The Wrong Girl

by David Hewson

  Laura Bakker and Dirk Van der Berg did their best to work. Koeman checked the logs to see if there were fresh leads. Nothing came in. Hanna Bublik remained on voicemail.

  The case, such as it was, had slipped into the debilitating rhythm of failure. It needed Vos to take it somewhere new. And Bakker thought she understood exactly how that ought to be done.

  They had to bring in Lucas Kuyper, his son, Henk’s wife, and the girl Saskia. Go through everything that happened that previous Sunday in Leidseplein. Try to sort truth from myth. Then work out where to go.

  She watched Van der Berg’s face as she went through all this again. He was mid-forties, a few years older than Vos. A detective who’d never go further up the ranks. Too lacking in ambition for that. Happy with his lot at the foot of the scale. She’d be his boss in a few years if things went right. And at some point probably have to give him hell.

  ‘We can’t ignore those photos,’ she added. ‘Can we?’

  He blinked and asked, ‘What photos?’

  ‘Kuyper. Thom Geerts. What do you mean . . . what photos?’

  He shook his head.

  ‘The commissaris took that memory card, Laura. It’s up to him and Vos now. We just do as we’re told. It’s how things work.’

  ‘That’s the oldest excuse of all, isn’t it?’

  ‘One of them,’ he agreed. ‘Stay here long enough and you’ll come across plenty of others.’

  ‘There’s a little girl missing out there . . .’

  ‘Do you think De Groot doesn’t know that? Or Pieter?’

  ‘Then . . .’

  His face fell. She saw something rare: a sign of temper. A considerable one.

  ‘You fight one battle at a time, Laura. The one that matters. Whatever those bastards in AIVD have been up to they don’t know where Natalya Bublik is. Not now.’

  ‘You seem very sure of that.’

  ‘We’ll find out what went on there. When we do . . .’

  He stopped. There was a sound coming from along the corridor. Loud voices. Angry shouts.

  It took a moment for Bakker to realize who one party was. She’d heard De Groot roaring with anger dozens of times. Vos never raised his voice with anyone. Now she realized he could shout down the commissaris any day of the week, with a vocabulary to match.

  Red-faced, fist clenched, De Groot followed him into the office.

  ‘Clear your desk now, Vos,’ the commissaris roared. ‘And I want your card. I was a fool ever to think you deserved it back.’

  Bakker and Van der Berg watched in shock. Vos had a look about him Bakker hadn’t seen in a long time. Defeat, despair. He’d been this way when De Groot first sent her to lure him back into the police from his lost days spent staring at the Oortman doll’s house in the Rijksmuseum.

  ‘I always think this kind of conversation is best settled at leisure, over a beer or three,’ Van der Berg suggested. ‘Can we calm things down a little?’

  ‘That’s it!’ De Groot bellowed, jabbing a finger as Vos went to his desk and picked up a few things. ‘Go boozing with these losers you surround yourself with. Lock yourself in that damned boat of yours and smoke your life away. You’re done here . . .’

  He followed, grabbed Vos by the shoulder, clicked his fingers. A big man with a powerful physical presence. Vos looked slight by comparison.

  ‘The card,’ De Groot ordered. ‘Your weapon.’

  Vos reached inside his jacket and took out his police ID. Then fetched a key from his drawer.

  ‘The gun’s still in the locker, Frank. You know I don’t like those things.’

  ‘Think you’re too damned clever for us, don’t you?’ De Groot said. ‘Didn’t work out so well for this girl.’

  A crowd was slowly assembling on the edges of the argument. Hanging on every bitter word.

  Vos looked into De Groot’s florid face. Thought of saying something. Changed his mind.

  ‘No,’ he agreed eventually. ‘It didn’t.’

  Then he picked up his donkey jacket and headed for the stairs.

  ‘This sideshow’s over,’ De Groot shouted at the group of men and women who’d come to watch. ‘Back to what you were doing.’

  He was still furious, breathing hard.

  ‘Speaking of which,’ Bakker said icily, ‘I assume you want us to bring in Lucas Kuyper and the Fransen woman?’

  De Groot glanced at his watch.

