The Corpse on the Dike (24 page)

Two men said, “No.” Two hesitated.

“What happened?” Sharif asked.

The man he was looking at lit a cigarette.

“They didn’t say anything, Sharif, but they may have seen something. I didn’t like the way they left. Perhaps they spoke to one of the employees who helped me shift the merchandise. I had to work quickly and I couldn’t get it all into the truck by myself.”

“And you. What happened in your store?”

“There was some confusion in my store, Sharif,” the man said slowly. “A wrong TV set stayed behind; a right one was moved out. The detectives took the numbers of all the sets in the store. If they check your books in the head office they may stumble into an irregularity.”

“I see,” Sharif said, and folded his hands. “I see; I am glad you’re telling me. Mistakes will be made. It’s a condition we humans must always take into account. There are detectives going through our books now, comparing invoices with lists of numbers. The TV sets and the other merchandise came from containers that our supplier secured. There must be lists of the numbers of missing TV sets. Yes. It’s bad. But perhaps it will not be noticed. Did anything else go wrong?”

He looked at his men one by one. Nobody said anything.

“The Cat,” one of the men said.

“He is in jail. I believe he won’t stay there. His connection with us was never proved. The Cat is a wily animal, proud and free. He will be sleeping on his bunk, smiling at the policemen who try to talk to him.”

“Half his mustache is gone.”

“Yes,” Sharif said, “so I heard. He will look slightly ridiculous but in Amsterdam half a mustache is not as strange as it would be in other places.” Sharif laughed, a gentle deep-throated laugh.

“Someone died on the dike, I heard,” one of the men said.

“That was planned,” another man said and chuckled. “The Flyer did well. There’s no trace, only a bullet.”

Sharif raised a hand. “This is a meeting, gentlemen, a business meeting. We must abide by our rules. Let me direct the meeting and let no one talk out of place.”

Sharif was looking at the ceiling. When his eyes came down the four men were staring straight ahead. “There has been death on the dike,” Sharif said. “Unplanned stupid death. A man was shot in the stomach by the police and he is now dead in hospital. Another man has died but the shot was directed and fired quietly; it came from the dark of night and a jinni slipped away and was never seen again. The jinni has no name. If the jinni is named, a person is created and a person has habits, leaves tracks, lives in a house. The police can put a hand on his shoulder. We must allow the jinni to be.”

“So what now?” a man asked.

“We wait,” Sharif said. “The Cat will be free one day but we must not talk to him again. We will play the Cat’s game ourselves now and our warrior will train some men to master the tricks that are necessary. The men will be reliable. There will be some Arabs and there will be some local men. And a woman perhaps—a good woman—who we will find in the house we are in now. But first we wait. We may have to wait six months or a year, but we can afford to wait. Gentlemen?” Sharif asked.

He looked at them one by one for agreement. “Excellent. We will end the meeting. I will see you downstairs in a minute. I thank you for your presence.”

The men stood as Sharif left the room.

He looked regal.

A sheik sweeping out of his tent, de Gier thought. There’ll be a white racing camel outside and he’ll be far away soon, swallowed by the desert.

16

T
HE DOORMAN LED DE
G
IER BACK TO THE CAR WHERE HE
handed the tape recorder to the constable at the wheel. Neither the doorman, nor de Gier, nor the sleepy-eyed constable saw the small dark man who had been standing in the garden opposite for some time now. The man stood next to the heavy trunk of a larix, his body hidden by the tree’s low branches.

De Gier and the doorman went back into the house. The commissaris was at the bar, sipping from a drink that the smiling fat bartender had prepared in a most professional manner. He handled the silver shaker as if he were welcoming a royal personage who had the right to an extravagant show of pure joy. A young lady was sitting next to the commissaris. De Gier stopped to admire her. She was dressed in a long black gown, buttoned up to her small chin and enclosing a long slender neck. Her face was innocence itself and the little red mouth pouted. Her leg on the commissaris’ side was bare and she moved it every few seconds. The naked thigh made de Gier gasp. The slit in the gown closed as de Gier joined the commissaris.

“Evening, sir,” de Gier said. “I didn’t expect you to be here tonight. I thought you were still in France.”

“Hello, Rinus,” the commissaris said, smiling delightedly. “I was hoping to meet you here. How are things at the office? Meet our charming hostess. Her name is Charlotte. Charlotte meet Rinus, my right hand in the firm. You two are very well suited, I think.”

The girl jumped down from her stool and bowed low. Then she lifted her face and offered her mouth. De Gier kissed her lightly while the commissaris tittered.

“Excellent,” he said. “You two
are
suited, I see. I was right.”

“Of course,” the girl said.

“Can I buy you a drink, Charlotte,” de Gier asked.

“No, thanks. I still have some in my glass, but we can dance if you like. Let me introduce you both to Ella. We can’t leave our friend at the bar by himself, can we.”

“Who is Ella?” the commissaris asked.

Charlotte pointed to a redheaded girl sitting by herself at the other side of the bar.

“She is beautiful,” the commissaris said, “but I would prefer that lovely Chinese girl who just came in. If you don’t mind, of course. It’s no reflection on your taste at all; it’s just that I am charmed by the wisdom of the Far East.”

“You are a dear,” Charlotte said and brushed her hair past the commissaris’ cheek. “Just a minute, please.”

“Everything all right?” the commissaris asked.

“Yes, sir. The recorder is back in the car and the doorman has cleaned up the conference room.”

