Rain Girl

by Gabi Kreslehner

  He nodded. “The big love. So it’s Ben.”

  “Yes,” she said. “It’s my Ben.”

  “And you can’t get hold of him?”

  She straightened her shoulders and closed her eyes for a moment. “That’s right. Not since that morning.”

  He got up, went to the window, and looked out. She knew what he saw, knew the view like the back of her hand: the fork in the road, the house across the way, the window with the torn curtains that were never opened, the small balcony full of bright geraniums, and the woman who regularly plucked out the dead flowers.

  “I know you’re worried,” he said finally, and turned around briskly. “Can you do it?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Of course.”

  “You know usually . . .”

  She interrupted him. “Yes, I know. But I can’t be taken off this case. You understand, don’t you?”

  “Yes,” he said without hesitation. “Of course I understand. But we’ll discuss everything in advance—no solo actions.”

  She nodded.

  “All right,” he said. “Let’s analyze this. You know your son quite well—and so do I. Do you really believe he’d be capable of cold-bloodedly dragging someone out of his car and knowingly letting her stumble to her death? The first injury is one thing. Things like that happen in the heat of the moment, they had a fight, arguing back and forth, and one lashes out. We’ve seen it a million times. You can fix it if you do the right thing. But what followed—no, that isn’t Ben! Ben would have done the right thing. Ben’s not a murderer!”

  He paused and looked thoughtfully at the door, past Franza.

  I love you, she thought, I love you. Thank you my Felix.

  “On top of that,” he continued, “Arthur found a bunch of new cigarette butts in the parking lot yesterday. If I’m not mistaken—if I’m not completely wrong—there’ll be some matching the ones from Tuesday.”

  She looked at him questioningly.

  “The man,” he said slowly, “who helped you through your panic attack yesterday, I think that’s our man. Can you describe him? Did he seem familiar?”

  She shook her head with surprise. “No. No, I was . . .”

  She fell silent, and he realized she was embarrassed. “That happens to the best of us,” he said. “Nothing to be embarrassed about.”

  She smiled gratefully. “I barely remember anything, can you imagine? It’s horrible.”

  He nodded. She thought about his questions. “No,” she continued. “I couldn’t really see him, he was standing . . . behind me the whole time, if I remember correctly.” She sighed. “But what makes you think he’s our man?”

  Felix scratched his freshly shaved chin. “Firstly, he acted strangely. Secondly, it’s just a hunch. Third, it would exonerate Ben. If it had been him there yesterday, you would have known—even if he’d tried to prevent you from recognizing him.”

  She nodded thoughtfully.

  “Have you thought of getting a DNA analysis?”

  “Of course,” she said and pulled a small plastic pouch out of her bag. It contained hair she’d taken from Ben’s brush that morning.

  “Does he even smoke?”

  She sighed. “Yes, sometimes. That made me worry even more.”

  “Well,” he said. “Half the population smokes. Or a third, at least.”

  “True,” she said. “Though something actually did seem familiar about the man. Something—but what? A smell, an odor?”

  “Really?” Felix asked excitedly. “Go on. Focus.”

  She tried, but without success.

  “It doesn’t matter, we’ll find out,” he said. “And Robert will be watching the rest area from now on. Maybe he’ll be back. Maybe we’ll get lucky.”

  45

  He wouldn’t go back there again. It was too dangerous.

  Ever since he’d run into that policewoman with the strange name the rest area had become a dangerous place, a place to be avoided. This annoyed him a little, because it had been his and Marie’s last place together and he thought he had a right to be there, but he knew he had to be careful now.

  But he was absolutely certain she didn’t recognize him. He made sure she couldn’t see him, staying behind her the entire time. Her awareness had been so limited that there wasn’t any real danger.

  He knew what an attack like that felt like, how great the loneliness was—the fear of death—and how you weren’t aware of anything going on around you.

  Overall, he’d become more relaxed. He was no longer starting out of his dreams bathed in sweat or beating himself up for losing Judith—because a life with her would’ve changed everything.

