She held up a curtain at the back of the shop. Hamish ducked his head and went through. There was a sort of back parlour-cum-kitchen and a glass door leading out into a sunny courtyard.
"We cycle," she said.
"You're coming with me?"
"I show you some of Amsterdam, yes? I am Anna." She held out a small hand.
"Hamish."
"Haymeesh? What sort of name is that?"
"It's Highland, Scottish for James."
"I love the Scots. So we go."
They wheeled bicycles out into a narrow cobbled street which ran along by a canal. She pedalled off and Hamish, with a feeling of exhilaration, mounted and pedalled after her.
"I do not know what you are talking about," said Greta, facing the two Glaswegians. "My friend Anna went off with her friend."
The one called Sammy thrust his face close to Greta's and said menacingly, "You'd better tell us, hen."
Greta pressed an alarm button under the counter and took a step back. "I do not know what you are or what you want," she said. "Get out of here."
The alarm button was not only connected to the local police station, but lit up a warning light outside the door of the shop, which, unknown to the two Glaswegians, was flashing like a beacon.
So that just as Sammy was about to utter further threats, suddenly there were four very large Dutch policemen in the shop.
Greta spoke in rapid Dutch. The Glaswegians were handcuffed and led off. One policeman waited behind and took a statement from Greta. "It's Anna," said Greta ruefully. "I don't know who the man is she went off with. He was very tall, with flaming-red hair. British."
Water, water, everywhere, thought Hamish as Anna's delectable rump bobbed on the bicycle in front of him. They shot down cobbled streets, each one looking remarkably like the other, and then along the banks of yet another canal until Anna stopped in front of a tall building.
"I live up there," she said. "Coffee?"
Hamish's spurt of rebellion was beginning to fade. Olivia's cold and angry face rose in his mind's eye. But, hey, he was supposed to be in charge of the operation.
Olivia was pacing up and down in front of Pieter. "What do I do now?" she asked. "He's been gone for ages. They may have killed him."
"I shouldn't think so," said Pieter. "I'll go off and check with my contacts with the police."
Hamish was sitting by a sunny window in Anna's kitchen, sipping coffee and enjoying the foreignness of it all. The very coffee he was drinking tasted foreign and exotic.
"Hamish/" Anna's voice calling from another room.
He got to his feet. "Where are you?"
"In here."
He looked into the living room: heavy carved fruitwood furniture, canary in a cage by the window, tall dresser with thick pottery blue-and-white mugs and plates.
"Hamish!"
He pushed open a door. The bedroom. Anna lying on the bed, naked.
"Come here." She held out her hand.
"I haff n-not the p-protection," he said, but approached the bed all the same, gazing at the ripe young body as if hypnotised.
She turned away from him and jerked open the drawer of a bedside table. "Help yourself"
Hamish moved round the large double bed and looked down into the drawer. Piles of condoms.
"I d-don't think…" he began, but she reached up and wrapped her arms around his neck.
"We have a little fun… yes?"
How long had he been gone? wondered Olivia. He had left at nine in the morning and it was now approaching two in the afternoon. No word from Pieter. What should she do? She was feeling guilty. She knew she had treated him with unusual coldness. Soon, she would need to phone Strathbane and tell them what had happened. Then Pieter's discreet inquiries would be no good. There would need to be a full-scale police search for Hamish Macbeth.
There was a knock at the door. "Hamish!" she cried, and ran to open it. But it was Pieter who stood there.
"Any news?"
"Yes."
"Is he alive?"
"Very much so."
"What happened?"
"They have video cameras at about every street corner in central Amsterdam. By running back the film of the street corners near the hotel for about the time you said Hamish disappeared, we saw him leave. He went into a souvenir shop. The woman said he had gone off with her friend Anna, who sometimes minds the shop for her. They left by the back way. The two Glaswegians came in and threatened her. She pressed the alarm bell and got them arrested. They have been told they are not welcome in Holland and sent on their way. I told the police at a high level that arresting them would complicate our business here."
"But this Anna…?"
"She's a prostitute. Friend Greta tried to claim she was just a girl who likes a good time. But she's on the books. She does have a good time but she takes money for it. I wonder what excuse our friend Hamish will have when he eventually shows up."
Hamish Macbeth awoke from a deep sleep. He felt marvellous. Then he looked at the clock. Two in the afternoon?
He hurriedly got into his clothes. He shook Anna awake. "I've got to go."
She smiled up at him. "I'll have another sleep. Just leave the money on the table."
Hamish's mouth dropped open.
"I take sterling," she said cheerfully. "Fifty pounds."
Hamish fished out his wallet. Anna had closed her beautiful eyes again.
Vanity, vanity, he thought dismally. And I thought you fancied me. At least he was carrying around enough money in his role of drug baron. He peeled off the money and put it down on the table.
He made his way down the narrow dark staircase and stood outside blinking in the sunlight. He didn't know where he was. How on earth was he going to explain his absence? Perhaps he could say that he had given the Glaswegians the slip and then turned and followed them, to see if they contacted anyone. That would do.
He walked and walked down cobbled streets and along by canals until he saw a taxi and hailed it. "Hilton," he said, and lay back in the cab, thinking all the while of Olivia's angry face.
He used his own key to let himself into the hotel room.
Pieter and Olivia were sitting in armchairs. They looked up at him, waiting, waiting, and with that Highland sixth sense of his, he all at once knew that somehow they knew not only where he had been but what he had been doing.
"Where have you been?" asked Olivia.
Hamish pulled up another chair and sat down. Nothing but the truth would serve.
"I've been making a fool of myself." He sighed. "It wass like this. I felt confined in here. I've never been abroad before and I thought the only part of Amsterdam I'm going to see is this hotel room and maybe the odd restaurant or nightclub. I only meant to walk around for a bit. I went into a souvenir shop around the corner and I met this girl. I could see the Glaswegians across the road and wanted to give them the slip. She led me out the back way, lent me a bicycle and asked me to follow her and I did. We went to her flat. I didn't know she was a prostitute until she demanded payment. I paid her and came back."
"And this is what I'm supposed to be working with," said Olivia to Pieter. "The village idiot abroad. I'd better phone Strathbane and abort the whole business. This man"-she jerked a contemptuous thumb at Hamish-"is going to get us all killed."
Pieter repressed a smile. He had expected Hamish to tell some highly embroidered lie. The fact that Hamish had told nothing but the truth amused him. Also Pieter found Olivia's dictatorial manner irritating. Men must stick together against bullying women. Poor Olivia, had she been a man, Pieter would have backed her all the way.
"I think that Strathbane would be furious with you for aborting an already expensive operation," said Pieter smoothly, "and as you are in charge of this case, it is you who would look bad, not Hamish here."
Olivia felt suddenly weary. Oh, what it was to be a woman.' Hamish would emerge as a bit of a lad and she would emerge as a carping bitch.