by Inge Löhnig
From the hill, he could see the lake, which reflected the cloudless sky. The snow-covered peaks of the Alps stood out against the lush green meadows on the horizon. A picture puzzle, Dühnfort thought. An image that gives the impression of reality but could be concealing another truth within its picture-perfect setting.
His gaze landed on the climbing tree. If Jakob had really come here alone, he was neither as timid nor as obedient as his mother thought. The tree stood on its own in a small clearing. However, ‘clearing’ was not the right word for it. Dühnfort would have preferred to use the word ‘headland’. It was as if the straight edge of the forest had been pulled back. The adjacent meadow had colonised the free space and poked into the forest like a peninsula. Something was bothering Dühnfort. The tree had grown symmetrically, with branches starting just above the ground. It was an ideal tree for climbing, but a large branch had broken off. That was it. That’s what was bothering him.
Gina was still making phone calls. He signalled to her that he would keep going, and he followed the well-trodden path to the clearing. Suddenly, the image of Gernot Mittermeyer saying goodbye to his wife and son popped into his head. The man had succeeded where he himself had failed. Two years ago, he had been well on his way to the same sort of life. Dühnfort’s jaw muscles tensed at the memory. He had been a goddamned idiot. He’d bought the engagement ring, had looked at a semi-detached house and had even started building a tree house for his non-existent kids in an old oak tree. Meanwhile, Konstanze had been cheating on him for weeks with her colleague, a boring geography and PE teacher, of all people. Shit. Dühnfort kicked a stone, which flew several metres and then landed in the open field.
Gina caught up with him. The chin-length dark hair that framed her round face bobbed along with her steps. He stopped and scanned the area around the tree.
‘What’s our model pupil doing?’ she asked.
Dühnfort was confused.
‘Alois, what is he up to?’
‘You don’t like him?’
‘To be honest, no. He seems like too much of an overachiever. He’s probably never parked illegally in his life. And then the suits.’ Gina rolled her eyes. ‘It almost looks like he’s the boss.’
‘He has excellent evaluations. I’m hoping we’ll become a good team. Give him a chance, OK?’
Gina nodded. ‘All right, boss. But I don’t know if I’ll ever warm to him.’
Dühnfort turned to the broken branch and let his eyes drift up the trunk, all the way to the top. At about two and a half metres up, he found the spot where it had broken off. It was strangely smooth. He bent down to look at the branch. It had been sawn off. The surface still looked relatively fresh.
‘What is it?’ Gina asked.
‘Someone helped this branch along.’ He caught a glimpse of something red between the leaves and carefully pulled it out. It was a small piece of fabric. ‘This could have come from Jakob’s jumper.’
He wanted to show it to Gina, but she was crouched over a stone that was peeking out from under the broken branch. She carefully pushed aside the leaves. The stone had dark spots on it. ‘Blood,’ she said. Her voice sounded breathy.
‘It doesn’t look like Jakob got lost. We need forensics to secure the evidence.’ Dühnfort took his mobile out of his pocket at the exact moment that it began to ring.
‘Dühnfort.’ He listened for a while and fixed his eyes on Gina. ‘What have you found? A goat’s head?’
* * *
Dühnfort drove into the forest. Following the directions he’d been given by Walter Bichler, the head of the search team, he turned down a stony track right by the Chapel of Our Lady. The forest track was narrow and full of large roots and potholes. Every now and then, a stone was thrown up against the body of the car. After a ten-minute drive, Dühnfort found the search party. The uniformed police officers had formed lines and were combing the woods step by step, metre by metre. They were silent and intensely focused. On the other side of the track was a mound of earth. Walter Bichler was standing on it like a general. A gaunt officer was standing on a tree trunk beside him.
Dühnfort parked the car. Bichler greeted him with a handshake. ‘This is Ernst Voggenreither.’ Bichler gestured to the pale-looking man that had joined them. ‘He discovered the head and he is also the one who knew that this was a Celtic enclosure. Apparently he’s an expert on these.’
Voggenreither greeted him with a nod.
