Cardozo dialed the telephone. "Not outside the city," Mrs. Cardozo said. "Your father doesn't like that. The bill is too high already."

"Sergeant?" Cardozo said. "It's me."

"You were dialing too long," Mrs. Cardozo said. "You're outside the city. Keep it short, Simon, or your father will be at me again."

"Do you have Douwe Scherjoen's photo?" Cardozo asked.

"Ask Grijpstra," de Gier said. "The commissaris went off with Grijpstra, but something must have gone wrong. They're presently being saved by the State Police, between Tzum and Tzummarum."

"Is that close to Dingjum?"

"It's in Friesland," de Gier said. "Fm not Frisian. I'm not in on this. I cook pea soup from a can and take care of a rat-and of a Frisian lady who'll be fetching me in a moment."

"I've got to have that photo," Cardozo said, "if I am to do my work. Shall I come and get it myself?"

"How?" de Gier asked. "Grijpstra has the car. The commissaris has lost his car, in a well between gardens. You can't declare expenses because you'd be moving outside your area."

"A train ticket will cost some money," Cardozo said.

"You're an idealist, aren't you?"

"Aren't you one too?"

"A nihilist," de Gier said. "Nihilists don't give a shit about anything-at that depth one has to be advanced. You aren't anywhere near there yet. Look here, why don't you cycle to Friesland tomorrow? I've just watched the news, the weather should be fine. It's only forty miles or so. Make it a holiday, watch the birds from the dike. Ever seen a cormorant land? They splash down and flop up. A great sight."

"You're really not in on this?" Cardozo asked.

"No," de Gier said. He replaced the phone. The sergeant wandered past the flowery wallpaper, the imitation Gothic dining room table, the copy of a Louis XVI recliner, and then past a clothes chest modeled on an antique Eastern Dutch design.