The Mystery of the Third Lucretia (17 page)

After that, to cheer ourselves up we went to the Hard Rock Café Amsterdam and we each had a hot-fudge sundae. We'd gotten most of the way through the ice cream and chocolate sauce when Lucas said, “You know how your mom said she'd call the guy from the Art Institute?”

“Mm-hmm,” I said, scooping up the last bite.

“How much do you want to bet this whole thing with him just drags on and on?”

“What do you mean?” I was looking in my bowl, wondering how the sundae could be gone already. Even though I was stuffed, it tasted so good I could have eaten another one right then and there.

Lucas was still working on hers. “Well,” she said, gesturing toward me with her spoon. “First of all, it's summer, and he might be out of town. If he's there, he's probably busy.” She stopped to take a bite. “Then, do you think he's going to be able to take her phone call or call her back right away? I doubt it. Who knows when she's going to be able to talk to him? It's going to take forever.” She looked down and started scraping the side of her dish.

“You're probably right. Nothing is ever as easy as you think it should be, especially when it comes to adults.” We were quiet for a minute. “Are you thinking what I'm thinking?”

“That we should do some detecting of our own?”

“Exactly.”

“What do you have in mind?”

“Well, we promised my mom no going into the Rijksmuseum, and no funny stuff. But we didn't promise her that we wouldn't keep an eye on Marianne.”

“Marianne? Why would—” Lucas began.

“Here's the thing I've been thinking about,” I broke in. “Remember when we were with Mom and looking for Marianne's place, and her house ended up being on the other side of the canal from where we were?”

Lucas nodded.

“Well, remember that little outdoor café that was just about where we were standing when we realized we needed to go over to the other side?”

“Yeeeaaaah?”

“Well, what if we went and sat at that café and took your camera and watched her door, and ended up getting a picture of Gallery Guy—Jacob whatever-his-name-is—going into her house? Or better yet, a picture of them kissing on her doorstep? Remember when Mom said we didn't have any proof they were in a relationship? Well, that would be awesome proof. And it would help in our case when the police finally get involved. Which they will eventually, once somebody figures out the Third Lucretia is a forgery.”

Lucas gave me a sideways glance and her face broke into a little smile. “Not a bad idea, Kari Sundgren. Not bad at all.”

“It's five after four now. How about we go over to that coffee shop and just hang for a while. Marianne's house is so close to the museum that if Jacob leaves work at five, he'll be there before five thirty. That's not so long.”

We were on our way, walking down the street, when Lucas said, “The more I think about it, the less likely I think it is that Jacob will turn up. He's been super sneaky in everything. I don't think he'd come to visit his girlfriend at her house.”

“Still, we'll be doing something,” I said. “And that beats sitting around doing nothing.”

But we hadn't been at the café for more than ten minutes when something did happen, only not what we expected.

When we'd gotten there, the coffee shop was just like I remembered, with cool house music piped outside and the smell of coffee spreading all out to the sidewalk. We sat down at a table where we had a good view of Marianne's blue door through the trees planted on both sides of the canal. Lucas was wearing her camera around her neck. She took it off, pulling the strap over her head, then, as casually as possible so people at the other tables wouldn't notice, she flicked it on, fiddled with the zoom lens, and set the camera down on the edge of the table. The digital screen on the back showed a perfect picture of the blue door with the number over it, and just enough of the surrounding building to prove that it was for sure Marianne's place. If Jacob showed up, we were all set.

The waiter—Heri, according to his name badge, which I figured must be pronounced like Harry—was probably in his twenties, had spiky bleached hair, and spoke almost perfect American English. After we gave our orders he disappeared through the café door. A few minutes later he came out with a tray with all the stuff on it.

“Here are your hot chocolates,” he said, and started putting things down on the table: cups, two small pitchers of hot chocolate, and a plate with two little cookies. While he poured each of us some hot chocolate from our pitchers, he said, “And where in America are you young ladies from?”

