than in the
past. Above all he wanted no trouble with the police, and neither with the Germans, and he wanted nothing to do with teacher Braaksma, the man from the underground who had come around to nag him so often. Especially not with him, that pious poop with the House of Orange ribbon under the lapel of his coat. He had not resisted when he was ordered to come along. He had not even been tempted. Gryt had been frightened and had gotten the shakes, and then she started to wail. He knew what she had wanted to say to him: “What did I tell you, we’re right back into misery.”

  She had said that as long as they had been married, but since they had been living on the lake she had less cause for it.

  He took his sandwich out of his pocket and started eating. Bolhuis looked at the bacon between the bread. “It looks to me like that’s not homegrown.”

  “I don’t do my own butchering.”

  “How is your business doing?”

  He gave no answer. He wished he had talked with Gryt about the eel. It would be a shame if all the fish died. And the fellas could have prepared the bobbers during the day. He wanted to lay out more tonight as long as the weather was so ideal: warm in the daytime and a dark moon at night. He had also wanted to set out a two-winged trap in the drainage ditch by the old cemetery, because the sluice valve was open and some big eel might easily come through. Maybe Germ would come back in time to prepare the business for the night. They had talked about that yesterday afternoon.

  But no one talked about the boy, and he didn’t trust that.

  “As long as we’re getting into your case, we might as well take up the subject of the black market, too,” said Bolhuis.

  “Man, what do I care about the black market,” he said. “I don’t care about making a profit, all I want is to make a living.”

  “Of course, but it makes a difference …”

  “I just barter a bit. I get a slab of bacon from a farmer and he gets a meal of fish from me.”

  “We’ll discuss it pretty soon.”

  The truck followed the cobblestone road that led to the village. The two policemen across from him said that it was getting stuffy and took their hats off. The soldiers, ragged and dirty, were all trying to catch a wink now and their heads bobbed up and down when the truck bounced through a pothole. The sputtering motorcycle followed behind. He thought that they should have reached town about now, but it was difficult to estimate because he had never ridden the distance in a car before.

  They crossed a bridge, and that had to be the canal that led to the harbor where the creamery stood. Now the truck slowed, turned left, and stopped. Bolhuis dropped the gate and jumped out.

  The sun blinded him, and he stood there blinking.

  “Come on out,” said Bolhuis.

  The soldiers stood up and stretched.

  “I hope the office boy still has some tea or coffee left,” said one policeman.

  “Last night there was coffee, real coffee. The Germans had it with them and Bouma made two potfuls. But the people in the clerk’s office probably finished it off.”

  He felt ill at ease when he got out. They were parked in front of the town hall, and a soldier stood guard on its stoop. More vehicles were parked here, including a motorcycle with sidecar, and next to the bike shed stood a car loaded with soldiers. No one was on the street, and the schoolyard was also empty.

  He seldom came to the village. Boonstra, the eel merchant, lived there, but when he had to get a message to him, Gryt would usually stop in.

  He walked up the stoop in front of Bolhuis. The man opened the door and stood aside. “Go ahead.”

  They came into a long white hallway with a runner on the floor. The people behind a couple of desks on one side momentarily looked up. On the other side he saw high oakwood doors with the nameplates of the mayor and the city clerk. And at the end were the wide stairs that took a turn halfway up.

  He knew the way; the adjutant of the water police had summoned him once. He didn’t want to go at first, for according to his thinking, whoever wanted him should come to him. But Gryt had said that it would be better for him to meet people halfway, so he had eventually gone on Germ’s bike. The adjutant had been very accommodating. He knew that game, they always started out like that. What he had really been after was information on Kuiken, who was also a fisherman but even more of a poacher. Of course, he should have told that adjutant right away what he thought of him, but he hadn’t done that. He had said that he would keep an eye on Kuiken.

  The two policemen went directly to the dispatch office; the soldiers stayed outside. He had not seen the officer again. Bolhuis accompanied him up the stairs. Next to the council chamber was the police bureau. The room was empty. He sat down on the bench by the wall. Bolhuis went for the telephone on the farthest desk.

  “Is Liuwes there? Ask him to come up a minute. He’s on duty, right?”

  A moment later a young policeman entered.

  “I’d like to have a real cup of coffee too,” said Bolhuis.

  “Then you’ve got to be quick.”

