by Inge Löhnig
Wednesday, 15 October
Albert was making a phone call in his study. Babs could hear his voice in the kitchen. She was relieved that he’d had the conversation with the boys and explained what had happened to their granddad. Clearly he’d done a good job, as they’d responded relatively calmly. They were at school now. It was better not to deviate too much from the usual reassuring routines.
Babs loaded the dishwasher and wiped down the table. Her eyes fell on the door to the pantry. Turning the tiny room into a study would take days. Time she didn’t have right now. For now the kitchen table would have to do. Fetching a notepad and pen, she began to transform her initial sketches into a presentation-ready draft. With sure strokes she drew a wall. How old-fashioned and laborious her way of working was. Somehow she had to conceal the fact that she still had no computer. But how? Perhaps by illustrating the sketches with marker pens and coloured pencil? That was one option. A buzz at the front door jolted her out of her thoughts. Albert was still on the phone.
She got up and opened the door. It was Bertram. She gazed at him in surprise.
‘You can close your mouth again.’ As always, he had some silly remark at the ready.
‘What do you want?’
‘To talk to Albert.’ Bertram pushed past her into the apartment, took off his coat and handed it to her as if she were the maid. ‘My dear brother isn’t at his practice, so I assume he’s giving full vent to his grief in here.’
Babs didn’t want an argument, so she swallowed her irritation and hung up the coat. ‘Albert’s in his study.’
Bertram made a beeline for it, entering without knocking. She went back to her sketches in the kitchen.
What did Bertram want? Albert had thrown him out after realising Bertram had conned him into a loan by cooking the books and making up projects. Since then the brothers had been communicating via their lawyers. Even the news of Wolfram’s death had been passed to Bertram via Caroline.
Albert’s and Bertram’s muffled voices came through the walls into the kitchen. Perhaps he was trying to make up. He would inherit, and could pay his debts. But his tone sounded more quarrelsome than that. Even if Bertram did reach out a hand in reconciliation, Babs doubted Albert would take it – even when they were little, the two of them had squabbled with predictable regularity. Again and again, Albert had defended his position as heir. Bertram had made it easy for him, the idiot. Whatever was expected of him, he did the opposite. Babs wondered whether he’d ever done anything he actually wanted to do, or whether all his decisions had been about offending the old man. Like his choice of career.
At eighteen Bertram had discovered something that would change the course of his life: the family secret about Uncle Siegfried, whose name was never mentioned. Wolfram’s brother hadn’t only been an architect but a gifted salesman and con artist. In the fifties he’d planned an apartment complex, taken money off potential buyers then absconded with the cash to Argentina, where he’d died in mysterious circumstances in the seventies. When Bertram found out that he could make his dad’s blood boil merely by dropping his name, Siegfried became his idol – including when it came to his career. Bertram, however, was not a good architect. Not a creative person, not an artist. Reproductions – those he could do. But that was all.
Babs brushed the hair out of her face and put down her pencil. Her back hurt. For a moment she envied Albert’s study, a bright room with parquet flooring and a balcony. Crucially, however, it also had a desk and a sensible office chair.
Albert’s voice grew louder, rising until it began to crack. Babs caught the word arsehole. The door was opened, and she heard footsteps. Then Albert yelled: ‘You think you’re so clever!’
Babs pushed back her chair and went into the corridor. Bertram was putting on his coat. He caught her eye, grinned and stepped through the door Albert had flung open.
‘Piss off, and don’t let me see you again!’ Albert slammed the door after him so hard that it echoed through the stairwell like the gunfire of an approaching battle.
‘What’s wrong? What did Bertram want?’
Albert surveyed her in confusion, as if only just noticing her. He took a deep breath, and his shoulders relaxed. ‘A fight, of course. What else?’
*
Dühnfort entered the office shortly after seven, switched on the computer, opened the window and for two hours read through the papers one of the admin assistants had left on his desk. The phone records for Heckeroth’s mobile and landline were among them.
