Good for my diet, she thought.
She paced back and forth in front of the door and called Weller. Should she come back to Norden or drive straight to Uslar?
Instead, she decided to talk to Ubbo Heide first. Somehow everything came back to him.
*
Odysseus wasn’t at all the type who sat drinking at a bar for a long time. No, after just a little while he had already begun to feel uncomfortable, observed, even stalked. His therapist, who unfortunately had to die because he knew too much, had told him at the time that it had been his guilty conscience. The therapist claimed that others would sense his thoughts or even hear them, as if they were being broadcast across the room with a loudspeaker.
Psychobabble. He was simply someone who wandered about. He never stayed longer than one or two beers.
He liked to think of himself as a flaneur, not someone who was on the run in fear. Sometimes he actually forced himself to remain seated, play the role of the cool guy and have another drink. But then his bladder went crazy. He had to go to the gents. He noticed that his gaze nervously swept around the room, studying everyone and wondering whether or not they knew.
He went into Dwarslooper intending to sprawl out on one of the cool pieces of furniture around the bar and have at least two draught beers. He wasn’t hungry. When he was like he was now, he felt like a predator on the hunt, just about to pounce, ripping his prey to pieces.
The alcohol slightly damped his pugnacity – helped him to bridge the time until the prey appeared – and simultaneously made him courageous. But when he was sitting there and sipping his first beer, it was hard for him to look relaxed. He would have so liked to lounge around like the others.
Everyone seemed to have time on this island – as though time didn’t really exist. Bad for someone who felt as driven as him. Nowhere else was this contradiction clearer to him than on the island. Stress was something for people from the mainland, for the big city. It belonged here as much as cholera or the plague.
Suddenly he began to doubt himself. He caught himself holding his hands in front of his face, as if he wanted to scratch his nose or wipe something out of his eyes. The fury directed inwards came with the shame and simultaneously the doubt.
Maybe I should just take the lethal pill here and end it all. Now is as good as any other time. I’m in control. Me!
He asked himself why he was so sure that he would meet Wilhelm Kaufmann here. His mind rebelled. It was always like this. His mind fought against his feelings, against his intuition. But in the end, something that was older than reason won out, even older than humanity. There was something reptilian inside him.
His skin felt dry, like a parched, callous material. He breathed with his mouth open, and would have preferred to walk on all fours. He felt lizard-like. Oh yes, he was familiar with those feelings.
In his mind’s eye he saw himself as a moray eel. How did the animal, in its cave, know that prey would come by? How did it have the certainty?
Yes, that’s the way he wanted to feel now, when he was sitting here: like an evil, poisonous predatory fish in the coral reef that is looking forward to food, and not like a sexual offender who fears being discovered and uses alcohol to fight the fear of the Devil. He felt comfortable as a moray eel.
He didn’t speak with anyone. He didn’t read a book. He just sat there and drank, his third beer already. He was able to sit tight as a moray. He was proud of himself.
No, he didn’t want to go to the gents. He just ignored it. His bladder had to follow his orders, not the other way around. He wanted to sit here and play the role of relaxed holidaymaker, without ever in his life having experienced how that really felt: leaving his cares behind. He watched the cheerful Vietnamese waiter.
And then the door actually opened and he came in: Wilhelm Kaufmann.
Odysseus looked at his glass of beer. Was it a hallucination? Had he drunk his mind to smithereens? Or was that really Wilhelm Kaufmann, and once again there was evidence that his intuition was far, far wiser and more perceptive than his mind ever would be.
He looked at Wilhelm Kaufmann in astonishment and thought derisively: what have you contributed to humanity? This whole, goddamn, self-destructive civilisation is steered by reason. Reason is needed to solve a mathematical problem or do your tax return, but not to eat and not even to digest anything. And intuition helps with the hunt.
He wanted to become what he had once been: voracious and vicious. Shake off all the filth of civilisation, return to the source of his being.
As if he hadn’t noticed Odysseus, Kaufmann walked to the bar, casually leaned on it and ordered a beer and a shot of sea buckthorn liqueur.
