by Bragelonne
‘What did you get up to together?’
‘We attended an evening function.’
Emily briefly frowned. Hadn’t Alexis referred to Linnéa Blix’s sojourns in Sweden as ‘retreats’?
‘Where?’
‘Gothenburg, but I can’t remember the name of the place.’
‘What type of function?’
‘Cocktails, canapes, pretty women.’
‘At someone’s home?’
‘No. In a club.’
‘Did you leave together?’
‘No. I left before she did. I had a plane to Berlin to catch the following morning.’
‘What time did you leave the club?’
‘I don’t know. Probably after midnight.’
‘Is there anyone who can confirm all of this?’
Anselme wetted his lips. ‘I can’t provide you with any names.’
‘What time did you see Linnéa for the last time?’
‘I have no idea. I had better things to do than to check my watch.’
‘There was no incident, argument – anything of note?’
‘Not that I know of.’
‘Do you often travel to Sweden, Mr Anselme?’
‘It happens, yes.’
‘Gothenburg? Stockholm?’
‘All over the place.’
‘Was that the first time you met up with Linnéa in Sweden?’
‘No. If we happened to be in Sweden at the same time, we generally arranged to see each other.’
‘And what happened during these meetings?’
‘We had dinner, went out.’
‘In Falkenberg?’
‘No, always in Gothenburg.’
‘Have you ever visited her place in Falkenberg?’
‘No, never.’
‘Were you lovers?’
The jeweller burst out in loud laughter as he straightened his tie. ‘If only!’
‘When did you see her for the last time, Mr Anselme?’
‘That evening.’
‘What were the last words you exchanged, what did you talk about?’
‘As I left the function, I wished her well, hoping she would enjoy herself.’
‘What sort of mood was she in that evening?’
‘She appeared quite vivacious.’
Emily noticed the eyes of the witness lighting up with a touch of amusement.
‘One final question, Mr Anselme…’ Pearce examined his notes.
There was a knock at the door, it opened and a man with short blond hair looked in. The DCS immediately fell silent. Emily continued staring at the jeweller, keeping her attention on him.
‘Yes, Durham?’ said Pearce.
‘Logan Mansfield’s mother is here, Sir.’
Richard Anselme adjusted his shirt collar and smoothed out his expensive jacket.
‘Good, thank you, Durham.’
‘Mr Anselme, we’ll leave you with Inspector Andrew Durham. He will ask you some further questions so we can trace Linnéa Blix’s whereabouts prior to her death. Thank you for coming to see us.’
‘The pleasure was all mine, BIA Roy and DCS Pearce,’ the jeweller replied, a note of irony in his voice.
Buchenwald concentration camp, Germany
February 1945
ERICH STILL WOKE UP with nightmares of the dreaded roll calls lingering in his mind. Some of the inmates feared it even more than the day’s exhausting work, as so many of them ended up dying at the evening one.
At breakfast, Doktor Fleischer had informed him that yesterday’s early-morning roll call had lasted nineteen hours. Nineteen hours. Three inmates were missing, so the SS had taken turns to count and recount the prisoners. During the night, the thermometer had fallen to minus 7 degrees.
Erich knew that his erstwhile companions, cold coursing through them, would have no way to warm up their numbed bodies; they would have had to remain standing, motionless lest their skulls be assaulted by boots or blackjacks. If it had been raining or snowing, they would have been wet to the bone. Some blocks didn’t even have a stove, so there would have been no opportunity for their rags to dry once they had been allowed to break rank, and they would have been obliged to dress in them again, still wet. The weakest amongst them, those who had not succumbed already to the infernal roll call, might now be on the way to dying of pneumonia.
Since his arrival in Block 46, Erich had escaped the two daily roll calls. The Doktor had obtained his exemption. Every day, he signed a document confirming that Erich was by his side. Hans then handed it over to the Kommandantur.
Erich pushed his two blankets aside. He dressed, drank some water from the hose and set to work.