‘So, where is this Celtic enclosure?’ Dühnfort looked around.
‘Here.’ Voggenreither gestured to the mound of earth. ‘It’s a late-Celtic rectangular ring fort, around two thousand years old. There are several of them in the area.’
‘This mound of dirt?’ Dühnfort looked at the ground, baffled.
Voggenreither nodded. ‘You’ll see it soon.’
Dühnfort followed him. A moment later, he realised that there were actually four earth mounds and they formed a square of about eighty metres long on each side. The inside of the square was overgrown with trees. They climbed down into it. Primroses and periwinkles bloomed between the trees. It smelled of wood and moss.
‘Was this a fortress?’
Voggenreither shook his head. ‘The experts still haven’t agreed on whether they were fortified farms or pagan places of worship.’
‘How did you discover the enclosure?’
‘I was trying to get out of it,’ Voggenreither said.
A light wind passed through, rustling the leaves and carrying the scent of the forest as well as a sickeningly sweet smell that reminded Dühnfort of why he was there.
‘So, you were beating your way through the bushes and found a goat’s head in the process.’
‘Not a pleasant sight, I’ll tell you that much.’ Voggenreither was still pale. ‘Something dripped onto my face. I looked up to see where it was coming from and what it was . . .’ Voggenreither swallowed. ‘I’ll show you.’ He led Dühnfort to a spruce and pointed up. The goat’s head was hanging there. Someone had wrapped a thin rope round its horns and tied the head to a branch. Dühnfort looked into the goat’s dead blue eyes. The tongue was swollen and hanging out of its mouth, discoloured to a bluish-black. The cut surface of the neck seemed to be moving. On closer inspection, it was teeming with countless small white maggots.
Right now, Dühnfort thought, it looks like a place of worship. But did it have anything to do with Jakob’s disappearance? He called Gina and asked her to work with Frank’s team to examine the goat’s head and secure it for evidence. He had to inform Jakob’s parents about what they’d found. Everything suggested that their son had been kidnapped. On top of that, the media was waiting for something to feed on. Dühnfort had to deal with the press and then the team meeting he’d scheduled for half past three, but first he had to talk to Dennis.
* * *
Dühnfort was standing at the window in the ballroom of the village hotel, talking on his phone. It was half past three and he was bang on time. He ended the conversation and put his phone away. He crumpled up the newspaper in his hand and left it on the windowsill. Heribert Schmockmöller, the head of the press office, had just assured him he would try and find out who’d leaked the story. ‘Shit,’ Dühnfort cursed. How could someone be so unprofessional as to publish the details of the case? Now everyone would know that there had been no ransom demand. The last thing they needed was to have freeloaders.
Still angry, he reached for the bicycle pump in front of him on the windowsill. He’d only noticed it after the cyclist had rushed off. Everything is fine. The way she’d said that had left an impression on him. Gaudera, that was how the reporter had addressed her. He recognised the name. And suddenly he remembered. The fire in the flat in Neuhausen last February or March. An acquaintance from the fire brigade had investigated the incident. A man and his young daughter had been trapped in it. If the cyclist was the child’s mother, then of course nothing in her life was fine.
The air in the room was stale and the
lights were dim. The chairs were stacked on top of the tables. He opened a window and then went over to Alois and Gina, who had pushed two tables together in front of the stage. The room was much too large, but Alois hadn’t been able to find anywhere else. The owner of the hotel carried in a tray of coffee, tea and pastries and set it down on the table. Frank Buchholz, the head of forensics, arrived and greeted Dühnfort with a nod. He looked like an ageing rock star. Around a hundred and twenty kilos spread over 1.9 metres and clad entirely in leather. A thick, greying mane sprouted from his equally large skull.
Tired, Dühnfort rubbed his eyes. His lack of sleep the previous night was now beginning to have an effect. He sat down at the makeshift conference table.
‘If I may ask for your attention. I think it’s time to go over what we’ve discovered so far.’ As well as Gina and Alois, Walter Bichler and Frank Buchholz were there. Only Robert Bachmaier was missing, as he was still with the divers at the lake.
