"And then we became aware of the mounted cop, also watching him," Sara said. "Mounted cops look nice in America. Not operatic-looking, like here. No long coats and stupid hats. In America their wear blue helmets. And that policewoman had a long ponytail. She wore a smart uniform. Dark riding pants, a blue starched shirt. A lot of leather. High boots. Belt."
"Nice-Nazi," Joop said. "Gun belt with hardware, complete, all the sidearms and a two-way radio with waving antenna. Like in Star Wars. I liked those films," Joop said. "I don't like the police myself, of course. They're all fascists, you know. Will do anything when ordered. Like in the war when they picked up my parents. Dutch cops did that, because the Germans said to take all Jews to the railway station. If I hadn't been playing outside they would have kicked me into a boxcar too. To gas me in Treblinka."
"Yes," Grijpstra said.
"Nothing personal," Joop said. "Obedience to authority goes with being human. We like to follow orders. Gets us up in the morning. We like violence too. Now there are Jewish police on the West Bank and in Gaza. Doing the same thing. Then that will turn around and they'll be beating us up again." Joop smiled, impressed with the exactitude of his argument. "Maybe humanity can evolve though? Suddenly twist its genes and become a new species?"
"Joop," Sara warned.
"So the Central Park female police officer on horseback caused her mount to kick Termeer?" Grijpstra asked. "That was his name, by the way, the name of the man you call a prophet. She attacked Bert Termeer, using her horse as a weapon?"
"No," Joop said. "That's to say, not on purpose. This Termeer was standing still, like a statue of someone, about to take off at speed, and then suddenly he did. He leaped onto the path, to start skipping again-the other part of his act-and the horse reared and its hoof struck him."
"The policewoman ignored that?" Grijpstra asked. "She rode off? Left the scene of an accident without taking proper action?"
"No," Sara said. "She dismounted and asked him if he was okay. He said he was, and then she rode off. But he wasn't okay. Soon after that the man-Mr. Termeer- started reeling and swaying. We helped him over to a bench. The policewoman was still in view, riding about in the meadow where the people were bopping to jazz from the bandstand. When we started yelling and waving, she came back and got nasty."
"Ordered us 'on our way,'" Joop said. "We're not the kind of people that can be ordered around, you know. We complained about her. Left our card at the Park Precinct."
"Of course," Sara said, "we didn't expect to get any response."
"You didn't get the messages the NYPD left on your machine?" Grijpstra said.
Sara blushed.
"Before we went on our trip I bought a new answering machine," Joop said. "When we came home Sara pressed the wrong button and erased everything. So this gentleman-Termeer-died, did he? What of, do you know?"
"Maybe a heart attack," Grijpstra said. "The body was found in some azalea bushes, dressed in rags, partly covered by a filthy blanket. Animals had consumed some of the corpse. Mr. Termeer's dentures were found at a distance from the body." The adjutant produced the faxed NYPD report and accompanying photograph, which had come through fairly clearly. Then he folded the papers and put the photo back in his inside jacket pocket. "I don't think you want to see this."
Joop was quiet. Sara poured more coffee.
"Termeer wasn't having a heart attack," Joop said while he passed around nonpareils. "Not when we saw him. I have had two heart attacks myself. He didn't seem to have a headache, wasn't feeling his neck, there was nothing wrong with his left arm, none of the well-known symptoms. He was just dazed, but after we helped him sit down I'm sure he felt much better."
"Were there any other people around?" Grijpstra asked.
Nobody. By then, both Lakmakers stated, events in the meadow were in full swing: The balloon dinosaur was being launched, the jazz band was playing.
'"When the Saints Go Marching In,'" Joop said.
The look-alikes and wannabes were lining up for their contest. There was nobody else at the crossing where Termeer, cared for by the Lakmaker couple, was recuperating from shock.
Grijpstra seemed ready to leave the Lakmakers' residence when de Gier took over. "Why," he asked Joop, "did you pay so much attention to this, this George Bernard Shaw type?"
"You don't know about George Bernard Shaw," Joop said. "How could you, policeman? What is your rank?"
"Yes," Grijpstra looked at de Gier. "George Bernard Who?"
Grijpstra looked at Joop. "De Gier is a sergeant."
"The sergeant reads a lot," Grijpstra told Sara. "Without using dictionaries. It takes him a few years to pick up a language. He likes languages, you see."
"You graduated from a grammar school?" Joop asked de Gier. "Wouldn't that qualify you for academic study? Shouldn't you be an inspector then, or a lieutenant or something?"
It took a while for de Gier to get the witnesses to confirm that Termeer had made an extraordinary impression. It wasn't just being good Samaritans, for they weren't, both Sara and Joop admitted. In New York they had stepped over homeless people, ignored beggars, walked away from traffic accidents. And it wasn't just New York-they would do that anywhere. At the most they would "alert the authorities," but the authorities, in Termeer's case, were right there. So when Bert Termeer was sent reeling by the policewoman's horse, the couple interfered for other reasons.
"Because you were upset with the authorities?" de Gier asked.
Joop was willing to go along with that, as an easy way out, but Sara said she wanted to be honest.
The interrogation continued. Honest is nice. De Gier was smiling at Sara. He liked her.
"No," Sara confessed. Now that she was old and retired and more able to watch the human situation as is she no longer felt much pity. Her sense of duty was way down too. If a man gets hurt by the police there is little one can do. She did do that little, by complaining about the policewoman at the Central Park Precinct, but normally she wouldn't have done that either. Certainly not in America where she happened to be as a tourist.
So what was abnormal? Why did Sara Lakmaker involve herself with a man she had already called prophet-like, philosopher-like, Shaw- and/or Voltaire-like0…
"Who is Voltaire?" Grijpstra asked de Gier. "One of your nihilists again?"
De Gier didn't think so. "Voltaire insisted on being rich; it guaranteed his independence."
"A benevolent atheist," Joop said, "who abhorred useless punishment."
"The sergeant likes the idea of Nothing," Grijpstra told the Lakmakers. "He lives in an empty apartment and he doesn't have a car. He does buy clothes, though. Has them made. But he doesn't have many."
"Are you married?" Joop asked de Gier.
"He is not," Grijpstra said.
"Ever been married?"
"That wouldn't be consistent with his insight, would it now?" Grijpstra asked.
"You have a dog?"
"He lives with a cat," Grijpstra said.
"You really have no car?"
"Never," Grijpstra said.
"I did own an orange Deux Chevaux once," de Gier said, "but it was stolen."
"But he doesn't have a TV," Grijpstra said.
"And he doesn't talk much," Joop told his wife. "The fat policeman does that for him."
Grijpstra looked at Joop.
"Pordy," Joop said, patting his own protruding stomach. "I am sorry, policeman."
"Joop," warned Sara.
"So you like the idea of Nothing?" Joop asked de Gier. "You want to own Nothing or you want to be Nothing?"
De Gier was still chewing on his nonpareil.
"The sergeant wants to be Nothing," Grijpstra said. "But he can't tell you that because then he makes Something out of Nothing. We often discuss that apparent controversy. I always get tangled up."