yard, even when you only needed a little bit, but now it's all supplied in those handy kits. Just the right fit too. All I have to do now is find a set of copper ornaments and sew them on and then I'll hang it over there, next to the door. Just the right place for it. Maybe I'll get a brass bell as well and then I'll pull it and the servant will come. Hahaha.'
'Beautifully done, Elizabeth,' the commissaris said. 'No, don't put it away, I want to see it properly. My wife is doing something like that as well. On linen I think she said it was, pure linen.'
'Can't work on linen anymore,' Elizabeth said sadly, 'not even with a magnifying glass. If the design isn't printed on the cloth I can't follow it; on linen you have to count the stitches, from a chart. I used to like doing that but now I get a headache when I try. We are getting old. It was very thoughtful of you giving me the bellpull kit, commissaris. Good of you not to forget an old woman living by herself.'
'I like coming to see you,' the commissaris said, 'and I would come more often if I wasn't so busy and if my legs didn't make me ill all the time, but this visit tonight isn't a social call. That's why the sergeant came with me. He is a detective and we are working tonight. There's been a manslaughter on the Straight Tree Ditch this afternoon.'
'Manslaughter? Nothing to do with the riots, I suppose?' 'No. A man's face got bashed in. Abe Rogge, a hawker. The house is close, perhaps you know the man.'
'That handsome man with the blond beard? Big fellow? With a golden necklace?'
'Yes.'
'I know him.' Elizabeth pursed her lips. 'He has spoken to me. Often. He has even visited me here. He's got a stall on the Albert Cuyp street market in town, hasn't he?'
'Had.'
'Yes, yes. Got killed, did he? What a shame. We haven't had any crime here for as long as I can re* member. Not since those two idiot sailors clobbered each other years and years ago and I don't think they were ever charged. I pulled them apart and one of them slipped and fell into the canal.'
She rubbed her hands gleefully. 'Maybe I shoved him a little, did I? Hehehehe.'
'Ah well, there has to be a first time for everything. Manslaughter, you said? Or murder? I saw some murders when I was on the force, but not too many of them, thank the Lord. Amsterdam isn't a murderous city although it's getting worse now. It's those newfangled drugs, don't you think?'
'You were on the force?' de Gier asked in a sudden high voice. The commissaris kicked him viciously under the table and de Gier began to rub his shin.
'Constable, first class,' Elizabeth said proudly, 'but that was some years ago, before I retired. My health was a bit weak, you see. But I liked the job, better than being lady of the toilets. Five years on the force and thirty years in the toilets. I think I can remember most of my police days but there wasn't much happening when I was scrubbing floors and polishing taps and carrying towels and cakes of soap. And all these men pissing, piss piss piss all day. I thought in the end that that was all men ever do, hehehehehe.'
The commissaris laughed and slapped his thighs and kicked de Gier under the table again. De Gier laughed too.
'I see,' he said when he had finished laughing.
'But tell me about Abe Rogge's death, commissaris,' Elizabeth said.
The commissaris talked for a long time and Elizabeth nodded and stirred her coffee and poured more coffee and handed out biscuits.
'Yes,' she said in the end. 'I see. And you want me to find out what I can find out. I see. I'll let you know. I can listen in the shops and I know a lot of people here. It's about time I paid some visits.'
The commissaris gave her his card. 'You can phone me in the evenings too. My home number is on the card.'
'No,' Elizabeth said. 'I don't like telephoning gentlemen at their homes. The wives don't like it when a spinister like me suddenly wants to talk to hubby.'
The commissaris smiled. 'No, perhaps you are right. We'll have to be on our way, Elizabeth, thanks for the coffee, and you did a beautiful job on the bell-pull.'
'Commissaris,' de Gier said when they were on the quay again.
'Yes?'
De Gier cleared his throat. 'Was that really a friend of yours, commissaris?'
'Sure. I kicked you just in time, didn't I? I thought I had warned you before we went in. That, as you put it, once was Constable First Class Herbert Kalff. Served under me for a while, used to patrol this part of the city, but he had a problem as you will understand. He thought he was a woman and the idea got stronger and stronger. We put him on sick leave for a year and he was more or less all right when he came back but it started again. Claimed he was a girl and wanted to be called Elizabeth. He was on sick leave again and when there was no change we could only retire him. By that time she was a woman. There wasn't much medical science could do for her then. I imagine they operate on cases like that now. The poor soul has to live in a male body. She got a job as a lavatory lady in a factory but they made fun of her and she didn't last. She thinks that she was there for a long time but it isn't the truth. Her self-respect makes her say that. The truth is that she was declared unemployable and has lived on State money ever since. I've kept in touch and the social workers call on her but there was no need really; she has had a stable personality ever since she chose to be a woman, and she is incredibly healthly. She's over seventy, you know, and her mind is clear.'
'Shouldn't she be in a home for the elderly?'
'No, the jokers would make fun of her. Old people are like children sometimes. We'll leave her here as long as possible.'
'And you visit her regularly?' De Gier's voice was still unnaturally high.
'Of course. I like her. I like walking about this part of town and she makes a good cup of coffee.'
'But he, she's mad!'
'Nonsense,' the commissaris said gruffly. 'Don't bandy that word about, de Gier.'
They walked a while in silence.
'How's your rheuma, sir? You have been in bed for a while, they tell me.'
'Incurable,' the commissaris said pleasantly. 'Drugs help a bit but not much. I don't like the medicines anyway. Horrible little pills, chemicals, that's all they are. Lying in a hot bath helps but who wants to be in a hot bath all day, like a frog in the tropics?'
'Yes,' de Gier said, trying to think of a more helpful remark.
'And she isn't mad,' the commissaris said.
'I can't understand it,' de Gier said slowly. 'The person is unnatural, absolutely, and you go to see her. Aren't you frightened or disgusted?'
'No. She is different, but that's all really. Some invalids look gruesome when you meet them for the first time but you get used to their deformity, especially when they are lovely people, just as Elizabeth is lovely. She is a kind and intelligent person so why would you be frightened of her? You are frightened of your own dreams, it seems to me. You do dream, don't you?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Any nightmares?'
'Yes.'
'What happens when you have a nightmare?''
'If it goes wrong I wake up in a sweat and I scream but usually it doesn't come to that. I can control the dreams somehow, get out of the most gruesome parts anyway. I find a weapon in my hand and I kill whoever is chasing me, or there's a car in the right spot and I jump into it and they can't catch up with me.'
'Very good,' the commissaris said, and laughed.
'But you don't always get away, and then you suffer.'
'Yes,' de Gier said reluctantly.
'But why? The dream is part of you, isn't it? It's your own mind. Why should your own mind frighten you?'
De Gier stopped. They had reached the narrow footbridge again and de Gier was ahead of the commissaris, so the commissaris had to stop as well.
'But I can't avoid my dreams, can I, sir? I can avoid mat… well, apparition in the houseboat. It scares