By selecting him as his assistant for his research work, Doktor Horst Fleischer had changed the course of his life. Erich had emerged from the larval state in which he had lain dormant since his arrival in Buchenwald. He no longer just put one foot in front of the other, thinking only of survival: he was now part of a grand project. Something larger than anything he had ever been involved in.
Some months earlier, the Doktor had ordered him into the room adjoining his study. Erich had been rendered speechless by what he was allowed to witness. He had so often been told that the so-called Nazi medics were imposters, barely able to handle a stethoscope … Erich had told the Doktor how his research would change the world and how honoured he was to be chosen to partner him in his mission. The Doktor had been visibly touched by his words; Erich had seen the sincerity in his eyes. He’d even briefly smiled at him and given him a gentle tap on the shoulder.
‘Good morning, Erich.’ Fleischer set down two jugs of coffee and some buttered slices of bread on the shelf he had installed by the dissecting tables.
‘Good morning, Horst.’
They each filled a mug and paid a visit to the room where the bodies were kept. Doktor Fleischer had explained why he had chosen only to work with the bodies of children: aside from the fact that their organs and tissues were in perfect condition, they deserved a share of eternity.
Erich followed the Doktor through his morning inspection. For about twenty minutes, they examined each respective body, noting what hadn’t worked and what could be improved. They then wolfed down their breakfasts and set to work again.
‘Have you given any thought to my proposal?’ Erich enquired, without looking up from the thigh he was dissecting.
The Doktor had asked Erich to call him by his first name, but it wasn’t an easy habit to acquire.
‘Which one?’
‘The one concerning my friends, the medical students.’
‘You mean the Norwegians? The ones who were helping you with your Scandinavian language skills – preparing you for your new life in Sweden?’ the practitioner commented with a wry smile. ‘Yes, I’ve thought about it. And I don’t believe it’s a good idea. Why show them our research? The two of us work perfectly well together, you see, and we’ve made such progress already. The more there are of us, the more complicated it all becomes. And I don’t wish to run the risk of them getting hold of our results and taking them to Ding-Schuler or Ellenbeck.’
The Doktor was right, Erich thought; they had to remain on their guard. Too much openness was risky.
He nodded his approval, set down his scalpel and stepped over to the formaldehyde pump, which had begun to stutter like a badly oiled engine. He checked the tube he had connected to the child’s aorta, then the pump’s supply, switched it off, waited patiently for a few seconds and switched it back on again. The noise had gone.
He walked across the room to the vat that stood by the incinerator, checked the state of the two other pumps, threw a quick glance at the body immersed inside it and returned to the corpse he was working on.
They set down their respective scalpels around midday, when Stan, the guy from the kitchens, brought them lunch.
They moved to the office and silently ate their initial mouthfuls of stuffed chicken.
The first time Doktor Fleischer had invited Erich to join him
at his table, they had shared the same meal. The Doktor had asked him to bring his bowl and had filled it with creamy potato gratin. Erich could still recall the taste. He had closed his eyes and allowed the potatoes to melt, butter and cream teasing his taste buds as if with effervescence. He’d been sick a few minutes later, his stomach no longer used to so much food, or its richness. He’d had to increase the quantities gradually and, three weeks later, Stan had arrived with two separate portions of the same food. Two hors d’oeuvres, two main courses and two desserts.
The Doktor interrupted the silence. ‘Gross-Rosen has been evacuated.’
‘And two weeks before that, the liberation of Auschwitz,’ Erich commented, his mouth full.
‘Hermann Pister was screaming his head off yesterday evening, at the extraordinary meeting. We have to complete our work, Erich, before we’re booted out of here.’
The Doktor shuffled through his mail as he finished his chicken. Erich nodded, his eyes fixed on his plate.
The meal came to an end in an unusual silence. Stan cleared up and left with the remains of the poultry, which he’d no doubt stuff down his throat on the way back to the kitchens.
