A Slow Death (Max Drescher Book 1)

by James Craig

  ‘No,’ Michael nodded in the darkness. ‘Thanks for the call,’ he added, but Ulrike had already hung up. Reaching across the bed, he replaced the handset on its cradle, giving his wife a hopeful kiss on the temple as he did so. ‘Go back to sleep,’ Sarah mumbled grumpily, rolling away from him, ‘the kids will be up in a couple of hours.’

  22

  A small knot of people – the usual mix of ethnics, lefties, rubberneckers and troublemakers – stood on Stresemannstraße with home-made banners calling for more progress in the Hakan Yaman investigation. The group leader, a scruffy youth in an army surplus jacket used a loudhailer to lead a sporadic, half-hearted chant of Whadda we want? Jus-tice? When do we want it? Noowww.

  Good luck with that, Max thought as he slipped through the meagre crowd and entered the main entrance of the Polizeipräsidium. In response to the clamour from the Turkish community, a couple of well-known Neo-Nazi troublemakers had finally been hauled in and questioned about Yaman’s murder. After sticking resolutely to their story that they had been at home watching videos on the night of the murder they walked out of the police station in less than three hours without any charges being laid. Everyone knew that the investigation was slowly heading nowhere.

  Striding through the lobby, he nodded at Frank Horn, a sergeant, stationed behind the front desk, keeping a wary eye on comings and goings.

  ‘Morning Frank.’

  Horn, a heavyset man in his early 50s, eyed Max suspiciously. ‘Kriminalinspektor. A bit early for you, isn’t it?’

  ‘Lots to do,’ Max said cheerily, stifling a yawn.

  Horn removed a black biro from behind his ear and pointed it at Max. ‘What’s that under your arm?’

  ‘An urn,’ Max replied, heading for the lifts.

  Horn frowned. ‘An urn?’

  ‘That’s right, an urn.’ Out of the corner of his eye, Max spotted Theo Oster skipping down the stairs. Blocking off his exit, he gave the rookie a big smile. ‘Theo, my boy. What are you up to this morning?’

  Oster, fresh-faced and clean cut, not a hair out of place, looked at Max suspiciously. He clocked the urn under the Kriminalinspektor’s arm but said nothing. ‘I was just going to get a coffee.’

  ‘Good, good,’ Max nodded.

  ‘I like to go to the café around the block, you know, the Austrian place; the stuff upstairs is so bad.’

  ‘Sure, sure.’ Max fell in step with his young colleague as he headed towards the door. ‘Anyway, look, I’ve got something very interesting for you this morning. A very important job –’

  ‘What’s that under your arm?’

  ‘An urn,’ Max said wearily. Max patted the burnished metal pot sitting on his desk. ‘The last remains of the Beerfeldt family.’

  Michael Rahn scratched his head. ‘All of them? It’s not that big a pot.’

  ‘Apparently so. They were cremated a couple of days ago. It takes a while for the ashes to cool down so that they can put them in the pot. I picked them up this morning.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Why what?’

  ‘Why did you bring them here?’

  ‘Until we find any next of kin, if there is any, they are part of the investigation,’ Max explained. ‘The Direktor of the Crematorium said that if I didn’t come and collect them they would just get thrown away.’

  ‘Ha. You really are a sentimental old softie, aren’t you?’

  ‘What was I supposed to do? We’ll keep them for the duration of the investigation then scatter them on the rose beds in the Tiergarten or something.’

  ‘I’m sure that’s not allowed. The gardeners will have a fit.’

  ‘It’ll be good for the flowers.’

  ‘I’m not so sure about that, either.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it, we’ll think of something.’ Max pulled a crumpled piece of paper from his jacket pocket and tossed it onto the desk. ‘In the meantime, I have to try and get Marin to pay the bill – four hundred deutschmarks.’

  ‘Dying’s an expensive business,’ Michael mused.

  ‘The damn Direktor wanted me to pay it then and there. It took me almost ten minutes to convince him that the city was good for it.’

  ‘And is it?’

  Max looked at the invoice on his desk. ‘No idea. But we couldn’t just leave them there, could we?’

  ‘No,’ Michael agreed.

