Under the Ice

by Gisa Klönne

  It’s nearly dark when she parks outside her flat. She buys bread, cheese, milk and a few bottles of beer at the kiosk, and walks up the stairs without turning the light on. I must ring Berthold, she thinks. Find out how he’s getting on. Tell him that I’m not going to get anywhere, that he’ll have to live with that. But he’ll want to meet me and I can’t face that just now. I’m not a replacement for his dead friend. I can’t help that. There is no justice, that’s all there is to it. I must get some sleep.

  At first she only senses a presence, like a premonition. She stops abruptly and spots a shadow a few steps above the door to her flat, not far from the access to the roof at the top of the stairs.

  ‘Judith?’

  David’s voice. Judith’s shopping bag drops to the floor with a clatter. She tears her pistol from the holster, switches the light on and stares at him. He looks absurdly out of place here on her stairs. There is a rucksack leaning against the wall beside him.

  He abused her trust. He abandoned her in the wilderness. He’s been keeping the police in suspense for days, and now here he is, sitting outside her door, smiling. She takes the last steps to the door of her flat, still pointing the pistol at him. She’ll arrest him. He’s trapped here; the hatch to the roof is locked. Judith leans against the wall, keeping her hip on the timer switch to stop the light from going out.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I wanted to give you this.’ He holds out a thick envelope to her.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘The explanation you’re looking for.’

  Judith had tried to explain to Margery that an anti-nuclear power activist isn’t necessarily to be equated with a violent criminal. The Canadian woman had given a dry laugh. Don’t kid yourself.

  Judith grips the pistol tighter. ‘Come on, against the wall.’

  He looks about him, gauging the distance between them.

  ‘Forget it. Top floor. End of the line!’ She’s shouting.

  He looks at her. ‘You’ll ruin everything.’

  ‘I’ll ruin everything? Spare me the romantic crap.’

  ‘OK, you’re right. I ruined everything.’

  ‘You just buggered off.’

  ‘When you said you were a detective, I suddenly panicked. I felt betrayed. Why didn’t you tell me right off?’

  ‘I didn’t think it would make any difference to you. I didn’t know you’d killed Charlotte.’ The pistol lies heavy in Judith’s hand. She grips it more firmly, her hip still on the light switch.

  ‘I didn’t kill Charlotte.’

  ‘Didn’t you? Then why did you do a runner?’ Judith is so tired. She searches David’s eyes, fixing him, like in an interrogation.

  ‘It was a reflex, a panic reaction. An idiotic mistake, I know. I wanted to win time. I didn’t want everything to start all over again, like all those years ago in Germany.’

  ‘You could have come back.’

  ‘I was never very good at facing up to conflicts.’

  ‘You could have trusted me.’

  He stares at Judith’s pistol. ‘That’s a bit rich, coming from you.’

  He mustn’t whisper, he mustn’t look sad, because it reminds her of lying in his arms. The light goes off; frantically Judith presses the timer switch again. She mustn’t make a mistake, not now, not again.

  ‘You abandoned me in the wilderness.’

  ‘You had the hut, you had supplies. I wouldn’t have let you starve. I’d have made sure the police found you.’

  ‘Yeah, right. Like you did with Charlotte.’

  ‘I didn’t do anything to her. I don’t know where she is. Please, you have to believe me.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous. How stupid do you think I am?’

  Again, he holds out the envelope to her. ‘Please, take this. It’s Charlotte’s notes.’

  ‘Censored, I assume. Where did you get them?’

  ‘I went to fetch Charlotte so she could catch her flight back. Her canoe was drifting on the lake, and her clothes were inside it. That seemed strange to me. I pulled the canoe ashore. I looked for her but couldn’t find her. The camp was tidy. The notebooks were in the tent. I read them and came to the conclusion that she had killed herself. That she had gone into the water.’

  ‘She couldn’t swim.’

  ‘I know,’ David says softly. ‘She always wore the life jacket in the canoe.’

  ‘When did you last see her?’

  ‘June the tenth. Two weeks before her flight back.’

