by Marc Raabe
‘Good god,’ Liz gasped. Her eyes wander up to the wall-hanging over the chaise longue. A man with a long white beard that might be god is being mobbed by monsters and hideous faces. A gnarled hand pulls on his snow-white hair, a reptile with a bird’s beak pecks at his fingers and a giant eagle thrashes him with a stick. At the very edge is a large toad on its back, its legs spread. A stark-naked man, just as large as the toad, straddles it and is killing it with a club.
A grim realisation grows in her mind.
‘He killed her down here? Why down here?’ She asks softly. ‘What is this?’
Von Braunsfeld follows her gaze and smiles weakly. ‘Ah, yes. The Temptation of Saint Anthony. The Isenheim Altarpiece, 1512, a real masterpiece . . . Simply fantastic. I would have liked to have the original. But that was unfortunately impossible . . .’ He points to the image and suddenly laughs; it sounds like hoarse barking. ‘Can you see the painted note over in the corner?’
Liz looks down at the lower-right corner of the image. There’s a piece of paper painted with letters.
‘Latin,’ von Braunsfeld mutters and giggles. ‘Do you know what it says?’
Liz shakes her head. Nothing interests her less right now.
‘Where were you, good Jesus, where were you?’ von Braunsfeld translates. ‘And why did you not come and dress my wounds?’ His chuckle turns into a cough. ‘Fitting, don’t you think?’
‘Why did he kill her, Victor?’ Liz asks. ‘What happened here?’
Von Braunsfeld shakes his head and coughs blood out between his teeth. Tears well up in his eyes. ‘I wouldn’t have . . .’ a violent tremor runs through his body. ‘I wouldn’t have allowed it. I couldn’t . . . I couldn’t do anything to him . . . he is, he’s . . . my . . .’
Von Braunsfeld’s eyes are glassy, his pupils flicker and search for some invisible spot behind the vaulted ceiling. A flat, rattling breath escapes from his throat. A last cloud, rising into nothingness.
Liz holds her breath and rubs her hand across her face. All at once, the pain has returned – in her abdomen, her back, her burning muscles, the broken glass in her hand.
She looks at von Braunsfeld’s body. Suddenly, she realises that she’s stuck down here. The passageway they entered is blocked by a door that has neither a knob nor a handle, but instead an electronic lock, protected by a numerical code she doesn’t know.
And the second exit?
Victor von Braunsfeld made no mention of the exit’s location and, even if she knew – the exit leads into the villa. To him.
Her eyes dart around between the columns until she suddenly realises that the same Latin inscription is carved into the stone around the top of each one: CARPE NOCTEM – Seize the Night.
A shudder runs down her spine. She remembers the phone call between Bug and von Braunsfeld that she’d overheard in the toilet at the Linus that night. Carpe Noctem, Bug had said.
Suddenly, the connection is clear and she can imagine what took place down here in the crypt.
Chapter 47
Berlin – 28 September, 6.11 a.m.
The cold water shoots onto Gabriel’s head and streams down his neck. He leans his head back a little and feels the water change direction, running icily over his eyelids. He still doesn’t manage to wash away his exhaustion.
When he woke up half an hour ago, he was lying on a sofa, the blanket pulled up to his chin. He heard David’s restless but steady breathing and, for a fleeting moment, he felt like he was at home, under the slanted ceiling in their childhood room, covered with a blanket that looked exactly like David’s. Luke and Luke. Double Skywalkers.
Until he realised that he was on a sofa in David’s living room. And that David was lying on the other sofa, as if he had decided to take care of him. When Gabriel got up, David was startled awake. It took a minute for him to remember their situation and then he stood up and made coffee – black for Gabriel, and since there was no more milk, black for him, too.
‘You’re still wanted by the police, right?’ David asked, while Gabriel leaned over the steaming mug.
Gabriel nodded and sipped slowly to keep from being scalded.
‘For murder, taking a hostage and fleeing from custody, right?’
Gabriel nods again. ‘But it’s all bullshit,’ he said.
‘What’s bullshit?’
