Five

by Ursula P Archer

  ‘About what?’

  ‘The year of his birth, of course! I mean, that’s what this is all about. Then we could have started working out the coordinates already and might even find what we’re looking for!’

  ‘I want to see some form of ID with his birth date on it, preferably his birth certificate, and in general get a better idea of who Christoph Beil is. Or do you think it’s just a coincidence that he’s part of all this?’

  Stefan shook his head, still a little reluctant. ‘I know. It’s just that our progress feels so slow.’

  Slow. The word was haunting her.

  ‘I’m as keen to get the coordinates as you are, but I want to do things properly. Cover as many bases as possible. I don’t want to be kicking myself later for stupid mistakes.’ Or have Hoffmann rub her nose in them.

  Stefan seemed convinced, albeit a little disappointed. ‘Okay. It’s just that I brought along my GPS device and thought, if we manage to find the guy we’re looking for …’

  An idea sparked in Beatrice’s mind. There was still plenty of time before four o’clock, and the opportunity to fill a gap in her knowledge seemed advantageous.

  ‘You know what? Let’s go and look for a cache. I want to have done it at least once, and you can show me how it works. Okay?’

  He looked surprised, but the prospect of taking on the expert role seemed to have cheered him up. ‘Okay, let me fire up my laptop then.’

  Christoph Beil stood in the shadow of the basilica, his eyes fixed on the police car. They were leaning over something together, presumably their notes.

  With the tips of his fingers, he stroked thoughtfully over the scar where the birthmark had once been. It was the only thing the policewoman with the honey-coloured hair had been interested in. She had searched for it intently, turning his hands over and around like a doctor.

  If only he knew what all this was about, but he didn’t dare ask again. He wasn’t used to dealing with the police and didn’t want to take any risks. It might lead them to ideas it would be better for them not to have. He wasn’t under suspicion; the woman had said that very clearly.

  Was she the gawky red-haired guy’s boss? It seemed so, for the man had stayed silent the whole time, just listening and staring at him attentively.

  ‘Have a good afternoon, Christoph! Give Vera my love!’ The hearty slap to his shoulder startled Beil, making his heart skip a beat. Heavens, he would have to be more aware of his surroundings; he didn’t want to end up having a heart attack over something like that. Hopefully he hadn’t yelped out loud. But Kurt, the man responsible for his now-racing pulse, had headed off without noticing the reaction unleashed by his rough farewell.

  It was fine. Everything was okay; he hadn’t made a fool of himself. Wiping his hand across his brow, he realised it was wet with sweat and felt annoyed at himself. Where had these sudden nerves come from? After all, he hadn’t done anything wrong; he didn’t need to worry. Not about Vera, either. She wouldn’t leave him – she loved him. And it was very unlikely that the police visit had anything to do with all that. He wasn’t guilty, as he had to keep reminding himself.

  And if it really turned out to be necessary, he would just come clean.

  The caching game was fun – much more so than Beatrice had expected. Stefan logged into Geocaching.com and searched through the maps for a hiding place that was relatively nearby. ‘Nothing too difficult, nothing too small,’ he murmured. ‘Voilà! Look, this cache is called “The Hole”, and it’s a regular.’

  ‘A what?’

  ‘A regular. That means it’s about this big.’ Stefan sketched something the size of a loaf of bread in the air. ‘Like the one you found the hand in. And it’s also a traditional – which means the given coordinates are also where the box is stashed. No stages, no puzzles. The difficulty rating is two stars, so that means we won’t end up searching for hours on end. Although the terrain is three and a half stars, so it’ll be more than a light stroll.’ He gave her Timberlands an appraising glance, then nodded contentedly. ‘Let’s head off then.’ He connected the navigation device with the computer via a USB cable and clicked ‘Send to my GPS’. ‘Done. The good thing is that we can drive almost all the way by car, so it won’t take too long.’

  The GPS device worked with astonishing precision. It led them from their parking space by the edge of the path directly to a wooded slope. Stefan switched into compass mode, and now they could see the distance between them and their target reducing with every step they took. In the end, it was Beatrice who found the entrance to the hole – a gap under a steep crag that she could only reach by lying on her stomach and easing herself along by the elbows.

