Van Oss clears his throat beside him. He whispers, “I’m going to check back there in the sacristy, Peter, and see if Jansen’s there.”
Böhm nods absently. How will it be when it is his coffin? How many wreaths will there be? How many people? And what if Brigitte really is leaving him? He shakes his head in confusion.
God, I’m getting old. My past is getting bigger; my future is shrinking. No matter what might yet happen here today, he had to get to Brigitte. He wasn’t indispensable. Van Oss and Steeg would manage on their own if the killer showed up at Magdalena Behrens’s grave tonight.
Van Oss comes back into the nave with Jansen. The little man, with his worn black suit, has his head bowed. Not until the two of them are standing in front of Böhm does he look up and hurriedly hold out his hand. He reminds Böhm of an eager weasel.
“I was intending to come and see you at the station after the funeral.”
“Ah.” Böhm pushes his glasses up and acknowledges him courteously. “Perhaps you know of somewhere we could talk in private?”
Jansen moves quickly to a side door. “Along here.”
Again, Böhm sees a weasel in front of him. Upright on its hind legs, quivering. It’s afraid.
They go out onto the gravel path and are greeted by a fine drizzle.
“That’s all we need.” Jansen raises his arms by his sides, as if to fly away. He lets them drop, resigned. He turns to his left. “Come. We can stand under the roof of the bike shelter.”
Van Oss rolls his eyes. “Great.”
Böhm can definitely sense Jansen’s fear now. It is spreading like dense, used air.
“Maybe that’s not quite right.” Jansen wrings his hands. “Maybe—”
“Here is fine, Herr Jansen.” Böhm’s tone is loud, friendly, firm.
The little man slumps. “Where should I start? Can you ask me questions, please? I don’t know where to begin.” He puts both hands to his head and runs his fingers through his thin, neatly parted hair.
“What really happened at the Behrens farm that day?”
Jansen examines the bicycle stands, as if seeing them for the first time. “Very well. It was an accident, you have to believe me. Nobody meant it, you see.”
Böhm takes a deep breath. “Please, Herr Jansen. What happened?”
Van Oss takes a notepad and pen from his pocket.
“We had all been drinking. You have to believe me: none of us were sober, or it wouldn’t have happened.”
Böhm and Van Oss exchange glances. They reach agreement in silence.
Böhm puts his hand on Jansen’s shoulder. “This isn’t working, Herr Jansen. Come with us to the station.”
Jansen gasps. “Please, you can’t do that. The funeral, please. I’m on my own today. Lena’s working in the Dorfkrug, and the pallbearers are coming any minute. I didn’t do anything. Please, I’ll come and see you at the station straight after the funeral and make a statement.” The little man has tears in his eyes.
Van Oss puts the pad back in his pocket.
Böhm looks at his watch. “How long does a funeral like this take?”
“The service begins at one o’clock. I can be with you at three.”
Böhm nods and tells him his room number. “I’m counting on it, Herr Jansen.”
They are on their way to the car. The fine, swirling drizzle is getting thicker, and the first fat drops of rain are hitting the ground. Van Oss pulls his jacket over his head and runs. They are both completely soaked by the time they are sitting in the car.
Böhm takes off his glasses, wipes them dry with a handkerchief, and stares out into the rain. “I’d like you to stay here, Joop. Keep your eyes open. At about half past two I’ll send a couple of officers over to watch the cemetery. When he’s ready, come to the station with Jansen.”
Van Oss lets his head flop back against the headrest. “You think he or she might come to the funeral?”
“Yes. I’m absolutely certain we’ll find the motive in the Behrens story. Our killer knows the victims’ habits: he’s from here. I’m sure he knows exactly who we’ve spoken to, and that we’re getting close. He’s running out of time, you see.”
“Okay. I don’t suppose you have an umbrella I could use?”
“In the trunk. Have you got your weapon?”
Van Oss’s hand is on the door handle. He turns to face Böhm. “Please, Peter. Don’t try to scare me, okay?”
