DON'T LOOK DOWN

by Barbara Scott Emmett

  Muscle gave a yell and pointed.

  Dragging Alina down with her, Lauren ducked behind a counter. Bent over, they scuttled through the legs of disgruntled shoppers, heading back towards the main door. Using a display model as cover, Lauren stood and peered at the shop floor. The goons were over in the far corner, where she and Alina had been the last time they were visible. They stood back to back searching the shop.

  ‘Come on. Make a break for it.’ Lauren made a dash for the door, burling through it as another yell bellowed out of Muscle.

  Lauren crashed into an old man on the threshold, sending him spinning. Momentarily, she turned to apologise but some instinct for survival pushed her on and away. No time. No time. Got to hide, get away. No time. Other shoppers had caught him anyway, broken his fall. No time for the luxury of guilt or contrition.

  Out in the street again, a light snow fell from the darkened sky. Glancing back Lauren saw Muscle skid out of the department store with Brains behind him. As they ran to their car, she darted down past the cathedral, Laurenzkirk, towards the Hauptmarkt where the Christmas market filled the square with red-striped awnings.

  Five o’clock. Christmas shoppers. Office workers going home. Tourists. Children. Stallholders. A brass band oompahing on the corner. The citrus-cinnamon smell of Gluhwein. And lights, everywhere, lights sparkling and winking, their reflections bouncing back from the sleety streets.

  At her back, Alina – and a black Mercedes, heedless of the shallow steps it jounced over, exhaust pipe clanging. The goons were on the move again.

  A wail of sirens. Police coming from all directions but could they get here in time? If the goons caught up with them she and Alina could be dead in seconds, their brains decorating the sidewalk, tinting the snow sugar pink. The goons wouldn’t care who saw them now. Or who got in their way. They would abandon the Merc and vanish into the crowds. Leave the country. Disappear.

  Alina screamed. Lauren skidded to a halt and turned. The girl was sprawled on the cobbles clutching her knee. She raised her face to Lauren – stricken, fearful, apologetic. Lauren doubled over, hands resting on her thighs, breath ragged, a stitch in her side. The Merc was only yards away.

  She reached down and hauled Alina up by the collar of her cardigan. Neither of them wore outdoor clothes but Lauren could see the girl was sweating as much as she was. She set off again and Alina limped after her for a step or two then stopped.

  ‘Go. Leave me. Go.’ The girl propped herself against a post, her face creased with pain. ‘Go.’

  Lauren hesitated, wild with panic. What to do? What to do? Can’t leave her at their mercy.

  The Merc clanked to a stop and both doors burst open.

  Seventy-nine

  Dieter Dorn was happy with his job delivering pizzas. He was out in the fresh air most of the day, nobody looking over his shoulder, and he got the chance to ride around town on a motorbike. Okay, it wasn’t exactly a Harley Davidson, not much more than a motorised pushbike really, but he tootled around quite happily, handing over the pizzas, picking up the tips.

  He was on his way now to drop a Margharita off to a stallholder at the Christmas market. All that food on sale at the market – Bratwurst, Bockwurst, Nürnberger sausages, Bratkartofflen, Lebkuchen – and still they wanted pizza. Probably got sick of their own stuff when it was all around them all day. Sick of the smell of sausages and potatoes and spicy cakes. Wanted something different. Same as he got sick of pizza really, smelling the hot cheesy tomato stink all the time. Wouldn’t eat one if you paid him.

  Whistling, he swung off his little bike, opened the pannier, lifted out the greasy flat box and strolled into the market square.

  Two minutes later, as he stood in the thick of the stalls, savouring the spicy aromas, he was startled to see his own bike hurtle past him, careen around a corner and phut-phut into the distance. Dieter, along with a collection of tourists, shoppers and stallholders, stood gaping at the place the little bike was last visible, as though it had vanished in the puff of smoke from its own exhaust pipe.

  ~

  Lauren twisted the motorbike between the stands, slipping through the widest spaces she could find. Alina, perched on the flat pannier on the back, had her in a stranglehold. They sped through the market scattering shoppers, cut right across the stall-packed square, skittering over the wooden walkways, sliding between stands, and bursting onto the cobbled street near the Schönen Brunnen. No time to turn the golden ring on the fountain now and make a wish.

