‘Please bear with us, Fabel,’ said Steinbach. He handed Fabel a photograph from the file. Fabel knew the picture had been taken in the Butenfeld mortuary, because he recognised the dead woman instantly.
‘And this is not the woman?’ asked Steinbach.
‘Of course it isn’t. You know it isn’t. This is the woman we found at the Poppenbütteler Schleuse. How could it have been her? She was long cold and in the morgue last night. The woman I spoke to was very much alive.’
‘We got an ID for her, Jan,’ explained Werner. ‘It came through this morning.’ He nodded apprehensively towards the photograph in Fabel’s hands. ‘This is Julia Henning. She lived at the address in Eppendorf you phoned in with.’
‘Shit,’ Fabel said in English. ‘So the woman I met must have something to do with these killings.’
‘That’s not our main concern at the moment, Fabel,’ said van Heiden. ‘We’ve had a report from Chief Commissar Kroeger and Technical Section about the phone you handed in. They say there is no trace of you having received a text message that said “Poppenbütteler Schleuse”.’
‘Like I said, it’s been deleted somehow.’
‘Herr Kroeger assures me that even if it had been deleted,’ said van Heiden, ‘his team would have been able to retrieve it. And they have checked the records of your service provider. Again, no trace.’
‘You see where this leaves us, Chief Commissar,’ said Steinbach. ‘You seem to have had prior knowledge of where a victim was going to be found, then you radio in the victim’s name and address before we have an identity for her.’
Fabel stared at Steinbach incredulously. ‘You can’t seriously be saying that these coincidences make me a suspect?’
‘On their own, no …’ Menke spoke for the first time. ‘But they are not on their own. We talked at length yesterday evening about the Pharos Project, and you instructed Frau Wolff to gather as much information as possible on the organisation. This is a day after Senator Müller-Voigt quizzed me persistently on the same subject.’
‘So?’ Fabel resented the BfV man becoming involved; this was a police matter.
‘I asked you where you had been the night before last,’ cut in van Heiden. ‘You evaded my question. Why did you do that, Fabel?’
‘Quite frankly, Herr Criminal Director, what I do in my own time is none of your affair.’ Fabel was beginning to feel outnumbered and exchanged a glance with Werner.
‘Quite the contrary,’ said van Heiden. ‘If you are using your own time to meet and discuss police matters with a member of the Hamburg Senate without my knowledge, I feel that that is very much my business.’
‘If you know where I was, then why did you ask me?’
‘Did you visit Herr Müller-Voigt at his home the night before last?’ asked Steinbach.
‘Yes, I did. After we finished our meeting here in the Presidium, he asked me if I would come out to his home that evening.’
‘Why?’
Fabel drew a long breath before launching into the story of Müller-Voigt’s missing girlfriend, the Senator’s belief that someone had deliberately erased all trace of her existence in Germany, his suspicions about the Pharos Project, and how Müller-Voigt had asked Fabel to make his enquiries ‘unofficial’.
‘So that’s why both you and he quizzed me about Pharos,’ asked Menke.
Fabel nodded. ‘And the more I find out about it, the more I believe that there could be a connection to this woman’s disappearance.’
‘Since when did you have the licence to undertake private investigations, Fabel?’ Something like a storm cloud darkened Van Heiden’s expression. ‘What the hell did you think you were doing agreeing to snoop around for Müller-Voigt?’
Fabel held his hands up. ‘Let’s get one thing straight: there’s a limit to how unofficial my enquiries were. To start with, I told Müller-Voigt that there was no way I could spare the time, but then I realised that there’s a good chance that the torso that was washed up at the Fischmarkt is that of Meliha Yazar. And that was the only reason I agreed to look into it. And I have to say that Senator Müller-Voigt accepts that I cannot guarantee to keep his name out of the spotlight. To be honest, all he is interested in is finding out what has happened to this woman.’
There was a pause and an exchange of looks between Steinbach, van Heiden and Werner. Fabel made an exasperated face.
‘Müller-Voigt is dead, Jan,’ said Werner. ‘He was found by his cleaner in his living room first thing this morning. That’s where Anna was headed when you came in.’
