The Streetbird

by Janwillem Van De Wetering

  She struck a match. "You can do what you like, as long as you pay in advance." Her breasts were close and he had trouble looking into her eyes. He knew who she was now and wondered if he'd remind her. She had been trustworthy then, so why be squeamish now?

  "Nellie?"

  She smiled. "Did someone tell you my name?"

  The commissaris sat down. "Try to think back. Five, no, it must be six years ago. A street hawker on the other side, living with his sister, killed by a lead ball at the end of a fishing rod. There was trouble in the streets then and the police fought the rioters, so my adjutant brought me here, but you didn't have a hotel, the place was a kind of bar."

  She clapped a hand over her mouth.

  "You made coffee for us. Adjutant Grijpstra had a bad cough and you made him drink syrup."

  She got up and walked around the desk. "And I just let you stand here, and called you Gramps!"

  "Well." He touched his shabby coat. "I look a bit strange maybe. Can I stay here? If I do, you can't tell anyone who I am. There's been another murder, in the Olofs-alley, and I'm working on my own for a while."

  She dropped her voice. "I know. Luku Obrian was shot. Nobody knows you're here?"

  "I'm supposed to be on holiday." He missed the ashtray. "I'm sorry. Only my wife knows I'm not. I'd better phone her."

  "Henk doesn't know either?"

  "Henk?"

  "Your adjutant. Henk Grijpstra. Surely you've told him."

  Right, the commissaris thought. I thought so at the time. Henk and Nellie, a romance. And Nellie was a prostitute then, entertaining clients in a cozy bar without a license. Not quite the thing to do, but even an adjutant has a private life.

  "No, Grijpstra doesn't know."

  "You don't trust him?"

  He nodded. "Yes, of course I do, but it isn't a simple case and I prefer us looking at it from different sides. We'll meet later, when suspicions firm up a little. I need a few days, longer maybe."

  "I never!" Nellie said. "And me worrying whether you could pay."

  He smiled. "So you should. This hotel is far too good for bums, but I'll try to keep out of the way."

  She hid her nose and mouth under her hand. Her eyes twinkled.

  "Yes?"

  "Some bum." She laughed outright. "A top official earning a yearly fortune. You're quite an honor to have around, sir."

  He laughed too. "I'm glad you got rid of your bar. How do you like running all this?" He gestured about him. "Such a pleasant-looking place."

  She pushed out her lower lip. "I was making out but it got harder every night. Bah." She shook her head. "I was taking ten baths a day in the end and throwing up too. All those hands, all over me." She patted her hips. "I was losing weight too, made me look better but I was crazy inside. Had to give it up. The money went into the hotel but it's coming back again and most of the customers pay cash so it doesn't show on my forms. Henk feels good about it too. Not that he was complaining, but a woman who makes a business of it isn't quite what a big shot like Henk should take out, or, well ..." She rubbed her cheek. "I'm his girlfriend, you know."

  "I know."

  "Commissaris?"

  "I think you shouldn't call me that now."

  "No, because you're working, right? Gramps?"

  He put up his hand. "I'm not that old."

  "Dad? But we look so different."

  "Jan," the commissaris said. "That's my name, but only my wife calls me that. Uncle Jan? From Utrecht? Visiting his niece? How would that do?"

  "Good," Nellie said. "Uncle Jan, and about the money, I would rather that you didn't pay me. Henk wouldn't like that, I'm sure."

  "No." The commissaris opened his wallet. "I have to pay. What do you charge per day?"

  She mentioned the price. "But you can give me half."

  "No." He counted the bills. "Here you are, three days in advance."

  The room was on the second floor, spotlessly clean and with a large comfortable bed covered by a pink crocheted spread and a pink rose in a slender vase on the night table.

  "You prefer that color, don't you?"

  "The color of what I used to do, so that I won't forget." She squeezed his arm. "Retired whores get uppity, you know. Henk doesn't like that. He wants me to be quiet, so that I can listen to him. There's a bathroom next door. Henk put in the tiles and we painted it together and it has its own tank. You can have as many baths as you like, the hot water is included."

