The Oath

by Klaus-Peter Wolf

  He immediately liked Wilhelm Kaufmann. He had a large collection of crime novels, and that pleased Weller.

  And there were quite a lot of books on astronomy. A rather large telescope for observing the planets was standing next to the window.

  Interesting hobby, Weller thought. But you need time for hobbies. Much more than I have. And it’s a hobby you can only do at night. So Kaufmann was possibly a night owl. Maybe he had trouble sleeping and had chosen this hobby for that reason.

  Weller looked in the fridge. None of it looked like it had been abandoned in haste. Weller could recognise at a glance homes that were abandoned because someone was afraid they would be arrested. This wasn’t the case here. The apartment was tidy. The departure had been carefully planned.

  There was nothing in the fridge that would spoil in the near future. Weller checked the expiry date on the yoghurts. Half a salami, a chunk of cheese wrapped in clingfilm, butter only in individual portion packages, but six of them.

  Undoubtedly the home of a single man.

  Weller liked the coffee machine. Wilhelm Kaufmann clearly didn’t struggle for money, despite being dismissed from the police force, or maybe that was precisely why. He probably earned significantly more than he ever would have if he had stayed with the police.

  There were many notes posted on the corkboard in the kitchen. The rubbish collection schedule, a tide chart, when the ferries to Langeoog ran, a postcard, the telephone number for a heating repairman, and then another small note with the words ‘holiday apartment’ and a telephone number below with the area code 04972.

  Weller called Büscher and was transferred directly to the meeting room.

  ‘Put it on speakerphone, Martin. Can everyone hear me?’

  ‘Yeah. What’s the news?’

  ‘I’m here in Brake and I’d bet anything that Kaufmann is on Langeoog. He has a holiday flat there, which we can reach on the following telephone number.’

  ‘How do you know that?’ Büscher asked again.

  ‘There’s a note on his corkboard. The local authorities must have overlooked it.’

  Rieke Gersema groaned and grabbed her head, but Büscher didn’t let any accusations against his colleagues in Brake stand. ‘Hey, hey, hey, that doesn’t mean anything. I have countless telephone numbers posted on my pinboard, but that doesn’t mean I go to these places.’

  Büscher wrote down the number all the same, thanked Weller, hung up the phone, and then snarled at the others. ‘Why don’t any of you know stuff like this about Kauffman?’

  Rupert had had enough. He burst out, ‘How are we supposed to know where he goes on holiday? We don’t even know him, damn it! That was all ages ago! Most of us only started here after Kaufmann was long gone. This is an old story between Ubbo and Kaufmann. We don’t have anything to do with it. Even someone from Bremerhaven should be able to understand that, right?’

  That was it. Büscher straightened himself up, then let fly. ‘When I was in Bremerhaven,’ he said, ‘none of the suspects we weren’t able to convict were killed! We did solid work and then put people behind bars if that’s where they belonged. None of them became vigilantes!’

  ‘You wouldn’t have dared say something like that if Ann Kathrin Klaasen was sitting here at the table,’ Elke Sommer said.

  ‘My God, what’s become of us?’ Rieke Gersema asked. ‘The atmosphere here is poisonous. We’re tearing each other to pieces. That didn’t used to happen.’

  ‘Sure,’ Rupert said, ‘and this time it’s nothing to do with me. ’ He looked at Büscher, who feared he was being held responsible for the situation.

  *

  Wilhelm Kaufmann began to shiver. He was wet through and his clothes were sticking to his body. He was still coughing and spitting up seawater.

  He saw Birger Holthusen, dead with the dagger in his chest. He knew that his own fingerprints would be on the weapon.

  He considered what he should do. His right bicep was bleeding, but he wasn’t worried. It wasn’t deep, a flesh wound. He could still move his arm. But should he go to a doctor anyway? Had any of the poison made it into his bloodstream?

  Or should he call the police? Tell them the whole story?

  Something terrible had happened. He had a credible confession from Birger Holthusen, admitting he was responsible for the murders of Steffi Heymann and Nicola Billing as well as two other children. But now Birger Holthusen was dead. He’d killed him.

