“Maybe this will help,” Felix said, handing her a magnifying glass. A few moments later she made a surprised sound.
“What is it?” Felix asked excitedly. She handed him the photo and the magnifying glass. “See for yourself.”
It was obvious. Judith Gleichenbach, Marie’s mother.
And the man? Long dark hair, headband, athletic, tanned.
Could it be Lauberts? The man they had been trying so hard to find? They weren’t sure; they couldn’t make him out.
“Never mind,” Franza said, leaning back in her chair. “The picture is twenty years old—twenty years changes people.”
Felix nodded as he got to his feet and picked up his jacket. “But why puzzle over it if she can just tell us?”
Franza tapped the newspaper clipping with her finger. “And hopefully she can explain the connection.”
55
He zipped up his pants slowly, staring at her in disbelief for a few heartbeats. Then horror overcame him.
A name. Lisa Fürst. Did he know it?
Did he? How could she even ask? Where on earth was this coming from?
It was etched into his memory forever, eating away at him like hydrochloric acid in his gut, slowly killing him for more than twenty years now. How could she know?
“Oh my God!” she said, realization gradually dawning on her. He saw it.
She got to her feet as if in slow motion.
“You were driving,” she said, stunned. “It was you!”
She swayed a little. The alcohol had loosened her tongue and caused her to stagger now—out of her life and into death. But she didn’t know this yet. Neither of them did.
She turned around.
She wants to go, he thought, but it’s too late now. It’s really too late for that.
She tried to slip past him. “I don’t know anything,” she said. “Honestly, I don’t know anything.”
He shook his head. “No,” he said, “you really don’t know anything. I wrestled with myself. I wrestle with myself every single day. You have no idea.”
“She was only nine,” she said. “Damn it, a nine-year-old girl and you took off.”
Her voice became firmer. Her wondering—her astonishment—was waning.
“You killed her!” she shouted. “A little girl!”
She crouched, cowering. “It’s always the same! You kill them and then you leave them and you don’t care. And then we die again and again while you walk away, back to your lives. And us? We stay right where you left us! Right where you dumped us! And no one sees us ever again, no one.”
She whimpered, lost in alcohol and memories.
Good, he thought, she won’t cause any trouble.
“Listen. Now listen carefully. I’m taking you to Berlin and we’ll forget this ever happened,” he said.
“Listen,” he said again, his voice hoarse. “Listen, I’m letting you go—just like you wanted.”
He raised his arms and walked slowly toward her, wanting to touch her hair, her neck, her face.
“But just one last time,” he said in his new hoarse voice and couldn’t help himself, couldn’t stop himself, “I want to be close to you one last time.”
When he touched her, she hissed like a cat. She jumped up, but he’d already grabbed her and was holding her by the throat.
She was too surprised to put up a fight. She gasped and groaned. He heard her choking as if through wads of cotton. And then he let go, pushing her away from him, and she spun around and fell. Just tipped over, all of a sudden. Then . . . the sound as her head hit the rocks, her eyes as she fell, her neck, still pulsing with life.
He ripped open the pack of cigarettes with trembling fingers, struggled to light a cigarette, and smoked it while trying to figure out what to do next. He couldn’t think of anything, and so he lit another one.
From the very start, her neck had seduced him. It was the only innocent part of her, the only pure part. It was the part, he imagined, no one else had possessed, only him. And it was still pulsing with life.
He looked down at her, brushing her with the back of his hand, feeling the urge to caress her in her innocence and purity. He felt like he was drowning and closed his eyes wearily, slipping briefly into a world of dreams. She was sitting on top of him, smiling. But then he heard again and again how her head hit the rocks, and how the blood trickled out, forming rivulets and puddles before disappearing among the rocks.
Then he saw the body of the child flying across the windshield and another sound, heavy raindrops hitting his car. The child, her eyes a dull gray—suddenly it all faded away.
Confused, he staggered backward and looked at his hand, covered with blood. Shit, he thought, you bitch! You’re ruining everything, you bitch!
“Shit!” he shouted out loud and spun around, once, twice, looking all around, but no one was there. It was three o’clock in the morning.
56
Arthur leaned forward, whistling softly through his teeth. “Tell me everything,” he said.
“Sure,” Marilyn replied. “Would you like a drink? Champagne, maybe? Or a vodka, on the house?”
“No,” he said regretfully, “thank you. I’m on duty.”
She took a strand of his hair, which had fallen over his right eye, and brushed it back behind his ear. “What a pity,” she said.
He grabbed her hand and smiled. “You’re gorgeous, aren’t you!” he said, feeling flattered, almost moved.
“Am I?” she said.
A man came to the table. It was the manager of the restaurant, judging by his resolute demeanor. “May I ask what . . .” he began. “Frau Wallner . . .”
Arthur pulled out his ID again. “Police, Homicide Division,” he said coolly, “I’m interviewing a witness. You’re obstructing a murder investigation.”
The man froze for a moment, and then recovered and opened his mouth to ask a question, but Arthur beat him to it. “Ask your headwaiter, he knows. And now I’d be grateful if you’d let me continue my work in peace. Thank you very much.”
