Until the Debt Is Paid

by Alexander Hartung

  “We would have called the locksmith. We wouldn’t want to try and break in, not in a neighborhood like this, where people watch for prowlers and the houses are well secured. If someone spotted us creeping around, they’d call the police. With the key, we can walk in through the front door and avoid arousing the neighbors’ suspicions.”

  “So why did you bother with those basic investigation questions? You knew all the answers already.”

  “Asking for the key right away would’ve been too conspicuous.”

  “Let’s just hope he bought our little story. If your coworkers find out you came over here . . .”

  “They won’t—not right away, anyway. Questioning was done a while ago and now the crime scene is sealed off. Nobody will bother to come back here for some time.”

  Harald Nieborg returned. “Here’s the key.” He pressed it into Jan’s hand. “Don’t go losing it this time,” he said before shutting the door.

  “Asshole,” Chandu muttered.

  “Finally,” Jan said, a look of satisfaction on his face. “Now let’s take a good look at the judge’s digs.”

  Jan, wearing gloves, ripped off the official Berlin Police paper seal that stretched across the front door and slid the key into the lock. Inside, he paused, staring at the spotless marble floor of the foyer as an odd fear crept over him. What if he remembered the house after all? What if the crime scene looked familiar? What if he really had driven over here that night, high on drugs?

  “Jan,” Chandu said, jolting him out of his reverie. “What are you waiting for? Let’s keep moving.”

  “Yeah,” Jan said. He turned and shut the front door behind them. He moved farther into the house, trying to banish the dark thoughts from his head, and let his gaze wander around the interior.

  The owner had clearly wanted to show off his wealth. The floor was beautifully tiled. Above the designer sofa hung a striking blown-glass chandelier, its unusual design reminding Jan of a weeping willow. The walls showcased two paintings that looked to his eyes like a jumble of color splashes, but he could guess they were valuable. Everything had a clinical cleanliness. Not one speck of dust anywhere. There were no streaks on the glass cabinets, and the carpet leading up the stairs looked immaculate, as if it had just been laid.

  Chandu was clearly impressed by the pomp. “Looks like the judge pulled in a few. What do we do now?”

  “We look for clues.”

  “I don’t mean to say the obvious, Jan, but didn’t your coworkers already go through the place?”

  “Sure, but maybe they missed something.”

  “You’re always telling me how thorough you guys are.”

  “The crime-scene techs might have been sloppier than normal. Plus, with me as the suspect, they probably viewed the case as easy to close. That might have tempted the guys into wanting to finish up quickly.”

  Chandu uttered a grumpy snort.

  “I know there’s little chance, but I had to come here. Even if we don’t find a thing.”

  “Where was the judge murdered?”

  “By the TV,” Jan said, pointing to a flat-screen built into the wall. As they neared it, the antiseptic smell of cleaning agents grew stronger.

  “Everything looks normal enough,” Chandu said.

  “The crime scene was cleaned. We won’t find anything here. We’ll have to look somewhere else.”

  “Today is my first day investigating a murder,” Chandu said. “So I’d be grateful for any tips.”

  “We’re looking for things that the judge might have hidden away. Every person has at least one dark secret. For some, it’s just the porno sites they like to visit on the Internet—we’ll never know in this case because they already confiscated the judge’s computer. But lots of people have tangible stuff too—say, kinky sex toys, illicit photos, drugs.”

  “So where do we start?”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Jan said. “Just focus on finding spots where something might be hidden. In a crawl space that’s hard to notice, or behind books on a shelf.” Jan shrugged. “Knock yourself out, but put on gloves. Your fingerprints are in our system.”

  “All right,” Chandu said, heading to the stairs. “I’ll start on the upper floor.”

  Jan nodded and then positioned himself in the middle of the living room, pivoting around. He tried to take in every detail. Then he closed his eyes.

