by Lena Bourne
I nod. “So there were two men, not one?”
He shakes his head. “I crawled to the main room to hide behind the bar. The footsteps were coming from the back and I figured I had a better chance of escaping through the windows there. But no one came in. And the man just kept walking, didn’t even stop at the teashop. So I went to the window to see where he was going. It was just one guy, carrying something on his shoulder, something heavy judging by the curses he was spewing and his hard breathing.”
“Something like a body?” I ask.
He shrugs. “It was slung over his shoulder. But not hanging down his back. It looked like a camera on a tripod. But bigger than any I’ve ever seen.”
“And he went down to the river?” I ask.
“Yes. After a while I lost sight of him in the darkness,” he says. “But then, about thirty minutes later, a camera flash went off several times. That’s how I figured he was probably carrying a camera. And then a light came on, a white light like they use on film sets. It lit up the river bank and the grass around it, almost to the path.”
“Did you get a good look at the man then?” I ask, sounding eager despite not wanting to. My heart’s thumping harder and harder.
He shakes his head, the shock stopping my racing heart dead. “I didn’t see him at all in the light. And while he walked past here, it was so dark that all I could see was his shape. He was wearing dark clothes and a dark hat. But he was a big man, tall and broad across the shoulders. Not fat, but built, you know.”
“How tall was he?” I ask. “My height.”
Jakob eyes me appraisingly. “Yes. Maybe a little taller but not much.”
I’m six foot two. In places like Italy or Spain, even Holland, and France, that kind of information might narrow down our suspect list. But Germans, especially in the north, are tall, and a lot of them are built, as the kid puts it. A built guy huffing and puffing carrying just a tripod and camera though? That makes no sense. Though maybe the kid’s fear made him seem louder than he actually was. I bet a whisper carries in the nighttime silence here.
“Anything else you can tell me? Anything else that struck you?”
The kid nods. “Yes. The man was speaking English. And it wasn’t a German speaking it. He sounded just like they do in the movies. Hollywood movies.”
“What? He was talking to himself?” I ask. “Or was someone else with him?”
“I didn’t see anyone else. Maybe he was speaking on the phone, but I didn’t see a phone,” he explains.
“And he was speaking American English?” I ask and the kid nods.
Schmitt is eyeing me pointedly, and I return his gaze. For all his pointed looks and robotic movements, his eyes and face are actually very expressive. Right now he’s thinking, “I knew this monster is an American”, and I hear that as clearly as if he spoke the words.
The thing is, I’ve been suspecting the same thing for months now. I just haven’t told anyone yet.
15
Eva
I make my way out of the tangle of alleys onto the main avenue. Ana is further down it to my left, I recognize her by the tall tower of hair on her head which together with the rest of the black outfit makes her seem impossibly tall.
The woman who said she wanted to talk about Selima is by the kebab place, leaning on the wall and pretending not to notice me as I walk up.
“You got a car?” she asks once I’m standing next to her, without looking at me.
“No,” I say. “Do you know where we can go to talk?”
“How about the city center?” she says, her eyes bright and hopeful.
“Great, let’s find a taxi,” I say, scanning the road for one. “We can have some early dinner while we talk.”
I had the dried end of a baguette dunked in half a cup of yogurt this morning after Mark left, and even that just so I could say I ate something. Truth is, I’m not really hungry now either, but I’m lightheaded and jittery, which means I should eat.
“There are no taxis here,” she says and giggles. “At least not ones picking up passengers. You have to call one.”
I have several taxi services saved in my phone and do as she suggests, calling the one that’s usually the fastest and most reliable. She wanders away from me, telling me we shouldn’t be seen talking by Ana while we wait for a cab. I have no idea how she plans to explain getting into the cab with me when it arrives, and almost ask her, but then a car pulls up next to Ana—a black Audi station wagon—and she gets in without even checking who’s in it. Clearly a regular.
It’s still a long fifteen-minute wait for the taxi to arrive after that, during which the kebab guy comes out, a leery look in his eyes and a fake wide smile on his lips as he not so suavely offers the girl some food, strongly suggesting he’ll take payment in kind. He’s flirting, I realize after watching the woman giggle and coyly lead him on. He’s about her age, I think, which is very early twenties, if that. The more I watch them interact, the more I believe this isn’t the first time they’ve done this. Maybe good things do happen on this street.
The cab arrives, and the girl says goodbye to the guy hurriedly, then climbs into the car before me.
“I’m Eva. What’s your name?” I ask her after I give the guy directions to a small restaurant near my apartment.
“Mirela,” she says, and I don’t think it’s a made-up name.
“And where are you from?” I ask. I have a hunch, and when she tells me Velika Kladusa, the same place Selima was originally from, it’s confirmed. I tell her that in my not stellar, but adequate Serbo-Croatian, asking if that’s where she knew her from. It’s not exactly the same as Bosnian, her native language, but it’s close enough.
“Selima is my cousin,” she tells me in her native language, visibly relieved I speak it too. Her German isn’t very good. “You could say I followed her here then followed in her footsteps too. She never lied about what she was working as here, nor did she ever tell me it’s an easy life. But it’s easier than back home, you know?”
