Three weeks earlier
Emma knew that she was at home, in her own bed. She also knew that she’d sunk into a feverish sleep, physically and mentally exhausted by the consciousness of having killed a man after the skirmishes in Palandt’s shed.
So she knew she was dreaming, but that didn’t make it any better.
Emma was crouching in the hotel bathroom, looking up from the tiled floor to the message on the mirror.
GET OUT.
OR I’LL HURT YOU.
There was a knock, but it was Emma herself at the door rather than the Russian woman. She looked like a victim of radiation sickness: a bald head, encrusted in places, interspersed with the odd strands and tufts of hair that remained like forgotten weeds, ready to be plucked out.
But worse than what she could see (the dried blood on her forehead and cheek, the blouse buttoned up wrong, the snot in her nostrils) was what she could not see: an expression on her face, life in her eyes.
That life had been switched off in the darkness of the hotel room. All that remained was the buzzing of the electric shaver in her ears and the pressure in her upper arm at the puncture site, now throbbing like a tooth after drilling.
She slammed the door to number 1904. Ran barefoot to the lifts. But when the lift opened she couldn’t get in. The cabin was almost entirely taken up by an organic waste bin. A monstrosity with a brown lid and a sticker on the front that said ‘EMMA’, the second ‘M’ formed by a bunch of carrots.
Emma heard, no, she felt, a noise emanating from the very bottom of the bin, as if it were several hundred metres deep. Something was carving its way from the depths of this well of horror, something which, once released, would never be able to be caught again.
‘You fucking bitch,’ Anton Palandt howled. ‘I had to do it. I had no other choice. I haven’t got any money! Why can’t anybody understand that? Why can’t you all just leave me in peace?’
Emma stepped closer. Looked into the bin, which was actually a shaft that Palandt was squatting inside. Maggots were crawling from his unmoving eyes. Only his lips were moving. ‘I had to do it. I had no other choice. I haven’t got any money! Why can’t anybody understand that? Why can’t you all just leave me in peace?’
‘But I haven’t got any money!’ he yelled from the shaft, and when the naked, blood-smeared corpse, stinking of decay, leaped into Emma’s face she woke up.
Her heart was ready to burst out of her chest. Everything about her was pulsing: her right eyelid, the artery on her neck, the cut on her forehead.
She felt for the bandage, happy to find it there. It covered a large section of her head, including her hair – she’d retch if she touched that now.
Emma had been given some medication for this too.
Ibuprofen for the pain, Vomex for the nausea and pantoprazole to stop the cocktail from making her stomach churn.
They had been able to patch the cut. Now the only thing that urgently needed stitching back together was her life, which was ripped into several parts when she killed the Hairdresser. Maybe it had been shredded earlier.
The Hairdresser. The Hairdresser. The Hairdresser.
It didn’t matter how many times she repeated this name, he remained a person. A person. A person.
I killed a person.
Emma looked at herself and wouldn’t have been surprised to see her hand chained to the bedframe with a metal clamp.
Philipp had managed to arrange things so that she was allowed to go to bed after giving a short preliminary statement in the living room. Tomorrow morning the interrogation wouldn’t finish so quickly.
Nor, in all likelihood, would it turn out to be so friendly when the coroner’s report was ready.
She had no idea how many times she’d stabbed Palandt, but she knew that it had been too many to count. And that it hadn’t merely been a case of self-defence, but a desire to bring it to an end.
Back in the shed it wasn’t only Palandt she would have killed, but anybody trying to stop her from ridding the world of this danger for good.
Revenge.
There was no other response that felt more important when you were done an injustice. And none that left you feeling guiltier once you’d exacted it.
Emma felt for the light switch and knocked a teacup that Philipp had considerately put beside her bed, its contents now cold. It was just after half past ten. She’d slept for more than an hour.
‘I haven’t got any money,’ Emma whispered with a shake of the head as she put a cushion behind her back so she could sit upright in bed.
