Knives, Forks, Scissors, Flames

by Stefan Kiesbye

  Braking proved to be a bit problematic, but driving was easier than he had thought. Once in Strathleven, he turned off the main road and onto Schulstraße. When he pulled up at the old school, he was greeted by an unexpected sight. The light above the entrance was on, but there was no suitcase in the yard. Instead, the door stood wide open, and Rasmus was chained to the banister jumping around furiously, trying to pull his head out of the collar. He growled and barked incessantly. Mrs. Schmied’s and Mr. Heintz’ doors were open too, and as Benno got out of the car, the old man came running from the house.

  “Where the hell were you?” he shouted at Benno.

  “I was . . .”

  “I don’t give a shit. Have you seen him?”

  “Who?”

  “The boy, of course.”

  Benno hobbled past Heintz to his front door. Carolin came running down the stairs, and behind her appeared a red-faced Manfred.

  “What took you so long?” Her voice cracked, her lips trembled. “You got him?”

  Benno shook his head. Carolin burst into tears. “All this is because of you, just because you had to let yourself get arrested at the old hospital.” She sobbed and ran toward the street. Lights came on in the pastor’s home, and a window opened on the second floor. Rasmus wouldn’t stop barking. He yanked at the leash, and his feet scratched over the floor.

  “What happened?” Benno asked, but no one paid him any attention. Only Manfred came up to him. “You stink,” he said and turned to his mother, who was stepping out of her house with a robe slung over her nightgown.

  “Tim is gone,” he said softly, as if afraid to be overheard by someone. “They came and took him away.”

  22

  He awoke in a muted gray. It smelled unfamiliar, and somewhat sweet and insubstantial, as though he might have been awakened to a more shallow life. He turned his head to the left, but there was only one chair, a silk coat hanging over the back.

  Benno pulled back the blanket and looked at his ankle. It was bandaged, his foot still swollen.

  His chest was dotted in blue and yellow, as if he were growing moldy from the inside. The pain hit him the moment he tried to sit up. He was naked.

  Getting out of bed was a difficult balancing act, and even tying the robe caused him pain. Hanne was no longer in her apartment. The living room was empty, flooded with gray daylight; he could hardly keep his eyes open. He found a second, smaller room. A study, it seemed, with books on the influence of names, the healing powers of indigenous herbs, about tarot and astrology. On her desk was a small plate full of colorful semi-precious stones. He felt safe in this strange room.

  She wasn’t in the kitchen either, but the clock on the wall showed that it was almost ten. After he had waited five more minutes, he called Carolin. He hadn’t expected her to be home, but she picked up after the second ring.

  “Hello,” she said breathlessly.

  “It’s me. Did you find Tim?”

  “No,” she said and hung up.

  Benno exhaled. He was to blame for everything. He had put her son in danger, she didn’t want to see him.

  At four in the morning, Benno had rung Hanne’s doorbell. He was still in the same filthy clothes, and she took them off in the hallway, but this time slower, gentler. She almost cried when she saw his ribs and ankle. He felt embarrassed. While sitting in the bathtub, she wrapped his foot in ice.

  She had silently listened to his story, dried him off and helped him into the bedroom. He had fallen asleep in her arms.

  He called the Strandkurier, was put through to Jochen Hecht, and then told the publisher of Tim’s disappearance.

  “Take your time, Diedrich.” Hecht’s voice was calm and soothing. “But once your boy has turned up again, we need to talk.”

  Benno closed his eyes and nodded into the phone. “Yes,” he said.

  “Your work. Maybe it’s my fault, maybe I’ve given you too much freedom.” Hecht sighed and continued. “Find your boy, Diedrich.” Then he hung up.

  Benno kept the receiver in his hand for a long time, unable to hang up. Carolin was right: he had screwed up.

  Half an hour later, Hanne came home, her hands full of shopping bags.

  “You can exchange everything.” She put the bags onto the couch in the living room and showed him her purchases. “How are you?” she suddenly asked, while still holding a gray sweater to her chest. “Did you call your wife?”

