by David Hewson
Kuyper found the place. A narrow house, no sign, opaque windows, red door. Just a bell and an intercom. He pressed it, said his name when a voice that sounded like Smits answered.
Long pause. A bunch of tourists wandered past the end of the alley wearing jester hats. Someone on the construction site shouted out a warning. The bell of a passing tram rang through the racket.
‘Have you lost your fucking mind?’ Smits asked through the fragile speaker.
‘I’m standing here until you let me in.’
Nothing.
‘Smits. I’m not a fool. No one’s followed me. I’m on my own. We need to talk.’
‘I don’t even know what you are, man,’ the gruff Amsterdammer moaned.
‘There are things you need to be told,’ Kuyper said, improvising. ‘Face to face. Right now.’
The door buzzed. He walked in. One office on the right behind the opaque window.
Smits was a beefy man with a heavy moustache on a face so flabby it seemed beyond expression.
‘Where is she?’ he asked.
‘Who?’
‘The kid.’
Smits wore a tatty black jacket over a shiny white shirt. No tie.
‘You just do this for the money, don’t you?’ Kuyper said when he got no answer.
‘And your reasons exactly?’ the man remarked, clearly angered by the accusation.
‘The deal was the child went free. All along.’
‘The deal was she was your kid,’ Smits responded. ‘The fact she wasn’t . . .’ He sighed, put his hands behind his head. ‘What are we supposed to think, Henk? Really?’
‘I want to talk to Barbone. There are things he needs to hear.’
‘You’ve seen him once. I guess you don’t understand this but he wasn’t impressed.’
Kuyper could feel the heat rising in his cheeks. Smits laughed.
‘He asked you to put your own daughter on the line to prove yourself? Your own kid? You didn’t even hesitate.’ A wry smile. ‘Do you think he was . . . convinced?’
‘I need to talk . . .’
‘Tell me. I’ll pass it on.’
Voices. Someone walked past outside. The alley was narrow. People used it to cut through to the shopping street behind.
‘I want the girl. I was promised she’d come to no harm.’
Smits looked at his fingers, shook his head.
‘The girl’s gone. We’re packing up here. Earlier than planned now. Thanks to you . . .’
‘If they don’t let her go I’m talking to the police. To AIVD. To anyone who’ll listen. If . . .’
Smits broke into a broad grin and pointed at him across the desk.
‘Please, Henk!’ He laughed. ‘Do you think we’re fools? Do you imagine we’d even speak to you once we had that girl to ourselves?’
‘What I did . . .’
All humour vanished.
‘It was for them. Not us. For the people who ran you.’ He leaned forward, serious in an instant. ‘That’s the trouble with strings. You can pull them two ways. And here you are . . .’
‘On my own,’ Kuyper explained.
‘On your own,’ Smits repeated and seemed interested in that.
‘This is really simple. Just let me know what I can do to get her back. Once that happens I’m gone. You, Khaled, Barbone, you’re safe. Nothing to worry about.’
‘Is that so?’ Smits asked.
‘I guarantee it.’
‘You think you’re in a position to guarantee anything?’
‘I do,’ Kuyper insisted. ‘This is an offer. A bargain. If it were anything else I’d be here with men to arrest you? Wouldn’t I?’
A moment’s silence. Then Smits picked up the phone and made a call.
It was protracted. In Arabic, a language Kuyper couldn’t understand.
Something in the conversation made Smits curse under his breath then stare hard at him.
‘Understood,’ he said in Dutch then came off the phone.
He picked up a notepad on the desk, scribbled something with a pen and pushed it over.
An address. Rapenburg, close to the IJ tunnel.
Smits got up and started going through the drawers, pulling out folders, papers. Stuff Kuyper couldn’t see. Then he walked to a grey metal filing cabinet, opened the bottom drawer and retrieved a plastic petrol can.
‘That’s what you wanted, isn’t it?’ he said, nodding at the paper. ‘Take it and get the hell out of here. I’ve got things to do.’