  Doubt rose within him. The conversation he had had in Gelsenkirchen with Ubbo Heide had been really strange. Ubbo suspected him of killing Heymann and Stern, just as Birger Holthusen had done. There was some logic to it, but it still seemed unbelievable to him.

  He felt the urge to wipe his fingerprints from the knife, retrieve the pistol that was hanging out of Holthusen’s pocket, go back to his holiday flat, have a shower, and then drink himself senseless. He thought of the hours of interrogation if he went to the police. No, he wasn’t up to it. Not today. He was exhausted. That fight had really taken it out of him.

  I’m not as young as I was, he thought, and grabbed his heart. If this horrible poison doesn’t work, hopefully my heart won’t give up on me. A tight feeling spread across his chest. He knelt next to the dead man in the sand and wiped the knife clean, grabbed the pistol, and stomped back up the beach.

  The sand will erase any tracks within hours, he thought. And I can still call the police tomorrow if I want to. For now I need peace and quiet. I need to get my thoughts in order, so I don’t get tangled up and confused.

  Kauffman was so worked up when he climbed onto his bicycle that he accidentally turned off the electric motor. He pedalled until his legs were burning. Only then did he realise his mistake and shifted down to third gear shortly before getting home; everything was really easy after that.

  Never in his whole life had he showered as long as that night.

  *

  Svenja Moers felt like she was wrapped in spiderwebs or sticky cotton balls, as if she were pupating.

  She heard a voice, swirling, with elongated vowels. She couldn’t understand the meaning of the words; they were only sounds to her. A foreign, distorted language.

  She tried to open her eyes, but she could hardly see anything through yellowish-white streaks. It was if she were looking out from inside a milky cocoon into an unknown, hostile world.

  Someone was hitting her in the face. She didn’t feel the pain, only heard the slapping and registered that her head shot quickly from right to left and back. It made her dizzy.

  ‘Drink this! You are supposed to drink, damn it!’

  She coughed. Something sloshed out of her mouth and ran down her neck. Her head was pulled upwards, hurting her neck.

  Someone was pressing her lips against a glass. She would really have liked to drink, but her throat felt too narrow, as if it was swollen shut, every passageway clogged. It was hard for her to breathe and she gasped.

  He wiped her face with a moist rag. Then he held something under her nose that smelled disgusting and she was racked by a coughing fit.

  Eventually, she was able to sit upright. There were still stars dancing in front of her eyes, but the white streaks had become transparent.

  She recognised Yves Stern with her in the cell.

  He looked worried, almost friendly, like a doctor in a hospital.

  ‘You can’t die now. You’re a part of something greater. That’s not the way it’s been planned. I brought you some fruit. You need a few vitamins. I’ll bake us another cake. You must hold on! This is all far from over. You can be my witness, see my work come to light.’

  He held a plate of peeled apple slices out to her. ‘Eat.’

  Am I awake? She asked herself. Is this a hallucination? Am I dreaming? Maybe I’m dead?

  How many times had she wished he would come into her cell? Longing for the opportunity to attack him. But at this moment she wasn’t in any position to do so. She’d have no chance of beating him. She wasn’t even able to lift a p
iece of apple and bite into it. She had to gather her strength first.

  He pushed a piece of apple between her lips. Then he showed her some photos. They were of figures made of wood.

  ‘Look, this is the sculpture garden in Hude. I want to complete my work there, under the giant sculpture. The last body will lie underneath it. When the grass grows it looks as if the sculpture is floating. Then everyone will understand that I have not only brought justice, but I’ve also created a work of art – a sculpture as a comment on society. The society in which we live is something like a piece of wood. It has to be formed, hewn. What doesn’t belong has to be removed so that in the end we have something that is beautiful. When I was walking among the sculptures I realised what I had to do. I’d gone on a cycling tour to Hude and had visited the monastery and the mill. The sculptures are on the banks of the River Hude, not far from the Peter Ustinov School. The artist is called Wolf E. Schultz.’

