‘Henk, I’m pretty sure he’s here, at the DoubleTree. I could’ve sworn I saw him enter the lobby not five minutes ago. His moped’s outside. I’ve got camera footage from my crash helmet.’
‘Of him?’
‘Er… of the moped.’
‘That just can’t be, Johan.’
But I’d begun to doubt myself. The moped rider on Prins Hendrikkade – had I been wrong about him? The tattoo on the body in the first place… Was I so obsessed with Slavic that I’d created the very problems for me and my family I was now desperately trying to solve?
‘Did you ID the car?’ Johan was asking.
‘Licence plate was too dirty.’
‘Convenient.’
‘That’s what I thought.’
‘What nationality?’
‘NL, I think.’
‘I’m going to hang out here at the DoubleTree… talk to reception.’
‘As you wish.’ I was walking past the glinting Porsches and Bentleys parked behind the Conservatorium. ‘Let’s talk again in the next ten minutes. No more than ten.’
The doorman wore an expensive black coat with a blood-red scarf. He was large, courteous and mistrustful; I was in my biker gear, dripping wet.
‘There was a car here a few moments ago,’ I said. ‘A black BMW saloon. Did you happen to see who it dropped off?’
His eyes narrowed. ‘And you might be…?’
‘A police officer.’
He looked me up and down. ‘May I see your warrant card?’
My warrant card – now with Joost.
‘It’s probably better that I speak to the reception staff.’ I walked straight past him before he had a chance to argue.
Welcome warm air, like entering a hothouse. Inside was Amsterdam’s beau monde – chic men and women lounging in expensive chairs, surrounded by artful knick-knacks and champagne on ice.
This was some watering hole.
I strode over to the reception desk, aware of dripping onto the pale stone floor. Coming the other way was none other than Jan Six – with an unnaturally beautiful young woman, cheekbones like blades, and a female member of the hotel staff.
Had he seen me?
I dodged over to the stone steps that led up to a gallery of boutique shops. There was a viewing spot at the top of the stairs, looking back out over the entire atrium. I stood back slightly, staying in the shadows. Six’s companion made an equal impression from the rear, her white satin dress revealing almost as much as if she hadn’t been wearing one. Lots of skin on display… Six’s mistress? She looked too young though – young enough to be his daughter. An expensive escort, maybe? Was Slavic into high-end prostitution? Or was I fitting the facts to my own, increasingly fractured story?
Was I projecting my fears onto the ‘other’ – this outsider… this Slavic?
No, there was Irena’s testimony and the BMW that I’d just followed from Little Hungary.
But what exactly was I observing here? Just another important figure, Jan Six, showing off a beautiful woman on his arm? The big beast in his natural habitat?
He hadn’t turned around. The hotel staff member was guiding them towards a lift at the base of a little glass tower, a separate structure within the atrium building. Six and his female friend parted ways with a companionable kiss. I watched through the layers of smoked glass as the lift ascended to the second floor and he entered a meeting room with three other figures; from where I was standing it was impossible to tell their gender even, let alone whether one of them was Slavic.
My phone started ringing.
I turned to walk through the gallery of boutiques and answered just as it became a missed call.
Johan.
There was a text too, from Petra: At the Ibis, please come soon as you can. Please.
I was hurrying back out to my bike when I got hold of Johan.
‘Could you go to the Ibis hotel right away? Petra’s there, I’m worried about her.’
‘Where are you going?’
‘I’m heading there too, but you’re closer.’
‘OK. I talked to reception here at the DoubleTree – they say a man possibly fitting Slavic’s description checked in with five young women, claiming they were all in town for a talent contest –’
‘Never mind that, just get to the Ibis. I need to call Petra. I’ll see you there. Please hurry.’
11
REM’S WORLD
From Petra’s room at the Ibis, you could just see IJ Tunnel 3 further along the opposite side of the busy street.
Johan stepped outside; I nodded my thanks to him.
