Raven Sisters (Franza Oberwieser Book 2) (12 page)

21

I was there.

And as she stood there in her house that smelled of damsons, as she looked at me with shocked eyes, I knew immediately. I knew I loved her again. Loved her as I had back then.

We sat in her kitchen, among the late harvest of damsons from the big tree in the garden. There was so much to talk about.

22

“OK,” said Herz. “We’re on the second day. Status report. Let’s take stock before we go any further.”

Around the table in the meeting room were all the investigators involved in the case, or rather the cases—Franza, Arthur, and Hansen from Missing Persons. Borger, the coroner, and the district attorney, Dr. Brückl. Felix was at the head of the table. He stood and pinned Gertrud’s photo on the bulletin board, writing her name beneath it.

“Our murder victim. Gertrud Rabinsky, forty-four years of age. She ran a pottery shop in the town center. Married to Christian Rabinsky. Mother of two children. Between Thursday night and Friday morning she was stabbed in her kitchen. We found the murder weapon next to her corpse. A kitchen knife, the kind used for chopping vegetables or slicing bacon. The handle hadn’t been wiped and we found the fingerprints of three people. One set belongs to the murder victim. Unfortunately, the other two are still unknown to us. Do we know the precise time of death yet? Borger?”

“Midnight,” Borger said. “As I thought from the start.”

“Can you give us any more detail about the nature of the injuries?”

Borger nodded. “Three stab wounds were inflicted with great force, indicating a similar strength of emotion. All the stab wounds were in the breast region, and one went straight to the heart, which led to a quick death. The wounds were inflicted from above. May I demonstrate?”

He stood and looked at Franza. “May I have your assistance?”

Franza rose and stood before him. He raised his hand to head height, balled it into a fist, and brought it down three times in rapid succession against Franza’s upper body. “Something like that.”

They sat down again, and he continued, “If we can judge from the angles of entry, and there’s no reason why we shouldn’t, the perpetrator is a person between five feet nine and six feet in height.”

“Hm,” Franza said. “That doesn’t narrow down the range of suspects much. It’s quite a common height.”

Borger shrugged regretfully. “Sorry.”

“Does the force of the blows indicate a male perpetrator at all?”

Borger shook his head. “No, not at all. A sharp knife like this penetrates easily. And if someone’s angry, acting in the heat of the moment
. . .
Yes, a woman would be capable of it, too.”

“OK,” Herz said, nodding slowly. “Anything else, Borger?”

“Well, it may not be relevant, but the knife was used before the attack to cut sausage—salami, to be precise—Emmentaler cheese, onions, and tomato. I found traces of them in the stab wounds. And she had eaten these things herself. Our victim. Her last supper, so to speak.” He paused briefly. “I found them in her stomach. Fairly undigested.”

They nodded. Borger’s analyses of stomach contents were always very graphic.

“Another thing,” Borger said. “I did actually find some skin particles beneath her fingernails.”

“Aha,” Franza said. “Can we assume that there’s someone missing these skin particles, who now has corresponding wounds?”

Borger nodded. “Precisely, my dear—you’ve got it. Scratches. Someone must have clear scratch marks somewhere on their body. Unfortunately, I haven’t found any DNA matches. So get to it, friends. A part of the puzzle is still missing.”

Herz snorted. “There are still plenty of pieces of the puzzle missing, but we’re smart and patient when it comes to putting them together. Do you have anything else for us?”

“No, not for now,” Borger said. “May I go? I’ll let you know if anything new comes to light.”

They nodded and he left, leaving them to continue their team meeting.

“Next item,” Herz said. He took out another photo and pinned it to the board. Hanna Umlauf.

“Hanna Umlauf,” he said. “Also forty-four years of age, an art photographer, fairly well known, married to Jonas Belitz, a gallery owner, resident of S
trasbourg, France, no children. Have I forgotten anything?”

Shaking heads and shrugs all around. Felix continued. “On the morning before Gertrud Rabinsky’s death, Jonas Belitz reported his wife, Hanna, missing. I happened to be there when he first visited Peter’s office.”

“Is there a connection between the two women?” The district attorney had clearly not read up on the case.

“I’m coming to that,” said Felix, nodding in Brückl’s direction. “Peter, have there been any developments?”

