by Inge Löhnig
Dear Tino,
Your answer surprised me. Did you really buy Les Fleurs du Mal? You must have done. That kind of answer doesn’t just come to you. It wasn’t my intention to hurt you when I wrote those lines, more to explain, but obviously you didn’t understand. Probably I was too roundabout, too indirect again. Directness, just blurting things out, isn’t my style. What I was trying to say is this: if we’d met some other time, under other circumstances, I could have loved you. It wasn’t my intention to play with your emotions. I didn’t know what they were – I sensed, perhaps, and that’s the only thing I blame myself for. I should have explored that sense early on, to spare you this disappointment. I’m truly sorry, believe me. I was never playing games with you. To continue drawing on the poem you chose, let’s say we’re going to end this ‘ferocious game’. Though I’d replace ‘ferocious’ with ‘ambiguous’. I hope you find what you’re looking for. But for me it’s too much.
Take care,
Agnes
Oh thou that I would have loved, oh thou that knew it. The cold pain was back, spreading, streaming into his limbs, making them numb as he sat frozen on the sofa. For me it’s too much. He shook himself, poured another glass of wine and drank it. Disappointment. As if that’s what it was. Dühnfort closed the card and put it on the table. Icarus. He’d flown too near the sun and tumbled into the sea. Seemed fitting. Except that he wouldn’t drown.
Monday, 27 October
The weekend was over. A small piece of the path she’d have to walk alone, completed. Babs didn’t know where she’d found the strength, but she’d done it, picking up the boys from the bus and finding the words to tell them what had happened – though without saying what Albert had nearly done to her. The rest was bad enough. Noel had fled to his room in tears. ‘I never want to see him again. Never, never, never!’ Leon, by contrast, had huddled in the corner of the sofa and stayed quiet for hours. Finally he went over to Babs in the kitchen and asked whether he could visit his dad. She’d nodded, although she wondered if it might not be best to cut off all contact.
‘You’re not angry with me?’
‘Of course not,’ Babs had replied. ‘Why do you want to see him?’
‘I want to understand why he did it,’ Leon had responded, his expression earnest.
That was Friday afternoon, shortly before Babs fled with the children to her parents’ place. On Thursday the police had sent out a press release about the case, and the hounding had begun. Reporters and TV crews stormed the buildings in Kaiserstraße and Kurfürstenplatz. Neighbours and tenants gathered in clusters and whispered, or, worse still, jabbered away into microphones. The kids were even more scared than she was. Then, suddenly, her father had appeared in the doorway. Like a bear protecting its young, he shoved his way past the journalists and into the flat. ‘Pack what you need. You’re coming to us.’ He’d escorted them out of the apartment and driven them, pursued by reporters, to his house, which had been under media siege ever since.
On Saturday afternoon, Carsten Morgenroth had abruptly shown up in her mother’s kitchen. Babs, in the middle of unloading the dishwasher, jumped when she saw him. She couldn’t afford to lose the job she hoped would prove a fresh start. In the future she’d have to care for the children by herself: she didn’t want a cent of Albert’s money. But Carsten hadn’t come to explain that they couldn’t work with the wife of a double murderer. He’d been trying to reach her since Thursday. A department head had quit and Veronika Jäger was going to take over her role, which meant he now had to fill her editorial position in Kitchens and Bathrooms. ‘I wanted to offer it to you. And it’s got nothing to do with sympathy or past friendships, it’s about your performance. We’d like to nab you before you get snapped up by the competition. Fancy becoming the new “queen of the wet rooms”? Veronika can teach you the ropes.’
It was out of her league, frankly, but she might never get such an incredible chance again. Proud of the trust he showed in her abilities, she eventually agreed.
Sunday had been rather quieter. Caroline had dropped by with Marc for an hour. She looked dreadful – pale and careworn – although it still hadn’t fully sunk in yet, as she herself acknowledged. Same here, thought Babs.
On Sunday afternoon the number of reporters trying to ambush them for pictures had dwindled when a large fire broke out at a furniture store.
Babs looked out of the window. Now they were back. Bertram’s funeral was at eleven. Together with her parents and the boys, she left the house at half ten. Her dad drove, not even attempting to throw off the press. ‘They know where to find us. Just ignore them.’