  “Where’s your secret, George?” he whispered. He’d searched through plenty of homes and found more sick stuff than he cared to remember. Some people would just leave a snuff video lying out on a table next to a crack pipe. But a man like Judge Holoch was far too clever for that. His secrets would have to be sniffed out. Jan doubted the judge was so secretive that he’d have to bust open the walls, but the man would have known to hide things in a place where the cleaning lady wouldn’t stumble on them.

  Jan hadn’t said it to Chandu, but he felt convinced that being in the judge’s home would bring back a memory or two. The thing he wanted most was to recall some details, even if they incriminated him. Not knowing was the worst.

  Just then, Jan heard Chandu calling for him.

  Once they’d found the murder weapon in the Judge Holoch case, Zoe had dropped everything to drive over right away and pick it up. Two tickets for excessive speeding later, she was in the lab with gloves on and all the analyzers running.

  She opened the plastic evidence bag, took out the hammer, and placed it, with due reverence, atop two little metal stands. Then she went around the table to verify its correct position. The apparent murder weapon was arm length and had industrial grip tape on the handle. Dried blood extended down to the tape. She focused on observing every centimeter of the surface. That completed, she pulled out of her lab coat a small tube topped with a cotton swab. She removed the cap and took a sample of the dried blood.

  She handed the sample to her colleague Walter, who had arrived just after her. “DNA sample,” Zoe said without turning, which Walter acknowledged with a crabby grunt. Walter hated being treated like an assistant, but Zoe didn’t care one bit. When she was examining evidence, she didn’t let anything interfere. A kind of symbiosis developed between her and the object if she concentrated hard enough. That was what she was after now. And there was no way she was going to let some Birkenstock-wearing bore wreck the delicate bond she was trying to forge.

  As she examined the weapon, a clear timeline of the murder started to coalesce in her head. The tape revealed that the killer had brought along the hammer. The person had known in advance that he wanted to keep his grip. He’d also sensed that the victim might try to fight back when he realized the attacker had a hammer, not a gun. That would explain the minor burn on the neck of the corpse, which must have come from a stun gun. The murderer had probably been waiting in the house to attack the judge by surprise. Once he’d incapacitated the man with the stun gun, he’d smashed the knee and other body parts in succession. Not exactly a fair fight.

  Zoe kept moving around the small table. She took a wide brush and began dusting off the handle. The first fingerprints became visible. Some were smudged and could barely be used, but two prints clearly stood out. She grabbed a piece of film and transferred the first print onto the see-through plastic.

  She went to the adjoining table, took a magnifying glass from her pocket, and examined the prints. The loops and arcs were familiar to her somehow. They were identical to the ones found at the crime scene—and they belonged to Jan.

  Zoe secured the second print and found Walter, who was busy analyzing the DNA.

  “Run these through the print database,” she said. “I’ll take a few more blood samples.”

  The blood likely came from the victim, but you never knew. Maybe the murderer was injured in a struggle. Whatever she found, she’d have to call Jan right away. The guy was not going to like the results.

  After hearing Chand
u call his name, Jan rushed up the stairs and into the bedroom. The decor echoed the upscale main story, with elegant floors, polished wood cabinets, and tiny halogen spotlights recessed in the ceiling. Only a set of branching deer antlers over the bed, which didn’t seem to fit at all, disrupted the cold, stylized look of the place.

  Chandu got up from the floor and held out a slim, leather-bound photo album.

  “Where’d you get that?” Jan asked, taking the book into his own hands.

  “There’s a hidden compartment near the head of the bed. I just had to remove the board that covered it.”

  Jan whistled. “What clued you in?”

  “Where you think I stash my piece?” Chandu said. “In the fridge?”

  Jan carefully cradled the book. A photo album. Its brown leather was worn. He opened it and studied the first shot. A young woman, practically a girl, stared fearfully into the camera. Her right cheek was swollen. Under her left eye was a gaping slash. Blood was running out of her nose, and her upper lip was split open.

  “My God,” Chandu said. “She’s fifteen at the most.”

