Eternal jf-3

by Craig Russel

  ‘No…’ Schuler tried to sound as though Fabel had not rattled him. He failed. ‘No… what will you do?’

  Fabel stood up. ‘I will let you go.’

  Schuler gave a confused laugh and looked across at Anna and Henk, both of whom remained expressionless.

  ‘I will let you walk out of here,’ continued Fabel. ‘And I will make sure that it is public knowledge that you are our principal witness to this murder. I might even allow one of the less scrupulous local newspapers to feel that they have tricked your name and address out of me. Then…’ Fabel gave a small, cruel laugh. ‘Oh, then, Leonard my boy, then you won’t ever have to worry about us again. Like I said, I don’t hunt small fry like you. But I can use you as bait.’ Fabel leaned close to Schuler once more. ‘You don’t understand this man. You could never even begin to think in the same way. But I can. I have hunted so many killers like him. Too many. Let me tell you, they don’t see or feel the world in the same way we do. Some of them don’t feel fear. Honestly. Some – most of them, actually – kill just to watch what it is like for another human being to die. And quite a few of them savour each death in the same way the rest of us would enjoy a fine wine or a good meal. And that means they like to make the experience last. To relish every last second. And trust me, Leonard… if my friend here believes that you might lead us to him, that you maybe saw him without him seeing you, it won’t cost him a thought to hunt you down and kill you. But he doesn’t just kill. Just imagine what it must feel like to be tied to a chair while he slices you up and tears your scalp from your head. And all that pain, all that horror, would be the very last thing on earth that you would experience. An eternal moment. Oh no, Leonard, he won’t just kill you. He’ll take you with him into hell first.’ Fabel stood up and extended an arm towards the door. ‘So, Leonard, do you want me to release you

  …?’

  Schuler shook his head determinedly. ‘I’ll tell you everything. Everything I know. Just make sure my name doesn’t get out.’

  Fabel smiled. ‘That’s a good boy.’ He turned to Anna and Henk as he made his way to the door. ‘I’ll leave this to you…’

  Fabel poured himself a coffee when he got back to his office. He sat down at his desk, hung his jacket over the back of his chair and checked his watch. It was now nine-thirty. Sometimes Fabel felt that there was no refuge from his work: that it had the ability to reach out to him no matter where he was or what time of day it was. Fabel was annoyed with himself that he had discussed the case with Susanne during their time off together, even if it had only been about Griebel’s work. He even regretted taking home the files that Ullrich had given him. But something nagged relentlessly at Fabel about the second victim and he could not put his finger on it. It was like not being able to locate a tiny stone in your shoe, yet feeling it with every step.

  Fabel reached into his desk and took out a large sketch pad from the drawer. He flipped it open at the page on which he had begun to map out the Hamburger Hairdresser case. It was a process that Fabel had repeated so many times before, with so many cases: a perversion of the creative function for which the sketch pads were intended. Fabel mapped out the profiles of sick and twisted minds, of death and pain. He thought back to what he had said to Schuler: all bluff, of course, but it bothered Fabel how true it was when he said that he was a hunter of men; someone who found it increasingly easy to enter the mindset of the men he hunted.

  Again Fabel found himself wondering how it had come to pass that he had ended up here, up to his elbows in the blood and filth of others. This life had crept up on him. There had been definite, discreet steps along the way. The first had been the murder of Hanna Dorn, his girlfriend at university. He had not really known her that long or that well, but she had been a significant figure in his landscape. And she had been taken from it, suddenly and violently, by a killer who had chosen her as a victim, completely at random. Fabel had been as much confused as grief-stricken, and as soon as he had graduated he had joined the Polizei Hamburg. Then there had been the Commerzbank shoot-out. Fabel – the pacifist Fabel who had for his national service elected for Civilian Duty, driving ambulances in his native Norden rather than opting for a shorter conscription period in the armed forces – had been forced to do that which he had always promised himself he would never do. He had taken a human life. Then, during his time at the Murder Commission, each new case had chipped away at him, reshaping him into someone he had never thought he would become.

  Sometimes Fabel felt that he was wearing someone else’s life, as if he had picked up the wrong coat from a restaurant cloakroom. This was not what he had planned for himself at all.

