The Sinner

by Petra Hammesfahr

  Perhaps someone would get the idea that Frankie had simply been a former client of hers. That wouldn't be a bad explanation! She'd had to kill him before he recognized her and gave her away to her husband.

  Her eyes suddenly swam with scalding tears at the thought of Gereon, but only for a moment. Her years with him were like the barrettes and lipsticks she'd stolen from Woolworths and sold or given away to other girls in the playground: over and gone forever. Gereon would be bound to hear in court, if not before, what sort of woman he had exchanged vows with.

  For lunch, there were mashed potatoes and some unidentifiable vegetable boiled to a pulp. The meat, which had been dissected into little cubes, consisted mostly of fat and gristle and was swimming in unappetizing brown gravy. A bowl of fruit yoghurt had been provided for afters.

  Reposing on the tray was a white plastic spoon. It reminded her of the lake and stirred everything up again. Why couldn't her son have asked for a yoghurt? The most she could have done to Frankie with a plastic spoon was scratch his face.

  She ate a little mashed potato. It tasted of cardboard. Taking the yoghurt with her, she went and stood at the barred window, looked up at the sky. She wondered where the occupants of the other beds had their midday meal. Was she considered too dangerous to eat with the others? Perhaps it was a test designed to discover how much of her wits she had left. Perhaps the professor would ask her at their next session how she was getting on with her room-mates.

  For a while she debated what answer to give him. Then she devoted some thought to the Frankie scenario. If the idea that he'd been a client of hers didn't occur to the professor spontaneously, she would have to rub his nose in it.

  Finally, she wondered whether Magdalena had been relieved to enter the pearly gates and find that Mother wasn't there yet. Whether she was getting bored singing "Holy, holy, holy!" all the time, or whether she was sitting face to face with the Saviour in some quiet corner. Magdalena had once pointed to a picture of the Saviour in the Bible and said: "Give the fellow a shave and a decent haircut, and he wouldn't be bad-looking."

  Frankie hadn't been bad-looking either. A pretty face for a man - pretty but masculine. They probably wouldn't believe her if she said he'd been a client of hers. A man like him had no need to pay for sex, nor was he a pervert.

  She could still see him clearly- without any blood- sitting up and complaining about that tune. Perhaps he'd found it as agonizing as she had. Perhaps he'd been grateful when she put him out of his misery. The way he'd looked at her ...

  She stood at the window until just after two - just stood there, feeling happy she hadn't been tied to the bed again. Someone came to collect the tray and scolded her for leaving her meat and vegetable mush untouched. She pointed to her throat with an apologetic smile. "It still hurts when I swallow, but I've finished the yoghurt. If there's some soup tomorrow, I'll definitely have two helpings." Then she was alone again.

  Twice she heard a sound behind her and turned to look at the door. She knew what had caused it: a watchful eye at the spy-hole. A few minutes later a key turned in the lock. She thought of the mugs of coffee and slices of stale cake at the hospital where she'd spent a few days after the birth of her son. They always brought afternoon coffee at midday and supper at teatime because they wanted to get off early.

  The door opened. The instant she turned, fear sprang at her like a rabid dog. The chief! His neutral, almost businesslike demeanour concealed all that he must have learned from her father.

  In fact, Rudolf Grovian's impassive face merely camouflaged his own emotions. Mea culpa! He had driven home at lunchtime, unable to endure the office any longer, with its gleaming coffee machine and the chair on which she'd sat. He never came home for lunch as a rule, so Mechthild hadn't been expecting him. He didn't have to say much; she asked what was wrong of her own accord.

  After he'd explained and told her what he felt he must do next, she said: "You're mad, Rudi. Leave the poor thing in peace. You can't help her, you'll only make matters worse. She's fine where she is."

  "Fine? Don't make me laugh! Have you any idea what it's like in a psychiatric ward?"

  "No," she said, cracking a couple of eggs into the pan, "and I don't want to know I already know what goes on in your outfit, that's good enough for me. Nobody says a word if you and Hoss come down hard on some fellow who deserves it, but a young woman like that? Think what she's been through!"

