The Devil's Playground (50 page)

in the armchair, the fight draining out of him.

‘If that was true, then she’d be with you now. It’s not my

fault.’

Dominic put his hand through his hair again. The thin

blond locks looked like a hay bale torn apart by terrible

winds. “I know. But I had to blame someone.’

Jon accepted this. ‘And now?’ he asked.

‘I told you I made a mistake. I need your help.’

‘And why should I give it to you?’

‘Because it’s for Jake, not for me.’

Jon edged forward, tried to keep his voice under control.

Who killed him, Dominic? Was it you?’

Dominic laughed. ‘You still haven’t guessed, have you?’

‘Then tell me.’

‘I can do better than that. I can show you.’ He looked up

at Jon. What do you know about the 49 reels?’

Heart beating fast: ‘Only what’s on the site, what I’ve been

told, but I know they had something to do with Jake’s death.’

With Jake’s death?’ Dominic paused, contemplating what

Jon had said. ‘I suppose they did in a way. You know I hadn’t

thought of that but I suppose you’re right, Jon.’ He exhaled

the cigarette smoke and watched it dissipate above him.

Dominic got up, went to the kitchen and came back with

two mugs of coffee. How perfectly English, Jon thought,

mugs of coffee. It was the first time he’d seen that in Amsterdam

and it was strangely comforting. He looked at all the

computers and black plastic devices, projectors and editing

boxes that filled the walls of the room and at Bill who’d

curled up beside his feet. He was restless, wanting to know,

sensing that things had come to a certain point of unravelling.

What mistake did you make?’

Dominic sipped his coffee, burning his tongue. ‘Jake realized

too late that Quirk had betrayed him. He’d trusted

the piercer, thought he would help us with the work, his

background, all that. But you can never tell, can you? I went

there the other day because I wanted to nail that sonofabitch

Quirk.’

‘What happened?’

‘I told him I knew all about him. He jumped me. Old

fuck’s quicker than he seems.’ Dominic pulled up his shirt.

There was a large purple-black bruise spreading over his left

kidney. ‘That’s what happened. I’ve been pissing blood for

the last two days. I fucked up. Happy?’

‘How did you get out of there?’

‘The buzzer went. He was distracted. I kicked him in the

balls and ran. What else could I do?’

Jon thought about what the detective had told him. ‘What

was Jake’s connection with Quirk?’

‘Quirk was a survivor. Another one. A kid in the camp,

been in and out of institutions most of his life. The Doctor

introduced them. Of course Jake found it useful that this

man was a piercer. I think he used him for that. But Quirk

promised us. He pretended to be part of the cause. His

background … we thought…’

What do you need me to do?’ Jon interrupted.

‘I’ve hidden the reels.’ Dominic leaned forward, bridging

the gap between them. ‘I knew that someone would eventually

trace them back here. I always knew that. It was never a

concern. No, time was, that was all. I had to get them

converted into MPEGs.’

Where are they?’ Jon asked, feeling himself being drawn

in again, like a sea stone caught in the drift of a whirlpool.

‘I hid them in the museum, the JHM.’ Dominic laughed.

‘Kind of fitting, don’t you think? In the basement. Room

435. Where they keep all their film archives. The auction

finishes tomorrow. I didn’t need the originals once I’d

digitally encoded them. It was too much of a risk keeping

them here.’

‘You’re going to sell to the highest bidder come Sunday?’

‘No chance.’ Dominic splashed the mug down on the

table.

‘No?’

‘That was never the plan.’

‘The plan?‘Jon was getting frustrated with his half-replies,

with the sense that Dominic still wasn’t telling him everything,

still playing games.

‘Jake’s plan. He had the films. Kaplan gave them to him

as a special present. A farewell gift, you might call it. Jake

needed someone who knew how to transfer them on to a

computer, how to post it on the net, so we worked together.’

‘This was all Jake’s idea?‘Jon said, a light starting to glint

through the darkness.