  "Beautiful," the commissaris said. "I had no idea Grijpstra was a handyman. Can I see the rest of the house too? You wouldn't have a rear door, would you? So that I can get in and out without anybody seeing me?"

  Nellie held on to his arm, and the commissaris had himself guided down the stairs, through the kitchen, and into the small rear garden. "Is that the door?"

  "No, it leads to the garden of my neighbor." She giggled. "Another uncle. He calls himself Wisi. He's black, but we're good friends and I'm sure he will let you use his exit."

  The commissaris admired lettuce plants and tomatoes growing against the wall. "My wife should see this. We never have much luck with ours. A black man, you said? From the west, you mean?"

  She picked a small tomato, washed it under the tap, and gave it to him. "Yes, but he didn't come with the others. He's been here a very long time, he came before I was born. He is old, he says he doesn't know how old. You may know him, he used to sell herbs in the street market."

  The commissaris felt the earth with his cane. "Let me see. White hair? Wears a robe and a little skullcap made out of beads?"

  "That's him." She laughed. "You do know everybody, don't you, Uncle Jan?"

  "Fortunately," the commissaris said, "you exaggerate. I have seen the man, however. Didn't he have a houseboat before, on the Prince's Canal? And keep animals? I think I recall seeing a donkey, and a fox or a wolf, and birds. I distinctly remember birds."

  "Yes, but that must have been a while back. And he still keeps animals, but not too many now."

  The commissaris glanced at his silver pocket watch. "A little lunch, I think. Would there be a restaurant you can recommend?"

  "Yes. Right here." Nellie swept an arm in the direction of her kitchen. "I'll make lunch and you can sit here in the garden if you like and enjoy the sun." She brought him a chair and got a small table from the house. "Henk likes to eat outside too. What would you like? I don't have too much choice today. Fried eggs maybe? On toast with some roast beef? Or smoked eel? With a salad, yes?"

  "Yes." The commissaris rubbed his hands while she laid the table. "Radishes—would you have those too? And some cold genever, to encourage the digestion?"

  Why do people complain so much? the commissaris thought as he ate. Life isn't all that bad really, and with a bit of patience you get just about anything you can wish for. I thought that I would have to hang round the streets and be thoroughly uncomfortable, and look what fate has pushed my way. But one has to be able to frame the exact desire, like smoked eel on toast, so that fate knows what to give.

  "You seem happy," Nellie said.

  The commissaris raised his glass. "I am. Your very good health."

  "Henk likes to eat too," Nellie said, "and he loves the garden. I'm fond of men who know how to enjoy themselves. But he doesn't come too often. How is his wife doing?"

  The commissaris pointed at his mouth that he had just filled with lettuce leaves. He chewed diligently.

  "Do you know his wife?"

  "From a distance."

  Nellie became interested in the hem of her little apron. "Isn't she rather fat?"

  The commissaris stuffed his mouth again.

  Nellie's fingers plucked away at the hem. She looked down. "I have that problem too, but Henk doesn't like too much of me, so I'm careful." She made gymnastic movements. "Every morning, with the radio, there's a lady who says what to do, and music. I get all twisted up sometimes. Pity in a way, I like pie, with cream on top." She patted her hips. "But the cream makes me puffy. But why bother, eh? He do
esn't come too often anyway."

  "His sense of duty," the commissaris said. "The children, they need a father around the house."

  "But aren't they growing up now?" Nellie fetched a chair from under the kitchen stairs and unfolded it energetically. She sat down at the other side of the table. "I don't want him to come and live with me, although that would be a good idea too. He wouldn't even have to work anymore, he could ask for early retirement. He always says he wants to paint but that his house is so full that he hasn't got the space. He could have my basement, or sit outside if the weather is like it is now."

  The commissaris lit a cigar. "A most excellent meal, Nellie, I do thank you."

  "Another drink?"

  "No, thanks."

  "Coffee? It should be done perking by now."

  The commissaris looked at her slender well-cared-for-hands playing with each other on the tablecloth. "I'm working, Nellie, although you wouldn't think so. About Obrian, now, the man who was shot early this morning. Did you know him at all?"