  ‘If I crawl in there my T-shirt will be in tatters,’ she said.

  ‘Yep. That’s all part of the fun. Here’s a torch.’

  She took a deep breath, struggled to contain a fleeting impulse of claustrophobia, and crawled into the darkness. She only switched the torch on when she literally couldn’t see a thing ahead of her.

  After the narrowness of the first few metres, Beatrice was surprised to see a tunnel open out in front of her. She could even stand and walk along it if she ducked. As she moved forwards, she heard someone following her in the darkness. For a split second, she was convinced it must be Nora Papenberg’s killer, that it hadn’t been enough for him to simply thank them for the hunt this time – he had picked up their tracks and wanted to trap his prey in the hole.

  But it was just Stefan, of course. ‘Shine the torch into all the nooks and crannies,’ he advised her. ‘The box is a big one, so it’ll stand out, but any owner worth his salt tries to hide his caches in a well-camouflaged spot so they don’t get muggled.’

  Hearing the word ‘owner’ made her jump involuntarily. She shook her head at herself. ‘What does “muggled” mean?’

  ‘It’s a Harry Potter reference. Muggles are people who can’t do magic – so in this context, the non-cachers. They’ve been known to throw cache containers in the bin if they stumble upon them by chance.’

  The light of the torch made every protrusion inside the crag throw shadows that could easily be taken for niches, so a good ten minutes passed before Beatrice found the cache, right at the back of the hollow. A plastic container, very similar to the one they had found at the stone chasm.

  ‘Well done,’ Stefan praised her. ‘Now open the box. That’s the logbook, you see?’

  She nodded, shone the light on the pages and started to read:

  Great cache, found it quickly. Out: Smurf. In: dice. TFTC, Heinzweidrei & Radebreaker

  TFTC, Wildinger

  All caches should be like this! TFTC, Team Bier

  At least half the pages in the small spiral notepad were scribbled full.

  ‘Draw a line under the last comment and write something – whatever you like. People normally leave a note of thanks – TFTC means “Thanks for the Cache”. Then sign off with Undercover Cookie. We can log our find on the website – it’s my eight hundred and sixty-seventh.’ Stefan sounded proud.

  Beatrice stared at the notepad, wondering whether it was wise to leave handwritten evidence, then shook her head in disbelief. She was thinking like a perpetrator, not a policewoman.

  So she did what Stefan had said, drawing a line under the last entry and writing:

  I wish all caches were like this. TFTC, Undercover Cookie.

  ‘Is that the right plural for cache?’

  ‘Absolutely. Right, now you pack the logbook back into the plastic bag and see what treasures are in the box.’

  A transparent dice, a sticker that clearly belonged in a collection album from the last football World Cup, a glass marble and a broken Matchbox car.

  ‘Those are the trades,’ explained Stefan. ‘Normal trades. You can take something with you and then put something else in. Do you want to?’

  Even though she couldn’t have explained why, she did want to. In her jacket pocket, alongside a rubber band and a tissue, she found a tiny metal heart
that had once been part of a keyring. She exchanged it for the glass marble.

  ‘Okay. Now pack everything up neatly and put it back exactly where you found it.’

  Having made a note of the hiding place behind the crag ledge, she put the box back, then turned her attentions to the arduous task of crawling back out.

  ‘Right then, I’ll have to go and get changed,’ Beatrice determined. ‘Thank you, Stefan, that was very educational. I think I understand the appeal now.’

  ‘It’s good, isn’t it?’ He beamed. ‘The last stage is on the computer. Come on.’

  They logged the cache as ‘Found’, which resulted in a yellow smiley appearing on both the map and the webpage with the cache description.

  I really enjoyed it, TFTC, wrote Beatrice as her comment on the site. The abbreviation was flowing from her hand as though it was second nature now.

  On the drive home, she contemplated whether she should get one of these GPS devices; perhaps the treasure hunt could be something Mina and Jakob would both enjoy. But thinking back to her very first find made her quickly dismiss the idea. Today, even accompanied by Stefan, she had been overcome by a queasy feeling as she opened the cache box. She wasn’t sure if she would ever be able to look at a plastic container like that again without thinking of the severed hand.