He screwed the lid off the can then started to walk round the room, shaking petrol everywhere.
‘Your man’s going to be there for the next two hours. After that he’s gone and so am I.’
Kuyper picked up the paper and got to his feet.
Smits kept walking round, sprinkling the petrol everywhere. The smell was rising in the air.
‘If—’
‘Just go, will you!’ Smits bellowed.
Henk Kuyper went out of the red door, walked head down along the alley, back into Damrak. Started on the long walk across the city.
Hanna chose the cafe. Vinyl records on the walls. A few lowlifes on the narrow seats. Not the kind of place the middle class frequented.
It was colder. Renata was wearing a fake fur coat when she came through the door. Carrying what looked like an expensive scarlet bag that matched her lipstick. Hanna put her cheap holdall on the floor to release the seat she’d been saving.
‘This is busy,’ Renata said.
Hanna asked what she wanted and gave the order to the man behind the counter.
‘I like busy.’
The red bag went on the table.
‘There’s everything I could get in there,’ Renata told her. ‘Sixty. Half from us. Half from Henk’s father.’
‘You’re very generous.’
‘His dad can afford it. We can’t.’ She scowled at an old man struggling to get out of his chair two tables away. ‘You could have picked somewhere else.’
Hanna looked round to make sure she wasn’t being watched. Then unzipped the red bag. There was a shoebox inside. DKNY. Renata nodded. She took the box and put it in her holdall.
‘Will it work?’ Renata asked.
‘I don’t know. How can I?’
‘And the police . . .?’
‘The police know nothing. I told you.’
Renata kept quiet.
Hanna turned her head to one side.
‘What is it?’
‘You look so different. The hair. The glasses. Why?’
‘I don’t want to make it easy for Vos’s people if they try to follow me.’
Renata Kuyper’s face hardened.
‘Vos isn’t on the case any more. You said last night.’
‘I don’t want them interfering. I got a call about the ransom. Noon. Today.’
‘Where?’
The question seemed odd.
‘It’s best you don’t know. I’m doing this on my own.’
That awkward silence again.
‘I’m not going to run away with your money if that’s what you think. I want my daughter. I’m not a thief Renata Kuyper looked as if she’d rather be anywhere else in the world.
‘These things shouldn’t happen here,’ she muttered. ‘It’s not right.’
‘Where should they happen? Far away? In foreign countries? To lesser people?’
That didn’t go down well.
‘You’re starting to sound like my husband. You’re sure you haven’t seen him?’
She shook her head.
‘You’re the only one who’s given me money today.’
‘I could ask for it back.’
Hanna Bublik placed her hands on the holdall.
‘But that would be rude. A gift’s a gift.’
‘Why do you hate me?’ Her voice was getting louder. People in the cafe were starting to stare. She realized this and said more softly, ‘I’m trying to help.’
‘I know. I’m sorry. I’ve never been very
good at gratitude.’ She checked her watch. ‘I have to go.’
‘I hope it works.’
A brief moment of regret then. She’d been harsh on this woman.
‘Your husband will come home. He’s bound to. Where else has he got to go?’
‘That’s a reason?’
‘Seems a good one to me.’
Renata Kuyper got to her feet, tried to pay for the coffee.
‘I’ll do that,’ Hanna said and watched her leave without another word.
Ten thirty. Time to get to Spooksteeg and Cem Yilmaz’s contribution.
Then she’d call Vos and meet him at the station. She wanted him there. But not in control.
When she paid she looked at the holdall again. It already held more money than she’d ever known. Soon, if Yilmaz kept his word, there’d be a hundred and sixty thousand euros in there. She’d be rich for a moment. Rich and alone. She’d give every penny to get Natalya free. All this and more.
‘Here,’ the waiter said when he came back with her change.
‘Keep it,’ she told him.
It was cents anyway.
She’d bought the holdall in the Noordermarkt one Saturday. Lots of little zip pockets on the side. So small she couldn’t imagine how or why anyone could use them.
