Hendricksen made the flight to Amsterdam with thirty minutes to spare, the imprecations of his spurned dinner companion still ringing in his ears. As anticipated, she had not understood the reason for his sudden departure. Then again, he did not completely understand it himself. He had no particular obligation to the American named Louis, beyond the fact that Louis had helped put an end to the man who was probably responsible for his colleague Yvette Visser’s murder in England. Visser’s body had still not been found, and was unlikely ever to be discovered now that her killer was dead. It was not even as though Louis had set out to uncover the truth behind her disappearance, or achieve some measure of justice for her. The culprit’s death had merely been incidental to a larger investigation.

But sometimes, Hendricksen thought, we encounter individuals who are beyond the norm, persons who inspire a loyalty and respect that can be neither analyzed nor quantified. If they ask a favor, they do so in the knowledge that another can, and should, be asked in return, and will not be refused. Hendricksen wasn’t sure that he would ever require the kind of favor Louis was capable of reciprocating. He certainly hoped he wouldn’t, because he suspected it would involve violent death, and Hendricksen was generally reluctant to involve himself in troubles of such magnitude.

He retrieved his car from the external parking facility at the airport Hyatt Hotel, dumped his bags at his apartment, and removed the Glock 17 from the safe in his closet. The Netherlands had some of the strictest gun laws in the world, with civilian ownership restricted to law enforcement, hunters, or those, like Hendricksen, who were members of gun clubs. Even taking one’s pistol to a shooting club required that it first be disassembled before being placed in a secure case. Open or concealed carry was forbidden. Hendricksen was a member of a club in Floradorp, but rarely visited the range. He disliked firearms. They held bad memories for him. Unfortunately, in his line of work he occasionally encountered men and women, but mostly men, who demonstrated no small disregard for the Netherlands’ gun laws – any laws, come to think of it. The Vuksans undoubtedly fell into this category, and therefore a weapon was advisable. Finally, Hendricksen took a small bag from the base of the closet and placed it in his backpack.