Petra’s eyes were puffy from crying. I hugged her but she broke away from me.
‘Henk, I can’t do this.’
I sat down on the edge of the bed, ready to talk. I was still in my biker gear. The room felt hot and stuffy.
‘Pushed out of our own home. Unable to find our daughter,’ she said.
‘It’s just for a night or two, then we’ll go back to the boat. Nadia’s safe, I’m sure of it. Just incommunicado, for whatever reason –’
‘Henk. No.’ She looked around the room. ‘I can’t function here. I don’t have any of my things!’ There was a wild look in her eyes; I’d seen it before in the homeless, the dispossessed – that lack of a secure place…
I stood up and gently placed my hands on her shoulders. ‘I’ll go back to the boat and get your things. What are you missing?’
She waved her arms meaninglessly and began sobbing.
I tried to hug her again but she pushed my hands away, more fiercely this time.
‘What will you do about Nadia?’
‘I’m dealing with any potential threat. That way she’s safe, wherever she is.’
‘I don’t even know what that means!’ she cried.
I just needed time to think. ‘Is there anything to drink here?’ I couldn’t see a minibar.
‘No! It’s all on the boat.’
‘I’ll go there, then, get whatever we need.’
She shook her head. ‘My daughter –’
I left the room.
Johan was outside, pointedly out of earshot. ‘Where to?’ he asked solemnly.
‘Could you stay here a little longer?’
‘Er… sure. But where are you going?’
‘The boat.’
‘D’you need help?’
‘No, please stay with Petra.’
I took the lift down, contemplating my next move. In the time it took to cross the lobby, I was resolved. I strode past my parked bike, crossed the busy street and entered the station.
*
Bergveld was in the squad room working late, and so was Liesbeth. They looked cozy together – police partners now?
‘I need a word.’
‘Are you talking to me?’ Bergveld looked up, incredulous.
‘Who the fuck else?’
Liesbeth was staring hard at her computer, avoiding eye contact.
Bergveld stood up, and as he did so I charged at him, shoving him through the door behind him into a conference room. He clattered over a chair onto the floor as the lights flickered on, his fringe flopping over his reddening face. ‘Yesus,’ he managed, winded. ‘Liesbeth, call Wester!’
But there was no force to his voice. I had him by the throat. ‘I’ve been a cop for thirty years, Bergveld. My daughter’s missing, my wife’s in a hotel room – you owe me and my family protection. You owe me that!’
His face was bright red, and sweating. I let him go and he collapsed back onto the floor, gasping. For a second he just lay there breathing, his chest rising and falling. Then he picked himself up, eyeing me with steely contempt.
‘D’you ever wonder if there might be other considerations, van der Pol?’ he asked hoarsely. ‘Ever allow for the p
ossibility that you might be missing something here? You’re like a fucking bull in a china shop!’
He pulled himself up to a chair, composing himself. The mask, the face I’d seen at karaoke, was back on. I remained standing.
‘We told you to leave that guy alone.’ He looked at me and then out into the squad room, calling: ‘Liesbeth, fetch Stefan.’ This time his voice carried, and Liesbeth acted.
‘Slavic’s lawyer is Vincent van Haaften, I’m sure you’re aware. It’s looking like you might be getting to know Vincent a whole lot better if they pursue their case.’
‘What case, you little shit?’
‘Harassment by a suspended officer. There’s a chain of command here, Henk.’
‘As the Nazis once said.’
He shook his head.
‘Where’s Joost?’ I suddenly asked. Was he with Jan Six?
‘Offsite.’
With Slavic?
Stefan appeared in the doorway, looking sheepish.
‘Tell him,’ Bergveld commanded.
‘Sebastiaan asked me to –’
‘Tell him!’
‘I pulled more footage from the Molensteeg,’ Stefan stammered, not making eye contact with me. ‘And also from the vicinity… and it appears that… you and another, unidentified male were conducting surveillance on Jan To˝zsér… I’m sorry…’
‘That’ll be legally discoverable,’ Bergveld promised, ‘if van Haaften and To˝zsér decide to file suit.’ He was standing now.