  They all met in front of the office shortly before four and got into the car, Stefan taking the wheel and Florin – still exhausted from his round trip to Munich – claiming the back seat.

  Christoph Beil’s house was out in the suburbs, and looked in dire need of renovation. The cracked facade suggested damp in the walls, and the wooden terrace looked unsound even from twenty metres away. But the garden was well looked after, complete with gnomes, clay frogs and a replica of the Manneken Pis.

  ‘We have to be careful – under no circumstances can we give too much away,’ warned Florin. ‘So not a word about coordinates or caches with body parts.’

  They rang the bell at the garden gate. Beil opened it so quickly that it seemed likely he had been watching out for their arrival from the window.

  ‘Would you like some coffee? Tea? Water?’ He waved to his wife, who had been waiting in the doorway and now came out bearing a tray of drinks, only to disappear back into the house again straight afterwards.

  They all sat down at a massive wooden table, on which a company of ants were forming a long line. Beil wiped them off with nervous, jerky hand movements. ‘I’ve been racking my brains since lunchtime, trying to work out what you might want from me.’

  He looked tense, like someone who had to do an exam without knowing what subject it was in. Beatrice cleared her throat. ‘We’re investigating the murder of Nora Papenberg. Does the name mean anything to you?’ She fixed her gaze on him. But Beil didn’t bat an eyelid; on the contrary, he suddenly seemed to relax. ‘No, I’m sorry. Although – it’s possible that I might have heard about it on the radio. Is this the woman who was found in the cattle pasture?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Hmm. Could you tell me what I have to do with all of this?’

  Beatrice wiped her forehead, a tiny insect stuck to her hand. ‘We’re pursuing every single lead, and one of them led us to you. May I check your ID, please?’ Seeing him hesitate, she smiled reassuringly.

  Beil pulled a battered black wallet out from his trouser pocket and handed Beatrice his driving licence. She immediately focused her attention on his date of birth.

  1964. She noted the day and month, along with the date of issue and licence number, then returned the document to Beil. ‘The thing is,’ she began cautiously, ‘the suspect left a clue that could indicate there’s some connection between you and the victim. I’m afraid I can’t be more specific.’

  ‘Aha.’ He stared at the discoloured spot on the back of his hand. ‘But that’s not the case. Which means I can’t be of any further assistance to you.’

  Florin cleared his throat, a signal that he wanted to take over. ‘Have you been singing with the choir for a while?’

  ‘Yes, nearly ten years now. I’m a dental technician, so I like to have some artistic balance in my free time.’

  ‘How’s business in the dental trade?’

  Beil grinned. ‘I assume you’re referring to the run-down state of the house? It’s being renovated this summer. My great-aunt left it to me.’

  Florin nodded to Beatrice, who was pulling two photographs from her bag. ‘We’d like to ask you to look at the woman in the pictures very closely and tell us whether it’s possible that you know her after all.’

  Beil took the photos. ‘Is that this Nora Pa …’

  ‘Papenberg. Yes. Please take your time.’

  He laid the picture down on the table, the one of her laughing heartily, and flicked one last confused ant away. It began to scrabble over the edge. ‘No. I really am very sorry.’

  The second photo was a portrait in which Nora was looking directly at the camera with a serious expression. The jolt that went through Beil’s body as Beatrice laid the photo in front of him was subtle, so much so that at first she wasn’t certain she had really seen it. But it had definitely been there. No widening of the eyes or sudden intake of breath, but a jolt nonetheless. When Beil handed the pictures back to Beatrice, his hand was completely steady. ‘No, sorry. I really wish I could have helped you.’

  She kept staring at him, not looking away for a second. ‘Are you completely certain that this woman doesn’t look familiar to you?’

  ‘Yes. I’ve got a really good memory for faces, so I would know if I’d ever met her. And the name doesn’t mean anything to me.’ Beil grimaced apologetically. ‘I can imagine that your job is no walk in the park, so I’m sorry you had to come all this way for nothing. And on a Sunday of all days.’