  He had a good life, after all. What else did he want?

  His wife let him have her when he wanted, the kids didn’t annoy him too much, he went for a run along the Danube every night until he was dripping with sweat, and his job was under control.

  Wasn’t that all he needed? What else could anyone want? To be consumed by ambition? What for?

  But there had been Judith. And then Marie. And now no one.

  This morning he’d noticed his first gray hairs, just two, behind his right ear. He’d pulled them out. Maybe everything would just blow over.

  46

  “Oh, shit!” Felix said, reaching for his cheek. “I forgot Max, the appointment. Because of all that drama with Lauberts!”

  He gingerly examined the location of yesterday’s suffering with his tongue, and looked surprised. “Strange, it doesn’t hurt anymore. I think I don’t need to . . .”

  “It’s fear,” Franza interrupted him. “Fear of the drill. You’ll see; your tooth won’t let you sleep tonight.”

  “You think?” Felix was genuinely alarmed.

  Franza nodded. “I know. But don’t worry, Borger will be here soon. Maybe he can have a look. He’s watched Max a few times, just out of interest, you know? He hasn’t for a while now, but you know, a doctor like him can do anything. Do you want me to ask him? As a favor?”

  She smiled.

  “Don’t you dare, you nasty woman!” Felix said and picked up his phone.

  Franza pictured Frau Brigitte. She was like part of the furniture sitting at the front desk in Max’s office. She had been there since forever, always insisting on being called Frau Brigitte. Franza could imagine her indignant look and how hurt she would be by the unreliability of mankind as evidenced by Detective Inspector Herz forgetting his appointment.

  Felix switched on the hands-free device so Franza could hear Frau Brigitte’s rant. She listened with amusement as Felix stammered for a bit at first but soon resigned himself to listening in silence in the face of Frau Brigitte’s thorough reprimand. She’d fit him in specially, just because the doctor had asked her so nicely that morning, and now this! If everyone acted this way—no, really—they’d all be drowning in chaos. But thank God, thank God she was there, Frau Brigitte—it was her vocation to keep things in order and running. When was he coming now, anyway, the Herr Inspector? Was she supposed to just sit and wait for him to tell her—and what was all the exciting news from his job anyway? Did they have the murderer yet—he knew the one she meant—and why didn’t he tell her a little bit about the case and this murderer? The Frau Inspector never told her anything, she hardly ever showed her face at the office—please give her regards—and was he going tell her when he’d be coming in? Did he think she had all the time in the world!

  Felix breathed a sigh of relief when he was done and had an appointment for late that afternoon. Now he needed a schnapps—though less to numb his tooth than to calm his nerves, which were strained enough already thanks to Lauberts, that asshole.

  Franza shrugged. “That’s our Frau Brigitte,” she said. “Priceless. Lauberts is another story.”

  Lauberts hadn’t turned up at the agreed time to have his statement taken down. Not too late and not too early would have been OK, but not at all—no.

  They had called, but Lauberts didn’t pick up, so they sent a uniformed
colleague, who came back empty-handed. There was no one home. So they had gone there themselves and opened the door with a lock pick pulled from the depths of Felix’s desk drawers, where it led a peaceful existence until it was needed for an occasion like this one.

  It got them inside, but the apartment was empty. As empty as an apartment can be when no one’s there.

  Felix had been furious. “Goddamn it! We should’ve kept him! We should’ve booked him right away! How stupid can you get?”

  Franza had tried to bring him back down to earth. “You know very well that Brückl would never have issued a warrant without any evidence.”

  “But he didn’t have an alibi!”

  “So what? That’s not nearly enough! Even a rank amateur lawyer would have cut us to pieces.”

  Felix heaved a sigh of resignation. “So what do we do now?”

  “Well, put out an APB,” she had said succinctly. “What else?”

  He calmed down, breathing deeply. “What did he say? Where’s his wife again?”

  Franza shrugged. “No idea! Wasn’t it . . . Italy?”

