Read The Maine Massacre Online

Authors: Janwillem Van De Wetering

The Maine Massacre (7 page)

"Exactly.
Well seen, sergeant. That's exactly how I feel and no doubt how I look. We are always the projection of what we think. Dopey. Here I am, with the puzzle of a lifetime staring me in the face. How many corpses? I made notes last night. If I read them I'll remember again. Five, I believe. This is America. Do you know that we get one real corpse every two months in Amsterdam? The others are accidents, suicides. These corpses are part of some web, a spider's web, with threads going everywhere, probably right into this store. But they are transparent and thin, although not quite invisible, I am sure. We'll find them if we apply the usual tested methods and persevere. And then there is this incredibly beautiful setting. I am not just referring to the landscape, sergeant. There's far more to it. You should have seen the car that picked me up yesterday, an elegant car. Who says there is no elegance in America? We've been misinformed. I have been anyway. Perhaps you know more, you read a great deal. What am I telling you anyway?
You
were flown in on a special jet. Did you see the two men who passed us in the street just now? They had guns on their belts, big revolvers. It's lawful here to carry arms. Even the police don't show their arms anymore in Amsterdam. Our pistols are hidden under tunics and coats. If you touch your gun, sergeant, you are expected to write a report and I have to countersign it."

"Yes, sir."

"All very well, of course. Our society functions in a way. But I have been thinking about other societies, and their possibilities, and here we seem to have die superb example of everything we haven't got. A bay. Hills. Mountains even. Gun-toters. Corpses. Lawmen in outdated uniforms. And you, of all people to pop up here, in that
hat."

"Yes, sir."

"And I have to sell a house. There's nothing I can do here, sergeant, and there's nothing I will do either. I'll sell the house and go back and see what Grijpstra has been doing. A corpse in the canal, no doubt, some young man who uses drugs and had an argument with a friend and they poked at each other with knives. No identification, so we'll search about for a week and get a dozen well-trained detectives on the job and turn up all sorts of other misdemeanors that will interest other specialists. And meanwhile this has been going on here. Five corpses. Or six? I forget."

"One of them is your brother-in-law, sir."

The commissaris stopped waving his arms. "Yes, sergeant, thank you. I hardly knew the man, of course, and I suspect that my sister is quite pleased about the whole thing, since she can go back to Holland now. If I can sell the house. I'll pay that young lady and we can go and have coffee and see the real estate agent. You'll have to carry your coat. Didn't you bring any warm clothes at all?"

"No, sir. I don't have any. Just a short coat. I never had a hat."

"Neither did I. I always hated winter sports, but this is different."

The commissaris paid and the girl took de Gier's coat. "I'll drop it off at the jailhouse on my way home."

"You know I stay here, miss?"

She smiled. "Aren't you staying with the sheriff?"

"Yes."

"Are you Canadian? I thought I heard you speak Canadian just now, when you were between the racks."

"No, miss, we spoke Dutch. We are from the Netherlands, in Europe."

"I don't know languages. We only hear Canadian here."

"Don't Canadians speak English?"

"Some do I believe, but not here they don't."

"French Canadian," the commissaris said when they had arrived at Beth's Diner and were eating cream pie near a large square cookstove in the middle of the small restaurant.

"That's right, sir. I helped arrest a French Canadian yesterday, on the way from the airstrip. Speeding, drunken driving, and theft of the car. The suspect harassed the sheriff, but he was only charged with speeding. The other charges somehow disappeared. The sheriff said that the suspect wouldn't be able to pay the fines and released him on bail."

"Don't they jail suspects for car theft?"

"May have been joy-riding, sir. The car belonged to a friend."

The commissaris didn't seem eager to leave the warm room and he ordered more pie and coffee.

"That sheriff, sergeant. Tell me about him. Did you get close to him at all? He showed you that file. That would be an act of trust. Did you make any contact?"

"He made the contact, sir. He wanted to know what I was doing here and he used liquor to make me open up. I didn't mind—the liquor was whiskey, a very good brand, and I have nothing to hide. I don't think I convinced him; I am sure that he still thinks that I came in on the Orca angle. He must be supposing that your sister told you that she thought her husband was murdered and that you rushed out here to see for yourself and that you got the proper authorities to back you up. I came as a bodyguard and to be of help perhaps, a liaison between you and him. He asked me questions and I answered them truthfully. He knows that I work for the Amsterdam murder brigade and that you are a division chief, specialize in homicide, and are my direct boss. So..."

