‘You’re just a little boy.’
‘No I’m not. I’m a big boy, I’m just small for my age, and that’s not my fault.’
‘Oh? You’re a big boy, are you? Are you quite sure? If you’re such a big boy, then why don’t you give me a kiss?’
He went outside with Ria and looked back at the house. ‘It’s such a long time since I was here last,’ he said. ‘I’d forgotten what it looked like.’
It was a tall, narrow canal house. Beside the door was a black marble plaque with gilt lettering: BELLINCOFF LTD., HABERDASHERS.
‘Why doesn’t it say Nauta?’
‘Bellincoff’s just the name of the firm.’
‘Why does it say haberdashers? Is that the same as birds’ feathers?’
‘No, it says haberdashers, but practically the only things Papa sells is birds’ feathers.’
‘Can it make you rich?’
‘Papa does quite well out of it. A hat with feathers costs an awful lot of money, and not many people wear hats with feathers these days. So Papa’s the only one in Amsterdam still selling feathers.’
‘Why is the street along this canal called Oudezijds Achterburgwal? What does it mean?’
‘It means that this was a rampart in the old days.’
‘Why are those ladies sitting in the windows wearing pink petticoats?’
‘They’re ladies who do it for money.’
‘What do they do for money?’
‘They’re nice to men.’
‘Like you’re nice to me?’
‘Shut up, will you? Or I won’t let you near me again, do you hear?’
Uncle Bart thought Osewoudt should go on to university when he was old enough, so he sent him to secondary school.
Osewoudt proved to be an amenable but quiet pupil.
Every night he slept in Ria’s bed. When he turned fifteen he realised he found her ugly. And then he also realised why the other boys’ furtive gossip didn’t interest him. Why listen to ill-informed whisperings about things he had been doing for ages, night after night, without any qualms? This wasn’t what worried him, what did worry him was that he was apparently the only one doing these things, and also that Ria was the only girl who would let him do them. He thought of ways of getting rid of her, but getting rid of her was not the main thing, the main thing was how to replace her.
Somewhere near Landsmeer, not far from Amsterdam, he found a spot quiet enough for his purpose.
They got off their bikes and lay down in the lee of the dyke. The girl’s name was Clelia Bieland.
‘You’re revolting!’
‘Revolting? But my uncle says it’s a matter of natural selection!’
She jumped up, grabbed her bike and rode off as fast as she could.
The next day he was summoned by the principal. For a secondary-school principal the man was remarkably young.
‘Look here, Osewoudt, Clelia Bieland’s father complains you’ve been telling his daughter smutty stories.’
‘But sir, I only told her what my uncle says about natural selection …’
‘I know your uncle very well, as it happens. Bart Nauta. Good man; used to be a Communist. He feels bad about having turned his back on a revolution which, in its pure form, has long ceased to exist. He realises that, but he’s sorry all the same. Puts out the flag on the queen’s birthday, votes and pays his taxes like everybody else, but tries to ease his conscience by clinging desperately to ideals that don’t stand much of a chance in society at large: abstinence from spirits, no smoking, and discussions about sexual liberation. Hard ideals to live up to, at least for anyone who’s addicted to drink and tobacco and lives a monogamous life. What good would they do anyway? Your uncle talks about natural selection, but the books he reads are all out of date.’
‘What about anti-militarism, then?’
‘Anti-militarism? Germany and the Soviet Union are busy building the mightiest armies the world has ever seen! Hitler wants to conquer the whole world, ditto Russia. Are we to be anti-militarists and let ourselves be killed off as saints? Don’t get me wrong, your uncle’s a fine man, but don’t believe everything he says. Promise?’
The principal held out his hand.
After school he saw Clelia Bieland cycling off with another boy, the same age as him but a head and a half taller.
That same week he joined a judo club. He stopped taking down books from his uncle’s shelves. He did his homework with listless diligence, got reasonably good marks, but he was only really interested in judo. Sometimes he thought of paying a visit to one of the whores along Oudezijds Achterburgwal, but although he knew several by their first names — they were neighbours, after all — none of them ever came on to him. And why put himself out? At night, after his uncle and aunt had gone to bed, he would rumple his sheets and creep down to Ria’s room.
Exactly how his mother had killed his father he still did not know.
One Ascension Day he went on his own to his childhood home in Voorschoten. First he took the blue tram to Haarlem. There he changed to another blue tram, which took him to Leiden. In Leiden he caught yet another blue tram in the direction of The Hague.
He got off in Voorschoten, at the north end of the high street. He took in the surroundings as if he were a stranger. There stood the house with the municipal coat of arms on the front: three chewed fingernails. In the same building, or in an annexe, were the school he had attended and the police station. Slightly closer to the centre was the Reformed Protestant church, with its steeple like an upright Zeppelin. Further along rose the medieval tower of the St Willibrord church. He headed towards the narrow high street, his eyes fixed on the NO OVERTAKING sign.
The tram he had travelled on came past, darkening the street. Each house smelled of crime and murder. He looked in all the windows, but there weren’t any whores. He felt as if something awful would befall him. At the tobacco shop he slowed down, but didn’t dare stop. Blinds covered the door and the display window. EUREKA CIGARS AND CIGARETTES, it said in silver letters on the glass; had the E and K been just as tarnished in the old days?
* * *
Sluimer’s garage, next door to the tobacco shop, was closed. Across the way was a new sweet shop belonging to the C. Jamin chain. The small white building opposite the other tram stop still had a sign saying CENTRAL SHOE REPAIRS. Central, they called it … yet it was at the far end of the high street, by the stop where the tramlines diverged again.
Should he step into the chemist’s and see how Evert Turlings was doing? But just then a tram from The Hague arrived, and Osewoudt got on, feeling as if he’d shaken off a pursuer. He took a window seat and stared outside. Again he went past the tobacco shop. He now saw, along the top of the display, a yellow sign: NORTH STATE CIGARETTES.
His Aunt Fie did not like him.
She often received women friends, and he began to notice that they stopped talking the moment he entered the living room.
He therefore often gave in to the temptation to linger in the passage and put his ear to the door when his aunt had visitors.
‘Don’t you ever worry about him?’
‘Well, what can I say, with a mother like that? It’s a wonder he’s alive at all.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Didn’t I tell you? He was a seven-months baby. Yes, and do you know, he wasn’t even born properly. His mother just dropped him into the po one day, along with her stools.’
‘Really?’
‘Well, he looks it, too.’
‘He won’t make old bones, I shouldn’t think.’
‘That pale girlish face of his, and the wispy fair hair.’
‘Is he really getting on for seventeen?’
‘Yes, and still not shaving.’
‘What? My boy was shaving at fourteen!’
‘Well, it isn’t normal, is it? He got off to a bad start. We’ll have to wait and see whether he grows into a proper man.’