Blood Eagle

by Craig Russell

  When Fabel looked over to the bed, he saw why. Somewhere behind him Werner muttered, ‘Scheisse!’

  There was an explosion of red. A sunburst of blood had encrimsoned the bed and splashed across the carpet and up the wall. The bed itself was sodden with dark, sticky blood and even the air seemed heavy with its rich, copper odour. At the heart of the bloody eruption, Fabel saw the body of a woman. It was difficult to make out how old, but probably somewhere between twenty-five and thirty. She was spread-eagled on the bed, her outstretched wrists and ankles bound to the posts, her abdomen grotesquely deformed. She had been sliced open through the chest and the ribs pulled apart and outwards until they looked like the superstructure of a boat. The bony whiteness of the sheared ribs shone through the prised-open mess of raw flesh and glistening dark viscera. Two dark, bloody masses of tissue – her lungs – speckled with frothy, bright blood, lay thrown out over her shoulders.

  It was as if she had been blown apart from the inside.

  Fabel’s heart pounded so fiercely that he felt as if his chest, too, were going to burst. He knew his face had blanched white. When Werner made his way over to him, squeezing past the police photographer, Fabel saw the same pallor on his face.

  ‘It’s him again. This is bad, Chef. This is really bad. We’ve got the mother of all psychos on the loose here.’

  For a moment Fabel found he couldn’t direct his gaze away from the corpse. Then, taking a breath, he turned to Paul.

  ‘Witnesses?’

  ‘None. Don’t ask me how this much mayhem could be created without someone hearing, but this is the way she was found. All we’ve got is the guy who found her. No one saw or heard anything.’

  ‘Any signs of forced entry?’

  Paul shook his head. ‘The guy who found her said the door was ajar, but no, no signs of forced entry.’

  Fabel moved towards the body. It seemed so cruel that such a violent and terrifying leaving of her life should go unnoticed. Her terror had been a lonely terror. Her death – a death he could not imagine, no matter how graphically it was laid out before him – had been desolate, solitary, in a universe filled with only the cold violence of her killer. He looked beyond the devastation of her body to the face. It was spattered with blood; the mouth gaped slightly and the eyes were open. There was no look of terror: no fear nor hate nor even peace. It was an expressionless mask that gave no concept of the personality that had once lived behind it. Möller, the pathologist, masked and bunny-suited in his white forensic kit, was examining the sliced-open abdomen. He gestured impatiently for Fabel to move back.

  Fabel pulled his attention away from the body. The corpse wasn’t just a physical object, it was a temporal entity: a point in time, an event. It represented the moment that the murder had been committed and, in the sealed scene of crime, everything around it belonged either to the time before or to the time after that moment. He scanned the room, trying to imagine it without the swirl of police and forensic technicians. It was small but uncluttered. There was a lack of personality about it, as if it were a functional space rather than a home. A small, faded photograph sat on the dressing table by the door, propped against the lamp; the photograph was conspicuous as the only truly ‘personal’ personal effect in the room. There was a print on the wall, a female nude reclining, eyes half closed in an attitude of erotic ecstasy: not something a woman would usually pick for her own enjoyment. A wide, full-length mirror, fixed to the wall which divided the room from the room beyond, which Fabel surmised would have to be the kitchen, reflected the bed. He noticed a small wicker bowl on the bedside table: it was filled with condoms of various colours. He turned to Anna Wolff.

  ‘Hooker?’

  ‘Looks like it, although she isn’t … wasn’t anyone Davidwache vice knew about.’ Anna’s face was pale beneath the shock of dark hair. Fabel noticed she was making an effort not to look in the direction of the devastated corpse. ‘But we do know the guy who called in.’

  ‘Oh yes?’

  ‘A guy called Klugmann. He’s ex-Polizei Hamburg.’

  ‘An ex-cop?’

  ‘In fact he’s an ex-Mobiles Einsatz Kommando officer. He claims that he was a friend … he has the lease on the flat.’