“Nothing,” Hansen replied. “Absolutely nothing. Her husband is completely out of his mind—you can’t blame him under the circumstances. He’s staying at the Hotel Babenberger, where his wife had also been staying. We made a thorough investigation of her room, but as you can imagine there was nothing—not a trace—to be found. The rooms are always thoroughly cleaned when someone checks out.”

“Yes, unfortunately, in this case,” Felix said. “Thanks, Peter.”

He turned to Brückl. “The connection is that the two women knew each other very well. They grew up together. Gertrud’s family was effectively also Hanna’s family. There is official evidence of the guardianship. But in recent years there was hardly any or no contact, either between the women or between Hanna and her foster parents. According to her husband, Hanna hasn’t been back to this area for many years. But they all knew one another. Jonas Belitz was also involved with the family in the past. He was a friend of Hans Brendler, Gertrud’s father, when they were young.”

“What do you think?” Brückl asked him.

Felix shook his head. “Nothing, for now. We’re gathering our thoughts. Of course, it could all be mere coincidence, but we don’t really believe that.”

“Why did Frau Umlauf break off the contact?”

“We don’t know yet. Only that there was a difference of opinion.”

“Which could have provided grounds for murder?” The district attorney suddenly seemed wide-awake.

Franza had to smile to herself. As if they hadn’t considered all that themselves!

“Possibly.” Felix nodded patronizingly, throwing Franza a glance. “Could indeed be the case.”

“So Umlauf could be Rabinsky’s murderer? And she’s now on the run?”

“Possibly,” Felix said, apparently completely indifferent. Only the tiniest raising of his eyebrows indicated to Franza, who knew him well, that he was slightly amused. He was well aware that the district attorney sensed publicity, a moment of glory, glamour. Of course, a movie actress would have been a better catch, but an art photographer would do nicely.

“Of course, the scenario could be completely different,” said Herz.

Brückl nodded rather brusquely. “Yes, yes. I’m not trying to do your work for you, Inspector Herz! Whatever happens, this case has high priority. Frau Umlauf is a public figure. You know what that means!”

“But of course we know.” Felix sighed. “Don’t we, Franza? We are aware of it?”

“We are.” Franza nodded obligingly. “Of course we know, Herr Brückl.”

Although she was in his home often—she had been best friends with his wife, Sonja, since kindergarten—they were not close. On the contrary, they were often at odds with each other.

“By the way, Sonja sends her greetings and asked you to pop by,” he said, with a slightly embarrassed smile as though he suspected they could all see right through him.

“Thank you,” said Franza. “Tell her I’ll give her a call.”

She thought of her last visit to the Brückls’, the evening when a drunken Max had approached her in the theater café and she’d had to take him home. After dropping him off, she’d phoned Port to say she was free if he wanted to come by. But he had still been aggrieved and didn’t come. So she’d taken the wine and cigarettes she’d bought at the gas station and driven to Sonja’s, where they had sat on the terrace, drinking and smoking, while the district attorney worked at his PC in his home office. From time to time he came to the window, waved and smiled, and Sonja waved happily back.

“Is everything going well with you two?” Franza had asked, and Sonja nodded.

“Yes, we’re fine. He works a lot, but that’s OK—so do I.”

“Yes,” Franza said. “Don’t we all?”

“It’s better to be working than hanging around in some online chat room,” Sonja said, and told her about a girlfriend who regularly logged in to chat forums under some pseudonym, getting to know men and even going on occasional titillating blind dates.

“Just imagine,” Sonja said. “You get there and suddenly find yourself standing in front of your neighbor, who always seemed so nice and in love with his wife. How horribly embarrassing!”

Later that evening, at home, Franza had spent some time on the Internet herself.

“All right,” Herz was saying. “If we’ve all got our private lives in order, can we carry on?”

Franza and Brückl raised their hands at the same time, indicating they were ready to proceed.

“So, to recap: Things could have happened as we’ve already described. As I said, we’re gathering ideas here. Another possibility could be that Hanna Umlauf is another victim of the same perpetrator. Perhaps he enticed her to the area for some reason, probably in connection with the women’s mutual past, and killed her. That would explain her disappearance.”

He fell into a pensive silence.

“We do now know that they were together at some point, Hanna and Gertrud. In Gertrud’s house, no less. We found Hanna’s DNA there.”

Brückl leaned forward in surprise. “Oh? What? Where? Doesn’t this support my theory?”

Felix tipped his head to one side. “Our theory. Ours.” He paused for a beat, then continued. “Yes, perhaps. Perhaps not. We shouldn’t draw rash conclusions.”