Böhm frowns and looks at him. “I’m serious, Joop. We’re dealing with someone who’ll stop at nothing.”
As he drives off, he watches in his rearview mirror as Van Oss runs back into the church under his big yellow umbrella.
Chapter 50
The coffee is ready. She pours it carefully into thermos jugs and reloads the big machine with instant coffee and water. She ought to sell at least two urns of coffee in this weather.
The bell tolled about half an hour ago, and in this rain they wouldn’t stay in the cemetery for long.
Lena has finished off the sandwiches and is arranging them on platters. Ruth goes up to her at the table. Her hands are trembling.
“That looks lovely, Lena. I’ve always just put the sandwiches out, but it looks much more refined with that lettuce, tomato, and parsley garnish. I can add a mark or two for a platter like that.” She nods encouragingly. The child looks tired. It’s probably all a bit much for her. “And once they’re here, keep going around with the coffee. It would be good to sell both urns.”
Lena nods mechanically.
“What’s wrong, child?” She strokes Lena’s arm. “Here, have one of the sandwiches yourself now, and a cup of coffee to go with it.”
Lena smiles gratefully. “I’m all right, but I would like a cup of coffee.”
Ruth takes the platters that are ready and puts them out on the tables in the room.
Lena starts with fright when the back door to the kitchen is wrenched open and Günther Mahler is suddenly standing in the kitchen. He is wearing a long green raincoat and a wide-brimmed hat.
“Awful weather.” He takes off his hat and tears open the snaps on his coat with a single downward stroke. The noise reminds Lena of a burst of machine-gun fire. “Where’s Ruth?”
“In front. She’s covering the platters.”
“Günther?” Ruth is standing in the doorway. “Are they coming already? Is it all over?”
“No. I made myself scarce. They can put the coffin in the ground without me.” He takes off the raincoat and lays it over the back of a chair. “I need to talk to you.”
Ruth folds her arms across her chest. “That’s good, because I need to talk to you.”
Mahler peers at her suspiciously. She nods toward the bar and walks there ahead of him. Mahler goes around the counter and sits at the end. “Give me a schnapps first.”
“Like hell I will. First I want to know what really happened with Magdalena.”
Mahler slaps the counter with his hand. “But you know what happened! What are you talking about? Has Jansen been going around talking nonsense? Just give me a schnapps.”
Ruth pours out a schnapps and takes a cognac for herself. They both drink it with a quick tipping-back motion.
“The police told me Magdalena Behrens was raped. What do you know about that?” She glares at him dangerously.
“Ruth, for crying out loud.” Mahler slides the little glass over to her with a swift movement of his hand. “Johann had completely lost it. Yes, he raped her.”
“Why didn’t I know about this before?”
“Well, it’s not a pleasant subject for a woman. Besides, I thought your husband told you everything at the time.”
She tops Mahler up. “No, he didn’t. And the detective said Johann denied it to the last.”
Mahler grimaces and shakes his head slowly. “Of course he denied it. It’s not a particularly nice thing to do, is it?”
Ruth leans back on the buffet behind the bar. Then she explodes. “Can you explain to me why he would confe
ss to the murder, but not the rape? What did he have to lose?”
Mahler slides off the bar stool. He raises his right index finger threateningly. His voice rises. “No, Ruth, not like this. But it doesn’t matter a damn anyway. I called this Anna Behrens, and she’s totally crazy. Screamed at me on the phone, saying I was there.” He takes a deep breath and leans over the counter. Quietly, he goes on. “Look, we need to toss something to the police. I think she’s behind all this. Maybe she hired a killer or something.”
Ruth’s hands clutch the cabinet behind her back. She stares past Mahler into the main room, as if seeing it for the first time. She speaks softly. “My God, Günther. The poor child. You left her there with her dying mother.”
