The Devil's Playground (24 page)

than to Piet.

‘Yes, in Amsterdam. That’s where the site is based at least,

we have strong reason to suspect that the films are also in

the city. It would make sense.’

‘This SPAR you talked about…’

‘The Society for the Preservation of the Achievements of

the Reich.’

‘Achievements?’

‘Yes, detective. The society was founded about a year

after the unconditional surrender. There were people who

believed that what they had achieved in those twelve years

since Hitler had come to power was something that had to

be preserved for future generations; for a time when people

would appreciate these things again. Their aim was to retrieve

as much of their history from the hands of the invaders as

possible. This is just one group, the most prestigious you

could say, but there are a thousand smaller groups, harder to

track, almost invisible.

‘ They tour the newly renovated concentration camps with

their interpretive signs and maps of death. They salute the

artefacts of their history, the crematorium doors and barbed

wire fences. They collect and stockpile bars of soap and

lampshades made from the dead. They tape the documentaries

that appear on every television station, endlessly watching

old footage of generals and officers striding through the

Fatherland, the whole world theirs for a short space of time.

They cruise the Internet and bid on a succession of items

from embossed plates to Bormann’s skull to darker things,

things of more worth. They believe that their time will come

again, that the Thousand Year Reich wasn’t just a rhetorical

one, and they collect and save these things so that when the

time does come, their children will have a link to their past,

a sense of history and pride in the achievements of the Reich.

It will be their inheritance.’

‘And these people are here, in the city?’ He was starting

to understand how this tied up with the case, the old man’s

past, Jon’s story. Obviously SPAR believed the films to be

real too. If only he could see them, he thought, catch a

glimpse of one of the victims, then he would know.

The man nodded. ‘Yes, we have information from Frankfurt

- we have a sighting at the train station last night. They

are here. Not only them but others too. Such a thing as this

collection does not appear every day. If it is what it purports

to be then certain groups will do anything in their power to

get hold of these films.’

Van Hijn shifted in his chair. Outside the light had disappeared

and the rain began a steady tattoo on the windowpane.

‘Can you track the films?’

‘That is not our job, detective. We track only the buyers,

those interested - we compile lists and databases - the rest,

I think, is up to you, no?’

Van Hijn nodded, though it was not so much in agreement

with Piet. He was thinking about Jake Colby, what the old

man of the museum had said about his interests in film, and

thinking about Jon too and why he’d decided to stay in the

city. He had a sudden flash: Jake perhaps finding the films,

the real films, in the museum’s dusty basement. Someone

had killed him for them. It didn’t matter if they were real or

snuff; either way, Van Hijn was now convinced, they had led

to the old man’s death, the deaths of the girls. Either someone

had known and murdered Jake for the films or they had

somehow convinced Jake to act out his history on film, to

recreate the horrors. And why? It seemed money was the

motivation as usual, the auction, the frenzy, the belief and

need for belief in the reality of these objects. Van Hijn

held down a smile, inappropriate in these surroundings. He

checked his watch. Late. He was supposed to meet Jon half

an hour ago.

He gave Piet his card. ‘I want to see the preview when it

goes online. Call me.’

The next day Jon awoke burning with the spark and pulse of

infatuation. That flush of feeling, the reeling madness that

occurs only once and only before you know someone too

well. It was crazy, he knew, and it had never happened so

fast. That was strictly for fiction, and yet he didn’t want it to

go, it felt so good.

He’d thought of nothing but Suze the whole previous

evening and now all he wanted to do was sleep through this

day so that the night and concert would come quicker. It

was nice to have something else to think about, something

other than …

But first he had to meet the detective. That damn detective.

How had he known? Had he been checking, suspecting

that Jon was somehow tied up in this? How ridiculous it

seemed, truly paranoid, but the note had unnerved him. He’d

almost forgotten about it all, well, not quite, but at least had

muted its clamour and now here he was again, the room

shrinking, the walls sucking the air out of his lungs.

He ate breakfast at what had become his local Chinese; a

rough, basic place with shared tables and a small, fat

splattered menu. The food was good however and Jon ate it

with relish. Thinking about the way she’d kissed him excited

him and his heart lurched suddenly, making swallowing

difficult.

He’d been surprised that morning when he’d noticed in

the mirror the definite beginnings of a beard. Had he not

looked in the mirror before? No, that was silly; just hadn’t

noticed it or remembered to shave, that was all. His ankle

was getting better and he needed only two pills this morning

to relegate the pain to the back of his mind.

As he drank the last bitter dregs of tea he checked his

watch, saw that he still had an hour to go and ordered some

more.

He hadn’t seen the detective anywhere. So he sat in the dark,

stranded in a foreign cinema, watching the opening credits

of a German film, subtitled in Dutch, Herzog’s Heart of Glass. He made out the title and the movie contained very little dialogue, so he had no problem in following its visionary

landscapes as they oozed across the screen. He almost knew

what the film was about but it didn’t quite cohere and he

liked it left just like that, balancing precariously.

‘Mr Reed.’

He turned around and saw Van Hijn walking towards him,

coming out of the same cinema. He felt a burst of anxiety

and wondered why he’d come. He looked around to check

if there were others, if this was a trap, an arrest, but he

couldn’t see anyone and he relaxed slightly, still lost in

the film.

‘Mr Reed, hello.’ Van Hijn’s smile was cold, his eyes

distracted, looking behind him. Jon remembered what he’d

seen outside the JHM, the shadowy man, but he wasn’t sure

if he wanted to tell the detective yet. They shook hands.

‘I was late.’ A statement rather than an apology.