I answered, “Saint Paul, Minnesota.”

Just then he looked down at the camera with the picture of Marianne's door showing, but he didn't mention it. Instead, he said, “Isn't Saint Paul near the source of the Mississippi River?”

Lucas was asking how he knew so much about America when I happened to glance across the street. And there was the blue door wide open, and the woman whose picture we'd seen in the Rijksmuseum was coming out, a big canvas shopping bag over her arm.

“Holy meep!” I said, and I scooted my chair back on the concrete so fast it practically fell over backward. “Lucas, grab your stuff, we've got to go.”

I slung my backpack over my shoulder while Lucas got the camera strap around her neck. “How much do we owe?” I asked.

Heri, who'd been looking way cool all this time, suddenly looked confused.

“But you haven't drunk—”

“How much?” Lucas piped up, using her firm voice.

“Five euros.”

I reached in my pocket, found a five-euro bill (they don't leave tips in Europe), flung it on the table, and off Lucas and I went, running on our side of the canal to catch up to Marianne, who was far ahead of us now, only on her side.

I looked at Lucas as we ran. “Stupid us. Why didn't we think of this?” We'd prepared for Jacob coming to her door. But like idiots, we hadn't prepared for Marianne going anywhere.

Lucas ignored me. She says it's not a good idea to “beat up on yourself.” Instead she said, “We've got to get to the other side of the canal. Let's do it up there.” Still running, she pointed to where a big cross street went over the water.

Gorgeous Marianne with the great body had incredibly long legs, wouldn't you know it, and she walked fast, so she was still ahead of us when she got to the bridge. But as it turned out, we didn't need to cross over to her side. She took a left on the big street and crossed over the canal to our side—ended up walking practically right toward us, in fact, because by that time we were almost up to the street ourselves.

Before Marianne caught sight of us, Lucas came to a screeching stop. I slowed down beside her.

“Look down at the water and act natural until she goes past,” Lucas muttered. “Pretend you're looking for a fish or something.”

“A fish!” I muttered back. “This water is way too dirty. You'd have to wait years to see a fish.” Just then a dead fish floated into view. “See? Too much canal water,” I said, and the two of us started to laugh.

By this time Marianne had passed us, so we took off after her again.

“Did you notice how low-cut her top was?” I asked Lucas as we rushed down the busy sidewalk. “How hot is that?” I'd gotten a really good straight-on look at Marianne while she was walking toward us on the bridge. She was wearing perfectly fitting black jeans and a pink V-necked T-shirt that showed at least an inch and a half of cleavage.

“I like her haircut,” Lucas said, just as Marianne turned left onto the next street.

I couldn't believe what I'd just heard. I was wondering if suddenly the sky would turn dark and the world would come to an end because Lucas had actually noticed somebody's haircut, when we turned the corner after Marianne.

And there we were, in the middle of Amsterdam's outdoor flower market, one of the most crowded places in the whole city, with flowers everywhere and about as many people as there were flowers. And Marianne had completely disappeared in the crowd.

We stopped at the corner and looked at the street full of shoppers. “Meep meep meep meep meep! We've lost her!” Lucas looked like she was ready to slam a fist into a nearby building.

“Maybe, but I think we should at least keep trying.”

Lucas gave me a look that said she wasn't too happy about it, but she stayed with me. For the next fifteen minutes we snaked and pushed our way through the crowd, moving from flower stand to flower stand. We got shoved and smiled at, and once somebody accidentally stepped on my foot. But we didn't find Marianne.

At last Lucas sighed. “Are you ready to give up yet?”

“Yeah, I guess so. Let's go to the coffee shop again and see if she comes back to her house with flowers or groceries or something.”

I expected Lucas to complain that I'd led her on a wild goose chase, but she didn't, and I was grateful.

When we turned to go, I said, “Heri's going to think we're weird.”

“Who cares what Heri thinks?”