‘The murder.’
‘And Dressler? Did you really send the old man naked through the city?’
Gabriel’s mouth twists into a grin.
David also can’t help but grin. ‘The bastard deserved no less. Is there anything else I should know?’ he asks, limping to the kitchen to pour himself a glass of grappa.
Gabriel shakes his head.
A bit later, he staggers into the shower, where he’s now standing, shivering, his fingers slowly going numb in the cold water. He gropes around for the shower dial and turns it in the opposite direction. The water is immediately warmer.
The change in temperature stimulates Gabriel’s circulation and it’s as if a thousand needles are piercing him. Goosebumps form on his entire body and the pain in his shoulder and arm seem to melt away. If only he could do the same with his mind! Wash it all and be clean. The drain under his feet makes an ugly gurgling sound, as if it can’t tolerate so much filth.
Gabriel turns the knob back without opening his eyes. He doesn’t want to open his eyes. The world beyond his eyelids has kicked him more than once. He feels powerless, useless and stupid.
It’s as if someone had drilled into his brain, into his memory, deeply and painfully, and he still hasn’t got anywhere – Liz is still at Val’s mercy. And Val has gone silent, for whatever reason, and simply isn’t calling.
Gabriel turns the knob back to hot and suddenly the thousand needles return. At that moment, the phone rings.
Gabriel opens his eyes. Val! He quickly stumbles out of the shower and grabs his mobile, which is beside the washbasin. With dripping wet fingers, he presses the green button. ‘Hello?’ he says, out of breath.
‘Liz?’ a woman’s voice asks. ‘It’s me. Sorry, I know it’s early, but good that I caught you,’ the woman cheerfully babbles on, ‘listen, about those telephone numbers yesterday, I –’
‘I don’t know who you are,’ Gabriel interrupts, ‘but you can’t reach Liz on this number any more.’
‘But . . . then can you just give her a message for me, from Pierra, it’s –’
‘Forget it,’ Gabriel interrupts. A puddle of water has formed at his feet. He wishes he could just throw the phone in the toilet.
‘Crap. You have no idea how I can reach her? You know, Liz told me yesterday that she absolutely –’
‘Yesterday?’ Gabriel’s heart skips a beat.
The only sound is the rushing water in the shower.
‘Do you always interrupt people when they’re talking,’ the woman says angrily, ‘or did you just get up on the wrong side of the bed this morning?’
‘Have I understood you correctly?’ Gabriel is suddenly wide awake. ‘You spoke with Liz yesterday?’
‘Yes, of course, I was happy that she’d finally got in touch again.’
Gabriel is dizzy. He sits on the toilet lid. ‘Are you sure that it was Liz?’
‘My god, yes. What is wrong with you? Are you her lover? Has she left you?’
‘No, no, that’s not it,’ Gabriel is quick to respond. ‘Listen, Liz is in terrible danger. Please believe me and tell me everything you discussed with her yesterday.’
Silence.
‘Tell me what that whooshing noise is in the background.’
Gabriel rolls his eyes, stumbles to the shower and almost slides into his own puddle. ‘That’s the shower, hang on, I’ll turn it off. He quickly turns off the tap. ‘There.’
‘How do I know,’ the woman says distrustfully, ‘that you aren’t some mad stalker who stole Liz’s mobile and is now following her?’
‘Please!’ Gabriel pleads. ‘I’m her
boyfriend. She’s pregnant and she’s in great danger. I can’t be more specific –’
‘She’s pregnant? Liz? Oh my god.’
‘Yes, she is. All the more important that you tell me what you know now. I have to find her by any means necessary.’
The woman on the line goes silent. Gabriel can practically hear her thinking.
‘She called me. Yesterday,’ she finally says. ‘She didn’t talk for long. She never does. And she sounded like she was under some sort of pressure.’
‘Was someone with her? Did you get the impression she was being threatened?’
‘No, actually, I don’t think so.’
Thank god! Maybe she’s free! ‘What did she say?’
‘She wanted some telephone numbers, I actually wondered about that, but apparently you have her mobile . . .’