Mahler is about to say something, but she cuts him off. “Look, stop with all the lies. The detective told me that too. Magdalena died on the way to the hospital. She wasn’t dead when you were there.” She pushes herself away from the buffet and heads for the kitchen. She turns one more time, tears glittering in her eyes. “What did you all do, Günther? What did you do?” Wearily, she sits down at the kitchen table.
Lena is standing at the serving pass-through. Ruth turns toward her. “I’ve been lied to for thirty years, Lena. Can you imagine? Thirty years.”
“I know, Frau Holter.”
Ruth shakes her head absently. “Ach, child. You can’t possibly know.”
Then she hears the first funeral guests coming in. The room fills up quickly. They have their hands full now.
Chapter 51
Böhm runs up the stairs at the entrance to the police station two steps at a time. He is nonetheless drenched when he gets into the hallway.
The rain was so heavy his windshield wipers had been unable to handle it. At times he had been forced to drive at walking speed. But he had been in a hurry, driven on by an inner uneasiness. He explained it to himself in terms of concern for Brigitte, but that wasn’t the whole truth. Like a shadow that kept eluding him, there was something else. Something he had seen. Something latent in his mind, like an unprojected slide. He looks into Steeg’s office.
Steeg raises a hand in greeting.
“Where have you all been, for crying out loud? I saw your car in Merklen at ten.”
Steeg cocks his head to one side to see past Böhm into the hall. “Where’s Joop? I wanted to tell him about our young colleague.”
“Joop stayed in Merklen. I asked him to keep watch during the funeral. Do you have anything new?”
“Yes.” He looks around for an empty chair. “Shall we go over to your office? You have a better view.”
Böhm nods and goes across to his office. He turns on the computer and sits down behind the desk.
Steeg sits down opposite and starts his report immediately.
“First: the new girl is sitting in the newspaper office until deadline time, taking all the death notices. Second: I went to see Jörg Lüders about the wooden stakes. On Friday evening he heard banging for a long time, and his dog kept barking. That was at about seven. He assumed one of his neighbors was putting in fenceposts.”
Böhm listens attentively. “As early as Friday.” He pushes his glasses up onto his forehead and rubs his eyes. “Anything else?”
Steeg tips his chair back and crosses his hands behind his head. “You bet. I tracked down one of our guys from the old days. He may be seventy-eight years old, but old Mester has a hell of a memory.”
Mester had told him that the file was closed after Behrens hanged himself. The thing with Lüders had been dubious. They were all sure the story about the strange car was a lie, but couldn’t prove anything. When the land purchase appeared on the scene—and it was talked about all over the region, it was such a blatantly dirty deal—their suspicions were confirmed. They were sure old Frau Behrens had asked him to say what he did in order to exonerate her son. She couldn’t have known that Johann would confess and then kill himself.
Böhm has placed himself beside the window. The rain is falling so hard that the houses on the other side of the market square are no more than indistinct shapes. He turns around and leans back against the windowsill. “What about the child? Why was the child never questioned?”
Steeg lets the chair back down onto all four feet. “The child was in shock. She didn’t say a word, at least not in the three months after the crime, and after that they had closed the case.”
Böhm picks up the phone. He tries to reach Anna Behrens for the sixth time today. Once again he hears the busy signal. He slams the receiver down on the cradle. Steeg looks at him in astonishment.
“It’s been busy since nine o’clock this morning. I don’t like it.” He rubs his neck. “Achim, can you do me a favor? Call our counterparts in Cologne. Ask them to drive over to Anna Behrens and find out what’s going on. The address is on the computer.” He puts his wet jacket back on. “And then make sure Joop is relieved at half past two. He’s coming here with Jansen after that, to take his statement. I need to be away for two or three hours. If there’s an emergency, you can reach me on my cell phone.”
He is picking up his car keys when Lembach knocks on the open door. “Morning, all. Leaving already?”
“I have to go home. My wife came back today.” He’s annoyed that he feels guilty. After a sixty- to seventy-hour week, he has no reason to.
