Judas Read online

  I didn’t buy it, but I didn’t want Miljuschka to grow up without a father, and I figured I shouldn’t be so rigid. These things happen in relationships, and it could have happened to me just the same.

  Once back in Amsterdam, he came home from an errand with scratch marks on his back.

  “Did you go to her again?” I asked.

  “Of course not. What makes you think that?” he said, with childlike surprise in his voice.

  He had no idea how those marks had ended up on his back, but if I didn’t trust him, we were finished.

  From then on, he got offensive.

  Every time I suspected him of cheating, he blamed me for being sickly jealous, just like my brother. I should see a psychiatrist. I was paranoid. I even started to believe he might be right; my brother was insanely jealous and it could be genetic, and recent events had actually made me paranoid.

  A couple of months later, I hadn’t shaken my sense of unease: I was convinced he was still seeing his “one-off.” Shortly after our return from Spain, I discovered a Rotterdam telephone number in the memory of our telephone. I hadn’t tried it, because I felt I should trust him. But I had written it down and kept it.

  I decided to try the number to check whether he was still seeing her. I dialed, and a woman answered.

  “Roxanna speaking.”

  Roxanna. So that was her name, and that was why Jaap had called me Xan that time when we were making love.

  “Hello,” I said, “this is Jaap’s wife speaking. Can I ask you something?”

  “Sure,” she said with a heavy Polish accent. “Fire away.”

  “Are you still seeing Jaap?” I asked her bluntly.

  “No, he see now some other girl,” she replied. “Her husband is stabbed to death.”

  “All right.” I played it as cool as I could, trying not to let on how this remark cut through my heart. “Can I ask you another thing?”

  “Sure,” she said.

  “How long were you with Jaap?”

  “We were together for eighteen months.”

  She began to tell me about their relationship as if she was having a regular chat with a girlfriend.

  “He thinks I’m so special. He doesn’t want I work in club. He says money not important, I must go to school, I am so smart. He try make baby with me. If I have baby, he leave you. But no luck, I’m happy. He all blah blah. He likes make babies everywhere. He sick,” she concluded.

  I was flabbergasted. Not because of what she told me, but by how clearly she saw him. I secretly admired the woman who had destroyed my relationship—she said what I’d never wanted to face but had always known.

  I confronted Jaap with what Roxanna had told me about him having a new girlfriend. I begged him to be honest about it. Yes, he did, and I was crazy. I was sickly jealous.

  Shortly afterward, it came out that Jaap had impregnated another woman, the one whose husband had been stabbed to death.

  Because he always lied to me, I had surreptitiously recorded a conversation during which he asked her to keep her pregnancy secret from me. I wanted him to be honest for once and decided to force him into it. I met with him and played back the conversation. I figured he’d have to tell the truth now.

  He looked at me with big innocent eyes and shouted, “You’ve really gone mad. You constructed this recording? You are really sick!” So ridiculous was his worthless defense that I burst out laughing. This confirmed without a doubt that I’d been living in a fantasy world all these years.

  At the same time, I realized this relationship had also given me the freedom to become who I was. I’d been able to grow as a person, I was a law graduate, and I had a wonderful daughter.

  Excellent foundations for starting a new life.

  I’ve heard it said that the number of months it takes to get over a relationship equals the number of years it lasted: that would have to be thirteen months. But I didn’t intend it to take that long. I gave myself three months to get over it and that was it. I had lost a lot, but gained a lot, too, and I should rejoice at that.

  What goes around comes around. What I’d done to Jaap’s girlfriend before me was done to me by the lady with the Polish accent, and what she did to me was done to both of us by the woman who’d popped up with her pregnancy.

  Pregnant.

  Meaning Miljuschka would have a half brother or half sister, and I figured I shouldn’t look at this pregnancy through the lens of my pain, but from her point of view. I wanted Miljuschka to have as natural a relationship as possible with her father, and thus with his pregnant girlfriend, whom Miljuschka would probably encounter at some point. So I took the initiative to have a “nice” coffee date with Jaap’s family-to-be.