‘What telephone numbers?’
‘For David Naumann. And for Victor von Braunsfeld. That’s why I’m calling, actually. She said she absolutely had to talk to Victor von Braunsfeld. Typical Liz – once she gets something in her head, it has to happen immediately. She was a bit put out that I could only give her the number for his office. But early this morning I got the number for the landline in his villa . . .’
‘Did she say why she wanted to talk to this von Braunsfeld?’
‘Unfortunately not. She was being secretive again. If you ask me, she’s found something huge, a big story, something to do with television.’
‘Who is this von Braunsfeld guy?’
The woman stops short. ‘You don’t know von Braunsfeld? Are you serious?’
‘Television is not my thing,’ Gabriel says.
‘You don’t need to watch television to know who he is. Just Google him, then you’ll know what I mean.’
‘And what else did she say?’
‘Nothing. That was it. Then she hung up. But if you ask me, I would bet that she showed up at von Braunsfeld’s villa yesterday.’
‘And can you remember anything else? Where she was calling from?’ Gabriel asks. ‘Any sounds during the phone call . . . ?’
‘No, actually . . . yes, wait. There was a whooshing, it sounded like rain, almost like it did on the phone a minute ago before you turned off the water. I think she was outside, in a callbox or something.’
Outside! Callbox! ‘You know what? You’ve helped me a lot! Thank you,’ Gabriel says. His voice sounds raw and he can hardly contain himself. The feeling of hope is overwhelming.
He hangs up and stares at the mobile. Then he pulls a towel from the rack, wraps it around his waist and storms out of the bathroom, straight into the living room.
David is sitting on the sofa and has nodded off again with the fingers on his right hand still wrapped around the handle of the coffee mug. Gabriel shakes him roughly on the shoulder and hip.
‘Ouch, damn it,’ David exclaims and sits up, spilling coffee on the carpet. ‘Can you be more careful, man? It hurts like hell. I was shot in the leg, in case you don’t remember.’ He puts the cup down next to a pile of painkillers on the coffee table and leans back again slowly.
‘All right, all right,’ Gabriel says in a hurry to get to his point. ‘I just got a phone call.’
David is suddenly wide awake. ‘From Val?’
‘No,’ Gabriel says hoarsely. ‘But I think I now know where to find Liz.’
‘Where?’ David asks.
‘What do you know about Victor von Braunsfeld?’
David stares at him, astonished. ‘That all depends,’ he says slowly. ‘What story do you want to hear? The one where he sacks me from TV2 or one of the thousands of others?’
‘I think it’s best if we start with where he lives. You can tell me the rest on our way there.’
David turns as white as a sheet and swallows. ‘I don’t know what you have in mind, but I . . . I’m not like you, I can’t do that – whatever it is you have in mind.’
‘I just want to find Liz.’
David hesitates. ‘And why would she be at von Braunsfeld’s mansion?’
‘I’ll explain soon, but let’s go.’
David nods slowly, slides a blister pack of dipyrone in his jeans and then sits up. ‘By the way, you know what’s strange?’
Gabriel shakes his head.
‘It could just be a coincidence,’ David says, thinking back, ‘but the house you were telling me about, the one in Lichterfelde, didn’t you say that the owner was named Ashton?’
‘Yes, why?’
‘Jill Ashton?’
‘Yes, exactly. Jill Ashton. It was on the nameplate on the door.’
‘David raises his eyebrows. Ashton is the maiden name of von Braunsfeld’s wife. Jill Ashton. She died over thirty years ago in a car accident, shortly after moving out of von Braunsfeld’s house. They wanted to get a divorce.’
Gabriel stares at him in disbelief.
‘Like I said, it could all be a coincidence, but . . .’
‘That’s too much to be a coincidence,’ Gabriel says. ‘Do you have a car? Or is that gone, too?’
Chapter 48
Berlin – 28 September, 6.18 a.m.
Liz sat for several minutes on the cold stone floor beside von Braunsfeld’s body with her back leaning against a column. The gruesome dark red bloodstain on the white shirt looked like it came from a horror film.