  He’s crazy, she thought, completely crazy. But for some reason he wants me to survive. That’s good. Maybe he just needs a witness. Did he lose a friend? Does he feel lonely? He wants me to join him in what he’s doing. He’s putting me in a position of power – more than just a piece of meat that he can simply dispose of.

  She chewed the apple wedge and was gradually able to speak.

  ‘Give me some water.’

  He held the glass for her and she drank greedily. She felt the vital energy flow back into her body.

  ‘I know the art trail in Dangast,’ she said, establishing a connection. ‘I went there with my first husband.’

  Immediately, she was scared. Had she said the wrong thing? His posture had changed. Was he now viewing her more as a murderer that he had before, rather than the sick person he needed to save from dying?

  ‘Please let me go,’ she said. ‘I won’t give anything away. I just want out. I’m dying in here. I can’t take it. I can’t breathe. It’s too hot. I’m a girl from the coast. I need fresh air, space to move around. Surely you understand. Don’t you?’

  He silently pushed another apple wedge into her mouth. She didn’t know exactly why he did it – to pacify her or re-energise her. ‘I can’t let you go. You’re serving your sentence here. Just accept that.’

  ‘But in every jail the prisoners are let out for fresh air! Don’t you have a garden or courtyard? I could go outside and then come back.’

  He laughed. ‘You’re promising to come back if I let you out of here? Why would you? Because you accept that this is where you belong?’

  ‘Where would I go?’ she asked. ‘I confessed to the murders. It’s all been with the police for a while now. I’d only go from one prison to another.’

  ‘That is true. This prison doesn’t have to stay as uncomfortable as it is at the moment though. We could agree on good food, regular meals, a pleasant temperature. What do you think?’

  She chewed and nodded. He held out aother piece of apple. This time he didn’t put it in her mouth but held it ten centimetres away from her face instead.

  She opened her lips and reached for it. That’s what he wants, she thought. For me to eat from the palm of his hand. And if that’s what he wants, then that’s what I’ll do. The main thing for me is surviving. Regardless of how.

  ‘I could cook for us,’ she said. ‘I could make your favourite dish. What your mother used to cook. My husbands always praised me for being a good cook,’ she lied.

  ‘I understand,’ he said, ‘you want to give me something for the mercy I’ve granted you. You realise that you haven’t earned any of this? I could put you out in the sculpture garden too, under the giant. But that wouldn’t work. After all, you’re not the culmination of everything. It’d be like building a house without finishing the roof.’

  He took a step back and looked at her. Although he was searching her body with his eyes, there was nothing sexual about it. Instead, she felt more like a slave at a market, being assessed for how he could best make use of her.

  Now she was sitting up in the bed. She still felt dizzy, and her extremities were stiff. She had difficulty moving her fingers and her legs, which were under the blanket, felt as if they no longer belonged to her.

  ‘There’s a lot of work to be done here in the house. I have to do everything myself at the moment. And that’s all your fault. I can’t let a cleaning lady or any tradesmen in here. All because of you!’

  He was speaking in an unstable tone, talking himself into a rage. His facial features became harder and he grew taller as he spoke. He must have grown used to walking hunched up so as not to be noticed, but when he stood up straight he was thin but huge.

  ‘I could take care of much of the work. I could cook for us, clean, tidy up the place. We could live together like a married couple.’

  ‘Yeah,’ he grinned. ‘You’d like that, wouldn’t you? And then you’d kill me, like you always kill your husbands.’ He grabbed her by the neck with his right hand and began to choke her. ‘It won’t work this time. I have you under control. I’m not going to fall for those pretty eyes!

  ‘You could start with cleaning up your own cell and keeping it in shape.’ He made a sweeping gesture. ‘Just open your eyes to how it looks in here! Did you always do such a poor job at keeping house? I’m surprised your husbands didn’t kill you.’

  She tried to get up but when her right foot touched the floor it felt like she was stepping onto cotton balls. Her leg tingled, but she couldn’t really feel the floor. Then she fell forward.

  She had the presence of mind to extend her hands forward so that her face wouldn’t slam against the floor. She tried to get back up, but she couldn’t do it unaided.

