by Mark Hobson
Bursting through the doorway, gripping the cricket bat in both hands, Pieter yelled fiercely. A quick, split-second glance showed him the room was empty, but when he looked over towards the small window he had the shock of his life.
Someone clad in a black coat or cloak was squeezing through the tiny opening, using it as a way out. Whoever he or she was, they were quite small in stature (for a crazy moment he was convinced it was a child) but it was still an effort to get their frame through, and they wriggled about with one leg still dangling down inside the room. Sitting half in and half out, the figure turned and looked back over their shoulder at Pieter. And when he saw the face, alabaster white with deep-set, shadowy eyes, his heart nearly stopped. The grin that appeared was like a narrow black gash.
Momentarily shocked, and unable to fathom the idea of anybody desperate enough to risk escaping this way, four stories above the street below, he nonetheless quickly regathered his wits and dashed across the room, his bare feet crunching over something on the rug, and made a lunge for the foot.
He missed it by inches and the intruder slipped through the opening.
Flinging the cricket bat away Pieter reached up for the edges of the window frame and pulled himself up, squirming his upper body through, and anger flooding his mind. Stupidly he looked down, seeing the street and canal far, far below, and a wave of vertigo overcame him.
He almost keeled over the edge and just in time he managed to grab a hold of the wooden joist and winch sticking out from the gable above his head.
Twisting awkwardly about, Pieter looked across the steep rooftop towards the next house over. The black-clad figure was scrambling up and over the roof tiles like some frightful phantom of the night, coat tail flapping in the breeze. Reaching the apex of the roof, they paused and looked back at Pieter once more.
Their eyes met briefly, those twin black pits seeming to bore straight through to Pieter’s brain.
Still clinging on to the wooden joist, he watched as the figure disappeared into the night.
CHAPTER 7
FAMKE AND THE STUPID OLD FOOL
Dropping back down to the floor inside the attic room, Pieter could feel himself starting to shake from the after effects of the terrifying incident, and so he paused to allow his nerves time to settle.
The room was in darkness but with a mixture of moonlight and orange streetlight filtering through from outside, his eyes quickly adjusted to the gloom. Looking about, he was able to see that everything was as it should be: nothing had been disturbed or moved, the room wasn’t ransacked.
Shaking his head in confusion Pieter drew a deep breath and turned and pulled down the window sash. Then, picking up the cricket bat once again, he crossed back over the room, heading for the staircase.
He paused halfway as he again felt his naked feet crunch over something on the floor rug. Looking down he strained his eyes and tried to make out what it was, and then stepping carefully around, he quickly moved down the stairs, flicked on the light switch, and hurried back up.
Standing beneath the bare light bulb Pieter searched the floor. He saw the brown powder scattered over the rug, and his own footprints where he had stepped through. Kneeling down, he scooped some up on his fingertips and examined it closer. Soil. It was soil.
Unable to work out what the hell was going on, Pieter went back down to the landing below. Putting on all of the upstairs lights he went from room to room, checking to see if anything was missing or disturbed, and also to make sure nobody was still lurking about. He looked in all of the wardrobes and cupboards, beneath the beds, in the shower cubicle, tried all of the windows to see if any had been forced open (unlikely this high up, but he did it just the same) and then moved down to the floor below which he hardly used really, and repeated the process. Finally he found himself on the ground floor. The front door was still bolted on the inside. He opened it and looked up and down the street, feeling the night time chill as he was only wearing boxers, went back inside, and then passed through the door into the ground floor garage. His car was still there and untampered with and the automatic garage door securely shut with the alarm still activated.
There was nothing amiss anywhere. Nothing seemed to have been stolen or even so much as moved. No doors or windows were damaged. All apart from the window right at the very top of the house.
The least likely scenario seemed to be the only plausible one: that the intruder had entered the house the same way in which he had left. And that was just too crazy to think about.
Pieter trudged back up to the third floor. He should call this in, have the place dusted and swiped for fingerprints.
He walked into his bedroom and was reaching out to pick his mobile up off the nightstand when it rang, the vibration making it dance across the surface.
Scooping it up he checked the display – Unknown Number – and the time, which was shortly after 4.30am. Nobody called at that time unless it was bad news. He swiped the green answer button.
Before he even brought the phone to his ear he heard the hysterical screaming, which chilled him to the bone. There was then some incoherent shouting, then more screams, and at last a woman’s voice, repeating over and over, “Your dad, your dad, Hansje! Hansje!!”
“Famke?”
More screaming, louder and louder.
◆◆◆
When Pieter pulled up at the Westerdock ten minutes later the police divers were just hauling his dad’s body from the river.
In the pre-dawn greyness the flashing lights of the emergency vehicles cast an eerie glow across the scene, and he stayed sitting in the car, watching as they heaved and manoeuvred the corpse up the high river wall and onto the pathway. Using ropes and pulleys attached to a fire-engine, the knot of men and women laid his dad prostrate and then covered him with a white sheet.