That afternoon Horst and Erich continued to work in a dull but productive manner. They managed to complete a new corpse.
When little Theodore arrived with dinner, they had just begun to clean a new body. The boy ignored Erich and set the table. Since Erich had begun sharing meals with the Doktor, Theodore had been throwing him hostile looks and no longer spoke to him. How could the little brat ever understand? He could not appreciate that the faith the Doktor had in Erich had provided him with a reason to live again.
Kilburn, London
Sunday, 19 January 2014, 11.00
AFTER A FEW DAYS of respite, the rain had returned to London with a vengeance. The raindrops felt as large as marbles and crashed against the windscreen, slowing cars down to a crawl.
Sitting in the front of Pearce’s car, Emily was thinking back to Anselme and his deceptively relaxed attitude. Pearce had planned Inspector Durham’s interruption: he wanted to see how the jeweller would react to hearing the name of the third victim. Anselme had clearly been perturbed and it had taken some time for him to regain his composure, but Emily wasn’t sure how to interpret this. Of one thing she was certain, however: Anselme had found the whole process oddly amusing.
Pearce broke the silence, his eyes fixed on the road ahead. ‘I spoke to Bergström before we left. He’s going to check the information we were given by Anselme. He’s sending someone to Gothenburg today.’
Emily nodded her head in approval. She was eager to know more about Linnéa’s escapade in Gothenburg.
Pearce turned left. If the robotic voice of the GPS was to be believed, they had reached their destination. He parked in front of number 43, the house where young Logan Mansfield, seven years of age, had lived with his mother.
A uniformed young woman opened the door for them. ‘Hello, Sir. Hello, Miss Roy.’
‘Are the scene-of-crime technicians still here, Burrows?’
‘They left half an hour ago, Sir.’
‘What have they found?’
‘No evidence of forced entry, but the locks on the two sash windows are broken, Sir, so they can be opened from the outside. And as the flat is on the ground floor, it would be easy to enter through the windows. They found lots of prints inside the house – too many to be of any use, according to the techs. They found nothing outside, though.’
Pearce found it unlikely that the killer, until now so cautious and meticulous, would have used his bare hands.
‘There are traces of cocaine all over the place, Sir. The poor kid lived in a real pigsty … To think that some people can’t have children while others treat them in such a terrible way…’
‘Please keep your opinions to yourself, Burrows.’
‘Sorry, Sir, I…’
‘Where is Miss Mansfield?’
‘In her room with the psychologist. This way, Sir.’ Burrows indicated the door to their right.
After knocking twice, Pearce walked in, followed by Emily. The smell of stale tobacco reached out to them.
Katie Mansfield couldn’t have been older than twenty-five. She was sitting cross-legged on a bed so large it filled the room. She threw a listless glance at the two visitors.
‘Good day, Miss Mansfield, Jack Pearce. We spoke on the phone this morning…’
She silently acknowledged him, pulling the edges of her thick dressing gown across the sweater she wore underneath.
‘And this is Emily Roy, my colleague. We’d like to talk to you for a bit.’
She nodded again in reply.
The psychologist left, closing the door behind her.
‘When can I see Logan?’ the young woman asked in a strangulated voice.
Emily smiled at her, demonstrating some form of empathy. ‘Very soon, Katie. May I?’ Emily pointed at the bed.
The young mother agreed.
Emily sat on the edge of the bed. They were now at the same level. It should put Katie Mansfield at ease, Emily thought.
‘Katie, tell me about Logan. What sort of little boy was he?’
The mother’s lower lip began to tremble. She sniffed and clenched her jaw so hard her lips froze.
‘I always had problems with him, one after another: he broke plates and glasses; burned a saucepan; wet himself … But at school, they said he was shy – not talkative, according to his teachers. If only he had been like that at home, instead of messing up the place and turning it into a battleground!’
‘Katie, can you tell me about the moment when you realised Logan had disappeared?’