In her eyes there’s a mix of hope, shame, and innocence so naïve, I have to steel myself not to look away from her questioning gaze. I get that look a lot when interviewing those on the edges of society, or beyond that edge, people in professions that most people scoff at, and look down on. She’s trying to justify herself, explain to me that she has no choice but to be a prostitute, that she knows it’s wrong, but it’s her only option. I squeeze her hand, which is frail and very cold.
“I understand,” I tell her. “And you don’t have to explain yourself to me.”
We’ve exited the run-down neighborhood she works in and entered the lively, relaxed one where we’re headed. The streets are full of people despite the winter gloom hanging over the city, and more than a few cafes lining the sidewalks have tables outside which are also full of people, chatting and laughing and just generally enjoying themselves. This is a hip, young, diverse neighborhood in Berlin, up and coming and still cheap to live in. I live just a few blocks from this area and often come to the cafes to work when my apartment starts feeling like the box of loneliness and isolation it is. Mirela is looking out the windows with wide, happily interested eyes, her lips slightly parted.
The cab pulls up to the curb and I pay then climb out, Mirela right behind me.
“I don’t feel out of place here at all,” she says, checking out the street. “That woman’s skirt is even shorter than mine.”
I look where she’s pointing, and she’s not wrong. The punk girl is wearing a short red and black plaid schoolgirl skirt, with ripped fishnets and army boots. I shiver just thinking about going out in fishnets in winter, but she seems not to notice the cold as she chats with her friends—a girl dressed similarly as her, and two guys in tight, ripped black jeans. At a table next to them, a man with long, greasy hair and wearing baggy, wrinkled jeans is having coffee with a young businesswoman in a tight skirt and blazer under a long, wool coat, the belt of which is almost touching the sidewalk. That’s w
hat I love about this neighborhood and this city in general. Everyone is welcome, no one is out of place. I guess it comes out of the bitter experience of being the aggressors in the worst war that the world has ever seen, coupled with living in a divided city for so long, the two sides as starkly different as day and night.
“I thought you’d feel most comfortable here. I know I do,” I tell her. “The restaurant is this way.”
Mario’s is not an Italian restaurant as the name suggests, they cater to every taste. Lately, they’ve even started offering vegan and raw stuff, which I tried the last time I was trying to start living healthy, but it didn’t stick. It’s a small, homely place, with scuffed hardwood flooring and scratched tables and chairs that have seen a lot of use. The rough white walls inside have long since turned yellow from the heat wafting from the pizza oven, and all the cigarettes smoked in the small space before smoking indoors was outlawed. Pictures of celebrities ranging from Mike Tyson to Mickey Mouse line the walls.
I take her to a table in the back, in the shadow of the pizza oven, where we’ll have some privacy, but also a great view of all the other people in here. She starts soaking it all in as soon as she sits down.
“They all seem so relaxed and happy,” she says after the waitress brings us the menus. “I miss that. It’s still like that in Sarajevo sometimes, but not in my village. There every one just complains and bitches all the time. I thought it’d be better here, but so far, I’ve only been to those run-down places in those rundown alleys where we, you know…” that look of shame again. It turns my stomach. “And everyone bitches there too, especially now that the police have started patrolling the area so much and arresting everyone there.”
She doesn’t add that they think it’s because of my article, and I’m thankful for that. It’s really not. It’s because of The Fairytale Killer and the fact that his preferred victim is an illegal prostitute, but I won’t mention that. It’ll just scare her.
“I can help you get off the streets,” I tell her.
She shrugs and gives me a sad little smile. “I’m happy enough.”
The waitress comes back and she orders a vegetable soup, a large pizza, a chocolate milkshake. I get the yellow curry, which is the best I’ve ever tasted anywhere, even though this place offers such a hodgepodge of food that there’s no way they could ever be masters of just one.
“When was the last time you saw Selima?” I ask, thinking I’ll return to offering her help after she knows about the full scope of the danger the streets of Berlin currently pose.
She thinks about it for a while, nodding her side to side. “On the third of January. We had coffee at home and sat and talked for hours. Just like old times, before we both lived here.”
“And then you went to work and never saw her again?” I ask.
“I went to work. It was a very windy and freezing kind of night and so cold even most of the Johns stayed home. I had a total of one client in four hours and then I decided I’d rather be warm and hungry than cold and paid, so I went home. I expected Selima to already be there since I didn’t see her on the street, but she wasn’t.”
“And home is the apartment building next to the factory?” I ask. The place where we found Cinderella. I wonder if she knows about that. She doesn’t seem to.
She shakes her head. “No. That place was grand, but we had to move after the police raided it. We were in an abandoned three-story house near where you found me today. Me and the other girls still live there now.”
“Where do you think Selima could’ve gone that night?” I ask. “Don’t you girls keep an eye on each other?”
“Selima did things her own way, and she had secrets. Her hot soldier boyfriend being the chief one of them. I was the only one who knew about him.”
“Tell me about him,” I say, but her soup arrives just then, and she digs in with a relish I haven’t seen since I watched the last young and very hungry child eat. She’s not talking and I don’t have the heart to force her to stop eating.