  Grovian had been thinking of nothing else. The law obliged him not only to investigate Cora Bender but also to gather any evidence that might exonerate her. He explained this to Mechthild. "Then do it, Rudi," she had said. "Do it, for God's sake, and take anything you discover to the district attorney. But not to her, certainly not the news that her father is dying. How much more do you plan to burden her with?"

  He looked at her standing beside the window, a picture of misery: her bruised face all the colours of the rainbow, her forehead adorned with a broad strip of sticking plaster. Thinking of the objects in his jacket pocket and the news he had to give her, he could still hear Mechthild's voice in his head: "You're mad, Rudi. Leave the poor thing in peace ..."

  The door was locked behind him. "I'm sorry," he began, fully expecting her to go for him with her fists and wondering how he could prevent her from being put in a straitjacket. But her body merely sagged a little. She stared at him moist-eyed, pursing her tremulous lower lip like a child on the verge of tears who knows that crying is forbidden.

  "Wouldn't you prefer to sit down, Frau Bender?"

  She shook her head. `A stroke?" she whispered. "How is he? Will he get over it?"

  "The doctors are very optimistic," he lied. `And your aunt never leaves his bedside."

  "That's good," she murmured. She went over to her bed and sat down after all. He gave her a minute or two to recover from the shock, saw her hopes revive and her shoulders straighten. She raised her head and looked at him. "So you weren't able to speak to him?"

  "No."

  A satisfied smile flitted across her face. "Good," she said. `And I don't want to speak to you either. Go away."

  He didn't budge, although he suddenly felt it would be the best solution. Psychiatry might seem horrendous to someone who didn't need it, but Professor Burthe enjoyed an excellent reputation. Burthe would discover why Georg Frankenberg had had to die. He was also bound to discover whether, when and under what circumstances Cora Bender had met Frankenberg and whether heroin had played a part in it, or whether she had come into contact with the drug later on. His own intentions in regard to her were fundamentally nonsensical. They would yield no evidence that would stand up in court, nor were they likely to establish a connection with Frankenberg. As for his wish to satisfy himself that her aunt had merely been launching another diversionary manoeuvre ...

  He drew a deep breath. "I realize you're angry with me, Frau Bender. I also realize you've no wish to talk to me, but I didn't come here to talk, just to ask you to do something for me."

  Her look of surprise and enquiry was still alloyedwith satisfaction. He felt in his jacket pocket. The hell with it! He'd got hold of the stuff and now he wanted to know the truth. Taking a plastic bag from his pocket, he went over to the table in the middle of the ward and laid out the contents: a hypodermic syringe still in its wrapping, a metal spoon, a candle end, a tourniquet and a small sachet filled with white powder.

  She surveyed them with a look of cold distaste. "What's this, taking a leaf out of the Americans' book? Lethal injections save the state a fortune, and we're pretty broke. What do you want me to do, OD?"

  "There isn't enough in there for that."

  She shrugged her shoulders indifferently. `A little something to cheer me up, then? Very nice of you, but no thanks. They give me enough dope in here already. I'll be interested to see if I can give it up as easily as I did that stuff there."

  "Didyou find it easy to give it up?" He almost grinned. It seemed a tiny indication that her aunt had been telling the truth in this respect.
"If so, you're the great exception," he added. "Other people go through hell."

  "I slept through it," she said tartly.

  He nodded. "Thanks to that nice doctor of yours, I presume. Doctors have ways of easing withdrawal symptoms, of course. From all I've heard, though, most of them make an addict go through hell as part of the cure. Ah well, there are different kinds of hell. We'll talk about that later."

  "I'm not talking at all," she said firmly. "Neither now nor later."

  "Very well," he said. "You don't have to. You don't have to inject yourself either. Just show me you can do it."

  She chuckled derisively. `Ah, so that's it: you've been talking to Margret. What did she tell you? That I didn't know how to fill a syringe? It's different when you're at your wits' end, you know When you're scared of being thrown out because you've already caused a lot of aggro and someone catches you shooting up. You have to think of something fast." She chuckled again. "What happens if I show you I can handle the stuff? Will you leave me in peace at last?"