  “Yes, shit! Italy!” Felix shook his head, furious again. “Huge country!” He sighed. “If this isn’t an admission of guilt, I’ll eat my hat.”

  Franza had called and made the necessary arrangements to get a search for Lauberts under way. Once again she thought of the DA and the scene after Bohrmann’s shooting.

  “Just what Brückl’s been waiting for,” she said. “He’ll eat us alive. Finally the case he’s been looking for to make his mark: a beautiful young girl murdered—her face perfect for the front pages and TV—and right during the midsummer lull. And we let the murderer get away. What a blow!” She sighed.

  The DA was at the point in life they all were. Not yet old—just not young anymore. It was a fact weighing heavily on someone like him. More than once he’d had the bitter experience of young upstarts—really young upstarts—passing him on their way up the career ladder.

  He was perfectly aware of how this had happened. The others were already on the other side while he had yet to cross the street. The others were already lined up and waiting for their feed at the great career feeding trough while he was still struggling to get there. He’d never gotten his hands on a really spectacular criminal or political case; those always happened somewhere else—in Berlin or Hamburg or other big cities, but never in this town, which he wished he could crunch between his regularly-serviced-by-Max teeth.

  He could feel the iron hand of irrelevancy and lack of recognition. It was a catastrophe for someone like him, who was ambitious and hungry and restless. He was gradually beginning to panic with the fear of abysmal failure—the awareness he’d not made it.

  The mountain called career was beginning to look too steep, the summit too far off. His longing was turning into fear of the permanent night of old age. He was out of breath and the night was closing in on him.

  Franza knew all this straight from his wife’s mouth, which amused her, but—understandably—provoked him. But she enjoyed her cups of coffee with his wife, who was the neighbor’s daughter from her childhood by the brook. Being carried away from their childhood floods on their fathers’ shoulders was bonding, and because Franza didn’t use her knowledge to her advantage and because Sonja Brückl needed a shoulder from time to time, Franza lent her one.

  Franza always maintained, when discussing the subject with Felix, that if it weren’t for her and her shoulder, the Brückls wouldn’t even be the Brückls anymore.

  “Are you two having coffee again?” Felix asked grimly. He obviously hadn’t regained his sense of humor yet. “To discuss the latest blow?”

  Yes, that’s what it was. A blow. But it couldn’t be helped; they just had to keep going. And that’s what they did, taking Lauberts’s slippers, which they’d found under the bed, back with them for DNA analysis. He’d taken his toothbrush wherever he’d run off to, damn him!

  They’d completely screwed this up! They could have easily had his DNA ages ago—he’d drunk water in their office, and there’d been a dirty glass with him all over it. They should have asked him if he wanted to smoke.

  But they hadn’t! What a screwup! Just because he didn’t look like a murderer. What the hell did a murderer look like anyway? Only now that he’d disappeared . . .

  As soon as they had arrived back at the precinct, they sent a young uniformed colleague to Borger with the shoes and a note attached that read “URGENT!”

  Then they had gotten on their phones: one to locate the children’s boarding schools, the other the wife’s holiday destination. Both proved difficult.

  Finally they reached the schools, the elite institutions they’d expected. Lauberts hadn’t turned up at either of them, which they’d also expected. Still another blow. He might’ve wanted to see his kids.

  47

  Borger arrived and they immediately quizzed him about the slippers. His expression turned strangely indignant, somehow reminding Franza of Frau Brigitte. “I’m good, thanks,” Borger said. “How are you?”

  “Sorry,” Franza said. “But the slippers!”

  Borger shook his head uncomprehendingly. “What slippers?”

  If Felix hadn’t regained his bad mood completely already, he did now. “What do you mean?” he thundered. “What do you mean: what slippers?”

  Borger shrugged, took one of the visitors’ seats, and loosened his tie. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Could someone perhaps enlighten me?” He smiled in Arthur’s direction. “The young colleague, perhaps?”

  Franza had to grin despite herself. Indeed, she thought. Is he actually turning gay in his old age?

