The Mind-Murders (5 page)

4

"Listen here," Frits Fortune said, "you're really not all that welcome. Why don't you leave?"

The suspect was lying down on his side on an air mattress under the open windows of the largest room in the apartment. De Gier sat opposite him, crosslegged. Grijpstra, unable to find a suitable spot, walked about, becoming visible every now and then through open doors. Fortune still wore the same clothes, a linen suit of good quality, crumpled and stained. He smelled mainly of damp rot but the stench mingled with the fragrances of soap, shampoo, and aftershave. Fortune smoked, spilling ash on the shiny parquet floor.

De Gier admired the glowing cigarette. The pack was within reach of his right hand. It still contained nineteen cigarettes. De Gier wanted to grab it, tear off the paper and silver foil, spread his hand around its entire contents, and light all cigarettes at the same time. He would then inhale the combined smoke into the extreme depths of his lungs. Afterward he would feel better.

"Won't you leave?" Fortune asked again.

"We'd rather not," de Gier said, "but if you insist, we'll have to, for to stay, after having been told to leave by the legal possessor of living space, constitutes a crime and would, in our case, being police officers and having identified ourselves as such, be punishable by a double maximum penalty, or six months in jail. But if we leave, we'll have to return with an order signed by a high-ranking officer. We have a car and it wouldn't take me longer than half an hour to obtain such an order. With a warrant you'll have to admit us, and if you refuse,
youll
be punishable."

"But what do you want of me? Is it because of last night? I remember vaguely that I fought with policemen, including yourself. You were in the canal too, but I don't believe you were in uniform."

"I'm a detective."

"You are? I'm sorry if I hurt you with my crutch. Did I hurt you?"

"You only intended to. Any charges the constables may have come up with have been dropped. We aren't here to remind you of last night, we only want to know the whereabouts of your wife."

Fortune rested his head on his arm. "Gone."

"Gone where?"

"Doesn't a detective detect? I've tried, but being an amateur I failed. I could only think of telephoning everybody who knows Rea. I made a list; here it is. It's been in the water too, which hasn't improved my handwriting. I checked off all the names, which means that I telephoned those people. I borrowed the telephone book of my neighbor downstairs, Mrs. Cabbage-Tonto and . . ."

Grijpstra reappeared and held up his hand.

"Is that her name?" de Gier asked. "Cabbage-Tonto?"

"The lady who lives below this apartment?" Grijpstra asked.

"Yes."

"Cabbage-Tonto," Grijpstra said thoughtfully. "The right name. If I had to name her I couldn't do better."

"Of Italian origin and married to a dead Englishman," Fortune said.

"There's always a superficial explanation."

Fortune nodded at the adjutant's disappearing back.

"How . . ." De Gier extended a hand and pushed the pack of cigarettes away. "How is your leg, Mr. Fortune?"

Fortune laughed. He had good teeth. His face was good too. De Gier thought of a hero he had seen in an old war movie that ended well when the bad enemies surrendered and the good flag was raised.

"My leg? My leg is fine. There's nothing ever wrong with me, really, I only have weak nerves. Or I'm crazy, like most of us. Whenever I have a bad fright, a part of my body goes wrong, but only for a while. Some time ago I was nearly run down by a car and I fainted on the sidewalk. The specialists played snooker with me. I hit every hospital and clinic in town. The doctors agreed in the end that I might have a bad heart and that the next severe shock would knock me down again. But they were wrong, as you can see. When the constables hit me and lost me in the canal, I didn't even faint. The shock repaired the effect of a previous unpleasant experience, when I came home to find nothing." He sat up. "By the way, those little constables are dangerous, they should be restrained. The same goes for that fool sergeant Jurriaans who disciplined me this morning. And to think that I've known Mm for years and respect him in a way. Another Aunt Coba, appearances mean nothing, a black soul in respectable dress. Arrrgh!" He lay down again.

"Aunt Coba?"

