‘If I were you, I’d bugger off as quickly as possible,’ Kirsten says soberly. As injured as she is, she’s still strong and defiant – nobody can change that. Not even an angry god. ‘Because if Maja knows you’re here . . .’
He waggles his hand grumpily.
‘And? Who’s saying I did the interview with Jasmin this evening? Perhaps in the official version of events, I don’t turn up here till tomorrow morning and find a few corpses. I’ve got lots of options.’
‘You’re going nowhere until you tell me what happened to my daughter,’ Matthias Beck growls. It’s the first thing he’s said since he recognised Rogner and slid limply down the wall. Your father, Lena. I can’t begin to imagine how painful this discovery must be for him. He’s quoted in many of Rogner’s articles and must have been in permanent contact with him, his daughter’s abductor, unaware, unsuspecting, full of hope.
‘Quiet!’ Rogner thunders, before immediately regaining his composure. With a sigh he moves his chair and sits facing us, like a ruthless general who’s taken three prisoners. There’s a furtive expression on his face. ‘I’ve always had respect for you, Herr Beck. Respect of the highest order. I might even go so far as to say I’ve admired you. The way you fought like a lion for Lena and your family. You failed, obviously, and often what you did was nothing short of idiotic.’ He laughs. ‘But you never gave up. How I enjoyed reading your emails, the anger in them, the determination. The threat, repeated a hundred times over, that you’d never talk to me again. But then you had no choice. You kept coming back to me, with complaints, with information, clues, always in the hope of some development. You’re a father, Herr Beck, a real father. You must understand me, surely? A real father doesn’t have a choice.’
‘You are perverted,’ Beck pants, clutching his chest again.
‘And you are here, Herr Beck! What does that say about us? You know full well that you won’t get Lena back. But now you’ve replaced her with Hannah.’ Rogner salutes him. ‘We’re not that dissimilar, Herr Beck.’
‘Tell me what you did with my daughter, you monster!’
One side of Rogner’s mouth twitches into a smile.
‘You have no idea, Herr Beck. The daughter you spent all those years defending never existed. We had an affair. Your daughter was that kind of girl. She had an affair with a married man.’ His smile becomes broader, provocative. ‘What do you think about that, Herr Beck?’
‘That’s a lie!’
‘No lie,’ Rogner protests. ‘It’s the truth. Can you cope with that, Herr Beck?’ He puts his head to one side in feigned sympathy. ‘Can your sick heart keep up?’
From the corner of my eye I see Matthias Beck grinding his teeth.
‘Well?’ Rogner bares his teeth. Then, as if at the flick of a switch, his face darkens. I know this look. It’s the last thing you see before his fist slams into your face, his foot starts kicking you mercilessly; before the pain explodes and everything turns black. ‘A lying, spoiled brat, stuffed with Papi’s cash like a plump Christmas goose. Irresponsible, fickle, lacking any respect. That was the daughter for whom you beat up a man so badly he had to go to hospital and whose reports you faked.’ Now he leans his head on the other side to see what effect his words have had. ‘Surely you remember our first meeting, Herr Beck? How proudly you showed me Lena’s reports. A straight “A” student! My photographer even took pictures of them and I didn’t doubt her achievements for one second until I had an interview with her tutor. Your daughter’s average grade was a “C” bordering on a “D”. But you knew that, didn’t you?’ Rogner shakes his head, smirking. ‘You lied for your daughter from the beginning. And so I suspected we’d have great fun together, which we did, didn’t we, Herr Beck? I mean, I had a lot of fun at least.’
‘Go on,’ Beck growls. ‘I want to know it all.’
Rogner mutters something. Looks at Beck. Seems to be thinking.
For a moment I feel a spark of hope. I pray his next reaction will be the right one. Someone intending to escape doesn’t have time for long stories. Someone with something to lose keeps the unsayable things to themselves.
