He operated a button on the remote control and the picture zoomed in, focusing down to a small shape alongside the roadway. It showed a pair of concrete jetties, and a number of tiny buildings, either houses or sheds. Vehicles on the road nearby continued to move east and west.
“This is Trintelhaven. A former dock where small fishing vessels and cargo ships would stop off at one time, years ago, to either refuel or unload their cargoes. There used to be a windsurfing place there once, and a roadside café, and a junkyard, but now the place is rundown and empty – or so we thought. There are a few buildings there, but from what we’ve learned today there is only one site that is habitable.”
Dyatlov looked across the room.
“Floris de Kok. Would you care to tell everybody what you have learned?”
Pieter spun in his seat, open-mouthed and looking at his companion in surprise.
Floris glanced at him out of the corner of his eye, and then nervously cleared his throat as he pulled his microphone towards his mouth. His arm was shaking slightly, either from nerves, or perhaps from his long-term medical condition.
“Erm, yes,” he began, and then remembered to press the button. There was a high-pitched whine of feedback, and then he started again. “Sorry. Yes, I decided to check through the records, going all the way back to the mid-seventies when the dam was completed. I wanted to see who owned the land there, as I believe the small boatyard was a private business back then.”
Everybody was looking at Floris, and when Pieter saw him lick his lips nervously he gave him an encouraging smile and a nod.
“In more recent times, actually up to about two years ago, as Mr Dyatlov said, there was a small diner there, but this has since closed down. The same with the watersports club that held meetings at Trintelhaven. So I decided to go further back.
In 1976, a year after the dam and the road crossing opened, the land was first rented and later purchased by a family, a Mr and Mrs Huisman. They later had a child, a boy, and they lived there for quite a few years, from where the husband ran several small businesses.
Then, when the child was about eleven years old, the family was involved in a road accident in Belgium. They had gone on a small holiday, travelling around in a camper van, when they were hit by a truck near Brugge. Mr Huisman, it later turned out, had a bad drink problem and this was thought to be the cause of the crash. Anyway, both the parents were killed and their son was badly hurt with a serious head injury, a blow to his frontal lobe. He survived, after spending a month in hospital, but the injury seemed to have a long-term effect on him. His personality changed, he suffered from violent mood swings, was expelled from various schools and finished up in a care home for a period of time. Up until his early teens, when he was adopted by a couple who were unable to have children of their own, and he went to live with them.”
Floris glanced around at the sea of faces looking his way, and he averted his gaze to look down at the tabletop.
“His new family’s surname was Vinke. So the boy became Tobias Vinke.”
The room suddenly erupted in conversation, the loud buzz giving the place a charged atmosphere. Dyatlov’s voice called out over the hubbub.
“Let him finish please.”
When the last of the murmurs died away, Floris went on.
“It seems that after the death of his natural parents, the land and house at Trintelhaven passed on to Tobias Vinke, although the place remained empty for many years. Apart from allowing the diner to open and the watersports club, he doesn’t seem to have done an awful lot with it, until a few months ago, in fact. Following the suicide of his daughter Elena Vinke and the breakdown of his marriage, Tobias Vinke must at some stage have moved back to his old family home, where he lived and, we assume, readied the building in preparation for his kidnapping of Nina Bakker. That must be where she was being held, and where Tobias Vinke was heading to after the hit-and-run at Ransdorp last week, and where he was going on Monday, before he was shot dead.”
Floris sat back in his chair.
“So yes, that’s the place. I’m certain of it.”
“Thank you, de Kok,” Dyatlov said in his crisp and clear voice, and Pieter gave Floris a gentle pat on his shaking arm.
Dyatlov resumed with his mission briefing.
“So folks - Trintelhaven is our primary target. It’s highly likely that Nina Bakker is in that house, although this doesn’t guarantee that she will still be alive when we get there. Sadly she could have been dead from day one after her kidnapping, but we can’t waste too much time pondering on that. We need to hit the place soon and hit it hard and catch the bad guys hiding out there.”
He paced back and forth across the front of the projector screen, his shadow rippling across the satellite image.
“We need to coordinate perfectly on this. It is essential that we move in simultaneously from both ends of the dam, and also have our air-assets overhead to be our eyes and ears. Obviously, it will mean closing the road to traffic to avoid any civvies getting hurt, but if we do that too soon we risk giving the game away and the whole operation falling apart. Therefore, timing is crucial. I’d also prefer it for everybody present in this room to fully acquaint themselves with the exact layout of the area. You and your men, and me and my men, are the ones who will be going in. We can’t afford any cock-ups or wrong turns once we get there. So, I have arranged a
