“Yes,” Serena said, “let us concentrate on the final purification, Baphomet! To secure our salvation.” This seemed to silence the critics for a moment.
He knew he had made the right choice in bringing her into the fold. “No other objections?” he inquired. “Let us go inside then. There will be food and drink.”
While the others entered the house, a man in a long black coat approached Baphomet. He had been observing the procedures from a short distance, as if he weren’t a member of the group. His given name was Metagogeus. Although only in the thirties, he clearly commanded respect, mostly due to his silence.
“What about the girl?” Baphomet addressed him.
“As promised, Baphomet, under our care. We’ve contacted her friend, and we made certain we have his cooperation in full. At least, we made clear what we expect from him.”
“And he fully understood?”
“We have made our intentions quite clear, Baphomet. He knows what’s at stake.”
“Excellent. We should have done this earlier. It would have saved us a lot of headaches. Another thing, I heard about a foreign diplomat who was killed in a villa. A Saudi prince, no less. And with him a certain number of young women. This worries me, Metagogeus. I have the impression some of our members have been overzealous. I do not remember having given anyone permission for another sacrifice.”
“Apparently, someone did indeed perform a ritual, and an improvised one at that.”
“Any idea who?”
“I’m afraid not. It might be one who acted alone. Or with a small number of friends. I’m at a loss.”
“This kind of creative destruction cannot be allowed. Discretion, Metagogeus, is what we need right now.”
“The ritual in the Ardennes—”
“I knew very well what I was doing at the time,” Baphomet snapped. “And I remember, quite distinctly, you and Courier promising all traces would be erased. I am disappointed, Metagogeus.”
“I’m disappointed as well, Baphomet. We’ll be more careful in the future, although we paid attention to every detail. I will of course make sure Courier takes this to heart as well. I sometimes have the impression he’s sloppy.”
“And now this new thing. The Saudi prince. The police, of course, are on it. Tell all members that initiatives of this kind will no longer be tolerated. We will focus on our final plan.”
“I’ll spread the word,” Metagogeus promised.
Baphomet found Serena after Metagogeus had left. “You certainly have made an impression on the members,” he said.
“This is important to me, more important than anything else in my life.”
Good girl, he thought. She was possessed of the fire, within her. The all-consuming fire, as he had once been.
32
“AND WHAT’S THAT NEPHEW of yours been up to?” Van Gils inquired.
“Excessive speed on the ring road. Twice. Running a red light. Then talked back to the cop who pulled him over.”
“Seems like he really did it this time,” Van Gils said.
The man in front of him hung his head. Oleg had been living in the Netherlands for a full three decades but remained at heart a melancholic Slav. His melancholic character was probably the only quality he still had left over from the Ukraine of his youth. He had come to the Netherlands with a significant part of his family in tow and had settled on the south side of Amsterdam. There, after toiling for years, he now owned a chain of small laundries and grocery stores specializing in Eastern European items. He was doing well these days, judging by the expensive leather jacket over his shoulders and the golden Rolex on his wrist. That would be a real Rolex, Van Gils knew.
Oleg had the looks of a criminal, which he was. Over the past thirty years, he had been convicted seven times for smuggling cigarettes and alcohol, receiving contraband, and inciting prostitution. The latter bothered Van Gils the most, but Oleg had assured him he had left this particular activity behind. His wife had seen to that. “No woman will be your slave,” she had told Oleg. Smuggling was all right with her, but a Christian should not force women to prostitute themselves. She had threatened to leave him. That and a year in prison had convinced him.
The nephew they were talking about was the youngest son of his sister. The problem child of the family. The kind of kid you found even in the best of families. Spoiled. Even Oleg knew the kid was spoiled. Too much pocket money from his dad. Fast cars and flashy sunglasses and girls and whatnot. Doing a hundred on the highway? Fast? Come on! Why that ridiculous speed limit? Why those stupid cops?
Oleg had tried to talk some sense into the kid. “But my sister is not very clever herself, Inspector, not the sharpest pencil in the box, and her husband doesn’t care ’cause he’s not the kid’s real dad. You see? Things happen. Things go wrong. Kid lands in jail. Again. So, they come and see me. Want me to arrange things.”
“There’s just so much I can do, Oleg,” Van Gils said. “Told you yesterday already. I know the police magistrate. I’ve taken care of business for him in the past. I’ll have a word. The kid might end up with his license suspended for a year or so, but I’ll try to keep him out of jail. You make sure he doesn’t get behind the wheel anymore. At least not while he doesn’t have his license. If he drives without his license, even I can’t help him.”
“You are a real friend of this family, Inspector,” Oleg said. “You come with the wife, and we go somewhere nice to have dinner. I owe you that at least. I get tickets for the match between Ajax and Feyenoord this weekend in the ArenA.”
“If you give me the info I asked for, I’d be more than happy.”
“Oh, that.” Oleg reached into his coat pocket. “Not difficult. We have contacts everywhere, don’t we?” He glanced at the piece of paper he was holding. “Karl Desmedt and Daniel Brecht. Both worked at TransCom. The first one was an information officer, the other was chief accountant. Well-paid jobs, I guess. I heard there were problems.”