  Max looked plaintively at his partner. ‘You’ll do the same for me, right?’

  ‘Sure,’ Michael grinned, keen to keep the tone light. ‘Sarah and I will fight Clara Ozil for the right to keep them on top of the TV at home.’

  Max made a face as he pretended to think about that. ‘On second thoughts, I think I like her place better.’

  ‘Cheeky bastard.’

  ‘It’s my choice.’

  ‘You’d better run that past Clara.’

  ‘I will.’

  ‘In the meantime, while we are still lucky enough to have you with us in the land of the living, what are we going to do about Isar Services?’ Michael quickly told him about his late night phone call from Ulrike Baachaz, nee Hell, and the mysterious, AWOL undercover cop.

  ‘Good question.’ Getting up from his chair, Max grabbed his jacket. ‘I think that it’s finally time we went to pay them visit, don’t you?’

  It started to rain as Michael led them up the driveway, the gravel crunching under the soles of his shoes, crossing himself as they passed the spot where Manfred Penzler had bled out.

  Odd time to start getting religious, Max mused. Of the dead detective there was no remaining clue. The moment you’re gone, that’s it. You might as well never have existed in the first place. In some ways, it was a comforting thought.

  Heads bowed, they hurried towards the front door. ‘Let’s hope there’s more here than there was at the last one,’ Michael muttered, more to himself than anything.

  ‘Yeah,’ Max grunted, ‘that Isar place was a complete waste of time.’

  In the event, the registered office for Isar Services turned out to be nothing more than a message-taking service occupying a foul-smelling room above a kebab shop on Oranienstrasse. It had taken less than five minutes to realise that the sole member of staff, a middle-aged woman with shocking peroxide hair and more piercings that an anarchist circus performer, knew absolutely nothing about the company or the people who ran it. Dismayed, the Kriminalinspektor had beaten a hasty retreat when the woman had started giving him the eye.

  Back on the street, Max set off at a brisk pace, rather than have to listen to Michael’s jokes about his attractiveness to the opposite sex.

  By the time he had reached Görlitzer Bahnhof, the Kriminalinspektor had determined to give the Polizeipräsidium a miss. Instead they set off to take a look at the Grozer residence. Having already written the day off as a lost cause, Max felt that a little professional sightseeing was in order.

  ‘Hey.’ Michael whispered. ‘Look at this.’ Reaching the door, he pointed to the broken police seal. Max raised an eyebrow and slowly reached for the Beretta on his hip.

  Max took a couple of deep breaths. ‘I’ll take the lead, you follow.’

  ‘Okay.’ Michael unholstered his own sidearm.

  ‘Just don’t shoot me in the ass.’

  Michael grinned. ‘I’ll try my best.’

  ‘Glad to hear it.’ With his gun in one hand, Max tentatively tried the door handle with the other. Finding it unlocked, he pushed it gently open. Stepping over the threshold, he strained to hear sounds of activity from within the house. All he could discern, however, was the gentle wail of the wind in the trees. Inching slowly forward, he took his bearings. The hallway extended for the best part of ten metres; there was a set of stairs to his immediate left and a closed door about half way down on his right. At the far end of the corridor, an open door led on to what he presumed was a living room. Through a set of sliding glass doors at the back of the house he could see fragments of the garden. Taking another deep breath, he signalled for Michael to check
the first floor. While his sergeant crept up the stairs, Max edged slowly along the corridor. As he approached the open door, he was conscious of his elevated heart rate as his finger tightened on the Beretta’s trigger. Reaching the threshold, he paused, almost jumping out of his skin as a loud cough came from inside.

  Time to party.

  Raising his weapon, he jumped through the door.

  ‘Police. Hands up.’

  The woman’s screams brought Michael scurrying down the stairs and into the room. Taking in the scene, he burst out laughing. ‘Hannah? What the hell are you doing here?’

  It took several seconds for Hannah Leicht to calm down enough to recover the power of speech. At her feet, a toolkit lay on its side, its contents strewn over the floor. ‘I just came over to collect some gear and then this –’ she gestured at Max, ‘this hooligan burst in and nearly gave me a heart attack.’

  ‘Sorry,’ Max grunted, holstering his Beretta.