Bertram had spoken to his father for two minutes on the Sunday prior to the attack. On the day of the incident, around six o’clock, was a telephone call to Albert at his practice, presumably about the drain. It was the final one. In the days before the attack, Caroline and the cleaning lady had phoned on the Saturday, and on the Friday, when he’d driven out to the lake, Heckeroth had dialled the number of a car dealership in Herrsching. Dühnfort reached for the phone, punched in the number and was informed by a woman who sounded as if she were full of cold that Heckeroth had had an appointment that day to get his jeep serviced. He had phoned to make sure a rental car had been arranged for him. ‘Is the car still in the shop?’ asked Dühnfort.
‘No. Mr Heckeroth picked it up himself that same day.’
Dühnfort thanked her for the information and hung up. The vehicle was still missing. It wouldn’t surprise him if it turned up neatly parked somewhere.
There was a knock. Alois stuck his head round the door. ‘Isn’t Gina coming in today?’
‘She has a doctor’s appointment, so she’ll be a little late. What’s the word on Bertram’s alibi?’
‘It’s solid. His ex confirmed it. On the evening of 6 October he was at the gallery with her. He asked her for a loan. But the sum he had in mind was too much, so he had to settle for five thousand euros.’
‘That’s hardly chicken feed.’
‘Her parents own Maison Vert, so she’s swimming in money.’
‘What’s Maison Vert?’
‘Natural cosmetics. Cost an arm and a leg. You don’t know the brand?’
Dühnfort didn’t. ‘I bear my wrinkles with dignity. Do you believe her?’
‘Why would she lie for him? Not out of love, that’s for sure. The divorce was her idea. He didn’t want it.’
‘Fine, then we’ll believe that for now. In any case, murders committed out of greed don’t look like this. The album takes first priority. We’ve got to identify the women. Maybe Heckeroth ruined the life of one of those girls. Until we know how he got them to agree to these photographs, we can’t rule out coercion or rape. And even if he just convinced them, we’ve got to take into account the possibility of psychological consequences.’
Gina came in. ‘Sorry, that took longer than I thought. I’ll just grab a coffee.’
When she returned, Dühnfort summarised the situation for her. She seemed distracted. He passed her the album. ‘Can you make three copies of this?’
She banged her mug down on the table, coffee sloshing over the edge. ‘What am I, the intern?’ With the linen-bound volume under her arm, she marched out of the room.
Alois grinned. ‘Her time of the month, is it?’
Gina wasn’t usually the type to take things so seriously, and she did make copies from time to time. A minute later she came back. ‘The admin assistants are doing it, all right?’
Suddenly Dühnfort felt uneasy. Had the check-up not gone well? She caught his eye and raised her hands apologetically. ‘I’m sorry. I slept badly. Now, who’s doing what? I’d like to wave Daddy’s little collection under Caroline’s nose. I’m curious to see how she’ll react.’
*
Caroline went through the lobby, past the receptionist. He looked up from his newspaper and got to his feet. ‘Good morning, Dr Heckeroth. My sympathies.’ She thanked him without pausing.
While she was waiting for a lift, Claus Henning entered the building. It would be him. But she mustn’t show inferiority in the face
of the enemy. Straightening her back, she adopted her business smile. Henning, his face like a manta ray, in an open coat over a shiny silver suit, made straight for her. Finally the lift arrived and she got in. Just before the doors closed, he reached her.
‘Good morning, Ms Heckeroth.’ His fake smile didn’t escape her. When they were alone, he always avoided using her title. ‘May I offer my condolences? Sadly there was no opportunity yesterday.’
Although she’d only told Gilles Winterboom about her father’s death, the news had spread through the office like proverbial wildfire. ‘Certainly.’ She knew, of course, that he thought he’d already discharged his sympathetic duties with that hackneyed phrase. He loved clichés of that sort, and several times she’d made him fall into a trap he’d laid himself.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘You asked me whether you could offer me your condolences.’
