The Streetbird (4 page)

He took the handkerchief that Karate was offering and dabbed at the spittle that was bubbling in the corners of his mouth. He leaned forward again and extended his hands. His index fingers became pistol barrels. Soundless bullets streaked past Grijpstra's ears. "Do you realize the power we have been given? Our power added to yours? Our station joined by the Murder Brigade? Without any restrictions from above?"

"Attaboy," said Adjutant Adèle.

"We will bust them all and kick them down the stairs," shouted Karate.

"We'll pound them into the floor of our worst cell," shouted Ketchup, "and never feed their remains."

"That's about how I would like to see it," said Jurriaans, wiping the sweat off his forehead. "With due regard for proportions and decency. We must try to remember that we have no skulls and bones on our caps and that even Gustav and Lennie belong to the shadow created by our own light. They have to be cut to slivers, of course, by the sword of justice, but with just a wee touch of love and kindness, as is our wont."

De Gier got up. "I'm going home, my cat has to be fed. I'll be back."

"In uniform," Grijpstra said, "and wait for me. I have to go home too."

"Please, adjutant."

"You object to my company?"

"If you insist on my uniform."

"I don't insist on anything," Grijpstra said, pushing himself out of his chair. "The commissaris insisted. Uniform, he said; uniform, it will be."

"Take your time," Jurriaans said. "This is a reasonable station and it doesn't only accept the needs of its staff, it understands them too. Feed your cat, put on your uniform, and come back at once. There is work to do."

"Got to pack a bag," Grijpstra said. "We are expected to work from the quarter itself. We even have to live here."

"One apartment," said Jurriaans, "for our appreciated colleagues."

Adjutant Adèle had left the table but turned. "It's available. A suspect, now in one of our cells, a burglar by the name of Kavel, resides on the Seadike but he won't be able to go home for a while. The owner of the property has asked if we'll keep an eye on the apartment because even burglars' homes are burglarized these days. I'll fetch the keys."

"Ha," Cardozo said. "The three of us together, that'll be nice."

"That'll be terrible," de Gier said, forcing the Volkswagen through thick traffic. "That'll be sickening. Why do we allow ourselves to be part of idiotic situations?"

"Why shouldn't it be nice?" Grijpstra asked. "We'll do the best we can and keep at it until it's behind us so that we can get into the next situation, which'11 undoubtedly be better."

De Gier drummed impatiently n the steering wheel. "And you won't even be allowed to smoke cigars during meetings."

"Adjutant Adèle," Grijpstra murmured. "A handsome woman. I like working with handsome women."

"And the number of suspects has been reduced to two. We can't even reason for ourselves."

"We'll catch the two first and the others later."

De Gier stamped on the gas pedal. "That Obrian must have been a most exceptional specimen. Imagine that prostitute on the bridge. I wouldn't have minded seeing that, although it's despicable. Revolting." He braked and swerved around a bus. "Amazing."

"Whoa," Grijpstra said. "Park over there and let me go. I'll go home from here, and you don't have to fetch me either. I'll walk back to the station, once I have my bag."

"But do you understand what happened there?"

"I understand it in detail," Grijpstra said, "but I have learned to live with evil, which doesn't mean that I'm without a taste for battle. Now, will you park or won't you?"

Tabriz studied the contents of her dish and swept the floor with her short striped tail. She folded her chubby front legs and grunted while she ate.

"Remember your manners."

Tabriz looked up. "Maybe you're somewhat fat and ugly," the sergeant said, "but that's no reason to behave like a piglet."

Tabriz slobbered on. The sergeant waited until the cat was done, picked her up, and carried her to his balcony. He sat down on a wicker chair and put his feet on the railing. The cat burped on his lap. De Gier opened his eyes. "Burp the other way."

The cat purred and put a paw on each side of his neck. De Gier slept and dreamed that nothing mattered while he engaged himself in racing a Mercedes sports car through empty Amsterdam alleys, caressed Adjutant Adèle's milk-white limbs, and turned into a condor, flying above the English Channel. He woke up because Tabriz hooked a claw into his lower lip.

"Easy, now." He pushed the claw out of his mouth. Tabriz jumped off his lap and began to butt her dish.

De Gier got into his uniform and stood at attention in front of the mirror. Tabriz left her dish and stood next to him.