We were both a little depressed and glum as we walked back the way we'd come. Heri was outside when we got back to the café, clearing off some dishes. He turned around when he heard our chairs scraping as we sat down. When he saw us, his eyes got wide in surprise, and just for a second I thought I saw an expression that was definitely notfriendly.

Before he could say anything, Lucas said, “Two hot chocolates, please.”

“Are you going to drink them this time?” he asked sarcastically.

“Nobody likes a wise guy,” Lucas said.

“Is that an American expression?” Heri asked.

Lucas and I both nodded.

“‘Nobody likes a wise guy.' I'm going to have to remember that one,” he said. Then he hoisted the tray of dirty dishes up to shoulder height, and off he went into the café.

This time when he came back and started to put our stuff down, he asked if we'd had to rush off to a fire.

Lucas said, “No, we thought we saw somebody we knew. But she got to the flower market before we did and got lost in the crowd.”

That look I thought I'd seen in his eyes returned. “So you know Marianne Mannefeldt?”

I caught my breath, but Lucas said, “Is that who she was? We thought it was our friend.”

“Hmm,” he said, now pouring our hot chocolates out again. “I thought you had a good chance to see who she was when you stopped by the side of the canal up near the Vijzelstraat. I must have been mistaken. Marianne's a regular customer here.” There was nothing friendly in his voice or his eyes now.

I waited for Lucas, hoping she'd come up with one of her instant lies, but even she couldn't seem to think of a likely story. So we stayed quiet while Heri finished pouring our drinks, put the tray under his arm, and disappeared inside.

Somehow the hot chocolate didn't taste very good after that. While we sat there, I wondered why it hadn't occurred to either one of us that Marianne might leave her house, or that she might sometimes stop in at the coffee shop nearest to where she lived.

Maybe you could call it beating myself up, but I personally felt totally stupid when I thought about everything that had happened.

When Heri came out again we asked for our bill, paid it, and left. The minute we were back out on the street and headed toward the hotel, I said, “I'm sorry. This was all my idea, and it wasn't a very good one. We didn't find out anything about Marianne and Jacob. And the first time we were there he saw your camera was on and pointing at her door, so he knows for sure we were spying on her. What if he tells her about it—maybe even tells both her and Jacob? What if he describes us?”

“So what? They don't know who we are.”

I wanted to ask what would happen if Jacob heard about us, put two and two together, and figured out Lucas was the same girl who'd been trying to see his work in London. But I knew she'd think that was as ridiculous as thinking he'd been driving that Jaguar that had almost hit her.

And another thing: all this time, I'd felt like I was a lot safer than she was because Jacob didn't know what I looked like. But now, with Heri maybe describing me to Jacob, I felt a little less safe. But even if Lucas didn't make fun of me for my theory—and I knew she would—I couldn't exactly ask her to feel sorry for me, since she'd
always
been in danger from Jacob.

So all I said was, “It still feels like a mistake.”

“It's true it didn't work out,” Lucas answered. “But I think your idea of getting a picture of the two of them together wasn't stupid at all. In fact, I think it was pretty brilliant.”

But she was wrong and I was right. As it turned out, my idea of keeping watch on Marianne from a coffee shop on the Herengracht was my second big mistake.

When we got up in the morning, it was raining. Since we'd been really busy for the past few days, Lucas and I decided just to hang.

The hotel had a little TV lounge downstairs with comfortable chairs. Nobody else was around, so we watched some British sitcoms on the BBC, then listened to our iPods.

We also got to know the owners of the hotel, a couple named Tony and Miesje. Tony was tall and handsome for an old guy, and had silver hair. He was always dressed in a blue blazer without a speck of dust on it, and his gray pants always looked like they'd just been ironed. Miesje (whose name was pronounced MEES-yuh) was quiet and blond. Tony spoke perfect English, but Miesje's English was pretty basic.

It was the middle of the afternoon when Lucas said, “Kari?” She had that sound in her voice again, the one that means she's going to try to get me to do something that might end up getting us in trouble, and she wanted me to approve of it.