  The bike buzzed like a drone as Lauren forced it up the incline away from the market, pushing it as hard as it would go, leaving the bright lights and commotion behind. They sped past the Meisengeige, through the archway of Innere Laufertor, past the fat tower at Lauferturm and onto the ringroad.

  Lauren didn’t care where she was going. Her only desire was to put as much distance between herself and the goons as possible. It seemed to be working. There was no sign of them when she twisted her head to look.

  Alina’s face was a rictus of fear. Duplicate of mine, probably, Lauren thought, as the cold air cut through them. They both shivered now, the sweat freezing on their skin but she’d bet Alina wasn’t bothered by the chill any more than she was. They had worse things to worry about.

  Eighty

  Lauren swung the little bike to a halt in a quiet street. They were in the area of the Trödlmarkt, where the antique shops were. Some of them were just now closing and there were still a few people around. She and Alina sheltered under the bare branches of a great linden tree in the cobbled square.

  They’d doubled back into the old town because Lauren felt safer hiding in back streets and alleyways than she did on the main roads. They would be too easy to spot and too easy to mow down and mangle on the open road if the goons happened past in the Mercedes.

  Also the police were probably on the lookout for the stolen bike by now and as a suspected murderer Lauren preferred to keep out of their way just for the moment. They had more chance of evading all their pursuers in the twists and turns and narrow lanes of the old city.

  Alina was now shivering violently and so was Lauren. Worsening snow had chilled their faces and soaked through their indoor clothes. Their hair trailed in rats tails across their foreheads. Alina’s bare legs were turning blue and her bruised knee was raw and puffy. They needed to go somewhere to warm up, get a hot drink, marshal their energy, decide what to do next.

  Once again, Lauren wished she had Wolf’s mobile number committed to memory. Not that she had any change to make a phone call – and her own mobile was back at Wolf’s place.

  ‘Do you have any cash on you, Alina?’ she asked, though it was unlikely the girl would be stashing a wad somewhere in her skimpy clothes.

  Alina’s face showed her usual mix of fear and frustration. ‘No!’ she said through rattling teeth. ‘I tell you already. I got no money. He don’t give me none.’

  ‘Okay. Just a thought.’ Lauren rubbed her arms to get the circulation going. Well, at least they’d shaken the goons off. They were safe for the moment – if they didn’t freeze to death. But where could they go? Not back to Wolf’s place because Kristo lived upstairs and would be on the lookout for them. Not to Clara’s flat or the holiday home – both too far for the two-stroke bike in this weather. There was Clara’s hotel, but Lauren hadn’t asked the name of it. Damn, damn and damn again.

  Alina’s teeth were knocking together with a hollow sound like claves. She looked drained and ill. Got to get her inside somewhere, Lauren thought. Poor kid. Finding out her mother’s been murdered then having to go through all this. She remembered the key – Wolf’s key – that Alina said someone had given Kristo. Someone? What someone? How had this someone got hold of it? This whole thing was nightmarish, freakish. I’ve had enough, she thought, ready to stamp her foot and throw a tantrum. Don’t wanna to play this game any more. Wanna go home.

  She made a decision. It might not be a good one but her choices were limited. The Meisengeige. They
weren’t too far from the café-kino now they’d doubled back off the main road. If they could get there without running into the goons or the cops they could at least warm up. Lauren could use the phone there – call Wolf’s apartment and reverse the charges, or call her brother again and get him to track Wolf down. She needed help from someone, and fast.

  ~

  They approached the Meisengeige via the narrowest, darkest alleyways Lauren could find. Leaving the pizza delivery bike in the side alley, she helped Alina limp into the café. The warm air hit their frozen faces like a blast from an oven. The café wasn’t full but there were enough people slouched at tables to allow their entrance to pass unremarked.

  Lauren ushered Alina straight to the Ladies. Tidy up, use the loo, stand under the hand-dryer for an hour or three thawing out in the hot air. They squeezed into the tiny cubicle together. God, a brandy wouldn’t half go down well. Maybe she could persuade the barman to chalk one on the slate. Hell, she’d offer her jewellery as a guarantee of future payment if necessary. She checked her hands. The two keeper rings were still there, hers and Katti’s. The rings and her watch were the only things of any value she had on her.