Dühnfort cleared his throat. ‘We’ve come one step further. We have to assume that Jakob was kidnapped.’ He summed up the day’s events and told everyone about what they’d found at the climbing tree, including the sawn-off branch.
‘Then I spoke to Dennis. The boy admitted that he and Jakob had ignored their parents’ rules several times in recent weeks and went to the climbing tree by themselves. Apparently, they competed to see who could go the highest. Someone must have seen them. But Dennis never noticed anyone. Maybe Jakob went there on his own more often, but we don’t know. Are you done there?’
Buchholz nodded and reported that the branch, stone and bits of fabric were already with the forensics unit. They had also found tyre marks on the track, but they didn’t amount to much. Buchholz fumbled inside the chest pocket of his leather jacket and pulled out a plastic bag. ‘But this could be exciting. We found this next to the stone.’
He handed Dühnfort the bag. It was only on second glance that Dühnfort noticed a tiny, curved piece of glass. A few crumbs of dirt were stuck to it.
Buchholz cleared his throat. ‘Could come from a vial. If we’re lucky, that could be enough to analyse any trace residues.’
‘Might be a narcotic,’ Dühnfort suggested. ‘As you all know, there are two main reasons for child kidnapping. Ransom and sexual abuse. Since Jakob’s parents are wealthy, I wouldn’t rule out the former. That being said, there has been no ransom demand. It would be unusual after twenty-four hours. Has the telephone surveillance been set up?’
Alois nodded. ‘But the only people that have called so far are idiots from the press.’
‘Is anyone going through the paedophile records?’ Gina asked.
Dühnfort had already put someone on that the previous evening. It was standard procedure when a child disappeared.
Alois poured a cup of green tea. ‘Whoever did this must have the patience of a saint,’ he said suddenly. ‘As things currently stand, it looks as if the kidnapping was planned. But the kidnapper couldn’t have known when Jakob would come to the tree. So the question is whether it was supposed to be Jakob in particular or whether it could have been any boy. And what would he have done if several kids fell off that branch? It seems to me that this was not very well thought out.’
‘Agreed – there is the question of whether he wanted Jakob in particular . . . After all, there are several millionaire farmers in the village. Maybe it didn’t matter which child he got, as long as it had rich parents. But he must have been watching the tree,’ Dühnfort said. ‘How wide an area did you search?’
Buchholz looked up. ‘A radius of about a hundred metres. There’s a bush nearby that would have made a perfect hiding place, but we found nothing there. And a bit further south are the remains of a hawthorn hedge that probably once surrounded the adjacent field. A beekeeper has an apiary there. But we found no evidence there either.’
Alois offered to go and take another look. Buchholz shrugged. Dühnfort nodded and then asked whether Alois had spoken to Jakob’s relatives yet.
‘Only briefly with the grandmother so far. Her name is Hedwig Münch.’ He looked up from his notes. ‘She is widowed and lives in a very luxurious house with a swimming pool, sauna and I don’t know what else. She’s a member of the local council. They were in session yesterday afternoon. I checked. I’ll look into the other relatives tomorrow.’
Gina offered to help him. Alois looked at her sceptically and took a breath. Dühnfort thought he was going to turn down the offer. ‘Thank you,’ he said instead, smiling. ‘I accept. Mrs Sonnberger has a brother, Anselm Münch. He took over the farm. You can look into him.’
‘What about the family on the father’s side?’ Dühnfort asked.
‘Beppo Sonnberger only has an uncle in the village and he’s on vacation with his girlfriend. And he has two sisters in Munich. One is a nurse and the other has a beauty salon. I’m going to talk to both of them tomorrow. Beppo Sonnberger’s father had a stroke and lives in a nursing home.’ Alois had also investigated Jakob’s parents. ‘There are still some gaps, but it looks like they were in their farm shop the whole time.’
‘Good,’ Dühnfort said and then turned to Walter Bichler and requested an overview of the search in the forest.