  How long does it take to starve to death? Days? Weeks? Is that what Charlotte wanted? To lose strength by the hour – torturously, slowly, alone on the island? Or is Karl-Heinz right? Was it an accident? Did she want to go into the water, and then find that she didn’t have the courage? It’s a brutal thought. Judith closes her eyes and then starts, because the stairs creak. David is coming towards her.

  ‘Stay where you are! Don’t move!’ Judith’s shouts ring out through the stairwell; she points the pistol straight at his chest. She must arrest him, fetch reinforcements. She mustn’t let him quell her suspicions again.

  ‘Please, Judith, read the notebooks.’

  She leans against the wall. Her arm, holding the pistol, aches; she feels dizzy, as if oxygen levels in the building are falling by the minute. ‘Why didn’t you give me the notebooks in Canada?’

  He shrugs. He suddenly looks helpless.

  ‘Why did you take me to Charlotte’s camp if you knew she was dead?’

  ‘All I knew was that she had planned to kill herself and then disappeared.’

  She stares at him, trying to plumb his thoughts.

  ‘OK, then, I’ve got myself up shit creek. Haven’t you ever made a mistake?’

  ‘What do you want from me, David? Why are you here?’

  ‘Please, read Charlotte’s notebooks.’

  She doesn’t take her eyes off him, keeps the pistol pointed at him. ‘All right, then. Throw the envelope on the floor, nice and low, very slowly, and stay where you are.’

  He does as she tells him and, quick as lightning, she kicks the envelope down the stairs.

  ‘A deal.’ She points to the door to her flat with her free hand. ‘You wait in there while I read. If you’re innocent, you can go.’

  David shakes his head. ‘This is a trap.’

  ‘It’s your choice. Either I get to make the rules, or I call my colleagues immediately.’

  He is about to say something, but realises that it’s pointless and reluctantly acquiesces.

  Again she presses the light switch. Then, without taking her eyes off David, she opens the door to her flat with her left hand, switches on the light inside and motions David down with a brisk wave of the pistol. ‘Nice and slowly now, no tricks, hands behind your head.’

  She directs him down the hall, through the living room and out onto the roof terrace. He gives a shout of anger when she shuts and bolts the terrace door. She runs back to the stairs, locking the front door behind her, then fetches the envelope and drops down onto the stairs.

  The notebooks are simple lined exercise books. Joined-up handwriting fills the pages, angular and vaguely familiar. Letters combine to make words and sentences that tell with scholarly sobriety of disappointments and hopes, of Charlotte’s blind desire for a man who didn’t love her even when she travelled to Canada for him. With scrupulous accuracy she records every attempt to get close to him, and all his rebuffs. Again and again she tried, until eventually Terence Atkinson asked David Becker to fly Charlotte into the wilderness where her second dream, at least, could come true.

  There follow descriptions of birds, reports on the lives of loons, sketches of the lake, the island, the conifers. The last page is a letter of farewell. Fond regards to Berthold, who is to inherit Charlotte’s house. The request that the rest of her assets go towards research into loons. I have arrived, she concludes. I am going to stay here. I am going to the loons. I am no longer afraid of the water.

  Judith closes
the last notebook. Nothing in them seems fake. There don’t seem to be any missing pages. Tomorrow she will have the most important passages translated and fax them to Canada – a case for the files. Not a murder, not a crime – not a punishable one, anyway. Her instinct was right; her body didn’t betray her. David is not a murderer.

  Not a sound comes from Judith’s flat. She takes her bag of shopping and unlocks the door. David hasn’t broken down the terrace door. He is leaning at the railings with his back to Judith, looking at the sky that never grows properly dark here in Cologne, where you never see more than a hint of the stars.

  Charlotte was wrong, thinks Judith. She was more scared of the water than she thought. Perhaps she even wanted to live in the end, but it was too late. Judith opens the door to the terrace.

  ‘Charlotte was on the island,’ she says to David’s silhouette. ‘She starved to death there. Now go.’

  He gives a start and comes towards her and, for a moment, her longing flares up again; she feels his warmth when they shake hands. Then he is gone and, although it hurts, Judith knows it is the only way.