Staff from the undertaker’s were waiting outside the hall, and her father instructed them to prevent any reporters entering.
It was an austere ceremony, not exactly comforting, and after just fifteen minutes they were walking behind the coffin towards the grave. As it was lowered into the earth, they stepped forward one by one to throw flowers and shovels of soil. Something came to an end, found closure, as the earth pattered against the wood. Something new would begin. Noel and Leon approached the grave together, each picking up the shovel with grave faces. ‘Bye, Uncle Bertram,’ said Noel softly.
Moments later a fine rain set in, scattering the clutch of mourners.
Caroline and Marc hurried to the exit behind Babs and her family, following them with the small group of friends and relatives to the restaurant where they’d reserved a table for the wake. They warmed up over semolina dumpling soup, and by the time the roast beef was served the awkward silence had given way to conversation, even the occasional laugh.
It was just before half twelve when Caroline glanced at the clock. Marc’s shoulders tensed.
‘Do you have to go into the office?’ asked Babs.
‘The board meeting starts in half an hour. I’ve got to be there.’ Caroline threw out her hands apologetically. ‘It’s about my professional future.’ That was directed at Marc. ‘But starting tomorrow I’ve got three weeks’ holiday. Gilles has already approved it.’
‘I’ll drive you.’ Marc pushed back his chair and stood up. Babs watched them go, and for a moment she envied Caroline having a man by her side.
*
As the lift carried them upwards, the sense of threat she’d been ignoring since Friday suddenly reappeared. Perhaps it had been a mistake not to go into the office that day; perhaps she should have squared off against the enemy. But she hadn’t had the strength. Tanja had called and told her Henning was marching up and down the corridors with a stack of newspapers under his arm, shoving what was wrong with Caroline’s family into everyone’s face. Over lunch in the canteen, Henning’s secretary had confided in Tanja that she’d booked a flight for Henning to Berlin. ‘The big boss arrived at the Adlon Hotel over the weekend, his assistant told me.’ Tanja’s knack for gleaning information was due to her invaluable ability to keep quiet at the right time. So Jacques Kerity had been in Berlin, and Henning had flown to see him. Three days before the board meeting. He must have been doing a bit of mudslinging, trying to push through his plan to expand the franchise partnerships. Yet Gilles’s words quoting the big boss were still ringing in Caroline’s ears. Bunch of small fry who’ll be nothing but a pain in the arse. Henning was a smarmy, slippery customer and Kerity was a man who valued fairness and good taste. That said, he prized the value of the brand as highly as either. Thank God neither the papers nor the television had mentioned the blood-drenched name of Heckeroth in the same breath as Caroline or Chocolaterie Jacques Kerity.
Getting out of the lift, she found Tanja waiting impatiently in her office. ‘I thought you weren’t coming. It starts in ten minutes. Do you have everything?’
‘Everything I need is in here,’ Caroline pointed at her laptop bag, ‘and here, if necessary.’ She tapped her head and made for the conference room. Everything will be fine, she told herself, lifting her head and taking a breath. Then she opened the door. They were all in there already, staring at her like a fairg
round attraction, but nobody mentioned Albert. Only Henning, in his silvery grey suit, grinned like a manta ray.
They began by discussing facts and figures, then moved onto the new product lines. Jacques Kerity was unstinting in his praise of Caroline’s idea for the autumn pralines and her market research. ‘You’ll go far, my girl.’
Her pleasure at the remark was mixed with resentment at the term my girl, and a vague kind of unease. But there was no time to probe the sensation further. It was her turn. The projector beamed her PowerPoint presentation against the wall. As Caroline recited figures and market activity, she noticed Henning’s manta-ray smile twist even wider and Kerity knit his brow. She glanced at Gilles, who was gazing just over her shoulder.
Kerity interrupted her mid-sentence. ‘It won’t work, my girl. We can’t chuck the whole budget towards advertising the new products. Finding franchise partners costs money. A single article in the press won’t be enough to bring them flocking.’