“What kind?”
“These things happen. Look, Van Gils, there’re many people working for me. In the shops I own. I tell them: do your job well. Or else you’re out. Simple as that. They know me. They know I mean what I say. Almost never had to let anybody go.”
“Good for you. Now, about these two? The rumors?”
“That’s what they are. Rumors. Both had a fight with the boss. Threatened they would reveal things. What things, I don’t know. There are always problems in big companies like that. Like my nephew, you know? People always want more, faster cars, nicer girls, more money. I tell him: you work, then you have money, not the other way around.”
“So, if I have this right, both these men had confronted the management of TransCom. Does that information come from a reliable source?”
“Niece of my other sister, Inspector. Works there. You know, secretarial work. And making coffee, taking phone calls, that sort of thing. Someone has to do it. Big companies have money for that. I can’t afford a secretary, so I do these things myself. But girls like her, they are everywhere, see everything. They’re invisible like I am to the Dutch.”
“No, Oleg, you’re not invisible.”
Oleg grinned, good-naturedly. “Perhaps I am not. Perhaps I should be more invisible. That is my problem. I am too obvious. But I love my work. Laundry business and small neighborhood shops. Earning good money. And I stay within the law too, Van Gils. You arrange this thing for my nephew? Then we have dinner together. Russian cuisine, here in Amsterdam. And what about that bottle of vodka?”
“I don’t say no.”
Oleg passed him a paper bag. “There’s another thing, Inspector.”
“Yes?”
“I know you’re interested in trade in suspicious and hazardous materials.”
“Yes. Like guns. And drugs. You got something for me, Oleg?”
“I don’t know if this concerns you, but maybe, yes. You know I have much family. The thing I heard, this delivery of a truck of five thousand gallons of liquefied gas. That’s
what my uncle does, fuels and chemical stuff in bulk.”
“And what’s so special about a truckload of liquefied gas?”
“The thing is the client, not the product. Although this kind of gas, he doesn’t often sell it. It’s explosive stuff. Has to be kept refrigerated all the time.”
“And who’s the client?”
“A company called Real Estate Technologies.”
Van Gils wrote that down. “And what does Real Estate Technologies do?”
“It manages large industrial premises. Like factories.”
“Machines need fuel.”
“No, not this kind of fuel. It’s too explosive. It’s used in certain processes in the chemical industry. Maybe it’s for export, maybe to some country that wants to produce weapons with it. You know? They can use any kind of explosive to make bombs. In Syria or Afghanistan, wherever.”
“I’ll look into it, Oleg.” Van Gils said, closing his notebook.
33
COLONEL SAEED AL-RAHMAN OPENED the bathroom door, stepped over the threshold, glanced at the mirror, and opened the tap. He fiddled with the water temperature until it was exactly right, pulled his hand back again, and then stood in front of the mirror. He inspected his face. Here in the Netherlands, he would not stand out too much with so many foreigners in the streets. He could easily blend in. But anyone looking carefully would notice he was not a Turk or Moroccan or Surinamese. Not that this mattered much. Nobody would bother him in the street. He would not be thrown out of a pub or a hotel if he dressed nicely.
But he was still an outsider.
He undressed and stepped into the shower. He closed his eyes and let the hot water run over his body. He wasn’t used to the cold weather, the winter. He was unsure all the time as to what clothes to wear. He would not want to be underdressed and cold. But with too many layers of clothing, he would be hot in a building. At home, he wore cotton trousers and cotton shirts and at the most a light sweater.
The general had called him into his office and patiently explained to him what was expected on this mission, this very personal mission, and had issued a few well-chosen words of warning. There had been the unexpected and frightening discovery in Somalia, to begin with. That had been bad enough. But now there was the same uncomfortable situation in the Netherlands, first the discovery in the Ardennes and then the grisly murder of the prince.
These events were, of course, connected. And they could, as such, not be ignored.
Colonel Al-Rahman understood at once what was expected of him.
He was given both a public and a confidential agenda. The public agenda stipulated he would be an investigator, assisting the Dutch authorities with the ongoing investigation in Amsterdam. Finding the actual murderers and bringing them to justice, however, was not important. That would be a problem for the Dutch.
Keeping the body of His Highness out of the hands of the unfaithful would be part of his public agenda as well. No medical examination would be allowed.
The hidden agenda was more involved, as explained by the general. Colonel Al-Rahman was not happy with this part of his mission. But he was clearly aware of his obligations to his country, to the royal family, and, finally, to Allah. And he had seen pictures of the bodies in Somalia and in the Ardennes. So he had accepted the mission, hidden agenda and all. Because it was his duty to do so.
Duty was connected to honor. Doing his duty was serving the higher powers out of a profound and personal desire to preserve the sanctity of life as laid out by the words of Allah Himself—the Merciful, the Benign.
The hidden agenda, however, was not entirely honorable. The hidden agenda had nothing whatsoever to do with his obligations to his country or to the House of Saud. The general had made it clear that both of them—Al-Rahman and himself—had obligations beyond those of country and kingdom. Obligations of a very different nature.
In that sense, the hidden agenda was far more important than the public one.