‘Someone here talked to Irena,’ I said. ‘She confirmed that Slavic killed Saskia.’
Bergveld screwed up his face. ‘Who the fuck’s Irena? Who’s Saskia?’
‘The woman in the harbour.’
‘I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about –’
‘Of course you don’t. So why’s the harbour case sealed?’
‘And I’ve no spare resources to protect paranoid former officers from themselves,’ Bergveld continued. ‘Take your family away for a while, Henk. Do us all a favour,’ he said in a low voice. ‘Take a break, or –’
‘Or what?’
‘Accept the consequences.’
‘Is that a threat?’
‘It’s a warning. It’s a fair and final warning.’
‘It’s certainly the final warning I’ll accept from you,’ I said, staring him down before turning away. Stefan had left.
Liesbeth wasn’t in the squad room either.
I walked straight out into the night, heading to the boat, when a black stretch Mercedes pulled up. The rain had eased up some. For a moment nothing happened – there was just the faint idle of the engine and the billow of the exhaust, like those New York street vents you see in movies. Then the rear passenger door opened as if under its own power, and out stepped Joost.
He didn’t meet my gaze, but rather walked straight past me into the station.
‘Get in, Henk,’ the remaining passenger said, a hand beckoning.
*
Alderman Rem Lottman amply filled the capacious black interior. The car was icily air-conditioned; it smelled faintly of cigar and expensive cologne, or maybe perfume – an aromatic fridge. The armrest featured a traditional phone handset. In front of it was a recess containing expensive-looking glassware. The back of the seat in front of him had a built-in TV, which was flickering silently.
‘Drink?’ Lottman offered. ‘Whisky?’
I nodded.
He lifted a decanter, pouring generously first into one and then a second cut-glass tumbler.
‘Cheers,’ he said, raising his glinting tumbler.
I raised mine too, not stopping till it reached my mouth. I drained half of it, the immensely welcome fire spreading through me.
‘You impressed me earlier,’ Lottman said. ‘Not everyone could do that, come to see me like that. Takes balls.’
It made me think of something – a trip to the zoo, with my dad. Where would that have been… Cape Town perhaps? We’re standing in front of the lion enclosure and a fully grown male, rangy-looking, is pawing at the cage, trying to get out, trying to get at us. I’m absolutely terrified. My dad puts his rough hand on my shoulder, says: ‘Never show you’re afraid, son. That’s when they really come for you…’
‘Congratulate my wife,’ I told Lottman. ‘She contacted you first.’
‘But it was you who married your wife, Henk. So congratulations are still in order.’ He tilted his glass again in acknowledgement. ‘There are no coincidences,’ he went on. ‘The people we meet in life, we meet for a reason: people who have a lesson to teach us, or some lesson to receive from us. But most often, people who just reflect us – show us some aspect of ourselves…’ He pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose with a fat forefinger. ‘You grasp the realities, Henk. Yes, I’m going to Brussels, and no, I can’t neglect my base here in Amsterdam. Weren’t those your words?’
‘Well remembered. Or recorded?’
‘Mmm,’ he said, mid-swallow. ‘Which reminds me. Servaas, would you do the honours?’
The burly driver got out and walked around the back of the car, opening my door.
I climbed out and Servaas patted me down, hesitating only over the large fob for my motorbike keys. Eventually satisfied, he let me back inside the car.
‘Sorry about that,’ Lottman said, ‘but I’m sure you understand. Things have been getting out of hand around here.’ He waved a hand towards the police station. ‘Quite a mess to clear up.’
‘Good thing you have Joost,’ I said. ‘And Jan Six above him.’
He shook his head. ‘Too many chiefs, not enough Indians.’
