Baptiste, episode 4 recap: a fool and his money are soon parted as Stratton goes rogue, but the twists keep on coming
Rather like sex worker Natalie, the missing million euros was found and then lost again. Here are all the talking points from episode four, titled “Vertrouwen” – that’s Dutch for trust (taps nose knowingly)…
Find the money or lose your head
We opened with psychopathic gangster Constantin Baracu (Alec Secăreanu) calmly threatening Edward Stratton (Tom Hollander), even proudly showing him the chainsaw that decapitated his dad in Deal. “I used zis to separate him,” said the Romanian, his halting English somehow making it sound more terrifying.
Now that craggy sleuth Julien Baptiste (Tchéky Karyo) was on the trail of the mob’s missing million euros, Constantin had no further use for the Englishman. Begging for his life, Stratton pointed out that ex-cop Baptiste might take the loot to the police. Stratton could stick close to him and ensure it was returned to Constantin’s crew.
Constantin saw the logic in this, so agreed to a temporary reprieve: “You have 24 hours to bring back what you took from me. If you fail, you will end up looking like your father.” Gulp.
Just two problems: the small matter of finding the AWOL cash, plus Europol were pressurising Stratton to entrap Constantin, so put him under armed guard at a hotel. The clock was ticking. The chainsaw was revving. But Stratton was trapped with a minbar, mini-kettle and a trouser press.
Baptiste’s son stayed secret – for now
The previous episode ended with Baptiste furiously confronting police commissioner Martha Horchner (Barbara Sarafian) about being biological father to her son Niels (Boris Van Severen). Now the old flames discussed it more calmly over coffee – not laced with vodka on this occasion.
Baptiste had broken Martha’s heart by leaving her, she’d fallen pregnant and decided to bring up the baby with her new boyfriend instead. Martha gently insisted: “It’s not your secret to tell.”
Surely it can’t remain hidden for much longer? Especially since father and son soon teamed up for a money-seeking road trip. Cue Baptiste playing The Band’s classic 1968 album Music from Big Pink and cop Niels teasing him about the car hi-fi. Baptiste protested: “I know where I am with a CD.” “Yeah, in the Nineties,” grinned Niels. When the younger man was summoned back to police HQ, Baptiste continued his quest alone. But with all those furtive phone calls, I’m still got a niggling worry that Niels could turn out to be corrupt.
Meanwhile, his mother’s superior officer told Martha she’d be forcibly retired from the force in three months. Reeking of booze had doubtless hastened her exit. But what dark secret had driven her to drink?
Farmer Herman had been cleaned out
Having discovered that it was sweet old Herman de Boer (Gijs de Lange) who had taken his grandson Matty (Boyd van den Bogert) out of hospital, Baptiste and Niels drove out past none-more-Dutch windmills to pay the tulip farmer a visit.
Herman happily filled them in: he’s the father of Natalie’s junkie ex Thijs. Natalie wrote to Herman, begging him to take care of Matty and giving instructions about where to find the stolen mob million she’d buried – except Herman’s dog Caspar had dug it up first.
However, the cash-stuffed holdall had been stolen from Herman's car. Had someone spotted it at the garage where he’d stopped? Herman also remembered that the village handyman – a misfit named Bram Visser – came to clean his windows that morning. The Dutch George Formby warranted investigation.
Creepy new villain was voyeur, not jailer
Ponytails are often the sign of a wrong’un. We first met Bram Visser (Tom Audenaert) in a sinister pre-credits sequence, which saw him buying unhealthy amounts of crisps. He took the snacks back to a rickety farmhouse with a heavily fortified front door – and a second padlocked door to the basement. Could this be the location of the captive trafficked girls from back in episode one? In a neat twist, no. Visser was indeed hiding a depraved secret. Just not that one.
