neatly stacked on a shelf. The bed was made, the floor was clean. I am sure Esther didn't look after the room for him; he must have done it himself. And his clothes were washed; he even had a crease in his trousers.'
'Because of Abe,' Grijpstra said. 'Abe pulled him together. Before he started hanging on to Rogge he was nothing. Dropout from university, sleeping late, drinking, fooling around with beads. He functioned because Abe made him function. I am sure he can do nothing on his own.'
'Can't make a weapon that shoots a spiked ball, you mean.'
'Yes, sir.'
'Yes, yes, yes,' the commissaris said.
'I think the killer may be some connection at the street market, sir, and it seems to me you are thinking the same way, or you wouldn't be pushing de Gier and Cardozo into their masquerade tomorrow. They are going to be hawkers, didn't you say so?'
'Yes,' the commissaris said, and smiled.
'This is the address, sir,' the constable at the wheel said.
Grijpstra hissed admiringly as he looked at the bungalow spread on a low artificial hill, sitting in the middle of at least an acre of freshly mown grass, decorated with bushes and evergreens. The gate was open and the Citroen eased itself into the driveway.
The front door of the bungalow opened as they got out of the car. 'Bezuur,' the man said as he pumped the commissaris' hand. 'I was waiting for you. Please come in.'
8
A pudding for a face, Grufstra thought, turning his head to watch Klaas Bezuur. Nobody had said anything for at least a minute. The commissaris, at the far end of the vast room, which covered almost three quarters of the modern bungalow, had made Grijpstra think of his youngest son's rag doll, a small lost object thrown into a large chair. The commissaris was in pain. Self-propelled white-hot needles were drilling into the bones of his legs. He was breathing deeply and had half-closed his eyes, fighting the temptation to close them completely. He felt very tired, he badly wanted to go to sleep. But he had to keep his mind on the case. Klaas Bezuur, the dead man's friend, was facing him.
A pudding, Grijpstra thought again. They have dropped a pudding on a human skull, a pudding of blubbery fat. The fat has oozed down, from the cranium downward. It covered the cheekbones and then it slowly dripped down to the jaws and clung to the chin.
Bezuur was sitting on the edge of his chair, straight up. His round belly hung over his belt and Grijpstra could see folds of flesh, hairy flesh, embedding the navel. The man was sweating. The sweat from his armpits was staining his striped tailor-made silk shirt.
Bezuur's face gleamed and drops were forming, joining each other in miniature streams, gliding down, hesitating near the small pudgy nose. It was very hot, of course. Grijpstra was sweating too.
A big man, Grijpstra thought. Over six feet, he must weigh a ton. He'll eat a hundred guilders a day, easily. Bowlsful of cashew nuts probably, and shrimps, and a bucket or two of potatoes, or spaghetti, and a loaf of bread thrown in, bread covered with fried mushrooms and smoked eel and thick slices of ham.
Bezuur reached out and grabbed a bottle of beer out of a carton placed near his chair. He broke off the cap and filled his glass. The thick foam rose quickly and flowed down the sides of the glass, spilling onto the thick rug.
'More beer, gentlemen?'
The commissaris shook his head. Grijpstra nodded. Bezuur tore the cap off another bottle. More foam was sucked into the rug. 'Here you are, adjutant.'
They looked at each other in the eye and raised their glasses, grunting simultaneously. Bezuur drained his glass. Grijpstra took a carefully measured sip; it was his third glass. Bezuur had had six since they came into the room. Grijpstra put the glass down gingerly.
'He is dead, the bastard,' Bezuur said, and viciously replaced the glass on a marble-topped side table. It cracked and he looked at it dolefully. 'The silly stupid bastard. Or perhaps he was clever. He always said that death is a trip and he liked traveling. He used to talk a lot about death, even when he was a boy. He talked a lot and he read a lot. Later he drank a lot too. He was an alcoholic when he was seventeen years old. Did anybody tell you?'
'No,' Grijpstra said. 'You tell us.'
'An alcoholic,' Bezuur said again. 'Became one when we entered the university. We were always together, at school and at the university. We passed our high school examinations when we were sixteen. Wonderkids we were. We never worked but we always passed. I was good at mathematics and he was good at languages. When we did work we worked together. A deadly team we were; nobody and nothing could tear us apart. We only worked when we came to an examination and then we would only put in the bare minimum. It was pride, I think. Showing off. We would pretend we weren't listening at classes but we soaked it all up, and we remembered the stuff too. And we made secret notes, on scraps of paper; we didn't have notebooks like the other kids. And no homework, homework was for the birds. We read. But he read more than I did and at the university he began to drink.'
'He did?' Grijpstra asked.
'Yes.'
Bezuur's hand shot out and another bottle lost its cap. He looked at the cracked glass, and turned around to look at the kitchen door. He must have had mote glasses in the kitchen but it was too far, and he drank from the bottle, tossing the cap on the floor. He looked at Grijpstra's glass but it was still half full.
'I think he was drinking a bottle a day. Jenever. He would drink any brand as long as it was cold. One day he couldn't get his pants on in the morning, his hands trembled too much. He thought it was runny but I worried and made him see a doctor who told him to layoff. He did too.'
'Really?' Grijpstra asked. 'He stopped drinking straight off? Just like that?'
'Yes. He was clever. He didn't want to be a drunk; it would complicate his routine.'
'Stopped drinking straight off, hey,' Grijpstra said, amp; airing his head.
'I told you he was clever,' Bezuur said. 'He knew it would be difficult to break the habit so he did something drastic. He disappeared for a while, three months I think it was. Went to work on a farm. When he came back he was off it. Later he began drinking again but then he knew when to stop. He would cut out at the third or fourth glass and drink soft stuff.'
'Beer?'
'Beer is not so soft. No, lemonades, homemade. He would fuss about, squeezing the fruit, adding sugar. With Abe everything had to be dead right.'
Bezuur tipped the bottle again but it was empty and he slammed it on the table. The bottle cracked. He glared at it.
'You seem a little upset,' Grijpstra said.
Bezuur was staring at the wall behind Grijpstra's chair. 'Yes,' he said, 'I am upset. So the bastard died.
How the hell did he manage that? I spoke to Zilver on the phone. He reckons they threw a ball at him, a metal ball, but nobody can find it. It that right?'
He was still staring at the wall behind Grijpstra's chair and Grijpstra turned around. There was a painting on the wall, a portrait of a lady. The lady was wearing a long skirt of some velvety material, a hat with a veil, an elaborate necklace, and nothing else. She had very full breasts with the nipples turned upward. The face was quiet, a delicate face with dreaming eyes and lips which opened in the beginning of a smile.
'Beautiful,' Grijpstra said.
'My wife.'
Grijpstra looked around the room.
Bezuur laughed, the laugh sounded bubbly and gushy, as if a pipe had suddenly burst and water was flowing down the wall.
'My ex-wife, I should say, perhaps, but the divorce isn't through yet. She left me some months ago now and her lawyers are squeezing me and my lawyers are having a lovely time, writing lots of little notes at a guilder a