We sat drinking in silence as I digested this remark. I was wondering about Sebastiaan Bergveld, his status on the chief–Indian scale, and exactly what mess Lottman was referring to, when he turned to me.
‘You could be inside the tent.’
‘Huh?’ I met his eye. ‘Why me?’
‘I see something of myself in you.’ A pause. ‘I, too, struggled greatly till I found a cause, and a mentor.’ He pushed his glasses further up his nose. ‘We all need that figure in our lives.’
Did we?
Did Nadia?
‘I can teach you.’
‘Alderman Lottman –’
‘Please, call me Rem.’
‘I’m a fifty-four-year-old father. Do you not think it’s a little late in the game for a community elder to be stepping forward and offering me guidance?’
‘It’s never too late to learn, Henk. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. It’s all up here’ – he tapped his temple – ‘in the mind. Doubtless it shocked you today when I brought up your father. I’m sorry. Everything to do with your father is in the past, I know. That was then, this is now. The questions we face are: How can we be useful? How can we serve? Knowing that there are always trade-offs, compromises…’
He shifted his bulk towards me.
‘And if you can take that…’ He cupped his plump hands together, like he was clasping some imaginary vessel. ‘If you can channel that…’ The exact word seemed to evade him. ‘You could be very useful to me,’ he concluded.
Or had he evaded the word?
Guilt? Shame?
More than anything… anger.
‘What exactly are you offering me?’ I said.
‘Delete that recording of our station captain, and any intent to use it with your wife.’
‘And?’
‘You’ll be reinstated to full active service.’
‘What about my family? Their safety?’
‘What’s your answer, Henk?’
I leaned in. ‘Are you holding my daughter hostage too now?’
‘No! Henk –’
But I was already out of the car.
‘Henk!’
12
INTO THE TUNNEL
I rode my bike back to the boat. As I approached, I felt a sinking sensation: there was a light on where there shouldn’t have been. I slowed down and hit the bike’s kill switch, the engine dying obediently.
The BMW rolled to a stop thirty metres from home.
I eased the Sig Sauer out of the pannier, unsheathing it from its oilcloth.
Someone was definitely aboard.
I ran along the waterside and crept up, crouching behind a couple of parked bikes. It was drizzling softly but steadily. I could see a moped parked further down Entrepotdok. The light I’d seen on the boat was dancing; it was a torch, a little handheld one that the intruder had clamped between his teeth. Slavic was trying to unpick the lock of the cabin, but he was failing. The lock had five tumblers instead of four; I’d fitted it myself.
I eased my crash helmet off and set it down, then checked Johan’s gun, re-familiarising myself with the old army weapon. I wanted to put a bullet in Slavic’s upper leg or pelvis right there and incapacitate him for good, but I was still running that last conversation with Bergveld through my mind: could a clever lawyer like van Haaften spin it a different way? Client comes to reason with persecuting ex-cop; vigilante ex-cop uses excessive force on him, or some such… As of now, Slavic was simply fumbling around on deck.
There was a shape-shifting quality to the man. I felt my heart beating hard at the thought of squeezing the trigger. Every now and then, the light of his torch reflected off the glass of the cabin windows and back onto his face. Once again, I felt the sense of my mind playing tricks on me: was I seeing Slavic, or someone else in his guise?
Somehow I knew I’d got things wrong. This lowlife’s crude attempts to break into my boat just didn’t jibe with seventy-thousand-euro cars and trips to the Conservatorium Hotel, where lurked the likes of Jan Six. What were the ‘other considerations’ Bergveld had mentioned, the ‘trade-offs’ and ‘compromises’ Joost and Rem Lottman had referenced?
A tinkle of glass – he’d given up on the lock and broken the window of the door.
‘Police! Don’t move!’ I yelled. I stood up, my gun in a two-handed grip, sighting at his centre-mass as I edged forward.
He dropped the torch. One arm, in silhouette, raised a translucent shape, like a litre-bottle of water.
The Harbour Master Page 8