  ‘You two are both over shift now. Go home. Be in my office at eight tomorrow. I’ll be handling this case personally from now on.’

  She stayed where she was.

  ‘You can’t bury this,’ Bakker told him. ‘Don’t think that. I won’t allow it.’

  Next to her Van der Berg sighed and covered his eyes for a moment. The commissaris came up to them.

  ‘Won’t you?’ he asked.

  ‘No. The law’s the law. And those people have broken it.’

  ‘Jesus,’ De Groot muttered. ‘It’s bad enough taking lectures from Pieter Vos. Without listening to his little girl.’

  ‘I’m not little, Commissaris,’ Bakker replied. ‘Or a girl.’

  ‘No. You’re a pain in the arse like him.’ He pointed to the door. ‘Eight o’clock tomorrow in my office. Now goodnight.’

  The monster was real. In that little basement room. A big man, foreign. With a cruel laugh and something wicked in his eyes.

  He kicked the stupid kid from Anadolu. Punched him. Banged his bleeding head against the wall. Then when the boy was nothing more than a bag of broken bones, still by the stone stairs, the monster came and sat next to the trembling Natalya Bublik on the bed.

  His strong arm went round her slender, shaking shoulders.

  ‘See, child,’ the monster said. ‘This is what happens when a little girl doesn’t do as she’s told.’

  The big arm squeezed her wrist. She thought she might pee herself.

  ‘You don’t want to be bad, Natalya. I’d have to tell your mother then.’

  She steeled herself to stare at him.

  ‘Yes,’ he said. His arm let go. He placed his giant’s hands on his lap, nodded. ‘I know her. This . . .’

  His hand swept the room.

  ‘This is the grown-up world. The real world. My world. Not a place for children and their dreams. There are matters that do not concern you. Important ones. Life and death.’

  Natalya glanced at the stairs and wished she had the strength to run from this place.

  ‘Your mother and I have agreed,’ he added. ‘You’ll stay here until the time’s right to leave. It’s safest that way.’

  His head came down. Two calm, dark eyes bore into hers.

  ‘Safer for both of you. You want that, don’t you?’

  She nodded. He expected that.

  ‘So you’ll do as your mother wants. Be good. No more trouble, please.’ He nodded at the prone shape across the room. ‘You did this, Natalya. You’re a bright girl. You know what you’re responsible for.’

  The eyes were back on her. She wanted to cry but wouldn’t.

  ‘Who did this?’ he asked.

  In a faint, firm voice she said, ‘Me.’

  His big hand slapped her leg. Then he got up. Said as he walked towards the body across the room, ‘I’ll send someone else to look after you. Tomorrow, if you’re good, you’ll see your mother.’

  The monster lugged the kid from Anadolu up the stairs. The boy didn’t move, didn’t make a noise, didn’t even breathe as far as she could see.

  After that the creature was gone, leaving in his wake the sharp and caustic smell of blood.

  Van der Berg followed Laura Bakker through the front doors into the constant rain. She knew where Vos would go. Straight down Elandsgracht into the warm, familiar interior of the Drie Vaten. There he’d sit at one of the battered tables and stare into his beer, Sam the terrier curled at his feet.

  She got her bike. Van der Berg caught up with her before she could ride away.

  ‘Where are you going?’ he asked.<
br />
  ‘Where do you think?’

  ‘Laura. Just for once will you listen to me?’

  He looked so desperate she agreed. And so the two of them went to a place she didn’t know a couple of streets from Elandsgracht. A gay bar from the look of it. Lesbian. A charming woman with a crew cut served up a couple of beers she’d never seen before.

  Van der Berg thanked her by name then found them a table in the corner.

  ‘Do you know every beer joint in Amsterdam?’ Bakker asked.

  ‘Big city. I have to keep looking.’

  He raised his glass. The beer was the colour of honey. Then the woman came over with two freshly boiled eggs, a little saucer of salt and some napkins.

  ‘God we know how to live, don’t we?’ she whispered.

  He laughed, raised his glass.

  ‘It’s nice to hear you cracking jokes. Means you’re getting settled.’

  ‘That was a joke?’