  Jan turned pages. Another girl had been messed up the same way. Her blonde hair, wet with sweat, hung over her forehead. Her eyes expressed the same fear he’d seen in the first girl.

  Chandu wiped his hands on his pants, as if touching the book had sullied him too. “Good thing that pig’s dead, or I’d be paying him a little visit.”

  Disgusted, Jan shut the album. “We got what we wanted. Let’s clear out of here and continue this back home.”

  He held the album under his arm and went downstairs. He’d seen a lot of sick crap in his day, but finds like this always left him shuddering a little. At least they now had a clue. This judge, he had a dark past.

  Chapter 5

  Once they were back in the car, Jan’s new cell rang. He held the little phone to his ear. “Yup.”

  “Hi, Mister Yup,” Zoe said. “Can I talk to Jan?”

  “Cut the crap.” He heard her snickering. “What’s the latest?”

  “They found the murder weapon.”

  “Where?”

  “At your place.”

  “My house? They went all through my apartment and didn’t find anything. All clear.”

  “Not in your apartment. In the basement instead. In your neighbor’s storage room, to be precise.”

  “What?” Jan said, startled. “But the storage rooms are locked up.”

  “True. That’s why investigators didn’t find the weapon right away. When your neighbor went down to grab some potatoes this morning, her key fell right out of her hand. Seems she saw a blood-smeared hammer.”

  “Did you analyze it already?”

  “Yes. Unfortunately, I don’t have great news. The hammer has blood from Judge Holoch as well as your fingerprints. Wounds on the corpse match size and shape. This hammer is definitely the murder weapon.”

  “Fucking hell,” Jan said.

  “You’re in a tight spot, yes, and it’s getting tighter. Of all the cases I’ve worked over the years, yours is the most clear-cut. They catch you, they’re going to lock you up and throw away the key.”

  “Someone wants to pin it on me.”

  Zoe sighed. “That may be, Janni, but we haven’t found any evidence to suggest you’re innocent. I’d love to help you, but the more I try, the tighter the noose around my neck if it gets out that I’ve been talking to you.”

  “I’m a homicide detective,” Jan said, his voice rising out of frustration. “If I’d killed the judge, I would not have left my own car parked outside the crime scene and then tossed the murder weapon in my neighbor’s basement storage. You have to give me that much.”

  “It’s an investigator’s dream, I’ll give you that. What killer pulls every stupid move in the book? But you can’t build a defense around that.”

  Jan rubbed at his eyes, weary. “Okay, Zoe. Thanks for the info. We found a book of photos at the judge’s house, deviant stuff, shots of battered young women. Chandu and I will go through them all. Maybe we can ID a girl, then I’ll report back in.”

  “Till then, Mister Yup,” Zoe said and hung up.

  Jan picked up the album. The photos were their only evidence. If this clue was a dead end, he was done for. He would just have to turn himself in, hoping. Maybe he’d get a milder sentence that way.

  Each photo told a horrific story. The women were brutally beaten, but worse than their wounds were their eyes. Broken. Empty. Without hope.

  Jan found it hard to look closely at the pictures, although his friend Chandu seemed capable of examining each photo precisely.

  “It doesn’t bother you?” Jan said.

  “I’ve seen this too often. Lots of prostitutes get beat up by their johns or their pimps.”

  “You think these are prostitutes?”

  “I know at least three of them are. There are a couple others I’ve seen around too. Besides, what other woman would undergo this kind of beating and end up being photographed—and never report a word to the cops?”

  “Maybe some of the girls were secretly involved with the judge and didn’t want it getting out,” Jan said.

  “Young things like that don’t go having affairs with an old fossil like Holoch. Maybe one girl with kinky preferences, but definitely not twenty of them. These girls were paid for.”

  “Where can we find them?”

  Chandu flipped back a few pages. “The first one was Manu. Nice girl from the country.” He sighed. “She came to Berlin for an education. Met the wrong guy, he got her addicted, she ended up on the street at twenty-one. Three years later, she was drifting dead down the Elbe.”