  The four of us sat in a café on Middenweg rather stiffly. Miljuschka didn’t have a clue what to do with this strange lady who was cheerily telling her she was going to have a “little brother or sister.”

  “Mom, who’s that lady?” she whispered into my ear.

  “She’s Daddy’s new girlfriend, and she’s going to have a baby, remember?” I said, embarrassed because she was whispering in front of the new girlfriend.

  “Oh, yeah,” she replied without seeming to remember anything. After half an hour we were all glad we could go our own ways. Miljuschka and I walked to my car, and I made an attempt to close the meeting on a light note. “Isn’t it exciting? A baby brother or sister. You’ll have so much fun!”

  “I guess,” she replied indifferently.

  Before Miljuschka got to know her, this lady, too, was replaced by another. Jaap had left her so quickly, she never bothered to inform the child about her biological father.

  Meanwhile, I’d moved to a house in Rivierenbuurt, a nice middle-class neighborhood, and Miljuschka and I were enjoying it there. She had a good routine with her father, which pleased me.

  Every Wednesday, he’d pick her up from school, they’d spend the afternoon together, and he’d drop her off at home around dinnertime.

  One night when he came in, I said, “We’re having endive for dinner. Would you like to have some?”

  “No, thanks, but we have to talk,” he said gravely.

  “Sure,” I said, “what’s up?”

  “You know my job at the club will end soon, right?”

  Yes, I knew, for Wim had come over to tell me. Jaap had created a financial mess and my brother was enraged. “He’s been stealing, the pervert, so he’s out. He completely ruined the business. All he cared about was what landed on his dick. That fucking asshole!”

  “Yes, I know that,” I told Jaap.

  “This means I won’t be able to give you money any longer,” he said dryly.

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “Exactly what I just said. Soon I’ll have no income.”

  “So what are Miljuschka and I supposed to live on? You know I don’t earn enough to get by. I can’t even pay the rent here.” I started to panic.

  “That’s your problem. I’ve got to move on, too,” he said, standing in the doorway, ready to walk away from his responsibilities.

  Just before walking out he remembered something. “Oh, here’s some mail for you.” He took an envelope from his inside pocket and threw it on the doormat. Then he was gone.

  I picked up the envelope and opened it. It was a payment reminder for a loan for seventeen thousand euros that we had lived off as a family and that had suddenly turned into “mail for me,” since the loan had been taken out in my name.

  Not only was I penniless, but now I was in debt as well.

  I ran after Jaap. “Wait a minute!” I shouted down the stairwell. “You’re not seriously leaving us behind without a penny, are you?”

  “Yes, I am,” he said without a hint of emotion. “And don’t you dare request child support, or I’ll tell the court you’re a cocaine dealer. You can try denying it, but you know as well as I do it’s not about the truth; it’s about what people think. You don’t think they’ll believe a Holleeder, do you? And you�
�ll lose your kid.” He looked up at me triumphantly.

  He was right. No one would believe me.

  I didn’t request child support. I couldn’t take the risk.

  Part II

  Heineken’s Curse

  1990–2007

  Amstelveen

  1997

  A FEW WEEKS AFTER THE FIRST ATTEMPT ON COR’S LIFE, WIM ARRANGED a temporary house on Anton Struikstraat for Sonja through Willem Endstra, a real estate mogul and Wim’s friend, so she and the kids at least had a place for themselves while they figured out what to do next. She appreciated Wim’s support. He and Cor might not agree on how to resolve the conflict with Mieremet and Klepper, the men Wim insisted were responsible for trying to kill Cor, but he hadn’t entirely forsaken her—or Cor. She wanted to believe Wim was still on their side, that he was no Judas.

  It was time to decide about their future. Sonja suggested moving abroad, but Cor wouldn’t have it. “I won’t be chased away,” he said.

  The house on Anton Struikstraat wouldn’t do for the long term. “You can see the rats running through the garden,” Sonja said. So she went looking for another house.