  ‘“Claims”?’

  ‘The local boys reckon he must have been her pimp.’ It was Paul who answered.

  ‘Whoa, hold on …’ Fabel’s impatient expression implied he held Paul responsible for his confusion. ‘You said this guy is a former Mobiles Einsatz Kommando member and now he’s a pimp?’

  ‘We think he may well be. He worked with the MEK special-operations unit attached to the Organised Crime Division, but he was kicked out.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Apparently he developed a taste for the goods.’ It was Anna Wolff who answered. ‘He was caught with a small amount of cocaine and sacked. He was charged and got off with a suspended sentence. The Staatsanwalt prosecutor was cagey about sending an MEK member to prison and anyway it was only a few grams of coke … personal use, he claimed.’

  ‘You seem to know the story pretty well.’

  Anna laughed. ‘While Paul and I were waiting for you at Davidwache, we got the whole story from one of the guys there. Klugmann was involved in a couple of raids in St Pauli. Typical surprise attacks on Turkish Mafia drugs factories by MEK special units. Both times the premises were as clean as a whistle – they’d obviously been tipped off. Because they were joint operations with Davidwache KriPo, the MEK tried to pin the blame on Davidwache for being loose with security. After Klugmann was busted it all fitted together.’

  ‘He bought his drugs with something other than cash?’

  ‘That’s what they reckon. The MEK tried to prove he’d been passing information on to the Ulugbay organisation but couldn’t come up with any hard evidence.’

  ‘So Klugmann got off with a slap on the wrist.’

  ‘Yes. And now he works in an Ulugbay-owned stripclub.’

  Fabel smiled. ‘And as a pimp.’

  ‘Like I say, that’s what the local police suspect … and more.’

  ‘I can imagine,’ said Fabel. A former special-forces policeman would be incredibly valuable to Ulugbay: muscle and inside information. ‘Should we look at him as a suspect for this?’

  ‘He needs checking out but no, I doubt it. Apparently, he was in genuine shock when the local uniforms got here. We talked to him briefly at Davidwache. He’s a tough-looking son of a bitch but he clearly hadn’t worked out a credible story. Just kept saying he was a friend and had called around to see her.’

  ‘Do we have a name for her?’

  ‘That’s the thing,’ Paul answered. ‘I’m afraid we have a mystery woman on our hands. Klugmann says he’s only ever known her as “Monique”.’

  ‘Is she French?’

  Paul half smiled, looking at Fabel to see if there was any sign of irony in his expression; he had heard of der englische Kommissar’s reputation for a British sense of humour. No irony. Just impatience. ‘Not according to Klugmann. Sounds like a professional name to me.’

  ‘What about her personal effects? Her identity card?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  Fabel noticed the bedside cabinet had already been dusted for prints. He pulled open one of the drawers. There was an oversized dildo and four pornographic magazines, one of which specialised in bondage. He looked back at the body: the wrists and ankles were tied tightly to the posts of the bed by what looked like black stockings. The choice had been practical and improvised rather than erotic and premeditated; nor was there any other evidence of the usual paraphernalia of bondage. The next drawer held more condoms, a large box of paper tissues and a bottle of massage oil. The third drawer was empty except for a pad of writing paper and two ballpoint pens. He turned to the head of the forensic team.

  ‘Where’s Holger Brauner?’ he asked, referring to the forensic department’s chief.

  ‘He’s on leave till the weekend.’

  Fabel wished that Braune
r had been on duty. Brauner could read a crime scene like an archaeologist could read a landscape: seeing the traces, invisible to everyone else, of those who had passed by before. ‘Can one of your guys bag all of this stuff for me?’

  ‘Of course, Herr Hauptkommissar.’

  ‘There was nothing else in this bottom drawer?’

  The duty forensics chief frowned. ‘No. Anything we removed for examination and dusting has been replaced. There was nothing else.’

