Alphabet House (43 page)

Lankau stepped over Bryan, who lay doubled up on the floor. Behind him Laureen sat still, shaking. She was paralyzed by the prospect of ending up as dog food.

Suddenly Lankau kicked aside the remains of his chair that had been used as a weapon in the heat of battle. Bryan leaned his head back and caught a glimpse of a couple of taut animal hides stretched out on the wall behind him. In between the hides was an almost invisible handle, painted the same colour as the wall. As Lankau took hold of it, a rush of fresh air entered the room that made Bryan feel dizzy. Double doors opened onto a terrace, revealing the moon rising in half-darkness. Lankau flipped a switch on the outer wall of the house, at which point a flood of light revealed the outdoor facilities in sharp detail. He took a step on to the terrace.

At last Bryan felt the Kenju lying snugly in his left hand. He would have to turn around and pull himself up to precisely the right angle if he were to have a hope of hitting his target. It was almost impossible to fire upwards at a sharp angle with his hand tied at waist-level. Bryan turned cautiously towards the double doors, waiting for Lankau to step backwards into the room. Laureen had almost stopped breathing.

The distance was less than fifteen feet when Lankau backed in. The shot was fired just as he was about to turn around.

The dull thud of the bullet hitting the beam just beside his head made him look back in astonishment.

At the next shot he had vanished back onto the terrace.

‘Did you hit him?’ Laureen asked, getting hysterical. She’d been hyperventilating for a couple of seconds before daring to speak. ‘He’s going to kill us, Bryan!’ She was sobbing now.

Bryan wasn’t sure. Maybe the second shot had hit. He turned towards the window facing the road, but saw only the faint outlines of some tall trees.

For a long time he was certain Lankau was just waiting. In fact, that was all he needed to do. Although Bryan had a joker in his hand, his situation was not good. Laureen constituted a weapon to be used against him. Lankau would attack her instantly if he left her side. That would be the wrong way to play the joker. And it was just as well. His mobility was greatly restricted by his bound feet. His arms weren’t too useful, either.

After Laureen’s final sniffle everything was quiet. Night birds were on the move in the distance. A faint hum from the swimming pool’s filtering system was practically all that could be heard. There was no sound of breathing, no movement, no trace of life beyond the double doors.

‘He’s going to kill us, Bryan,’ Laureen repeated, this time much more faintly. Bryan shushed her sharply. There was no doubt the front door had been opened. Silently. But there was no mistaking the draught that suddenly swept the floor.

Bryan turned onto his back and tried to take aim at the door to the entrance hall. The thought that Lankau might have a gun hidden somewhere made him turn ice-cold. He fired the moment the figure stepped into the room. The dry wood of the doorframe splintered, leaving a hole bigger than a teacup.

Bryan’s heart stopped beating the instant the figure acquired form. His finger froze on the trigger, drained of will and intent.

He could have fainted.

Fully illuminated by the light from outside stood the person over whom he’d been brooding, for whom he’d been mourning and sacrificing himself for a lifetime in a bottomless feeling of loss. The brother he’d lost so long ago. The friend he had failed, deserted and betrayed.

The torn earlobe was the first thing Bryan registered.

It was James.

He stood there like a ghost, looking him straight in the eyes. He hardly looked older, merely different. The shot hadn’t made him flinch in the slightest. He simply stood completely still, trying to comprehend what he saw.

As the figure stepped forward, Bryan stammered his name repeatedly.

Laureen was holding her breath again, looking alternately at the stranger and at the door to the terrace.

Bryan didn’t notice her. The hand holding the Kenju had quit obeying him. His eyes were blinded by tears.

‘James…!’ he whispered.

As the figure in front of him knelt down, Bryan tried to absorb every single one of his features, as though James might vanish just as quickly as he’d appeared.
You’re alive
, his eyes said, laughing.

The figure in front of him expressed nothing.

James glanced at Laureen and over towards the open door. Then he turned and looked Bryan straight in the eyes, but his gaze was dead. ‘Watch out for Lankau,’ Bryan pleaded, feeling his friend’s breath on his face. ‘He’s here!’

At these words James gently took the gun out of his hand. Bryan sighed deeply. It was incredibly wonderful and incomprehensible. He looked up at his friend again and wriggled his left arm. ‘Untie me, James. Quickly!’

The spit hit Bryan in the face like a whiplash. In a second, James’ face contorted and became completely unrecognisable. The Kenju quivered as it pointed straight at Bryan’s temple. The turnaround came so quickly that Bryan was still wearing a frozen smile.

The next moment Lankau stepped back inside, obscuring the light from the terrace.

James looked at him without changing expression.