  He gazed down at the sketch pad, not seeing it for the moment but trying to look into another life. Not, this time, into the mind of a killer or into the life of a murder victim, but into a life that should, that could, have been his. Maybe that was what Fabel had become: a victim of murder himself.

  He reached into his jacket and pulled out his wallet. He took out the slip of paper with her telephone number on it that Sonja Brun had given him, and Roland Bartz’s card, and laid them on the desk. A new life. He could pick up the phone, make two phone calls and change everything. What would it be like, he wondered, to have small worries? Not to have to make life-or-death decisions? He looked at the phone on his desk for a moment, imagining it as a portal to a new life. Then he sighed and put the scrap of paper and the business card back into his wallet before turning his attention again to the sketch pad.

  Two victims in a single day. No solid leads and little to connect them. One a flagrant attention-seeker, the other practically a recluse. The only common theme that Fabel could discern, other than the suggestion of political radicalism in their youth, was the way they seemed to exist only in reflection. Hauser had sought to establish himself as an environmental guru and significant figure on the Left, only to become a footnote in the biographies of others. Griebel had seemed to exist only through and for his work, even when his wife had been alive.

  Earlier, Fabel had written Kristina Dreyer’s name on the page, looped it with a highlighter pen and linked it to Hauser’s. He crossed it out. He had also linked Sebastian Lang’s name to Hauser’s. Fabel had not interviewed Lang personally, but Anna had assured him that Lang’s alibi was solid. A question mark indicated the older man who Anna had said had been seen with Hauser in The Firehouse. Could that have been Griebel? There were so few clear pictures of the camera-shy scientist in life, and the mortuary photograph of him with the top of his head sliced off did not help with identification. Fabel made a note to have Anna take an artist’s impression of Griebel down to The Firehouse to see if any of the staff recognised him.

  There was a knock on the door and Anna Wolff walked in, as usual without being invited. Henk Hermann followed her.

  ‘Thanks for softening up Schuler,’ said Anna, in a tone that left Fabel unsure of whether she meant it or not, as she sat down opposite him. ‘It was difficult to get him to shut up, he’s so scared of the bogeyman you threatened to unleash on him.’

  ‘Anything useful?’ asked Fabel.

  ‘Yes, Chef,’ said Henk. ‘Schuler admitted he was cruising the area on foot, checking out likely apartments and houses. According to him it was only a half-hearted reconnaissance… apparently he does his best work in the wee small hours when the occupiers are asleep, but the Schanzenviertel is a clubby and pubby type of area so he thought he might find a few empty flats at that time of evening. Anyway, he hadn’t had any luck and had nearly been caught once by a householder, so he had decided to call it a night. It was on his way home that he noticed the bike chained up outside Hauser’s apartment and he thought “Why not?” The interesting thing is he said he wanted to check the apartment out, just in case, so he went around to the back where there’s a small courtyard with access to the lounge, bedroom and bathroom windows. He says he didn’t take it any further because he could see that the occupier was at home.’

  ‘He saw Hauser?’


  ‘Yep,’ said Anna. ‘Alive. He was sitting in the lounge drinking, so Schuler decided to settle for the bike.’

  ‘But the main thing is that Hauser was not alone,’ said Henk. ‘He had a guest.’

  ‘Oh?’ Fabel leaned forward. ‘Do we have a description?’

  ‘Schuler says that Hauser’s guest was sitting with his back to the window,’ said Anna. ‘Schuler was keen to get out of the courtyard in case he was spotted, so he didn’t pay much attention to either of the men. But, from what he said, one of them was definitely Hauser. Schuler described the other man as younger, maybe early thirties, dark hair and slim.’

  ‘Doesn’t that description fit with the guy who discovered Kristina Dreyer cleaning up after the murder?’ said Fabel.

  ‘Sebastian Lang… It does, doesn’t it?’ Anna grinned. ‘I have a photograph of Lang that I’ve been using when I’ve been asking around about Hauser.’

  ‘Lang gave you a photograph voluntarily?’ asked Fabel.

  ‘Not exactly.’ Anna exchanged a look with Henk. ‘I borrowed it from the crime scene. Technically, it was the property of the deceased. Not Lang’s.’

  Fabel let it go. ‘Did you show the photograph to Schuler?’