He glanced thoughtfully at the image of the photographer. “A hair. Bright red. Of course, the laboratory checked the DNA—Herr Belitz had one of his wife’s lipsticks with him.”

Arthur let out a gasp of surprise. “Who would have something like that? Had he assumed from the start that his wife was dead and we’d need DNA for some reason?”

“Well,” Franza said. “He’s bound to have seen some detective shows on TV. Whatever the reason, he’s made our work unusually easy. Strasbourg is a long way away, after all. If he’d had to go and get the lipstick, we still wouldn’t have our confirmation.”

“Indeed,” Brückl said. “So where did you find the hair?”

“Hm,” Franza said casually. “In the bed.”

“In the bed? In the guest room? Did she stay there after she checked out of the hotel?”

“No.” Franza drew the word out a little. “Not in the guest room. In the bed of Herr and Frau Rabinsky.”

“Aha,” said the district attorney. “Ahaaaa.” He also drew the word out. “You don’t say! That’s not a little indelicate. What do you conclude from it?”

Franza gave him her most winning smile. “As we’ve said: nothing yet. We’re gathering our thoughts.”

Brückl sighed and rolled his eyes a little, but seemed patient enough.

“At first glance it simply expands the range of people we’re considering as suspects,” Felix added.

“The husband!” Brückl exclaimed. “Jealousy. Frau Rabinsky catches her husband in bed with Umlauf, they get into an argument, the wife dies, the lover vanishes, and Herr Rabinsky plays the grieving husband.”

He had been talking at full speed, shaking his head indignantly. “Honestly, if you ask me, infidelity always ends in tears!”

Felix raised his eyebrows. “Well,” he said, “that’s life. You can’t do anything about it. Or do you have an idea about that, Herr Prosecutor? A new law, perhaps? Because we don’t have enough laws?”

Brückl flushed slightly, shifting in his seat. “Pff,” he said brusquely. “Nonsense!”

Felix grinned. “Of course extramarital coitus is not to be held up as exemplary behavior, but thank God that screwing around while in a conjugal state is not yet the stuff of a criminal act.”

Wow,
Franza thought,
how’s that for a pompous statement!
She grinned and looked around at her colleagues’ expressions, which were no different from her own. The district attorney didn’t find it as amusing.

“Are you making fun of me?” he snapped. “Tone it down.”

“No, I wasn’t making fun of you,” Felix said calmly. “Nothing could be further from my mind. But things are never as straightforward as they appear.”

Brückl sighed. “Very well. I don’t want to step on anyone’s toes here. But a man’s entitled to his thoughts, isn’t he?”

He glanced at Franza, who responded with a radiant smile.
Asshole,
she thought.

Brückl cleared his throat. “So,” he said. “Where were we?” He thought for a moment. “Oh, yes. Rabinsky, the grieving husband. Is he playing the grieving husband?”

“He’s grieving,” Franza said. “Whether he’s playing a part is another matter. Hard to say.”

“Anyway,” Arthur put in triumphantly, “the list of suspects is about to get longer.”

They all turned to him. He had drifted into the station right before the meeting, so no one else knew about the new witness.

“Frau Rabinsky had an interesting visitor,” he said, enjoying being the focus of attention as he reported what the owner of the café had told him.

“OK,” Felix said for the umpteenth time. “We now have quite a few leads, all in completely different directions. That’s not necessarily a good thing. It certainly doesn’t simplify matters. But that’s how it is. Can’t do anything about it.”

He sighed. “We’ll divide up the work. Arthur, you stay with the café proprietor, get a composite picture and all that. Can you also check out Rabinsky’s alibi? Get the names of the people at that birthday party. Pump them for what they know. We have to determine whether there’s a window when he can’t prove he was seen by anyone. And whether that window was long enough for him to have gotten home, made certain discoveries, and committed certain acts.”

Felix nodded to Arthur, then turned to Peter Hansen. “Peter, I’d like to ask you to speak to Belitz again. Find out if anything else has occurred to him recently. Any blind spots, skeletons in the closet, so to speak—you know what I’m saying.”

Hansen nodded.

“As for you and me, Franza, we’ll dig around in the past. Gertrud’s past. And Hanna’s. See whether there’s anything else that overlaps. There will be, I’m sure. Intersection math, I believe it’s called.”

He grinned. Franza nodded, returning his smile. “Aye, aye, sir!”