‘So be it, Herr Beck,’ I hear him say and close my eyes.
This is the end.
‘We met when Lena was in her second semester. When she turned up at our office enquiring about an internship. Maybe she was motivated by the fleeting desire to stand on her own two feet, or at least to escape her mother’s pesky criticism. In the interview, I already guessed that Lena was no journalist. There wasn’t a world around Lena Beck. Lena Beck was the world. Or at least so she thought. Nonetheless I gave her a chance. I asked her to write an article on a particular topic by the following week.’ He laughs. ‘She didn’t, of course. When I called her, she said she’d changed her mind and wanted to concentrate on her studies instead. What a dreadful girl, I thought. And yet I just couldn’t get her out of my mind. Her lightness, like a delicate little bird. Her carelessness, which both fascinated and repelled me.’ Rogner shakes his head again, this time deep in his memories. ‘One thing led to another. But we had to be careful – after all, I was a married man. I’d been married to Simone for twelve years and had never been unfaithful. I’d pledged my life to her and I meant it. Until Lena came on the scene. In the beginning we’d just meet for a few hours, but soon that wasn’t enough. So we started spending weekends together. I told Simone I was away for work. As a journalist you spend a lot of time away, so there was no reason for my wife to doubt me. I took Lena to the cabin, which had existed when I was a child. I originally come from near Cham, you see. The cabin . . . I’d played there as a child. Pretended I lived there. It’s really lovely. Sadly, you’ve never seen it by day,’ he says to me. There’s a hint of melancholy in his voice, but I don’t buy it. ‘The cabin is at one with its surroundings, it exists outside of time and space. You can’t get there by car. At least you couldn’t until the police came and made access paths that nature had never intended. Before, you had to park a good half kilometre away, near a footpath, and walk the rest of the way through the woods. There was always something so primordial about that for me. Something romantic, even, when I walked hand in hand with Lena, when we made our own paths to the secret, enchanted place that belonged to just the two of us. Here we existed only for each other; we were secure and far away from the world. Back then the cabin was really run-down. Together we renovated and furnished it.’ He looks at me and grins. ‘Lena chose the carpet in the sitting room.’
You helped build your prison, Lena.
I peer over at Matthias Beck, a vein protruding on his forehead. He’s totally silent, mesmerised. But I suspect it’s just a matter of time. He won’t be able to stick this out, not for long.
‘I lived for our weekends in the cabin. And I thought she felt the same way.’ Rogner runs his hands roughly through his dark hair. When he jerks his hands back down, it’s now all shaggy where it was neat. ‘But I was mistaken. After a while she came up with more and more excuses as to why we couldn’t meet. She didn’t have time, she had to revise for exams. She had to go to a birthday party. Father, mother, grandmother – all of a sudden there were these endless birthdays. She also stopped answering the mobile phone I’d bought for her. For both of us, as I didn’t want Simone to get wind of anything.’ He snorts, sounding both scornful and perplexed. I sense him getting ever more caught up in his story, this story becoming an experience he’s now reliving. ‘Who does she think she is?’ his voice now drones through the room. ‘Who does she think I am? I’m the best journalist in the country, I know when someone’s lying to me. She’s lying. So I follow her. And I’m right. She’s meeting her ex-boyfriend again. Just when I’ve told my wife about us. I finally told her, just as Lena wanted. She wanted me to decide. So I told Simone I was leaving her. That I wanted to live with Lena.’ He breaks off. At this moment, something happens; I can feel it. All of a sudden he looks unbelievably old. It may be just m
y imagination, or the unfavourable angle at which the gloomy light from the cooker hits his facial features and distorts them.
‘That’s why,’ Matthias Beck says, clearly having twigged something.
Rogner nods.
‘I couldn’t stop some papers writing about it. Luckily, people in our business tend to be concise when reporting on suicide, to avoid encouraging other poor, desperate souls.’ He rubs his brow, wearily, perhaps in the hope of banishing the images from his head. But in vain.