  Michael shot him a look that said: Say it like you mean it.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he repeated. ‘I didn’t realise who you were.’

  ‘I got the shock of my life,’ the woman twittered. ‘If you’d pulled the trigger, I could have been joining poor Dr Gerber on the slab.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Max quipped, ‘we’re trained not to shoot colleagues. And, anyway, the Institut für Rechtsmedizin can’t afford to lose any more staff at the moment.’

  Not amused in the slightest, the pathologist looked at Michael. ‘What are you doing here, anyway? This is still a crime scene.’

  ‘And we’re still cops,’ Max muttered.

  ‘But it’s not your crime scene,’ Leicht reminded him, ‘is it?’

  Maybe I should have shot you, after all, Max thought, just a little flesh wound.

  ‘We think there may be a connection between the guy who owned this house, Bodo Grozer, and something else we’re looking at,’ Michael explained.

  Hannah looked at him doubtfully. ‘Kriminalkommissar Eichel won’t like it.’

  ‘Eichel knows all about it,’ Max lied smoothly. ‘This is a very complex investigation and we need to cooperate as much as possible.’

  ‘We still need the Beerfeldt file, by the way,’ Michael chipped in. ‘You sent me Bodo’s autopsy report by mistake.’

  ‘I know, I know,’ Leicht snapped. ‘I’m sorry about that. It was just an admin error.’

  That’s what they all say. Max folded his arms.

  ‘Has Beerfeldt been written up yet?’ Michael asked gently.

  ‘Not yet,’ Leicht admitted.

  ‘But the family was cremated the other day,’ Max pointed out.

  ‘I know, I know. All the slab work has been done, obviously. I just haven’t written up the findings yet. It’s at the top of my in-tray, but Penzler had to take priority.’

  ‘Of course,’ Michael nodded.

  ‘It’s been crazy busy,’ the pathologist groaned. ‘They were going to send some students from the university but they never showed up.’

  ‘Probably just as well,’ Max mused, ‘you know what students are like; more trouble than they’re worth.’

  ‘Yes,’ Leicht replied, softening a little, ‘but I’m still having to do at least two jobs.’

  You managed to find time to saunter out here and pick up your gear though, didn’t you? To be fair, the woman did look shattered; her face was puffy with lack of sleep and the rings under her eyes looked like they’d been painted on with black eyeliner. ‘It must be very difficult.’

  ‘Yes,’ Leicht nodded, ‘but we’re doing the best we can.’

  ‘And we appreciate it.’ Just about avoiding a sneer, Max gestured towards the crusted pool of dried blood on the carpet. ‘What can you tell us about what happened here?’

  The pathologist thought about it for a moment, then launched into a practised monologue. ‘Two or three people came into the house. One shooter.’ She pointed at the blood. ‘Mrs Grozer was shot here and Kriminalinspektor Penzler outside. It was the same gun that shot them both.’

  Max made a face. ‘Is that it? Did they nick anything?’

  Leicht shrugged. ‘That’s not my area. From what I heard, though, nothing was stolen from the house.’ She flicked her chin towards the sliding doors leading to the garden. ‘They reckon something was dug up from the garden though.’

  Max stepped over to the glass and looked outside. A piece of lawn about a metre square had been marked off with police tape. The grass had been dug up and laid to one side, leaving hole maybe half a metre deep.

  ‘Dirt had been tramped into the carpet,’ Leicht added.

  Turning away from the doors, Max looked at Michael.

  ‘I’ll look into it,’ the sergeant nodded.

  ‘Good.’ Max watched Leicht drop to her knees and resume retrieving her tools, carefully placing each one back in its proper place in the case. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Well …’

  ‘Yes?’

  Leicht looked at Michael and Max in turn. ‘Are you sure Eichel is happy with you being here?’

  ‘100%. Eichel and our boss, Kriminalkommissar Marin are old mates. They go back a long way. They’ve always worked very closely together.’ He gestured towards Michael. ‘And we’ve worked with the guy Eichel has got undercover.’

  ‘Stefan Hug?’ Hannah’s face brightened.

  ‘That’s right,’ Max grinned, ‘Stefan. Nice bloke.’