“All right,” the manager said confused. “But if I may ask you to . . .”
“You may,” Arthur said, surprised at himself. “Of course you may.”
He gave a friendly nod to the man, who raised his eyebrows and walked away.
Marilyn giggled with delight. “Wow!” she said. “You let him have it!”
“Did I?” Arthur said, and felt flattered again. “Now, where were we?”
“My name’s Sabine,” Marilyn said.
Later, after she’d told him everything and shown him the private room and he’d enjoyed a tiny vodka after all, he thought with a certain degree of compassion that teachers really were poor bastards. They couldn’t get away with anything, really couldn’t make a single false move. They would always be recognized by someone, and there would always be someone with a score to settle—and who would do so with a smile.
He’d failed her. Without remorse, she said, without an ounce of compassion. He’d raised his left eyebrow a tiny bit and cold-bloodedly failed her.
It happened six years ago. She’d chosen chemistry in her final exams because she thought she could manipulate him with her female charms. Apparently that pissed him off. When he walked past her table during the prep period for the oral exam, she handed him her exam sheet. On it she’d written one single meaningful sentence in pencil.
I’d like to show my gratitude with enthusiasm and persistence.
A smile and a glimpse of her strategically placed, half-opened thighs should have done the rest, but they didn’t. He carefully looked over everything she had presented so cleverly, and then looked into her face. She noticed, in addition to his surprise, an amused glint in his eyes. He raised one eyebrow and that had been that.
“Even though,” she said, “rumor had it he was after anyone in a skirt. But just not me, unfortunately.”
“Well,” Arthur sighed.
“Well,” Marilyn sighed. “And so I’m stuck here, wasti
ng my time, ’cause every good-looking guy coming through the door already has a date.”
Her eyes traveled up Arthur’s legs and to his face. She smiled, and he was afraid he’d turned red.
“Except for you,” she said and beamed. He beamed too, like a tomato on its way to the ketchup bottle.
Later on she added that the asshole didn’t even recognize her when she served him and that little slut their champagne and shrimp and sea bass—though it had only been six years ago. But he’d only had eyes for his little whore. She was sure things had gotten pretty hot in that private room between the main course and dessert, she told Arthur with bright eyes. She’d bet on it, if he knew what she meant.
Yes, he knew. She was hinting so unambiguously he couldn’t help knowing.
He learned everything: name, age, likes, dislikes, clothing size, everything.
And as the vodka spread through his body, warming him, he would have liked to warm himself somewhere else, too. If only there’d been time—but there wasn’t. Damn Herz! Damn all this overtime!
A short time later he followed her to the door. What a fantastic ass, he thought, overwhelmed.
And he left feeling elated.
57
Judith didn’t say anything but they could see she was surprised. She stepped aside, letting the detectives in, and then led them to the living room. They saw immediately that she was packing to leave: empty shelves, boxes stacked high, organized chaos. “I’m moving,” she explained. “I’m renting an apartment in town. We’re selling the house.”
She cleared the table, pulled up three chairs, and turned off the TV, which was showing the evening news. She asked the detectives to take a seat. “I should have done it a long time ago,” she said, staring into space. “I’m looking forward to being on my own.”
Would they have stayed together, Franza wondered, my son and her daughter? Would we have met, would we have liked each other?
“Can I offer you a drink?” Judith Gleichenbach asked, wiping off the table with her hand.
Franza shook her head, as did Felix. “No,” she said. “Thank you. How are you doing?”
Judith nodded and shrugged her shoulders. “I’m doing OK. I just have to. I’m going to look for a job.”
She paused for a moment, searching for words. Franza spoke first.
“We’d like to show you something,” she said. “We found this in Marie’s room.”
She placed the newspaper article and the photo side by side on the table. Judith leaned forward to look at them, and a moment later she froze. Then she jumped up and started digging in her boxes, throwing books, folders, and other odds and ends onto the floor. Finally she found what she was looking for: a photo album. She opened it with trembling fingers and turned page after page until she was about halfway through. Then she lowered the album and it slipped out of her hands onto the floor, where it stayed.
Judith covered her deathly pale face with her hands. “She took it,” she whispered. “She really took it.”
Franza got up and leaned down to look at the photo album. She saw there was a picture missing on the opened page. “What?”
“That there.” The woman’s voice was flat and her eyes glassy. “What you just put on the table.”
“Could you please explain?” Franza said and suddenly felt it was urgent. Time was running out because of something they didn’t yet know about.
Judith thought for a moment. “About half a year ago she turned up here, just before Christmas. I was . . . surprised. And very happy. She was different—she said she’d met someone. We drank tea and ate gingerbread cookies. She told me her boyfriend’s mother had made them. I found it a little strange, but also touching. She was so proud of this . . . normalcy.”
She laughed softly, tears streaming down her face.
“Then all of a sudden she wanted to look at photos from when she was little. I gave her two or three albums, but she must’ve looked at the rest as well.”
