The Sergeant's Cat

by Janwillem Van De Wetering

  “That’s right,” Karate said. “I saw that on TV. The tango is big in Finland. It takes place in cafés. They have tango on the jukebox. Women come on to you. You don’t talk but you can touch while dancing. Kind of intimate. Saves flirting. Next move is ‘Your place or mine?’”

  “His place,” Eira-Liisa said. “Here. But what is with can­non?”

  “Your gun, sir?” Grijpstra asked.

  “Oh, that,” the Englishman said. “But that was an antique. It came with the apartment here. Part of the furniture. I was just showing it to her. What did I do with the damn thing? Will you get out of my dream when I find it?”

  “Please?” de Gier asked.

  The Englishman jumped up and rushed around the room, pushing his way past the policemen, stumbling about wildly. A plate loaded with potato chips was brushed off a cabinet. Mag­azines and video tapes flew about. A laptop computer was picked up and shaken. The suspect overturned a suitcase and kicked its contents. He looked through drawers. He pushed books off shelves. “There,” he shouted. “There is your damn cannon!” He threw a large object onto the bed.

  Grijpstra picked up the bulky weapon gingerly.

  “It’s ornamental,” Michael said. “Ancient. Antique. They used them in the old days with ball and powder. I found it behind the books. I am sorry. Okay? I shouldn’t have been nosy.”

  Grijpstra showed the weapon to de Gier. “What do you think, Sergeant?”

  “Known as a blunderbuss,” de Gier said. “Front loader. A cavalry weapon. Early Napoleonic, I would say. Flint and steel, one of the first handguns equipped with a trigger.”

  “Illegal?”

  De Gier shook his head. “A collector’s piece, Adjutant.”

  Michael walked over and picked up the pistol. He waved it about. “It must belong to whoever lives here. I rented the apartment furnished. I’m a scholar, you see. A historian and so­ciologist, researching the last war. I was telling Eira-Liisa here about it. My specialty is the British-Dutch sea wars. Weapons fascinate me.”

  “My specialty Van Gogh Museum,” the woman said. “Other specialty Bach on organ. This Sunday concert. In Saint Nicolas Church.”

  Ketchup held up a hand. “Didn’t we have a rape charge?”

  “Rrrrape,” Eira said, rolling her R, staring at Michael.

  “Tango,” Michael said. “You explained it to me. You even got the tape from your apartment across the landing. First dance, then . . .”

  “Fucketyfucketyfuck,” Ketchup and Karate sang softly.

  “Hey,” Grijpstra growled. “Constables. You were warned before.”

  Eira-Liisa sobbed. “Now me AIDS.”

  “No,” Michael shook his head. “None of that, dear. I’m clean. I had my nose straightened early on this summer, an accident broke it, the break interfered with my breathing. They checked my blood prior to operating. No sickness. I’m just fine.”

  “Huren,” Eira-Liisa sobbed. “Amsterdam voll mit Huren.”

  “I wouldn’t dare go to the whores,” Michael said. “You’re the first since my nose got straightened.” He smiled. “I really liked it.”

  “Me no whore.” She stamped her foot. “Police! Please arrest!”

  “But you got drunk,” Grijpstra said, “and then you waved that gun about, sir.”

  “It isn’t just the Finnish who are shy, you know,” Michael said. “They tango, we drink alcohol. I don’t drink usually, all right? The Agency said I was welcome to use the apartment’s supply of food and drink. I found this damned jar. I can handle a few beers but this jenever is liquid dynamite. This is Amster­dam, foreign to me. The local language sounds like the people aren’t feeling well. Beautiful women dance on the landing. All this makes me nervous.” He opened the refrigerator. “I looked for a beer. Found this.” He held up a stone jug. “Looks harmless, doesn’t it?”

  The Englishman, reliving his adventure, was pulling his hair.

  “You got all that?” Grijpstra asked de Gier.

  “Yes, Adjutant.” He turned to the suspect. “Then what happened, sir?”

  “Well, I got drunk. Right? I was telling her that I know things, about antique weapons, for instance, because I’m a his­torian.” The Englishman pointed the blunderbuss at a window. “This thing doesn’t even fire. See?”

