by Nele Neuhaus
The officer handed Pia the victim’s purse, a cheap knockoff of a fancy brand. Besides a wallet, it contained a cell phone, a key ring, and all sorts of odds and ends. Pia thanked her for the information, then took a pair of latex gloves out of her pocket and pulled them on. In the wallet, she found a driver’s license.
“Hürmet Schwarzer,” she read, looking at the photo. “What a lovely young woman, only twenty-seven years old. Lived in Schwalbach.”
“Why?” Bodenstein asked himself. “Why would he kill a twenty-seven-year-old bakery sales clerk?”
“If it was the sniper, we’ll know soon enough,” said Pia. “He’s getting bolder and bolder each time.”
“Because he wants attention,” Bodenstein suggested. “He doesn’t kill for the simple thrill of it. There’s a lot more behind this.”
“One thing is for sure,” said Pia. “He’s playing us for fools and carrying out his intentions with ice-cold precision.”
Bodenstein looked around. Where had the sniper taken up position? Kitty-corner, across the street, he saw a building under construction. Did the sniper lie in wait on the roof of the unfinished building? If so, how did he get up there? Did the furniture store have surveillance cameras in its parking lot that may have caught the perp on video?
Bodenstein had seldom felt so powerless. He felt like somebody who wanted to open a treasure chest with a crowbar but couldn’t find anywhere to insert the lever.
Karoline Albrecht left the editorial office of the Taunus Echo in Königstein and walked up Limburger Strasse to the pedestrian zone, which was usually swarming with shoppers in the days after Christmas. This time, many of the shops were closed. Somebody had accomplished this simply by firing three shots. But at least the pub, which had been mentioned to her at the editorial office, was open. Karoline entered, pushing aside the curtain meant to keep out the wind. A couple of men were sitting in the semidarkness at the bar, drinking coffee. Neither of them matched the photo of Konstantin Faber that she’d found on the Web site of the Taunus Echo. She didn’t want to ask about him, so she decided to wait for a while. The woman at the reception desk of the editorial office had told her that he went to this pub almost every morning. So she ordered a cup of coffee and sat down at one of the few tables, receiving curious looks from the men at the bar.
Just as she was about to pay and leave, the door opened. The curtain parted, and a bitterly cold draft blew in. Karoline recognized the man at once, although he was considerably more rotund than in the photo, and he had less hair on his head.
“I hope everyone had a merry Christmas!” Konstantin Faber said to the other customers, and sat down next to them at the bar.
“Shut the hell up,” replied one of the men. “I had the worst sales ever before Christmas.”
“Me, too,” the other chimed in. “All year, we were looking forward to the Christmas business, and then this goddamn killer ruined it all.”
Both men nodded, looking depressed. Apparently, they were chefs, because they talked about canceled reservations and about staff calling in sick with the flimsiest of excuses. Karoline pretended she was busy with her cell phone as she listened intently to their conversation.
“People ordered their last-minute gifts online,” said the second man dejectedly. “I’ll have to let two people go in January, that’s for sure.”
“I’m closing till all this crap is over,” said one chef. “We’re leaving for Italy tomorrow. Whether it’s ten days earlier or late doesn’t really matter.”
One man had heard that since yesterday the bus drivers and train engineers were refusing to go to work. In Frankfurt, the S-trains were going nowhere, and the cabdrivers were staying home.
“I hope they catch this nutcase soon,” said the proprietor, shoving another cup of coffee over to Faber. “The infrastructure in the whole Rhein-Main region is going to collapse if this keeps up.”
“We’ve got problems, too,” said the journalist. The office had been getting complaints from numerous subscribers that their daily paper wasn’t being delivered. Many of the delivery boys had called in sick, and you couldn’t really blame them.
The men at the bar continued to discuss what the police could and should be doing. Karoline would have liked to tell them that there was no need for panic, because the sniper wasn’t interested in shooting paper boys or bus drivers. The police probably hadn’t thought about this aspect, but obviously, the Judge was causing major headaches for many businesses and shop owners in the region.