  Francis was already going to grade school in Amstelveen, and Sonja had put Richie in the same school when he turned four years old, together with his cousins—Gerard’s children—so he would see familiar faces. Moving to Amstelveen seemed pretty logical.

  A house on Catharina van Renneslaan was available to her if she wanted it. Because Wim had helped her with the previous house, she asked him to come check it out. He climbed onto the shed to take a peek inside and concluded it looked fine. He told Sonja she should take it.

  The only problem was that the previous tenant was asking for payment for some of the furnishings he had installed. Sonja asked Wim for some of the money she had nicked from Cor and given to Wim for safekeeping.

  He’d reacted quite strongly, saying, “You’re whining about money now? I’ve got nothing now, so don’t pester me, Boxer. I’m trying to sell the red building—after that I’ll have some cash. That man of yours gives me nothing but trouble, so don’t start putting me under pressure!”

  Taken aback by his eruption, Sonja was afraid to ask further.

  “So, did you like the house?” I asked her when I stopped by that evening.

  “The house is fine, but Wim is being crazy again. He told me he can’t give me my money because he doesn’t have any.”

  “What do you mean by ‘doesn’t have any’?”

  “He says he’s broke. He’s selling something. A red building or something. After that, he’ll give me some of it.”

  Sonja didn’t get anything, though. From the moment she’d asked for her money, Wim started dropping by. He explained it was too bad Cor hadn’t paid the million-guilder fine that Klepper and Mieremet had demanded, because that left the issue unresolved. The message was still that he’d better just pay up.

  Sonja told Wim to say this to Cor, but Wim wouldn’t. He and Cor weren’t on speaking terms. She should tell him; he was her husband, her problem.

  But Sonja was afraid to. The last time she’d suggested it might be better if Cor just paid up, he’d gotten extremely angry. She knew for sure that Cor would never pay.

  Later on, Wim showed up at Sonja’s door with a solution to the problem. If Cor wouldn’t pay, Sonja should pay his part of the fine. He’d settle it with the money she’d given to him for safekeeping. He delivered his message as if he were doing Sonja a huge favor.

  Sonja had lost her hoard of cash. For a second she thought, No way, I don’t want to do this, but immediately afterward, she was just glad she could safeguard the lives of her husband and children.

  It was just money.

  In the meantime, the conflict with Mieremet and Klepper had turned into an argument between Cor and Wim. Wim wanted to have Cor cut off, financially and otherwise. Their interests had to be divided. He was fed up with the trouble Cor caused him because of his excessive drinking, and he wanted to move on alone.

  “He’s just dropping me, Assie. That piece of filth,” Cor said. “We went through everything together, and now he cuts me off, just like that. I made him—I took him along for the ride. He owes everything he’s got to me, and when things get a little rocky, he bolts. He must be fucking kidding me, right?”

  But Wim wasn’t kidding, and he kept pushing for splitting up and dividing the capital he and Cor had built up with a little help from Robbie Grifhorst, thanks to the six million guilders missing from the Heineken ransom. In the end, Cor agreed. “Take whatever you want,” he’d told Wim. Wim took the gambling halls and the sex club on Roompotstraat. He used Willem Endstra to cover up his illegal possessions. Cor “got” Achterdam, a red-light district street in the nearby city of Alkmaar.

  By October of 1996, the split was official.

  From that moment on, Wim’s dealings with the Mieremet group became more and more open. Wim claimed that he was forced to join Mieremet and Klepper to survive the conflict with Cor.

  Cor said, “He’s a traitor, a Judas. He’s sucking up to Mieremet and Klepper now.”

  Back then, I couldn’t believe Wim would join the group that had tried to kill my brother-in-law, sister, and nephew.

  “Listen, As, no one can be forced into siding with people who want to kill your family,” Cor said, and he was right.

  Wim wasn’t forced to be around Mieremet.

  It was his choice.

  I felt ashamed at Wim’s betrayal and thought he was weak, but I still wanted to believe he only did it to save us from a bloodbath.

  That belief was eroding under the pressure of facts.

