steadily from the luxury automobile. The deli's owners, concerned about their business-their store window showed a display of choice meats-alerted the police. Uniformed officers forced the trunk with a crowbar.
People gasped when they saw a dead female human body, soon to be known as 'Maggotmaid,' stretched out in the car's ample trunk. There were no signs of violence but small pieces of broken glass and wood splinters were found in the dead woman's clothing during a painstaking investigation by forensic criminologists. Meanwhile, detectives traced the owner of the Cadillac, a vehicle with Texas license plates, to a nearby Upper West Side apartment. The subject, described by Russo as a Texan named Trevor, claimed ignorance. Yes, he vaguely knew the woman, a prostitute who could be picked up in Central Park, but he hadn't invited her to that weekend's party.
'But,' the detectives said, 'she was there.' Splinters and glass matched a broken door inside the apartment. Trevor proposed that if Maggotmaid had been at the apartment rented in his name, a guest, friend or associate- a gate-crasher maybe?-might have brought her in. Any of Trevor's friends had access to his car keys. The keys hung in the apartment's hall. Several of his associates took turns changing the vehicle's parking spot, in obedience to alternate-side-of-the-street parking rules in the neighborhood. These associates also fed the parking meters, which would explain why the vehicle hadn't been towed away by traffic policemen. None of these associates happened to be around right then, but they did show up later. They confirmed having moved the Cadillac around and fed parking meters with coins. Nobody remembered having put Maggotmaid in the Caddy's trunk. Nobody had smelled the body. Which could be true, Dr. Russo said. Tests indicated that Maggotmaid had died during a Saturday night. She was found Wednesday afternoon, when the weather suddenly changed from fairly cool to hot. The Cadillac had been baking in the sun all that day.
'Maggotmaid died of an overdose of heroin,' Russo said. 'We ascertained that much. We also found that her body had penetrated a glass door in Trevor's apartment. Did she fall? Was she pushed?' He wobbled his eyebrows. 'A small quantity of heroin was found in the main sitting room. There were a few grams of cannabis products here and there, and many empty bottles. Trevor claimed to have no knowledge of any drug use. Nobody came forward to admit ownership of the heroin and cannabis products.'
There were questions.
No, no arrests had been made, Dr. Russo said, but the investigation was still ongoing. He checked his notes. 'Under the guidance of Detective-Sergeant Earl Hurrell, assisted by Detectives-First-Class Tom Tierney and Jerry Curran.'
Yes, Trevor was a suspected dealer of note, allegedly in charge of several retail salesmen who worked the park.
Had investigators come up with a theory so far? Well, it was quite simple. Maggotmaid had been brought in to entertain Trevor's guests. She overdosed and died. A dead body does little to improve a party. Trevor, or an associate, probably stoned and/or drunk, had carried the body down and dumped it in the Cadillac's trunk for the meantime. There must have been a plan to get rid of the body later, which wouldn't have been a big deal-there are the rivers, there is Central Park-but, as the partying went on, Maggotmaid was forgotten.
After the lecture the commissaris attended a luncheon offered by the NYPD to its distinguished guests and colleagues. He kept shivering through the speeches and toasts. He was reasonably sure he was running a high temperature. He felt faint. It seemed his glasses had fogged up again, which was strange for he had just blown and spat on them and rubbed them clean with his necktie.
'You look tired,' O'Neill's voice said. 'I'll drive you to the Cavendish. Tomorrow's lecture is by a bigwig from the Los Angeles County Sheriffs Crime Laboratory on physical evidence relating to hit and run cases.' O'Neill's elbow nudged the commissaris's arm. 'I hear you have more cars in Holland now than there are in all of Africa. Five million cars in such a small country.' O'Neill whistled admiringly. 'Hit and run must be a common occurrence there. I'm sure your comments will be worth hearing tomorrow.'
Chapter 7
The query the commissaris faxed off late that afternoon from the Cavendish desk, before consuming the hotel's nouvelle cuisine dinner specials, caused surprise in Amsterdam Police Headquarters.
Detective-Constable Simon Cardozo, a curly-haired young man in a rumpled corduroy suit, brought the fax in and, when he was unable to attract attention, jumped up and down while he read its text loudly.
He shouted the word 'GOLF.'
Grijpstra had been practicing on a set of drums, which, for years, had been kept in his office, as Lost amp;Found was desperately short of space and had no idea where the set had come from. De Gier provided background on his dented mini trumpet. They were trying out a composition by the Dutch group Chazz called Water- straat Blue, with a young black student detective pecking out the melody on a small Yamaha keyboard, confiscated by Cardozo from an unmusical street musician using too powerful amplification. Cardozo, it turned out soon enough, could not learn to play the instrument either.
'Golf?' Adjutant Grijpstra asked after he had studied the commissaris's note. 'Are we to believe that Termeer was knocked down, maybe even killed by a golf ball, in a public park, for God's sake?' He studied the commissaris's note again. 'And what, please, is lacrosse?'
Cardozo knew. He had seen the game played on TV. Early Native Americans-using long-handled racketlike implements, 'crosses,' to hit a hard little deerskin ball- considered lacrosse as combat training. 'A rough sport,' Cardozo said, 'with thousands of players on each side, with goals miles apart.' Players got wounded, even killed. The white man changed the rules, making the game soft, with only twelve players on each side and penalties for 'unnecessary roughness.' But it was still a bruising sport.
'The ball,' Cardozo said, 'is now hard rubber.'
'And it could have knocked down our man,' Grijpstra said. 'Oh dear.'
'And what are we to do?' de Gier asked.
The commissaris's note said that they were to ask the chief-constable, who played golf, to locate an expert, and to consult with same.
Grijpstra and de Gier were received by the owner of the Crailo Golf Club, some thirty miles out of Amsterdam. Balder Gudde, former golf champion, dressed in a sky blue suit, could have modeled for a semitransparent figure in a Magritte painting.
'A good day to you,' Grijpstra said, pocketing his police identification, which Baldert tried to study while he held the plastic-laminated card upside down. 'Just a few questions if you please. Merely routine. My colleague and I are interested in a possible deadly impact caused by a golf ball.'
'At this golf club?' Baldert asked nervously.
'Anywhere,' Grijpstra said.
'Not specifically here?' Baldert asked. 'No. Could have been here, though. Right? In fact, you do mean here.' He stepped back, sideways, forward, sideways. 'Out with it, Detective, are you treating me as a suspect?'
'As an expert,' Grijpstra said. 'This isn't our jurisdiction, sir.'
From Baldert's babbling the detectives gradually understood that they were accused of looking into the death of Baron Hilger van Hopper at the Crailo Golf Club. The baron had been a star member of Baldert's establishment. He 'wasn't anymore because he had passed away, just a few weeks ago. Baldert winked, reminding the detectives jokingly-as if they didn't know all about the dead baron-that the baron had died at his own so-called wedding party.
'You don't say,' Grijpstra said.
Baldert kept winking.
De Gier thought he would humor the golfer, who might suffer from a disorder. 'What did the baron die of, sir?'
Baldert shrugged. Then he mimed swinging a golf club.
'Overextended himself?' Baldert asked Grijpstra. 'Physical shock? A golf ball whizzing by too close for comfort?' He patted Grijpstra's arm. 'But you know all that, Detective. I told the lieutenant. Want to go through all that again?'
Grijpstra checked his watch. Nellie was cooking mussel soup that evening. He liked mussel soup, especially