  She gets a bottle of beer out of the fridge and takes it out onto the roof terrace, past the painting of Charlotte’s loon, which still looks as if it has a question. She’ll find a place on the wall for it, later, when she’s had a proper sleep at last.

  The city is throbbing below her, alive. Her tiredness returns and with it her memories of floating stars and happiness. The darkness is soft and warm, almost physical. For the moment, it is enough.

  Acknowledgements

  Whether I wanted to know about tripping dachshunds or human corpses, forensic pathologist Dr Frank Glenewinkel of Cologne answered all my questions with humour and patience. Michael Breiter of the Cologne Criminal Investigation Department gave me all the information I needed on searching for missing persons. Child and youth psychotherapist Elke Wieczorrek enlightened me on the psyches of adolescent bullies and their victims.

  Stephen G. Martin took me to the loons in Canada. Underwater photographer Norbert Wu’s photo book Splendours of the Seas (Hugh Lauter Levin Associates, 1998) fired the imagination of my character Tim Rinker; the music of Manfred Mann’s Earth Band, Susheela Raman, Friend ’n Fellow and Tori Amos fired my own.

  The book Call of the Loon by ornithologist Dr Paul Strong was a great help to me, as was a scholarly article by Professor Michael Wink, from which I was given kind permission to quote (Michael Wink et al., ‘Ein Eistaucher, Gavia immer, bei Düren – Fundgeschichte und erste genetische Herkunftsuntersuchungen’, Charadrius 38.4, 2002).

  I would like to thank my friend and proofreader Katrin Busch who always said or asked exactly the right thing at the right moment, my friend Christina Horst for philosophical evenings and insight into everyday life in a school in 2006, and my esteemed colleagues at Sisters in Crime.

  Very special thanks go to my husband Michael for our many rewarding conversations about this book – and for being at my side, even though life with a crime writer can at times resemble a crime novel.

  Gisa Klönne

  PS. This is a novel. All characters and the story are my own invention, as is the town of Cozy Harbour and Bertolt Brecht Grammar School.

  About the Author

  Gisa Klönne is the author of the best-selling, award-winning and critically acclaimed crime series featuring superintendents Judith Krieger and Manni Korzilius. Silent Is The Forest was nominated for a prestigious Friedrich Glauser Crime Writing Award. Her books have been translated into several languages.

  Gisa Klönne has worked as a magazine editor, a freelance journalist and as a lecturer in creative writing. She has also published short stories and is the editor of two crime anthologies.

  She is married and lives in Cologne, where she works as a freelance writer while also being active in various authors’ networks, teaching creative writing and mentoring young, aspiring writers.

  Read on for the gripping opening pages of the first Judith Krieger novel, Silent Is The Forest. Available now as a Manilla e-book.

  Sahar International Airport. Mumbai, 8 May

  The little man was wearing dusty, worn-out rubber sandals, Adidas shorts and a faded shirt. He looked out of place alongside the others in their sharply pressed fantasy uniforms, who stood with polished metal signs in their hands, waiting for holidaymakers. ‘Darshan Klein’ it said on the piece of cardboard that the little man held above his head. The glass doors in front of the luggage carousels spat out noisy people. Somewhere a baby started to wail. Whenever anyone opened the doors at the other end of the terminal building, a surge of humid, exhaust-drenched air billowed into the air-conditioned hall. Sandra Hughes sat at the British Airways ticket counter and watched the little out-of-place man because she had nothing else to do. She saw two business travellers almost mow him down. They didn’t apologise, but rushed on to the information desk, where they crashed their flight cases down on the pale stone floor. Behind the counter, the air hostesses maintained their neutral smiles.

  Nobody seemed to want to buy a ticket this afternoon. Her shift dragged on. She thought of her boyfriend who would get back from Sydney tomorrow. That Jenny was working on the same flight as him again, which she didn’t like. Maybe she should take Ann’s advice and bring the thing to an end. She could get herself transferred to England again, but the thought of the perpetual drizzle wasn’t exactly heartening. Maybe she should simply stop taking the pill. Now American Airlines had landed too. A cluster of sweaty, white-skinned tourists in brightly coloured leisurewear poured out into the arrivals hall. They pulled vast hard-shell suitcases behind them and were immediately escorted to the side entrance by the men in fantasy uniforms. Only the little man in the rubber sandals remained. He held his cardboard sign a bit higher, his eyes fixed on the glass doors.

