The Streetbird

by Janwillem Van De Wetering

  "In time for tea but much too late to help out," Grijpstra said. "Why aren't you in uniform?"

  Cardozo stood in the open door. "Sugar, sergeant? Milk, sergeant?"

  "Please," de Gier said. "I'm not in uniform because I left it in Adjutant Adèle's cupboard. A uniform draws unwanted attention. You can't even cross the street against the light without being admonished."

  "By the authorities?"

  "By a black toddler." The sergeant looked about. "Was the previous occupant convicted on a charge of bad taste?"

  Grijpstra spilled more tea. Cardozo set to work again. Grijpstra pushed the sponge away. "You're staining my trousers. The sergeant has been goofing off while we worked, and now the sergeant is tired. Why don't you take the sergeant to his nice clean room?"

  De Gier joined Grijpstra on the creaking couch. "The sergeant was doing his job. He now knows something."

  "Share it," Grijpstra said. "I will draw the correct conclusion and go out to make a proper arrest, so that we can get out of here. I have a pleasant place of my own now and want to make a painting, of an exotic bird. What does the sergeant know?"

  "That the killer was wearing size thirteen shoes."

  "No," Grijpstra said. "I don't want to fight giants."

  "Rubber soles?" Cardozo asked.

  "New?" Grijpstra asked.

  De Gier nodded.

  "Galoshes," Cardozo said. "Now in one of the city's garbage boats, under ten tons of goopy glop."

  "What else does the sergeant know?" Grijpstra asked.

  De Gier looked at his watch. "That lunch time has come and gone. Are we eating?"

  "We'll go to a Chinese."

  "Lennie," de Gier said, "one of the two other superpimps, has had a trying time since Obrian got busy here. I have admired Lennie's photograph and read his file. He's an ordinary-looking man, which probably helped him toward his success. Forty-three years old and a native of the city, like his father, and his father was no good either. Another pimp, making out on a few whores placed here and there. The father had little brains but he sent his son to school and Lennie was studying mathematics when his father was arrested on a charge of buying stolen property and had a heart attack in jail."

  "Mathematics? University? And he still became a pimp?"

  "Why not, Cardozo? Numbers go both ways. Some numbers are lucky. Lennie inherited seven whores. He relocated them to the most popular alley and extended his operation from there, moving his headquarters to a floating brothel for the select on the Catburgh Canal."

  "Outside the quarter," Cardozo said. "A quiet area."

  "The select don't want to be seen, but they know the way."

  "Dope?" Grijpstra asked.

  "A lot of dope, more and more, especially since Obrian pushed him out of the alleys."

  "And where was Lennie supposed to be last night?"

  "On his boat. The bouncer, the ladies in residence, and the barman will confirm his alibi. This morning, at twenty past three, when machine-gun fire hit Obrian in the Olofs-alley, Lennie had just stepped into bed. His Mazda sports car was on the quay—this much is true, because a local cop saw the car there at the fatal time. But Lennie could have used another car, or walked. Catburgh Canal is close by."

  "And was he pleased that Obrian is now under refrigeration?"

  "Delighted," said De Gier.

  "Did he say so? Not to you, I hope."

  "He told one of the detectives of the station."

  De Gier placed his mug on the floor. Drops of tea danced across its edge. Cardozo jumped up.

  "Stay here," Grijpstra said. "You worked from this station for years, as a uniformed constable. How can it be that a floating brothel is tolerated outside the quarter?"

  "Just a minute, adjutant. I take pride in my work." Cardozo brought the sponge and rubbed the floor clean. "How can it be? Indolence, adjutant."

  "No more than that?"

  "Well," Cardozo said, "Lennie wholesales heroin. Heroin is costly material. It comes in small parcels. Money comes in small parcels too. The parcels are easily opened and the top bills may float away." He checked the floor, holding his sponge ready. "Or so I have been told."

  "And Jurriaans?"

  "An incorruptible official." Cardozo looked into Grijpstra's eyes. "King of the quarter. Jurriaans has long arms but I don't know whether they reach as far as Catburgh."

  "The local station employs a few hundred able men," de Gier said. "How about a little raid across the border once in a while?"

  "Yes."

  "So?"