Fabel sat stunned for a moment. Then, as if a current had been switched on, he stood up suddenly. ‘I’m going out there …’
‘That would be inadvisable, Fabel,’ said Steinbach. ‘You can see that yourself, given the circumstances.’
‘You can’t seriously be suggesting that I am a suspect?’
‘No one is suggesting that,’ said van Heiden in a vaguely offended tone that still did not convince Fabel. ‘But you are compromised as far as both of these murder investigations are concerned. You simply cannot be seen to be heading up an enquiry in which you feature. You must understand that.’
‘So what happens? Am I suspended?’
‘Of course not,’ said Steinbach.
‘Then I insist on leading the Müller-Voigt case.’ Fabel still could not believe he was referring to the man he had sat and talked with just two nights before as a case. ‘That is my job, after all. And I have a personal stake in this …’
‘But that’s exactly the point,’ said van Heiden. ‘It’s precisely because of your personal involvement that we have to place the case in the hands of another officer.’
‘I suggest we all head out to the crime scene,’ said Menke. ‘There’s clearly more to this than meets the eye. And, in my opinion, Herr Fabel hasn’t compromised himself: someone else has deliberately gone out of their way to remove him from the investigation.’
Fabel looked at Menke: he was surprised that the intelligence man had spoken up for him.
‘I agree,’ said Werner. ‘This is all crap, the thing with the text messages and this woman with a victim’s identity. It’s all engineered to get Jan off the case. Unless you really believe that he is a suspect. In which case you can suspend me as well.’
Fabel shot Werner a warning look: Van Heiden, who now glowered at Werner, was by-the-book enough to take him up on his suggestion.
‘You lead the investigation, Werner,’ said Fabel. ‘The Criminal Director is right. I’m too close to all of this.’ He turned to van Heiden. ‘But I still want to see the Müller-Voigt murder scene.’
Fabel sat in the back of the Mercedes that took them out to the Altes Land. Werner followed. Stuck in the back of the car next to Menke, watching a huge sky above a billiard-table landscape slide by, Fabel still felt more than a little like a suspect and found himself resenting the intelligence man’s presence.
‘What did Müller-Voigt say to you about this supposedly missing woman?’ asked Menke.
Fabel remained quiet for a moment. Long enough to make the point that he resented Menke questioning him.
‘If you don’t mind me asking,’ said Menke into the void.
Fabel sighed. ‘She’s not just supposed missing, she’s a supposed woman. Müller-Voigt told me that he said that he could find no trace of her existence. He asked me to investigate because he felt that if he were to go through official channels he would look like he was losing his mind.’
‘You do realise,’ said Menke, ‘that this all ties up. Your encounter with a woman who shows you identification that belongs to someone already dead, your problems with electronic messages disappearing.’
Van Heiden twisted around in the front seat, edged his broad shoulders so he could turn to Menke. ‘If you have some information we should know, Herr Menke,’ he said, ‘then I strongly suggest you share it with us.’
Menke shrugged. ‘I was just making an observation, that’s all.’
Holger Bra
uner and his team had been at the Müller-Voigt murder scene for some time and when Fabel entered the house with Menke, van Heiden and Werner, Anna Wolff was standing in the lounge, talking to a uniformed officer. She came over and spoke directly to Fabel, pointedly ignoring van Heiden.
‘Müller-Voigt is over there …’ She indicated the seating area where Fabel had talked with the politician two days earlier. Fabel could see a scattering of books and magazines on the floor next to the coffee table. Müller-Voigt’s feet were just visible: he had obviously fallen between the sofa and the coffee table. There was an arc of blood spatter visible on the leather of the sofa. ‘You want to see?’
Anna handed Fabel blue stretch overshoes and a pair of latex gloves but ignored van Heiden. The Criminal Director began to fume and Fabel shot Anna a warning look. She handed the Criminal Director a set. Anna was an officer of great ability and promise, but Fabel knew her very obvious problem with authority meant she would never be promoted much above her current rank. It frustrated him but somewhere deep inside he was heartened by these little displays: maybe her rebellion was not at an end after all.