One of the zips wasn’t quite closed. She was a precise woman and would have noticed if it was like this before.
Hanna opened the tiny pocket and took out a round shiny black plastic disk. Looked at it in the bright fluorescent lights of the cafe.
Smoke was drifting in from the dope place round the corner. The smell of it reminded her of how she’d fallen into a place like that after Yilmaz had branded her. Neither was an experience to be repeated.
The thing was electronic. That was obvious. Only one way it could have got there. On the base was an on-off switch and she so nearly used it. But then Vos would become even more suspicious than usual.
Cold outside. The holdall weighed heavily on the end of her right arm. The gun and the ammunition she’d stolen from the Turk took up most of her small shoulder bag.
Both were vulnerable. But one was more precious than the other. So she hooked both handles of the holdall through her arm and held it close to her chest. Walked on into the red-light district, wondering how much she’d have to explain to Cem Yilmaz about the hair and the glasses.
She was his now. He might not approve.
Twenty-five minutes separated Henk Kuyper’s exit from Damrak and the arrival of Bakker and Van der Berg on their bikes.
‘Where the hell is this place?’ she asked, checking her phone.
He nodded at the alley.
A heavily built bearded man with dark skin and a friendly face was marching out, hands deep in the pockets of his black business coat.
‘Morning,’ he said for no reason then went on his way.
Intelligence had sent some information about Smits as they cycled to his office. His agency in Amsterdam was just three years old. Before that he’d worked in property maintenance in Saudi Arabia and the Yemen. Nothing on file to link him to any terrorist cell. But the company accounts showed meagre turnover while Smits lived in a fancy apartment near the Rijksmuseum, one he owned.
Van der Berg flicked through the details.
‘This guy’s a mercenary. Doesn’t matter who pays.’
‘Nice,’ she said and they went down the alley.
A smell.
She stopped, looked at him.
‘What’s that?’
‘Smoke,’ he said and started to run.
Halfway down the alley they got there. The red door was open. Flames behind it. There was a woman outside, in what looked like the uniform for a hairdresser. She was on the phone already looking shocked and tearful.
Bakker started to walk for the office.
‘You don’t want to go in there,’ the woman said, holding out a hand. ‘I’ve called an ambulance. Jesus . . . I just heard a scream.’
There was a salon three doors down.
Van der Berg flashed his police ID.
‘An ambulance?’
Laura Bakker was through already. He followed her.
The smoke was from a small bonfire of papers next to a grey filing cabinet. On the floor in front was the body of a corpulent man in middle age. Mouth open, arms out, legs akimbo.
Dead eyes staring at the ceiling. The red mass of a bullet wound off-centre in his forehead.
‘Shit,’ Bakker gasped, checking him for signs of life, finding nothing. ‘Shit.’
Van der Berg was stomping on the flames, managing to put them out.
‘We missed this by minutes, Dirk.’
‘Yeah.’ His big feet kept pummelling at the paper. ‘Look above the door.’
‘What?’
‘He’s got CCTV. Probably on the computer.’
There was a small lens in the corner of the room, pointed back towards the desk. She went to the PC, pulled out a pair of latex gloves, started on the keyboard.
Van der Berg came over. The flames were out. Sirens were sounding outside somewhere.
Then the crowd started to turn up.
Ten minutes later the place was packed. Fire officers. Uniform police. Mirjam Fransen and some fresh goons from AIVD.
Bakker didn’t take any notice of them. She’d been working her way back through the video on the computer.
‘What have you got?’ Mirjam Fransen asked.
‘Maybe,’ she said, ‘Barbone.’
She wound back to a few minutes before they arrived. A hefty man with a full black beard and a cheerful face coming through the door. Smits stops walking round the room sprinkling petrol everywhere, looks up. Says something they can’t make out. Seems surprised. Worried too.
The man with the beard smiles, marches up, pulls out a gun and shoots him in the head. Looks at the flames. Piles a few more papers on them. Leaves.