  He tore the egg in half, dipped a chunk in salt and popped it into his mouth.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Bakker wondered.

  ‘We fouled up big time. Someone’s kicking down on Frank de Groot. So he’s doing what management do best. Kicking down on the first person he finds beneath him.’

  He pushed the remaining egg over the table. She declined.

  ‘If Pieter was the usual brigadier he’d be kicking down on us right now. But he’s not.’

  ‘We can’t sit back and watch him take the blame. We all screwed up. Besides . . . those bastards in AIVD . . .’

  The studious way he held up the glass of beer and admired it silenced her.

  ‘True,’ he said.

  ‘So?’

  ‘So we do what the commissaris asks. We turn up in his office tomorrow. We listen to what he wants. We try to find the Bublik girl. Maybe in a week or so De Groot will change his mind. This isn’t the first time we’ve had a few explosions.’

  ‘And we just leave Pieter on his own? Not a word of support? No—’

  ‘He was an aspirant under me when he joined up,’ Van der Berg broke in. ‘I was the one supposed to hit the heights. Pieter was just this smart, soft kid everyone liked. Felt sorry for really.’

  ‘What happened?’

  Van der Berg smiled at her.

  ‘He was just the same then. You couldn’t really talk to him. Tell him anything. He went his own sweet way. Got the job done. Then in a couple of years he got promoted. I got . . . nowhere.’

  The beer was finished. The barmaid came over with another without him asking.

  ‘What happens with him happens inside. When he’s on his own. I learned long ago. You have to leave him to it. With his little dog and that nagging conscience. There’s nothing we can do. You or me. Except wait.’

  He poured some of the bottle into her glass then chinked it.

  ‘Are you willing?’

  ‘What’s the alternative?’ she asked.

  ‘We barge in there doe-eyed and full of sympathy and he shrinks back into his shell. Where you found him all those months ago. Remember?’

  She knocked back some beer and loved it.

  ‘I hate feeling there’s nothing you can do.’

  Van der Berg’s heavy eyebrows rose.

  ‘I said we’d wait. That’s not the same now, is it?’

  No answer.

  ‘I’ll walk you home,’ he added. ‘It’s on my way.’

  Two streets away Vos was sitting where Bakker said: at his usual table, dog at his feet, a beer and a glass of old jenever in front of him. Sofia Albers eyeing him from the bar.

  Close to eleven. He was the Drie Vaten’s last customer and didn’t look ready to leave.

  ‘How’s your mother?’ Vos asked, knowing she was planning to throw him out.

  ‘A lot better thanks. How are you?’

  He raised the glass, toasted her, then emptied it.

  ‘That’s enough,’ she said.

  The dog, recognizing the words, stirred at his feet, got up, shook his wiry coat.

  ‘That’s for me to decide, isn’t it?’ Vos wondered.

  ‘Stop doing this, Pieter. You’re starting to worry me.’

  ‘Doing what?’

  ‘Looking like you used to.’

  ‘I could drink all night if I wanted.’

  ‘You could. Just not here.’

  Vos glimpsed a shape outside by the boat. Slim, familiar. Furtive. Everything had a risk.

  He got up and took Sam to the bar then held out his lead.

  ‘Things to do.’ He wrapped the loop of the leash around the nearest beer pump. ‘Sam’ll think he lives here pretty soon.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous! I just look after him. He’s yours.’

  As always the dog knew when they were talking about him. He had his paws against the counter, tail wagging, hoping for some last scrap of food.

  ‘He can hear you walking down the street,’ she added. ‘Long before I can. You should see—’

  ‘I don’t have time for this,’ Vos said. ‘Not now.’ He pointed to the lead. ‘Please.’

  She took Sam behind the bar. The dog seemed more puzzled than dejected.

  ‘This is about that girl, isn’t it? I know you can’t talk about work . . .’

  ‘Work. Yes.’

  She was an attractive woman. Divorced. Alone a lot of the time. About his own age. Looking for someone, but not desperately. When his world fell apart and he retreated to the solitary cabin of the houseboat across the road she saved him after a fashion. Vos never said thanks. It seemed presumptuous somehow. And unnecessary. She was from the Jordaan. People like her helped others without a second thought, and with no expectation whatsoever of reward.