  "I'm glad," Nellie said, "I'll never have to know him again. It's a sin, of course, but if I think it, I may as well say it. I hope Luku Obrian goes to hell. He was worse than the worst types one sees around here. If that bastard looked at a woman with those large moist eyes he had, then she could forget her future, and everything else as well. All he wanted to do was have your guts and then throw away the skin."

  "A pimp, wasn't he?"

  Nellie's fingers cracked as she contorted them. "Right. I know all about pimps, had one myself when I started out. He talked nicely enough, but he was just like the others, after the money to spend it on others. Once you get into their hands, you'll never get out again, and when mine caught a knife in his lovely flat belly, I swore I would never have another one."

  "Obrian was after you too?"

  She looked up. "Whatever makes you think that?"

  The commissaris crumpled his paper napkin. "Well, he was a pimp, wasn't he, and he knew you, and you're a very attractive woman. I'm just asking. Policemen ask. I didn't want to offend you."

  Nellie laughed. "You're a cop, aren't you? Who would ever think so?" Her hand slid across the table and touched his.

  The commissaris smiled. "Grijpstra is a cop too."

  "Yes, I'll never believe it. Such a sweet man. The ideal father, and you would be the right grandfather."

  "Now now."

  "Only when you dress up funny. Old clothes make you look old, but without the coat you look much younger already."

  The commissaris waited.

  "And you're right," Nellie said. "Obrian was after me."

  "Could you resist?"

  "I had Henk."

  "Of course," the commissaris said softly. "I hadn't thought of that."

  "And Sergeant Jurriaans," Nellie said. "He's a very strong man and he sometimes drops in for coffee here, always in uniform."

  She was holding his hand. The commissaris pulled it back and stretched. "So quiet here, and yet we're in the midst of the city."

  "Shouldn't you take a nap now? Henk always rests after a meal."

  "No," the commissaris said, "but you know what I would like to do? Have a hot bath. I'm somewhat rheumatic and hot water soaks the pain away."

  "Go right ahead." Nellie began to clear the table.

  "Yes?" the commissaris asked from the tub.

  Nellie's hand appeared, holding a silver tray."I thought you wouldn't mind another cup of coffee."

  "Please."

  "Do you mind if I come in a moment? I won't look."

  She sat on a stool next to the tub, and the commissaris pushed himself up carefully, concerned about keeping his cigar dry.

  "I'm lonely sometimes," Nellie said. "It's nice to know there's someone in the house. The guests don't count and there aren't any right now anyway. Is the water hot enough?"

  "Cooling. Would you mind turning the faucet?"

  Nellie reached to the tub's other end. "The tank is enormous, you can have baths all day."

  "Good to know," the commissaris said. "Hot water is about the only thing the pain reacts to. I say, Nellie, I was thinking about Obrian again. He was shot with a machine pistol. Would you have any idea who might have used such an unusual weapon?"

  Nellie rested her chin on her hand. "Another pimp, who else? Luku was taking it all, the others couldn't accept his grabbiness. To live and let live—Luku never heard about that idea."

  "With a machine pistol," the commissaris said. "Strange, eh? Who would have a gun like that?"

  "Hard to handle. They jump in your hands."

  "You know about shooting?"

  "Yes," Nellie said. "I'm a farmer's daughter. My brother and I had to shoot crows, to save Dad's chicks. And I have used a machine pistol too. We had German soldiers on the farm during the war. We were only little kids then, and I hardly remember the soldiers, but my brother found their gear, years and years later, where my father had hidden it. Rifles, hand grenades, ammo. The grenades were fun, we used them for fishing. You just throw them in and there's a fountain, that high"—she pointed at the ceiling—"and then the dead fish float. We used a machine pistol on a crow. There was nothing left of him afterward but broken feathers."

  "My, you were a dangerous girl. How old were you then?"

  "Fourteen, I think. My father was all upset and the local cop came and took the guns. My father would have been fined, but he called the cop himself, so it was all right."

  "Shouldn't have guns about."

  Nellie smiled. "No? With all the mugging going on? In this neighborhood?"

  "You have a gun?"

  She handed him a towel. "Shouldn't you get out? If you stay in too long you get all wrinkled. Look at your fingers now."