  The suspect pulled the weapon’s trigger.

  The explosion deafened everybody. Black smoke filled the room. Glass clattered down. The weapon’s charge of nails and rusty iron hit the canal’s surface and scattered sleeping ducks. The birds flew off quacking. Plaster fell from the wall above the window. The acrid fumes of gunpowder made de Gier and Eira-Liisa choke. Karate coughed. Grijpstra wheezed. The English­man, still holding the blunderbuss, staggered back. Ketchup got hiccups.

  Ketchup and Karate, who shared an apartment overlooking the Amstel River, discussed the Finnish/British conflict during their next morning’s breakfast. Karate, recently returned from leave in Torremolinos, made Spanish omelets. Ketchup, who had visited the Dutch Antilles, opened cans of chilled curuba juice.

  “More fresh bread?”

  “If you please.”

  “So Grijpstra confiscated Eira-Liisa and Michael’s pass­ports,” Karate said, “and he will return them today at lunchtime, at the Dobbe Sandwich Shop.”

  “After making sure there are no bad feelings between sub­jects,” Ketchup said. “A couple of angels. I bet you de Gier will pick up the bill.” He shook his small head. “Pity we couldn’t take care of the case, hey?”

  Karate didn’t know. “We couldn’t have done much anyway. They were well-meaning folks caught up in a misunderstanding.”

  “I don’t care for well-meaning folks,” Ketchup said. “They’re hard to shake down.”

  Karate agreed. “I would have liked that Eira-Liisa.”

  “Our superiors are crazy,” Ketchup said, carrying dirty dishes to the kitchen. “Those two bumblers believe in making things better, but this is a time when things get worse. It’s nice when things get worse. You get to take money from robbers. You get to abuse beautiful whores. I like that.”

  Karate dried while Ketchup washed up. Karate sighed.

  Ketchup looked up from the steaming sink. “Going with the flow. You think Grijpstra and de Gier believe they can re­verse the tide?”

  Karate pondered the matter. “No.”

  Ketchup dropped a mug back into the suds. “So what do our so-called superiors believe in? In being good in spite of the fact that this planet is about to shake off its human occupants? Just as we, sincere and therefore cynical observers, believe in doing evil?”

  “I don’t think those two believe in good,” Karate said. “They’re too smart to go for an obvious solution. I’ve heard them talk. They seem to prefer to believe in nothing.”

  Ketchup grinned. He thought that was amusing.

  “What?” Karate asked.

  Ketchup said he would like to believe in nothing, too. That nothing was lighter than either Good or Evil. “Totally cool.” Ketchup also said he believed it couldn’t be done.

  “Good luck comes to those who keep trying,” Karate said. “Couldn’t we try to believe in nothing?”

  “Good luck comes to those who keep trying?” Ketchup asked, as he arranged mugs in the cupboard, their ears parallel, every mug shining. “You really think so?”

  “What do you think?” Ketchup said, brushing down the sink.

  “Good luck,” Karate said, “comes to those who are lucky.”

  Later that day Grijpstra watched Michael and Eira-Liisa walk away stiffly. They had their passports.

  “Couldn’t make them dance and kiss,” de Gier said, walk­ing ahead of Grijpstra on their way back to the Fiat. “They’re still too shy. Maybe once they’re alone together again, eh?”

  “Who cares?” Grijpstra asked.

  De
Gier sang the tango’s tune. “Tah-tah-TAH-tah . . .” He danced to the tune. Grijpstra danced behind him. De Gier suddenly stopped and looked around, making Grijpstra freeze halfway in a sliding step.

  “I saw that,” de Gier said.

  Sure, Blue, and Dead, Too

  The evening had passed and night was due, but it wasn’t quite dark yet. Sergeant de Gier had noticed the mysterious moment of change and passed the infor­mation on to Adjutant Grijpstra. “Evening gone, night not quite come.” He went further and drew the adjutant’s attention to the faint coloring of the sky that curved like a tight metallic blue sheet above the city of Amsterdam, iridescent in its entirety, intensified by the first pulsating stars.

  “Quite,” Grijpstra answered.