  ‘What about your daughter, Pieter?’ Sofia Albers asked. ‘Have you heard from her lately?’

  He pulled a postcard out of his jacket pocket and handed it over. A beach in Aruba, where Anneliese now lived with her mother.

  It was posted six weeks before. For some reason he kept it with him. There was one sentence on the reverse: a simple message, ‘Miss you, Dad. When are you coming to enjoy the sun?’

  ‘When are you?’

  ‘I don’t like . . .’ Vos hesitated, searching for an excuse. ‘I don’t like hot places so much. She’ll come back. When she’s ready.’

  ‘And in the meantime you beat yourself up trying to save others? All on your own?’

  He pocketed the postcard.

  ‘I’m back in the police, aren’t I? It’s what I’m supposed to do.’

  ‘You won’t find that kid if you go down that old black road again, will you?’ Sofia Albers said.

  Vos was taken aback by that. They were the most severe and damning words she’d ever uttered to him.

  He looked around the dishevelled little bar, at the woman who ran it.

  ‘I’m not entirely on my own, am I?’ he said then smiled sheepishly, tipped an imaginary hat and wandered out into the night.

  The lone figure who’d risked so much was waiting by the bridge. He took the thing she brought and said goodbye.

  Cold winter rain was coming down steadily. It made pinpricks on the canal glittering under the street lights. A tourist boat went past, cleaving through the black water. Figures inside, men in evening suits, women in colourful party dresses. Glasses of champagne in their hands. Laughter and music around them. The city went about its business regardless. No time to worry about injured creatures like Hanna and Natalya Bublik. It wasn’t cruelty or want of sympathy. Just a simple practicality born of experience. When there was nothing to be done why worry? Let others do that if they could.

  At the Berenstraat bridge the coloured street lights in the Nine Streets became visible, reflecting on the feathered, rippling waves left by the wake of the vanishing cruiser. The city had a strange and solitary beauty at that moment. One that wouldn’t last.

  He pulled out his fisherman’s hat, wool, not much use against the wet. Then wandered the way he’d planned all along.

  Ther
e were plenty of bars still busy if he wanted them. Though he couldn’t tell Sofia Albers drink wasn’t what he required, or the black road she suspected.

  Ten minutes and he was in the narrow confines of Oude Nieuwstraat, searching out the address he had for Hanna Bublik. A young woman answered the door. She looked Malaysian or Filipina with the kind of fragile innocence the imported whores possessed, for a while anyway. Until time and the city took it away.

  ‘Hanna’s not here,’ the girl said. ‘Besides she don’t do business from home.’

  He didn’t have an ID card to flash any more. It was an understandable mistake.

  ‘Where?’ Vos asked.

  ‘I don’t know. I’m here. I do,’ she said with a coy smile.

  Something in his disappointed expression made her close the door in his face.

  Down the street an argument was starting. A customer and a woman. A pimp involved maybe. Fights, drunks, shouting, screaming. It all kicked off long before midnight in these parts. Then, by the morning, was gone. Parents walked their children to school down the same street, not watching as the cleaner dealt with the sick and the rubbish, the syringes and spent condoms.

  Vos wandered towards the racket, thinking perhaps he’d intervene. Try to calm things down. Persuade people to behave with the common sense he sometimes found so hard himself. His own life had retreated from the edge when an offer of redemption from Frank de Groot and Laura Bakker’s muscular persuasiveness drew him back into the police. But the precipice was always there. They knew it too.

  His eyes strayed to the window on his left. Red light. Bright neon tube. A figure in the window, head down, eyes closed, face full of pain. An old scarf round her naked shoulders. Shiny satin bra and knickers, legs crossed, arms folded. The kind of pose that said, ‘Go away. Not now.’

  Something you never saw around these parts.

  Vos forgot about the argument down the street. Walked up to the glass. She still didn’t open her eyes. He pressed the bell. Hanna Bublik did look then and he struggled to interpret what he was seeing. A curious mix of hatred and despair. And perhaps a fearful touch of hope.