‘Signs of struggle?’ asked Fabel as they approached the body.
‘Minimal,’ said Anna. ‘It looks like he knew his attacker. There’s no sign of forced entry and all this …’ she indicated the scattered books and magazines ‘… could have been simply when he fell, or at the most after a very brief struggle.’
Fabel nodded a greeting to Holger Brauner. ‘Can I have a look?’
‘So long as you don’t contaminate my crime scene,’ said Brauner, with a grin.
Fabel looked down at Müller-Voigt’s body and Müller-Voigt looked back at him with an unblinking stare and an expression of surprise. It was not really an expression, Fabel knew, just the slack-jawed stare of eased rigor mortis. One side of the politician’s head, above the right temple, was badly deformed, as if dented, and the hair was parted by an ugly deep laceration where he had been hit with a heavy object. There was a halo of dark, thickly viscous blood around Müller-Voigt’s head. Fabel felt something unpleasant flutter dark wings in his gut when he realised that Müller-Voigt was wearing the same clothes as he had been the last time Fabel had seen him.
‘How long has he been dead, roughly?’ Fabel asked Brauner.
‘He’s not fresh,’ said the forensics chief. ‘More than a day. Maybe two.’
Fabel tensed.
‘What did you say?’ asked van Heiden over Fabel’s shoulder.
Brauner gave a small laugh and looked at Fabel quizzically before turning to van Heiden. ‘I said the victim’s been dead for more than a day. What’s the problem?’
‘I met with the victim the night before last,’ explained Fabel in a dull voice. ‘Here.’
‘Ah …’ Brauner said and frowned.
‘Wait a minute.’ Fabel turned to where Menke was standing. ‘Didn’t you say Müller-Voigt missed a meeting yesterday but got in touch to make his apologies?’
‘Yes … that …’ Menke said ponderously. ‘The thing is, we don’t have the email any more. Or, for the moment, any of our other emails. I’m afraid your concerns about email security were right, after all. You see, the message sent from Müller-Voigt’s computer had corrupted our entire system. It would appear to have been infected with the Klabautermann Virus. And, of course, an email doesn’t mean he was still alive. His killer could have sent it from his account.’
‘Müller-Voigt told me that his computer had been infected,’ said Fabel. ‘But he had sent it off for cleaning and repair. He told me that the computer he had was new and clean. And that he was using a new account to send emails. So I’d say your infected emails didn’t come from him.’
‘Herr Meyer …’ van Heiden called over to Werner. ‘I’d like you to take sole charge of this investigation.’ He turned back to Fabel, ‘I think you can understand, given the position we’re in.’
‘As far as I can see,’ said Fabel, ‘I’m the only one in a position.’
‘You said you saw a picture of this mysterious missing woman when you were last here,’ said van Heiden. ‘Where is it?’
Fabel pointed to the digital picture frame. ‘It’s on that.’
Leaning over the sofa, Brauner reached and picked up the remote control, handing it to Fabel. Van Heiden took it instead, frowning at the images.
‘These are all scenic photographs, as far as I can see,’ said the Criminal Director.
‘It’s a digital picture frame,’ said Fabel. ‘It stores hundreds of photographs. May I?’
A new image appeared every time Fabel pressed the frame’s button. Seascapes, lots of seascapes, some images of the countryside around the Altes Land, several littoral scenes, many with lighthouses. Nothing with Müller-Voigt in it. None of the other photographs he had seen when the politician had flicked through them. Before they had viewed half of the photographs, Fabel already knew that he would not find any photograph of Meliha Yazar.
‘And you say that you definitely saw the woman Müller-Voigt said had gone missing on this thing?’ asked van Heiden after they had gone through all the images.
‘Without a doubt. Someone has deleted it. And a lot of other images.’
‘Just like the text message you say you got about the location of the victim the other day.’
‘Just like …’ Fabel handed the digital frame back to Brauner. ‘You’d better bag that up. Whoever did Müller-Voigt has been playing with his toys.’