  "When they get to the boat, the lights are out and there's nobody home. The station here has a large number of telephones. I imagine most of the colleagues know Lennie's unlisted number."

  "That was Lennie," Grijpstra said. "What about Gustav?"

  "Lunch first," said de Gier.

  "You can't eat here, adjutant," Cardozo said, and pulled Grijpstra's sleeve.

  Grijpstra pointed with his other arm. "Is that sign in Chinese or isn't it?"

  "That's a gambling joint, adjutant. The characters are different. We can eat across the street. See?"

  Grijpstra turned his hand. "Same scribbles."

  "No, adjutant. See the ones on the sign across the street? Meaning 'Eating House'?"

  "Scribbles."

  "Look at the scribble at the left. See the little running legs sticking out of it? It means 'eat.' And the one on this side, see, with the uncombed beard hanging underneath, says 'gamble.'"

  Grijpstra narrowed his eyes. His hand weighed heavily on Cardozo's shoulder. "Since when can you read Chinese?"

  "I worked here, adjutant. I had to learn what is what. I got to know the signs to know what goes on inside."

  "The boy is intelligent," de Gier said. "He can't help it. Can we go to the eating house now, or do you prefer to play Mah-Jongg?"

  Grijpstra crossed the street. He still held on to Cardozo. "Constable first-class?"

  Cardozo's chin rested on Grijpstra's hand. "Yes?"

  "If gambling is illegal, how come the slit-eyes have the sign on their door?"

  Cardozo squeaked. "But this is the quarter. Anything goes here."

  "Too far," Grijpstra growled. "You too."

  A middle-aged black man squatted on the sidewalk, leaning against the restaurant's gable. He wore a heavy sweater in spite of the heat and was rolling up his tattered sleeve. The man wasn't interested in the portly gentleman in the pinstriped suit who was observing him. He was intent on the point of his hollow needle, sucking milky fluid out of a bent teaspoon. When the needle was full it emptied itself again, into the man's arm, after having found a spot of skin between running sores. The needle yanked free and the man looked up, grinning inanely, then sighed and closed his eyes. Grijpstra closed his eyes too. De Gier pushed the adjutant's shoulder. "Come eat. Mandarin cooking. Very special."

  Grijpstra studied the gleaming dark red naked carcasses dangling from a sagging string behind the restaurant's dirty window.

  "Birds," Cardozo said. "Exotic birds."

  "Yecch."

  "Duck is good," de Gier said. "Ugly duck is good too. Come along, dear."

  The waiter brought the menu.

  "Don't take forever," de Gier said. "I'm hungry."

  Grijpstra was still staring through his half-glasses. "I wanted fried rice, with a fried egg on top, can't find it on the list."

  "You can eat that everywhere."

  "So I can eat it here too."

  The waiter covered the table with dishes. They weren't Grijpstra's. Grijpstra got a small bowl heaped with dark brown rice topped with a fried egg the size of an overcoat button.

  "Small egg," the adjutant said.

  "Duck's egg," said the waiter.

  "Bald duckling's egg," said Cardozo. "Will you tell us about Gustav, sergeant? Is he still driving a Corvette? He did in my days, always the latest model."

  Grijpstra jabbed at the egg with a chopstick.

  "Hold them like these, adjutant," Cardozo said. "One
fixed and the other like a pencil. Like this. You can do it."

  Grijpstra pressed the bowl against his mouth and inhaled the egg. "What's a Corvette?"

  "American," de Gier explained. "Flat. Like an iron without the handle, hollow inside. Goes fast, costs money."

  "How much?"

  "What you and I make a year."

  "But he has other cars too," Cardozo said. "Gustav likes cars. He likes women too, he's got lots of them, in my time anyway. Look, adjutant, it's really quite easy. Hold your chopsticks like this and you can pick up anything. See that bit of meat next to de Gier's bowl? I'll pick it up."

  Cardozo inserted the meat between his teeth and chewed.

  "There's a bone in it," de Gier said. "I've been chewing it for a while too. Okay, Gustav. Still drives a Corvette. No alibi for last night. He doesn't like women, he only likes the money they give him. He sleeps alone, in his seventeenth-century city-funded restored gable house on the Old Mint Canal."

  "Bust him," Cardozo said with his mouth full of noodles.

  "Beg pardon?" Grijpstra asked.