He closed the tap and stepped from the shower. He draped a towel around his hips, dried his hair and then his body with another towel, and stepped into the bedroom. The TV was showing CNN. At home, he often watched CNN. It was American, it was biased, but you had to give it to them because they were well informed about what went on in the world. An Indian woman was discussing disturbances on the subcontinent. Al-Rahman knew three officers of his division were active there, and so he knew about the tensions in that region.
And the involvement of his government—unofficially, of course.
He sat down on the sofa, still damp from the shower. The curtains were partially open. He was on the fourth floor of the hotel, and he assumed no one could look in. An officer of the Mutaween standing half naked watching CNN was not a subject of interest to foreign security services, but of course he would still have to be careful. There might be microphones in his room, but he didn’t care. He was not going to invite anyone in for a private chat. Officially, his job here was very low profile. Officially, he hardly existed.
The next day he had an unscheduled appointment, arranged by the general. The general had mentioned old friends and old friendships, and while Al-Rahman inwardly frowned upon such luxuries, he made no comment. The general had been concise about the arrangement, assuming the colonel knew how to handle such matters. He was familiar with the qualities of Colonel Al-Rahman. This was not his first foreign mission with a hidden agenda. The general knew certain matters would, in the end, have to be solved by the colonel, at his own discretion.
The only things that bothered Colonel Al-Rahman was how to stay involved with the criminal investigation and how to stay informed on the progress the security services made.
THURSDAY
34
EEKHAUT WAS STARTLED BY the shrill ringing of his phone. He didn’t like the sound but hadn’t yet figured out how to change it into something more agreeable. Like a Beethoven symphony. He quickly looked around, but nobody was paying attention. It was the tone associated with Linda.
“Walter,” she said.
He knew this was one of those moments when no intelligent reaction would be expected of him. “Mmm?” he uttered, at once realizing he would never win awards for being eloquent.
It didn’t even sound as if he was happy to hear from her.
Fortunately, she chose to ignore all that.
“I just arrived in Madrid, Walter. Direct flight from Mombasa. Can you hear me?”
“Yes, I can.”
“Were you asleep just now? Did I wake you?”
“What’s the time over there?”
“Nine,” she said, sounding somewhat confused. “In the morning.”
“That’s what we have here too,” he said.
“Oh, I didn’t realize you’re at work.”
“Never mind,” he said. “Never mind. You can call me anytime. Glad to hear from you. Forgive the grumpy old man I’ve become, but I’ve been worried. Was worried. But happy again when I heard you’re safe and all.”
“Safe since we left Somalia, actually,” she said. “I’m waiting for a connection to Amsterdam. Next flight with a seat available is not until tomorrow morning. Can’t be helped. Tourists fleeing winter, I guess. So I’ll have to hang around here at the airport all day, which is . . . Anyway, I’ll be at Schiphol Airport by half past seven tomorrow. Morning, that is.”
“I’ll pick you up. You’ll be exhausted.”
He almost heard her smile. Despite everything she’d gone through. “Don’t bother, Walter. I’ll take the train. It’s no problem.”
“You have a pile of luggage. I’ll pick you up.”
“I have almost no luggage left. It’s all gone, and anything that was left that I didn’t want to bring home again, I gave away. I have some hand luggage. I’ll take the train. I’ll call you from Amsterdam station when I get there. Can you pick me up there? In a police car? One with flashing lights and a siren? I’d like that.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
“I know y
ou’ll do your best, Walter. Like you always do. Look, I’ll tell you the whole story later, but my phone battery is low now, and I have to go look for a place to . . . you know.”
Then she was gone. The phone was silent. He leaned back in his chair. The morning was almost silent except for some sirens in the distance. He was glad the African adventure was over. He was glad she was coming home.
Prinsen walked past his office, lost in thoughts. The young man noticed Eekhaut and entered.
Something was wrong, Eekhaut could see. He saw the deep creases in Prinsen’s forehead. Something was eating at him. Maybe he’d just slept badly. He was losing sleep because of Eileen, but it didn’t seem he was spending his night at orgies.
“Anything new to report?” Prinsen asked.
“We went to the villa where the Saudi was killed, and I witnessed the autopsy of the three female victims. Or more precisely, I was around for the autopsies. I went for a coffee, and the pathologist did his job.”
“I’ve never been present at one,” Prinsen said thoughtfully. “I want to keep it that way.”
“You know how focused pathologists can get concerning their subjects.”
“I heard,” Prinsen said, his thoughts drifting elsewhere.
“We’re supposed to see Dewaal in a minute, to coordinate what everybody has found out. You all right?”
“Yes, just a little tired, that’s all.”
Van Gils walked in. “Morning, all,” he cheerfully said. “Seems like the worst of winter is behind us. Spring soon again.”
Prinsen walked out.
Something is really wrong with that boy, Eekhaut thought. This isn’t his usual behavior. We can’t do with that now. We need everybody at their best.
35
THE CROOKED OLD WOMAN carefully deposited the tray with a pot of tea, two cups, saucers, sugar, milk, and cookies on the table in the parlor. “Anything more, ma’am?” she inquired, her voice feeble.
Purgatory Page 21