‘Carbon monoxide poisoning. She took our barbecue into the bathroom, sealed the room completely and then lit some charcoal. It’s me who finds them when I come home from work. They’re lying in the bathtub, Pascal in Simone’s arms, almost like they’re asleep. But they’re not. They’re dead.’ He takes his hand from his head. The expression that now flashes across his face suggests he’s come up with an idea. ‘Lena’s all I’ve got left now. I’m never going to relinquish control again. No more disasters like that again, I promise you, Pascal. From now on, Papa’s always going to take good care.’
It’s silent for a moment, and the silence assumes a tension that’s almost unbearable. As if an invisible, deadly gas were swirling around this room, just as it had in Rogner’s bathroom. Then Rogner clears his throat, and he appears to have returned from the past, he’s back with us, in the kitchen where the inevitable end is being played out.
‘Lena wasn’t even startled when I intercepted her on the way home from a student party. Hey, Lars, she said and laughed. She stank of alcohol and grass. Haven’t seen you in ages. It had been precisely thirteen days. Thirteen days during which I’d buried my family and converted the cabin. She thought I was joking at first when I took her there. She thought it was a game, even something sexual, perhaps. A little goodbye game. Until I told her about Simone and Pascal. Then it dawned on her. She was never going to leave the cabin. For the first time in her life she was going to take on some responsibility, I’d make sure of that.’
‘You . . . you wrote articles about her,’ Matthias says, unable to believe what he’s hearing.
When Rogner looks at him I can see that the pain has vanished from his face at a stroke. He’s grinning again.
‘That was my way of letting you know what sort of a girl your daughter really was. Besides, it meant I was always close to the investigation. That’s quite important when you’ve committed a crime and are not particularly keen on the truth coming to light.’
I can see Matthias Beck struggling. The vein on his forehead is throbbing; his lips are moving without any sound. And yet the question, this one question, comes out – probably all of us suspect it’s going to be the last one.
‘Why did Lena have to die?’
Rogner sighs as he leans back in his chair and puts his head back.
‘You think I killed Lena,’ he begins cautiously. ‘But that’s not the case. It was an accident, not long after Sara was born. Our little one. In the beginning she just screamed . . .’
Hannah
You always have to listen carefully, especially when Papa’s talking. I put the red crayon away some time ago. But that’s partly because my subject has moved. The woman’s not lying on the floor anymore, but sitting by the wall between Grandad and Mama. The carmine crayon won’t work for those patches on her face anymore. I’d need the claret one. Papa slammed her head really hard against the wall in the hallway. So hard that it went Bam! But no matter how big the wound is, blood generally dries very quickly. Speedy clotting of the blood raises the chances of survival when you’re injured. Once we had a mama at home who had a bleeding disorder. She bled a carmine red colour for almost three days non-stop. Cleverly we laid her on a plastic tarpaulin, otherwise she’d have probably made everything dirty. Anyway, Papa’s just been telling the sad story about the boy in the bathtub. He was my brother, just like Jonathan’s my brother. I listened carefully, even though I know the story. Papa told it to me after the thing happened to Mama and Sara. He cried and said you always have to protect your family, otherwise you lose them. I bet he said that because I couldn’t stand Sara and felt very ashamed of this. Now he’s telling Grandad, Mama and the woman about Sara and how she did nothing but cry when she was born. Soon after that the coughing began too. Luckily, though, that didn’t last long. I remember how happy I was the first time she was quiet, because I thought we’d finally be able to sleep through the night again. ‘It’s not good,’ Mama said, but she was wrong. Sleep is very good, and most of all, it’s important, as it allows the body to regenerate. ‘She needs to go to hospital!’ She’d been saying this to Papa for a few days now, but Papa said, ‘It’s nothing, it’s just a minor cold. She’ll get better again soon.’ Usually such words would satisfy Mama, but not that evening. She insisted that Sara had pneumonia. Pneumonia is an acute or chronic inflammation of the lung tissue, caused by a bacterial, viral or fungal infection. Papa said she wasn’t a doctor. And not a good mother either if she couldn’t make Sara better again. Mama cried, loudly.