‘He thought these films needed disseminating. He became

obsessed with it. He was right.’

Jon shifted in his seat. ‘What happens Sunday midnight?’

‘The complete footage goes out on a live video feed to

anyone who wants to see it.’

‘My God, why?’

Why? Christ, Jon. Jake said you weren’t much of a Jew.

Don’t you see that these films are unique? That they need

exposure? People need to see this. They stand outside of

everything we’ve seen about the Holocaust. Nothing like

this has ever been unearthed before. Don’t you see the

possibilities?’

Jon wasn’t sure which possibilities Dominic was talking

about but he nodded anyway, sure that the strange Yorkshireman

would explain himself.

‘These are pure images compared to what we’ve already

watched. It’ll reawaken the Holocaust, redeem it from the

banality and comedy it’s become. The auction is just a

medium through which to open up interest, electronic foreplay

in an age where the brevity of 8 mm is a symbol of a

gone world.’ Dominic laughed to himself, then stared right

back at him.

Jon wondered if all the men around Suze were like this.

He remembered Wouter’s preachy epistle on freedom and

sin. Now this. Did she attract this kind of man or was it just

coincidence?

Dominic continued: ‘There’s something to them beyond

mere images, Jon, there’s a palpable sense of history there, a

sense of something lost in the last fifty years, frozen in time

and revived again in this new century to redeem what has

been corrupted in the interim.’ Dominic stopped to take a

breath. ‘Don’t you see how badly we need this?’

Who’s we?’

‘Everyone! This is our only chance at redemption. Our

salvation. And with the net we have the possibility of disseminating it to untold receivers. To put it into the mythstream,

into the living body of knowledge.’

‘Don’t you care how some people might use this footage?’

Jon said, thinking back to the night at Nagatha’s. Thinking

how much more interest there would be in the full, uncensored

object. ‘Is that what you want to do, remind everyone

of what beasts we are? Is that the fucking point?’

‘No! Jake wanted the opposite. He thought these films

were strong enough to repel those thoughts.’

It made sense. A brutal, disgusting kind of sense. All those

visits by Jake to the museum. The recordings of Jake’s and

the Doctor’s testimonies. There was a certain logic, deluded

perhaps, to Jake’s actions. ‘And you, why are you doing this?’

Dominic looked away. ‘Jake was a friend of mine,’ he said.

‘Is that all? You’re as obsessed by it as he was.’

‘And you’re not? Anyway, what, only Jews are allowed to

be obsessed by it? It belongs to everyone. This is where it

begins. It was the start of the new millennium right there

and then.’

What are you talking about?’

‘Auschwitz was the last nail in God’s coffin. The last

belief blown away by the crematorium fires. The last hope

sublimated down into soap. After the Holocaust we had to

come to terms with all our worst fears. That there was only

us, only this life.’

What about Nietzsche and Marx? They said that way

before.’

‘There’s always been people who’ve said it. We always

had a hunch it was true. The Holocaust was just the last

strand. It was like the veil of reality was lifted and instead of

it being all illusion, we saw that it was all terror. It’s the

hinge on which the twentieth century flaps. You think it’s a

coincidence that Sartre wrote of existence being the only

remaining thing? Or Brando in his leather jacket, saying

‘What d’ya got?” The beat generation? Rock and roll? The

emergence of the counter-culture? Work it out for yourself.’

Jon listened to everything Dominic said, making as little

facial movement as possible, thinking, he’s making sense but

he’s lost all sense of proportion. Dominic’s tirade didn’t stop,

he looked like a victim of road rage, his muscles tight, his

mouth exhaling words and smoke with the fury of a Gatling

gun. ‘Christ, Jon. You picked Jake up off the streets, you

thought you were saving him, saving his soul, but you were

wrong, so wrong. It was you whose soul needed saving. Jake

told me that when he came back.’