"What's on display here," de Gier said, "is a madman, in the queen's coat, about to be released to wreak havoc amongst the perverted." He tightened his belt and rested his hand on the butt of his pistol. "A lunatic, armed to the teeth, who will slay the insane." He put on his cap and saluted. "A nut who sees roller-skating gentlemen in the small hours of the night, and a vulture on a TV antenna."

Tabriz pushed herself against his leg. "Keep your multicolored hairs to yourself," de Gier said. "Sit on the balcony and catch insects until I come back." He pushed the cat with a polished boot. "To report on how I worsened a situation that was already hopeless to begin with."

\\\\ 4 ////

"As ready as we'll ever be," Grijpstra said, "thank you." He stirred the pale fluid. "Is that real milk?"

"Powder, adjutant. Just as good. Tastes the same."

"Plastic milk," Grijpstra said. "Why do I bother walking around in a real body? Can't I have one molded, and swallow a tape recorder?"

Cardozo sat on the windowsill next to a bowl filled with paper flowers. Grijpstra pointed. "Throw those out."

"But I dusted them."

"Away with the rags."

Cardozo carried the torn bouquet out and came back with a sponge. He knelt and wiped tea drops off the cracked linoleum floor. "Please, adjutant. It took us eight hours to get this place clean."

Grijpstra nodded. "Criminals are dirty buggers. We've got six bags of debris in the corridor; if that chap ever gets back here, he won't recognize his hole. What was it again that we have him for?"

Cardozo arranged a set of polystyrene elephants on a shelf, ranging from the size of a large rabbit to the measurements of a small mouse. "Burglary."

"Simple or complicated?"

"Complicated. He crapped on the carpet too. Same suburb where de Gier lives. Hardly a professional, this Kavel. They've got new cars out there and he arrived in a junker. But he had telephoned first, to make sure that his mark wasn't home. Lugged all his tools into the elevator and was seen by a neighbor who was good enough to phone us. Kavel forced the door, filled his bag with plated silverware and the owner's worthless collection of Nigerian stamps and didn't forget the child's piggy bank. A curtain moved in the draft, and he took fright and crapped on the rug, just as the cops came in. A habitual offender, he'll get a few years this time."

"Crapped, eh?"

"That's what they do, adjutant. Part of the pattern. Always in the best room and always on the Persian rug."

"Disgusting." Grijpstra bit into his cigar and spat. Cardozo glared. The adjutant groaned, bent down, and picked up the shreds of tobacco. "Now what?"

Cardozo held out a paper. "Put it here, adjutant. Don't do it again." The bell rang and Cardozo pulled a rope. He greeted de Gier, who ran up the stairs.

"In time for tea but much too late to help out," Grijpstra said. "Why aren't you in uniform?"

Cardozo stood in the open door. "Sugar, sergeant? Milk, sergeant?"

"Please," de Gier said. "I'm not in uniform because I left it in Adjutant Adèle's cupboard. A uniform draws unwanted attention. You can't even cross the street against the light without being admonished."

"By the authorities?"

"By a black toddler." The sergeant looked about. "Was the previous occupant convicted on a charge of bad taste?"

Grijpstra spilled more tea. Cardozo set to work again. Grijpstra pushed the sponge away. "You're staining my trousers. The sergeant has been goofing off while we worked, and now the sergeant is tired. Why don't you take the sergeant to his nice clean room?"

De Gier joined Grijpstra on the creaking couch. "The sergeant was doing his job. He now knows something."

"Share it," Grijpstra said. "I will draw the correct conclusion and go out to make a proper arrest, so that we can get out of here. I have a pleasant place of my own now and want to make a painting, of an exotic bird. What does the sergeant know?"

"That the killer was wearing size thirteen shoes."

"No," Grijpstra said. "I don't want to fight giants."

"Rubber soles?" Cardozo asked.

"New?" Grijpstra asked.

De Gier nodded.

"Galoshes," Cardozo said. "Now in one of the city's garbage boats, under ten tons of goopy glop."

"What else does the sergeant know?" Grijpstra asked.

De Gier looked at his watch. "That lunch time has come and gone. Are we eating?"

"We'll go to a Chinese."

"Lennie," de Gier said, "one of the two other superpimps, has had a trying time since Obrian got busy here. I have admired Lennie's photograph and read his file. He's an ordinary-looking man, which probably helped him toward his success. Forty-three years old and a native of the city, like his father, and his father was no good either. Another pimp, making out on a few whores placed here and there. The father had little brains but he sent his son to school and Lennie was studying mathematics when his father was arrested on a charge of buying stolen property and had a heart attack in jail."