  When he nodded she got up off the bed and came over to the table. She raised her forefinger like someone bidding a child pay attention. "Good, then let's make a deal. I'll show you. In return, you must leave my father alone as well as me. I want you to shake hands on it."

  He held out his hand, momentarily surprised by the firm grip of her slender fingers. Then he handed her a lighter.

  She sighed, looking at the wrapped syringe and the tourniquet. "But I'm not putting that round my arm," she said. "I never liked the feel of it. It'll be good enough if I fill the syringe and apply it to the back of my hand, won't it? I couldn't get it into my arm anyway. Will that be all right?"

  He nodded again.

  "Let me think, then. It's been quite a while." She put a finger to her head, then said: "First we stick the candle to the table. If it leaves any wax behind, you can explain it to them. It was your idea."

  "You don't have to stick the candle to the table, Frau Bender," he said, but she'd already lit the wick and was dripping wax onto the tabletop by rotating the candle end.

  "But it's safer if your hands shake," she said, "and they usually do. That way the candle won't fall over, at least. You can concentrate on the spoon and make sure you don't spill any of the precious stuff. So, what next?"

  She picked up the sachet, rubbed it between her fingers and peered at the white powder through the transparent plastic. "What is this? It isn't H! You can't give me H!"

  She eyed him thoughtfully with her head on one side. "But you wouldn't do that, you aren't that stupid. You know perfectly well I'd grass on you as soon as your back was turned. What did you put in there? It isn't flour - flour isn't as white as that."

  When he didn't reply she said: "I'm only asking because of the solution. There mustn't be any lumps or it wouldn't go through the needle."

  He still didn't speak. With a shrug, she carefully tore open the sachet and sniffed the contents. Then she moistened a finger and inserted it. Never taking her eyes off him, she slowly put the finger to her lips and dabbed it with the tip of her tongue.

  "Icing sugar," she said. "That's not fair, when I've always had such a sweet tooth. You wouldn't have a knob of butter in your pocket, would you? I could make us a few nice caramels. They'd be more enjoyable than this nonsense of yours."

  When he didn't respond, feeling suddenly stupid and privately cursing Margret Rosch and her opinions, which were just a tactical smokescreen, she shrugged again. `All right," she said, "let's get it over."

  She tipped the contents of the sachet into the spoon, went over to the washbasin and turned on the tap. Having adjusted it until it was only dripping, she held the spoon underneath and gave a nod every time a drop landed in it, almost as if she was counting. Twice she carefully stirred the solution with a fingertip. Then, apparently satisfied with the consistency, she turned off the tap and came back to the table. She smiled at him as she held the spoon over the candle flame. Grovian did his best to look noncommittal.

  `At least the water here is clean," she said. "We used to scoop it out of the loo. Heaven knows what sort of shit I pumped into my arms. No wonder they look as if they've been gnawed by rats."

  She was uncertain, that was unmistakable. Her eyes flitted back and forth between his face and the spoon. Eventually she removed the spoon from the flame, smiled at him and said casually: "I think that's hot enough. I mustn't let it boil."

  Grovian found it hard to suppress a grin. When she picked up the hypo with her free hand, lie caught hold of her arm. "Thank you, Frau Bender, that'll do. You don't have to fill it."

  He didn't know whether to laugh or swear, nor did he know what bearing this had on the Frankenberg case. He only knew that her aunt had been right: Cora Bender genuinely had no idea how to prepare a fix. She had never shot up by herself; she could at most have seen someone else fill a hypo on television.

  He blew out the candle, took the spoon from her and rinsed off the sugar solution under the tap. Then he stowed everything in the plastic bag and replaced it in his pocket.

  "So," he said. "Remember our bargain? If you showed me you could handle the stuff, I'd leave you in peace. Well, now you've shown me you can't handle it, I'm at liberty to ask you a few more questions."

  She was so startled, she simply stared at him for a few seconds before shaking her head and glaring at him angrily. "Did I do something wrong? Yes, I know, I ought to have unwrapped the syringe first. But I'd have done that - I could have managed it with my teeth and one hand. It was mean of you to grab my arm before I could show you, and now you say I couldn't have done it."