  ‘Have you found her appointment book?’

  Again the technician looked puzzled.

  ‘She’s been a hooker but not a street girl,’ explained Fabel. ‘Her customers will have been by appointment, probably made by phone. She must have had an appointment book.’

  ‘Not that we’ve found.’

  ‘My guess is that, if she had one, it was in here,’ said Fabel, nodding to the open third drawer. ‘If we can’t find it elsewhere then it’s my guess our guy took it with him.’

  ‘To protect himself? You think she’s been done by a client?’ asked Paul.

  ‘I doubt it. Our guy – and this is our guy – wouldn’t be so dumb as to pick someone who has prior knowledge of him.’

  ‘So this is definitely the same guy who did the Kastner girl?’

  ‘Who the hell else could it be?’ answered Werner, nodding towards the corpse. ‘This is obviously his signature.’

  A silence fell between them as they each sank into their own thoughts about the implications of this being the work of a serial killer. They all knew that they would not close the gap between themselves and this monster until he had killed again. And more than once. Each scene of crime would yield a little more: small investigative steps paid for with the blood of innocent victims. It was Fabel who broke the silence.

  ‘Anyway, if our guy didn’t take the appointment book with him then maybe Klugmann swiped it to protect the identities of his clients.’

  Möller, the pathologist, had remained bent over the body, peering into the empty chasm of the girl’s abdomen. He straightened up, peeled off his bloodied surgical gloves and turned to the Hauptkommissar.

  ‘This is the same man’s work all right, Fabel …’ With a surprising gentleness, Möller swept the blonde hair back from the girl’s face. ‘Exactly the same form of killing as the other victim.’

  ‘I can see that for myself, Möller. When did she die?’

  ‘This kind of catastrophic dismemberment makes temperature readings –’

  Fabel cut him off. ‘Your best guess?’

  Möller angled his head backwards. He was a good bit taller than Fabel and looked down at him as if he were surveying something unworthy of his attention. ‘I would estimate between one and three a.m.’

  A tall, blonde woman, dressed in an elegant grey trouser suit, emerged from the hall. She looked as if she would be more at home in the boardroom of a corporate bank than at a murder scene. She was Kriminaloberkommissarin Maria Klee, Fabel’s most recent addition to his team. ‘Chef, you’d better have a look at this.’

  Fabel followed her out to the hall and into a small and extremely narrow galley kitchen. Like the rest of the flat, the kitchen seemed almost unused. There was a kettle and a packet of teabags on the counter. A single rinsed cup lay upturned on the drainer. Otherwise there was no trace of the mechanics of living: no plates in the sink, no letters sitting on the counter or on top of the fridge, nothing to suggest that this space contained the cycle of a human life. Maria Klee indicated an open wall-cupboard door. When Fabel looked inside he saw that the plaster of the wall had been cut away and a sheet of glass allowed a clear view of the room beyond. He found himself looking directly at the gore-sodden bed.

  ‘One way?’ Fabel asked Maria.

  ‘Yep. The other side is the full-length mirror. Look at this.’ She squeezed past Fabel, reached her latex-gloved hand into the cupboard and stretched out an electrical cable. ‘I reckon there’s been a camera in here.’

  ‘So our guy could have been caught on video?’

  ‘Except there’s nothing in here now,’ said Maria. ‘Maybe he found it and took it.’

  ‘Okay. Get the forensic guys to give it a good going over.’

  Fabel made to leave but Maria stopped him. ‘I remember, when I was a kid, my school went on a day trip to the NDR television studios. We were shown around a set for some TV show … you know, a Lindenstrasse or Gute Zeiten Schlechte Zeiten type soap opera. I remember how real the room looked – until you got up close. Then you saw that the sky beyond the windows was painted and the cupboard doors didn’t open …’

  ‘What’s your point, Maria?’

  ‘There’s everything here you would expect from a call girl’s apartment … but it’s like a set designer’s idea of what a call girl’s apartment should look like. And it’s like no one has really lived here.’