  With their hair partly dried and finger combed, their faces defrosting, and their teeth-chattering toned down a notch, Lauren and Alina ventured out into the bar. They’d sit at the back so as not to be seen from the street and so Lauren could use the phone. Was it worth asking for a coffee at least? Did she have the cheek to beg, trade, barter? She sighed. Make her calls first.

  Picking up the phone she dialled the operator, asking for a reverse charge call to Wolf’s apartment. At least she remembered that number now as it turned out it was only one digit different from Katti’s. After eight or nine unanswered rings the operator came on the line, apologised brusquely and cut off the call. Maybe they were upstairs, given the door had been broken down. Lauren asked the operator to call Katti’s number. Same result. Wolf and Clara should have been back by now, surely.

  After a moment, Lauren picked the phone up again and was about to call Paul. She checked the time. Six o’clock. And there was a time difference. He wouldn’t be home from work yet. Give it another half hour at least.

  As she cradled the receiver wondering what her next move should be, she caught a glimpse of day-glo orange out of the corner of her eye. Turning, she saw the boiler-suited Axel at the far side of the U-shaped bar. Shit. His dark eyes struck fear into her, then soothed it away in a second.

  ‘Lauren Keane,’ he said, coming around to where she cowered with the phone still clutched in her hands. ‘Aha, and young Alina, too.’

  ~

  With coffees on standby at their elbows, Lauren and Alina nursed their brandies. Axel sat with them at the back of the Meisengeige.

  ‘Trust me,’ he said, and Lauren thought of the serpent tempting Eve. How easy it would be to give in and tell him all. How easy – and how stupid.

  ‘I am on your side, Lauren,’ he went on. ‘If Katti Hartmann is in trouble I want to know about it.’

  ‘W-why should Katti be in trouble?’ Lauren cleared her throat to get rid of whatever was making her voice come out at a higher pitch than normal.

  ‘You have come to Nürnberg to visit her. Yet you arrive here in this state – cut and bruised – and without Katti, yet with Alina. I can see all is not as it should be.’

  Lauren ran her hand over the bump on her forehead. Alina had a matching one. Her cut lip throbbed as her blood warmed up.

  ‘Who has hurt you?’ Axel’s eyes held Lauren’s against her will. ‘And why are you wet and cold and without coats?’

  He’s a fucking hypnotist, she thought. He’s Svengali, Anton Mesmer and Derren Brown all rolled into one. At last he released her from his magnetic gaze.

  ‘Is Sammy involved in this?’ he said, turning to Alina. ‘Zamir?’

  The girl’s eyes were like headlamps. She whimpered softly, probably involuntarily. Lauren patted her arm, gripped it, shook it, and still couldn’t make her drag her eyes away from Axel’s.

  He smiled, his cheeks creasing into vertical folds. He was like a varnished wood carving. ‘Finish your coffee.’

  Obediently, Alina and Lauren picked up their cups. Jesus! Lauren thought, am I losing the power of my own will? Is he sapping it somehow? She drained her cup and slammed it into the saucer, wrenching her eyes away from his face. He couldn’t keep two of them mesmerised at the same time. Not unless he was wall-eyed. She upended her brandy balloon into her mouth, all but licking out the last trace of cognac.

  ‘Very well,’ Axel said, standing. ‘You will come to my home. You will dry your clothes. You will make your phone calls.’ He reached a hand out to each of them. ‘Then you will do whatever you wish to do. Stay or go. It will be up to you.’

  Though grubby, his hand was warm and strong. And surprisingly comforting. Just call me Tsarina Alexandra, Lauren thought. That’s me. Me and my beardless Rasputin. Maybe that wasn’t the best analogy though, considering what happened to them in the end.

  Eighty-one

  Axel drove an ancient VW Beetle – orange, to match his boilersuit. He reached into the back and shovelled a pile of maps, papers and fast food wrappers onto the floor to make space for Alina. Lauren sat in the passenger seat. Several minutes passed before the Beetle deigned to start. Axel was unruffled by its reluctance. Calmly he turned the key, listened to the wheezing engine then let it rest before trying again.