‘Gerhart! What the hell are you doing here?’ Despite his coarse manner, Lankau addressed him in a friendly fashion. ‘Not that you’ve chosen the wrong moment. Not at all!’ He came closer, at the same time guarding himself against any new, unpleasant moves from the recumbent von der Leyen. ‘It’s good you’ve come, my friend!’ He raised his hand slowly in a cordial, accommodating fashion, his face ever watchful. ‘You’ve done the right thing. You’ve helped me. Well done!’

Von der Leyen appeared unable to stop trembling. He seemed paralyzed, a pleading expression on his face. ‘Please…!’ was all that passed his lips.

The word hit Gerhart Peuckert like a smack in the face. He backed his way towards the entrance hall in the midst of snarled exchanges between Lankau and the figure lying prone on the floor. There was no sign of agitation. His face was blank.

‘Come now, Gerhart,’ Lankau said, smiling broadly to disguise his excitement and anger. ‘Give me that gun. It’s not such a good thing to be walking around with.’

Lankau looked at him imploringly, stretching out his hand tentatively. Gerhart shook his head. ‘Just calm down, Gerhart. Let me put the safety on for you. You mustn’t do that on your own. Come. Everything’s good now.’

Lankau looked him in the eyes. The defiance he saw was something new. ‘Come on now, Gerhart. Give it to me or else I’ll get angry!’ Lankau went right up to him. ‘Give it to me!’ he demanded, with outstretched hand. The defiance in Gerhart Peuckert’s eyes intensified. He put on the Kenju’s safety latch, but didn’t hand it over.

Lankau retreated to the middle of the room and looked at Peuckert as if he were a naughty schoolboy. ‘Gerhart,’ he tried again, ‘what do you think Stich and Kröner would say if they saw you like this? You give me that pistol now, OK?’

The words that came left him completely dumbfounded. ‘They wouldn’t say anything. They’re dead.’

Lankau’s jaw dropped. It was the first time he’d heard Gerhart Peuckert speak coherently.

This was a hellish situation. Could what the idiot said really be true? Lankau went over to the telephone and dialled Stich’s number. After several fruitless attempts, he phoned Kröner. No one answered there, either. Lankau replaced the receiver and nodded quietly without looking directly at Gerhart. ‘No, there’s nobody home,’ he frowned. ‘Maybe you’re right.’ Gerhart looked at him as if his chain of thought had been interrupted. The multitude of impressions had apparently begun to confuse him. ‘I don’t know what to believe,’ Lankau continued, tilting his head. ‘How did you get out here, Gerhart?’

‘I walked,’ Gerhart answered promptly, pursing his lips.

Lankau looked at him guardedly. ‘You did the right thing, Gerhart,’ he finally said, his face lighting up in a big, ugly grin. ‘Absolutely! But why aren’t you with Peter and Andrea? What’s happened?’ Lankau studied him. The idiot’s atypical shrug of the shoulders and upturned gaze would get on anyone’s nerves. ‘Did you see anything?’ Lankau persisted. He shook his head as he saw Peuckert’s expression. ‘What about Petra? Why didn’t you go to her? She lives much closer to Stich’s flat.’

‘Petra was together with that one over there,’ Gerhart said, pointing accusingly at Laureen, who sat with closed eyes.

‘Do you think Petra’s in league with these two?’ Lankau left the question hanging for a moment and glanced once more at the weapon lying loosely in Gerhart’s hand.

The gun barrel pointed further and further upwards with each step Lankau took forward. ‘We can trust each other, can’t we, little Gerhart? No, you needn’t be afraid that I’ll take the pistol from you. Why should you harm me? I’m the only one you can trust.’

Gerhart’s eyebrows rose slowly.

‘It’s OK to put the gun down, Gerhart. Put it on the table and come help me with von der Leyen.’ Lankau watched with satisfaction as Gerhart complied. ‘We’re going to write his last chapter.’

Despite the woman’s despairing look, Arno von der Leyen made no attempt to resist. He fell limply into Peuckert and Lankau’s grasp.

The terrace was greyish white. The swimming pool fitted naturally into the architectonic layout. Leaves were already floating on its surface. Lankau, who was carrying Bryan’s foot end, snorted as he made straight for the edge. The water level was high. The pool had not yet been drained after the long summer.

Von der Leyen struck his head as they dropped him on the tiled edge of the pool. Peuckert stood over him, looking him straight in the eyes. Von der Leyen returned his look with one of distress until his eyes rolled up and he mercifully lost consciousness.

‘It serves him right!’ Lankau said, straightening up. ‘Now we’ve just got to make it look more or less natural, don’t we?’ he added to himself. ‘Someone might come looking for him and they’d be bound to find something they shouldn’t. Like fingerprints and such,’ he muttered merrily. ‘So it’s better that he’s all they find.’ Lankau nudged the unconscious body disdainfully with the toe of his broad shoe.