Why were these the words she’d taken from her dream?
Emma didn’t believe in dream analysis as a means of psychotherapeutic treatment. Not every vision that appeared at night had a meaning in the cold light of day. It was just that, even out of a dream, these words made little sense.
Why had Palandt said them?
Even if in some points Philipp’s profile analysis didn’t match the reality, for example over the question of wealth, there were still universal, almost indisputable, characteristics that defined a sex offender. They were driven less by lust than power, their motor was impulsivity, and money rarely or never played a role with a serial rapist.
And yet Palandt had uttered these words in a state of great distress and agitation. At a point when he could no longer think, only act instinctively like a trapped animal fighting desperately for its life.
And he chooses this moment to articulate his financial problems?
In her own terror, Emma hadn’t spent a second thinking about her blocked credit card and the fact that she urgently needed to ask Philipp to top up her account again.
Then there was something else, something really bizarre: Palandt was terminally ill and being harassed by strangers. Even if he’d shown himself to be surprisingly strong on occasion, the whole thing really didn’t fit. If the Hairdresser was in such bad physical condition that he couldn’t keep blackmailers at bay, how on earth was he able to rape and kill women?
Emma threw back the duvet.
Someone – Philipp, probably – had changed her into silk pyjama bottoms before putting her to bed. She was wearing sports socks, which was useful because she didn’t now have to hunt for her slippers before going downstairs to talk to Philipp about what was unnerving her – she was worried that the danger posed by the Hairdresser still hadn’t disappeared.
She checked again to see if her bandage was in place and, as she breathed into her hand to see if the smell was as bad as the taste in her mouth, Emma saw the red light.
A small diode on the display of her house phone beside the charging unit.
It showed that the device would soon have to be recharged.
‘I don’t have any money. I’m not going to prison. Never!’ she heard Palandt shouting in her mind, and she couldn’t help thinking of the corpse in the bin, another inconsistency.
The Hairdresser’s other victims had been left at the crime scene.
This gave her an idea.
Emma picked up the phone on the bedside table, deactivated the caller ID function and hoped that Philipp hadn’t reassigned the saved numbers recently.
41
‘Lechtenbrinck?’
Hans-Ulrich’s voice was unmistakeable. Nasal, almost as if he had a cold, and far too high-pitched for a sixty-year-old professor.
From a single word Emma had recognised the head of the forensic medicine department at the Charité clinic.
She, by contrast, tried to disguise her voice so Professor Lechtenbrinck didn’t guess who he was really talking to, even though it was unlikely he would remember her. They’d rarely spoken in the past.
‘My name is Detective Superintendent Tanja Schmidt,’ Emma introduced herself, using the name of the police officer who’d questioned her earlier in the living room. She gave the name of the department responsible for the Stein/Palandt investigation. ‘The body of Anton Palandt, victim of an attack in Westend, was brought in to you this evening.’
‘Where did you get this number from?’ Lechtenbrinck asked angrily.
‘It’s in the computer,’ Emma lied. In fact it was stored in the speed dial memory of their phone: button 9. Philipp and Lechtenbrinck had cooperated for some time on the puzzle murderer case. Over the course of several months a Berlin serial killer had put a victim’s body parts in plastic bags and left them in public places. In the final week, shortly before the killer was apprehended, they’d telephoned each other almost daily and their professional connection became a casual friendship, which was why Lechtenbrinck’s private number was still stored in the phone.
‘This is outrageous!’ the forensic scientist objected. ‘This number is only for emergencies and a select few individuals. I demand you delete it at once.’
‘I will,’ Emma promised. ‘But now I’ve got you on the line…’
‘I’m in the middle of a post-mortem.’
Excellent!
‘Listen, I really don’t want to interrupt you. It’s just that we’re about to question the suspect, Emma Stein, a second time and it would be of great help to us if we knew the cause of death of the female victim in the organic waste bin.’