“This is Thsien-niu,” Charlotte said. “Did I pronounce your name right, Thsien-niu?”

The girl smiled and bowed, a tiny bow that didn’t do much more than acknowledge the presence of the two men.

Tricks, de Gier thought. Tricks that they learn from the podgy pimp. He saw Joop, the doorman, in the classroom upstairs, his huge body slumped on a couch while the girls performed. He inspired them with his warm deep voice that slurred and caressed its words and he made the girls glow with pleasure, obedience and humility.

“Sit next to me, Thsien-niu,” the commissaris said, trying to pronounce the foreign sounds properly.

“Please,” the girl said in English while she jumped lightly onto the high stool.

“Thsien-niu doesn’t speak Dutch yet,” Charlotte said, “but she is learning quickly and her English is wonderful. She comes from Hong Kong. She is very popular here.”

De Gier was on the small dance floor with Charlotte’s gowned body pressed against him. The combo, consisting of three young men—all dressed in dark suits with narrow trousers and white fluffy open-necked shirts with dark blue scarves—played a slow shuffle, very easy to get into. They often stopped, letting four bars go by. The pianist’s right hand played a simple combination of high notes with a loose touch. The left hand, drums and double bass came in together, stressing the combination and making it run up de Gier’s spine. He had his hands on the girl’s shoulders and pulled her against his chest but she wriggled free and began a dance on her own, four feet away from him. She stuck to the same place, hardly moving her feet but making her body shiver and de Gier, led by the piano’s high notes, improvised a merry-go-round without overdoing it. He was using a proper pattern for his feet, which he remembered from dance lessons twenty years ago. But he had never been taught by the old lady of the school to use his shoulders, his arms and his hands. It had been kind of the old lady not to teach him, for now he could do as he liked and he was doing well. The commissaris approved, studying him from the bar, and the Chinese girl smiled vaguely as she saw the tall athletic man change into a little boy and then gradually begin to find his own strength again. De Gier had no thoughts while he danced; he was aware of a feeling of well-being. He had become part of the music.

“Beautiful man,” the Chinese girl said to the commissaris.

“Yes,” the commissaris said. “Don’t tell him; it makes him feel silly.”

“That’s good,” the girl said. “You want to dance too?”

“No. Let’s drink.”

The barman came before he was called. The crushed ice in his silver flask moved with the rhythm of the shuffle and the commissaris’ and the girl’s glasses were filled.

Sharif came into the bar, followed by his four men, who were grinning with pleasure in anticipation. There were more girls in the bar now and some twelve men. Other couples had joined de Gier and Charlotte on the dance floor and the combo, feeling that the shuffle had caught on, allowed some exuberance to glide into the music. The pianist’s right hand was now rather complicated and the double bass had a chance to exert itself; it was good enough to play by itself and the pianist sat back, smiling at the drummer, who only stressed the vibrations of the giant violin by softly hitting a cymbal.

Sharif separated from his companions and came to the bar. The commissaris smiled at him and Sharif stopped.

“Virgins as fair as corals and rubies,” Sharif said. “Which of your Lord’s blessings would you deny?”

“This is hardly the place I would come to deny myself anything,” the commissaris said. “Can I offer you a drink?”

“You can,” Sharif said, “but there should not be alcohol in it. And there’s nothing right now I can offer in return, except perhaps my company.”

The barman, who had seen Sharif join the commissaris from the other end of the bar, was hovering around them already and poured a glass of an almost black liquid.

“The juice of blackberries,” Sharif said, raising the glass. “A rare delicacy but I have noticed nobody here likes it. I always find the contents of the bottle at the same level as I left it on my last visit. Yet it mixes with alcohol, I think, although I have never tried it.”

“You don’t drink at all?” the commissaris asked.

“Never. I am an Arab.”

“Which of your Lord’s blessings would you deny?” the commissaris asked.

“Ah,” said Sharif, “you remembered. A sentence from the Koran: Noah, one of its first chapters. Perhaps you think I was blaspheming?”

There was no glimmer of amusement in Sharif’s large dark eyes as he scrutinized the commissaris’ face.

“No,” the commissaris said. “To blaspheme is to be childish and you do not strike me as a childish man. But to be able to drink is a blessing and you have asked me whether I would deny it?”

“I was referring to other pleasures,” Sharif said. “And I do not agree with you that alcohol is a blessing. When I was younger and sillier I tasted alcohol. And I have been very drunk. It took weeks to forget the imbecilities I uttered during those few hours. I woke up in a large building where streetcars are parked during the night. I was lying with my head on a rail. I could never remember how I got into that building but waking up was waking up in hell, and even now I have a fear of streetcars, especially at night. I have never drunk again.”

“I see,” the commissaris said. “Please meet my companion; her name is Thsien-niu.”

“We are acquainted. How are you this evening, vision from heaven?”

The girl smiled.

“You are in business?” Sharif asked, sipping his blackberry juice.

The commissaris laughed and immediately excused himself. “When I was a child,” the commissaris said, “I suffered from constipation. My mother would prepare porridge for me, a porridge of gray cement with lumps moving about in it. To give it flavor, and to mask the taste of the olive oil that she poured into it when she thought I wasn’t looking, she would add half a glass of blackberry juice.”

“Haha,” Sharif said and there was real amusement on his face now. His eyes were slanting more than usual and there was a glitter of gold between his lips. “Perhaps the juice is to you what the streetcars in the evening are to me. Every man has his fears. Are you in business?”