  He yelled at her, ‘It’s all your fault! You did all of this to yourself! If you’d have been more cooperative, I would have turned down the heat sooner, brought you food and water, but no, the lady always has to exert her will. You don’t just need nourishment, you need exercise! You have to keep fit! Just look at yourself. You are doing a terrible job of looking after the body God gave you. You’re a thankless bitch.’

  He grabbed her by the arm and pulled her up. He pressed her against the bars and used both hands to hold her still, so she wouldn’t collapse again as her knees went slack.

  ‘You’re all skin and bone! And that skin is loose.’ He grabbed her bicep with his fingertips and tugged at her skin, as if it were a piece of fabric.

  ‘Get on the scales over there! From now on we’re going to keep you fit. I want to know how much you weigh.’

  She tried to walk the two steps to the scales. She wobbled back and forth, but got there. Then she stepped onto the scale.

  They read 72.9 kilos.

  ‘How much did you weigh at home, before you came in here?’ he asked. His voice was aggressive.

  Because she didn’t answer, he hissed. ‘Don’t tell me you don’t know! Women weigh themselves all the time. You don’t have any topics for discussion except your weight and stupid diets.’

  ‘I’m always yo-yoing between seventy-four and seventy-six kilos.’

  ‘Well, there you go,’ he laughed, ‘then you’ve lost weight in here. That must please you. But did you weigh yourself fully clothed at home? Be truthful!’

  ‘No,’ she said meekly, ‘of course not.’

  He reached into his side pocket and pulled out a notebook. He laid it in front of her, along with a pen.

  ‘OK, starting now you’ll write down your weight every day. Is that clear? You’ll weigh yourself once in the morning and once at night. I want you to gain some weight. I want this to do you some good, and this notebook will prove it. You’ll write down your precise weight and then,’ he reached for a bag that he’d placed on the floor and she hadn’t even noticed and took something out of it, ‘you’ll blow in here. This will measure your lung capacity. The instructions are in there. Blow in, nice and smooth. And then you write down your lung capacity every day. Besides that, your body temperature will be measured and everything you eat will be recorded. Once you’v
e reached eighty kilos and have shown me that you can behave yourself, then you can watch television with me in the evening and move around the house. Maybe we’ll even get some fresh air together.’ He clapped his hands. ‘Well, it’s good to have a goal, right? From now on you can eat as much as you want. Pasta. Pizza. Cake. You no longer have to worry about keeping a slim figure. Now you’re finally free behind these bars. The first goal is eighty kilos.’

  He looked at her and her face twitched. She didn’t know what to say or think and felt even more afraid.

  ‘OK, now go and get undressed and weigh yourself so we can get some reasonable results. And remember, from now on you’re going to do it twice a day. Morning and night.’

  ‘I don’t even know when it’s morning or night,’ she said, and was glad she was able to offer a little resistance. ‘After all, I don’t have a watch.’

  ‘OK,’ he said, and even seemed a little guilty. ‘OK, I’ll give you a watch so that we can run our experiment properly.’

  He took his own watch from his wrist and tossed it on the bed. ‘Eighty kilos,’ he said, tapping the notebook, ‘Write everything down nicely in here. It’s the proof that I treat you decently, that everything here is orderly.’

  Then he left her cell, locking it behind him and, without turning round once, disappeared between the steel doors and into the hall behind them.

  On the one hand she was relieved. He hadn’t demanded that she get undressed because he wanted to watch her. No, it was something different.

  Although, maybe he’s watching me now, she thought, through the cameras he’s installed. I’m sure he’s doing exactly that.

  But she still got the feeling that her situation had just taken a turn for the better. No, she wouldn’t give up yet. He wanted something from her and he needed the proof that he treated her decently. He wouldn’t rape her or torture her. He was trying to do everything right. He believed he was good and wanted to collect evidence of that.

  She quickly undressed and weighed herself again.

  69.7.

  My God, she thought, I’ve actually lost at least four kilos.

  But what would have previously been a cause for joy now just worried her.