Caroline managed not to let her surprise show. Henning was inspecting his fingernails with a smirk, while Gilles opened his laptop. Caroline frantically scanned her memory for the alternative strategy she’d deleted, while she deluged Kerity with empty words to distract him from the real problem: she had no backing from the board. Why had Gilles done this? Why hadn’t he told her Henning had managed to bring the big boss on side? She watched Gilles connect his laptop to the projector as she fell silent, heard him talking about alternative plans and double strategies, about slow-motion marketing – what the hell was that? – an appropriate strategy for launching the new product onto the market, which, given the prestige of the Kerity name, would slowly but surely find its place even without a large advertising budget.
She leaned back and began to understand. Gilles was aiming for promotion to the supervisory board, so he needed a win. He was a coward, so he’d hedged his bets. A life vest plus a safety buoy, she thought, fuming. If I’m sacked because of my family, then he’s still got Henning. If I survive, he’ll play me and Henning off against each other until the stock-market flotation, when he’ll have secured his spot on the senior board. All at once she was sick of these games. Gilles’s words passed her by, Henning’s smug grin bounced off her, and Kerity’s patriarchal manners left her unmoved. What was she doing here? She sold fancy chocolates to people who had too much cash to spend. Was that what she wanted?
She saw herself close her laptop, push back her chair and get to her feet. As she did so, she was aware of Gilles’s astonished gaze and the triumphant glow in Henning’s eyes. ‘Don’t let me disturb you. But it’s time for me to leave.’ Had she really just said that? As she reached the door her knees felt weak, but as she walked down the corridor her footsteps regained their firm ring. Still, she felt nauseous. Heading past Tanja into her office, she put her laptop in its case, picked up her handbag and coat and switched off her phone. Wishing her stunned secretary a nice life, she made for the nearest Underground station on foot.
Only once she was sitting in a fusty-smelling carriage did she realise what she’d given up. She could forget about her career; word of an exit like that got round quickly. Unreliable, they’d say of her in the future, a prima donna, not a team player. Yet there was no chiding voice inside her, nothing calling her a silly goose or a hysterical cow. Only a waiting emptiness. A vacuum eager to be released, to implode.
As Caroline climbed the stairs in the building on Kurfürstenplatz two hours later, she wasn’t sure how she’d got there. On her way up she bumped into Mrs Kiendel, who threw back her head and informed Caroline she was vacating the apartment. So what? She refused to stay in a house like this. How deceived you could be in people – that filthy old bastard had abused her little Franziska, and she hoped he wouldn’t rest in peace. Not one day longer would she live here. Caroline walked past her, letting her invective echo in the stairwell. Pausing outside the door to her father’s flat, she heard the telephone ring inside. She took a bunch of keys out of her pocket, unlocked the door and entered. The ringing stopped.
Although the police had put everything back after the search, the apartment felt as though something was out of place. She went into the kitchen and made a cup of tea, waiting for something to happen. The emptiness remained. Caroline wandered through the rooms, opening Mum’s wardrobe. Oh, Mum. Dad found the diary before me. I could have prevented all of this. Why didn’t I fulfil your last wish? I’m so sorry. I know you didn’t really want us. We weren’t born of love, at least, not me and Bertram. But I still loved you. What a misspent life you lived.
Caroline inhaled the familiar scent of Tresor and lavender, which held a note of verbena. Then she closed the door.
In the guest room items of Albert’s clothing were strewn around. His violin case stood on the chest of drawers. Caroline opened the lid and stared at the instrument. So that’s what it was all for. Turning on her heel, she went into her father’s study. It smelled of cherry wood and furniture polish, with a vague hint of Irish Moss, as though he’d only left the room a few minutes before. She sat down at the desk. The computer was gone, only loose cables on the surface. A few files were missing. With the police, presumably. This must be where Dad had read Mum’s diary, furious and disbelieving.
Again the phone began to ring. Caroline ignored it. A pretty box covered in Venetian paper stood on the desk. As she took off the lid, a faint breath of various aromas escaped. So these were the letters Dad had collected and stored all his life. Caroline ran a finger over the sheaf, tempted to take one out and read it, when her fingertip came to rest on one that was made of thicker paper. She drew it out. It wasn’t a letter at all, it was a postcard-sized black-and-white photograph. The portrait of a man she didn’t recognise, though something about his features seemed familiar. She turned it over, but there was no name on the back. Only a scrap of paper sellotaped on – the torn corner of a packet. Cardenol-SIL 20 ml Drops. Caroline leaned back, a creeping fear rising inside her. Jumping up, she fetched her laptop from the kitchen, carried it to the desk and stuffed in the internet cable. When the computer had switched itself on, she googled Cardenol. More than two thousand hits. She skimmed the first few. Cardiac glycoside . . . medication in the treatment of heart problems . . . active ingredient digitalis . . . lowers the heart rate . . . must be given in very precise doses . . . taken off the market in 1966. Those were the words that pierced the vacuum, those were the words that made it implode. She leaped to her feet, sweeping the box off the table with a shriek and sending the photo flying as Albert’s eyes gazed back at her from it. Panting, she struggled for air.