  Cardozo swallowed. "Handcuffs. Drag him to the station. He's got the motivation and the opportunity, so we've got serious suspicions. I say Gustav is our man. He likes to hunt big game, in Africa with a cannon, so why shouldn't he hunt competitors here with a machine pistol? Sergeant Jurriaans is right, we're the Murder Brigade and this is the quarter. Anything goes. The local cops scare easy, but we're from outside. Bust him, I say, and—"

  "Right," de Gier whispered fiercely. "Disengage the buzzer in his cell. Nail a board over the window in his door. Forget to feed him. Fill his jug with sea water. Beat the bastard."

  "No, no," Grijpstra said.

  Cardozo stopped slurping his stew. "Why not, adjutant?"

  "Because that isn't the way."

  "And what if we do it a little bit?"

  "I've got to sleep at night."

  "Heaven is waiting for us," de Gier said. "Gustav and Lennie. How many enemies did Obrian have? Just those two? What about the prostitute on the cast-iron bridge with the lions' heads? She may have a friend, a relative, a son even. Revenge, you know. All we think of is greed and jealously. A black soul brother Obrian had kicked into the gutter? Some heroin merchant who Obrian never paid? Or plain indignation? Some good guy fired the gun?"

  Grijpstra paused in his effort to shovel the rice with the fat ends of his chopsticks. "We haven't even begun to think. We don't know the corpse either. He had a house. The house will still have his smell. I want to go and sniff. Now, maybe? After Cardozo has paid the bill?"

  "Later," de Gier said. "I went to bed late and got up early. A nap."

  Cardozo paid. "We have to go to Hotel Hadde too, tonight maybe. It's open all night and the bar is a hangout for pimps. Maybe we'll hear something."

  "A nap."

  "And the morgue," Grijpstra said. "They'll have looked into Obrian's pockets by now. Thank you, Cardozo. I didn't like the food. And because you took me here, you can spend a few hours on your own now. Look around. Do more than we can expect of you."

  "And you?"

  "I will go for a walk," Grijpstra said. "I tried earlier on but I felt disturbed then. I feel better now. When I come back, I'll wake up the sergeant."

  "That way we all do something," de Gier said.

  De Gier got through the door first, tripping over the threshold. He bumped into a little old man who shuffled along on the narrow sidewalk, leaning on his cane. The old man managed to stay on his feet.

  De Gier apologized.

  The little old man, his small head tucked away under the wide brim of his felt hat, walked on slowly. Grijpstra stood next to de Gier. "Can't he get a better coat? Social security is getting fatter every year. I thought moldy rags were out by now."

  "Old drunk," de Gier said.

  "An alien," Cardozo said. "They get no welfare. Maybe I should go after him and take him to the Salvation Army. Sir?"

  The old man had reached a mud puddle and slithered on, jabbing his stick ferociously into the tiles of the sidewalk.

  "Leave him alone," Grijpstra said. "It's not your job to save old bums."

  \\ 5 ////

  THE COMMISSARIS TURNED A CORNER AND SLOWED DOWN again. The good weather hardly improved the quarter's mental climate; the alley he found himself in was gray and smelly, a sewer, the commissaris thought, through which the lower lusts slide along by night and dribble by day.

  Older women pushed wet rags along grimy windows, the squealing of dirt against dirt matched the shrill voices that argued or complained. Hung-over clients left dingy one-night hotels, staring from red-rimmed eyes at the lack of possibilities that another day would offer. A hawker pushed a cart, yelling hoarsely out of a toothless mouth between sunken stubbly cheeks: "Radishes and smoked eel."

  A cat on high legs rubbed itself against the commissaris' cane and looked up, squinting from bright yellow eyes. The commissaris scratched the animal's gleaming fur. "Haven't we met?"

  The cat howled softly.

  "Yes. In the Olofs-alley this morning." The commissaris shivered violently, reacting to a stab of pain that had burned up his thigh and found the bone in his hip. He concentrated on the cat, stroking its neck, feeling its soft body vibrate under his hand.

  "Not enough love?"

  The cat slid away and ran ahead, stopped and looked back before it turned the next corner.

  "Love may be hard to find around here," the commissaris mumbled, following the cat.