  "It wasn't that, Fran Bender."

  "What was it, then?"

  "Why do you want to know? If you've washed your hands of heroin, you've no need to know"

  To hell with fear and feelings of guilt, his own and hers. He was feeling good at this moment - damned good, in fact. The first step had been taken, now for the second. He was undeterred by the fact that she'd sat down on the bed again and was ostentatiously staring out of the window with a face like stone. He felt sure he could induce her to talk. He'd always managed to loosen her tongue and chip away at her wall in the past. Another few well-aimed hammer blows were all it needed.

  "I couldn't speak to your father," he began, "and I never even tried to speak to your mother, but your neighbour proved helpful." He inserted a minute pause before adding the name. "Grit Adigar. I'm sure you remember her."

  She didn't reply, just sucked in her lower lip and went on staring out of the window

  "She told me about Horsti and Johnny Guitar," he went on, mingling Grit Adigar's statements with his own conjectures. `Johnny was a friend of Georg Frankenberg's, and Horsti was a little weed with pale skin and colourless hair. You'd been his girlfriend since you were seventeen. Your neighbour also told me about Magdalena. She told me you were very fond of her. You did everything for her, and her death sent you right off the rails."

  Grovian never took his eyes off her, but all she did was stare out of the window and bite her lower lip. She'd gone pale under the rainbow-hued bruises and the big strip of plaster on her forehead. He felt almost sorry for her, but not quite. Pity wouldn't help her.

  "So," he said again. The word was like an audible punctuation mark. "I'd like you to get something straight, Frau Bender. I'm not your father. I'm not your mother. I'm not your aunt or your neighbour. I imagine you must have been subjected to a lot of questions and recriminations when you came home that time, but I'm not interested in Magdalena. I don't want to know why you left your sister by herself on that particular night. It's completely irrelevant to me, understand?"

  She didn't respond, so he went on: 'All I want to know is, what happened that night at the Aladdin and afterwards? I want to know what became of Horsti, whether you stayed with Johnny, when and where you met Georg Frankenberg, whether and when you came into contact with heroin and who gave it to you. Above all, I want to know the name of the doctor who treated your injuries."
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br />   Still no reaction. Her hands were lying in her lap as though she'd forgotten them. Her lower lip should have been bleeding by now, she was biting it so hard.

  `And don't lie to me again, Fran Bender," he said sternly, as though speaking to a child - which was, in a way, how he looked upon her. "I'll find out one way or another. It may take time, but I'll get there in the end. Two of my men have been on the phone since lunchtime, each with a long list beside him. They're calling every doctor, every hospital in the Hamburg area. You could save us a lot of time and money if you volunteered the information."

  He gave a start, it happened so suddenly. As she repeated the words, her voice rose from a whisper to a shout: "I don't know I don't know! I don't know! I've no wish to know, either; when are you going to grasp that? I didn't go out at all that night - I wouldn't have left my sister alone on her birthday!"

  He raised his hands in a soothing gesture. "Easy, Fran Bender, easy. I'm not talking about your sister's birthday. I know you didn't go out that night. I'm talking about the night in August when she died."

  She shook her head like a wet dog, breathing heavily. Almost a minute went by. Then she slowly raised her arm and pointed to the door. "I'm not talking, I've told you a dozen times. Once and for all: get out! Go away, get lost, you're the bane of my existence. Do you seriously believe I'd confide in you again? You'd have to beat it out of me. If I tell you shit, I'll never be rid of the stink."

  Still shaking her head, she underlined her refusal by stamping her foot several times. "No! That's it! Enough! Stop it, or you'll send me to join my sister. Go away, or I'll shout the house down. I'll tell them you tried to give me some heroin and I tipped it into the washbasin. They'll believe me - you've still got the stuff in your pocket. I'll say you wanted to have sex with me. Try proving the opposite! If you don't go this minute, I'll give you a dose of your own medicine. The boss of this place - he's the only one I'll talk to. I told him everything this morning."

  "Everything?" he said, ignoring her threat altogether. "Did you really tell him the whole story, Frau Bender?"