"She has been living on the Emperorscanal for several centuries now. As a child I used to spend time in her house; with her and Uncle Henry. A dignified-looking couple but their valor is lopsided. Only Uncle Henry will go to heaven."

"You stayed with them? You're not Amsterdam born?"

"Of course I am, but my parents lived on the other side of the river and my mother was sickly. I would be sent to Aunt Coba. Aunt Coba would interfere with my mind. Would you like to have coffee?"

They went to the kitchen, finding Grijpstra observing an empty shelf. On the stone sink stood a hot plate and a box filled with groceries.

Fortune talked while he made the coffee. "Never thought Rea could be that thorough. She even took the toilet paper, very bothersome if you notice its absence too late. Had to use the paper in my pocket diary, too thin and too slippery.

"Not that the experience isn't two-sided. Without obstructions one can see far. When the dizziness wore off I went shopping. It happened to be Thursday evening and the stores were open. I could even buy a mattress and lie down and think it out. I used to think in a circle, about the business, about money. More of this to get that, more of that to get this."

"You publish books, we were told."

"I certainly do, or did maybe. A good selection, if I say so myself, nothing but what the public wants. Books on how to grow tomatoes in water, and what the gurus say about coitus and meditation, illustrated. Today's subject today, for those who want to live free in the security of togetherness. The oozy seekers, Holland's hope."

De Gier looked for a match. Grijpstra frowned.

"Coitus?" Grijpstra asked. "Meditation? Separate or simultaneous?" He sipped his coffee, didn't like the taste, and continued to frown, studying miniature swells in his plastic cup.

"Both, the book is in two parts, but I don't know too much about the quality of what I sell. A publisher believes in sales and calculates in profit. There's no choice. Expenses increase and profit diminishes. Only more of this gives more of that, as I explained just now."

Grijpstra's frown dissolved.

Fortune smiled. "The endless circle, but not quite, as I found out on the mattress in the other room. To think that I quarreled with Rea because I refused to sell the circle. To consider that someone, a colleague who lives on the next canal, would buy my garbage on behalf of his company—a hundred times the size of mine, he doesn't own it but he's a director—would offer to free me, and I actually refused." He shook his head.

"At the right price?"

"A little more."

"Your wife wanted you to sell?"

"She did and I wouldn't agree. My colleague invited me to dinner at Beelema's, Rea was asked to come too. Borry Beelema likes to serve meals at request. He serves himself, and Zhaver and Titania dress up as cooks. Beelema believes in perfection. Caviar and champagne. Hyme, my colleague, must have discussed every detail of the party. It was meant as a trap, but I hadn't learned yet how to be caught in order to become free, FREE, damn it! They may not have known how to approach me. I'm a quiet man, or used to be.
I
worked, and that was all. Hyme sidled up along conventional lines and wined and dined me to soften up my resistance."

"The price?" asked Grijpstra.

Fortune told him.

Grijpstra whistled. "You could retire."

"And I didn't want to."

They had left the kitchen and stood alongside each other, gazing out of the windows. Below them a sea of irregular roof tops was contained by a row of warehouses. A thrush, perched on the head of a gargoyle, initiated a fairly complicated statement. The silver Mercedes with the German number plate that de Gier had seen before slithered to a stop before the striped awning of the Hotel Oberon and the same fat German slammed his car door and waddled across the street.

"You refused outright?"

"No, I asked for time to consider the offer. I was alone, under attack by a wicked monstrosity, horribly eager to rob me of my safe routine, or so I thought. I pretended to laugh a lot, became angry, and went home."

"With your wife."

"Yes, then we fought."

"Did you hit her?" Grijpstra asked pleasantly.

"No. I repeated myself. We didn't sleep that night. She wanted to buy a car, a country house, furnish it in style. She said I could read books. I told her that I manufactured books."

"You don't read?"

"I do, but not too often. I told her I was being useful to society. She tore me to pieces. She proved I wasn't, that the other company could publish my trash better than I."

"Was she right?"

"Of course."

Fortune thought.

"You would sell now?" Grijpstra asked.