‘That’s okay, I enjoyed the film. My kind of thing.’ He felt

a curious mixture of dread and relief. Despite all his fears,

the detective made him feel better.

They walked down the cinema’s steps, past the crowd of

queuing strangers — chatting, nodding heads, speaking into

mobile phones, finishing cigarettes — and the posters of

movie stars, all bruise and bluster, fire and steely eyes staring

into the distance. The detective took out a pack of Camels

and offered one to Jon. ‘I thought you’d be back in London

by now.’

‘I thought so too.’

Van Hijn stopped and stared at him. A hard, fixed look

that carried the years in its gaze. ‘I told you that this is no

longer any of your business.’

Jon shifted, wanted to continue walking but the detective’s

stare held him tight. He thought about telling the detective

that he was just enjoying the sights, a tourist nothing more,

but Van Hijn’s eyes made it clear that he knew. ‘I don’t see

the harm in me …’

Van Hijn cut him off, grabbing his arm. *You don’t see.

That’s exactly it. You can’t see. This is not your city. You do

not have access to the right information. You walk into the

wrong area and start asking questions, I’ll be staring at your

corpse tomorrow morning.’

Jon looked at him. Wrenched his arm away, making Van

Hijn flinch. ‘You can’t stop me. There’s nothing you can do.

I’m going to do what I need to, whether you help me or not.’

Van Hijn burst out laughing. Jon reeled back, surprised

by the older man’s reaction. ‘What’s so funny?’ he said.

‘Nothing. Nothing at all.’ Van Hijn composed himself,

hunched back down into his crumpled shape. ‘Let’s go for a

coffee. You want to follow this through, I can’t give you my

blessing but I can give you some information that might be

of help.’

They sat in the Four Way Street, a Crosby, Stills, Nash and

Young-themed coffee shop. Squeezed into a small table

behind an enormous air-brushed rendering of David Crosby,

walrus moustache and all. Each wall of the coffee shop was

decorated with similar representations of the other members

of the supergroup, though you could make this out only as

the clouds of smoke parted and cleared and Van Hijn liked

to think that it was a rather apposite metaphor on the group’s

existence.

‘You ever hear the one about the unreleased recordings?’

he asked Jon. ‘It’s a Zappa skit. Frank’s rapping about this and

that and all these objects he’s going to tempt this girl with and

among them are the four unreleased recordings of Crosby,

Stills,Nash and Young arguing backstage atthe Fillmore East.’

Despite himself Jon laughed, amused at the way the detective’s

mood had changed, as if something lodged between

them had suddenly given way.

‘The cake trolley’s coming round. Then you’ll see why I

brought you to such an ostensibly horrific place.’

‘I was wondering about that.’ .

‘Well, wonder no more,’ Van Hijn said at the exact

moment that the creaking trolley came to a stop parallel to

their table. The waitress smiled and Van Hijn indicated with

three quick jabs what he wanted.

‘Liquorice cheesecake.’ The detective pointed to a slowly

oozing black globule on one of the plates. To Jon it looked

like a seabird drowned in crude oil.

‘Only place in the city you can get this delicacy. High

calorie count but what the hell, I’ve had a bad morning. Only

way to make it better.’

Jon nodded, agreeing in principle but not at all sure about

the object in question which seemed to be dissolving rapidly,

covering ever greater expanses of plate.

“You said you had some new information, detective?’ he

asked, hoping the policeman wouldn’t force him to try some

of this ‘delicacy’.

Van Hijn looked up. ‘Call me Ronald, please.’

‘Oh no.’ Jon shook his head. ‘Detective sounds much

cooler. I’ve never known a detective before.’

Van Hijn grinned, tore apart three sachets of sugar and

upended them into his drink. “You want a piece?’ he asked,

smoothing his fork into the liquefying mass and wrapping it

around it like spaghetti.

‘No, I’m fine. Really.’

‘Okay, but you’ve got to try it before you go back to

London.’

Jon let that hang.

Van Hijn glanced up from his drink. He looked tired, tired

and worn out.

‘This morning has been particularly crazy, I hope you will

excuse me. Okay, yes, the coroner made his report. Your

friend Jake died from a speedball, heroin and …’

‘I know what it is,‘Jon replied, shocked. It was almost too

prosaic a death after all the things he’d imagined. ‘Self

inflicted?’

‘No. That’s not the way it looks. He didn’t show any other

signs that he’d ever injected anything. And I told you, those

other girls were injected with heroin too, same type, the

forensics think. Another link.’ Van Hijn stirred his coffee.

‘There was something else on him.’

‘What?’

‘When we found him, apart from the book. Or rather, in the book, there was a bookmark. I was told not to mention this to you originally. I don’t suppose it matters now.’

Jon leaned forward, almost unable to get the words out

of his mouth. ‘A bookmark?’

‘A piece of paper really. I wasn’t sure if you knew about

it. There was a string of numbers on it, handwritten. It was

being used as a bookmark; we don’t know if the numbers

have any connection with the book. They don’t seem to.’

ŚWhat numbers?’ Jon asked, dying to see anything that

might shed some light on events, anything written in Jake’s

hand.

The detective took out his wallet. He reached into one of

the side pockets and extracted a small strip of photocopied

paper. ‘We thought it could perhaps be a bank account or

code for some locker or retrieval area. I’ve been keeping it

in my wallet. Looking at it from time to time, trying to

understand what it refers to.’

Jon stared at the paper, obscured in the detective’s hand.

‘Is it possible that it doesn’t refer to anything?’

‘Possible, probable even, but if I accepted that then I’d

have no job to do. I have to give it the benefit of the doubt.’

Jon nodded as the detective passed him the piece of paper.