  She tapped his shoulder and told him Lauberts’s story from the beginning. When she was halfway through, someone knocked on the door. The young uniformed police officer stood in the doorway, still holding the plastic bag with the slippers.

  “I couldn’t find him,” he said. “There’s only one Dr. Berger in the entire hospital, and he’s a psychiatrist and didn’t know what to do with the slippers.”

  “Borger,” Borger said and smiled. “Not Berger, dear boy, Borger.”

  “Oh!” the man said, bracing himself against the doorjamb in order not to fall over.

  Shit, Franza thought, why is everything going wrong today?

  “Well, now you’ve found me.” Borger smiled.

  “Yes,” muttered the young man, deeply embarrassed. “I have.”

  Franza looked at Felix and knew he was about to explode.

  “Out!” he said, trying hard to hold his breath. “Get out!”

  “Yes,” the young man whispered. “OK. I’m already gone.”

  He turned pale, took a step back, and was about to close the door when Felix’s voice roared: “STOP!”

  The whole room seemed to shake. Arthur thought admiringly: Wow! Borger studied his fingernails, and Franza decided to consult an ear specialist sometime soon. The young man froze and feared for his life for a moment.

  “The shoes,” Felix asked, perfectly calm again. “Do you want to take them with you again? Maybe try Dr. Berger one more time?”

  “Yes,” the young man whispered, utterly unnerved. “No.”

  Carefully he placed the plastic bag with the shoes on the floor, stepped out into the corridor, and closed the door so quietly they couldn’t hear a sound.

  “Jesus,” Borger sighed, looking at Arthur. “Young people today.”

  We could pass for a cabaret, Franza thought resignedly, closing her eyes for a few seconds. If it weren’t so serious, they could turn us into a nightclub act with buffoons and clowns.

  “OK,” she said. “Enough. When can we have your results, Borger? As you may have noticed, it’s urgent.”

  “As always,” Borger sighed. “I’ll get right onto it. But can I first share my news?”

  He could. And it was worth it.

  “The cigarette butts,” he said. “The ones from yesterday. Bingo. One hundred percent match with the D
NA from Tuesday.”

  Franza swallowed, a light shiver running down her spine. Felix’s suspicion had been right. Good old sleuth, she thought tenderly and was grateful for his hand on her back.

  Borger raised his eyebrows. “Have I missed something?”

  “Yes,” Felix said slowly. “You have indeed. It’s getting hot.”

  He looked out the window with the rain lashing against it and the wind howling, and tapped his finger against the glass. “But don’t take it too hard. Here’s the short version for you.”

  When Borger had heard about the murderer’s interaction with Franza, his eyes were wide.

  “Yes, but the hair you gave me,” he said, “that’s a mystery. It doesn’t match anything. Sorry to disappoint you.”

  Franza closed her eyes, smiled, and breathed a sigh of relief. A weight was lifted from her—a stone, a huge boulder. At least she didn’t have to worry about her son’s innocence. “Thank you,” she said. “Thank you. When this is over I’m taking you all out to dinner.”

  Strange day, Borger thought, perplexed, and looked at Felix for help, but he only grinned.

  “Are you two OK?” he asked, looking from one to the other. “Are you sure this case isn’t getting to you?”

  Franza turned serious. “Yes,” she said. “I am now. Now I’m sure.”

  Frowning, Borger sat down on the windowsill. “Am I supposed to get it?” He looked at Arthur. “Do you get it?”

  Arthur shook his head. “No, not everything. But I’m used to it.” He grinned. Borger sighed.

  “That’s what I was afraid of. But speaking of dinner . . .” He had the report of what was in Marie’s stomach.

  “This might actually help you,” he said mysteriously, spreading his notes carefully in front of them. “Our girl had a fancy dinner. You don’t eat something like this every day, and more importantly, not everywhere.”

  For sure, Felix thought. He gulped down a cup of coffee while Borger went into a detailed description of all the delicacies Marie Gleichenbach had consumed that night, just so they could be removed from her stomach and analyzed by tie-Borger.