  “Peek and Cloppenburg?” He came up to Hanne and hugged her and the sweater. Her coat smelled cold, and of coffee and croissants and spring rain.

  “Tim didn’t come home?”

  His nose pressed against her neck, he gently shook his head.

  “Now what?”

  “No idea.” Benno dropped his arms at his side.

  “She kicked you out. What if she wants you back? Do you want to go back to her? Where will you stay in the meantime?”

  He stared blankly ahead. Without thinking, he had assumed that she would want him to stay with her. What a fool he was, he thought. A conceited, arrogant fool. “I’ll have to find something.”

  Hanne folded the sweater, put it on the coffee table. “Take your time,” she said, without looking at him.

  “Thank you.”

  “As long as you’re sexually available to me, of course.”

  He opened his silk robe. “Right now?”

  “You should find your son.”

  The police car in front of the house almost made him turn back. The sun, which was all too easily escaping the clouds and finding open skies yet again, didn’t fit this occasion. Nothing seemed to fit. Church and village looked too ordinary, and the air was relatively mild, with a slight hint of cow dung. As he walked toward the house, he wasn’t sure what the confusing mix of police, church, wife and disappearance meant to him. Different laws seemed to be at work in Strathleven, and the meaning of events could be changed depending on the wishes of the residents. He would never find his assumptions confirmed, never find his way.

  Ingo Schmoeh was without his partner this time and slowly and carefully took down Carolin’s description of Tim. He nodded at Benno, without moving a muscle in his face. Last night he had stepped on Benno’s ankle, today he was searching for his son.

  “And you don’t believe he ran away?” asked Schmoeh. “Has he been fighting with you, does he have problems at school?”

  Carolin shook her head. “He has an illness and the people here have reacted very strangely to him, but no, I think he felt comfortable.” She paused. “Rasmus was chained to the railing. Tim would never have done that.”

  “Your dog?” Schmoeh looked away from Carolin and nodded toward the large window overlooking the yard. Rasmus sat in front of it, with his paws on the windowsill, and looked out onto the yard. Not even on Benno’s coming home had he left his post. “You suspect that he left with someone else?”

  Carolin kneaded her hands, didn’t look at the policeman. “I know. This sounds stupid. Who is going to kidnap a little boy?”

  “Kidnap?” Schmoeh’s voice was businesslike, but his question made Carolin shrink.

  “Maybe it was just his friends, maybe they wanted to play a prank on him.”

  Twenty minutes later Schmoeh left the house, after he had asked Benno for clues about Tim’s whereabouts and not received any. When he closed the door behind him, the silence in the house glued their ears shut. Carolin hugged her knees, hair covering her face. From the kitchen sounded the ticking of the wall clock.

  Rasmus whimpered softly and slowly trotted toward the entrance. When Benno let him out, he sniffed the ground, ran towards the sandbox, then back. He looked at Benno and cocked his head. He barked twice, whined again, then looked around as if searching. His limp had become more pronounced, his movements were stiff and angular. His eyes seemed dead. Within one night he had turned into the ghost dog again.

  Benno waited until the dog had finished his business, then he went back into the house. Carolin was making coffee. She stood b
y the window, her face like that of a young girl. She had taken off her glasses, her eyes stared out toward the garden, and yet they couldn’t see anything.

  As the coffee maker began to wheeze, she poured two cups and handed one to Benno.

  “What are you wearing?” She reached for her glasses, pushed them back on her nose.

  “Had to buy something,” Benno said. The clothes still smelled brand new.

  She nodded. “I have put two suitcases in your room.”

  “You still don’t believe me?”

  “You smell like her.”

  “Because of Tim?”

  She looked up from her coffee, too tired or too controlled to lash out at him. “That Cornelius is a killer and that there is a conspiracy against Tim?” She waited a few seconds and when Benno didn’t reply, she continued, “No, I don’t believe that.” She seemed to listen to the echo of her voice, tried the word again. “No.”

  “Tim is gone.”

  “But he will come back.”