Suspicions aroused, Baptiste broke in. He found no sign of the money but did stumble upon a nosy parker’s nerve centre, with CCTV feeds from all over town. Visser had been using his odd jobbing as a cover to secretly install spyware. "I’m not a pervert," he repeated. Even though some of the cameras were located in restrooms.
Still, footage of the local garage showed it was town dentist Jasper (Wim Danckaert) who’d nabbed the holdall from Herman’s car. Baptiste ordered Bram to destroy the cameras and “make a life of your own, so you don’t have to take refuge in the lives of others”, before leaving for an appointment with the dentist.
Case was personal for Europol cop
In episode three, abrasive Europol officer Genevieve Taylor (Jessica Raine) visited a non-responsive man named Lucas (Marc de Hond). Now she read aloud to him from Thomas Hardy’s The Mayor of Casterbridge (possibly significant subtitle: The Life and Death of a Man of Character).
Suddenly Lucas’s wife stormed in, furious Genevieve had dared visit. “You should be out finding the people who did this,” she spat. “You helped put him in that wheelchair in the first place.” Further hints that Genevieve’s interest in crime syndicate Brigada Serbilu is personal.
Realising Stratton was her best chance to get something on them, Genevieve coerced him to meet Constantin wearing a wire – but she hadn’t reckoned for the uncooperative, enjoyably sarky Stratton swerving off-piste. While Constantin held a knife to his jugular, he jotted on a beermat that Europol were listening – but he could help Constantin by finding out what they had on him. Once again, the Romanian grudgingly agreed.
Stratton slyly told Genevieve that he was merely trying to earn his trust and would set up another rendezvous where he’d be less guarded. The Englishman’s life hung in the balance but he was playing them off cunningly.
Poor Kim was coldly killed
With her former identity blown, café owner-cum-sex workers’ rights campaigner Kim Vogel (Talisa Garcia) bravely told boyfriend Greg (Trystan Gravelle) the truth. She used to be Dragomir Zelencu, always “felt this body was not mine” and anger played a part in driving her to become a ruthless Romanian mob boss. Now, though, “dangerous people know who I am” and their lives were at risk. Enraged and sickened, Greg stormed out.
We next saw Kim taking a phone call from a sex worker seeking her help and asking to meet. Viewers were screaming at her not to go but as Kim neared the address, she was ruthlessly assassinated – her throat slit by a black-clad assailant on a motorbike and left to bleed out on the street. R.I.P. Kim. Your character was deeply implausible but we liked it all the same.
Hedonistic dentist soon coughed up
Well, that was easy. Baptiste found Jasper in a lapdancing club, throwing money around like a rubbish rapper. All it took for the drunken dentist to hand back the money was outlining exactly who he stole it from and how dangerous the Brigada Serbilu are.
As the camera cut from Kim’s body in the morgue to Baptiste’s own family (uh-oh), Baptiste intoned: “They have no compunction about who they hurt or kill. People are commodities. Human life means nothing to them. They buy sell and dispose of it without any second thought…” OK, OK. Here, have the money.
Stratton went rogue. Again
Delighted that Baptiste had recovered the cash, Stratton treated himself to a sauna in the hotel spa amid some gratuitous naked bodies. He worked out a way to escape across some rooftops and down some scaffolding, like an even tinier Tom Cruise.
In the closing sequence, the stubbly enigma made a reckless move that put the entire case – not to mention several lives – in jeopardy. As Niels told Baptiste earlier: “Desperate men are unpredictable. Stratton’s a liability.”
He told Baptiste they were going to meet Constantin but, aided by Natalie’s friend Lina (Martha Canga Antonio), contrived to get Baptiste out of the car and sped off with the money. “Some good has to come out of this,” he said. “I’m sorry.” Baptiste’s response was more succinct: “Merde!”
Penultimate episode now beckons
Events build to a head next Sunday, when Stratton takes drastic measures to keep his ex-wife safe. Can Baptiste team up with Europol to bring down the Brigada Serbilu? Meet you back here to peer at all the action on a bank of CCTV screens…
