DeKok and the Death of a Clown

by A. C. Baantjer

  “Exactly, that’s a wrap.” It sounded like a challenge.

  DeKok thoughtfully swallowed the last of his sandwich and lifted his coffee mug. Then he put it down and lifted an index finger into the air.

  “Now, however, Charlotte wants nothing whatsoever to do with the jewelry.”

  Vledder grinned crookedly.

  “Understandable,” he said with fervor. “She would be stupid to open her mouth at this time. Pierrot is dead. There’s nothing left to get from a dead lover. Based on her history, we know she can fall back into the loving arms of her husband anytime she wishes.”

  DeKok took a sip of coffee and then smiled derisively.

  “A very good financial prospect, which Fantinelli richly endowed with a fortune in antique jewelry.”

  “Exactly,” agreed Vledder. “If I read Charlotte right, and I think I did, she’ll return to Fantinelli full of remorse, teary-eyed. She probably has already done so.” He paused and frowned. “It wouldn’t be a bit surprising if Carol became Fantinelli’s next victim.”

  DeKok stared at him in amazement.

  “Carol?”

  “Don’t you see, DeKok?” cried Vledder, full of excitement. “As it stands now, Carol is the only witness against the Fantinellis … and they could take her cut.”

  “You mean,” said DeKok, “if the Fantinellis split the proceeds as husband and wife, they share with no one.”

  Vledder looked triumphant.

  “Now you’re getting it. It falls together naturally.”

  DeKok leaned forward.

  “Eh, didn’t you say you had rejected the theory of Carol’s involvement in the theft? Just checking—now you’ve changed your mind?”

  “Yes,” said Vledder confidently. “I’ve been mulling it over. When she was here, she acted the innocent. That’s all it

  was … just an act. Something about her demeanor made me change my mind. Anyway without Carol in the equation, there’s no solution. She is the only one who could get access to Vlaanderen’s safe.”

  DeKok drained his coffee mug and stood up. He could not accept the notion of Carol as an accomplice. It was plain unthinkable, despite Vledder’s convictions. For a moment he seemed to wonder what to do next. Then he walked over to get his coat and hat.

  Vledder got up and followed.

  “Where are you headed?”

  “I’m going to ask Henri Jonkers what he knows about jewelry.”

  At that moment the telephone on DeKok’s desk rang. Vledder walked back and picked up the receiver.

  DeKok waited. He watched Vledder’s back while he talked on the phone. Instinctively he knew it was an important call. Vledder turned around, the receiver still in his hand. There was a haunted look on his face.

  “Butterfly.”

  “What about Butterfly?”

  “She’s been found in her apartment.”

  “Murdered?”

  “Yes,” said Vledder. “There was a knife in her back.”

  12

  Intently crouched over the steering wheel, Vledder concentrated on guiding his VW through the heavy traffic. In a few minutes DeKok observed at least thirteen serious traffic violations. He gave his partner an irritated look.

  “What are you doing? You’re driving as if the devil is behind you. You’re always in such a hurry to reach a corpse. Do you think it will walk away?”

  Vledder pressed harder on the accelerator.

  “The bastard.”

  “Who?”

  “How could anyone sink low enough to kill such a little girl,” replied Vledder sharply.

  DeKok straightened up in the seat. To head off a fruitless conversation, he changed the subject.

  “What, exactly, did the watch commander say … who was killed? Butterfly or Martha Hagen?”

  “Butterfly.”

  DeKok sighed and sank back in his seat. For the rest of the trip he was lost in his own thoughts.

  A young, uniformed constable guarded the door to the apartment building. He saluted politely when DeKok approached.

  “You came fast,” he said.

  “Anybody else here?”

  The constable shook his head.

  “No, we reported to the watch commander. He said he would inform you. Whether he notified anyone else, I don’t know. My partner is upstairs, the third floor. He’s taking a statement from the neighbor who found her.”

  “How was the body discovered?”

