JF05 - The Valkyrie Song (15 page)

He took his English tweed jacket from the back of his chair and unhooked his raincoat from the rack. As he made for the door he almost expected the phone to ring.

It did.

It was strange, given the very nature of his job, that the one thing that Fabel had never fully come to terms with was the sudden extinction of life.

He had heard that astronauts, once they are truly in space, look back at the Earth and tend to become, in that instant, either entirely atheistic or totally convinced of the existence of a god. No middle ground. Whether in reality it was as absolute as that, Fabel could understand the experience. He had a similar feeling every time he looked at the dead. A corpse has no humanity: it doesn’t look like someone sleeping, it becomes nothing more than a human-like object. An empty shell. And in Fabel’s case, most of the dead he looked upon had been forcibly evicted from that shell.

Where some would have seen the vessel abandoned by the departing soul, Fabel saw only emptiness. The final shutting down of an interdependence of biological systems. The ending of a universe seen from a never-to-be-repeated viewpoint.

However Armin Lensch had seen the world, he wasn’t seeing it now.

His body lay on a scrubby patch of grass and rubble down near the shore of the River Elbe, close to Hafenstrasse. A few empty beer bottles and the wheel of some long-discarded child’s toy served as his pillow, and the grass on which he lay was framed by broken red bricks from whatever dock
building had stood there at one time. The rain had turned to sleet, then to snow so the technicians had erected a white forensics tent to protect the crime scene and had illuminated it with lights on telescopic stands. Like Westland, Lensch had been sliced across the belly and his viscera, spilling sideways from the mouth-like gape of the wound, glistened in the harsh light of the arc lamps the forensic team had erected. A nauseating stench from his sliced-open abdomen lingered in the air of the forensics tent.

A man almost completely concealed in white hooded coveralls, blue latex gloves and a surgical mask came over to Fabel.

‘Hello, Jan.’ Holger Brauner, the forensics chief, slipped the mask from his face and smiled. ‘It’s a nippy one tonight …’

Fabel returned the smile. Brauner was almost invariably cheerful, despite the nature of his work. Or maybe because of it. ‘Hi, Holger. What’s the story?’

‘From my estimation, we’re talking about a male, twenty-nine years old, one-seventy-nine centimetres tall, white-collar job – finance sector – blood group O rhesus negative, suffers from a nut allergy and lives in Eppendorf.’

‘Very impressive, Sherlock,’ said Fabel. ‘You found his wallet, didn’t you?’

‘No, of course not. I established it all with DNA and the arcane skills of the forensic wizard. Do you never watch
CSI
?’ Brauner grinned and held up a plastic evidence bag containing a black leather wallet and a state identity card. ‘It’s all in there,’ he said. ‘All his credit cards and cash too, as far as I can see. Cellphone as well. Robbery doesn’t seem to have been the motive.’

‘Leave the detective work to us, lab rat,’ said Fabel, with a grin. Someone entered the tent behind him and he turned to see Anna and Werner. It had been Werner who had called Fabel. Werner rolled his eyes as he and Anna stepped back into the enclosed scene of crime. Fabel read his meaning: Anna’s make-up was thrown out in stark contrast to the
pallor of her skin. It was the same effect he had seen on Viola Dahlke; in Anna’s case it was Armin Lensch’s mutilated belly, which she worked so hard not to look at, that was the cause of her lack of colour. Tough little Anna’s Achilles heel and another reason for her to consider a transfer.

‘You all right?’ Fabel asked.

‘I’m fine,’ said Anna defensively, but she still avoided looking at Lensch. ‘So we’ve got number two. Looks like we’re at the start of another series.’

‘I need you two to get on to finding out when he was last seen, who he was with … Werner, what is it?’ Fabel noticed Werner leaning close to the body, staring at the dead man’s face intently.

‘Anna, come here and look.’

‘Yeah … very funny.’

‘No, Anna, I mean it. Look at him – isn’t he the guy from earlier? When we were arresting Dahlke?’

Anna moved closer, holding the back of her hand to her nose. ‘Shit … you’re right.’

‘Okay,’ said Fabel. ‘Let’s have it.’