  ‘He’s lovely. I just hope he gets put back on normal duties soon, I haven’t seen him for ages.’

  I just hope the poor sod’s still alive, Max thought. These bastards have already killed one cop.

  ‘You were going to tell us something else,’ Michael prompted her.

  ‘Yes, ah, well, in the interests of sharing and cooperation, you should know that the gun that was used here was used in another killing. A Turkish kid called Serhat Khedira.’

  Aw, hell.

  ‘He was shot near the Kreuberg Monument.’

  I know where he was shot, Max thought grimly, already heading for the door.

  23

  Sitting at a table in the Neues Ufer café, Theo Oster looked at his reflection in the mirror above the bar and grimaced. Around here, he thought, dressing like a door-to-door vacuum cleaner salesman is just an invitation to get mugged. If he’d known he was going to be spending his day slumming it in Schöneberg, he would have worn a pair of dirty jeans and his leather jacket, rather than his only suit, a two-button, single-breasted grey polyester-cotton mix from C&A. The suit had been a gift from his mother when he graduated from the Police Academy. Theo knew that, above all else, the present was her way of telling him to get himself safely ensconced behind a desk at Police HQ as quickly as possible. Agnes Oster had always hated the idea of her only child pounding the streets, consorting with criminals and ruffians. She had never been the type of mother to try and tell him what to do with his life, but she knew what she didn’t like all the same.

  Letting his gaze slip back to the street outside, he realised that, after more than two hours of people-watching, he had not seen one other person wearing a suit walking down Hauptstrasse. Not one other person. He was like an alien in his own city. I’m like Thomas Jerome Newton, he mused, the Man Who Fell to Earth.

  Even after removing his tie and undoing the top button of his shirt, Theo remained acutely conscious of just how out of place he looked among the bohemians and lowlifes. Aside from the odd smirk, however, the locals seemed happy enough to leave this strange creature to his own to his own devices. At this time of the day, they were far more concerned with getting caffeine into their bloodstream than checking out their fellow patrons.

  Feeling more than a little sorry for himself, Theo toyed with his third americano of the morning. If this is the fast track to being a Berlin cop, he thought, I’d hate to see what the slow one is like. At this rate, he would be pushing thirty by the time he made Kriminalinspektor. Such a slow rate of progress almost made going to the Academy seem like a waste of t
ime. More than that, it had made him a hate figure for every ‘proper’ cop who had made his way up through the ranks the old-fashioned way, by cracking skulls and nicking scumbags.

  Trying to avoid making eye contact with the waiter hovering at the bar, Theo ran through a list of some of the rubbish jobs he’d been landed with since arriving at Stresemannstraße.

  There had been the long, slow investigation into the wave of sick dogs in Kreuzberg over the previous six months. Eventually, it was discovered that the hapless hounds had been poisoned after eating the excrement of junkies. In the wake of this revelation, Theo found himself on his hands and knees in the bushes of Viktoriapark, collecting human turds in plastic evidence bags. The end result? Only one arrest. Even then, the moron somehow managed to OD in his holding cell, leaving the case to be quietly closed.

  Then there was the sixty-seven-year-old man walking his dog (what was it with him and dogs?) who was killed after being run down on a pedestrian crossing by a short-sighted motorist who had forgotten to put on his glasses. A plea-bargain and a suspended sentence for the driver had resulted in Oster receiving hate mail from the widow, much to the amusement of his colleagues.

  And now this: hanging around some gay café, waiting to see if some little hooligan with the 36Boys showed up. And all because that sleazeball Max Drescher couldn’t be bothered to do the job himself.

  Theo drummed his fingers on the table in frustration. Of all the rubbish cops he had come across in his short career Drescher was the worst. Everyone knew that the Kriminalinspektor was a total disgrace, a lazy, cynical drunk.

  From what Oster heard around the station, the man was almost as bad as the criminals he was supposed to be chasing. He was exactly the kind of dinosaur that the hierarchy was trying to get rid of. Kriminalkommissar Marin clearly hated him. Well, changes were afoot. The whiff of modernisation was in the air, mingling with the tear gas. All in all, it would be a miracle if Drescher still had a job this time next year.