  Two hours later, when the swelteringly hot afternoon outside had darkened to another night that would bring no respite from the heat, the little man hesitantly approached the ticket counter. The cardboard sign was now tucked beneath his arm, and his bowed shoulders made his gait look somewhat cowering and resigned. What on earth? Sandra thought, but he was already standing in front of her and she could see how gaunt and sinewy he was and that his shirt had holes at the collar. He smelt of curry and fresh coriander. ‘Darshan Klein,’ he said and a golden molar flashed in his mouth. One of his incisors was missing. He laid a slip of crumpled paper on the counter: ‘BA 756, 17:05, Darshan Maria Klein’.

  ‘The flight from Frankfurt landed on time. All the passengers came through a while ago.’ She wasn’t sure whether he understood. ‘It landed at five,’ she repeated. ‘No more passengers here.’

  ‘Darshan Klein.’ There was something urgent in the words.

  His dark eyes fixed her gaze. He pointed at her computer. He was not, Sandra thought, by any means disagreeable.

  She sighed. ‘Okay, I’ll check.’ She tapped in the flight number and the strange name. The plane had landed on time, as she had told him, but there had been no one by the name of Darshan Maria Klein on board.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘Darshan wasn’t on that flight.’

  The man didn’t seem to understand.

  ‘Darshan not come,’ she said in broken English.

  The man nodded, but made no move to leave. ‘Darshan?’ he repeated, pointing at the computer again and then at the clock above the information desk.

  ‘Oh, you mean is there another British Airways flight later? No, that was the last for today.’

  Next door, at the Air India counter, the ticket saleswomen were knocking off for the day. Somehow or other she had to get rid of this tenacious customer. She called up the bookings system and once more entered the name. Bingo! Darshan Maria Klein had indeed been booked on the five o’clock plane from Frankfurt. To hell with data security, she thought, turning the screen a little and signalling to the man to look. He followed her index finger attentively.

  ‘Darshan was booked on Flight BA 756.’ She showed him the nam
e in the booking menu and then switched to the passenger list. ‘But she didn’t check in, do you see? In Frankfurt? Darshan not come.’

  ‘Darshan not come,’ the man repeated, and it sounded sad.

  Sandra flashed a professional smile at him.

  ‘Darshan not come. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Tomorrow?’

  She sighed. This possibility, too, she tapped out on the keys.

  ‘No, I’m sorry.’ She got up and began to gather up brochures from the counter.

  The man nodded hesitantly and at last made his way to the exit. A small, bowed shadow, he slid through the glass door and melted into the night, purposeful and noiseless as a cat.

  Part I

  The Crime

  Sunday 26 October

  They see the woman as soon as they come to the clearing. She is kneeling down, vomiting. The grass is marshy, dotted with bristly, wig-like hillocks. Egbert Wiehl thrusts the little mushroom basket into his wife’s hand and tries to reach the woman as quickly as he can without getting his feet wet. A hopeless endeavour; it’s been raining for days. The woman is young, with a blond ponytail. She gives a low cry when she notices Egbert Wiehl and suddenly he doesn’t know what to say. Are you unwell? Do you need help? Both are obvious; it’s a cold morning and yet the woman is cowering in the middle of a muddy puddle. A sportswoman. He forces himself not to stare at her long muscular legs clad in black Lycra.

  The woman tries to say something, but her teeth are chattering too much. There’s a stench of vomit. The woman has very round grass-green eyes. A thread of saliva which she seems not to have noticed is hanging from her chin. At any rate, she makes no move to wipe it away. Egbert Wiehl has the feeling she’s afraid of him and crouches down to her.

  ‘Have you eaten something bad? Fungi, perhaps? Did you fall?’ He reaches out his hand to her and she flinches. He realises he’s holding his sheath knife in his hand.