Grave Intent

by Alexander Hartung

  The press conference was basically over. The police chief would answer a few questions in the same noncommittal way he’d done in his speech. The information would be enough for the news, but there was nothing truly new to report.

  Jan climbed off the planter and worked his way out of the crowd. Hopefully the rear entrance was quieter. His boss surely hadn’t called him in for a press conference.

  Bergman had something new, something he was keeping from the press.

  Jan heard Bergman and his muffled cursing before he saw him. It would have been smarter to wait until his boss calmed down, but he didn’t want to lose any time. He was going to get his ass kicked one way or another.

  “There he is, our Super Detective,” Bergman said.

  “Mornin’,” Jan said and smiled. It didn’t matter what he said. Bergman’s mood wasn’t going to improve.

  “You ever going to find the murderer, or should I just hope he dies of old age?”

  Jan felt actual physical pain from not being able to strike back with a comment of his own. “Why am I here?” he grunted.

  “You have a visitor.”

  Jan furrowed his brow. Patrick Stein and his crew were the ones responsible for questioning potential witnesses. If Bergman was calling Jan in too, it had to be someone important.

  Bergman waved him into his office and slammed the door shut. A woman sat slumped in his armchair, her face buried in her hands. She looked so despondent that Jan fought an urge to go hide the scissors lying on the desk.

  Bergman gestured at her and took his chair. “You already know Frau Roth.”

  Friederike raised her head. Her eyes were wet and swollen from crying, and her mascara had left black streaks down her cheeks. Robin Cordes’s girlfriend had turned into a quivering mess.

  Jan sat down across from her. Nothing could have happened to Robin. Jan had still been with the man when Bergman called.

  Friederike held up a photo and placed it in Jan’s lap.

  In it, he saw an empty grave. On a wooden cross, it read: Here Rests Robin Cordes. Born on March 12, 1972. Died on June 29, 2013.

  Jan tried not to swear.

  “Where did it come from?” he asked.

  “It was in my mailbox this morning.”

  Jan studied the photo more closely. Apart from the hole in the ground, he didn’t detect much else. No buildings in the background and no other grave that would help them place it in a particular cemetery.

  “Do you know where this is?”

  Friederike shook her head.

  Jan turned to Bergman. “Did Forensics get their hands on this yet?”

  “That’s a copy. Crime techs are on it.”

  Jan took the photo and stood up. “I’ll be right back.” He left the office, hustled down the hallway, and headed for the special unit’s conference room. If there was one constant in the chaos of an investigation, it was Patrick. He arrived at work when most people were still asleep, and he was one of the last to leave. Sure, he was pedantic and humorless, but he was also dependable and exacting. The perfect man for this job.

  Jan stormed into the room. “We have a new grave.”

  All heads turned his way. “So we’ve heard,” Patrick said. “We’re waiting on the crime techs’ analysis.”

  “No time. Robin Cordes is supposed to die tomorrow. If it’s the same murderer, we’re not going to get any evidence off it anyway.”

  Jan laid the photo on the table. “This grave, it’s somewhere in Berlin. The murderer left us no clues, so the only way to do this is the hard way. Call every cemetery, get all personnel back from lunch, whatever it takes. They’ll have to search out this grave. No idea how the murderer is going to find his victim when he’s gone into hiding, but if he does, we’ll be waiting for him right here.” Jan pointed at the photo.

  “We should send all available patrols to the cemeteries to assist personnel there,” Patrick suggested.

  “Good idea. The more people searching, the better.”

  “What if the grave isn’t at a cemetery?” Patrick said.

  Jan hadn’t considered that possibility. “It wouldn’t fit the murderer’s pattern up till now.”

  “But it’s not inconceivable.”

  “We’re hurting, in that case. We can’t go turning all Berlin upside down in half a day.”

  “We’ll just hope for the best,” Patrick said. “I’ll send a list of all the local cemeteries around. Everyone takes a few. It couldn’t take more than an hour. Mark the addresses where we haven’t reached anyone. We’ll send a car there.”