Further along the roadway was an ambulance with its back doors open. Inside he could see Famke sitting with a red blanket around her shoulders and talking with a paramedic. Her long grey hair was soaked and her lined face was a mask of pain and grief. Pieter felt nothing for her. His mind was blank.
After a few minutes he noticed the distinctive figure of Daan Beumers break away from the cluster of figures and head his way. Pieter had no idea how the sergeant had heard about the incident, but he was here.
Opening the front passenger door his friend climbed in next to him. They sat in silence for a minute.
Finally, just to break the silence, Beumers said, “It’s a fucked up world.”
Pieter nodded. “Full of stupid people.”
Out on the river was his dad’s houseboat, anchored mid-stream. Two figures wearing bright orange life-preservers moved about on the wooden deck. Alongside it was a police launch.
“I warned him, a thousand times. Not to go out there.”
“Well it seems they’d been drinking,” the police sergeant told him. “All day long, according to his friend.”
“I know,” Pieter responded simply.
Beumers turned to look at him closely, perhaps to gauge how he was handling the situation. But Pieter kept his face blank, unwilling to give anything away, instead choosing to keep his own counsel.
“We’re still putting the pieces together, which isn’t easy as she’s in a complete state and probably has mild hyperthermia to boot. And she’s also still a little drunk. But what we know is that your father, Hansje, decided he wanted to do a spot of fishing and so the pair of them took his boat out there –“
“In the middle of the night?” Pieter cut in sharply.
“Famke says that your father said that was the best time to go, through the night. That’s when they bite the most. The fish. She tried to stop him, or at least that’s what she has told us, but he insisted. And so she tagged along with him. Anyway, they carried on drinking, did a bit of fishing, getting drunker and drunker. The blokes out on the boat,” he nodded at the figures on board dad’s houseboat, “they’ve found a load of empty cans and bottles, enough for them to be p
retty sozzled. Anyway, somehow your dad fell or tripped, or maybe the boat was rocked by a heavy swell, and he ended up in the water. Famke jumped in after him and tried to get him out, but it was dark and she couldn’t find him… After that she managed to climb back on board, and rang you…”
“The stupid old fool. After everything he’s gone through, in Bosnia and in and out of rehab, to die like this.”
“I know mate. The post mortem will confirm her story and everything.”
“Just one of those things, eh?” Pieter answered back somewhat unfairly, and then he climbed out of the car and walked over to where his dad’s body lay on the pavement. Beumers caught up with him, and a hush descended amongst the police and rescue people, for they all knew who Pieter was.
Crouching down, he peeled back the edge of the sheet and looked down on his dad’s face. A heaviness seemed to descend on him, crunching him on the inside, pressing his soul down and down.
He stood and walked silently away.
Pieter went straight back home.
The city was just starting to come to life around him but he barely noticed during the drive. A strange tingling sensation was gently vibrating through his body which he knew was the onset of delayed shock, mostly a result of seeing his dad like that and the implications of the whole sorry affair. He also guessed it was partly due to the break-in and subsequent fright it had caused. Oh, and not forgetting his confrontation with Bart. All in all the last few hours had been one long shit-storm of emotions, so much so that he felt physically and mentally exhausted.
Parking in the garage, he locked up and set the alarm and then went back up to the third floor. The house was silent and still and felt empty, but he carried out the most cursory of checks in each room just to be sure the intruder hadn’t paid a second call. He was too weary to fret about it just yet, and to be honest he didn’t care too much one way or the other. For the same reasons, he’d chosen not to mention the break-in to his colleagues. Nothing had been taken or damaged, and he also wanted to think about the incident first as there were aspects to it which he just couldn’t fathom. But now wasn’t the time.
There was no point in going back to bed. He wouldn’t sleep anyway, even though he felt drained. Instead he made himself a strong coffee and sat at the small table in the kitchen. Watching the sunrise through the lace curtain, Pieter went over events.
The tragic passing of his dad, horrible and wretched as it was, nonetheless somehow felt preordained. His life over the last twenty-odd years had been one of steady decline, through a failed marriage and family feuds and booze, everything intertwined and twisted into a mess of bad choices and stupid mistakes, with it all stemming from his time in Bosnia. Pieter had moved heaven and earth to intervene, seeking help wherever he could find it, but all of the programmes and rehab that his dad had gone through – some of it unwillingly – had ultimately come to naught. And deep down inside, Pieter had always known this was how it would end. Not necessarily with his dad dying, but in a failure of his dad’s willpower. All of the time and effort thrown back into Pieter’s face.
He thought back to the previous afternoon and that brief glimpse of his dad and Famke in Leidseplein Square. Wondered whether anything he could have done differently might have made a difference. Instead of driving on to rush to Lotte, perhaps if he’d climbed out of the car? Taken his dad home to get him sobered up? Would he still be alive now? Or would it have merely delayed the inevitable?
Even as he contemplated these things Pieter knew it was a pointless exercise. None of it would change what had happened. Blaming himself for his dad’s own self-destructive personality would only let guilt eat him away inside.
But he still felt empty and hollow to the pit of his stomach.
His thoughts and ruminations were interrupted just then by a call on his phone. He answered it. This time it was Daan Beumers – did he ever sleep? Pieter wondered.
