The Hollow-Eyed Angel (6 page)

The commissaris struggled against letting his body sag back on the couch. He thought he might be fainting. If he let on how he felt, the visitors would probably call a doctor, or, worse, an ambulance. He forced himself to appear interested. "Dutch? Dutch tourists?"

"But Termeer was alive then when the couple saw him in some sort of physical trouble," O'Neill said. "Just not feeling well, which fits in with the autopsy's findings. At that time the subject was wearing his own clothes, of course. Tweed suit. Tie. Hat. He had been gesticulating oddly and frolicking about, after standing still for a long time, finally collapsing. Older man...open-heart surgery..."

The commissaris caught on to words here and there, which came close, wafted away, turned back, floated around. He wasn't quite sure what "frolicking" meant.

O'Neill demonstrated. He held up his arms, fingers pointing at the ceiling, and skipped through the suite.

The commissaris tried to smile. "And Termeer had heart trouble, you said? Open-heart surgery? Of course, that would show on the body."

O'Neill sounded downright angry now. "Jesus F. Christ, didn't we make a mess of it though? A derelict, who'd had recent open-heart surgery? Expensive dentures in nearby bushes? Blatant contradictions. That's what police work is all about, noticing things that don't fit. It's the discrepancies that lead us to truth, right, Sergeant?" He glared. "We would still know nothing if that neighbor hadn't showed...."

It was Hurrell talking now. Somewhat defensive. "Charlie did show and he identified the body as that of Bert Termeer, his tenant, a book dealer."

"We still had it," O'Neill said. "Good thing. Bums' bodies don't stay around for long with our limited morgue space. They get dumped in some mass grave."

"And the Dutch couple," the commissaris said, pronouncing each word with difficulty. "The tourists."

Hurrell found a visiting card among the photographs on the table. He read aloud: "Dr. (Chemistry) Johan Lakmaker..." He read the address: Nieuwegein. "That's the town? 'Nyu-wee-jeen?'"

"But your man wasn't dead when they saw him," O'Neill said. "We have to be clear here. And when he died, much later probably, his death was from shock. The cause could have been that fat branch crashing down. Or a hard object hitting him in the chest: a ball, a rock or something. A Frisbee. The blow wasn't severe. The bruising on the skin in the chest area that remains is slight."

The commissaris tried to keep his eyes wide open. "Shock?"

"Leading to a heart attack," O'Neill said. "It doesn't matter much what the precipitant was because, whatever it was, your man wasn't murdered."

"Roughly robbed, yes," Hurrell said, "but after death. Struck by a branch. Or a random ball. No possible criminal intent here. Just happenstance, Yan, fatally connecting with a heart condition."

"Seventy years old," O'Neill was saying now. "No spring chicken. All that running around the park, and then standing still, posing like some silly statue. Your man was asking for trouble."

"Happenstance," the commissaris repeated. He liked that word.

"You look all worn out," O'Neill said kindly. "We'll leave you our paperwork. It should be self-explanatory. Look it over sometime. No hurry. Here is my card. Phone me if you have questions. Get some sleep first. I'll have you picked up for the lecture tomorrow. It's my pal Russo's show, right? On modes of death or something? Russo will be all gung ho about Maggotmaid again. You will like that."

"Maggotmaid?"

O'Neill raised a joking finger. "Surprise, Yan. You'll find out tomorrow."

Hurrell was doing his heavy breathing again.

"Ball," the commissaris said. "People play ball in your park. Like what kind of ball? Golf?"

"Baseball—softball—volleyball maybe, soccer, lacrosse," O'Neill said. "I used to play that. Used to be an Indian sport. A pretty rough game. They still play lacrosse in the park, Hurrell?"

"Some," Hurrell said. "We don't want them to, but it happens. Ball games are restricted to a few clearly marked areas. Park personnel are supposed to warn offenders. But there are always the assholes."

The commissaris hadn't been able to concentrate. He was feeling nauseous too. So lacrosse was some kind of Indian golf? And there were illegal ball games played in the park? He felt too sick to ask for details.

The commissaris, surprisingly, found himself on his feet, guiding his guests to the suite's door, pumping their hands, thanking them. Excusing himself again for wearing his pajamas and bathrobe.

The burst of energy didn't last. He had trouble making it to his four-poster, where he collapsed, groaned and thrashed about for a while, before getting up to stumble about the suite's bathroom, looking for more medication.

