‘You’re Osewoudt, aren’t you? Interesting to talk to you. Everyone’s heard about your case. If you ask me, the hunt for Dorbeck’s like walking through quicksand: every step you take you sink deeper. What’s your view?’
‘That’s none of your business.’
‘If you ask me, Osewoudt, you’re a real bastard. I’m not saying that to have a go at you, it’s the truth. You know the trouble with most Dutchmen? They never learned to think. Take me. I joined the SS a year ago. I’m a theorist, an amoral theorist. A theorist, because I can’t stand the sight of blood, and besides, by the time I joined, Germany was already losing the war and there were SS men running for cover with the Resistance. It wasn’t that I believed in the SS, the 1,000 year Reich, or any of the other tripe the papers say every SS man believed in. But what I do believe is that moral values are nothing but a temporary frame of reference, and that once you’re dead morality is irrelevant. I don’t suppose you’ve done much reading, have you? I have. I’m an intellectual. Not many of them in the SS, either. A pack of idiots, like everybody else. Some of them thought the world of Himmler! Himmler, I ask you! A sea cow in pince-nez! They thought Hitler was a genius! Hitler! The epileptic schnauzer! They believed in a better future, for God’s sake! If it were up to me, I’d have them all put against a wall, now, here, this minute!’
He pointed to the exercising men.
‘See how they run! Ridiculous. You know what it is? You know what it all boils down to? It all boils down to the fact that man is mortal and doesn’t want to admit it. But to anyone who accepts the reality of death there is no morality in the absolute sense, to anyone like that goodness and charity are nothing but fear in disguise. Why should I behave morally if I will get the death sentence in any case? Everyone is sentenced to die in the end, and everyone knows it.
‘The crackpot philosophers who shaped our Western civilisation thought there was a difference between guilt and innocence. But I say: in a world where everyone gets the death sentence there can be no distinction between innocence and guilt. And all that rot about compassion! Of course you’ve never read a decent book in your life, like all the other imbeciles in this country. But if you get a chance, you should take a look at Shakespeare’s Richard III! Shakespeare, now there was someone who understood. What happens when Richard’s kingdom is on the verge of collapse and he must prepare for the decisive battle?
‘He sleeps, and in his dream appear all the friends and relations he murdered so that he could take the throne. Do you know what they say? Well, what do you think? Do you think they say: Richard, it was awful of you to kill us off, but what’s done is done, there’s no way we can come back to life, we forgive you for what you did to us and hope that you’ll be spared our miserable fate, because even if you are punished for your crimes, it won’t do us any good … Do you think that’s what they say, Osewoudt? No, my friend, that’s not what they say. Despair and die! is what they say. Despair and die! Women, children, old folk. Despair and die they all say! Shakespeare knew what he was talking about!
‘Take Dostoevsky. In Dostoevsky you’ll find people who are gentle, kind, high-minded, generous, saintly — but they’re all insane, every one of them. That’s what it boils down to! Man is only good out of calculation, insanity, or cowardice.
‘And this brings me to the point I’m trying to make: this insight is gradually gaining acceptance. The old prophets and philosophers who claimed otherwise are losing ground. The truth can’t be kept at bay by autosuggestion. Man will have to learn to live in a world without liberty, goodness and truth. It’ll soon be taught at primary school! This war is just a foretaste of what’s in store! The world is getting far too densely populated for there to be room for madmen, do-gooders or saints. Just as we no longer believe in witches, just as sexual taboos are disappearing, so our great-grandchildren will have no qualms about allowing things to happen that would horrify your taxpaying, vote-casting populace of today.
‘The carnage of this war, the millions of defenceless people who have been gassed, beaten to death, starved, doused with burning phosphor from aeroplanes, that’s just a start. Our grandchildren won’t understand the hue and cry in the papers over such things. The persecution of Jews? You mark my words! In twenty years’ time the British, the Americans and the Russians will have the Jews exterminated by the Arabs, if it happens to suit them. May I wish you the very best of luck with your case, Osewoudt?’
The prisoners were marshalled into line. The young SS man jumped up to join them. But after two paces he paused, looked back at Osewoudt and said: ‘Or they’ll have the Arabs exterminated by the Jews, if that makes you feel any better!’
Not until the car pulled up at the entrance of the British army base in Oldenburg did Osewoudt get a chance to exchange a few words with the dentist, whom they had collected on the way.
‘I gather you were a close acquaintance of the Jagtman family,’ said Osewoudt.
‘Yes, they were all patients of mine.’
‘And did any of them look like me?’
‘I should say so. That was why I phoned the police when I saw that picture of Dorbeck in the paper. But you must realise that it’s five years since I last saw him. I don’t keep a photo album of my patients.’
‘What exactly was his name?’
‘Egbert.’
‘Egbert. Did you see him at all after May 1940?’
‘That’s a bit of a problem. The last time he came to see me was in August 1939. He was called up after that.’
‘Was he in the artillery?’
‘I wouldn’t know for sure.’
‘How old was he?’
‘Twenty-three.’
‘What if he’d had a lot of work done on his teeth by another dentist, while he was in the army?’
‘Oh, the distinctive features of a person’s dentition aren’t affected, under normal circumstances. The chance of that happening is incredibly small.’
The dentist opened a small case he had been holding on his lap throughout the journey. Just then Selderhorst got in the car again, after having a word with the British commander. He started the engine. The British sentry waved them on. They drove very slowly down a track that was completely ploughed up by tanks, towards a low shed.
There were more British soldiers standing about, unarmed, with their flat helmets pushed back at a jaunty angle. They directed the car to a parking space among their own vehicles.
Selderhorst, the dentist, Spuybroek, and Osewoudt got out.
The dentist put down his case on the grass and opened it. He took out a large, buff-coloured card. It was a diagram of a full set of human teeth, several of them annotated, in two facing horseshoe shapes. On the left were listed the patient’s particulars: surname, first name, date of birth, dental appointments, and so on. The dentist happened to be holding the card in his left hand, thus obscuring most of the list, but Osewoudt was able to catch a glimpse of the words Jagtman and Egbert, and a date: 3 December, 1916. There were three addresses, two of which were scored out.
The dentist pointed to the chart.
‘A diagram like this,’ he said, ‘gives a complete record of everything that has been done to a person’s teeth. It represents a unique combination. Rather like the combination which opens a safe. For example, here we have an inlay in the third molar in the bottom left, a filling on the inside of the second molar, an extracted eye tooth (necessitated in this case by a childhood accident — he was hit by a flying stone), three fillings in the third molar on the right, et cetera … No, no, the chances of this combination occurring in anyone else are negligible.’