before, found a more useful occupation in producing a newspaper and folding it artfully so that it became a triangular hat, of the type old-fashioned children will wear.
'Yes, adjutant, the disappearance of Rea Fortune, a charming woman engaged with the short end of the stick throughout her short and unhappy life-she can't have been older than thirty-five when I saw her last-' ('Yes?' Grijpstra asked compassionately) 'is surrounded by doubt.' Hyme focused his eyes triumphantly. 'Doubt!'
De Gier's chewing changed. He abandoned the earlier method of simple chomping and replaced it by repetitive sucking and flattening.
Zhaver, at Grijpstra's request, brought more beer.
Hyme patted his paper headgear into shape and placed it on the table. He stretched both arms and nodded pleasantly.
'Doubt. And why do I doubt Rea's so-called voluntary retreat followed by a complete failure on Frits's part to retrieve her presence? I doubt, for the one-among-other-reasons that this very same Rea practically embraced me when I offered Frits Fortune, at this same table a week ago, a cool million for his assorted rubbish, against my personal inclination, although the urgency of my associates' desire to take over Frit's's business might have warranted such a price.' Hyme sighed briefly. 'Did Frits accept? He did not. Was he sorry? No, he was angry. Was he very angry? He was furious. An emotion of that caliber is not without its deeper meaning. It isn't necessary to have studied psychology, as I have…'
'Really?' Grijpstra asked admiringly.
'… to conclude that Frits's personality began to split at that moment. A new personality attempted to emerge: new Frits trampled old Frits and confronted me, a once trusted friend.'
Zhaver brought more beer, at Hyme's request.
Hyme collapsed. The beer supplied new energy. His voice dropped. His hand touched Grijpstra's knee. 'We had been drinking, my guests and I. The stage was set well and I meant to give joy. Was I thanked? I was not. Frits stalked out of here; Rea followed sadly. What happened afterward? Can we surmise?' Hyme took his hand from Grijpstra's knee. 'Was Rea a dragon, and did new Frits become a knight without fear?'
'Or blame,' de Gier said.
'With blame,' Hyme whispered.
De Gier stood up. His chair screeched on the boards. Hyme coughed, shielding his mouth politely. 'Suicide and reincarnation, and the new birth financed by a million florins to ease the black knight's future path.'
Grijpstra ordered a box of expensive cigars. Hyme accepted a cigar, reached again, and put a handful in his breast pocket.
De Gier combed his hair in the rest room. Except for the detectives and Hyme, there were no clients in the cafe.
Beelema returned from having walked Kiran in the street. 'Titania hasn't come back yet?'
'Not yet,' Zhaver said. 'I shouldn't have joked about her predicament. True love is admirable. She has loved Fortune since he bought her those flowers.'
De Gier came back. 'Flowers?'
'Two dozen roses. Beelema and I forgot about Titania's birthday although we remembered the year before, and Titania complained. She cried. Frits Fortune was here and a flower cart happened to pass. He rushed outside and bought the roses. A sentimental gesture and the undoing of Titania.'
'Because Fortune is a serious man,' Beelema said. 'Titania isn't used to his type, she is used to the others.'
'Fornicators,' Zhaver said, 'like us.'
'Whom she tries to avoid.'
'Not too successfully,' Zhaver said.
'Which makes her feel worse,' Beelema said.
Zhaver smiled. 'Frits Fortune is a serious gentleman left by his wife, a handsome man still in the strength of his late youth and blessed with ample income. Titania is a lonely and beautiful woman looking for appreciation and solidity. If those two could meet, even for a moment, everlasting joy would surely result. I would like to see such bliss. True love, harmonious and lasting. It would encourage me. Why don't you arrange it, Borry? You claim divine parentage, it's your sort of thing.'
Beelema nodded, shifted on his stool, bent his elbows on the counter, rested his head in his hands, and closed his eyes.
Grijpstra and de Gier studied Beelema.
Hyme said goodbye and left the cafe' quietly.
Zhaver put his hands to his lips and moved to the far end of the bar. The detectives followed him.
'Sshh,' Zhaver whispered, 'he's thinking, it may take a while'. What will be your pleasure?'
'Coffee,' Grijpstra said, 'for me and my sergeant.' He smiled. 'I was glad to meet Mr. Hyme. He argues along sensible lines and he is a reliable gent.' He turned to de Gier. 'I don't understand your negative attitude, Rinus. I'm going to telephone Cardozo and Public Works. They'll have to produce a digger and be quick about it. Weekend work is healthy and pays double.'
'Please, Grijpstra.'
'I don't quite know what you're talking about,' Zhaver said, 'but Mr. Hyme is not a reliable gent.'
'No?' Grijpstra asked. 'No? A director of the best known publishing house of this country? A gentleman who dresses as a gentleman, who behaves as a gentleman?'
'Don't talk like the American lady in Paris,' de Gier said. 'A gentleman is a gentleman is a gentleman.'
'Rose,' Zhaver said. 'Rose. Not gentleman. Do me a favor and please look out of that window, so that I can share my suffering. Throughout the week he holds himself together, but the weekends are too much, like now. Again and again. Isn't that type of behavior degenerate? Or am I old-fashioned? I think it is degenerate.'
Hyme straddled the bridge railing in feeble but ecstatic balance. The triangular paper hat rested on his elongated skull. His penis rested on the tops of two fingers. A thick foaming jet of sunlit fluid raced to the sky before-gracefully forced by gravity- curving downward to unite with the passive and gleaming canal water.
'No,' said Grijpstra.
'Yes,' said de Gier. 'As if you couldn't have known. Why did you have to force it? Forget your imagination and join the party. Nothing whatsoever is the matter. We are in a caf 6 in the inner city of Amsterdam. Life is bad but we can put up with it here. And when we're done, we'll go for a nice little walk and look at the geese if you like. A Hondecoeter theme, remember?' He clenched his fist and shook it in Grijpstra's face. 'Cheer up. It's all right.'
Beelema opened his eyes.
'It's not all right, but we can rectify the situation. Zhaver, it won't be easy but I can do it, as you say. Fetch Titania and tell her to wear her new jacket and skirt.'
'With this heat?'
Beelema sighed. 'You want me to do it or not? You want to obstruct or assist? Is it your fate or Titania's?'
'This is it,' Grijpstra said. 'This is it forever. I will no longer do this work. Everybody is quite abnormal in this town. I hereby grant them leave to destroy each other. I will, from now on, be sorting out traffic. No, because then I will still see them. I will be working in the clothing store at Headquarters. Not up front, but in the rear where nobody ever comes.'
'I want to assist in achieving Titania's happiness,' Zhaver said. 'I'm sorry, Beelema.'
'Go and fetch her then. She has to wear the long skirt, not that mini-rag. Her knees, first, will be covered or I won't even get into this. And a simple black blouse and something easy around her neck, that silk cord with the bone ring, she wore it the other day. She has to look neat.'
'Neat,' said Zhaver.
'Neat. And long silk stockings, no combination, real stockings, with real garters, she'll have some somewhere, and no panties.'
Zhaver was at the door but stopped and turned.
'Is that neat?'
'Neat? What neat? What do I care about neat? We're concerned with Fortune's mind, and with contrast. What are you delaying the action for, Zhaver?'
'Right away, Bony.'