                                        "I like this little town of Nieuwegein," Adjutant Grijpstra said, after he had switched off the car engine. "How pleasant to get out of Amsterdam sometimes. We can even park here, Rinus. No pollution. Look at those huge trees. If those screeching magpies would shut up it would be real peaceful."

The unmarked police car stood in a private parking lot belonging to a row of new town houses overlooking the river Rhine. The houses showed their forbidding backsides to the detectives, and further hid behind a raised row of new brick planters containing baby evergreen bushes that would grow into more protection later.

Grijpstra read the note Sergeant de Gier passed him. "Lakmaker, Joop and Sara. They're the Central Park witnesses we are after?"

De Gier had given up trying to figure out how to fold the road map. He now flattened it with his fist. In spite of the long drive his mood was still good. He had followed Grijpstra's order: Gridlocked speedways had been avoided. The journey from Amsterdam had followed tree-lined canal quays and dikes twisting along narrow rivers. De Gier had pointed at fishermen in rowboats, sitting quietly behind their rods, at storks and herons planing on breezes, at turning windmills.

"Beautiful," Grijpstra said each time. "Lovely country. Nice spring we're having."

"I don't like this," Grijpstra said now. "Interviewing stale witnesses. How did Lakmaker strike you when you phoned for the appointment?"

"Member of the elderly arrogant class," de Gier said. "Old coot with a university background. Enjoys an ample pension. Addressed me as 'policeman.'"

Grijpstra grinned. "Maybe we'll end up with a cigar each, to put beneath our caps."

"You do the talking," de Gier said. "I'm allergic to their kind."

Grijpstra didn't move yet; they had arrived early.

De Gier looked at the town houses' unfriendly backsides. "Two hundred thousand each?"

Grijpstra thought the town houses would price at three. One hundred thousand extra for the view of the Rhine.

De Gier kept staring while he wondered how the old couple would live, while viewing Holland's widest, most splendid river. So what else do you do? Ignore the aching old body while watching boats sail through your picture windows?

Discipline yourself? One hour of viewing, ten minutes for checking
TV GUIDE
for nature programs later on? Nap? Dinner? De Gier asked Grijpstra.

"NEWS!" Grijpstra shouted.

"WHAT?"

Grijpstra pointed out that de Gier didn't have to shout in his face. Grijpstra had merely acted out how an elderly couple conducts dialogue. One sees a newscaster clearing his throat and shouts at the other to come watch the news. Or vice versa. Then, while one partner makes hurry-up movements, the other comes hobbling along so that the complete couple can share Worldly Horrors.

De Gier had trouble imagining the scene.

"Sharing of media-fodder," Grijpstra said. He also suggested membership in a chess club or a bird-watching society: Identified species can be crossed off a list. Or visiting even older elderly persons in institutions. The couple might also invent ways to improve life on the planet.

De Gier got it now. He suggested guilt. The old couple analyzes past mistakes. They fantasize about how things could have been better. They prepare for a painless end by studying euthanasia literature supplied by their doctor.

"Read the
Rotterdam Times
and quote from same?"

de Gier asked. He tried to vocalize the
Rotterdam Times's
style of reporting, hardly opening his lips, keeping his nose closed, expressing wise-ass opinions in the latest cliches.

"Okay, okay," Grijpstra said, "it's still my paper.

Only the
Rotterdam Times
dares to mention police corruption."

"You subscribe?" de Gier asked.

Grijpstra sometimes read the paper at Cafe Keyzer, Fridays, between mocha cake and espresso.

"The photographs are okay," de Gier said. "Politicians all look like compulsive jerk-offs, schizoid too."

"That one old drunk looked handsome, can't think of his name now."

De Gier agreed that Holland's vice president was rather photogenic.

It was about time now.

De Gier looked at macrame curtains covering the glass part of the Lakmaker front door.

Grijpstra reread the commissaris's faxed note:
Find out
what exactly the Lakmakers saw on June 4.
Grijpstra checked the day on his watch. "Almost three weeks ago."
Ask
(the note ordered)
why they ignored Sergeant Hurrell's queries left
on their answering machine.

"Are we going to interrogate the Lakmakers separately?" de Gier asked. "In different rooms? Catch them later on all the discrepancies?"