Jon didn’t know what to say. All this time, he’d never even

considered it. Dominic seemed further away from him, the

room almost boundless. Why did Jake come back to Amsterdam?’

he asked, trying to deflect the previous comment.

‘He read about Beatrice. He didn’t need to see her face or

hear her name. He knew it was her. Knew that the Doctor

had tried to get the film from her.’

What was her role?’

Dominic looked at him, spat out some loose tobacco from

his gums. ‘Jake asked her to help him film his testament.

Then the Doctor’s.’

‘He must have known he was putting her in danger.’

Dominic smiled sadly. ‘You didn’t know Beatrice. Danger

would have been like a red rag to her. Besides, Jake believed

we’re all responsible for our own actions. She knew what

she was doing.’

‘I have the single 8 mm reel he gave her,’ Jon said.

For the first time, Dominic looked genuinely surprised. ‘The ted?’

Jon smiled.

‘Jake gave it to her to hide. How the hell did you get it?’

‘Never mind that. Why’s it so important?’

ŚYou haven’t seen it then? Watch it, Jon. Suze can get hold

of a projector. Watch it, remember what Jake left for you in

London. Compare faces. You’ll see what I mean.’

What are you talking about?’

‘It’s something you’ll have to see for yourself. Only then

will you accept it. Jake was the same. He kept looking for

this one thing and then he found it but it was not what he

thought it was, in fact it was the very opposite and it broke

his fucking life. Far worse than anything else, worse than

what his father had left him in that will. When he saw it, he

left Amsterdam. His life cracked like an egg under a truck

wheel’

Dominic got up, walked over to his CD case and came

back with a clear plastic pouch in his hand. ‘This is for you.

Jake made this when he came back to Amsterdam. After

London. He wanted you to have it. He knew you’d come.’

Jon’s heart cranked up three gears. He’d suspected there

might be a third CD all along but not that Jake would have

made it after London. What’s on it?’

Watch it and see. Give you an excuse to visit Suze. Not

that you need that,’ he added sourly.

Jon let that ride. ‘I still don’t understand why you had to

go through the pretence of running the auction.’

‘It wasn’t a pretence. The auction is real’ Dominic smiled,

almost cackled, Jon thought. ‘Except they don’t get what

they paid for. People who bid for these kind of things, the

last thing they want to see is their rare item out in the public

domain. Where it should be. I want to rub their noses in it.

They’ve spent all week getting fired up about owning such a

unique item. I wish I could see even one of their faces when

the live feed goes out.’

Jon smiled, finally seeing it, starting to sense that the

answers were indeed out there, eminently graspable. ‘And

the Doctor?’ he asked. Where is he? I need to find him.’

Dominic laughed. He shook out a cigarette and lit it.

Watch the video, Jon, watch and you’ll understand.’

Jon slipped the disc into his pocket, along with the single

8 mm reel, stroked Bill. He knew he’d got what he could out

of Dominic, what Dominic wanted him to know.

They shook hands and Jon walked back through the early

hours to his hotel, watching the first smears of light creep in

from the east, his head so filled with all this new information

that he feared it might explode. He thought of calling Van

Hijn and telling him where the 49 reels were, the auction,

but he knew he wouldn’t and why. Because of Jake. Jake had

obviously trusted Dominic and Jon knew that he would wait

another day, let this thing reach its end, before informing

the detective. Jake deserved that at least. He felt the hard

presence and poke of the disc in his pocket, the third instalment

in Jake’s story. It would mean he’d have to go round

to Suze’s in the morning, and the thought of that made him

smile for the first time in hours, perhaps even days.

The next morning he sat in the hotel room, now more

familiar than his own flat, and stared at the single reel of

film, the final CD.

He reached for the phone. No hesitation.

Dialled Suze’s number.

‘Jon. How are you?’ She sounded excited to hear him. He

took it as a good sign.

‘I’m fine, I guess. Suze, I really need to use your computer.’