‘And what, in fact, will they find?’ he muttered again. ‘A drowned foreigner with a belly full of alcohol, that’s what.’ He bared his crooked teeth.

Her eyes were so swollen that Laureen could scarcely see Lankau when he re-entered the room. ‘Hey,’ he said, glancing at her mischievously, ‘this ought to do it!’ He held up the magnum bottle for her to see and went out into the night air again.

‘What do you say, Gerhart?’ he asked the motionless man, who stood studying the unconscious figure. ‘Isn’t this just the
answer? Come to think of it, that’s how the bastard had planned to get rid of me!’ He knelt down beside the swimming pool and scooped up a handful of chlorinated water. ‘If it had been up to this swine, I’d have drowned in the Rhine, wouldn’t I?’ He nodded to himself in answer.

Bryan jerked to the side when the cold water struck him in the face. For a moment he was confused. He wasn’t afraid until he saw James’ blue eyes riveted on him.

Then reality returned.

The years had robbed him of his childhood friend and given him a monster instead. And it was his own fault. It was an insight that destroyed his peace of mind, a realisation that would prevent him from returning to his old life, even if he managed to survive his present nightmare. Bryan shook his head at the thought. He tugged at his bound arms.

‘That’s right,
Herr
von der Leyen!’ came from above him. ‘Time to wake up, because now we’re going to drown you like a rat. You’re going to get a taste of your own medicine!’

Bryan tried in vain to defend himself. A quick jerk backwards loosened his neck vertebrae with a faint crunching sound, like at a chiropractor’s. The bottle had no trouble finding his lips. Every time he pulled his head away, Lankau squeezed his neck tighter with his free hand. His fingers closed off the carotid arteries with deadly precision until Bryan began to black out and his lower jaw drooped.

Finally he stopped resisting.

After a long gulp his throat began to burn and the vodka almost choked him. Lankau loosened his hold and let him cough. ‘We can’t have you suffocate, can we? That’s not the plan.’

‘There’ll be an inquest,’ Bryan sputtered. ‘They’ll find marks on my body. I have deep wounds. They’ll be hard to explain, you pig!’

‘Maybe, and maybe not. Who knows whether they’ll find anything? Perhaps the pathologist will have a bad day. He sometimes does. I happen to know all about that!’ Lankau took a single swig from the enormous bottle. ‘Perhaps I even know him. Yes, come to think of it, I know him pretty well.’ He took
another swig. ‘Aaah!’ he said, exhaling deeply. ‘We’d better say that you and I were drinking together, but you were a bit less seaworthy!’ He laughed so hard, his whole stomach shook.

Bryan felt his surroundings losing their meaning.

Still laughing, Lankau pushed Bryan forward until he hung halfway over the edge of the pool. Again he wrenched Bryan’s head back and forced a big gulp into him. ‘You might as well drink, my friend. It’ll be easier for you that way.’

The vodka warmed his lips. The bottle had done its job and would soon be empty. The water below him was almost beautiful with its delicate, green reflections. He scarcely felt Lankau push his head underwater. It swaddled him, cool and soft, like the feeling of a fresh pillow in a feverish sleep. The second before he’d have to give up and breathe the water into his lungs, Lankau heaved him up again.

After another two plunges he succumbed to a feeling of indifference. The alcohol had had its redeeming effect.

‘I don’t hear you complaining!’ Lankau’s acrid breath was close to him as the water streamed off Bryan. ‘Are you still there, you swine, or have you had too much to drink? Are you going to deny me the pleasure?’ He shook Bryan’s head back and forth. Bryan saw only flickering images.

More determined than irritated, Lankau flung him down again. ‘Then we must have another go, I’m afraid. I want you screaming for mercy!’ His eyes bore through Bryan’s foggy gaze. ‘You’re going to get to see that female of yours crushed to death in the wine press over there. And Petra, too. We’ll take her first, since she’s already been prepared. In the meantime you can come to yourself a bit so you’ll be fresher when it’s wifey’s turn. A little flip of the switch out in the pantry, and hey, presto! All over! That’s what can happen when someone rubs me the wrong way. Maybe it’ll affect your tenacity.’ He thrust out his jaw, clutching the magnum bottle. ‘It’s a pity for Stich and Kröner that I didn’t get to you a little earlier, but never mind. He who laughs last, laughs best.’

Lankau snorted and took another swig. His hair was tangled, his whole upper body wet with chlorinated water. With extreme difficulty he got up and leaned over Bryan. ‘You take hold of him there, Gerhart. We’ve got to get him over to the shed!’