So, Selima had a boyfriend that she was keeping secret from everyone. Did she consider him a way out for her? Her one and only plan of getting out of the street life was to meet a guy and marry him. She was never interested in me helping her get a residency permit, which would allow her to get a real job. I figured I’d have time to convince her. Now that time’s run out. The knot that forms in my throat is so hard I have trouble breathing, let alone swallowing. It’s a good thing I wasn’t served yet.
“What did you ask me?” Mirela asks, pushing the empty soup bowl away and wiping her mouth with the back of her hand before thinking to use the napkin by her side.
“The man Selima was seeing, tell me about him,” I say ignoring the waitress who comes to take the empty soup bowl and hoping the rest of the food won’t arrive right away.
“He was a big guy, very good looking, muscular, a good catch. Blond, blue-eyed, typical all-American jock, you know,” she says and I nod. I don’t really know, but I bet she does. There’s no shortage of US military presence where she comes from, she must know all about jocks.
Her pizza and my curry and rice arrive, but I don’t touch it.
“Was he a soldier? An American soldier?” I ask. That description sure makes it sound like that.
“Yes, and I was surprised when she told me,” she says, pausing to take a bite of her pizza. It came pre-sliced, and she’s holding it folded over double the way Mark eats his. Where I come from, we use a fork and knife to eat a pizza, but I like this method.
“Why?” I ask to nudge her along since I don’t want her to stop talking again.
“You know, soldiers are always just looking for a good time, and you can’t count on them for anything,” she says. “So I was surprised that Selima was so serious about him. But he was apparently from a rich family. Though that could’ve been a soldier lie. They’re known for those too.”
Mark is the only US soldier that I’ve ever gotten to know well, and he’s the most truthful person I know. But then again, he is older.
“How old was this man?” I ask.
She shrugs, taking a large bite of pizza and chewing slowly.
“Younger than thirty, I’d say,” she finally says. “But I don’t know exactly.”
“And do you know his name?”
“Russell. I remember that because it’s such an old man's name and didn’t fit him at all,” she says while still chewing. “His last name started with a P, something weird like Parcibal or something like that.”
I’ve never heard that last name.
“And how sure are you that he was the last person to see Selima alive?”
“You think she’s dead?” Her eyes go very wide. If I could, I’d kick myself so hard I’d scream out. The names of the last four victims haven’t been revealed yet. I only know it because Mark told me off the record.
I smile and shake my head. “Sorry, I got carried away there. I don’t think she’s dead…well…well…we don’t know what happened to her now, do we? And my thoughts just always go to the worst possible scenario, I’m weird like that.”
I smile in a way that I hope isn’t transparent at all. Eventually, she offers me a tiny little smile too.
“I’ve been thinking that too,” she says, letting the crust of the slice she was eating fall to the plate and not picking up another.
“It’s hard not to, but she might just be having a good time with this guy, you know,” I say so hopefully I almost believe it’s a possibility myself.
She shrugs. “I don’t know…”
“Come on, finish your pizza,” I say, finally picking up my fork. “Then I’d like you to speak with my boyfriend. He’s an investigator and has been helping me look for Selima. He’ll want to know what you just told me.”
My heart is thumping so hard I can’t take a full breath, let alone take a bite of my food. Mark once told me that in every investigation they always focus on the victims last 24 hours and especially on the people they were with las
t. This usually holds the key to solving the crime. Could Mirela be the key that finally leads to catching The Fairytale Killer? I dare not hope it, but I do.
“OK, yes, that’d be good,” she says and picks up another slice. Her eyes aren’t innocent anymore, or happy. They’re sharp as she gazes into mine, as though she’s trying to read what I’m not telling her. I keep my face as neutral as I can while I eat my curry.
Mark hasn’t called me all day, but I’ll call him as soon as we’re done eating. He needs to hear Mirela’s story.
16
Mark
Jakob protested and fought when Schmitt told him we need to take him with us to the station, but he had no other choice and between us, we managed to drag him and his belongings to the parking lot at the entrance of the park. There was no other choice for him because he’s the closest thing to a witness we’d found in this case, and we are therefore not letting him out of our sight. Schmitt and I barely had to glance at each other to agree on that.
The sky is a few shades darker than it was all day as I follow Schmitt’s dark grey Volkswagen sedan. The thick, snow-laden clouds are still hanging low over the city, and the night is settling. It’s been twenty-four hours since Pocahontas’ body was found and the more I consider it, the more it seems to me that she could be the key to catching this madman. I had the first kernel of that idea as soon as I saw the photos in Thompson’s office and finding our first eyewitness kind of confirmed it. She’s the only one who doesn’t fit with the others.
Pocahontas wasn’t a princess in the true sense of the word, and she’s not a fairytale princess either. She was the daughter of an Indian tribal chieftain, and if I remember correctly, she was an actual person who died very young and inspired many works of fiction, including the cartoon. Either The Fairytale Killer is branching away for fairytales as inspiration for his kills, or she’s a message. I’ll just treat her as such and hope I never have to find out if the former is actually the case. That’s why I chose to revisit her crime scene first.