Bichler stood up. He was an ascetic-looking man with military-short hair and striking facial features. He was in the habit of pacing up and down as he spoke, which he was doing now. ‘Bachmaier and his divers will have finished at the lake this evening, but we’ll need at least three more days for the forest. So far, we haven’t found any evidence of the boy. The only finding that could be relevant is the goat’s head and the associated –’ Bichler paused and cleared his throat – ‘bits and pieces.’
‘What? Bits and pieces?’ Dühnfort asked, surprised.
‘“Bits and pieces” is good.’ Gina grinned.
‘What’s that about a goat’s head?’ Alois asked.
Gina explained it to him.
‘I took a closer look round the Celtic enclosure. It seemed sensible to check if the rest of the animal was hanging like tinsel in the spruces. And lo and behold, there was even more than just the rest of the one goat. There were eight goat’s legs, a head and a tail. I photographed the trees.’
‘What should we do with it – animal-carcass disposal or the works?’ Buchholz asked.
‘The works. How old are the body parts, and how long have they been hanging there? What tools were used? Are there any traceable fibres? I also want a thorough blood analysis. Maybe the person who slaughtered the goat or sacrificed it or whatever also got some sort of injury. Then we would have DNA.’
Gina leaned back and stared across the table and out of the window. ‘This enclosure was the site of a Celtic cult two thousand years ago. Maybe a cult is using the location now for pagan rituals –’
‘But soon they’ll be sacrificing humans instead of goats?’ Alois interrupted Gina. ‘What’s your point?’
Gina looked back at the group. She smiled at Alois. ‘I don’t have a point. It was just a possibility.’
* * *
Agnes sat in her office. Her modern maplewood desk contrasted nicely with the high ceiling and its fresco of Diana, goddess of the hunt. She started up her Mac and grabbed the to-do list from the tray. I’m ticking off my whole life these days, she thought. She was constantly writing lists and daily schedules, trying to keep everything organised and under control, ticking things off as they were completed and then writing new plans. It was her life-navigation system.
First, she needed to draw up a list of names and addresses that she could either dig out of her memory or research somehow. Even her notebook had been burned and with it the addresses of classmates and former colleagues, like people from the agency where she used to work. She had to somehow start collecting them again.
That kept her busy until late in the afternoon. Then she went into the kitchen, turned on the espresso machine and stretched. Her shoulders were very tense, but the work had paid off. She had found a considerable
number of addresses on the internet and had scribbled down an even more extensive list of names in her notebook. She briefly wondered whether it might be a good idea to send enquiries to new agencies where she had no former contacts, but decided against it. All that mattered in her industry was the portfolio. As a graphic designer, you didn’t apply for a job with a list of credentials but with your work. She certainly wasn’t looking for a permanent position. She wanted to freelance, but she would have to produce references to get contracts. And those no longer existed, and neither did her diploma or any physical copies of her work. So she would have to stick to the people who knew her and what she could do.
Agnes pushed the hair out of her face. It wouldn’t be easy. She hadn’t worked for over eight years and had neglected her contacts. After Yvonne was born, her priorities shifted. She had been satisfied with her life as a housewife and mother. Really. But now she had to get back to her professional life. Even though ‘had to’ might not be quite the right way to put it. Of course, she needed to work again, but she was also looking forward to it. However, the fact that she was looking forward to it also gave her an inexplicable feeling of guilt. She shook her head.
The sound of the doorbell pulled her out of her thoughts. As usual, she glanced in the mirror on her way to the door. Her own reflection still looked foreign to her. When she opened the door, a pair of greenish-grey eyes stared back at her. She smiled at the visitor.
‘Hello, Mrs Gaudera.’
‘Yes?’
‘I’m sure you remember. From this morning.’
‘Yes.’ The word was drawn out – she had almost forgotten about the incident.
‘I wanted to apologise and bring this back to you. This belongs to you, doesn’t it?’ He held up the bicycle pump, which he had decorated with a bow made from bandages and daisies. Agnes smiled.