‘We passed that bastard in the street,’ Bakker added. ‘He’s big. Unusual. I’d know him again.’
‘You passed him?’ Fransen asked.
‘Yeah,’ said Van der Berg. ‘And lots of other people too. Do you want—?’
‘Shut up, Dirk,’ Bakker told him.
The detective stood there on his flat feet, lost for words.
‘This . . .’ Bakker said, finger jabbing at the screen. ‘Barbone wasn’t the only visitor.’
She’d gone right back to Henk Kuyper’s arrival. They watched him turn up. What looked like a difficult conversation.
‘What the hell was Kuyper doing here?’ Bakker wondered.
Then Smits’s phone call.
‘Get this emailed to my office,’ Fransen ordered. ‘Technical can take a look. Maybe we can work out what they were saying . . .’
‘He wrote something down!’ She found the sequence. Smits taking out a pen and a notepad. Scribbling a few words. Handing over a single sheet. ‘That’s what Kuyper wanted. That’s where he’s going.’
The image was so indistinct. She took a photo with her phone then sent it back to Aisha in Marnixstraat. Thought again and ran through the sequence, snapping it as a video. Sent her that too. Perhaps they could recreate something from the movement of Smits’s pen or arm or . . .
Three scene of crime officers had turned up alongside the AIVD crew and were looking at the body on the floor.
‘I’m running this operation,’ Fransen insisted. ‘You wait on my say-so.’
‘This is a murder,’ Van der Berg cut in. ‘And you’ve got our best homicide detective suspended. Back off.’
She took a step towards him.
‘I said back off!’ he yelled.
‘Dirk,’ cut in the lead scene of crime man.
‘What?’
‘We don’t work when people are shouting. Can you shut up or what?’
Bakker went out into the street and called Aisha.
‘I need you to look at those photos I sent you straight away . . .’
‘I am looking at them,’ the forensic
officer came back.
‘And?’
‘And what? You didn’t tell me what you were looking for.’
‘He scribbled something on a pad. I want to know what it was.’
A long moment then Aisha said, ‘Sorry. You can’t even see the words from this angle.’
‘You can see the pen. Can’t you work out what he was writing from that?’
Aisha sighed and said, ‘I perform science, Laura. Not magic.’
Bakker swore.
‘Find the pad he used,’ Aisha suggested. ‘See if he pressed hard enough to make a mark on the page beneath. Bring it in anyway . . .’
Back inside and she started sifting through the burned papers by the filing cabinet. There was only one notepad there. It was a charred mass of burned paper and metal spiral ring. Nothing easily recoverable.
She sent Aisha a photo of that.
‘Sorry,’ came the reply. ‘This will take time. If we get there at all.’
‘I don’t—’
‘Enough,’ Aisha snapped. ‘I’ve got Vos on the other line bleating on about his problems.’
Fransen was still arguing with Van der Berg. Within earshot.
Bakker moved to the door.
‘Vos is suspended,’ she said.
‘Got to run,’ Aisha told her. ‘Bye.’
‘Get in there,’ the man with the dreadlocks told her.
The bag was open on the floor. Big enough for her twice over. She saw they’d put pillows in there and a blanket and didn’t know whether that was good or bad.
‘Come on,’ he said and shook his head, the long dark locks swinging from side to side. ‘They told me you could be a little bitch. Not now, kid. Just get in. We’re not going far. After all your games . . .’
He bent down and peered into her face.
‘The boss man told me. You don’t get the chance to run away again. In the bag. Or else.’
Then he pulled something out of his pocket. She saw it was a long, clean bandage, the kind they had in the medicine chest at school. Before she could speak he’d wound it round both his hands, pulled it over her open mouth, gagged her with the thing tight between the teeth. The dry fabric made her choke for a moment.
He pushed her towards the open holdall.
Natalya got down on her knees on the blanket inside. Twisted round. Sat for a moment. Then lay down.
‘Good girl,’ he said. ‘Won’t be long.’
Then she saw the zip closing and her little world turned dark.