Grijpstra didn't think so. "Might annoy them too much."

"They're annoyed already," de Gier said.

"Angry, well-meaning fellow citizens," Grijpstra said. "But don't they have a nice place to live in?" He pushed his car door open. "I attack, Sergeant. Follow me."

Grijpstra and de Gier sat on a couch upholstered in blue velvet and drank coffee from Chinese mugs adorned with hand-painted flowers. A limping white-haired old lady pointed at cargo vessels motoring along the Rhine. Her bald husband checked a plastic file on his deck. It contained maps and leaflets, mementos of the couple's recent American journey.

"That couch you two are sitting on is original Biedermeier," Sara Lakmaker said. "A wreck when I found it. Joop repaired the frame and I upholstered it. It would cost a fortune if you figured in the hours."

"The professional artistic touch," Grijpstra said. He moved carefully, anxious not to damage the couch's ancient springs, which creaked painfully under his bulk.

"The coffee you are drinking comes from Nigeria," Sara said. "It's from Zabar's, in New York. That's the biggest and best deli in the world. In New York you can buy anything. Americans still have the greatest buying power."

"A strong and interesting flavor," Grijpstra said.

"Care to join me here?" Joop Lakmaker asked from his desk. He had unfolded a map. "This is Central Park and this is where we saw the man you are inquiring about now. Just off this path, next to that meadow." Lakmaker changed both his voice and his posture so that he could be a poet, speaking loudly and with a rhetorical effect. "The grass was green," Lakmaker declaimed, "and the gent was dying. The balloon beast was rising"—Lakmaker covered his heart with his hand—"and the children were playing." He looked at Grijpstra. "How does that sound?"

"That sounds real pretty," Grijpstra said.

Lakmaker grinned. "I didn't even have to put in the blooming azaleas. I wanted to be a poet, wear a corduroy suit, live in a mountain cabin, but Sara wanted us to live usefully instead."

"Joop," Sara warned.

"And usefully we lived. A lifetime long. Do you know," Joop asked, "that I was instrumental in lowering the cost of Dutch soda pop?" Joop's bulging eyes looked through Grijpstra. "Isn't that something?"

"You were much appreciated," Sara said. "You did a good job. You raised good kids." Sara smiled. "You collected art." She pointed at three masks hung above the large TV screen. "We already auctioned off two collections and now Joop has started collecting again. Impressive? They are Bolivian. We bought them on a trip. Mine workers make them from beer cans during their yearly holiday."

Grijpstra and de Gier looked at the masks. "Devils?"

"Mine demons," Sara said. "They live underground and come up with the workers, to share their holiday."

The masks sprouted blunt horns, and blood dripped from the eyes.

"Expressive," Grijpstra said.

"I changed my interests and collected Fellini." Joop pointed at stacked videotapes. "I want that included in my obituary."

"Joop," Sara warned.

"Not in the
Rotterdam Times,"
Joop said, "I know I'm not on that level. Maybe in the
Nieuwegein Advertiser!"
He was rubbing his hands. "What do you think, policeman? You think that my regression from present-day pop art to a nostalgic interest in surrealism, due to reliving World War II horrors, will make good copy?"

"So that poor old man in Central Park was Dutch," Sara said. "He spoke English to us. Amazing. Our running into a Dutchman in Central Park, I mean."

"Nothing out-of-the-way about that," Joop said. "Holland is rich so we Dutch can travel. New York welcomes big spenders. Six jumbos a day on the transatlantic route. 'Step right up, step right up.'" He made inviting gestures. "We're bound to stumble into each other in Central Park."

"Did that poor man survive?" Sara asked. "He seemed to be feeling very bad. The horse kicked him, you know. There he was, spinning and turning. And that uniformed hussy just rode off."

"Uniformed hussy," Grijpstra said. "What uniformed hussy would that be?"

"The policewoman," Sara said. "We had been watching the poor man for a while, you see. So had she. From high up on her huge horse."

"Well," Joop said, "that's what you
thought,
Sara. We can't know for sure. She was wearing sunglasses."

"To answer your question," Grijpstra said, "yes, the old man died. He was found in the azalea bushes the next morning. So the police horse kicked him?"

"Just a little," Sara said. "There was a lot going on. They had a big balloon beast going up for the kids, on the meadow, some kind of dinosaur."