  ‘For all we know this place wasn’t lived in. It could simply be “business” premises used by a team of girls …’

  ‘I know … but there’s still something about it that doesn’t ring true. Know what I mean?’

  Fabel took a deep breath and held it for a moment before replying. ‘As a matter of fact I know exactly what you mean, Maria.’

  Fabel moved back into the main room. The scene-of-crime photographer was taking detailed shots of the body. He had set up a lamp on a stand; the stark light was focused on the corpse, making the blood spattered across the room even more vivid and adding to the sense of explosive violence. The young uniformed officer was still standing at the door, his gaze fixed on the corpse. Fabel placed himself between the young cop and the body.

  ‘What’s your name, son?’

  ‘Beller, sir. Uwe Beller.’

  ‘Okay, Beller. Did you speak to any of the neighbours?’

  Beller’s gaze had started to drift across Fabel’s shoulder and back to the horror in the room beyond. He snapped himself back. ‘What? Oh … yes. Sorry sir, yes, I did. There’s a couple on the ground floor and an old lady immediately underneath. They didn’t hear a thing. But there again, the Oma underneath is practically deaf.’

  ‘Can they give us a name for the girl?’

  ‘No. Both the old lady and the couple say they hardly ever saw her. The flat used to be owned by another old woman who died about a year ago. It was empty for about three months and then it was rented out again.’

  ‘Did they see anyone come or go this evening?’

  ‘No. Other than the guy who arrived at two-thirty, the guy who phoned us. The couple on the ground floor were woken up by the front door slamming – it’s on a spring hinge and it closes with a bang that echoes a bit in the hall … but nobody heard anything before that. There again the couple on the ground floor were asleep and, like I say, the old lady underneath is a bit deaf.’ Beller tilted his head to look over Fabel’s shoulder towards the body. ‘Whoever it was is a complete psycho. Mind you, she was asking for trouble getting mixed up in this game – bringing back all kinds of pervert off the street.’

  Fabel picked up the dog-eared photograph that leaned against the lamp on the dresser. A worn fragment of someone’s life, a real life. It was as much at home in this spiritless apartment as grit in an eye. The photograph had been taken in what Fabel guessed to be Hamburg’s Planten un Blomen park on a sunny day. It was an old photograph, the quality was not good and it had been taken from a distance, but he could just make out the features of a mousy-haired adolescent girl, around fourteen. It was a face that was not ugly, not pretty, but one you would pass in the street without noticing. With her was an older boy, about nineteen, and a couple in their mid-forties. There was that feel of familiarity and ease between them that led instantly to the conclusion that this was a family.

  ‘She’s still a person,’ Fabel answered without looking at the young Polizeimeister, ‘still someone’s daughter. The question is whose.’ He took an evidence bag out of his jacket pocket and placed the photograph in it. Then he turned to Möller.

  ‘Give me your
report as soon as you can.’

  Wednesday 4 June, 6.00 a.m. St Pauli, Hamburg.

  On the way out, Fabel got Beller to go with him to the apartment downstairs. There was already a uniformed officer there, drinking tea with a bird-like old woman with paper skin. This apartment was an exact copy, in layout at least, of the one above. But decades of habitation had etched itself into the walls of this flat, until it had become an extension of the old woman who lived in it. In contrast, it was someone’s death, not their life, that had made the only mark on the apartment above.

  The officer rose from the armchair when Fabel walked in but Fabel motioned for him to relax. Beller introduced the woman as Frau Steiner. She stared up at Fabel with large, round, watery eyes. The combination of her gaze and her bird-like frailty made Fabel think of an owl. There was a table and chairs against one wall. Fabel pulled up one of the chairs and sat facing the old woman.

  ‘Are you all right, Frau Steiner? I know this must be a shock for you. Such a terrible business. And I’m sure that you must find it disturbing to have all of us tramping around the place. So much noise …’