Odysseus heard his mind telling him, ‘Men who drink liqueur can’t be dangerous. You can take him easily.’
But his intuition told him something else. Be careful, he knows that you’re watching him. He just wants you to think he’s harmless. Normally he would have ordered a double shot of something at least forty percent proof, but he wants to keep his wits about him. He wants the duel to take place today.
Did I come here to look for him, Odysseus asked himself, or did he come to find me? He remembered a movie with the Three Musketeers. Someone hit d’Artagnan with a glove and demanded satisfaction for an insult. They arranged to meet in a park.
This was exactly the same.
Duels had already been banned back then, but he and Wilhelm Kaufmann would stick to this ban just as little as the Three Musketeers had. And resist the rest of the world if necessary.
We won’t exchange any words here, Odysseus thought. When he leaves, I will follow. And today one of us will die.
*
Ann Kathrin talked with Ubbo on speakerphone while steering the car towards the autobahn.
‘Can you explain it, Ubbo?’
She heard Carola’s voice in the background. His wife was talking insistently to him. She was wanting to calm him, but sounded terribly nervous herself.
Ubbo’s voice was so distressed, even shaky, that Ann Kathrin could hardly recognise her former boss. ‘Ann, they found something in the mouth of the corpse. They said it was a piece of fur. They don’t know any more. And I’m afraid that it is a fox fur.’
‘Why do you think that, Ubbo?’
‘My new book begins with the David Weissberg case. I call him Mr Silver Fox.’
Confused, Ann Kathrin asked, ‘Yes, but your new book hasn’t even been published. Were there any previews or anything like that?’
‘No, Ann Kathrin, there’s nothing like that. And I also stopped the publication. It won’t ever appear.’
‘But that would mean the killer knows your manuscript.’
‘Wilhelm Kaufmann knows that I was working on that case. He was even at the trial back then.’
‘What?’
‘He was always there when things got tough. He was traumatised by this case. He was often in court when we had to testify and the accused’s clever lawyer labelled us as idiots who hadn’t done our work properly. When those big failures weighed down on us. At least for those people he liked. He sat in the back three times for me while I was being grilled.’
Ann Kathrin turned on her hazard lights, stopped in the middle of the street and got out of her car. She could think better when she walked. This was the case with telephone calls, not just interrogations.
The starry sky above her was clear. A cat yowled somewhere. It almost sounded like a baby’s cry.
‘Does Wilhelm Kaufmann know that you called Weissberg a fox in your book?’
‘Silver fox.’
‘Does he know that?’
‘No, Ann, I don’t think anyone knows.’
‘Someone always knows something, Ubbo. I learned that from you. Nothing can ever truly remain secret. Who read your manuscript? Who typed it? You write longhand, right?’
‘Yes, I always wrote in a notebook with a fountain pen.’
‘And then?’
‘Then Carola typed it up. Insa als
o did a couple of passages because Carola wasn’t feeling well. We’d lent Insa money and she wanted to be nice to us. But the two of them are above reproach.’
Ann Kathrin said, ‘Yeah, sure. As suspects. But not as informants. Where did your manuscript go then, Ubbo?’
‘I printed it out for myself and sent a digital copy to my publisher.’
‘And then?’
‘Well, I have an editor there who was very excited. She wrote me an unbelievably nice email. She is smart and well read. She protected me from some mistakes or imprecise wording that could be misunderstood.’
‘If you sent it digitally, then we have no clue how many copies there are. Maybe she sent it around to friends, acquaintances and fans of yours, to journalists – good Lord!’
‘You have to follow up on this, Ann. I think the killer has made a mistake.’
‘He doesn’t make mistakes, Ubbo. He wants to surprise us. He wants to show us how powerful he is. That’s exactly the way it was with the keys to your car. He wants to prove that he can get inside anywhere, has access to your private space. Now even your manuscript.’
‘What are you planning, Ann?’
She took a deep breath of evening air. The air wasn’t salty enough for her here. The wind blew over the smell of horse manure.
