Jeroen Windmeijer - St Paul’s Labyrinth

‘ What? ’ Janna exclaimed.

Daniël clenched his fist, like a sports fan watching his team miss a huge opportunity.

‘Yes, escaped,’ the officer said again, as though it was nothing out of the ordinary. ‘He just got up and walked away. The stupid thing is he was so covered in blood that we didn’t get a chance to take any photos of him. His interview was planned for tomorrow, assuming he’d come round by then. But, there you go. Things don’t always go the way you plan them.’

‘The mystery deepens …’ Janna whispered to Daniël.

‘Whereabouts do you reckon we are now?’ the female officer asked. She took out her mobile phone, then immediately put it away again. ‘I thought as much. No coverage down here. I thought we might be able to look at a map …’

‘I think,’ her colleague said, ‘I think that we’re somewhere past the Hooglandse Kerk, under the Hooglandse‌kerkgracht, but …’ He stood still. ‘That’s odd.’

Daniël and Janna stood next to the officers so that they could see what he was looking at.

He took a few steps forward and swung the lamp back and forth. Now they could all see that the tunnel didn’t go any further.

‘But how is that possible?’ Janna said, raising her hands in disbelief like a bad amateur actress.

The younger police officer crouched down to examine the wall more closely. Then she pointed the lamp at the wall as she slowly stood up.

‘I don’t know what you’re searching for, Indiana Jones,’ her colleague said, ‘but I think moving walls and secret passages are more of a Hollywood thing.’

‘This whole tunnel is a Hollywood thing,’ his colleague replied curtly, not taking her eyes off the wall. She studied the point where the wall and the ceiling met, then crouched down to look at the other corner.

‘Nothing unusual here,’ she said, finally.

The older officer turned to Janna and Daniël. ‘Ladies and gentleman, whichever way you look at it, what we have here is a mystery.’

They nodded in agreement.

‘We need more equipment.’

‘A GeoSeeker,’ Daniël said.

The man grunted in a way that was entirely open to interpretation.

‘We’re definitely under the Lutheran church,’ said Daniël.

‘Could I have that lamp for a second?’ Janna asked the female officer, who passed it straight over to her.

Janna moved the lamp back and forth over the ground with a broad, systematic sweeping motion, as though she was clipping a lawn with a strimmer.

‘What are you looking for, Janna?’ Daniël asked.

‘Didn’t Peter say Arnold had wounded his head? So that means there must be blood somewhere, right?’

‘I don’t think it was a gaping wound. He just bumped his head. Most of the blood ended up on Peter’s shirt.’

Janna ignored him and started slowly walking backwards.

The others followed along behind her, scanning the ground inch by inch.

‘Here!’ Janna shouted triumphantly, after she had shuffled another ten or so metres. She put down the lamp with a thud, then got down on her knees and held her nose to the ground.

The others squatted near the area where Janna thought she had seen something.

She circled a spot in the sand with the index finger of her right hand. It was slightly darker than the area around it, like something damp and red had mixed with the sand.

The younger police officer wiped her little finger over the stain and sniffed her fingertip. ‘Hmm,’ she said, ‘that’s blood, without a doubt. That metallic smell …’

‘But it doesn’t look like it’s dripped here,’ her colleague said, ‘otherwise it would look like more like a splashed raindrop. It looks like someone fell here.’

‘Arnold,’ Janna concluded.

‘We can’t say that for certain, although I can see why you think that …’ the older officer said, a little too gravely. ‘But all we can say is that someone was here recently, that they were wounded and very probably fell, but other than that—’

‘We need to go back,’ the other officer said urgently. ‘We can leave one of the lamps here. We need to close this place off for forensics and we need a kit to collect the blood …’

Daniël didn’t move.

‘Are you okay?’ Janna asked him.

‘Not really …’ he replied. ‘This wasn’t what we …’

Janna put a hand on his shoulder. ‘No, this isn’t what we were expecting this afternoon. It was supposed to be a celebration.’

Daniël nodded.

‘Come on, let’s go.’ She gave him a gentle push.

The four of them walked back, leaving a lamp behind them in the middle of the tunnel, like a beacon out at sea.

When they reached the tunnel entrance, the younger officer walked a few metres ahead of them.

‘Does it continue along here?’ she asked, shining the lamp down the passage. But the light fell on a wall about ten metres away. ‘Looks like another dead end.’

‘Peter and I walked a little way down there earlier today,’ Daniël confirmed.

‘Go and have a look,’ the older officer grunted, with a note of cynicism in his voice. ‘Maybe you’ll find another secret passage.’

They helped each other climb back up to the surface. Stones came loose as they went and tumbled to the ground in a scud of gravel.

‘We’ll bring a ladder next time,’ the older officer wheezed.

Only one police officer was waiting for them on the street. The other sat in the front of the police car with his feet hanging out of the door and a radio in his hands.

‘A report’s just come in,’ the officer said, holding out a hand to help them up.

The man in the car barked short sentences into the microphone, but from this distance, all they could hear was beeping and static.

He eventually put the radio back in the cradle and sat for a while, with his hands on his knees and palms facing upwards. Then he stood up and walked towards them. ‘It looks like there won’t be any need to continue the search down there,’ he said hesitantly.

‘Whatdoyoumean?’ Daniël asked, the four words coming out as one.

‘I’ve just been told that they’ve found a body floating in the Nieuw Rijn, under the bridge next to Annie’s Verjaardag.’

Daniël covered his face with his hands.

The officer continued in an official tone: ‘There’s every indication that it’s Mr Van Tiegem.’

Friday 20 March, 8:58pm

Peter rushed outside, slamming Judith’s front door behind him. He bounded across the courtyard to Mark’s house and pounded on the windows, shouting his name. He realised immediately that it was useless.

Feeling helpless, he stretched out his hands, then curled his tensed fingers as though he was kneading a stress ball. His lips were tightly pressed together.

He had to go to the police of course, as he had originally intended. He would be able to explain the whole Arnold business, including why he’d foolishly run away earlier in the evening. He would be completely open and honest … up to the point where he’d met Raven in the park.

He pivoted around on one leg, like a soldier at the changing of the guard. At that exact moment, another message arrived.

Do not seek help. The same message as before. But now it was followed by something more sinister. If you ever want to see her alive again.

He looked up in panic. The timing of the messages was worryingly precise, as though someone was aware of every step he took. He searched the sky. Was there a drone up there, with a camera watching him?

Do not seek help …

He opened Google and typed in ‘black raven Leiden’, but it didn’t bring up anything useful. The first hit was a barber in Groningen of all things. So he tried ‘raven Leiden’. A student dorm, entries in a telephone book for people called Raven, a seaside holiday park, the puppet from a children’s TV show … they all led nowhere.