  ‘Yep,’ said Anna. ‘Inconclusive, I would say. Schuler says that it could be the same guy – the colouring is the same and, roughly, so is the build. But he didn’t get a close enough look at Hauser’s guest to make a positive identification. Nevertheless, I think we should pay Herr Lang another visit. I’d like to have another look at that alibi.’

  ‘This time,’ said Fabel, ‘I think I’ll come along too.’

  10.35 p.m.: Eimsbuttel, Hamburg

  It was after ten-thirty by the time Fabel, Anna and Henk knocked on the door of Sebastian Lang’s apartment. Lang lived on the second storey of an impressive building in Ottersbekallee, only a few minutes from Hans-Joachim Hauser’s Schanzenviertel apartment. Fabel had never met Lang before: he was a tall man in his early thirties, very slim, with a pale complexion, pale blue eyes and dark hair. His appearance certainly fitted the rough description of the man Schuler had seen in Hauser’s apartment. Lang’s face was perfectly proportioned, yet instead of making him handsome the perfection of his features seemed to feminise him. A ‘pretty’ boy was how Maria had described him. The other thing that was remarkable about Lang’s face was its lack of expression, and when he stood to one side with a sigh to allow the officers to enter there was nothing in the mask of his face to reveal the extent of his annoyance.

  He directed Fabel, Anna and Henk into the lounge. Like its occupier, the flat was immaculately presented, with not a thing out of place. It was as if Lang made the minimum possible impact on his living environment. He had clearly been reading when Fabel and the others arrived and he had set the book down, neatly, on the coffee table. Fabel picked it up. It was some kind of political history of post-war Germany, open at a chapter on German domestic terrorism in the 1970s and 1980s.

  ‘You a student of history, Herr Lang?’ asked Fabel.

  Lang took the book from Fabel’s hands and closed it, placing it back into the space it had left in Lang’s tidily arranged bookshelf.

  ‘It’s late, Herr Chief Commissar, and I don’t really appreciate being pestered at home,’ Lang said. ‘Would you please tell me what this is all about?’

  ‘Certainly, Herr Lang. And I do apologise for disturbing you in the evening, but I assumed you’d be only too willing to answer any questions that might take us closer to understanding what happened to Herr Hauser.’

  Another sigh. ‘You’re trying my patience, Herr Fabel. Of course I want to help catch Hans-Joachim’s killer. But when the police turn up mob-handed at my door after ten in the evening, I assume that there is more to their visit than just checking a few facts.’

  ‘True…’ said Fabel. ‘A witness has come forward. He saw someone in Herr Hauser’s apartment on the night of his murder. Someone who fits your description.’

  ‘But that’s impossible.’ Still the protesting tone in Lang’s voice did not translate into any animation of his features. ‘Or, at least, it is possible that someone like me was there. But it was not me.’

  ‘Well,’ said Anna, ‘that is something we have yet to establish.’

  ‘For God’s sake, I gave you full details of where I was that night

  …’ Lang walked over to a bureau by the door and opened a drawer. He turned back to the officers with something in each hand. ‘Here is my ticket stub for the exhibition I attended. See, it’s dated for that Thursday. And here…’ He gave the stub to Fabel. In his other hand was a pen and notebook. ‘Here are the names and telephone numbers again of the people who can and will confirm that they were with me that night.’

  ‘You came home about one, one-fifteen in the morning, you say?’ Fabel passed the stub to Anna.

  ‘Yes.’ Lang folded his arms defiantly, ‘We – I mean my friends and I – went for a meal afterwards. I’ve already given her’ – he nodded in Anna’s direction – ‘the name of the restaurant and the waiter who served us. We left the restaurant about a quarter to one.’

  ‘And you came home alone?’

  ‘Yes. Alone, Herr Fabel. So I can’t provide an alibi after that.’

  ‘That may be immaterial, Herr Lang,’ said Fabel. ‘All the indications are that Herr Hauser died between ten and midnight.’

  Fabel thought he detected something disturb Lang’s impassive expression, as if pinning a time to Hauser’s ordeal and death had made it more real.

  ‘Your relationship with Herr Hauser was not exclusive?’ asked Anna.

  ‘No. Not on Hans-Joachim’s side, anyway.’

  ‘Do you know of anyone else he might have been involved with?’

  For a moment Lang looked confused. ‘What do you mean involved? Oh

  … oh, I see. No. Hans-Joachim had countless flings, but there was no one… well, I was his only companion.’