‘Just a coincidence,
Chef
,’ said Anna. ‘I
think
it’s a coincidence. Remember we told you there was a bit of trouble when we arrested Dahlke – the drunks …’

‘I remember.’

‘He was the ringleader,’ said Werner.

Fabel looked down at Lensch. The dead man’s lips gaped slightly as if to speak and his eyes were still half open, as if a camera had caught him mid-blink. His hair was cut short and had been styled with some form of gel. The shirt looked as if it had been expensive, but the lower half was now sodden with blood. Lensch’s trousers were unfastened and his fly half unzipped. The slice across his belly again spoke of a single, purposeful stroke. Whoever had killed him had known what they were doing. Had done this before.

‘So why wasn’t he arrested?’ asked Fabel. ‘Did he go quietly?’

‘He moaned a bit,’ said Anna and Fabel caught Werner firing a look at her.

‘Don’t tell me, Anna …’ Fabel said, exasperated.

‘Listen,
Chef
, things were starting to turn ugly. We were waiting for back-up and Sonny Boy here started to give us gyp. It is regulations that if someone acts aggressively and they’ve been warned to stay one and a half metres away, if they step closer we can knock them to the ground.’

‘Is that what happened? Did you give him a formal warning?’

‘We told him to back off,’ said Werner. ‘It was this guy who was stirring it up. Anna acted properly, Jan.’

‘Did you draw your firearm?’

‘Yes,’ said Anna.

‘So why haven’t you submitted a report? Did you strike him?’

‘Well, yes – kind of.’ A sigh. ‘I kneed him in the groin.’

‘Marvellous! Bloody marvellous, Anna. You realise you’re going to have to make a full report to that effect? Any swelling you caused will probably be noted in the autopsy. For Christ’s sake, Anna. And you, Werner – I thought you’d have the sense to keep her on a short chain.’

‘A short
what?
’ Anna glowered at Fabel.

‘Okay, Anna, leave it …’ said Werner. ‘Jan – when this guy here started to kick up, we thought there was a good chance we had the Angel in custody. Or at least Jake Westland’s murderer. And like Anna said, we were outnumbered. I think you should let this one go.’

‘Oh, you do, do you?’ Fabel sighed. ‘Anna, make sure you have a complete report on my desk tomorrow.’ He looked at the ID Brauner had handed him in the polythene evidence bag. ‘Armin Lensch … Did you see where he went after you had dealt with him?’

‘He followed on after his mates,’ said Anna. ‘They went in the direction of Hans-Albers-Platz.’

‘Then I suggest you get enlargements of this …’ He tossed her the evidence bag with Lensch’s identity card. ‘And start going around the bars to see if you can find where he was and when. Werner, check out next of kin. Speaking of which, have you seen Dahlke’s husband?’

‘Not yet. We were on our way when we got this shout.’

‘Okay, leave Anna to get started on the bars – I’ll arrange a uniform to chaperone her – and you head out to get the story from Dahlke’s husband.’

‘Okay, Jan,’ said Werner. ‘But it’s a bit redundant now, isn’t it? I mean, she can’t have done this guy. She’s been in custody since we last saw him alive.’

‘We still need to confirm her alibi for Westland.’

Fabel made his way down the steep embankment to St Pauli Hafenstrasse, where his car was parked next to the silver and blue police cruisers. He felt tired and irritated and, for a moment, he nearly headed off in the direction of the city centre and Pöseldorf, where he had had his attic flat for five years. Instead he turned west towards Altona: his new home. His shared home.

Hamburg is a city where gentility and prurience rub shoulders uncomfortably: the deliberate vulgarity of St Pauli sits directly next to the restrained gentility of one of the grander parts of Altona. Back in the days when Altona was Danish, St Pauli was the marshy no-man’s-land between it and German Hamburg. Both Altona and Hamburg were resolutely Lutheran. Catholics seeking freedom to worship had to find it outside the boundaries of both cities: hence the street called Grosse Freiheit, the Great Freedom. But St Pauli had also become a dumping ground: a place known in the late Middle Ages for its unsavoury inhabitants, its poorhouses and its pestilence hospitals.

Yet, as Fabel headed along Breitestrasse, it took only a couple of minutes for the crude glamour of St Pauli to give
way to the wide tree-lined boulevard of Palmaille, with its grand villas on either side. It had started to snow and the naked branches of the trees sparkled in the lamplight.