  As if on some invisible signal, all the investigators turned to their computers and got to work.

  Jan smiled. In less than two hours, he would know where this grave was. Then they’d set up a little greeting committee for the murderer.

  Friederike Roth was sitting on the visitors’ bench outside the glass walls of Bergman’s office, staring absently into her coffee cup.

  Once Jan was back inside Bergman’s office, Bergman asked him, “Did I understand correctly that you talked to Robin Cordes an hour ago?”

  “Right before you called.”

  “So why didn’t you bring him in to the station?”

  “Because he had a gun in my face and wasn’t exactly cooperating.”

  “So he’s not the grave murderer?”

  Jan shook his head. “He’s all about escaping his own grave.”

  “But what if that was simply some clever chess move to throw us off?”

  “The murderer doesn’t need to do that. We’re feeling around in the dark as it is.”

  “We know that, but the murderer doesn’t.”

  “Robin Cordes was a small-time crook. Maybe he’s changed, but such precise planning? It’s not his thing.”

  “Did he say anything about his connection to Valburg or Quast?”

  “Nothing new. Cordes was Valburg’s dealer, and Quast put him in jail. He’d love to pay Quast back for that, but he didn’t want to risk his probation.”

  “He wouldn’t be the first,” Bergman said.

  “Cordes had the motive for Moritz Quast, but the way he died points to a more complicated relationship. Such a sophisticated production just isn’t Cordes’s style.”

  “So what’s happening now?”

  “Patrick’s people are contacting all cemetery personnel in Berlin. Together with the patrols we have on it, we’ll find that grave before sundown. If the murderer shows up there, we’ll get him. Robin smelled a rat before we did, so I don’t think he’ll let himself be caught. I only stumbled upon him because he wanted me to.”

  “This would be simpler if we could keep an eye on him.”

  “He wouldn’t do it. It’s understandable from his perspective, considering how things went wrong with Moritz Quast.”

  “That’s not a mistake we’ll make a second time.”

  “Robin will stay underground. I’ll talk to his girlfriend again and try to convince her to work with us. Maybe he’ll get in touch with her. We might also locate him if he turns on his phone.” He grinned briefly at the thought of Max’s tech savvy.

  “Good,” Bergman said. “I’ll put some pressure on Crime Tech.” He reached for the phone.

  Outside Bergman’s office, Jan sat down on the bench next to Friederike Roth, who was still staring into her empty cup. He didn’t want to pressure her, so he just sat there without saying a word.

  “I flip through the paper every day,” she eventually began in a low voice. “You read about muggings, accidents, sometimes even murder. But as soon as you put down the paper, you forget about all those headlines.”

  She turned the cup in her hand. “It’s so bizarre being an actual part of one of these stories. In the blink of an eye, your whole life can change.”

  She turned to Jan. “Who is this grave murderer? Why come after Robin?”

  “If I knew that, we wouldn’t be sitting here and you wouldn’t have to be afraid. The murderer is obviously deranged. The good news i
s, he’s also arrogant and sticking to his pattern. He doesn’t just want to kill his victims, he wants to make their death a ceremony. I don’t know what’s driving him to dig those graves, but it will be his Achilles’ heel. He will return there.”

  “But only with Robin’s corpse.”

  “I don’t think so,” Jan countered. “I’d rather your boyfriend was here right now, but not even the police have been able to catch him. And we have far more resources than the murderer.”

  “But why is he after Robin?”

  “It has something to do with Dr. Valburg and Moritz Quast.”

  “The first two victims.”

  Jan nodded. “We can’t ask them, and Robin isn’t talking. He might know who the murderer is, possibly without even realizing it. There’s some connection between those three.”

  “I wish I could help, but Robin never said a thing to me. And I guess I didn’t want to know what he was up to.”

  Bergman came up to the glass from inside his office. He shook his head.