  “The neighbor was going out for an errand. When he passed her door he noticed it was ajar. He thought it strange. He knew the victim as a shy woman, who was seldom out. She always kept her doors and windows closed.”

  “So he took a look?”

  “He said he called out before going in. When there was no answer, he entered the apartment. He found her in the living room and knew at once she was dead. He says he didn’t touch anything, but went back upstairs to call the police.”

  DeKok nodded his understanding.

  “And you got the call by radio?”

  “Yes.”

  “What was the message?”

  “Proceed immediately to Patrick Henry Street, number 764, second floor. Report of a dead woman. Possible homicide.”

  Vledder understood that the constable was translating the coded message as he went along. Apparently even this young constable knew DeKok’s reputation. DeKok abhorred codes. But then, he hated anything to do with radio communications. The radio in the VW was almost always turned off. He stubbornly refused to carry a personal radio. It was somewhere in the trunk, gathering dust.

  “That was the whole message?”

  “That was it.”

  Vledder was getting impatient. He tried to enter the building behind DeKok’s back, but his old colleague motioned for him to wait while he continued the conversation with the constable.

  “So,” he recapitulated, “you drove here, established that the woman was indeed murdered, and asked your watch commander to contact Homicide?”

  “Yes, that’s it.”

  DeKok rubbed his chin.

  “Where did you get the name Butterfly?”

  The constable pointed upstairs.

  “The neighbor … he said that was what the woman was called.”

  She was in a prone position, her upper body on the seat of the couch where the two inspectors had been seated during their previous visit. Her lower legs and knees rested on the carpet. From her back protruded a throwing knife of the same model that had been used on the clown.

  DeKok leaned over her. Her narrow, oval face was turned to one side. Both eyes were half closed and her mouth was frozen in a bitter smile. It was as though she had always known what would happen to her.

  He took another look at the knife. Just as with the clown, the knife had penetrated the tiny body for the length of the blade. There was less blood. He looked up at Vledder, who stood across from the body. The young man was obviously trying to control his emotions. Both hands were balled into fists, the white showing around his knuckles. His face was pale and there was a nervous tic along his jaw.

  DeKok saw it with concern and pity. Whenever death presented itself in its gruesome inevitability, he had the same feeling of anger and helplessness. But over the years he had learned to outwardly control his emotions. It gave him the strength to appear unmoved, to do his job objectively. The nightmares didn’t come until later.

  Vledder moved and came to stand next to DeKok. With a shaking hand he pointed at the slight, delicate shape of the dead woman.

  “This ...” he said in a shaking voice, “this should never have happened. Surely we could have prevented this. We should never have given the killer this opportunity. We, we’re also guilty.”

  DeKok listened, primarily, to the sad tone of his voice. He was annoyed by the self-accusation.

  “How are we culpable?” he exclaimed angrily. “Are you a clairvoyant? Am I? How do you expect to produce a murderer just like that?” He snapped his fingers. “Are we magicians? Do we pull t
hem out of a high hat like rabbits?”

  He felt the anger taking hold of him. Despite his years of experience and his customary iron self-control, he felt the berserker rage growing. This rage slumbers in every placid Dutchman. It is a national trait, some say a curse. With difficulty he took a deep breath and finally succeeded in calming himself.

  “I know, before God,” he continued, in a more reasonable tone of voice, “I know I’ve done the best I can. If this murderer is quicker or smarter than I, he’s only ahead of me for now.”

  Vledder appeared to not have heard a word.

  DeKok studied the tall, young man. He bent his head, his shoulders sloped. He had the aura of defeat. It was all slightly odious to DeKok. With a sudden, stern gesture he pointed at the door.

  “Alert the Herd,” he ordered. “Then tell that guy on the floor above, who recalled his neighbor’s stage name with such precision, we’ll expect him at Warmoes Street no later than eight o’clock this evening.”

  Vledder hastily left the room. He appeared to be escaping.