“Hey mate. I’ve been asked by the powers-that-be to tell you not to come in today. Actually, with it been Saturday tomorrow I reckon you should have the whole weekend off. We can handle things here for a few days.”
“Yeah ok Daan. I guess it make’s sense.”
“If there are any major developments with the case I promise I will be straight on the blower to you. We should be getting the results on the British victim sometime today, so I will email you the details, but there’s no need for you to go over it too much. And the same applies to your father. I’ll make sure he’s taken care of.”
Pieter suddenly felt shattered. He sagged in his chair and felt his eyelids grow heavier by the second. Perhaps fourty winks wouldn’t be out of the question. And then over the weekend, not only would he make arrangements with his dad’s passing, but he was also determined to investigate the strange circumstances of his early-morning visit by the intruder, and the bizarre nature of his escape through the window.
Saying goodbye to Beumers, Pieter lay his head on the table and was fast asleep in seconds.
◆◆◆
He woke up sometime towards mid-morning feeling much more refreshed and invigorated. Grabbing a quick shower and eating a bowlful of fruit with yoghurt, Pieter switched on the coffee machine and instead of waiting for it to bubble to a slow boil he popped down to the ground floor and stepped outside.
Between his house and that of his neighbours there was a short, covered passage leading to a small courtyard where someone had arranged some potted plants. Pieter headed down the passage and stood with his back to the wall so he could look up at the side of his attic room, which was perched right at the top of the sloping roof four floors up. The window itself was around the front, but he could just about make out the roof slates and the side of the bell gable, as well as part of his neighbours adjoining roof.
A pipe fed out from a small hole in the wall, just about where the bathroom was in Pieter’s house, and dropped straight down to a small grate in the ground next to where he was standing. There was also a small ledge below the bathroom window, perhaps two or three inches wide. Above this there was nothing but a flat and featureless wall, until the attic dormer itself. About fifteen feet with no hand-holds or ledges or pipes or anything whatsoever to grip or climb up. His neighbour’s side was pretty much the same but without even a pipe. So there was no way the intruder could have climbed up to his attic window from this location, unless he had rubber suction pads on his hands!
courtyard
Could he have got in via his neighbour’s house, waited until she had gone to bed, and then scrambled across the roof to Pieter’s? Possible, but from what he knew the old dear never used the top floor of her house and access to her attic was sealed off inside with a brick wall. So very doubtful.
Pieter considered the possibility of the intruder breaking in from below. But most homes in Amsterdam – including his – had no basement as they were prone to flooding. All there was down there was some recent concrete foundations and the original and very old wooden piles. It was a real puzzle.
Strolling back around to the front he paused and looked at his garage door. Perhaps the intruder had hidden in the boot of his car at Police HQ and stole a ride right into Pieter’s garage? Not possible: not only would he have set off the car alarm when sneaking out of his hiding place late at night, but he would also have had to pass from the garage through the connecting door into the house itself, triggering that alarm as well.
Ok, so whoever had been in his house last night cannot have entered via the attic window, not unless they had somehow found a route up to the roof perhaps from a house further along the row and then travelled across many rooftops to climb in through his window? Short of checking with each of his neighbours, there was no way to be absolutely sure, but it still seemed unlikely.
He guessed a really good cat-burglar would know how to by-pass a good security system and get past the house alarms, but then again why go to all of this trouble to break in but then to leave empty-handed? Unless robbery wasn’t the motive? But if the int
ention was to harm the occupant – and if the intruder knew who Pieter Van Dijk was, he could have a motive for wishing him harm – then he’d had ample opportunity to sneak into his bedroom and attack him whilst he had been sleeping. Yet he hadn’t.
So, let’s see, Pieter thought, using his policeman’s analytical brain.
Motive No 1: Robbery – Nothing seemed to be missing so he ruled that one out.
Motive No 2: To harm, or murder, the sleeping homeowner – Again, he could tick that off the list.
Perhaps there was a Motive No 3: Not to steal anything, but to leave something behind?
He remembered the soil up on the attic rug.
Finishing his coffee and quickly clearing away the breakfast things, Pieter searched around under the kitchen sink and came out with a small dustpan and brush, as well as a small plastic container. Then he slogged up the narrow stairs to the attic room.
Kneeling on the square rug he once again studied the brown powdery substance. There was lots of it, more than he had realized last night. There were small piles and heaps of the stuff. Certainly more than would be accidentally walked in off the soles of somebody's shoes. It actually looked to have been deliberately placed there, apart from the bits which his own feet had scattered and trod into the rug. And in amidst the brown there seemed to be flecks of a black tarry substance. Pieter ran his fingertips through it, feeling it gently. It felt and looked like ordinary soil to him. But when he brought his fingers to his nostrils and sniffed, he detected a familiar briny smell. Like seaweed?
Utterly confused, he spent several minutes sweeping up the mess and storing it safely away in the plastic container. First thing Monday morning he would get the guys in the lab to analyse it. Hopefully they would provide some answers to the mystery.