  He flipped pages. “Jasmina.” He pointed to a photo of a woman with eyes swollen shut from blows. “She’s from the Czech Republic. Was turning tricks for this nasty scumbag while living in a cellar hole in Marzahn. Eventually she disappeared, never seen again.”

  “You think all the women in these photos are dead?”

  “Manu and Jasmina are, I know that for sure. But this one here,” Chandu said, turning the page, “I saw two weeks ago. Sarah, works an illegal streetwalk over in the poorest part of the Wedding District. We’re lucky, we’ll find her there.”

  Jan grabbed his jacket. “Come on.”

  A lead, finally.

  Patrick held his pistol out in front of him as he went up the grimy stairway. The wooden steps were worn and splintered, the walls smeared with graffiti. Overhead, the decrepit ceiling plaster was peeling off, and the whole place reeked of vomit and urine. On the second floor, a couple was having a shouting contest. If that wasn’t nerve-wracking enough, the barking of a ferocious dog was interspersed with an infant’s screams.

  This was one of those Berlin buildings no one would ever enter by choice, but Patrick had a good reason. He’d traced the car Jan had climbed into during his escape; the trace led to this address. Considering how expensive that Mercedes had looked, Patrick could hardly believe the owner lived on such a run-down street.

  He waved over two officers in bulletproof vests. One of them carried a metal battering ram. Without speaking, they positioned themselves next to a door. Patrick checked the safety on his pistol and nodded to the officers. The lock broke with a dull bang, springing open the door. The three men stormed inside.

  “Berlin Police!” Patrick shouted. He stepped on an open blue trash bag and turned his face away in disgust. The little studio apartment was piled up with garbage. Cockroaches roamed over food scraps and empty beer bottles. It stunk of mold and feces. Rats scurried around between the shelves. In the middle of this shambles, a man lay on a tattered couch. He stared at the newcomers through bleary eyes. Patrick aimed his weapon, but the man just waved at him, smiling.

  “He’s no threat,” one of the officers said. “Guy’s all doped up.”

  Patrick lowered his
pistol and navigated his way to the couch. Luckily he’d just gotten a tetanus shot.

  “My name is Patrick Stein,” he said, showing his badge. “Berlin Detectives. You’re Peer Runge?”

  “Yo, boss,” the guy said. “Sit on down, help y’self.” He pointed to a large pile of blue pills and a spoon that looked like it had been cooking heroin.

  Patrick wrinkled his brow. He’d seen a lot of things, but no one had ever offered him drugs before. But he wasn’t about to arrest this guy for possession. All he wanted were answers.

  “Do you know a Jan Tommen?”

  “Never heard of him, boss, but if he’s a friend of yours, then bring him on over and we’ll party.”

  Patrick sighed and stuck his pistol in his holster.

  “Take this drugged-out idiot down to the station,” he ordered the officers. “I’ll question him once he’s come down.”

  Patrick worked his way through the trash to get back outside. In frustration he kicked away a beer bottle, which clanked and shattered against the wall. The guy was just a goddamn drug dealer who hadn’t even noticed that his car had been stolen. And given the bender the guy was on at the moment, Patrick couldn’t hold out hope that his memory would be stellar.

  “The first round goes to you, Jan,” Patrick muttered. “But I’m already getting warm.”

  As Chandu slowed the car, Jan looked out the window at the desolate neighborhood. He hated run-down areas like this. The buildings’ gray walls were smeared with graffiti, and not the artful kind. The glass windows of one of the now-closed storefronts had been replaced with plywood, and then pasted over with cheesy ads for an upcoming André Rieu concert at the O2 World arena. The bare trees looked hardly alive, and an uprooted “No Parking” sign lay out on the street. Near the curb, young women lounged around in way-too-short skirts. Their thick makeup masked the grief on their faces as their eyes followed the traffic. Jan watched a car roll to a stop alongside one of the young women. The driver opened the door, and she climbed in without a word.