She had the urge to drive to the coast. But she said, ‘I think it’s time to officially issue a warrant for Wilhelm Kaufmann. We’ve lost him. And I’ll also drive over to your publisher.’
‘Should I come along?’
She wanted to make it easier for him and said, ‘No, that’s not necessary,’ but he insisted.
‘Ann, please, don’t exclude me now. Let me come along. I know the people there. I know the game. And I know the rules.’
‘No, Ubbo, I fear that this time neither of us knows the rules. At least not the ones the killer plays by.’
‘We have to force him to play by our rules, Ann. Then we’ll get him.’
‘I’m getting back into the car now, Ubbo. I don’t want to lose any time.’
‘Wait, Ann!’
‘Is there something on your mind?’
‘Yeah. Is it really necessary to put out a warrant for Wilhelm Kaufmann? Can’t we just try to find him and then . . . maybe he’s just in Brake. We know where he lives. We know his friends. We know his relatives, his bank account and his habits. Good Lord, we did him a terrible injustice as a person. He was one of ours. One of the really good ones. And we excluded him on the basis of flimsy arguments. I don’t want us to treat him unfairly again.’
It hurt her to say it, but she did anyway. ‘Ubbo, I can’t make allowances for your feelings in this case, as honourable as they are. The murderer is killing at a great rate. I’m sure he’s already on his way to his next victim. We can’t afford to make any mistakes. If the worst comes to the worst, we’ll apologise to Kaufmann later. I’d do that personally and would even take you along. But now we have to get him off the streets.
Ann Kathrin hung up, got back into the car, strapped in and then turned the key. But the hatchback didn’t start.
She slammed her head back against the headrests twice. She gritted her teeth.
No, please not now!
She was furious. I should have sold this shitty car, she thought. Why don’t I listen to Weller or Peter Grendel when it comes to things like this? I’m a sentimental cow. Now I’m sitting here in this heap of metal.
OK, she thought, no one’s looking. She stroked the dashboard and said, ‘I didn’t mean it that way. We’re all under unbelievable pressure. Please don’t abandon me, sweetheart. Come on, start! I promise you that you’ll get a great car wash with bubbles, undercarriage cleaning and a wax treatment if you like. I won’t neglect you anymore, but please don’t leave me now!’
She tried again and the car started.
Ann Kathrin bent over, touching the steering wheel with her chin. She looked up into the night sky. ‘Thanks, Universe,’ she said. ‘Sometimes you just need a little luck.’
*
Odysseus’ stomach tensed when Wilhelm Kaufmann went to the bar to pay. Had he made a mistake? Kaufmann could already have gone by the time he had got his own bill. Then the old detective would be waiting somewhere for him.
No, he couldn’t let him out of his sight. He didn’t want to walk back across the dark island without knowing where Kaufmann was.
He pulled a twenty-euro bill from his wallet, put it under his beer glass and called to the barman, ‘Keep the change!’
Wilhelm Kaufmann stretched in front of the Dwarslooper bar, ran his fingers through his hair and didn’t head back to his holiday accommodation. He had a bicycle with him, and Odysseus knew where he was going before him even got on it. To Flinthörn.
There were at least a dozen bicycles parked in front of the bar, and not even half of them were locked. Odysseus grabbed a Dutch roadster. He really had to pedal hard because Wilhelm Kaufmann had an e-bike and was easily doing thirty kilometres per hour in fifth gear.
The sky was midnight blue. It wasn’t completely dark, as if twilight moved seamlessly into morning light here on the coast.
Wilhelm Kaufmann had parked his bike on the street next to the sign for tourists and had climbed up along the path over the dunes. Now he was up on top of them, with a clear view. The gentle breeze went through his clothing and felt good on his skin.
In his memory there was a rubbish bin attached to a metal pole at the bottom, straight ahead. But he couldn’t see it. In this muted light, it looked more like a mediaeval cannon.
Wilhelm Kaufmann had been interested in the planets for a long time. The starry sky had always been very important to him. He could recognise the huge planet of Jupiter with his naked eye, revealing itself in the west as a bright point of light in the Gemini constellation. The other two bright stars were Castor and Pollux – if he wasn’t mistaken. Together they formed an elongated triangle.
