The Japanese Corpse by Janwillem van de Wetering

Bloody great truck hit her, truck was speeding, we can prove it from the brake tracks, see, they are over there. I have photographed them already. I think he was going at eighty kilometers. Can't blame him too much though, the lady must have practically run into his front bumper. She was holding the cat as he hit her, he says. Poor bloke is sitting in his cab now, crying his eyes out."
    He pointed at a stationary truck, parked half on the footwalk, some two hundred yards ahead.
    De Gier's mouth felt very dry. "How old was the lady?"
    "Thirty, I would say. Quite nice-looking, I think, although it is always hard to say when they are dead."
    "Color hair?"
    "Dark." The sergeant suddenly looked up, almost upsetting his tripod. "Shit, she isn't yours, is she? You have a cat, I remember now. A Siamese. They were telling me at the station. One of the constables had seen you playing with it on your balcony. You were holding it in your arms and he thought it was a baby at first."
    De Gier wasn't listening, he was walking to the bushes, dreamily, his mind only partly functioning. She is dead, he thought. Esther is dead. She let Oliver escape. I warned her. I even told her never to go after him if he gets away. He got me almost killed too, once. He always runs to the park and he can be caught in the park, it is too dangerous to catch him on the road. Too much traffic. But she went after him all the same. She is dead.
    His mind was giving him all sorts of disconnected information. How long had he known her now? About a year. Whether he loved her. He did. She had never really surrendered completely. She held on to bits of her freedom here and there. She would spend her nights with him, but not always. She hadn't given up her own house. She hadn't allowed him to marry her. But he had accepted her conditions and had enjoyed the pleasant side effects. They had never quarreled. Their love life had been fairly passionate. They hadn't bored or irritated each other. He was wiping his face as he stumbled about the bushes. He had thought the woman very beautiful. A slender neck, long black hair, long legs and very slim ankles. He had never understood how such thin bones could support her, but she walked graciously. He saw her sensuous wide lips and the nose with the delicate bridge.
    The cat was stretched out on the edge of the lawn. De Gier knelt down and caressed its wet skin. A bleeding paw came up and touched his cheek. Oliver was aiming for his nose but it seemed he couldn't focus, the eyes were glazed and the cat was breathing with short painful gasps. The cat always liked to pat him on the nose.
    "Oliver," de Gier said. The cat lifted its head but had to let it drop back. De Gier felt the skin again, Oliver's fur was wet with blood and sweat, the sweat of fear and pain. The eyes had closed, but the gasping continued. De Gier felt for his pistol, withdrew and loaded it mechanically and pressed the muzzle against the Siamese's ear. The shot was loud in the breathlessly still park. He got up and replaced the pistol under his armpit and walked away. He hadn't seen what the bullet had done to the cat's head.
    Running footsteps on the path brought the sergeant and two constables. The sergeant's arm caught de Gier's body as it began to crumple up.
    "No," a constable said. "He has shot the cat, not himself."
    De Gier's brain hadn't stopped completely. He mumbled a name and a telephone number. The sergeant called the number on the radio in his van. The commissaris answered.
    "Yes," the commissaris said. "I see, sergeant. Put him on a stretcher or something, it won't take me long to get there. Til take him to my house. Do you have some strong drug you can inject into him?"
    "Yes, sir."
    "Do that then; keep him warm and quiet. I'll be there in ten minutes."
    The sergeant wanted to ring off.
    "Sergeant?"
    "Sir?"
    "Remove the cat's body. He shouldn't see it again."
    "I have a spade, sir. I can bury it in the park."
    "Yes. Bury it properly and mark the