He removed his glasses on the way up, but kept his hat on as he entered Uncle Bart’s small room.
Uncle Bart crossed to the stove, the coffee pot in one hand, a cup in the other.
‘I thought it was some gent with glasses, but it’s you.’
‘A gent with glasses? You must be getting awfully old! You should have your own glasses checked some time.’
Uncle Bart set down his cup of coffee on his desk.
‘I was about to pour you a cup, too, but if you carry on snapping at me like that I may change my mind.’
Uncle Bart was already on his way to the wall cupboard for another cup. The hat felt heavy on Osewoudt’s head. He didn’t dare take it off, nor did he dare sit down. If I sit down he’ll only notice the hat and the fact that I’m wearing it indoors.
He remained standing, but started unbuttoning his coat.
‘I’m in a terrible rush, Uncle, I must be off again straightaway. It’s just that I have some really bad news to tell you.’
Uncle Bart turned to face him. He held the cup of coffee in his hand.
‘Why don’t you sit down? Keeping something under that hat of yours, are you? Well I never, he’s got a new hat!’
He stared at Osewoudt and Osewoudt noted that his uncle was poorly shaven, as usual, and he thought: I didn’t realise Uncle Bart was so old. He said: ‘Sorry about keeping my hat on. But I’ve come to tell you that Ria and Mother have been arrested by the Germans.’
‘What did you say? Why would they do that?’
Osewoudt shrugged. Everything here smelled of lonely old man. The book lying open on the desk was by Hegel; beside the book lay a stub of aniline pencil used for making notes in the margins, which were veined with multicoloured scribbles: red, black and blue, resembling the cross section of a tumour. That’s forty years he’s been reading the same book, forty years he’s been writing in the margins.
‘Go on, boy, answer me. Why were they arrested?’
‘Why? They didn’t tell me! I wasn’t there! If I’d been there, I wouldn’t be here to tell you! Do you understand what I’m saying?’
‘But surely you could have gone to the police station to find out what was going on?’
‘Me go to the station? Me? What do you think! They’d have locked me up immediately. I can go to the police, but I won’t come back! That’s the way it is these days, understand?’
‘There’s no need to shout! You’re behaving as if it’s my fault! It wasn’t me that ran off with some floosie, remember!’
Osewoudt went up to him and grabbed his arm.
‘Come now, Uncle Bart, I didn’t run off with anyone! You don’t get it. Is Elly still here?’
‘Elly? You have the cheek to ask me where Elly is? Your wife and mother arrested and all you want to know is where that girl is? Come all the way here to wind me up, have you, acting as if butter wouldn’t melt in your mouth? Good grief, has everybody run mad? Eh? Henri? What have I done to deserve this?’
‘You don’t get it, Uncle. But I really need to know where Elly is. Now, this minute.’
‘All right then! I’ll tell you! She went chasing after you the next day. Just as well, too, that she left when she did, because you know me: I’m not prejudiced, never have been, but there are limits!’
‘She didn’t come after me at all — I haven’t seen her since, I swear. And it’s not true that I ran off with her, as you put it.’
‘Are you saying you’re not fed up with Ria? That you came here with a girl you didn’t even fancy?’
‘Uncle, listen to me, please. If it had been like that do you think I’d have come to you of all people for a place to stay?’
‘Stop arguing with me,’ said Uncle Bart. Clutching his side, he staggered to the desk and sank on to his chair. ‘Good grief! My poor sister! What a life, what a way to go! But surely that’s not possible! Even the Germans wouldn’t be such brutes as to lock up some unfortunate old woman for killing her husband years ago in a fit of insanity? They certified her as being of unsound mind!’
For killing her husband! Should he disabuse old Uncle Bart? Offer him a more likely explanation? Never! The less he knew the better!
‘Oh, Uncle Bart, you have no idea what the Germans have been getting up to, ever since 1933! People who’ve served their sentences for past crimes and who’ve been perfectly law-abiding ever since are being sent to concentration camps and done away with! Berufsverbrecher, professional criminals, that’s what they call them!’
‘I don’t care what they call them, you must still do everything you can to secure your mother’s release. It’s your duty!’
Osewoudt sat down and slurped his coffee. Turning things over in his mind, it struck him that his uncle’s assumption might not be so far-fetched after all. The Germans might indeed have come for his mother and not for him! What evidence could they have against him? Why would they have come to get her on Tuesday morning, at a time when Elly was presumably still safe with Uncle Bart? Even if Elly had already left by then, even if she’d been stopped in the street and the Germans had wrung his address from her, that still wouldn’t explain their coming for his mother and Ria on Tuesday morning!
‘Was there anything in the papers about it, Uncle?’ he asked.
‘About what?’
‘Have the Germans made any announcement about detaining former criminals and the insane? Was it on the radio? You listen to the radio every day, don’t you? Was it in a broadcast from London by any chance?’
‘How should I know? You’re the one talking about the Germans sending recidivists and people of unsound mind to concentration camps without trial, not me! All I said was that I can’t see why they would arrest an old woman who had an unfortunate accident involving her husband ten years ago, who’s been before the courts, who’s been treated in an institution and who’s never hurt a fly since! And what about Ria? What did she do?’
‘I don’t know, Uncle. Everybody’s up to something, but not everybody’s found out! Take yourself, you have a radio, you listen to broadcasts from London, that alone could get you two years hard labour. The Germans can arrest anybody they like, only for being in breach of some rule of theirs. Not that they abide by the rules — they just go around arresting people anyway! How could I possibly find out why they’ve taken Ria?’
‘What’s wrong with you? Are you daft? Grow up! Are you going to allow your wife and mother to disappear without lifting a finger? Damn you, didn’t it ever occur to you to get hold of a lawyer?’
‘A lawyer? But my dear Uncle Bart, it’s not as if we’re living under the rule of law. You must be mad. Do you want to be arrested too? The first thing they’d ask any lawyer requesting information is: who sent you?’
‘He could say it was me!’ Uncle Bart cried. ‘Let him say I sent him, let the lawyer say: I am here on behalf of Mr Nauta, the brother of old Mrs Osewoudt and the father of young Mrs Osewoudt. I’ll instruct the lawyer accordingly. Do you hear, Henri? I’m not afraid! And if the Germans consider someone like your mother a danger to the public, I’m prepared to reach a compromise with them. I’ll do whatever it takes, but they’re not sending her to some concentration camp! I’ll offer to put her in a private clinic at my expense!’
Osewoudt’s jaw began to twitch, he was barely capable of remaining seated. His forehead itched unbearably under the brim of the hat. Without realising what he was doing he took off the hat and wiped his forehead.
‘What on earth?’
Breathing noisily, Uncle Bart leaned forwards, open-mouthed, stubble down to his Adam’s apple.
‘I said,’ Osewoudt went on, ‘that it’s no use sending a lawyer because the Germans won’t take any notice. Believe me, Hitler isn’t the same as Hegel, even if they both begin with an H! If we could fork out 20,000 guilders, or 50,000, it would be different, then they might listen!’