THE GRAPES
The mist had gathered in, but I managed to find The Grapes easily enough. Part of a row of seventeenth-century houses, the bar was low-ceilinged. I walked through to the back of it, looking for an expectant face, but found just a couple of older, regular-looking types.
The far end gave onto the Thames. I stared into its dark reaches, wondering how many outlaws had hidden there in centuries past.
Then I returned to the bar. As I did so, I saw him through the glass window, discarding a cigarette. The light inside caught his lively brown eyes and sandy-coloured hair. He was wearing a beige raincoat. Tim O’Farrell wasn’t his real name – or at least, not the name I’d known him by.
He entered and greeted me. ‘Henk,’ he said. ‘Fancy encountering you again, in this neck of the woods.’
My heart was beating like a bass drum.
‘All a bit cloak and dagger, isn’t it?’ I managed.
‘Precautions. A lot’s happened. I’ll tell you about it.’
‘You’ve got my full attention, Tommy. Or should I call you Tim?’
‘You’d be surprised by the reprisals – where they come from. Some high-level places.’ He stroked the tips of his moustache. ‘I retract that. You wouldn’t be surprised.’
Part of me wanted to leave there and then. But I couldn’t.
He knew that. ‘Let’s get that drink,’ he offered. ‘Pint?’
I found a quiet table. My hearing and other senses had become very acute: the murmur of the regulars’ conversation, the river washing against shingle outside. Then that ringtone of mine.
Fuck. It was the Dutch number again. Instinct told me to take the call.
‘Henk, finally. It’s Kelly Verhagen.’
My mind went blank.
‘The recruitment officer,’ she prompted.
‘Ah yes, Kelly. Now’s not a good time…’
‘Never is, apparently. Look, your application has been accepted.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘For the Rijksrecherche… the tests you sat, the interview – remember?’
It felt like a lifetime ago. ‘Did you say my application has been accepted?’
I couldn’t believe it.
‘One thing, Henk. The decision wasn’t unanimous. A few strong voices were against.’
‘That instils confidence.’
‘Better to know these things.’
‘Who was against, out of interest?’
‘I can’t say. But the minister had the casting vote. Sonja came out strongly in favour, too.’
‘Sonja?’
‘Brinkerhof. The psychologist. She said you were the most empathetic policeman she’d ever interviewed for Internal Investigations.’
I didn’t know what that said about my prospective colleagues.
Franks was carrying two pints back from the bar, a pack of crisps clamped between his teeth.
‘I’ll call you later, Kelly.’
‘Please!’
I pressed disconnect.
It was a dark beer that had a sharp tang to it.
‘What is this?’
‘Black Sheep.’ He winked, then drank and finally sighed.
‘All feels very English,’ I remarked, glancing around the bar again.
‘Yes. Although the place is owned by a Russian oligarch, among others.’
‘It’s the mirror image of my local in Amsterdam, De Druif. Means “The Grape”.’
‘How fitting,’ Franks said, leaning in, ‘because you and I turn out to be mirror images of one another, Henk.’ He lowered his voice. ‘Here’s how it is…’ and he proceeded to describe all his frustrations in trying to progress child abuse cases – the cover-ups, the wrongful use of the UK’s Official Secrets Act in order to protect powerful suspects…
I sat half-fascinated, half-appalled. Eventually, the latter got the better of me.
‘Franks, you killed three fellow policemen in that forest in Driebergen.’
‘Only rogue cops,’ he countered, forefinger raised. ‘They risked blowing everything with their obsessions about that guy.’
‘What guy?’
‘You know very well which guy, else why would you be here in London?’ He didn’t need to mention Karremans by name. ‘Tell me that you’ve never killed a man.’
‘Not your way.’
In my mind’s eye, I saw Hals’s white-lit face twisted into its death rictus…
‘Same difference.’
‘Is it?’ I asked.
‘We’re talking about a cover-up throughout the force here – and the Amsterdam one, too, I’m willing to wager.’
I was about to remonstrate, but the words never arrived.
‘Night Market may have gone, but the same people remain.’
His brown eyes glinted.
‘What do you think, Henk?’ He clinked his glass softly against mine, looking me in the eye. ‘What say we slay this beast together?’