The bright sand was a huge natural source of light. Small dark shadows moved over the sand. Seagulls, crows. Maybe rabbits. Kaufmann wasn’t exactly sure.
The longer Kaufmann looked, the more he came to the conclusion that there was a gathering of rabbits or hares there. He would have liked nothing more than to walk down and be close to them.
He took off his shoes and put his socks in his trouser pockets.
Now the gathering dispersed. The animals fluttered up, and as the first ones clearly rose against the sky, he recognised that they were seagulls.
He had concentrated too much on the animals and hadn’t noticed that someone had crept up behind him. Only when Odysseus was two metres behind him did he hear human breathing, someone who sounded as though they had been walking too fast.
Kaufmann turned round and looked into the feverish eyes of a murderer.
‘Hello, Mr Kaufmann. My name is Birger Holthusen. I saw you at Ubbo Heide’s reading in Gelsenkirchen. And you were just in Dwarslooper.’
Kaufmann was dumbfounded at being addressed directly. Being addressed by name hit him like a blow to the head.
Odysseus reached into the pocket of his hoodie and wrapped his left hand around his dagger. The handle, which was made out of cherry wood, calmed him.
With a firm voice he said, ‘You’ve come here to kill me.’
At the same time, he tried to climb a little higher up the dune to be on the same level as Kaufmann. He didn’t like that he was being looked down upon.
‘No, I came here on holiday,’ Wilhelm Kaufmann corrected him.
The sand under Odysseus’ feet was fine and slippery. He sank in slightly as he tried to find a firm footing. He would need a better position in which to thrust with a dagger.
‘Holiday,’ he scoffed. ‘Holidays aren’t for madmen like us.’
Odysseus watched Kaufmann’s hands carefully. He was afraid that he would reach into his jacket and produce a gun from where his right pocket bulged. He wasn’t wearing a shoulder holster. It had been quite warm in Dwarslooper, and he’d briefly take
n off his jacket, but he’d held it loosely from his index finger instead of hanging it on the coat rack. It hadn’t got any cooler but he’d already put his jacket back on.
Odysseus knew that Kaufmann was in a gun club in Brake and that he had two handguns registered under his name. A Walther PPK and a Sig Sauer. He was surely carrying the light, short Walther in his jacket pocket. He could hardly carry the Sig Sauer on his body, dressed as he was.
Now, the fact that he was standing barefoot in front of Odysseus eliminated the question of whether he was wearing a weapon on his leg; unlike Odysseus, who didn’t leave the house without his boot knife.
‘If you have something to say, then spit it out,’ Wilhelm Kaufmann demanded.
‘On the one hand, you feel drawn to me; on the other, you’re scared of me because I’m like you. But unlike you, I follow through with my urges, while you try to stumble through a seemingly ordinary life. You killed Stern and Heymann to get rid of the sadistic child murderer inside yourself. Or do you still call yourself a paedophile? I gave it up. It sounds so friendly. In reality we’re beasts, right? We don’t love children, we destroy them.’
Kaufmann turned so that the moon was behind him, and tried to move so that his right hand was hidden from Odysseus’ field of vision. Odysseus knew exactly what Kaufmann had planned and stepped to one side. There he sank ankle-deep into the sand.
‘You killed the children, right?’ Kaufmann asked. ‘Stern and Heymann were actually innocent.’
‘Yes, I did, damn it! Steffi Heymann and Nicola Billing. And two others.’
‘Which others? And where’s Steffi’s body?’
Odysseus laughed. ‘Now you’re playing the role of cop again, right?’
Kaufmann had wondered why they were acting so formally with one another. Was this the last vestige of civilised behaviour that they wanted to preserve before the struggle began?
‘I’m not on the police force anymore.’
‘I know. They kicked you off. People like us always get kicked out at some point. When the carefully constructed façade gets cracked. When they sense that we are different from them and that something’s not right with us. Sometimes they fire us without knowing exactly why. They just want to get rid of us because they feel uncomfortable in our presence. You know what I mean?’
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