December 2024
Anneliese
ANNELIESE TOOK THE train to Veenendaal Central Station, and from there the bus.
The bus wound through a birch forest, the papery bark peeling off the tall, thin trunks that rose, straight as pins, from a cushion of dead leaves. It wasn’t noon yet, but the sky grew darker by the hour.
She thought back on the text messages from Radboud—and his warnings. Bep wasn’t reliable. She might lie. She might not know anything useful. But it was an opportunity too promising to pass up. Radboud had persuaded Bep to meet with Anneliese.
Blustery flurries of snow stung Anneliese’s face as she got off the bus in Amerongen, and she wished she had worn something warmer than her parka. She used her phone to find Bep’s house in a middle-class neighborhood of terraced brick houses. She double-checked the address. From the street, Bep’s house looked more than okay—two stories with a steep roof.
Up close, neglect was evident, and the doorbell cover plate was missing. She knocked. A Labrador, barking his head off, appeared in the front window, but no one answered the door. Anneliese couldn’t call Bep because the old junkie didn’t have a phone. But she wasn’t going to go all that way and not see her. She decided to kill some time and try again later.
She wandered through the village, looking for a coffee specialty shop. What kind of place didn’t have a Starbucks or a De Koffiesalon? She backtracked to the bus stop and crossed the county road. That side of the village was a few centuries older, dominated by crumbling old houses with black shutters on the windows; and an old castle, complete with a moat. She walked the perimeter of the property. An icy wind shuttled over the polder and numbed her lips.
After an hour, she bought a bouquet at the supermarket and retraced her steps to Bep’s house.
The door opened.
Bep was a pale, gaunt woman in faded blue jeans a size too large. Her white scalp showed through her thin gray hair. She looked seventy, but drug use might have aged her.
“I’m Anneliese. Radboud sent me.”
“Are you the baby?” Bep said in a raspy voice.
“Yes. I brought you flowers.”
“You could have gotten me cigarettes for what those cost.” Bep shoved the flowers into the umbrella stand.
Anneliese hung her parka on a hook and followed Bep into the living room. It smelled like a kennel. The calico cat that was curled up in a chair lifted its head and regarded her with golden eyes. In the corner, a gray cat was hunched over, trying to cough up a hairball. The fat Labrador sniffed Anneliese’s crotch and stretched out on the sagging sofa. On the coffee table was an enormous ashtray that overflowed with cigarette butts and ash.
Bep set the calico cat on the floor and motioned for Anneliese to sit in the chair. The cat hair would stick to her pants, but she didn’t want to insult her hostess, so she sat.
“Tea?” Bep asked.
“No, thank you,” Anneliese said, picturing the cats cavorting about on the kitchen counter.
Bep shrugged and wedged her skinny hips between the dog’s head and the armrest. She stroked the dog’s back, giving Anneliese a view of the underside of her forearm.
“What are you staring at?” Bep snapped.
“Your tracks.”
“What’s it to you?”
“Nothing. It’s none of my business.”
“Did you bring the money?”
“Tell me first what you know.”
“That’s not how this works. The money first.”
Anneliese dug the wallet from her backpack, walked over to the sofa, and handed Bep two fifties.
“Where’s the rest?”
“The rest?” Anneliese said, feigning innocence.
“I told Radboud I wanted five hundred.”
“He told me a hundred.” Anneliese couldn’t ask Willem for five hundred without telling him what the money was for.
Bep swore. “A lousy hundred isn’t enough.”
“It’s all I have. I had to use my overdraft facility to pick up this much. I’m in the red,” she added in case Bep didn’t know what an overdraft facility was.
The junkie muttered to herself, back and forth like an argument, and tucked the cash into the pocket of her jeans. “If a hundred’s all you got.”
Anneliese showed her the inside of her wallet and returned to the chair.
“Radboud said you were the housekeeper at the hotel when I was born. What can you tell me about my mother and her stepsister?”
“The older one was a snob. Miss Hoity-Toity I called her … not to her face, of course. She held her mouth funny when I came to clean her room. Like she tasted something foul. She wore a long coat and complained her room was too cold. The temperature seemed fine to me, but I wasn’t sitting on my ass all day.” Bep scratched at her forearm.
“And my mother?”
“She was a shy little thing.” Bep bent over and nuzzled the Labrador’s nose. “Most guests stayed for a couple of nights, but them two stayed for six weeks or so. They didn’t hardly go out, not even for meals. They kept me running, bringing up trays of food and carrying away empty dishes. They didn’t leave me a tip neither.”
Anneliese said, “Radboud recalls you saying that something was odd. What did you mean?”
Bep screwed up her forehead. “I might’ve said that. It was a long time ago, mind you. The way they hid out in their rooms. And no visitors that I ever saw. It was odd, all right.”
Anneliese tried to hide her impatience. She should have listened to Radboud. Bep couldn’t tell her anything of importance that she didn’t already know. The visit was a waste of time and money.
Bep turned the dog’s head to the side, leaned forward, and rummaged in the ashtray until she found a cigarette butt long enough to relight. The gray cat coughed up the hairball, which was disgusting enough, but then it slunk over and rubbed itself against Anneliese’s legs. Cats made her neck hair prickle. She kicked out her foot—not hard—but firm enough to let it know she meant business. It stalked away.
“Don’t treat my Dora like that.” Bep twitched all over.
“I didn’t hurt her. I’m allergic to cats.” Anneliese faked a sneeze.
Bep tutted. “I guess you can’t help it if you’re allergic.”
“Can you remember anything else about my mother?”
Bep took a cautious drag on the cigarette butt, as if afraid she might suck it down her throat.
“One morning I went to clean her room. Before I could knock, I heard Miss Hoity-Toity shouting, then a loud crash.”
Anneliese sat up straighter. “What did you do?”
“I should have come back later, but I was damn curious. I used my pass key. The duvet was in a heap on the floor. A lamp base lay nearby. I didn’t see where the lampshade went. Your poor little mama was sitting on the floor crying, her arms covering her head. Her sister yelled at me to get out. I didn’t have to be told twice.”
“When was this?”
“A week before the baby came.”
“Do you know what they were arguing about?”
“Nah. But I know what I heard: ‘After all I’ve done for you. You can’t back out now.’ Something like that.”
Anneliese felt something inside her shift, like twisting the focus of a microscope. She could guess why they had argued. Louisa must have missed playing the piano and missed the limelight. If Katja had changed her mind and decided to keep her baby, Louisa’s sacrifices would have been for nothing. Louisa must have bullied Katja into going through with the adoption.
“You look a little peaked,” Bep said.
The cloying stench. Cigarette smoke. Animal hair. Dirty clothes. Body odor. Stale grease. Anneliese’s stomach heaved. After saying goodbye, she stumbled from the room and let herself out the front door.