"Mathematics? University? And he still became a pimp?"

"Why not, Cardozo? Numbers go both ways. Some numbers are lucky. Lennie inherited seven whores. He relocated them to the most popular alley and extended his operation from there, moving his headquarters to a floating brothel for the select on the Catburgh Canal."

"Outside the quarter," Cardozo said. "A quiet area."

"The select don't want to be seen, but they know the way."

"Dope?" Grijpstra asked.

"A lot of dope, more and more, especially since Obrian pushed him out of the alleys."

"And where was Lennie supposed to be last night?"

"On his boat. The bouncer, the ladies in residence, and the barman will confirm his alibi. This morning, at twenty past three, when machine-gun fire hit Obrian in the Olofs-alley, Lennie had just stepped into bed. His Mazda sports car was on the quay—this much is true, because a local cop saw the car there at the fatal time. But Lennie could have used another car, or walked. Catburgh Canal is close by."

"And was he pleased that Obrian is now under refrigeration?"

"Delighted," said De Gier.

"Did he say so? Not to you, I hope."

"He told one of the detectives of the station."

De Gier placed his mug on the floor. Drops of tea danced across its edge. Cardozo jumped up.

"Stay here," Grijpstra said. "You worked from this station for years, as a uniformed constable. How can it be that a floating brothel is tolerated outside the quarter?"

"Just a minute, adjutant. I take pride in my work." Cardozo brought the sponge and rubbed the floor clean. "How can it be? Indolence, adjutant."

"No more than that?"

"Well," Cardozo said, "Lennie wholesales heroin. Heroin is costly material. It comes in small parcels. Money comes in small parcels too. The parcels are easily opened and the top bills may float away." He checked the floor, holding his sponge ready. "Or so I have been told."

"And Jurriaans?"

"An incorruptible official." Cardozo looked into Grijpstra's eyes. "King of the quarter. Jurriaans has long arms but I don't know whether they reach as far as Catburgh."

"The local station employs a few hundred able men," de Gier said. "How about a little raid across the border once in a while?"

"Yes."

"So?"

"When they get to the boat, the lights are out and there's nobody home. The station here has a large number of telephones. I imagine most of the colleagues know Lennie's unlisted number."

"That was Lennie," Grijpstra said. "What about Gustav?"

"Lunch first," said de Gier.

Grijpstra pointed with his other arm. "Is that sign in Chinese or isn't it?"

"That's a gambling joint, adjutant. The characters are different. We can eat across the street. See?"

Grijpstra turned his hand. "Same scribbles."

"No, adjutant. See the ones on the sign across the street? Meaning 'Eating House'?"

"Scribbles."

"Look at the scribble at the left. See the little running legs sticking out of it? It means 'eat.' And the one on this side, see, with the uncombed beard hanging underneath, says 'gamble.'"

Grijpstra narrowed his eyes. His hand weighed heavily on Cardozo's shoulder. "Since when can you read Chinese?"

"I worked here, adjutant. I had to learn what is what. I got to know the signs to know what goes on inside."

"The boy is intelligent," de Gier said. "He can't help it. Can we go to the eating house now, or do you prefer to play Mah-Jongg?"

Grijpstra crossed the street. He still held on to Cardozo. "Constable first-class?"

Cardozo's chin rested on Grijpstra's hand. "Yes?"

"If gambling is illegal, how come the slit-eyes have the sign on their door?"

Cardozo squeaked. "But this is the
quarter.
Anything goes here."

"Too far," Grijpstra growled. "You too."

A middle-aged black man squatted on the sidewalk, leaning against the restaurant's gable. He wore a heavy sweater in spite of the heat and was rolling up his tattered sleeve. The man wasn't interested in the portly gentleman in the pinstriped suit who was observing him. He was intent on the point of his hollow needle, sucking milky fluid out of a bent teaspoon. When the needle was full it emptied itself again, into the man's arm, after having found a spot of skin between running sores. The needle yanked free and the man looked up, grinning inanely, then sighed and closed his eyes. Grijpstra closed his eyes too. De Gier pushed the adjutant's shoulder. "Come eat. Mandarin cooking. Very special."

Grijpstra studied the gleaming dark red naked carcasses dangling from a sagging string behind the restaurant's dirty window.

"Birds," Cardozo said. "Exotic birds."

"Yecch."