Karoline got up and went over to the bar.
“Excuse me for bothering you,” she said to the journalist. “Are you Mr. Faber from the Taunus Echo?”
“Who wants to know?” Faber looked at her impatiently. “Are you from the police?”
“No. One of your colleagues told me that I might find you here,” she replied. “I’d like to talk with you. But perhaps somewhere more private.”
“Oho, Faber, somebody wants to drag you off,” teased one of his pals, and the others laughed, but he didn’t pay them any mind. He was no longer looking annoyed.
“Okay.” He got up from his barstool and grabbed his jacket. “Put it on my tab, all right, Willi?”
“No problem,” replied the proprietor.
Karoline paid for her coffee and followed Konstantin Faber out to the street.
For Pia, it was unusual to work under the eyes of the public. Mostly dead bodies were found in a residence, in the woods, or somewhere else hidden away. She then had to deal with one or two witnesses and with those who had discovered the body. But this time, there were dozens of people who had seen Hürmet Schwarzer get shot. In a country where firearms were a rarity and generally not part of everyday life, this experience was even more traumatic. It was particularly bad for a seven-year-old boy who had been with his parents and siblings in the shoe store when the plate glass window was shattered by the bullet. His older siblings were trying on some shoes, but he was bored and had been looking out the window when the horrible event took place right in front of him. The little boy had had some good luck with the bad, because the bullet that killed Hürmet Schwarzer flew past him only millimeters away and slammed into some shelving.
The boy now lay inside an ambulance and was being treated by a medic. Bodenstein talked to his parents while Pia looked for the young woman who had stood next to the victim.
“May I speak with her?” she asked the doctor.
“You can try,” he said. “She is suffering from shock. She hasn’t said a word to us yet.”
Celina Hoffmann, a blond woman in her early twenties, sat slumped on the running board of the second ambulance, staring at her hands. She was wearing her bakery smock, and someone had put a foil blanket around her shoulders. At first, Pia thought the woman had freckles, but then she realized that her face, hair, smock, and hands were covered with blood spatter.
“Hello, Ms. Hoffmann,” said Pia. “I’m Pia Kirchhoff from Kripo in Hofheim. May I sit with you for a moment?”
The young woman raised her head, looked at Pia with an empty gaze, and shrugged her shoulders. She was trembling all over, and her face was gray. Even if the shock eventually receded, she would never forget what she had experienced today. Some people were more robust than others and could cope with processing such a horrendous experience; for others, it would leave behind lifelong scars in their souls.
“I . . . I wanted to pay back the fifty euros to Hürmet before she went on vacation,” whispered Celina Hoffmann, holding out a crumpled bill to Pia. A tear ran down her cheek. “She loaned it to me before Christmas, and I didn’t want . . . I . . . It’s bad luck if you go into the new year with debts.”
“You and Hürmet were colleagues, weren’t you?” Pia asked.
“Yes. We . . . We both work at the bakery,” Celina replied in a quavering voice as she stared at her hands covered with spots of blood. “She always works the early shift, and I usually don’t come in until noon. And today . . . Today I came a little late, becaus
e . . . my car ran out of gas. Hürmet had already left, but she always goes shopping after work, so I looked to see if she was still around. Then she came out of REWE. I . . . I ran out and called to her. She stopped and . . . and . . . turned around to face me and then . . . then . . .”
She fell silent and broke into tears. But talking about it seemed to have done her good, lessening the shock. Celina Hoffmann sobbed in despair. Pia handed her a pack of tissues and waited patiently until the young woman regained her composure and spoke again.
“I . . . I couldn’t even understand what happened,” she went on after a moment. “Hürmet lay there in front of me, and I was screaming like a crazy woman until a guy slapped me and took me away from there.”
“Did you see the direction the shot came from?” Pia wanted to know.
“No. I . . . I was only looking at Hürmet.” She stopped and glanced up. “But it was definitely from behind me to the right, up high. Because . . . because she was standing with her back half turned to the parking lot, and . . . and . . . her face . . . it just exploded somehow.”