‘It was the beginning of the week. I’m not sure if it was Monday or Tuesday. The police know the precise day. I work at night, and I don’t have anyone to look after Logan, so he was by himself. I didn’t have a choice…’
‘I realise how difficult it is to raise a child on your own. I’m sure you do it to the best of your ability, Katie. I truly am.’
Pearce wondered how, when faced with interviews, Emily seemed to find just the right words to put people at ease, while, during the normal course of things, she did anything but.
‘It’s just that … it’s easy when you have a husband or a grandmother nearby, or a good job … I’ve got no one, and I don’t have any skills apart from…’ Her eyes were fixed on the bed. She lit a cigarette and took a few, avid puffs.
‘Katie, what time did you leave for work that night?’
‘Around ten or eleven. He was watching the telly. I got back later in the night – I’m not sure what time, probably around four in the morning – and I fell asleep on the couch. I woke up a bit later than usual, somewhere around ten. But as he’s usually at school by then, I thought there was nothing to worry about. Then he didn’t come back from school. I mean, by five in the afternoon, he still wasn’t home.’
Pearce and Emily were aware that the police had found Logan’s bag in the front room, which indicated with some certainty that he had been kidnapped from his home between 10 p.m. and 4 a.m. But going over the timetable with the mother might elicit some further important clues.
‘I went for a walk around the neighbourhood, because he often likes to play around the square down the road. I’ve told him a thousand times to always come straight back home from school, but he never listened, always went his own way. Pig-headed. He wasn’t easy, I can tell you.’
She stubbed her cigarette out in the overflowing ashtray that lay on the bedside table.
‘Anyway, he wasn’t in the square. So I waited a bit longer, until, I think, around eight, and then I called the police.’ Her lower lip was trembling. She went on talking, her voice shaken by tears. ‘But I still thought he’d been mucking about and was afraid of coming home because he thought I’d be annoyed.’ She angrily wiped away the tears staining her cheeks.
‘Did he ever mention any new friends or teachers at school?’
‘No. The only friend
he ever talked about was Kim. They were at school together.’
‘Did you meet him?’
‘Yes – a Chinese or maybe Japanese boy, I’m not sure. Slant-eyed, you know. They were friends since their first year in school.’
‘OK,’ said Emily gently. ‘I think that’ll do for now. We’ll be in touch soon.’
As they were leaving the flat, Pearce called out to Burrows. ‘Call Logan Mansfield’s school and get the address for Kim – a boy who was in his class. Pay him a visit and find out if Logan mentioned anyone new in his life recently – a new playmate, a neighbour, anyone…’
‘Will do, Sir.’
Pearce exchanged a few words with the two other cops who were present and the psychologist assigned to keep Katie Mansfield company, then he joined Emily in the car.
Face turned to the window, Emily remained silent for the whole journey. Jack guessed what she was thinking about: what Burrows had said about people who were unable to have children and the curse of others who mistreated them. God just hadn’t done his job properly…
Emily was thinking about the three London victims: Andy Meadowbanks, Cole Halliwell and Logan Mansfield. Three boys aged between six and eight, all living in the north of the city, all in oneparent families, all neglected and abused, as shown by the bruises and marks on their bodies, their state of malnutrition and the unhealthy environment in which they had lived.
Logan’s murder had transformed some of her speculations into certainties. It was the ‘rule of three’: two similar victims could prove coincidence; three was part of a plan.
Mayfair, London
Sunday, 19 January 2014, 12.00
ALEXIS WALKED DOWN Duke Street, her steps regular and robot-like.
Unable to control her curiosity any longer, she had called Emily to find out the reason for her hasty departure from the party the previous evening. Emily had held nothing back: a new murder had been committed; the murder of a child.
Alexis hadn’t expected the media to find out so quickly: but little Logan’s mother was already on every channel. However, no journalist had yet thought of linking the case with Linnéa’s death.