"Duck is good," de Gier said. "Ugly duck is good too. Come along, dear."

The waiter brought the menu.

"Don't take forever," de Gier said. "I'm hungry."

Grijpstra was still staring through his half-glasses. "I wanted fried rice, with a fried egg on top, can't find it on the list."

"You can eat that everywhere."

"So I can eat it here too."

The waiter covered the table with dishes. They weren't Grijpstra's. Grijpstra got a small bowl heaped with dark brown rice topped with a fried egg the size of an overcoat button.

"Small egg," the adjutant said.

"Duck's egg," said the waiter.

"Bald duckling's egg," said Cardozo. "Will you tell us about Gustav, sergeant? Is he still driving a Corvette? He did in my days, always the latest model."

Grijpstra jabbed at the egg with a chopstick.

"Hold them like these, adjutant," Cardozo said. "One fixed and the other like a pencil. Like this. You can do it."

Grijpstra pressed the bowl against his mouth and inhaled the egg. "What's a Corvette?"

"American," de Gier explained. "Flat. Like an iron without the handle, hollow inside. Goes fast, costs money."

"How much?"

"What you and I make a year."

"But he has other cars too," Cardozo said. "Gustav likes cars. He likes women too, he's got lots of them, in my time anyway. Look, adjutant, it's really quite easy. Hold your chopsticks like this and you can pick up anything. See that bit of meat next to de Gier's bowl? I'll pick it up."

Cardozo inserted the meat between his teeth and chewed.

"There's a bone in it," de Gier said. "I've been chewing it for a while too. Okay, Gustav. Still drives a Corvette. No alibi for last night. He doesn't like women, he only likes the money they give him. He sleeps alone, in his seventeenth-century city-funded restored gable house on the Old Mint Canal."

"Bust him," Cardozo said with his mouth full of noodles.

"Beg pardon?" Grijpstra asked.

Cardozo swallowed. "Handcuffs. Drag him to the station. He's got the motivation and the opportunity, so we've got serious suspicions. I say Gustav is our man. He likes to hunt big game, in Africa with a cannon, so why shouldn't he hunt competitors here with a machine pistol? Sergeant Jurriaans is right, we're the Murder Brigade and this is the quarter. Anything goes. The local cops scare easy, but we're from outside. Bust him, I say, and—"

"Right," de Gier whispered fiercely. "Disengage the buzzer in his cell. Nail a board over the window in his door. Forget to feed him. Fill his jug with sea water. Beat the bastard."

"No, no," Grijpstra said.

Cardozo stopped slurping his stew. "Why not, adjutant?"

"Because that isn't the way."

"And what if we do it a little bit?"

"I've got to sleep at night."

"Heaven is waiting for us," de Gier said. "Gustav and Lennie. How many enemies did Obrian have? Just those two? What about the prostitute on the cast-iron bridge with the lions' heads? She may have a friend, a relative, a son even. Revenge, you know. All we think of is greed and jealously. A black soul brother Obrian had kicked into the gutter? Some heroin merchant who Obrian never paid? Or plain indignation? Some good guy fired the gun?"

Grijpstra paused in his effort to shovel the rice with the fat ends of his chopsticks. "We haven't even begun to think. We don't know the corpse either. He had a house. The house will still have his smell. I want to go and sniff. Now, maybe? After Cardozo has paid the bill?"

"Later," de Gier said. "I went to bed late and got up early. A nap."

Cardozo paid. "We have to go to Hotel Hadde too, tonight maybe. It's open all night and the bar is a hangout for pimps. Maybe we'll hear something."

"A nap."

"And the morgue," Grijpstra said. "They'll have looked into Obrian's pockets by now. Thank you, Cardozo. I didn't like the food. And because you took me here, you can spend a few hours on your own now. Look around. Do more than we can expect of you."

"And you?"

"I will go for a walk," Grijpstra said. "I tried earlier on but I felt disturbed then. I feel better now. When I come back, I'll wake up the sergeant."

"That way we all do something," de Gier said.

De Gier got through the door first, tripping over the threshold. He bumped into a little old man who shuffled along on the narrow sidewalk, leaning on his cane. The old man managed to stay on his feet.

De Gier apologized.

The little old man, his small head tucked away under the wide brim of his felt hat, walked on slowly. Grijpstra stood next to de Gier. "Can't he get a better coat? Social security is getting fatter every year. I thought moldy rags were out by now."