‘Puh…’
Just from this exhalation Emma knew that she’d cracked him. Forensic scientists couldn’t stand the fact that in books and films they were generally portrayed as oddballs who were only ever deployed when it was all too late. They tended to feel that their work was undervalued. After all, they didn’t just cut up corpses, but often played a key role especially in the questioning of witnesses and suspects. On one occasion Lechtenbrinck had been able to nail a suspect thanks to a telephone connection between the autopsy room and the interrogation room at the police station. Whenever the murderer tried to depict the death of his victim as a tragic accident, by analysing the wounds Lechtenbrinck was able to advance proof to the contrary, in parallel to the interrogation.
And now the renowned expert didn’t seem to want to pass up the opportunity to have a decisive influence on another investigation.
‘Well, the cause of death is fairly unspectacular. The report isn’t yet cut and dried, but I’d lay money on multiple organ failure as a result of age-related ischaemia.’
‘Are you… having me on?’ Emma almost cried, her panic making her forget to disguise her voice when she next spoke. ‘A natural cause of death? The woman was chopped up.’
‘Post-mortem. Looks like a classic case of benefits fraud.’
Emma wondered whether Lechtenbrinck had suffered a stroke. Or if she had, because his words made no sense unless he was trying to pull her leg.
‘A classic case of fraud whereby the cheat climbs into a bin without legs?’
‘Not the cheat. That’s Anton Palandt, of course.’
‘I don’t understand.’
Lechtenbrinck was breathing heavily again, but he seemed to be relishing his role as the experienced scholar able to teach a thing or two to a naïve policewoman.
‘Look, Frau Schmidt. I haven’t seen the crime scene, but I bet you ten to one that our perpetrator lives in poverty. One day he comes back home and finds his mother dead in bed—’
‘His mother?’ Emma interrupted Lechtenbrinck, who added with palpable irritation, ‘Didn’t I mention that? The corpse in the waste bin is almost certainly Palandt’s mother. We’re still waiting for the final dental analysis, but she’s over eighty at any rate.’ Then he elaborated on his theory, which Emma listened to as if in a diving bell: muffled, with numbed ears.
‘Anyway, after a moment of sorrow, the son says, “Bloody hell, I’ve got access to Mama’s account. Who says I have to ring the police just because she’s dead?” He decides to keep his mother alive, as far as the authorities are concerned, so he can cash in on her pension.’
‘I haven’t got any money!’
‘He tells the neighbours about a lengthy stay abroad, spending time at a health resort or something like that, but to tell you the truth in Berlin nobody wonders if an old person stops showing their face. At some point the smell becomes noticeable, which is why the perpetrator organises a burial in a waste bin. He just stuffs the remains into the container, which is a bit of a mess as corpses usually don’t fit in without amputations. Then he leaves the waste bin in the cellar or shed, and chucks in cat litter or sprays litres of air freshener. The classic case.’
So my dream put me on the right track, Emma thought.
Palandt wasn’t the Hairdresser and she hadn’t killed a ripper, but at most a hot-tempered benefits cheat who’d done nothing worse than to prevent his mother from resting in peace just because he needed the money.
Which meant the danger is still very much present!
Emma wasn’t sure how she’d managed to avoid bellowing this last thought down the line. She thought she thanked the doctor and said a rapid goodbye, but she couldn’t recall another word that was said. Exhausted, she fell back into the cushions and pillows.
I killed a person!
Not the Hairdresser!
Palandt didn’t have the slightest thing to do with him.
His wig, the medication, the package… In her paranoia she’d bent the facts, which had cost an innocent man his life.
Emma closed her eyes and couldn’t help thinking of the blood that had spurted from Palandt’s body. After she’d stabbed him again and again.
Which in turn reminded her of the pool of blood she’d had to wipe up in the living room this morning.
Samson!