"So he talked too. Well, tell me what he told you, any detail, anything. My interest is theoretical, of course. Did the two of you get drunk?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well," the commissaris said an hour later. "Maybe there is something
you
can do, but I don't see where I fit in. I don't have a general who makes telephone calls on my behalf. Was the name Astrinsky mentioned at all?"

"Not last night, sir, but I saw a plane land, a very small plane, earlier on today, on an island just off Cape Orca. The jailhouse is on a hill and has a good view of the bay. I asked about the plane and the sheriff said that it belongs to Michael Astrinsky, the real estate agent here, and is often flown by his daughter, Madelin. She is friendly with a man who lives on that island. The man is old, used to be a New York businessman, and has been living here twenty years. Madelin sometimes flies in supplies. The man on the island is called Jeremy, and the island is called Jeremy's Island. He lives like a hermit, but he has some contact with the town."

"I saw that island, sergeant, from my bedroom window. Very beautiful, especially at night. I saw no lights, but there is a jetty. A hermit, you say. I've always wanted to meet a hermit. I could go and see him. Try to see him. Maybe he doesn't want visitors."

The commissaris asked for the bill and Beth brought more coffee. The two hunters who had flown in with the commissaris came in, sat down at the same table, and talked. Beth sat down and talked too. The commissaris said something pleasant about the large woodstove and Beth, a big-breasted woman in a tight sweater, took him by the hand and showed him the stove, explaining its various functions. The stove didn't just give warmth and cook food, it also baked bread, dried socks, and had what Beth called a waiting area for simmering soups and boiling water. The hunters joined the audience and everybody learned about what to use for firewood and what not, unless there was nothing else. Pine crackles, Beth said, and spruce pops, and alder bums too fast and gives so much heat that the stove may come apart. Birch, that's what should be used, and maple. Oak? the hunters asked. Yes, oak, but oak is expensive. Beech is even more expensive. There was more coffee again, and finally the commissaris was allowed to pay.

"Why don't we stay here?" the commissaris asked when they were back on Main Street. "That came to half of what any Amsterdam restaurant would have charged and some sloppy waiter would have popped the bill under my nose before I had finished the pie. Good pie too. She must have baked it herself in that museum piece."

"But they seem a little slow here. We spent hours in there."

"What's time, sergeant? There must be a lot of time here; back home there isn't anymore. The telephone rings it away and people like you grab it. With questions and bits of paper. Grijpstra takes my time too. With his scheming and conniving."

"He meant well, sir."

"Yes. Here we are, sergeant. I haven't got my glasses on. What do those cards say? Here, they are stuck in the door."

De Gier read the signs. The first said, "Out, back in ten minutes," and the second said, "Closed for the winter."

The commissaris tried the door and found it unlocked. A girl opened the second door for them. "Come in, gentlemen. It's very cold out there. I've finally managed to get this office warm. Please sit down. What can I do for you?"

De Gier gaped at the girl while the commissaris stated his business. He knew the girl, he knew her very well, he knew she wouldn't be in his day-to-day memory, but he had gone deeper down already. His dreams, but further back. Madelin's face seemed to be all eyes, large dark eyes. He had seen the eyes before. And the small slender body too, in tight corduroy jeans and a soft sweater, so supple that he was sure it would wilt if he breathed out with force. He guessed her age, twenty-five perhaps. He admired the smooth skin, stretched over small cheekbones and a dainty but firm jaw, and her pointed chin, a perfect base for the triangular face. He looked back at her eyes and recognized the girl: the princess caught and kept by the dragon. He had lost the book but the page came back in full detail. The girl was in a cave, chained to a rock, and the dragon was breathing foul fumes at her. She was staring bravely into the dragon's face. When he had the book he couldn't read—he must have been four or five years old. His mother and his older sister had read the story to him so many times that he knew the words by heart, but he still carried the book around and made them read the tale. The dragon was slain by a knight with long black hair. He had hated the knight almost as much as he had hated the dragon, and he finally destroyed both by rubbing the page with a wet finger, patiently, until the images faded away. But he hadn't rubbed out Madelin.