  “You said yourself that people look at him strangely. The gifts, the crown, all that doesn’t frighten you?”

  She seemed to think, sipped hot coffee, then looked for Rasmus, who had resumed his observation post by the front window.

  “That’s nothing compared to what Tim would have experienced in Berlin. What I experienced in Berlin. Daniel and Jens—I acted like a crazy woman in front of Mrs. Stroth, but it was harmless.” She suddenly shook his head. “He will come back today. I’m sure of it.”

  The suitcases lay open on the ground, as if they had landed there just a few minutes ago. Large spots of light played on the carpet. Benno put his coffee on the desk, trying to concentrate—what was he to pack, what could stay behind for now? For a few minutes he stood around, before he randomly threw writing pads and pens in the first suitcase. Carolin came up behind him in the doorway.

  “Are you staying with her?”

  “She’s a friend.” He wasn’t sure why he was still lying. Perhaps for Tim’s sake, so Carolin could not invalidate his suspicion against Cornelius. For Tim’s sake? No, he couldn’t claim to be so unselfish. He didn’t want to be treated like a cheater, he didn’t want to look the way he really was.

  “You haven’t even asked if I would like to have you here.”

  “You’ve thrown me out.” He tried to filter all his anger from his voice.

  “That was last night.”

  “Do you want me to stay?”

  She looked directly at him, adjusted her glasses. “Do you want to stay?”

  He looked at the books in his suitcase. He wanted to leave, he wanted to go back to Lübeck, back to Hanne, to colorful semi-precious stones and silk robes. When he thought of unpacking his bags again, something in his stomach clenched. But Carolin was his wife, Tim was his son. He could not just leave and abandon them now.

  “I didn’t expect you to,” she said softly, turned around and walked back into the living room.

  After he had put the luggage in the car, Benno went over to the rectory. Mrs. Cornelius came to the door.

  “Have you found Tim?” She blinked in the sunlight.

  What did she know about her husband? Had she been helping him all along? Maybe she had carried food to their prisoner?

  Benno shook his head. “Is your husband home?”

  “He is in the church. If you hurry, you can still catch him, he has to be in Grevenhorst later.”

  Benno thanked her and walked over to the church. The red VW bus stood in front of the side entrance, and the door was open.

  “Hello?” Benno called. For a moment he imagined the pastor waiting with an axe behind the door, but no, Cornelius couldn’t possibly know that he had spoken with Ania Walczak. Unless Carolin had told him everything.

  “Hello?” It smelled of cheap wood, closed windows, and sweat. Benno walked through the small, narrow room and a moment later entered the church, where the pastor was standing on a ladder changing light bulbs in the chandeliers. Sunlight flooded through the windows and framed him as though he might be a heavenly apparition.

  “Is it time?” he asked, without turning around.

  “It’s me,” Benno said.

  Cornelius stopped. “Oh, Mr. Diedrich. Have you found Tim?”

  Benno took a few steps closer. “You know where he is, right? Maybe he’s even here somewhere?”

  “What?” The pastor turned so quickly that the ladder started to sway. Benno lunged forward and held on to it. His ankle protested on the spot.

  “Thank you.” Cornelius descended slowly, his face was sweaty. “What did you say?”

  Benno let go of the ladder, kept his distance from Cornelius. “I know that you were Irina’s lover.”

  “Irina?” The pastor seemed surprised, then his face reddened. “What do you want, Diedrich?”

  “You imprisoned her somewhere in the village. But something went wrong, she tried to escape, and you killed her.” Benno expected an explosion, but Cornelius’ face only darkened. “And you’ve seen Irina’s dog every day. Right next door, in our house. Every day you saw Tim walking him. And you’ve kept your mouth shut, hoping that no one would find out about your affair. Is that why you’ve kidnapped Tim? Where is he?”

  The pastor seemed to inflate and suck in all the air around him, but suddenly he stopped to let out a huff. “You’ve got it all wrong.”

  “Where is Tim? Is he here? Do you have a basement?”

