The safe house had been stripped of all but the most inexpensive of furnishings, and De Jaager’s lawyer alerted to his client’s desire for a quick sale. Already the lawyer had interested parties eager to view the property, even though its precise location had not yet been shared with them. The starting price was five million euros, but De Jaager expected the final offer to exceed that by ten or twenty percent. It would assure him of a great deal of comfort in the winter of his years. He might even travel a little, if the mood took him, although he found airports wearying and people more wearying still. There were many countries he had not yet seen, but the effort of reaching them would almost certainly be greater than the rewards they promised. Possibly he would remain in Amersfoort, and walk each day to Café Onder de Linde for soup and coffee, and a glass of genever to keep out the cold. Eva used to say that he would be lost without her, and she also would therefore be required to relocate from Amsterdam to Amersfoort in order to keep an eye on him. She made it sound like a joke, but De Jaager knew it was more than that. He had become a father to her following the death of her parents, steering her through grief and her rebellious late teens. She had not wanted to be without him, nor he without her. But he had failed to protect her, and her life had come to an end in the waters of an Amsterdam canal. Now, in the time that was left to him, he would mourn her, and have discourse with her ghost in Amersfoort.

He arrived at the safe house. A light burned behind the shutters in the kitchen. Anouk would be there with her son, Paulus; and Liesl, who had survived while her friend Eva had not, and would always feel guilty for it. In his right hand De Jaager held a bottle of champagne: a 1959 Dom Pérignon, one of only 306 ever produced, none of which was ever officially offered for sale. It was probably worth fourteen or fifteen thousand euros, and De Jaager could think of no better company with whom to share it.

For the last time, he placed his key in the lock of the door, entered the hallway of the late seventeenth-century dwelling, and waited for the living and the dead to greet him, each in their own way.

‘Ik ben hier, Ik ben hier,’ he announced, and noticed how different his voice sounded now that the building had been emptied of much of its contents. ‘Et Ik bring rijkdom!’

He walked to the kitchen and glanced inside. A man was seated against the wall beside the fireplace, his hands lying by his sides, palms up. He stared straight ahead, but saw nothing. On the wall behind him was a smear of blood, bone, and gray matter.