She thought about Markus – Valerius – and his two-sided demonic face. He was out there somewhere! She had somehow walked right into the lion’s den and now she was stuck down in this crypt where Valerius had already killed a woman.
She felt her pulse speed up as fear finally took hold of her.
Do something! she thought. Distract yourself.
Liz stood up. Her legs ached from the strain, but pain was decidedly better than doing nothing. She pushed open the door to the corridor and ran back to the entrance under the greenhouse. When she stood in front of the electronic lock, she was overcome with anger and scolded herself for not watching more closely when von Braunsfeld entered the code. She pushed against the door, ran her fingers around the edges and looked for damaged sections. The brick walls were soaked through, even crumbling in places, but there was nothing she could do with just her bare hands.
So she went back and began examining the crypt, feeling the walls, looking for gaps, doors, openings or anything else that might indicate an exit. Even if there was no way she was going to escape through the second exit – because it led into the house and straight into his clutches – it still seemed important to know where he was.
But there was no second exit. At least none that she could find. She was overcome by deep fatigue. She sat down as far from Victor von Braunsfeld’s body as possible on one of the other red chaises longues.
When she starts awake some time later, she is confused and has no sense of how long she slept. It could have been hours or just a few minutes.
Her fear returns, so she decides to examine the crypt again. Groaning, she sits up and looks between the columns to the sarcophagus. She goes to it slowly and her steps echo from the ceiling back into the crypt, as if they were in front of her at one moment and then again behind her.
The mirror in the niche behind the sarcophagus is about two metres high, set in dark cracked wood, the glass splotchy and clouded. The intricate relief that surrounds the sarcophagus plays with the light, casting countless shadows of intertwined human figures, which seem to grow out of the stone. Most of them wear helmets and thrust weapons at the others, some look like demons or gods of war, others like normal warriors and some like innocent farmers or women, caught up in a deadly battle.
Liz’s fingers run across the carved stone. The majority of the heavy sarcophagus lid is smooth, almost flawless, but this front part is darker; trails run across the relief like tears. Liz shudders.
At that moment, the light goes out without warning, as if someone has cut the line. Within a split second, everything around her turns pitch black like the inside of a coffin deep bene
ath the earth. Liz lets out a strangled cry that echoes under the vaulted ceiling.
‘Isn’t it beautiful?’ a voice whispers right beside her. Liz recognises the voice immediately. It’s Val.
The shock makes her tremble.
This cannot be. Just a moment ago, she was alone . . . and now?
‘Like an altar,’ Valerius breathes in her ear.
She instinctively takes a swing in the direction of the voice. Her hand painfully slams against stone. She screams again.
‘How does it feel to be here alone in the dark?’
Liz doesn’t answer. Her lips tremble and she gropes for the stone next to her. It feels round and smooth. A column.
‘You’re strong,’ Valerius whispers. His voice seems to be coming directly from the stone column. ‘I knew it from the start. You nearly killed Yvette. But here, there is nothing and no one to save you.’ All of a sudden, the voice seems to be several metres further away, as if Valerius has jumped.
He’s not here. This is a hallucination.
‘Do you know,’ he whispers right beside her again, ‘how angry I am?’
Liz tries to keep her breath calm and clenches her jaw.
‘Do you know why I’m so angry?’
Silence.
A hand savagely grabs Liz by the throat and pushes her back against the column.
‘Answer when I ask you something,’ Valerius hisses. Spittle sprays her face. For the first time, he seems completely beside himself. ‘Do you know why I’m so angry?’
‘No,’ Liz says, choking.
Valerius lets go just as suddenly as he grabbed her and Liz struggles to stay on her feet.
‘Do you know how hard I’ve worked? How long I waited for my chance? For my freedom, then and now?’
Now . . . now . . . now. The echo rolls softly along the vaulted ceiling.
‘Do you know how long?’ he roars.
‘N– no,’ Liz chokes out.
Silence again.
Long and agonising silence.
‘Is he dead?’ he asks abruptly and coldly. His voice sounds surprisingly far away.