For a moment he narrowed his gaze. ‘My sincerest sympathies, Ms Heckeroth. It must be a terrible blow to you. A murder in the family.’ He glanced into the mirror and adjusted his tie. ‘A while ago I read a statistic that said more than eighty per cent of murders were committed by relatives. A horrifying number, wouldn’t you say?’
That arsehole. He’d found his way straight to the sore point. ‘My father was the victim of a robbery. Greed and envy often lead people to go too far.’ The lift stopped, and she turned and pushed past him through the doors.
Tanja Wiezorek was sitting in the outer office, opening the post.
Caroline entered her office and booted up her computer, as she did every morning. She needed the soft patter with which the machine started up. Only then did she become Dr Heckeroth; only then did she feel like everything was under her control. She slipped out of her coat. Her briefcase, an expensive designer one by Valentino, landed on the table. Marc had given it to her. He often surprised her with expensive gifts. Would the investment ever pay off for him? She was under no romantic illusions as to the rationale behind their relationship. They were a beautiful couple, and complemented each other in bed. But there was no love there. Marc was a senior executive at a bank, responsible for major corporate accounts. Naturally he hoped she would give him easy access to the decision-makers at her company. The firm was still small, not yet listed on the stock exchange. The majority of the shares were in the owners’ hands, and the rest belonged to family members. They were planning to go public the year after next, however, and hadn’t yet selected an issuing bank. Marc was hoping to hook that particular big fish, and he needed her to do it. Proposing marriage on that account, however, was extreme. And anyway, he hadn’t been serious. Stumbling back to his apartment at three in the morning, drunk after a party, they’d paused to rest by the Angel of Peace. She sat down beside him, took off her high-heeled shoes and massaged her aching toes. The Isar moved sluggishly below them, the occasional car drove round the tight curves of the roundabout, and the early-morning sun stirred in the east as Marc pulled her close, stroked her hair out of her face and said: ‘What do you reckon, shall we get married?’ She had genuinely flinched. Marc’s smile slipped. He turned away and laughed. ‘It was just a suggestion.’
Caroline opened the file with the marketing plan for their new product line. Henning had made the mistake of underestimating her. She would get one over him using the very weapon he was planning to use against her, and he’d only notice afterwards. The Monday after next, at the board meeting. He was going to push through his proposal to expand their branch network. That was the rumour, at least. Henning was planning to expand via franchise partners, and to win them over he needed more marketing spend than he was allocated. He was hoping, therefore, to take some of the money Caroline would need to successfully launch the autumn pralines. In the meantime Caroline had used her network to find a new agency, which would work for a significantly lower daily rate than their previous partner, Adhoc. In terms of media strategy, she already had some initial ideas about how to use the advertising budget more effectively. That, plus the emergency fund she always kept in reserve, meant she had put together enough money to cover both the product launch and the campaign needed to find new partners. The presentation at the board meeting would be her finest hour. All she had to do was convince Gilles to switch agencies, but she was sure that wouldn’t be a problem. Satisfied, over the next hour she added the finishing touches to her roadmap. Then she allowed herself a cup of coffee to relax.
Before she knew it, however, her thoughts had turned to the death of her parents. She had loved her mother, even if her mother had barely noticed it. What little emotion she possessed was spent on Albert and Bertram. But neither of them had sat at her deathbed. Caroline had. Her mother had spoken her last words to Caroline, who had promised to destroy the diary and letters, and shortly afterwards her mother had drifted peacefully away. Saying goodbye had been painful, but also, in its own way, right and proper. She hadn’t said goodbye to her father, and it hurt like an open wound, even though by the end she’d been as indifferent to him as he was to her. Since Albert’s call on Monday night she’d been waiting for a switch to flick inside her and the tears to flow, for sorrow and despair to take their rightful place. Why hadn’t that happened?
Maybe because she hadn’t really loved her father. How could she have? How could you love someone for whom you were irrelevant? Albert had always been the focus. Bertram, too, though in a different way. Bertram, always making trouble, always the centre of attention, the black sheep, the unloved son, the one nut his father could never crack. Albert, by contrast, fulfilled all expectations calmly and conscientiously. And Caroline had disappeared in this father–sons Bermuda Triangle.