“Weren’t you with her?”
“Not the whole time. I was making her bed. She wanted to stay the night. But when I came back . . .”
She got up, wiping her face. “The albums had been put away. She’d taken the dishes to the kitchen and said she couldn’t stay after all; she had to go back to town. There was a bus in ten minutes.”
“Did she say why?”
“No.” Judith shook her head. “She didn’t say, and I didn’t ask.”
“Why not?”
“Because I knew I wouldn’t get an answer. That’s just how she was.”
“Had she changed?”
Judith shrugged.
“And you didn’t ask why?”
Trembling, Judith turned to the window. She was about to lose control.
“Good Lord, if you’d known my daughter you wouldn’t be asking questions like that. She either talked when she wanted to or not at all. And most of the time she didn’t.”
Franza nodded, trying to calm her down. “All right, let’s move on. What happened next?”
A deep sigh. “Nothing. She left.”
“So she found the newspaper article and the photo. In this album?”
Judith nodded. “Yes, that’s what must have happened.”
“What’s the connection?”
“There is none!”
“And we’re supposed to believe that?”
Judith trembled harder and shrugged. “The only connection is that I kept the article on this page of the album.”
“Why did you keep the article?”
“I can’t remember. It was twenty years ago.”
“Did you know the child in the accident?”
“No.”
“No?!”
Judith Gleichenbach opened the door to the terrace, letting in a gust of fresh air. She inhaled deeply.
“Frau Gleichenbach.” Franza walked over to her and touched her on the shoulder. “Frau Gleichenbach, please help us. It’s about your daughter!”
She nodded. “Yes,” she whispered. “Yes, I know. About my daughter.”
“So, the girl,” Felix began. “Her name was Lisa Fürst, and she was here on vacation with her parents. Someone ran over her with a car and then just left her there to die. Whoever was driving just took off—that’s called hit and run. That’s a serious crime. I think you’re aware of that!” Felix held up the article for her to see, his voice had become sharp, angry. He knew that time was running out, too. “Look at her! You knew her!”
Judith shook her head with despair. “No, I didn’t know her, and I don’t know what you want from me!”
“Oh, just cut it out!” Felix was angry. “Are you seriously trying to tell us you just kept the article for fun? You must have had a reason! And you haven’t forgotten it!”
He waited, watching her struggling with herself. Come on, he thought, don’t take forever. He felt tiredness weighing him down the way it always did when difficult cases hit the homestretch but played hard to get right at the end.
Felix looked at Franza and saw she felt the same. They felt like puppets before the impending storm. When it broke, it would crush them. They always sensed that in advance. It was like a tingling in their bones, a turmoil in their guts. Felix knew he shouldn’t eat heavy food on those days, but he always did anyway and paid for it by spending hours on the toilet when it was all over, draining himself body and soul.
But that’s how it was, plain and simple. It made them old—damned old. They’d be doddering old fools before their time because all these cases sucked the bright, blooming life right out of them. In moments like this he could feel the aging, feel the weariness seeping its way inside him. It felt like he was being torn apart and the youth drained from his body.
He assumed it was the same for Franza. Her face and her eyes said it clearly enough, but he didn’t dare ask.
He could also see it when he looked at Borger. His ties seemed to be closing in menacingly around him, while propping up his bulging neck and making his cheeks loo
k chubbier than they actually were.
Maybe Franza was right to allow herself this young actor; maybe it let her feel something long lost. But how long would he be there for her? At some point he’d get an offer from somewhere up north, or from Switzerland—one he couldn’t resist. And then what?
Felix saw how Franza swallowed, how her eyelids twitched. She was tired. She’d had too little sleep the last few days. Her body and soul were drained from worrying about Ben and everything else.
“Frau Gleichenbach,” she said, “let’s not drag this out unnecessarily. We’re all tired. Let’s bring this to an end. What happened with the girl back then?”
Felix looked at Judith and knew Franza had found the right words. Judith gave in, melted.
“Just once,” she said. “I saw her just once.”
Felix took a deep breath. “When?”
She remained silent, wiping her face again. Tears continued running down her cheeks. She had time; she’d already lost everything.
“When? Where?”
She shook her head. Different question, Felix thought, change the topic, quick!
Franza beat him to it. She picked up the photo from the table and pointed to the girl. “Is that you?”
Judith nodded.
“Did you draw circles around the heads?”
“No.”
“So Marie did. Why? What’s the connection?”
“I don’t know.” Her desperation—her helplessness—was tangible. She really didn’t know, not yet.
“Have you heard the name Lauberts before? Anton Lauberts?”
She thought about it, and then shook her head, repeating the name. “Lauberts? No.”
Too bad, Franza thought, that’s a shame. She tried again. “So the man standing next to you in the picture is not Anton Lauberts?”
She shook her head again, uncomprehending. “No, what makes you think that?”
“Who is it then?”
She looked up. A suspicion crept into her eyes. She shook her head almost imperceptibly, as if wanting to shake off the realization gradually coming over her.
Rain Girl Page 17