The young woman covered her face with her hands as she relived the horror of the last half hour—a scene that her mind so wanted to eradicate. Pia was impressed. It was extremely seldom that an eyewitness could remember something in such detail. Often, it seemed heartless to question a person immediately after they had lived through or seen something terrible. But the sooner a witness could be questioned, the greater the chance of getting an unexpurgated and thus fairly factual statement. If the witness first had a chance to think everything over and talk to other people, then what they saw could be mixed up with all sorts of conclusions and emotions. The human brain was designed to protect the person by erasing the memory of terrible events or breaking them into fragments. For this reason, people often failed to remember accidents they had seen or even experienced, and this type of amnesia was generally permanent.
“I know that it’s not easy for you,” Pia said sympathetically. “But you’ll need to talk to my colleague from the evidence team.”
Celina Hoffmann nodded. Pia jotted down her name, address, and phone number, then made sure that her coworkers from the bakery were allowed to see her. In the meantime, Christian Kröger and his team had arrived and begun to examine the crime scene.
“According to the witness, the shot came from the right, behind, and above,” Pia reported to Kröger and Bodenstein. “So if she was standing here, the bullet came from somewhere over there.”
She pointed toward the furniture store.
“Hmm, I figured more like from the roof of the building under construction,” Bodenstein said.
“No, the angle of the shot doesn’t match.” Kröger looked around and shook his head. “I concur with the witness. The bullet entered above the left ear and passed through the skull. I’m guessing the shooter was on the roof of Mann Mobilia. We’ll go up there and do a trajectory analysis.”
“Her telephone is ringing!” called one of Kröger’s people, and held out Hürmet Schwarzer’s purse to Pia. She exchanged a look with Bodenstein, then stuck her hand in the purse and pulled out the phone.
The display said PATRICK CALLING. Whoever that was, it must be a close friend, if Hürmet Schwarzer had stored him under his first name. Pia took the call.
“Hürmet, where the heck are you?” the man shouted. “Why don’t you pick up?”
“This is Pia Kirchhoff from the criminal police, Hofheim,” she said. “With whom am I speaking, please?”
“Where’s my wife?” the man asked after a brief pause. That explained his relationship to the dead woman. “What’s going on? Why doesn’t she answer her phone?”
“Mr. Schwarzer, where are you now?” Pia countered with another question. No telling what the news of his wife’s death might trigger if the man was possibly at the wheel of a forty-ton truck.
“I . . . I’m at home,” said Patrick Schwarzer, giving his address. His voice sounded shaky, losing its self-confidence. “Please tell me, what has happened to my wife?”
“We’ll be over there right away,” replied Pia, terminating the call, and handed the phone to her colleague, who slipped it into an exhibit bag.
She felt a great reluctance to confront the bewilderment and grief of a relative for a fourth time in a week. She would rather delegate the task to someone else.
“Come on,” said Bodenstein, who knew exactly what was going through her mind. “Let’s get it over with.”
“What does the victim’s husband say?” Dr. Nicola Engel wanted to know an hour later at the improvised meeting being held in Pia and Ostermann’s office. “Is there a connection between his wife and the other victims? Did he know Kirsten Stadler?”
“We didn’t have a chance to question him.” Bodenstein waved aside her query. “He works in customer service at a savings bank in Hattersheim and had come home for lunch as usual. Because he hadn’t listened to the radio, he didn’t know what was going on in Eschborn. He was completely unprepared.”
“How certain is it that this perp is the sniper?” Nicola Engel asked.
“One hundred percent. It’s the same ammunition he used for the other three victims,” said Pia.
“Why do you think he decided to make contact with the press?” The commissioner hadn’t been at the morning meeting when Bodenstein presented the letter from the Judge to the journalist Konstantin Faber. “What’s your opinion of his message?”