Grown-ups always have to lock children in their room before they start arguing. Probably they hadn’t planned to argue and besides, Papa had already said, ‘That’s enough!’ But Mama still cried, and she got louder and louder.
‘What’s wrong?’ whispered Jonathan, who was also hiding behind the bedroom door. We’d just finished brushing our teeth when we heard the agitated voices.
‘Sara’s causing trouble again,’ I whispered back.
‘I’ve said that’s enough!’ Papa’s lion voice. Jonathan ducked.
‘Please! I don’t have to go with her,’ Mama howled. ‘I’ll stay here. Just take her to hospital.’
Papa grabbed Mama’s arm.
‘If you don’t stop right now . . .’ he hissed at her.
‘She’s got a temperature!’
‘She’s getting better.’
Mama spat in Papa’s face. And she had a lion voice too.
‘You are a vile human being! You’re allowing your own daughter to die! She’s not going to survive the night!’
Papa tried to calm Mama down. She’d never had a fit as bad as this. He held her by the throat, which he’d often done when she had a fit.
Turning to Jonathan, I said, ‘Let’s go to bed.’ We really wanted to stay up until Mama came to read us a goodnight story. But as soon as we were in bed, we fell asleep. We were so tired because we’d slept badly all those nights when Sara just screamed. But that night it was nice and quiet.
Papa is talking about this right now: ‘But that night . . .’
Jasmin
‘. . . it’s terribly quiet.’ Rogner sighs sadly then pauses for a moment. ‘I know it shouldn’t have happened,’ he resumes. ‘Not again. Once again I didn’t take enough care. I failed. Just like you failed, Herr Beck. Just as all good fathers fail from time to time.’
‘Don’t you dare,’ Matthias Beck snarls, in pain, it seems. Rogner shrugs – not callously, but more like a man who’s got to the end of his story and is wondering what to say next.
Silence fills the room. Silence, which is interrupted by a soft, disconcerting sound. All eyes turn to Hannah, who’s started sobbing. It sounds like hiccoughs.
‘She still thinks it’s her fault,’ Rogner says, getting up from his chair. ‘Because she couldn’t stand the baby. But she just hadn’t got used to the new situation.’
I watch him walk around Hannah and plant a kiss on her forehead.
‘It’s not your fault that Sara got ill. None of it is your fault, my darling.’
Matthias Beck is straining to breathe. It’s hard to watch this, but maybe that’s how it is. Love. It’s love. No matter how sick, distorted and misunderstood, it’s still love. Love that spurs us on. That turns us into monsters, each in our own way.
‘Lars,’ I say, stifling a spontaneous retch. That’s what he’s called, Lars. That’s his name, and it’s the first time
I’ve uttered it.
Kirsten tries restraining me. She grabs my arm, whispers, ‘No, Jassy, don’t.’
I shake her off. Get to my feet. Lars Rogner is here because of love. Love for his family. I’m standing now and my knees are shaking. But I’m standing. He didn’t stop me from getting up. He didn’t even make a move to. He watches me. I take a first tentative step towards him. He allows me to. I take a second.
‘I want to go home,’ I say.
‘Don’t bother, Jasmin,’ he scoffs. ‘You know it’s over.’
I shake my head.
‘If it really were over, you wouldn’t have bothered coming here. And you certainly wouldn’t have brought Hannah. You said you wanted Lena to finally take responsibility. But you bear some responsibility too, Lars. For your children, for me. Hannah wants us to be a family again, don’t you, Hannah?’
He looks at his daughter, who gives a hesitant nod.
Dear Child: The twisty thriller that starts where others end Page 29