Lembach grips his arm. “Wait, there’s one more thing.” He holds up a small bag with the fiber found at the second scene. “It’s Lycra. But we already knew that. What’s interesting, though, is that it comes from a pink top or leggings.”
Steeg whistles through his teeth. “You don’t say. That makes it more likely we’re dealing with a woman.” He claps Lembach on the shoulder. “Or do you know a man who wears pink? Besides Joop, of course, but he’s not a suspect.”
Lembach and Steeg laugh.
Even Böhm can’t resist a grin. “Achim, that makes it even more urgent to check Anna Behrens’s home.” And then he is out the door.
Chapter 52
She drops the receiver. It lies on the sofa, producing that exhausting sound. She shuffles to the other end of the sofa, away from the sound, away from the machine that lets people like Mahler make their way into her home.
She curls up and closes her eyes. With her knees up against her chest and her arms wrapped around her shins, she rocks back and forth, like the pendulum of a clock. That’s the only way the time passes. That’s the only way she can leave the fear behind and create some distance. Put some distance between herself and these dark figures, one of which is Mahler.
How long she lies there, she doesn’t know. But a single thought rouses her from that diffuse world between the past and the present. From the world that only exists within her. Which can’t help her find her way, because it’s outside time and space.
Gietmann came to see her, and now he’s dead.
Lüders came to see her, and now he’s dead.
Mahler just called. Would he die now?
The idea takes hold. She forces herself to open her eyes. It flows through her body like a sluggish current, causing pain in her chest and back. She sits up.
Oh God.
She leaps to her feet and runs into the kitchen. She opens all the cabinets, pulls all the drawers out. Open! Open! Open! She has to open herself up. She blocks her ears, as if that would help her to escape the voice expressing this shocking idea. She has to cut her flesh open, so that the voice can come running out of her body along with the blood. Deep cuts.
Her eyes fix on the knife drawer; it draws her closer and closer with an invisible ribbon. She breathes greedily, can’t stop sucking oxygen into herself. She knows she ought to get a paper bag. She knows she ought to put it to her mouth. She knows Margret won’t be coming till Tuesday.
She reaches into the drawer. The oxygen is sending crystals of light into her head. She places the knife on her left shoulder. She draws the blade straight across her ribcage as far as the breastbone. She sees her pink T-shirt turning dark red but doesn’t
feel anything. Free! Free!
But the moment of happiness passes. She feels herself collapse. She doesn’t hear the doorbell ringing. She doesn’t hear the door being opened a few minutes later. She doesn’t hear the police officer say, “Shit! Call an ambulance!”
Chapter 53
She is sitting at the kitchen table. The first thing he notices is her translucent pallor. For a moment he wants to follow his instincts and take her in his arms, but he stays on the threshold. She looks at him quite calmly, and the sadness in her eyes smolders in his chest.
“Where were you?” The force with which he throws out this question startles even him.
“Sit down, Peter. Please.”
Her calm sadness undermines his anger. He takes off his wet jacket, hangs it on the handle of the kitchen door, and sits down opposite her. There are papers on the kitchen table, her watch, her garnet bracelet. He picks up the bracelet, needing something in his hands to keep them still.
“I was at a conference.”
He laughs bitterly.
“I needed a little time. I thought a weekend would be enough, but it wasn’t.”
She speaks softly. She speaks in the same flat monotone she used to use during the period of her mourning for Andreas, and he had found it unbearable then.
He stares at his hands. Holding individual stones in the bracelet between thumb and forefinger, he spins the bracelet around and around, slipping the stones through his fingers one by one, like a rosary.
“Is there somebody else?” He grits his teeth, awaiting the impact of her reply.
“You don’t really believe that?”
He looks up and sees genuine shock in her eyes. He feels his jaws relax, and tears of relief welling up in his eyes. “I was so scared I was losing you.” He takes her hands, which are clenched together.
To Clear the Air Page 15