  DeKok watched him go. In a complete reversal of feelings he wondered whether, somehow, he had failed his young partner. He pushed the distressing thought into his subconscious and looked around the room. Things looked much the same as they did on their previous visit. He remembered the leather chairs and the hassock on which she had been seated. He dredged the scene from his memory—how she looked, the prim gesture when she covered her knees.

  Poor Butterfly, indeed. What had she known? Why would anyone wish her dead? There had to be a motive. Where was the sense in forever silencing this diminutive woman? Was she perhaps the Butterfly who lingered in the memory of Julius Vlaanderen, the broker who seemed to have started it all?

  He rubbed the bridge of his nose. There was one confrontation he still had to arrange. It could be done, even if it was with death. Stupid not to have thought of it before.

  He stepped back and observed the scene from a distance. The large throwing knife in her back looked horrifying and obscene. The knife seemed almost larger than the frail figure below it. He would never forget this. It was even more intrusive and memorable than the picture of the clown. He tried to revive his sluggish thought processes. Was Martha Hagen killed because she was Martha Hagen? Or was it her stage persona who held the key to the motive? The thoughts tumbled through his head, but he could not close the circuit. It was as though the individual thoughts were arranged in a three-dimensional puzzle, nearly impossible to connect.

  A noise on the landing interrupted his thoughts. Bram Weelen entered the room a second later he was followed by Ben Kruger. Both carried aluminum suitcases. They were the first of the Herd, as DeKok frequently called the small army who always gathered at the scene of a murder.

  “You’re amazingly quick,” DeKok said by way of greeting. “It must be a record. Were you waiting around the corner?”

  Weelen grinned.

  “No, we took the call in the car. We happened to be sharing a cruiser, on our way back from a job in West Harbor. A Greek cook on a tramp steamer was found hanging between his pots and pans. The crew didn’t like his cooking.”

  “You’re making that up,” accused DeKok.

  “No. True. No joke. The Water Police are handling the case.”

  Ben Kruger walked around DeKok and got a good look at the corpse.

  “Well, I’ll be,” he said. “That’s the same knife we found in that clown.”

  DeKok shook his head.

  “That’s impossible. It is the same type of knife. The knife that killed the clown is in my desk at the station.”

  Kruger looked bland.

  “That’s what I meant,” he said. “It’s like that knife.” He leaned over the victim. “How many of those knives are floating around?”

  DeKok spread his hands.

  “About a month ago a whole set was stolen from the car of a knife thrower in Apeldoorn.”

  “How many in a set?”

  “Twelve.”

  Weelen grimaced.

  “So, you can expect another ten murders?”

  DeKok looked baffled.

  “Surely you don’t really think,” he said, “that the killer is going to use all the knives?”

  Weelen waved at the corpse.

  “If you ask me he’s working at it.”

  Kruger slapped Weelen on the shoulder.

  “Hurry up,” he admonished. “Take your pictures so I can start with my brush.” He pointed at the dead woman and turned to DeKok. “Is she in our collection?”

  DeKok shook his head.

  “No, you’ll have to take her prints. Vledder checked it. She’s not in our files.”

  “You know her?”

  DeKok nodded slowly.

  “I talked with her only yesterday.”

  “She’s somehow connected with the murder of the clown?”

  “Yes.”

  Kruger looked at the corpse.

  “Perhaps that is what scared the killer.”

  DeKok gave him an admiring look.

  “Ben,” he said, “you’re such an old pro.” He turned around. Dr. Koning was in the door opening. Behind him were the ubiquitous morgue attendants.

  DeKok approached the old coroner with his hands spread wide in a gesture of apology.

  “I’m sorry, doctor,” he said, “But I have to bother you again.”

  Dr. Koning took off his old Garibaldi hat and looked at DeKok with a mocking look in his eyes.

  “Don’t apologize, old friend,” he said, shaking his head. “As long as crime flourishes, we can’t really retire.”