  When it finally did get going, they didn’t go far anyway, just round past the university to an area where building work was in progress. Deep foundations with wire and girders protruding from them suggested some large structure was being built.

  Axel’s home was a bare open loft; an industrial space that opened out from behind a steel door at the top of an otherwise empty warehouse. It was musty with disuse and smelled of paraffin heaters.

  At one end of the vast space, cocooned by a couple of cloth-covered office screens, was a lounging area. An L-shaped seating arrangement – again probably ex-office reception seating – was supplemented by a selection of battered armchairs, leather car seats, and Moroccan saddles and pouffes. A low table constructed out of railway sleepers and bricks filled the central space.

  ‘Sit,’ Axel commanded. ‘I will get robes for you and you will dry your clothes.’ He indicated an oil heater in the corner.

  Lauren sat hesitantly, perching on one end of the oatmeal reception seating. Alina sat beside her, examining her bruised knee, her expression misery personified.

  Axel’s footsteps echoed across the wooden floorboards, stopped, then returned. He handed each of them a hooded Moroccan robe of coarse cotton, and a striped blanket. ‘Undress,’ he said. After a flickering glance at each of them, he turned and again left the screened area.

  Lauren pulled her sodden jumper over her head and tossed it to the floor. Slipping the robe over her head, she wriggled out of her bra and t-shirt, extracting them awkwardly through the loose neck of the robe. When she peeled the soaked jeans off, her thighs felt damp and rubbery so she got some friction going with a corner of the blanket. Finally, she tied the bright pom-pommed strings at the neck of the robe and draped the blanket around her shoulders.

  After watching Lauren for a moment, Alina reluctantly took off her cardigan. The faux fur collar and cuffs resembled drowned rats. When they were both garbed like Bedouin and snuggled up in their blankets, Axel returned. Lauren couldn’t be bothered worrying how he knew the precise moment to step back into view. If he’d spied on them, well good luck to him. He wouldn’t have seen much.

  He scooped up their wet clothes and spread them out on the backs of chairs near the oil heater. Steam soon rose from the garments and a smell of damp wool permeated the room. He wheeled another heater into the screened-off area. The room was lit by oil lamps and candles.

  Producing a tin box, Axel took out cotton wool and disinfectant. ‘Here. Tend to your wounds.’

  As Lauren and Alina did what they were told, he
poured them all generous shots of plum Schnapps, then slouched in the bucket car seat.

  ‘So, Lauren Keane,’ he said. ‘Tell me why you are wanted for murder.’

  Lauren exchanged a glance with Alina. The girl twisted her swollen bottom lip and her flat chest hitched with a muffled sob.

  ‘You saw the news then,’ Lauren said, looking around for evidence of a television set. There wasn’t even any electricity, as far as she could tell. ‘Personally, I didn’t think it was a very good likeness of me.’

  ‘For those who have not looked closely at your face, perhaps.’

  Lauren hunched her shoulders and lowered her head like a tortoise trying to retreat into its shell. God, why did he make her feel so scrutinized, objectified? His gaze seemed to pierce her soul. She took a slug of her Schnapps, grimacing. ‘It is all a mistake you know. I didn’t kill–’ she broke off as Alina’s sobs increased in volume.

  ‘Naturally,’ Axel said, his eyes never leaving her face. ‘But the man you were with? Was he involved?’

  Alina curled up on the long side of the seating module, weeping. Lauren reached out and stroked the girl’s damp hair. ‘Maybe. But I don’t know what his reason could be.’ She plucked at each stringy lock, untangled it and smoothed it flat. ‘I only know what he told me – and that could be lies for all I know.’

  She explained briefly about Gunther having claimed he was an undercover policeman on the trail of a gang of people traffickers. Then in a low voice she told Axel about Alina’s mother, as the girl sobbed into the seating.

  ‘My main concern now, though,’ Lauren went on,. ‘is Katti.’ Taking another slug of Schnapps, she decided to dive in and tell all. They were up shit creek anyway, whatever she said. The alcohol burned her throat. Might even get to like this stuff one of these days.

  ‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘Sammy…Zamir…is involved. We know Katti was at his flat. He tied her up, drugged her, and God knows what else. Though she may have been with him willingly…at least at first.’