  “This is a tragedy.” Cornelius voice was thick with feeling. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “You were Irina’s lover.”

  “Who gave you that idea?” He seemed truly offended.

  “I know it.”

  “And when should I have had time for that?”

  “You were seen in the restaurant.”

  “What?” The pastor gasped. “In what restaurant?”

  “You picked up Irina.”

  “I did not,” Cornelius cried indignantly. “What a cunning lie. I understand that . . .”

  “And you told my wife to throw away her medication. Where is Tim?”

  Cornelius’ mouth snapped shut, he swallowed his protest. Instead he threw his arms in the air and shook his head. “What do you want?”

  “My marriage is broken. Tim, where is he?”

  “I don’t have the slightest idea,” the pastor said gloomily. “And your wife does not need medication. She needs her God and her faith, not pills.”

  “And you’re the expert?” Benno said. “Who’s the king?”

  “My good man . . .”

  “At the time I didn’t really think about it,” Benno interrupted the pastor. “But when you and I were driving out to that meadow, you said, ‘How in the world did she get out?’ I didn’t suspect you, of course, but you had kept her hidden all that time. Where? Where did you keep her? Where is Tim? Who is the king of the village? Why does he have to die?”

  Cornelius took the ladder, folded it and let it slide to the ground. “Just look around. Look at everything. And then you are welcome to call the police.”

  “And they’ll beat me up again?”

  The pastor went past Benno without looking at him. “You have brought this on yourself.”

  Wehrke wasn’t home, his car was nowhere to be seen. Nevertheless, Benno got out and looked around on the property. The house stood back from the road and was protected from prying eyes by trees and hedges. No one would be able to watch him.

  To his left was the garage, but through the window he could see that it was empty except for a bicycle and garden equipment. He followed the gravel path past the garage and along the left side of the house to the garden, while trying to protect his ankle as much as possible. The sun disappeared behind the clouds more often now, but it was still mild enough that Benno almost wanted to take off his new coat.

  He had only ever seen the garden from the living room window. It seemed old, right out of another century, with thick hedges and a low stone wall. Except for a few f
ruit trees, there was nothing that blocked the view onto the fields beyond.

  A light was burning in the living room; maybe Wehrke had forgotten to switch it off. Benno was looking through a window at a wooden door with tigers painted on its panels when the glass broke into a thousand pieces. The crack of a rifle made him jump, but the pain in his foot forced him to his knees. Benno looked around. A second blast followed, and behind him a brick shattered.

  Benno threw himself flat on the ground. He didn’t know where the shooter was hiding, didn’t know if he was already running towards the house. He didn’t dare move. After a minute he crawled to the right, trying to put weight mostly on his arms to protect his ankle. He could hear nothing but the blood rushing in his ears, and hoped that he wasn’t making any noise, hoped that he could no longer be seen.

  Cautiously, he peeked around the corner. He could see the rear of his car. Behind him lay the garden, and nothing moved around in it. As fast as he could, he crawled on hands and knees toward his car. He stopped once more when he finally had to give up the protection of the house, but he still couldn’t detect anything. Slowly he straightened up, took a deep breath and ran. His foot was raging, his teeth gnashing so loudly that it echoed in his ears, but he ran, and heard the cracking sound only when it was already over. Before him, pebbles went flying and a second shot went straight into the radiator of the car. But Benno didn’t stop. I am a huge target, I’m tall, I’m too slow, I have to run back, I have to protect myself . . . but he managed to tear open the passenger door and throw himself on the seat. He twisted his body to get his feet on the pedals, lost the key, fished it out of the gap between the seat and handbrake. He writhed, the fifth shot had to come at any moment . . .

  But the fifth shot didn’t come. The engine howled, because he hadn’t selected a gear. The gearbox crunched while Benno struggled with the shifter. Half blind with fear, he drove off, almost rammed one of the large, white boulders that stood at the entrance of the yard, and then raced toward the entrance to the highway. A truck came from the left and was able to dodge him at the last moment. The horn made Benno jump. When he stepped on the accelerator, he could no longer feel his ankle.