  He did not wait for a reaction from DeKok, but walked toward the dead woman. Once again, his examination took longer than DeKok recalled. The coroner leaned close to the corpse and examined it from every angle. After a long time, he closed her eyes and with some difficulty came to a standing position.

  “She is dead.”

  It sounded laconic. DeKok nodded with resignation.

  “I feared so.”

  The old coroner took out a large handkerchief and wiped his glasses. Meanwhile he inclined his head in the direction of the corpse.

  “I think it happened last night, or maybe this morning, very early.”

  “Rigor is complete?”

  Dr. Koning nodded. He replaced his handkerchief and his pince-nez. He looked at the ceiling.

  “Did you notice the position of her hands?”

  DeKok narrowed his eyes.

  “What’s the matter with her hands? They aren’t visible.”

  “They’re folded under her chest.”

  DeKok was startled.

  “Folded?”

  Dr. Koning nodded.

  “She was praying when she was killed.”

  13

  Vledder was so surprised that he involuntarily twisted the steering wheel around and almost rammed a parked car.

  “Praying?” he asked, incredulous.

  DeKok nodded slowly.

  “According to the coroner, Butterfly was kneeling in prayer when she was killed.”

  “She was on her knees,” agreed Vledder.

  “With folded hands.”

  “I didn’t see that.”

  “I didn’t either, at first. Her hands were hidden beneath her chest. Actually, I did not look as closely as Dr. Koning did when he came. It wasn’t until the morgue attendants lifted her up that I saw her folded hands, the fingers entwined.”

  Vledder looked somber. His face still had little color.

  “After I alerted the Herd, I went to see the neighbor on the third floor. I told him to be at the station by eight o’clock. After that, I sat down in the car. I’m sorry, DeKok, really … but I just couldn’t go back to that room.”

  “I noticed. Kruger missed you as well.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “I just said you weren’t feeling well.”

  Vledder shook his head.

  “It wasn’t that,” he said hotly. “You know that.
”

  DeKok allowed himself to sink down in his seat. His face was expressionless.

  “No worries,” he said tiredly. “I wouldn’t attempt to justify it. But I can understand. Butterfly made the same impression on me. I thought her to be a sweet, good-natured young woman. Finding her one day later with a knife …” He did not complete the sentence. “This is a dirty job at times. We have to steel ourselves. A professional should be able to objectively investigate the murder of his own mother.”

  Vledder looked wild.

  “Could you do that?” he demanded.

  DeKok shook his head sadly. He sank lower in his seat. The mere thought of his old mother as the victim of a horrible crime made him shiver.

  “No, I don’t believe I could,” he said finally. “Objectivity is overrated. Objective people often keep their emotional distance, loosing their humanity in the process. Humanity should be the primary requisite for a policeman. Without it, we would be machines—heartless, soulless automatons.” He paused. “No,” he added, “that would never do.”

  After that they drove for a while in silence. Vledder was the first one to speak again.

  “Is there some significance to the praying attitude?”

  “Yes.”

  “That she was praying?”

  “No.”

  Vledder was surprised.

  “Not praying?” he exclaimed. “But Dr Koning said …” he swallowed. “You say you saw it yourself. Her fingers were entwined.”

  DeKok pushed himself up so that he could at least look over the dashboard.

  “It’s not natural,” he said, shaking his head. “Nobody maintains a praying position while being violently stabbed in the back. Therefore I disagree with Dr. Koning. She was not in that position when she was killed. We have seen that once before, you’ll remember.” He thought for a moment. “It was that case you called ‘The Brothers of the Easy Death.’ Remember, we found drowned couples with their hands entwined. They had apparently committed double suicides. Later we found out we didn’t have the answer.”

  “Yes, I remember that case,” said Vledder. “It was sometime ago, you—”

  DeKok interrupted.

  “Besides, I don’t think our little Butterfly was all that religious. It doesn’t seem she would pray to Our Dear Lord on her bare knees. I did not see a Bible, statue, or religious text anywhere in that apartment.”