  Jan sighed. Bergman must be referring to the analysis of the photo. So they hadn’t found any leads this time either.

  He turned back to Friederike. “You can help us—by persuading your boyfriend to talk to us.”

  “I’ve left hundreds of voice messages for Robin and I have no idea where he’s hiding.”

  “He’ll get in touch eventually. He might call you or be waiting for you somewhere.” Jan handed her a card with his number. “I know he’s had trouble with the cops all his life, but ask him to call this number. We can protect him. And when we’ve uncovered the exact connection between him, Dr. Valburg and Moritz Quast, then we’ll have our man. Then your boyfriend can go home.”

  Friederike took the card. “Thank you.” She raised her head and looked Jan in the eye for the first time. “If he contacts me, he’ll call you. I promise.”

  After Friederike left, Jan allowed himself a stroll to his favorite kebab joint around the corner. He hadn’t had any breakfast, and his stomach was growling. The lack of sleep was wearing on him, but he saw no chance of catching up on it in the next few days.

  He liked being a cop, and getting assigned to Detectives had been his dream, but investigating homicide cases came at a heavy price. He missed the things so many people got to do every day. Knowing when he’d be home at night and not having to think about work until the next day. Enjoying the weekend with all its creature comforts. Sleeping in, a nice big breakfast, partying till any hour, or just channel surfing.

  Jan didn’t need a mansion, a swanky vacation, or a flashy sports car. But just to do nothing for a single day, with no responsibilities and without the knowledge that there was a maniac serial killer running around Berlin—he would give a full month’s salary for that.

  For now, he hoped to have at least ten minutes to get something to eat. Enjoy a cup of tea, some banter with Alkim, the restaurant’s owner, and maybe one or two cubes of Turkish delight. Just ten minutes before his cell phone rang, before Patrick’s team found the grave, before all the madness started closing in on him again.

  “Just ten,” he muttered as if it were a mantra, folding his hands and looking up to the sky. “All I ask.”

  Eight minutes was all he got. His phone rang. The Turkish delight would have to wait.

  “We have the grave,” Patrick said with pride. He bounded over to the map on the wall and pointed at a green area. “It’s in a wooded cemetery in Charlottenburg.”

  “That’s the big patch near Olympic Stadium?”

  “Exactly. All thirty-seven acres of it.”

  Jan groaned. Conducting surveillance on all that was going to be a nightmare. Lots of exits, even more paths, and countless hiding places.

  “How did you guys find the grave so fast?”

  “The cemetery has plenty of famous people in it. Which means extra-attentive cemetery staff and more of them.”

  “We watching the spot?”

  “Not yet. We have two patrols positioned nearby to observe the street, with instructions to remain inconspicuous.”

  “Then send two plainclothes officers out there too. They should water some flowers, pull some weeds, but stay back from the grave.”

  Patrick nodded.

  “We have to stay under the radar. The murderer isn’t counting on us finding the grave so quickly. We cannot lose our advantage. Maybe he’s still in the vicinity or is checking it occasionally. Anything suspicious and he’s going to clear out for good.”

  “Cameras?”

  “They’re essential. We’ll mount them around the grave site. Park the surveillance van next to the grounds. On top of that I want plainclothes near all exits until dark. We’ll look for somewhere to hide near the grave beforehand. We’ll sit tight through the night. So far he’s killed his victims right around midnight and then put them in sometime before dawn.”

  “I’ll see to the plainclothes officers.” Patrick went to a phone and was deep in a conversation a moment later.

  Jan pulled his own phone from his pocket and pressed a number from his recent calls. “Max? Jan here.”

  “I see that,” Max replied.

  “Pack all you’d need for a night stakeout,” Jan continued. “Above all, those cams that don’t need any light.”

  “They call them infrared.”

  “Save the smart-ass quips. Move your butt and get over here. I want to be gone in twenty minutes.”

  Jan put away his phone. The special team’s room was buzzing. In two hours, not even an ant would be able to pass through the cemetery without them spotting it.

