A Cold Case in Amsterdam Central by Anja de Jager

Author:Anja de Jager [Jager, Anja de]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mystery
ISBN: 1472120639
Google: j-FPvgAACAAJ
Amazon: B01DSTTSAW
Barnesnoble: B01DSTTSAW
Goodreads: 33014535
Publisher: Constable
Published: 2016-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-two

Mark was parked two cars in front of us.

Here, Amsterdam was for living. Not for working or sightseeing. The streets were empty and wide. The houses were squat. They gave a sense of dependability, with their wide bases and low ceilings. They seemed sturdy. Solid. Looking at this house, nobody would have thought a little girl had been murdered here. But all the muscles in my body were tensed. Because I knew. I knew what had happened here thirty-five years ago.

Mark’s parents had moved out of Amsterdam almost immediately afterwards. At the age of eight, having a friend in another town was like having a long-distance relationship. I had no memories of meeting Mark after that moment when we’d seen his sister’s body. I remembered that I ran. I remembered his mother’s screams. Adults must have turned up at some point. Someone must have called the police. Those things must have happened but I had no memory of them. Looking back at early childhood was like that: a set of scenes, flashes into a past, not linked together, just horrible moments that shone brightly through the fog of history.

Mark got out of his car. He walked towards ours. I lowered the window.

‘Have you changed your mind?’ he said.

I shook my head but made no move to get out. For a moment it felt as if we were two children again.

‘We can just drive back.’ His eyes were pleading with me. The morning sunlight picked out the hair on his temples, more white than brown. ‘There’s nothing to see here. Can we turn back? Not go inside the house?’

I wanted to. Every fibre in my body shouted that I should go back. A brick in the middle of my stomach pushed its way towards my mouth. I don’t know what I would have done if Ingrid hadn’t been sitting beside me. ‘You can stay here,’ I told Mark.

Ingrid depressed the button on the handbrake and pulled it up. It complained with the sound of unwilling metal. ‘As long as your workmen are there to let us in,’ she said.

‘They’re not here today.’ He sighed. ‘No, I’ll come.’

We walked up the path to the front door. It was smaller than I remembered. It had only seemed large compared to the flat we’d lived in. The front door had been dark brown before. Strange I remembered that detail but not so many other things about that day. Now it was painted blue. It was the same colour as the neighbours’. It still smelled of paint. Mark got his keys out, reached past me and opened the door.

Inside it was bright. The walls were painted bone white. The skirting board was one tint darker. The colour of old ivory. Light was reflected into all corners. The wood of the window frames was painted in a rusty-red primer. There was nowhere to hide. ‘Did Frank Stapel do all the decorating?’ I said.

‘Most of it. He’d nearly finished when . . .’ He glanced up to the ceiling and blinked.

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