  Sometime in early 1997, Wim and Mieremet stepped into my law office on Tijl Uilenspiegelstraat in the Bos en Lommer neighborhood. It was Sunday morning, and I was alone there.

  “There.” Wim pointed to one of the office phones. Without showing the decency of introducing himself, Mieremet walked over and started to make a call.

  “What are you doing, Wim?” I asked. “Can’t you ask?”

  He didn’t answer me. He and Mieremet laughed and talked to each other like I wasn’t even there, then walked out again. They seemed to be on very familiar terms.

  I was seething with anger, knowing I’d been used; my brother had abused my duty of confidentiality. He’d clearly wanted to impress Mieremet. Not out of fear, but to flatter his way in. Like the time after that, when he said he had a job for me and took me to a café around the corner, where Mieremet was already waiting.

  Mieremet needed a lawyer to fix things for him, and Wim had told him he could get him one. His sister was a lawyer! Mieremet was interested and had summoned me.

  He started to explain what he expected his lawyers to do for him, like taking things he needed to get to the prison, delivering messages, handing over information on other clients, and showing him files—and he told me I could work for him.

  My brother had put me in a tricky situation. He was forcing me to choose between the criminal world and the normal one. Did I even have a choice, though?

  I wanted to refuse, but I was afraid to. I knew that complying would mean my life was over. I’d be their property, prone to blackmail. And they’d include me in their practices, and I’d have nowhere to turn. Say goodbye to the independence I’d been striving toward all these years.

  It was the last thing I wanted.

  No matter how scared I was, I had to find the courage to refuse. On the way to the café, Wim had been telling me to make the right impression—I realized that was exactly what I shouldn’t do. I had to come across as weak enough for Mieremet to reject me. I stared at him cross-eyed and made up some story about exclusively handling assistance cases, and never having seen the inside of prison except to visit my brother. I pointed out a long list of regulations for lawyers that couldn’t be broken, and I made it very clear I never broke the rules, how the Justice Department was already watching me like a hawk, and that I would be a risk rather than a deliverer of results.
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  Mieremet threw a disappointed glance at Wim. This whiny bitch was nothing like the kind of lawyer he was looking for.

  I’d dodged the bullet.

  Wim walked me back to the office. He was cross with me; if I had just played along he could have gotten insight into Mieremet’s business. I played dumb and avoided challenging him as I knew it would only feed his anger. I was angry that he’d wanted to hand me over to this madman, but what really enraged me was that he’d obviously chosen to associate with the criminal who’d had bullets fired at his brother-in-law, sister, and nephew. I was amazed at his impudent assumption that I’d get involved with such a person.

  He just kept pretending it was completely normal.

  Sometime after, he rang my doorbell. “Walk to my car with me.” He’d just gotten back from abroad, he said, and he’d bought a couple of watches. He opened the trunk and took out a beautiful box. “Have this one,” he said, and handed me a white gold Chopard watch. I was surprised. Apart from a puppet and the hundred guilders when he’d kidnapped Heineken, he’d never given me anything but misery.

  He hadn’t bought the watch especially for me but for a girlfriend who didn’t like it, and because it was purchased abroad, he couldn’t take it back to the store. There were two other boxes in the trunk. I could see from the boxes that they contained watches, too. He saw me looking at them.

  “For Klepper and Mieremet,” he said. Klepper and Mieremet, the men he supposedly had no connection with.

  My stomach turned over from disgust. This proved that he’d crossed over to Mieremet’s gang. Did he really expect me to be fine with that?

  I was deeply ashamed of my brother. Wim didn’t mind at all, though. No more excessive dinner parties with Cor for him; he dined at Le Garage with Endstra and Mieremet now. He skipped Francis’s birthday party but went to Mieremet’s daughter Kelly’s and even took his girlfriend Maike. Instead of Richie, he now played with Mieremet’s son Barry, who was Richie’s age. He didn’t come to Sonja’s birthday party but celebrated with Ria, Mieremet’s wife. A boat outing was planned for her thirty-fifth birthday, and Wim took Endstra as his guest.