  “Blue,” Sergeant de Gier said, “but not your everyday blue. A most noteworthy shade of blue, don’t you think?”

  “So what are we doing here again?” Grijpstra asked.

  “We’re police detectives,” de Gier explained, caressing his full mustache and delicately curved nose. “We’re waiting for the heroin dealers to meet and exchange merchandise for money.”

  “And when are they due?”

  “We don’t know.”

  “And what do they look like?”

  “We don’t know that either.”

  Adjutant and sergeant, members of the Amsterdam Murder Brigade, were assisting—because no murders had been reported recently—the Dangerous Drugs Department. They were doing so quietly, dressed like innocent civilians, comfortably reclining in an unmarked blue Volkswagen, parked on Brewer’s Square, opposite the Concert Building, pointed at Museum Square. They had been reclining for a while now.

  “And how do we know that the dealers will meet?”

  “Because,” the sergeant answered, “Detection passed on the message. Our very own Detection, with the whispering voice of a handsome man like me, who in turn had heard an­other whispering voice—in the rest room of a better brothel, perhaps. A large quantity of the evil drug will change hands tonight. For us to see. For us to apprehend, together with the hands that exchange it.”

  Grijpstra spilled cigar ash on his neat pin-striped waistcoat. He also arranged his bristly grey hair. “Bah.”

  “Bah how?”

  “Both in general,” the adjutant explained, “and in partic­ular. What can we see? The sky. Numberless passersby. Do you honestly think that we will be able to spot a suspect popping up, parcel in hand, to greet and do business with another?”

  “The sky is lovely,” said de Gier. “Do look before the blue becomes black. Now is the time to be impressed.”

  Grijpstra looked up, grunted, and looked down. He grunted again, more emotionally.

  “Nice woman,” de Gier agreed. “Same color as the sky. Blue summer coat, blue scarf, blue high heels. I can’t see her face, but from her general bearing I would deduce she is crying. Why is she crying?”

  The woman’s hands dropped away from her face. “She’s only crying a little,” Grijpstra said. “We could investigate the mystery, but we don’t want to exceed our authority. A crying woman hardly disturbs the peace of our city.”

  De Gier sat up. “I feel like working. We were sent on a fool’s errand. We aren’t fools. I suspect the subject of being a prostitute and want to question her. Are you coming, Adjutant?”

  “Prostitution isn’t illegal.”

  “It is, too,” de Gier said. “Here it is. We are within two hundred feet of the Concert Building, which contains a bar. Prostitution within two hundred feet of a public place where alcoholic beverages are sold is illegal.”

  “Leave the woman in peace,” Grijpstra said gently. “We’re after heroin.”

  “Very well, Adjutant. But now look at that. What do you see? A handcart loaded with rags. Parked under a no-parking sign. And a subject climbing into it. A most suspicious agglom­eration of events.” He put his hand on the handle of his door. “May I?”

  “You may not. Leave Blue Pete alone.”

  “You know the subject?”

  “An old acquaintance.”

  “Tell me about him,” the sergeant said. “I feel a trifle rest­less. Your tale will calm me down.”

  “Anything to keep your youthful enthusiasm within suit­able bounds.

  “Some years ago,” Adjutant Grijpstra intoned pleasantly, “when the local station here hadn’t been computerized away, I happened to be behind the counter and Blue Pete came in, accompanied by his dear wife, a fat woman, just like mine. Maybe even fatter, if that could be possible. She pushed Blue Pete aside and lodged a complaint. He was part of the complaint, so she had brought him along.”

  “Yes?” de Gier prodded.

  “If you interrupt me, I won’t tell the tale.”

  “Right. But over there goes a gentleman carrying a parcel. Does it contain heroin? No, it’s a present for a loved one adorned with a ribbon. Perhaps it’s his wife’s birthday. Go on, Adjutant.”

  “Her name was Anne, Blue Pete’s wife’s was, and probably still is, and she was suffering from a venereal disease at the time.”

  “That was the complaint?”

  “Part of it. She had contracted it from her neighbor and passed it on to Blue Pete.”

