Hard Rain Read Online Free PDF Page B

jacket. Then we—well, the cops I mean—started shooting back and a police bullet hit a detective behind the telephone booth. Sloppy strategy, the men are saying."
    "So it seems," the commissaris said. "Halba, eh?"
    "Nasty man," Miss Antoinette said. "He keeps bothering me too. I'm complaining now, sir. The sergeant I don't really mind."
    "Yes," the commissaris sighed. "Halba is a present I think I could do without. I wish he had stayed with Narcotics. He was doing well there, I hear. Murder requires a different approach altogether."
    "You should hear what the girls at Narcotics have to say about Halba, sir."
    The commissaris waved a small hand. "Yes, dear, but that's just talk. I heard something too. Narcotics is slippery ground, a lot of money is involved. There are informers to be paid off, rival gangs to be played against each other. Halba would fit well into that scene. What interests me is why he would apply for a transfer to my deparment."
    "Yes," Miss Antoinette said briskly.
    "You're interested too?"
    "Maybe I know."
    "You do?" the commissaris asked. "Well, then, tell me."
    "He's after your job, sir. Commissaris ranks higher than chief inspector, doesn't it?"
    The commissaris sipped his coffee. "Well, he'll have to wait."
    "Maybe he won't, sir." Miss Antoinette walked to the door. "Anything else? Can I send in Grijpstra and de Gier?"
    "Yes. Please do."
    The commissaris thought Miss Antoinette had attractive hips, and an even more attractive way of swinging them when she suddenly turned. He opened the file she had placed next to his cup, and grunted irritably as he read.
    There was a knock on the door. "Yes?" His assistants walked in, in order of rank.
    "Well," the commissaris said twenty minutes later, when the three of them were looking at a map that de Gier had unrolled on the paneled wall. "Reopen two closed cases? Are you sure now, Adjutant? Won't we be stepping on long toes?"
    "But you are interested, sir," Grijpstra said. "Especially as you're sort of personally involved."
    "You knew the dead banker," de Gier said. "How was that now? Martin IJsbreker's father and your father were partners?"
    "I don't think Martin was born then," the commissaris said. "All this goes back a long way, Sergeant. There were four partners in the Banque du Credit, but my father backed out. That left three. IJsbreker Senior, Baron de la Faille, and old Mr. Fernandus. I knew them all, since we moved in the same circles. Willem, old Mr. Fernandus's son, went to school with me.
    "But you aren't friends with Willem Fernandus, the bank's current president, anymore?"
    "Please," the commissaris said. "I don't even greet Willem when we meet in the street. That bank's reputation has gone down even further, Sergeant. Fernandus has been in a lot of scandals. His practice as an attorney is infamous, as you know if you've been reading the papers."
    "The Society for Help Abroad?" Grijpstra asked.
    "Started by Willem Fernandus," the commissaris said, "and very likely linked with his bank. That bank has never had a good aura about it; that's why my father got rid of his shares. It only has one office, situated fairly close to the prostitution quarter. The bank reputedly helped the German occupation. Fernandus was a double agent who somehow managed to jump clear when the war was over."
    "Willem Fernandus," Grijsptra said, "not his dad."
    "Yes, Willem," the commissaris said. "Let me see now. I think my father and the others all had equal shares. My father sold out, and old Fernandus may then have had half. Willem inherited half of that, so he only got a quarter, but his brother Ernst was never interested in business, so Willem may effectively control Ernst's shares as well. Then Willem married the Baroness de la Faille, whom I also know; she's an old lady now, and divorced. Fleur's share probably went to Willem. But Fleur only inherited half of her father's stake, for he married again and had a son. The son I met once, when he was still a child. I