  ‘What did you think we meant when we asked you if he was involved with anyone else?’ asked Fabel.

  ‘Nothing, really. I just wasn’t sure if you meant privately or professionally. Or politically in Hans-Joachim’s case. It’s just that he was very, well, strange about his associations. He got a bit drunk one night and lectured me about not getting involved with the wrong group of people. About making the wrong choices.’

  Fabel looked across to where Lang had replaced the book on the shelf. ‘Did Herr Hauser ever discuss the past with you? I mean his days as an activist, that kind of thing?’

  ‘Endlessly,’ Lang said wearily. ‘He would rant on about how his generation had saved Germany. How their actions back then shaped the society we live in now. He seemed to think that my generation, as he would put it, was screwing the whole thing up.’

  ‘But did he ever say anything about his activities? Or his associates?’

  ‘Oddly enough, no. The only person he tended to go on about was Bertholdt Muller-Voigt. You know, the Environment Senator. Hans-Joachim hated him with a vengeance. He used to say that Muller-Voigt believed that he could be Chancellor one day, and that was what all this “Lady Macbeth” crap with First Mayor Schreiber’s wife was all about. Hans-Joachim said that Muller-Voigt and Hans Schreiber were cut from the same cloth. Shameless opportunists. He had known them both at university and had despised them even then – particularly Muller-Voigt.’

  ‘Did he ever discuss the allegations made against Muller-Voigt in the press by Ingrid Fischmann – all that stuff about the Wiedler kidnapping?’

  ‘No. Not with me, anyway.’

  ‘Did Herr Hauser have any contact with Muller-Voigt? Recently, I mean.’

  Lang shrugged. ‘Not that I know of. I would have thought that Hans-Joachim would have gone out of his way to avoid him.’

  Fabel nodded. He took a moment to process what Lang had told him. It did not add up to much. ‘You are probably aware that another man was killed in the same way, within twenty-four hours of Herr Hauser’s death. The man�
�s name was Dr Gunter Griebel. Does that name mean anything to you? Did Herr Hauser ever discuss a Dr Griebel?’

  Lang shook his delicately sculpted head. ‘No. I can’t say that I ever heard him mention him.’

  ‘We spoke to the staff at The Firehouse,’ said Anna. ‘They told us that Herr Hauser was sometimes seen drinking and talking with an older man, about the same age as him. Would you have any idea who it might have been?’

  ‘Sorry. I wouldn’t,’ said Lang. ‘Listen, I’m not being obstructive or awkward or anything. It’s just that Hans-Joachim only included me in his life when it suited him. There’s practically nothing you could tell me about him that would surprise me. He was a very, very secretive man… despite all his publicity-seeking. Sometimes I think that Hans-Joachim was hiding in plain sight – concealing himself behind his public persona. It was like there was something deep down inside that he didn’t want anyone to see.’

  Fabel considered Lang’s words. What he had said about Hauser was true of Griebel, but in a different way.

  ‘We’re all like that,’ said Fabel. ‘To one degree or another.’

  In the car on the way back to the Presidium, Fabel discussed Lang with his two junior officers.

  ‘I’ll double-check these details,’ said Anna. ‘But, to be honest, his alibi doesn’t put him entirely in the clear for Hauser’s death. If he had gone straight from the restaurant to Hauser’s apartment, and if we allow a margin of error in the estimated time of death, then he could just about have done it.’

  ‘It would be stretching the timeline pretty far,’ said Fabel. ‘Although I have to admit there’s something about Lang that bothers me. But the main thing that puts him out of the picture is the fact that your sequence of events just doesn’t fit with Schuler’s statement. He saw Hauser sitting with a guest who broadly fits Lang’s description somewhere between eleven and eleven-thirty; Lang’s alibi is solid for that time.’

  Fabel dropped Henk and Anna back at the Presidium and drove home to Poseldorf. Hamburg glowed in the dark warmth of the summer night. Something sat heavy in the back of Fabel’s mind, obscuring what this case was all about, but his tired brain could not shift it out of the way. As he drove, he knew that he was dealing with a case that was growing cold on him. A lead-less case. And that meant he might not get a break in it until the killer struck again. Considering he had killed twice within a twenty-four-hour period, and had not struck since, it was entirely possible that the killer’s work was over.