Someone was pounding on the front door. ‘Caro, for Christ’s sake open up!’ Marc. What was he doing here? Her whole body shaking, she walked down the hall and answered the door.
‘Caro. What’s wrong? Tanja called me in a terrible state. She thought you were going to kill yourself. Why aren’t you answering the phone?’ He pulled her close. ‘I was fucking petrified, you know that?’
She felt his heartbeat, the vibration of his body against hers, and burst into tears.
Caroline shut the door and wiped a hand across her face. ‘Come in. Everything’s fine.’
‘I can see that, Caro. Why can’t you just admit when something’s not fine, when you’re feeling down, when you don’t have everything in hand? Look, sweetheart, I’ve got a strong shoulder here to lean on and cry on. It’ll atrophy if it’s not used, and that’ll ruin my physique. I’ll end up looking like Quasimodo.’ As if to demonstrate, he hunched his back and took a few dragging steps down the hall.
She remembered the way he’d walked down the platform at the train station, remembered the moment she’d realised she wanted to grow old with him.
‘You can’t live with that kind of guilt.’ Marc straightened up, coming towards her with a smile and pointing at his shoulder.
She leaned her head against it. His arms hugged her, and it felt nice. Right. She still owed him an answer. ‘Let’s go home.’
‘To yours
or mine?’
‘To ours.’
*
Dühnfort reached Münsing. He’d soon be on his boat. By now he knew what he was going to call it.
Last Friday and half of Saturday he’d spent closing the case with Alois and Gina, making sure it would stand up in court. Afterwards, confident that he and his people had done good work, he’d driven to Rechts der Isar Hospital to visit Christine Meingast. She was getting better, though she kept blaming herself for her impulsive and ill-considered behaviour. He decided, therefore, to spare her the lecture, contenting himself with one piece of advice: ‘If you want to be a detective, learn to get a grip on your emotions.’
‘I’ve learned that lesson,’ she’d replied. Afterwards he’d done some shopping, buying a down jacket with an integrated windbreaker, a beanie, a pair of sturdy boots with non-slip soles and some windproof gloves for his first sailing trip in five years, then picked up a map of Starnberg Lake, which he studied over the weekend as he planned his route. Previously he’d sailed on the Alster and the Elbe, but mainly on the North Sea. After such a long time without planks underfoot, however, even a Bavarian lake was tempting. Laden with bags, he’d also tracked down a shop selling baby clothes, where he bought a pink romper and tiny fabric shoes for his niece. Before he chose a christening present, he wanted a chat with his sister-in-law, Victoria.
When he’d phoned the other evening, Julius had picked up. It had been a pleasant, almost easy conversation, all rivalries swept away. Julius seemed to have withdrawn from the battlefield Dühnfort had left years before, finally mounting the winner’s podium. He was the one who’d given their father the grandchild he longed for. The certainty of his triumph left him serene and magnanimous, his tone conciliatory. ‘I’m looking forward to seeing you at the christening next month.’
The roast dinner on Sunday had been dry and flavourless. Probably Gina’s mother hadn’t marinated it long enough, nor had it been properly cooked. ‘I don’t understand,’ she’d said, with a helpless shrug. ‘The stuff’s in there.’ By stuff she’d presumably meant the ingredients. But Dühnfort hadn’t been expecting a decent meal; he’d been following Gina’s advice about spending time with nice people. And there he had not been disappointed. Sitting round the table like one big family, they’d chatted about everything and anything – except the Heckeroth case. Both he and Gina had refused. As he left, he’d wished Gina’s mother best of luck at the interview. ‘Oh, she’ll be fine,’ Gina had said as she watched him go.