  “Shall I inquire about the nature of the contents of the parcel the gent is carrying? Now look at that, will you? A well-dressed, well-educated gentleman, probably holding an impor­tant position in our society, on his way home, where his wife awaits him, is bothering our blue lady. Just because she is crying. Let me arrest the scoundrel.”

  “He has stopped bothering her,” Grijpstra said. “He’s still carrying the parcel. Has he perhaps exchanged it for a similar parcel the lady was hiding under her coat?”

  “No, I had a full view from here. Nothing changed hands.”

  “I never have a full view of anything,” Grijpstra com­plained mildly. “Very well, Anne’s charge was that her neighbor had given her a venereal disease. She carried proof.”

  “She showed you her microbes?”

  “Her pills. And a prescription for more, signed by her phy­sician. Proof of her affliction.”

  “The complaint is not clear to me.”

  “Because you’re too young,” Grijpstra explained. “You’re not familiar with yesteryear’s laws. Whippersnappers like your good self gambol about while totally unaware of the great hap­penings. The present connects with the past. You have no past yet.”

  “Since when is the spreading of venereal disease prohib­ited?”

  “It was during the war. A German Occupation law, to pro­tect the Nazi soldiery.”

  “And Blue Pete?”

  “A detached personality. Blue Pete drinks methyl alcohol, a well-known killer of microbes, and he only came along to support his wife in her struggle with the paramour next door.”

  The sergeant looked at the ragman, now settled comfort­ably on his cart. “You have a marvelous memory, Adjutant.”

  “Blue Pete showed up again that very same night, the night of the complaint. I was driving a patrol car through an alley and nearly ran into the blighter’s cart. No lights. I was going to fine him, but he did have a light, he said. He showed me a candle that he hadn’t lit. There was a bit of breeze, you see, and the light might have been blown out.”

  “Did you fine him?”

  “Nah,” Grijpstra said. “Mustn’t bother the poor too much.”

  The sergeant looked out of the window again. “Not even when they keep breaking the law? Parking under no-parking signs? How sad it all is. And the blue lady is still crying. What can be the matter with her?”

  “Fourteen-six?” the radio under the blue Volkswagen’s dashboard asked.

  Grijpstra grabbed the microphone. “Go ahead. This is fourteen-six.”

  “Not correct,” the radio said. “Even the Murder Brigade has to adhere to the
rules. First you have to confirm your number and then you should ask me for orders.”

  “Yes, ducks. Sorry, ducks.”

  “Ducks?”

  De Gier took over the microphone. “Fourteen-six here, Marie. Sergeant de Gier. What can we do for you?”

  “Darling,” the radio purred. “Do go to Headquarters. The constables guarding the building are being bothered by a man.”

  “We’re on our way.”

  The Volkswagen veered away from the curb.

  “And our heroin?” Grijpstra asked.

  “Will wait for us,” de Gier said. “The communications room is at Headquarters, too, and who knows what will happen if that terrible man penetrates to Marie’s whereabouts. She’s a constable, of course, but rather vulnerable because of her beauty. Onward at once.”

  Grijpstra clutched the dashboard. “Please, Sergeant, this is an unmarked car. Nobody knows we’re the police. Oh, Sweet Savior—”

  “That pedestrian got away, didn’t he?” de Gier asked, glancing at his rearview mirror. “Sporty type, climbing a tree now.”

  “Whoa!”

  “I can’t slow down for joyriding cyclists. Assistance to en­dangered colleagues is our most prized emergency.”

  “Red light ahead.”

  “Not anymore.”

  “The streetcar!”

  “Police always have the right of way and streetcars have powerful brakes. Ha-ha, look at all those people sliding off their seats. Right, here we are. Headquarters.”

  “What’s happening here?” Grijpstra asked.

  “Well,” the constable coming from the doorman’s lobby said, “we’re supposed to guard this building, right? This is no police station, this is Headquarters itself, but this subject walks straight in, drunk and all, and bothers us. What can we do? We can’t guard the building and arrest him at the same time.”

  “But aren’t there two of you?” de Gier asked. “You could arrest the subject while your colleague guards the building.”

  “The subject wants to be subdued by force,” the constable whispered.