  They had been one step ahead of the murder the first time, and gotten behind the second time. They weren’t going to miss this chance.

  An hour after their find, the wooded cemetery was under the control of the Detectives Division. Fourteen plainclothes cops were strolling around: four along the cemetery walls, six near the exits, and four within the immediate vicinity of Robin Cordes’s grave.

  Jan had thrown on a cemetery-personnel jacket and was loosening up the soil of an overgrown planting bed with a hoe. After three minutes, he had the first blister on his thumb. Five minutes later, he needed a back massage. He had no idea how someone could do such work all day long without becoming totally disabled by age forty.

  Since he’d been there, he’d seen no visitors. The area was off the beaten path. Surely no coincidence, Jan thought. The murderer had done his homework here too. But at the moment, the seclusion was working for Detectives. Max could set up the cams without being disturbed.

  Jan looked over his shoulder at Max. The cemetery jacket was far too big for the scrawny geek. He’d had to roll up the sleeves so that at least his fingers would poke out. He was strapping a small cam to the branch of a big chestnut tree. He finished by covering the thumb-sized piece of tech with a leaf.

  “That little thing’s enough for watching the whole grave?” Jan whispered into his portable radio.

  “With color and sound,” Max replied. “It hardly needs any light for you to see razor-sharp images, even at night.”

  “There’s no streetlights around here. Where’s the light supposed to come from?”

  “It’s almost full moon. If the weather’s clear tonight, that’ll do. For safety’s sake, I placed two little candles near enough.”

  “What about the paths to the grave?”

  “As long as he doesn’t come bushwhacking his way through the underbrush—there’s only one path here. I installed a bigger camera in that holly. I can zoom it. When I’m done here I’ll mount more of our little spies at the entrances. Then nothing gets by us.” Max finished aligning the cam, grabbed his backpack, and went over to Jan. “You know where you’re spending the night yet?”

  “About ten yards from the grave there are these big shrubs about head high; luckily they don’t have pointy leaves. A cemetery worker is cutting us out a hole in the middle and covering the rear part with bushes in pots. The hideaway is about as deep as my closet, but it will d
o.”

  “I’ll set you up with a monitor. You can watch the grave and the path at the same time without having to get out. All that rustling could get conspicuous.”

  “Okay.” Jan stood up and stretched. “I’m heading over to the briefing.”

  “I’ll be at the main entrance.” Max raised a hand. “See you soon.”

  Jan waved back. Still four more hours until it was dark. The trap was set.

  Jan yawned as he left the conference room. He was going to have to either stock up on coffee for the night or steal some of Max’s energy drinks, if he didn’t want to fall asleep inside those shrubs. Still another hour until dusk. Robin’s death wasn’t scheduled until tomorrow, so Jan didn’t believe the murderer would show up before midnight. But he might check in on the grave. Jan didn’t want to spoil any chance of seizing him.

  In a half hour, the plainclothes cops would withdraw. Visitors wandering around and caring for graves in the dark were just too conspicuous—but the cams were working and the paths weren’t too long. An officer could be at an entrance or at the grave within twenty seconds. Worst case, they could lock down the cemetery. The canine team was on standby. They could even have a chopper over the area in a few minutes.

  Wasn’t more they could do. If the murderer were to enter the cemetery, he’d be leaving in handcuffs. The only unknown was Robin Cordes. Jan was hoping Robin really was as good as everyone was saying. Then at least they wouldn’t be dealing with a fresh corpse.

  Jan went to the coffee machine and pressed the “Coffee Black” button for what felt like the thousandth time. He closed his eyes and considered whether to go lie down for a half hour. This was going to be a long night, and he needed every trace of concentration he could summon.

  His phone jolted him from his thoughts. The screen showed an unknown number.

  “Detective Tommen,” he answered.

  “It’s Robin here. You wanted to talk to me?”

  Jan almost dropped his coffee.

  “Herr Cordes. Nice of you to call.”