Janwillem De Wetering - The Rattle-Rat

"Frisian, of course," de Gier said. "The recipe was in the paper. Curry, flour, cream, and stir well. The mussels are fresh, compliments of the Military Police."

"Did you see them again?" Grijpstra asked.

'Thought I'd drop in for a chat," de Gier said. "They were having their coffee and cake, off the mahogany table. Told me a good tale. Very exciting, their daily routine. Some copper was stolen from the islands, property of the military. Amazing. This morning the copper turned up again. And then there was this deserter that they were hunting, but he turned up by himself too, and he'll be let off. There's too much manpower, the Air Force is automated. The less men about, the better."

De Gier cut bread and passed the butter.

Grijpstra and Cardozo weren't listening too well.

"Like the bread?" de Gier asked. "Lieutenant Sudema baked it himself. I visited him too. He's done with the wall and has replaced it with three posts from Ameland. His nephew brought them in, in the Military Police patrol boat, but that boat isn't really theirs, it belongs to the Wet Engineers."

"More soup," Grijpstra said.

"Yes," de Gier said, "and the Sudema wall will go up again. He's been given some bricks by the Water Inspection. The bricks were brought in by the Game Warden Department; he exchanged them for tomatoes. The tomatoes will end up with the Navy, who'll send an Army truck to his greenhouse, a truck temporarily registered with the Municipal Police.

"More bread," Grgpstra said.

"It'll take time," de Gier said. "Sudema is distracted. Keeps kissing his wife. Embarrassing. I had to watch it."

"What are you really doing?" Grijpstra asked, cleaning his plate with the last crust of bread.

"Too much," de Gier said. "Coffee, Adjutant? You can do the dishes, Cardozo."

Cardozo had to go. De Gier waved as the Citroen left the street. Grijpstra did the dishes.

The doorbell rang.

"Hello, Hylkje," de Gier said.

"I'm not going," Grijpstra shouted from the kitchen. "I've got to see Phyr, Tyark, and Yelte. You take the rat."

Hylkje and de Gier went to look at Eddy. Only the rat's nose moved. Hylkje touched one of Eddy's feet. She let go quickly. "Cold."

"Warm them," de Gier said.

"I'd rather warm yours," Hylkje said. "In your bed in Amsterdam, the one you told me about, with the brass ornaments on each side. I'll come and visit you from time to time. I won't stay. No commitment. I'm not after you at all. Maybe you think that, and are trying to keep your distance, but there's no need. I'll bring coffee and my filter machine, and Sunday evening I'll be off. No aftermath. Nothing."

"Promise?" de Gier asked.

"Promise."

"Not me," Grijpstra shouted from the kitchen. "You take Eddy. You used every pot in the house to make a pint of mussel soup. I'll be here for hours."

"My apartment faces a park," de Gier said. "I'll take you for a walk. We can feed the ducks."

"How romantic," Hylkje's eyelashes fluttered.

"I've got to go to Dinjum too," Grijpstra shouted, "to tell the lieutenant where I hid his pistol. I'll be busy all night."

"I'd like some romance tonight," Hylkje said.

"We'll combine all our duties," de Gier said, "and construct activity that provides optimal satisfaction for all parties concerned. Eddy has to go to Engwierum. Grijpstra needs the Volkswagen. There's a full moon tonight. You have your Deux Chevaux. This is beautiful country. You want to be romantic. You and I will go for a drive. Everything fits in."

"Eddy's death too?" Hylkje asked.

"Of course," de Gier said.

De Gier picked up Eddy, moving both his hands slowly under the small body.

"You did that at the right moment," Hylkje said. "You knew I was ready to beat you up. I can't stand that cold logic of yours and the way you make others fit into your plans. You're inhuman. What am I to you? Something that you can combine?"

De Gier took Eddy into the kitchen to say good-bye to Grijpstra.

"You abuse me," Hylkje hissed in the car.

"I use you," de Gier said warmly.

"I'm not going to be forced into anything," Hylkje said.

"I'm merely making use of your desire," de Gier said, "like you use mine. What's wrong with that? Isn't there mutual benefit?"

"Oh," Hylkje whispered hoarsely.

"I do like your voice," de Gier said.

Eddy rattled, shook, and slackened in de Gier's hands.

"Eddy is all used up," de Gier said.

" Police?" Mrs. Oppenhuyzen asked when she opened the door.

"Now that you mention it," de Gier said, "I had forgotten, but I am. And Hylkje too, she's with the State Police. We came to deliver the dead."

That was crude. It's no time to be flippant when you're handing someone a dear dead pet. De Gier felt sorry, but he didn't like Mrs. Oppenhuyzen, there was that too. He realized why. Mrs. Oppenhuyzen's dress was printed with the same flower pattern as the wallpaper in her city house. Mrs. Oppenhuyzen was a printed rose. De Gier was familiar with this type of woman, familiar but uncomfortable, for they don't look good and they live drably. Was this the egocentric argument that forced him to live alone? But I like to be alone, de Gier thought. Alone with Tabriz, and Grypstra over for coffee once a week, and maybe Hylkje for a weekend but no commitment, a promise is a promise.

"Please come in," Mrs. Oppenhuyzen said. "I'm sorry Eddy kept causing trouble, and that you had to come all the way here."

De Gier had to bend over so as not to hit his head against a brass Chinese lamp in which four sharp-tailed dragons held up the bulb. Walls and ceiling were made out of sheets of pressed sawdust covered with peeling paint. Mrs. Oppenhuyzen's ample shape swung ahead. De Gier still carried dead Eddy.

"Oh, dear," Mrs. Oppenhuyzen said, "nothing but trouble."

He remembered an aunt of his, who also wore flowered dresses and liked to complain, whom he had visited once and never again. He couldn't have been more than three years old at the time, and she had lived in some suburb, surrounded by knickknacks from the Far East, where her husband had been a soldier. He had escaped halfway through the visit, and was found by strangers and taken to a police station, where he forgot his name out of spite.

Mrs. Oppenhuyzen directed them to plastic camping chairs, mumbling, biting a finger, and adjusting her hair, which was tied in a bun that had become undone. "I don't really want him," she said, nodding toward Eddy. "He belongs to Sybe, you see. A holiday doesn't mean anything to my husband. He's always working, he hardly comes here. I was to go first and Sybe would bring Eddy later, but he never did."

"Your husband works during holidays?" de Gier asked.

"He's always about," Mrs. Oppenhuyzen said, "except when he's in pain."

"What's his ailment?" Hylkje asked.

"Trigeminal neuralgia," Mrs. Oppenhuyzen said.

"Something with nerves?" de Gier asked.

"A pain," Mrs. Oppenhuyzen said. "In his face. The triple facial nerve, you know? There are two varieties of the disease. One is hopeless, they say, for they don't know what it is, and the other has to do with infection." She worked on her hair bun. "What do I know? That's what the doctor says."

"From which variety does your husband suffer?" de Gier asked.

"Sybe has the hopeless kind. Can't be cured at all. Sure, he can eat aspirin but that gives him a pain in his tummy that isn't nice either."

"The poor man," Hylkje said.

"So you are police too?" Mrs. Oppenhuyzen asked Hylkje.

"Yes," Hylkje said. "A colleague of your husband's."

"But you're State Police," Mrs. Oppenhuyzen said. "We have State Police here, in Engwierum. It's such a small village, there's no Municipal Police."

"Right," Hylkje said.

"And you are Municipal Police," Mrs. Oppenhuyzen said to de Gier.