  "Yes," the commissaris said. He raised himself with difficulty and wrapped himself in the towel. Nellie looked away. "I'm all covered now," the commissaris said. "Tell me, do you have anyone in particular in mind?"

  "Who could have shot Obrian? Lennie, I would think, or Gustav. They hated him most. Here, let me dry your back."

  "No," the commissaris said, turning away. "What if Henk were to suddenly come in and see us like this?"

  She grinned sadly. "I wish he would. It's his own fault. Staying away doesn't do much for our relationship." She followed him to his room and folded the sheets open. "Nap time, Uncle Jan."

  "No. I'll lie down and think."

  She walked to the door. "That's what Henk says he does too, and then he snores for hours."

  "Not me," the commissaris said to himself. "It's a matter of self-discipline. Keep sleep back by force of will and enter the in-between dreamscape where all facts connect." He sighed, closed his eyes, and fell asleep.

  \\ 6 ////

  DE GIER SLEPT ON THE RED PLASTIC COUCH IN THE burglar's apartment. He had closed the curtains before lying down. Dripping spittle was cooling his mustache and he was turning on his side when he heard the door squeak. He was still too far gone to wake up completely, or perhaps fear crippled him; that possibility occurred to him later, although he never bothered to confirm it.

  Whether he was dreaming was to remain unclear too. He saw a blade shape that he interpreted as a bird, a vulture. The vulture did not walk, but hopped. Each hop brought the bird closer to the couch. The vulture looked like the bird that he saw in the early morning, on the antenna in the Olofs-alley, but this vulture was considerably bigger, bigger also than the birds of prey in the zoo, hunched-up sad feathery bodies staring morosely at a hostile world.

  The vulture wasn't in a hurry. The sergeant heard its claws scratch on the floor's linoleum. He saw its wings, flapping clumsily. He also noticed the sinister hooked beak and the evil eyes, surrounded by dry folds of skin.

  The dream's backdrop changed. The sergeant was lying in a white-yellowish desert, under a scorching sun, and the vulture fluttered closer, bent over his prostrate body, and stared down curiously. Vultures don't wait until you're dead, the sergeant thought, they get right into you, chisel into your
skull, tear out brains, hack away.

  He was also thinking that the bird was an aspect of himself, representing his own evil, the solid poison that had accumulated because of wrong living and that now was strong enough to split away and take its own form.

  That he was frightened was certain. The impulses emitted by his brain did not connect. Paralyzed by dread, he tried to concentrate on the wet sensation in the lower extremity of his mustache, the only part of his body he was still aware of. His fear was somewhat comical. It was funny that he could do nothing to protect himself. Here I am, the sergeant thought, judo champion of the Amsterdam Municipal Police, with the world's most deadly pistol tucked into my armpit, and I'm ready to be torn into slivers.

  The dreadful bird stood next to him, stretched out, its head bent back in order to be able to strike down more forcefully. The sergeant wanted to scream but couldn't produce more than the weakest squeak, drowned immediately in the vulture's awful screech. The biting impact numbed his head. The furious bird shuffled away; the door banged closed.

  The painful and, in spite of its lengthy introduction, still rather sudden attack broke his sleep-induced overall paralysis and the sergeant groaned, sat up, and even managed to force himself to his feet and stagger over to the windows to open the curtains. He saw that the couch was covered with soppy white worms, which were also stuck to his shoulders and slithered down his jacket. The worms burned his hands and he yelled as he tried to flip them away. The couch looked too disgusting and he staggered to a chair. He heard the door open again and tried to get up, to defend himself against the returning bird.

  "What's all this?" Grijpstra asked.

  "Adjutant," babbled de Gier. "Adjutant. To arms!"

  "What on earth for?" Grijpstra was about to sit down on the couch.

  "No!"

  Grijpstra studied the white worms on the red vinyl. "What's the mess?"

  "My brains."

  "Looks more like spaghetti."

  "Look, my blood too."

  "Spaghetti with tomato sauce?" Grijpstra smeared a finger with the warm fluid. "Still hot. Tastes okay. Why did you throw it out?"

  "Attacked. By a vulture. While I slept."