  He was a jolly fellow, whistling a tune while he took a seat behind a desk.

  “I see, another one in custody. I thought we were finished. Are there still more coming?”

  He looked at him.

  “I don’t know,” he answered.

  Bolhuis left. The young policeman took a cigarette out of a package that lay on the desk. He tossed him one. “You take one too, there’s lots more. The Germans have plenty.”

  He declined, though he would have enjoyed one. The cigarette fell on the floor. He was going to leave it there but then he picked it up and brought it back. When he was back on the bench he took some chewing tobacco out of his pouch.

  The policeman said: “You can chew the cigarette tobacco too; it’s got to be better than that tobacco of yours, anyway.”

  “This is good enough for me.”

  The policeman sauntered through the office and picked up the telephone. “Is Bolhuis there? Did he get his coffee? Good. What am I supposed to do with this man? Yes, I’ll stay here, but at twelve my shift is up and then I’ll have more hours in than I usually have in a whole week. Of course, you too, but I can’t help that. I’m going to request two days off right away. What did you say? I don’t care what the chief has to say about it.”

  He put the receiver down. “Can you imagine …”

  Bolhuis hurried back in, a cup of coffee in his hand.

  “The Oberst is with the mayor again and the chief is with them, too. They got the water police involved in this one, didn’t they. I saw the adjutant, and that other fellow, what’s his name, again. They’ve been out in the field all night. They got the mayor out of bed at three o’clock this morning. He’s in a pretty foul mood, according to the boys.”

  The two of them stood in front of the window.

  “What kind of character is this, Bolhuis?” the young policeman wanted to know.

  “A rascal. The water police know him pretty well.”

  The telephone rang and Bolhuis took the message. “He’s coming.”

  And then to him: “Come along.”

  They went down the stairs and were admitted to the mayor’s office. He had never seen the man before, but he knew that he had been mayor here for years. An elderly man with a round, bald head. A German officer sat next to him and the adjutant of the water police was there too.

  The mayor beckoned for him to come closer. He shifted his wad and took a few steps forward.

  “You know this man, adjutant?”

  “‘I see him almost every day, Mr. mayor.”

  Through the binoculars, from the back of the police boat.

  It was the same sort as the one in Beetsterzwaag, this mayor. That one in Beets had four policemen around him before he began to read him the riot act. That he was the man who had incited the peat workers to strike, that he had been the ringleader this time too, and that they would teach him a lesson or two. He had said: You wouldn’t dare say this if you didn’t have your henchmen here. You�
�re a yellow bastard, not worth a shit.

  This one was the same kind. But he wanted no trouble. He wanted to go home and he wanted to know above all where Germ was.

  “Let’s make it short,” the mayor began. “What is your role in this business?”

  He said nothing. He didn’t know what they were talking about, otherwise he would have said something.

  “Well?”

  “No one has told me what this is all about,” he said.

  “Man, I have enough trouble with the Germans. I’ve got to finish this business.”

  “I know nothing,” he said.

  “Now listen, we’re getting nowhere this way. If I get no results this morning, then the Oberst will take over, and that will be bad news for you. They would take it out not only on you but on the whole community. As mayor I’ve got to prevent that. We’ve got to take care of this ourselves, do you understand that?”

  He had nothing to say.

  “We have your service record here, if one may call it that,” said the mayor. “We know who you are and I don’t intend to protect a man of your sort. It’s going to turn out pretty bad for you if you have nothing to tell me.”

  He said apologetically: “I’ve never bothered a soul here.”

  “If I may,” interrupted the adjutant. “I see here that you received three sentences that are far from trivial: fourteen months, three months, four weeks, and that’s just a random sampling.”

  “I’ve lived here almost five years and I’ve never had trouble.”

  “That’s because you’ve learned to become pretty sly,” said the adjutant.

  “I’ve heard that you went fishing during the night,” said the mayor.

  “Last night I laid out the bobbers and checked the trapnets, and this morning I picked the stuff up again.”

  “And you saw nothing, of course.”

  He didn’t answer.

  “I said: and you saw nothing, of course.”

  He said, “I saw nothing, but it makes no difference if I say that, you don’t believe me anyway.”

  “And you didn’t notice anything last night either. Even though there was a hell of a racket.”

  He said: “That’s almost impossible. Then I should have heard something.”