She hadn’t thought about him once since she’d woken up. In the uneasy hope that he, at least, was better, she dialled the number to access her voicemail from the landline. Her mobile had been confiscated as evidence by the police.
‘You have three new messages,’ the robotic voice announced. And indeed the first was from Dr Plank, reassuring Emma that Samson was over the worst. Thank God. But they’d have to wait for the definitive results on Monday before she could pick him up, and what was happening now about payment?
The next was from Philipp, sounding concerned and informing her that he’d be back home in a few minutes.
And finally she heard another voice that sounded so agitated that Emma didn’t recognise it at first. It didn’t help that Jorgo was practically whispering either.
‘Emma? I’m sorry about earlier. I mean that I lied to you. Of course I gave you that note.’
The note!
Something else that Emma, in her distress, had temporarily forgotten. The telephone beeped because the battery was low. It needed to be put back on the dock, but then she wouldn’t be able to make any more calls, which is why Emma decided to go downstairs where she hoped the second handset would be waiting fully charged.
‘Your husband has a spy program on his mobile,’ she heard Jorgo say. ‘It automatically records every incoming call.’
A spy program? What the bloody hell is that about?
It beeped again three times before she got to the bedroom door.
But there was just enough juice left in the battery for a few more words from Jorgo.
‘I didn’t want your husband to find out about the note when he listened to our conversation later on. So please call me on my mobile. Please. It’s important. We found out something. Philipp doesn’t want to tell you, but I think you ought to know. In the hotel, in Le Zen—’
Beep.
The line was dead and the display as dark as the hallway on the ground floor.
Emma felt her way to the light switch as Jorgo’s final words echoed slowly in her head.
‘We found out something…’
She went into the kitchen first, but the second handset wasn’t in the dock.
‘Philipp doesn’t want to tell you…’
On the way into the living room Jorgo’s voice went quiet, but now she thought she could hear the buzzing of the shaver in her head, only that this time it wasn’t a long, penetrating drone, but an intermittent stutter.
‘In the hotel, in Le Zen…’
Like a drill.
An insect.
Emma went over to the desk where that afternoon she’d ripped open Palandt’s package. She couldn’t find the second house phone here either, although she did locate the source of the buzzing: Philipp’s mobile.
With every ring it rotated to the rhythm of the vibrations. The caller’s name flashed ominously.
Emma turned around, but the vague inkling that her husband would suddenly be standing there was unfounded.
She hesitantly picked up the mobile and pressed the green symbol to take the call.
‘What did you find out in the hotel, Jorgo?’ she asked anxiously.
‘Help me!’ screamed the voice on the other end.
42
She recognised it straight away, even though Emma had never heard this voice sound so unfamiliar before.
Muffled, choking with gurgling in the background.
‘Sylvia?’ she said, and her friend started to sob by way of an answer. ‘What’s wrong?’ Emma asked. ‘Are you hurt? How can I help you?’
And why are you calling from Jorgo’s phone?
‘I… I’m dying,’ Sylvia slurred. The panic and terror were still in her voice, but the force of her initial scream had dissipated.
‘No, you’re not. Do you hear me? You’re not dying. I’ll fetch help and everything will be alright.’
‘No. Never… alright… again!’
Emma could virtually hear Sylvia drifting away. The more tightly she pressed the phone against her ear, the quieter it sounded.
In her mind she saw her friend with a utility knife in her neck, sitting in a pool of blood she’d coughed up in a torrent. Sylvia was no longer speaking now, just coughing and gasping, no matter how loudly Emma implored her to say what on earth had happened.
‘Where are you?’
Now Emma screamed, because this question could apply to both Sylvia and Philipp, whose help she desperately needed.
Emma hurried through the living room, the mobile still at her ear. She saw Philipp’s keys on the chest of drawers, his jacket hanging on the rack, so he couldn’t be out. Anyway he’d never leave the house without his mobile, but he had left it in the living room, which he only does when…
The Package Page 17