"Tyrannosaurus rex," Joop said. "Enormous. Made from multicolor balloons stuck together."

"And there was a jazz group playing, on a big bandstand."

"Don't underestimate jazz," said Joop. "Even if I collect classical myself I admit that jazz is a superior art form." He looked at de Gier.

De Gier nodded.

"We had been listening to the music," Sara said. "And watching all the costumed people. There was a contest going on. Look-alikes of famous movie characters. Madonna in garters. Monroe pretending her skirt was caught in a draft. Marlon Brando dancing the last tango. Yves Montand being seduced by Catherine Deneuve."

"Mayor Koch was one of the judges," Joop said. "Odd-looking man but his speech was funny."

"But this man you came about," Sara said. "He was the most impressive. He reminded me of a professor I had when I was studying interior decoration in Utrecht."

"He wasn't part of the contest, was he?"

Sara seemed sure. "Oh no, not at all."

"I can see you are an interior decorator, that you are visually perceptive," Grijpstra said, looking about the apartment, noting open spaces and a different way of lighting. "Could you describe the man, please?"

"A tall majestic old man wearing plus fours," Sara said. "Like mountaineers do. Old-fashioned trousers that tie up half-way between knee and ankle. And a waistcoat and jacket, all dark brown tweed, a matching outfit. White shirt, buttoned down. Plaid tie. Long white beard. High forehead. Sharp nose. Bushy eyebrows. Lovely blue eyes. Polished boots and cream woolen stockings. A full head of hair."

"Sara loves hairy types," Joop said. "He struck me as a performer. He was standing absolutely still when Sara first saw him, but I had noticed the fellow before. He was skipping about then, an unlikely thing for a sage to do."

"Where was I," Sara asked, "when he skipped?"

"Going kootchy-coo at a baby."

"A sage?" Grijpstra asked.

"A kind of Voltaire type. You've heard of Voltaire?" Joop asked. "He had that sort of world-waking aura, but he looked rather like George Bernard Shaw. You've heard of George Bernard Shaw?"

Grijpstra looked at de Gier.

De Gier nodded.

"Yes," Grijpstra said. "He looked like them, did he?"

"Upper-class prophet," Sara said. "That's what he seemed like to me. Not crazy looking, but decent. After the skipping he stood at a crossing—still, like a statue, on one leg, leaning forward. Posing, in an exaggerated attitude, for effect. Very startling. You couldn't help noticing the man, and wondering what he was up to."

"Kids went over and touched him," Joop said. "Making sure he was real." He nodded. "Excellent performer. A showman. You know?"

"And then we became aware of the mounted cop, also watching him," Sara said. "Mounted cops look nice in America. Not operatic-looking, like here. No long coats and stupid hats. In America their wear blue helmets. And that policewoman had a long ponytail. She wore a smart uniform. Dark riding pants, a blue starched shirt. A lot of leather. High boots. Belt."

"Nice-Nazi," Joop said. "Gun belt with hardware, complete, all the sidearms and a two-way radio with waving antenna. Like in
Star Wars.
I liked those films," Joop said. "I don't like the police myself, of course. They're all fascists, you know. Will do anything when ordered. Like in the war when they picked up my parents. Dutch cops did that, because the Germans said to take all Jews to the railway station. If I hadn't been playing outside they would have kicked me into a boxcar too. To gas me in Treblinka."

"Yes," Grijpstra said.

"Nothing personal," Joop said. "Obedience to authority goes with being human. We like to follow orders. Gets us up in the morning. We like violence too. Now there are Jewish police on the West Bank and in Gaza. Doing the same thing. Then that will turn around and they'll be beating us up again." Joop smiled, impressed with the exactitude of his argument. "Maybe humanity can evolve though? Suddenly twist its genes and become a new species?"

"Joop," Sara warned.

"So the Central Park female police officer on horseback caused her mount to kick Termeer?" Grijpstra asked. "That was his name, by the way, the name of the man you call a prophet. She attacked Bert Termeer, using her horse as a weapon?"

"No," Joop said. "That's to say, not on purpose. This Termeer was standing still, like a statue of someone, about to take off at speed, and then suddenly he did. He leaped onto the path, to start skipping again—the other part of his act—and the horse reared and its hoof struck him."

"The policewoman ignored that?" Grijpstra asked. "She rode off? Left the scene of an accident without taking proper action?"