Brauner nodded. ‘By the way,’ he said, reaching down and picking up a large plastic evidence bag from the floor, ‘this would appear to be our murder weapon. Bloody ugly thing, if you ask me. Anyway, it has blood, hair and skin on the base and its weight and form seem consistent with the damage to his skull. We’ll take it back for a full fingerprint check. What’s up, Jan?’
Fabel stared at the evidence bag and its heavy, soiled contents in Brauner’s hand. In that moment he felt his career, his life unravelling.
‘It’s a bronze sculpture of Rahab. A Hebrew sea devil.’ Fabel’s voice was dull. Distant. He struggled for a moment to remember Müller-Voigt’s exact words. ‘Rahab was the creator of storms and the father of chaos. And I think I’d better tell you now that you will get a good set of prints from it. Mine.’
Part Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
When he was eight years old Roman Kraxner’s parents had taken him to see the family doctor, who had shaken his head and frowned a lot and referred them on to a child psychiatrist who had not shaken his head or frowned at all. In fact, Roman had not noticed much of any kind of expression at all on the specialist’s face. Instead of frowning and head-shaking, the psychiatrist had discussed Roman with his parents in a disjointed, almost incoherent way. Roman recalled that about him; that and the heavy, black-rimmed spectacles he had worn. To hide his eyes, Roman had thought; to hide them so he didn’t have to look anyone else in the eye. And with this realisation, all Roman’s anxieties had gone. And so had those of his parents: the psychiatrist had reassured Roman’s parents that their son did not have any profound learning difficulty or mental instability.
‘Your son has a schizotypal personality,’ the doctor had said, fiddling with his black framed glasses and not engaging in eye contact. ‘But he … it’s not that … he doesn’t suffer from schizotypal personality disorder, or schizophrenia … no … we have also ruled out Asperger’s. But … he does … he’s got … he displays blunted affect and excessive introspection.’
‘What does that mean?’ Roman’s father had asked.
‘Roman … well, he lacks a developed ability to function … to, erm … he will struggle to get on well socially. He doesn’t really understand others. But all this is typical of a schizotypal personality and it does not mean that he cannot enjoy a full and successful life. There are compensations: he is clearly highly intelligent and a schizotypal personality can manifest itself in an extremely imaginative and creative mind. A great many composers, artists, writers,
mathematicians, physicists … in many walks of life it is an advantage.’
Roman had sat there and wondered why the incoherent physician, hiding behind the heavy glasses, had not added psychiatrist to the list.
His parents had never fully understood the implications of what the psychiatrist had said. After a period of reassurance, the old doubts had begun to creep back into their heads: the psychiatrist had said schizotypal, hadn’t he? And that sounded a lot like schizophrenic. In the meantime, Roman had blossomed from a strange child with no friends into an even stranger adolescent with no friends. It was not so much that others avoided him – although that certainly was the case – it was more that he avoided others. At school, there had been only one person with whom he had anything approaching a friendship: Niels Freese. But Niels had been even stranger than Roman and had been taken out of the school for long periods of therapy. Still, when they had spent time together, they had recognised that each, in his own way, saw the world completely differently from their peers.
After Niels had been permanently transferred to a special school, Roman had shunned any kind of intimacy or contact. Not that he had to do a lot of shunning: his classmates either ignored or avoided him. Those who did not tormented him.
When puberty had come along, Roman became aware that his rejection of intimacy was even more profound than he had guessed himself. The concomitant storm of hormones had failed to stir much in the way of sexual desire, for either gender. The idea of physical intimacy with another was not so much abhorrent as superfluous. He genuinely could not see much point in it.
Roman realised that he was not entirely asexual, however. He found that any tingles of arousal he felt were connected to girls and women who were totally beyond the already corpulent Roman; for the only thing that stirred anything like desire in him was true beauty. Perfect symmetry, perfect skin, perfect figure. But, even then, the level of his arousal was muted. He had often wondered if it had been their very unattainability that had drawn him to these women: the knowledge that such desires were unfulfillable and could never result in actual physical contact.
A Fear of Dark Water Page 16