Mem: "It was just a vague hopeful feeling."

Vague. Too vague. So Mem had married because she thought there was some slight hope in Douwe's company. Hope for the better, of course. And the opposite came up. Even the Amsterdam dentist had seen the devil in Douwe. How devilish had the poor bugger been? Had Douwe, evilly and by premeditation, sucked Mem of her strength? Had he bedeviled her daily? Had she slowly begun to believe in a possible revolt? Had she used the courage that had served her so well in her struggle with the German army? Was her motivation clear now? Had opportunity been available? Mem knew Amsterdam, where she often stayed with her sister.

How would Grijpstra plan his attack? By himself, he wouldn't have a chance, of course, but the commissaris was sly, subtle, a more dangerous sleuth than even the sergeant himself. Once the commissaris got hold of this case…

De Gier turned pages, eager to discover another phrase that might fill a gap. What else was the literary woman think- ing? In no way will I ever be satisfied… here I am, left to my own resources… How boring… I could climb the walls… alone…

Clear enough. Mem, unsatisfied, hollow in her soul, locked in a solitude created by her willful and often absent husband, was ready to jump through her restraining walls. Egged on by the equally unhappy Gyske to find a solution, no matter how painful. But was Mem wrong?

Where did the finger of justice point? de Gier thought theoretically, for he himself couldn't care less. If order had been disturbed, it wasn't his order. He was quite content to heat pea soup from cans and bathe a rat.

He strolled through the room, circled the Louis XVI chair, and counted a row of roses on the wallpaper.

Was order disturbed? Shouldn't someone like Douwe be deftly removed? Hadn't Mem been kind enough to do society a favor? The commissaris, once on her trail, would corner her and interrogate the woman politely. Then what? Lead her on to an institute for the elderly insane? Mem wasn't quite that old.