  "Hi, Gramps," a female voice said. The commissaris looked up. A young woman, a girl perhaps, leaned out of a window on the second floor. He saw her breasts bounce. "He's got me from the rear," the girl said, "and I've got to wait till he's done. Want to talk to me meanwhile?"

  The commissaris couldn't see the man but he could hear him groan. He walked on, his cane tip scratching on the alley's cobblestones. The girl called after him, "Come back later, Gramps, I'm cheap today."

  "Radish and smoked eel."

  A bit to eat, the commissaris thought, and then an hour's worth of quiet contemplation in a clean room. He turned the corner the cat had taken before. The cat was waiting, sitting on the edge of the sidewalk, licking a paw. She jumped up when she saw him and ran on.

  A guide, the commissaris thought. The alley ended at the wide Eastern Canal. He followed the waterside, walking under huge elms and their proud load of small newly green leaves. An old woman, wrapped in plaid, crumbled bread for noisy ducks, who splashed each other to reach their free lunch. The commissaris watched. Two small boys, one white with long blond hair and one black, bright-eyed under a frizzy crest, paddled a plastic bathtub. The cat stood next to him, stiff forelegs pressed on stacked bricks, chattering at the quacking ducks. "Not quite your size," the commissaris said. "Try a sparrow." There were sparrows about too, hopping at crumbs.

  I really need lunch, the commissaris thought. His original plan—to be a tramp in the Salvation Army dormitory and listen to the gossip—faded out. He saw a stone jug with a silver spout, tinkling coolly while cold genever, the juniper flavored gin the Dutch favor so much, filled a long-stemmed tulip-shaped glass. He also saw hot toast, thickly buttered, spread with slices of white and pink eel, circled with cut radishes and artfully placed gherkins. He glanced about, searching for the sign of a suitable establishment, but saw only freshly painted windows of tall gable houses, leaning against each other in age-old confidence. He lifted his hat and addressed the old woman. "A small hotel? Where the food is good?"

  The woman looked doubtfully at the leather bag, cracked at the seams, dangling from his gesturing hand. "Can it cost a few pennies?"

  "Oh, yes."

  She pointed. "The Straight-Tree Ditch. Ask for Nellie. Third house on the right."

  "Much obliged."

  "Rooms," the sign said in four languages. The sign was elegantly lettered and hung from a freshly painted heavy rod, ending in a copper ball. The commissaris admired the narrow house, five stories high, with wooden plant
ers holding pink geraniums attached to each window. The dark brown bricks shone and the white trim of sills and posts set off the pink of curtains. A rather fleshy pink, the commissaris thought, but what's wrong with flesh? The cat had lost interest and danced away, tail up, legs straight.

  The commissaris leaned on his cane and tried to remember why the house was familiar. Had he been here before? There had been a murder in the street, some years back, but on the other side, he thought, across the water and farther along. Pink? What had been pink in that case, properly solved and conveniently forgotten. He tried to activate his slow brain and worried about cells lost through age and never replaced.

  Eel on toast.

  I don't want to think of food now, the commissaris thought. But why shouldn't he? The pinkness of whatever it was would come to him later. He rang the bell. The door clicked open.

  "Come in," the mature voice of a woman called out. "I'm in my office, on the left, come in."

  The commissaris dragged himself along, tired of the long walk and the increasing weight of his bag. The point of his shoe hit the threshold of the room and he had to force himself to lift his foot. He took off his hat. "I'm looking for a room for a few nights."

  She didn't answer at once, and he looked at her quietly, hat in hand, the other clawed around the handle of the bag. The woman's breasts, caught tightly in a pink jersey, seemed abnormally full; he felt as if the massive mounds pointed at him, with their aggressive nipples, surging through the thin material. She smiled and he saw the whiteness of her strong teeth, growing firmly out of healthy gums. "This isn't a cheap place, Gramps."

  "I don't mind."

  "Are you sure? Are you in town to visit relatives? There are more reasonable rooms available, not far from here." Her hand touched the telephone. "Shall I try to get you one?"

  "I've got cash." The commissaris put down his bag and took out his wallet.

  She pointed at a chair. He shook his head. "Can I see the room? I would like to lie down for a minute and then eat something perhaps." He stepped forward, put the wallet on her desk, and brought out his tin of cigars. "Do you mind if I smoke?"