She’d done better at school than Albert, but he’d got a car when he passed his final exams, while she got a hideous watch and a voucher for the university bookshop. She’d studied business management and published a book about management in mid-size companies. Yet all she heard was that Albert could have done the same if his studies hadn’t been so taxing and time-intensive.
Caroline sighed. All that lay behind her. She’d long since given up seeking her father’s approval, let alone his love.
The telephone rang. Tanja announced Gina Angelucci. ‘She’s already up here. Do you have time?’
Couldn’t police officers make appointments, like normal people? ‘Not really. But that’s probably irrelevant.’
A moment later, the policewoman entered the room. Her denim jacket was spotted with rain. ‘This won’t take long.’ She took off the jacket, hung it over a chair and sat down. She didn’t suffer from a lack of confidence, Caroline had grasped that yesterday. ‘We found a photo album in your dad’s apartment. I’d like you to take a look at some images. It’s one focus of our investigation, and it would make our work easier if you could identify some of the women.’
What kind of album? Had Dad bound photos of his girlfriends into volumes, like other people kept letters? Was she really being asked to put names to Dad’s harem? Not even Mum had known the details of Dad’s latest squeeze. If Caroline had been in her shoes, she’d never have put up with it. There would have been consequences. Divorce. But Mum, out of a strange combination of responsibility, co-dependence, and a scrupulous concern about what others might think, had never seriously considered that step. Until death us do part. She’d stuck to that. ‘Why are you interested in my father’s girlfriends?’
Gina Angelucci’s mouth twisted. ‘You haven’t seen the album? You’ll understand when you see the pictures.’
The way Gina said it stirred a vague sense of unease in Caroline.
‘They’re not just portraits. Your father had certain sexual proclivities.’
What was this woman trying to say? Latex and leather, whips, chains and studded collars whirled through Caroline’s imagination, her father at the centre of them. She groaned and rubbed her hands across her face. It couldn’t be true. She watched in astonishment as Gina Angelucci drew a thick envelope out of her shoulder bag. That many? Caroline took a deep bre
ath. She would simply refuse to look at them. Nobody could force her. But then what would the policewoman do? Probably show the pictures to all their tenants and relatives, maybe even take them round the shops on Kurfürstenplatz. To the baker, the drycleaner, the grocer. Oh my God! Caroline grabbed the phone. ‘For the next half-hour I don’t want to be disturbed. By anyone.’
*
Dühnfort went to see Albert around noon. His wife let him in. ‘My husband’s just had a visit from someone at the funeral parlour. I’m sure it won’t take long. But perhaps I should . . .’ She gestured towards the living room, where they could hear muffled voices.
‘It’s not that urgent.’ He followed her into the kitchen, sat down and put the envelope with the copies on the table. The phone in the hall began to ring.
Babs excused herself and went to answer it. Dühnfort judged from the conversation that her sister-in-law Caroline was on the other end. First they talked about a job she’d helped her get, but then the topic changed. ‘No. That’s absolute nonsense.’ Albert’s wife lowered her voice. ‘Yes, he’ll get the inheritance now, but if he was with Katja . . .’ Barbara Heckeroth was standing with her back to the kitchen, playing with her shoulder-length hair with her right hand. ‘But you just said yourself . . . sorry, Caro, but there’s a po– . . . yes, exactly.’ She turned round and saw Dühnfort. ‘What pictures?’ Her eyes wandered over the kitchen table and came to rest on the envelope. She ended the conversation and came back into the kitchen. ‘Caro says you found horrible photographs at Wolfram’s.’
For the moment Dühnfort was interested in something else. ‘Your sister-in-law suspects Bertram? Why?’
Babs brushed a few strands of hair out of her face and sat down. ‘Bertram’s the black sheep of the family. I’m sure you’ve realised that by now. I think he’s spent most of his life working out what would upset Wolfram then doing exactly that.’
‘Fathers never approve of what their children do.’