“ ‘A great injustice has been done. The guilty parties shall feel the same pain as the one who has suffered because of their indifference, greed, vanity, and thoughtlessness. Those who have taken guilt upon themselves shall live in fear and terror, for I am come to judge the living and the dead.’ ” Andreas Neff, leaning on shelves for document binders, read the message aloud.
“A psychopath,” he then pronounced judgment. “A megalomaniac who sets himself up as the Judge over life and death. With this message, the perpetrator reveals quite a bit about himself. For example, he is religious. The last sentence of his mail is taken from the Catholic profession of faith. He has a mission and at the same time wants to challenge his pursuers. For him, it’s a game. Our perpetrator is an adventurer.”
He looked around the room, inviting confirmation.
“Do you believe me now? Was my profile right?”
The question was directed at Kim, who was standing next to him.
“To believe means not to know,” she replied without even looking at Neff. He, on the other hand, scrutinized her with unconcealed interest. It was clear to everyone that he liked her. But it was equally clear to everyone except himself that Kim was not the slightest bit interested in him. She didn’t deign to respond to his theory, as she bit her lower lip, obviously thinking about something else.
“Has anyone talked to Helen Stadler yet?” she suddenly broke her silence. “Why was she at Renate Rohleder’s?”
Bodenstein and Pia exchanged a quick glance. In the hectic rush of the past few hours, they had completely forgotten to inform the team what they had discovered earlier in the day.
“Helen Stadler, the daughter of Kirsten Stadler, committed suicide a few months ago,” Bodenstein said. “One of Erik Stadler’s colleagues told us that today, and his father confirmed it.”
“Erik Stadler was once a biathlete. He does stuff like BASE jumping and other extreme sports,” Pia added reluctantly, because it seemed to support Neff’s theory. “He even won a bronze medal at the Olympics. In addition, he was in the army. That means he knows how to shoot. He may even be an expert marksman. And today at noon, he was not at work or at home.”
“There you have it.” Andreas Neff nodded with satisfaction. “He’s the one. As the son of Kirsten Stadler, he also has a suitable motive.”
“How do you see it, Oliver?” Nicola Engel asked.
“Erik Stadler does seem to meet all the conditions,” Bodenstein admitted, rubbing his unshaven chin.
“Then you should put him on the wanted list,” En
gel advised.
“Officers from Frankfurt are already staking out his apartment,” said Kai Ostermann. “I’m sending another patrol over to his office. He’s bound to turn up sooner or later.”
“Kirsten Stadler’s parents haven’t called in either,” Cem told them. “They have at least as strong a motive as the widower and the son.”
Engel thought for a moment, then got up from her chair.
“We’re going to the media,” she announced. “We’re going to give them everything we know to date. Four victims in ten days! This case is upsetting the whole region. We’ve been ordered to ask for assistance from the public, so that means all crime scenes and times will be published. Someone must have seen something. For both the print media and television, I want detailed reconstructions of the crimes, including the possible escape routes used by the perpetrator.”
“I’m worried about that,” said Ostermann.
“The press will also point out that the perpetrator must have had a sports bag or large shopping bag with him,” Cem Altunay added. “That’s what he used to transport the stripped-down rifle.”
“I want results,” Engel said emphatically. All that was missing was for her to clap her hands. “So, get to work!”
“The motive of the perp seems to be retaliation, not mere revenge,” Kim remarked.
“What’s the difference?” asked Kathrin Fachinger skeptically. “It boils down to the same thing—lynch law.”
“Retaliation is the reciprocation of an injustice inflicted as vengeance and requires a punishment qualitatively corresponding to the deed,” replied Kim. “What you did to me, I will do to you—in the negative as well as in the positive, because it’s also possible to retaliate with goodness. In the ethical sense, retaliation is the basis for the social principle of justice. Vengeance is an extreme form of retaliation, for example, blood vengeance. The avenger ignores legal means of reparations because he considers them inappropriate.”
“I don’t see any difference,” said Ostermann. “According to Section 211 StGb, revenge is a classic characteristic of murder.”