  He smiled warmly and looked her right in the eyes without blinking, but she didn’t believe him. He had recognised Nora Papenberg – not immediately, but when he saw the second photo. So it was very interesting indeed that he was denying it.

  With a friendly smile, Beatrice took the pictures, tucked them away in her bag and pulled out a business card. ‘If anything else occurs to you that you think might be relevant to us, then please call me.’

  He put the card in his wallet. ‘Of course, but as I said …’ He shrugged. ‘I don’t know the woman.’

  Beatrice was convinced, even though neither Florin nor Stefan had noticed Beil’s reaction to the second photo. If he was lying, then there must be a reason.

  ‘There are two possibilities,’ Beatrice pondered out loud. ‘First, I’m mistaken, and Beil never met Papenberg. Maybe he’s even the wrong choir singer and his birthday will just be leading us off track. For one thing, he doesn’t even have the birthmark any more.’

  ‘And the other possibility?’ asked Florin.

  ‘My instinct is right, and he did know her. Then there has to be a reason why he’s lying to us. If we find something at Stage Two, then we’ll speak to him again.’

  Back at the office, the three of them sat down on Florin’s side of the desk. Florin picked up the copy of the cache note. ‘“The last two numbers of his birth date are A,”’ he read out loud.

  ‘So, sixty-four. Then square that …’ Beatrice tapped on the calculator and made a note of the resulting sum. ‘Four thousand and ninety-six.’

  ‘Okay. Then add thirty-seven.’

  ‘That gives four thousand, one hundred and thirty-three. That should be the northern coordinate, right?’

  ‘Correct. For the eastern coordinates, we need the sum of A’s digits – four plus six equals ten. That times ten gives a hundred. Multiply by A and we get six thousand, four hundred.’

  Beatrice wrote the number down and looked up. ‘Why didn’t he just say straight away that we needed to times A by a hundred?’

  ‘To make it less obvious?’ Florin suggested. ‘To increase the possibility of us making a mistake? Okay, let’s keep going. Take away two hundred and twenty-nine and subtract the resulting sum from
the eastern coordinates.’

  Beatrice calculated, noting the results as she went and then circling them. ‘This is it. Shall we drive out there today?’ Even as she said it, she realised she wouldn’t have enough time before she had to get home.

  ‘Of course!’ Stefan had already jumped up, but Florin stopped him.

  ‘I want Drasche to be with us. We’ll go first thing tomorrow. Having said that, I’d still like to see where this place is.’ He entered the new coordinates into Google Maps. The map appeared on the monitor in just a fraction of a second, prompting Florin to let out a brief and – or so it seemed to Beatrice – pained laugh. ‘We’ve dropped the ball here somehow.’

  They zoomed in closer. ‘The results are never completely accurate,’ said Stefan. ‘It’ll be a few metres to the right or left of that.’

  They would just have to hope he was right. Because the arrow indicating the location of the coordinates they had just entered was pointing directly at the autobahn.

  Beatrice arrived home just in time to air the apartment and prepare all the ingredients for ham-and-cheese omelettes. Achim brought the children back on the dot of the arranged time. They were practically bursting with stories about their weekend. The cat was now called Cinderella. She was grey and white and a little bit black. They had gone for ice cream in the afternoon, two scoops each. Papa had been really funny and lost twelve times to Jakob at arm wrestling.

  Beatrice smiled, laughed, nodded and suppressed something that, on closer inspection, she identified as melancholy. Did she wish she had been there too?

  She shook her head in disbelief, cleared the table and sent the children off to the bathroom. She would read The Hobbit to them and have a relaxing evening for once.

  ‘The fires in the middle of the hall were built with fresh logs and the torches were put out, and still they sat in the light of the dancing flames,’ read Beatrice. Jakob, who in her opinion was still too young for the book, and for whom she improvised harmless passages in place of the more violent scenes, was staring at the Buzz Lightyear poster on the wall, his eyes glistening. Mina’s gaze, on the other hand, was fixed on Beatrice; she was smiling and seemed to be at peace with herself and the world for the first time in weeks.