Fabel suddenly had an idea. He pulled over to the kerb and reached down between his legs and under the driver’s seat. His fingertips brushed against something small and metallic.

‘Got you, you little swine.’ After a little scrabbling he retrieved his MP3 player and put it into the plastic tray behind the handbrake. He replaced his seat belt, pulled out into the road and resumed his journey. As he did so, his smile faded. At the next junction he made a left into Behnstrasse. Then another left into Struenseestrasse. Left again and he was back on Palmaille.

It was still there.

Fabel had first noticed it as he had driven off after finding his MP3 player. Headlights about sixty metres behind him, pulling out maybe thirty seconds after he had. The last three manoeuvres had made no sense and the car behind had followed. What bothered Fabel was that he had only just picked up on it. Whoever was following him knew what they were doing. God knew how long they had been on his tail: at least from the murder scene, and maybe before that. Fabel was not far from the apartment he shared with Susanne, but he was not going to drive there. He had no idea who was on his tail, or how dangerous they were. He swung across Palmaille and headed straight on towards Neumühlen and Övelgönne. As he drove, he flipped open his cellphone.

‘Principal Chief Commissar Fabel here,’ he said to the operations room officer who answered his call. ‘I’m in Altona, on Palmaille heading west. I’ve just passed the fishing museum. Where’s your nearest traffic camera?’

‘There’s one at the junction with Max-Brauer-Allee.’

‘I’m in a dark blue BMW 3-series, old shape. There’s very little on the road but there’s a car behind me. When I turn
north into Max-Brauer-Allee, could you get his index number and check it out?’

‘Yes, Chief Commissar. Do you need assistance? I could send an area car.’

‘It’s probably nothing, but if there’s one available, send it to the Max-Brauer-Allee. Call me back on this number when you have a make on the car.’

Fabel turned into Max-Brauer-Allee at the intersection. As he drove north he checked that his tail was still there. The white baroque edifice of Altona City Hall slid by on his left and as he passed the road end at Platz-der-Republik, he saw the silver and blue police cruiser waiting at the junction. His cellphone rang.

‘Chief Commissar Fabel, Presidium Ops Room here – we got the index plate. The car behind you is a Mercedes CLK cabriolet, registered to a Sylvie Achtenhagen, Edgar-Ross-Strasse, Altona. Isn’t that …?’

‘Yes, it is. Thanks. Tell the patrol car to pull her over.’

Fabel drew into the kerb once he had seen in his rear-view mirror that the Mercedes had been pulled over. He got out and approached Achtenhagen, who was out of her car and remonstrating with the two uniformed officers.

‘Thanks, I’ll take it from here,’ he said to the uniforms.

‘This looks like harassment,’ said Achtenhagen in halfhearted indignation. ‘Pulling over members of the press for no good reason. Other than, that is, the fact that I’m embarrassing you by pointing out your incompetence to the public.’

‘Are you quite finished?’ asked Fabel, with a sigh. ‘I want to know why you were following me.’

‘I wasn’t. I live in Altona.’

‘Cut the crap, Frau Achtenhagen. It’s nearly three-thirty in the morning and I have a home to go to. You trailed me in a complete circle. You’ve been on my tail since I left the murder scene.’

‘There’s been another murder?’ asked Achtenhagen. Her shock was about as genuine as her earlier indignation. Fabel folded his arms across his body, signalling his impatience for Achtenhagen to stop the pretence.

‘Okay …’ she sighed. ‘But I’ve got every right to drive where I want and follow who I want. You and your department have been less than helpful. I decided I would keep tabs on you. It sure as hell paid dividends tonight. Who was the victim?’

Fabel remained silent.

‘Listen, Herr Fabel. You and I haven’t got off to a good start.’

‘We haven’t got off to any kind of start. It’s not my job to deal with the media. I told you that. And, let’s face it, Frau Achtenhagen, satellite television isn’t exactly the home of in-depth quality news analysis. I’ve heard your theories about how broadcasters should make the news, not just report it. All you want is sensationalism. Gory details and a cartoon-character villain to scare the public with. I deal in the real world.’