She was dressed differently then, in a semitransparent dress. She had excited him then. She still excited him now.

She wasn't in a cave now. He looked about. The office could have been anywhere. The best and most expensive metal and imitation wood desks. A thick wall-to-wall carpet. Brand-new office machinery. Walls paneled in veneer. One wall carried a map of Woodcock County, an antique map, cracked in places, with a wealth of detail and handwritten place names. He got up and found Cape Orca and the bay and studied the fish that had been drawn into the bay's waves. A large fish, black on top, white below. Smooth, sleek, with a wicked mouth full of grinning teeth, on its leisurely way to take another tasty morsel off the rapidly approaching shore.

"The Opdijk house," Madelin said thoughtfully. "And you are Pete Opdijk's brother-in-law. What a terrible accident that was. We were all very upset. Dad went to the funeral. I didn't know Pete so well and I didn't want to see his wife cry. I am sure my father is interested in the Opdijk house. I'll telephone. We live in a house just behind this office. Just a minute, please."

She replaced the telephone. "He's on his way. So Suzanne wants to go back to Amsterdam, does she? I've heard about Amsterdam, a magical city, I believe. Are you and your friend from Amsterdam, sir?"

"We are, miss."

"You're in business out there?"

"No, Miss Astrinsky. I am a police officer and so is Sergeant deGier."

Madelin's voice stayed on the same polite level. "Police officers? How exciting! What branch of the police, sir?"

"Homicide, Miss Astrinsky."

Madelin smiled at the sergeant, and de Gier was preparing to return the smile when the back door of the room opened.

A blusterer, de Gier thought when it was his turn to shake the heavy man's hand. The realtor had a loud, deep voice that hooted sonorously, as if he had swallowed a Swiss Alpine trumpet. Michael Astrinsky said the right things. Very sorry that the accident happened. Opdijk had been a good friend. Good old Pete. A fellow Blue Crustacean. Friendship based on many years of mutual understanding. Would sure miss him. Poor Suzanne. Glad to meet her brother. Suzanne often talked about her brother. Here he was, all the way from across the ocean. House to be sold. A pity that Suzanne would leave too, but understandable under the circumstances. Yes.

"Did you know that Suzanne's brother is a police officer, dad?"

Astrinsky lit a cigarette. He dropped it. "No, are you really?"

"Yes, Mr. Astrinsky. From Amsterdam."

Madelin looked at de Gier. "Homicide, dad. Mr. de..."

"Gier," de Gier said.

"The sergeant is also a police officer, dad."

Astrinsky had lit the cigarette at the wrong end. Madelin took it out of his mouth and killed it in the ashtray on the desk.

"The sergeant is studying with the local police, Mr. Astrinsky, and I came out to help Suzanne. The house is to be sold as soon as possible. Suzanne asked me to come and see you," the commissaris said.

Astrinsky lit another cigarette and looked sad. "A quick sale, yes, that could be arranged. I might be interested myself, but, unfortunately, values aren't what they used to be some years ago. This is a cold comer of the country, with a very short summer season. We used to have a lot of people summering up here, but the fashion has changed. They seem to prefer the warmer states in the South; Florida, California. The sun states offer holidays all year round and here, well, you can see for yourself. The climate is so fierce that it seems to be out to kill us all some times. Just too damn cold."

"I see."

"I could list the house, of course, and try to sell it in the summer."

"No, Suzanne wants to buy an apartment in Amsterdam, and she needs a lot of cash now."

Astrinsky walked around his desk, his hands in the pockets of an immaculate tweed jacket. A well-dressed man, but flabby.

"I could take the house off her hands for cash, but I couldn't pay more than, say, thirty thousand."

"Thirty thousand," the commissaris said.

"In summer I might get a little more perhaps, but it wouldn't be cash. The trouble with the Cape Orca properties is that they don't seem to move at all. There are a number of empty houses on the cape. There's some problem with the right of way. The rest of the cape belongs to Janet Wash, and, technically, she owns the roads. They're maintained by the town, but Janet gets the bill. She has never been difficult about allowing other residents to use the roads, but newcomers don't like to feel restricted."

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