Fortune grinned. "Yes, I will. I've been looking at my products again. Goat-wool socks, hallucinating mushrooms, UFO wisdom, Mr. Hyme can have it."

"UFOs may exist."

"Sure, but what do my authors know? They know how to spread ignorance on two hundred pages. They fantasize or lie outright and connect nonsense with fabrication."

The thrush sang on.

"Rea was right, but for the wrong reasons," Fortune said. "And she didn't care. I care now, and I disagree with her motivation. All she wanted was wealth, happiness, some short-range goal like that. She's a silly woman really."

"You won't take her back?"

"No."

"Divorce?"

"Yes."

"What will the neighbors say?" Grijpstra asked solemnly.

Fortune lit another cigarette and puffed placidly.

"Mrs. Cabbage-Tonto? She's the only neighbor I know and she never liked Rea. Sure I'll divorce Rea, but she'll have to show up or write to me through her lawyer. 111 return her money to her; she brought a fair sum into the marriage. I invested it in the business. I'll pay her back with profits."

"You're angry with her?"

Fortune dropped down on the mattress.

"No."

"And what do you plan to do?"

Fortune yawned. "Nothing much. Think more out of the circle, right here. This is a good place to think. Go on a trip afterward, find a quiet place, build my own cabin. I can't do that yet, but somebody may teach me."

"Will you have a car?"

"I'll have to learn to drive again. I could when I was in the army, that's twenty years ago. I don't have a license."

"Your wife can't drive either?"

"No."

De Gier swirled his coffee. "The dog, do you think it will come back again?"

"It did come back and I can't understand where it went. I'm sure I locked the door. It's Saturday today, yesterday I was in the canal, Rea left Thursday. I come home and it's all gone. I fall, Mrs. Cabbage takes me to the doctor. I do some shopping. Babette is at the door when I come back, pleased to see me, yapping, affectionate. I go in with the dog. On Friday I leave the dog in the house. It isn't there when I come home."

"The dog could only leave through the door?"

"Door, communal staircase, front door, there's no other way."

De Gier pointed at a wall built out of rough bricks. "Solid wall."

"Yes, the building used to be a warehouse, everything is solid. You see the holes in that wall? I drilled them and drove in cast-iron bars to support my book shelves. She even removed the bars."

"Do you miss your books?"

"Not really. A few perhaps but they can be replaced. Books become stuffing after a while, something to collect; another circle."

"What subjects did you read yourself?"

"Some novels, travel, horror."

"Any particular horror?"

"Poe."

"Poe," Grijpstra said helpfully. "I've heard of him. What's he like?"

De Gier pressed his hand against the wall. "I'll tell you a Poe story. There was a couple. They weren't happy. They lived in the country on an estate. It cost them all they had to keep the estate going. The estate wasn't profitable and the lady couldn't buy what she wanted. She would screech at her husband and one evening he picked up the poker and brained her."

"That was bad," Grijpstra said.

"Not too bad. It solved the squire's problem. But the corpse was still there, he had to remove that as well. Wait, I almost forgot, they also had a cat. The cat was around. Okay. The gentleman was a handy fellow and he got some tools and made a hole in the wall. A big hole, big enough to hold the corpse. He put the corpse in the hole and closed it up again."

"I've never done any masonry," Fortune said.

"But the squire had, you see. He was handy, as I said just now. He did an excellent job. Another thing about this gentleman, he had a sense of humor. He waited a couple of days, a week maybe, and invited the local constable for a glass of wine. Wait, I forgot that cat again. The cat disappeared. The squire looked for the cat but it had gone. Right. The constable comes and gets his wine and the squire pours himself some, too, and tells jokes. After every joke he laughs, loudly,
haha, hoho,
and knocks on the wall with the poker. Harder and harder." De Gier hit the brick wall with his fiat hand. "like this. The squire kept on laughing,
haha, hoho."
De Gier shouted. A reaction on the roof became audible. There were screeches and cackles, a rustling and a flapping.