The Owner had made his intentions clear from the very moment he registered on the geocaching site. He would bring death. But no one had understood his message – not least Herbert Liebscher.
Dagmar Zoubek was one of those women who command respect at the very first glance. Tall, with a taut back and an equally taut bun at the nape of her neck, she reminded Beatrice of the ballet teacher who, with her impatient, bony hands, had pushed Beatrice’s toes outwards when she was six years old. But Zoubek taught the flute, not ballet.
Beatrice had made a spur-of-the-moment decision that morning. The thought of having to plod through endless lists of names had been so unbearable to her that she had decided to go for the direct route. She would look for a torn woman, not a dark-haired woman with a dark name.
They were sitting in one of the small practice rooms, where a Steinway dominated the space.
‘Many students go through difficult times,’ explained Zoubek after giving it some thought. ‘The pressure here is bearable, but some just aren’t up to it. I’ll need you to narrow it down a little more for me.’
‘She was likely to have been studying composition too. And she probably had dark hair.’
To her credit, Zoubek tried to hide the flicker of mockery in her eyes. ‘Dark hair? Do you realise how many girls here change their hair colour on a monthly basis?’
It was hard to imagine Zoubek being popular with her students. A schoolmarmish nature seemed to be inherent to this woman’s character, as firmly rooted as the nose on her face.
‘The problem is,’ explained Beatrice, ‘that I can’t even narrow down the time period. It’s just as possible that the student in question left the institute six years ago as six months. It’s even possible that she’s still here. The information I have is very vague.’
‘I’m inclined to agree with you there.’ But Beatrice’s admission seemed to make Zoubek more sympathetic. ‘Personal crises. Let me think… yes, one student lost her parents in a car crash last year and then went back to Munich. It was very tragic.’ The woman stopped for a moment and lowered her gaze. ‘A very gifted young woman. Although her second subject was singing, not composition, and her hair was always blonde.’
‘Could you tell me her name anyway?’
‘Tamara Kohl.’
If the subject and hair colour had matched it would have been worth a try, but given they didn’t Beatrice could probably rule her out. The Owner was always very precise with his clues.
‘Can you think of anyone else? Was there a suicide attempt, perhaps? Self-harming behaviour? Or aggression towards others?’
The way Zoubek glanced away told Beatrice that her questions had struck a raw nerve. ‘Was there?’ she persevered. ‘Please tell me anything that comes to mind – it could be exactly the information I’m looking for.’
‘There was this shy girl… a little plump and always on a diet. She had dark hair, yes. I taught her in flute, and if I’m not mistaken composition was her second subject. She worked very hard – not as gifted as the others, but she was very diligent.’
Diligence was, if Beatrice had judged her correctly, an indispensable virtue in Zoubek’s universe. ‘What happened to her?’
‘It was such a long time ago now. She wasn’t even in my class at the time it happened – she had switched to my colleague Dr Horner’s group, but I think she had some kind of breakdown. She was picked up by an ambulance and unenrolled from the university shortly after.’
‘Can you remember what kind of breakdown it was? What it was caused by?’
Zoubek shook her head briskly. ‘I wasn’t there. I just heard that she started to scream and cry and that no one was able to calm her down. Maybe it’s better if you speak to Dr Horner – he’ll be able to tell you more.’
I certainly will, thought Beatrice. ‘Could you please tell me the girl’s name?’
With a demonstratively thoughtful expression, Dagmar Zoubek pursed her lips. ‘It was a long name, not an easy one to remember – I’d have to check.’
‘That would be very helpful, thank you.’
Clearly a little disgruntled, the teacher got up from her chair and left the room. Ten minutes later, she came back with a blue ring binder.
‘Here she is. Melanie Dalamasso. Flute and composition. There’s a note here – ex-matriculated due to health reasons, roughly five years ago.’
‘Thank you.’ Beatrice shook the woman’s hand and went out into the fresh air of the Mirabell Gardens, where the sun was shining hazily. She found a bench and stretched her legs out in front of her.
Bingo. There was no need to look any further; Dalamasso was an Italian name, which fitted the dark hair the Owner had mentioned. And Beatrice didn’t even need to bother Google in order to solve the rest of the puzzle. As a child, she used to have a dictionary of names, and would always flick through it eagerly whenever she met someone new.
Her own name had often been cause for amusement, as Beatrice meant ‘Blessed’. Her best friend at school had been called Nadine – meaning ‘Hope’. Sitting a row in front of them in class back then was a Melanie, a girl with strawberry blonde hair and freckles on her face, neck and arms. They had always had fits of giggles about the fact that Melanie meant ‘Dark’.
It seemed that Melanie Dalamasso hadn’t just stopped studying, but had also shelved her entire life of independence. She was now living with her parents, and spent from eight in the morning until half-four in the afternoon in a psychiatric day clinic.
‘She’s under observation around the clock, but we won’t question her, not yet.’ Florin looked at each of them in turn, pausing when he came to Hoffmann. Eventually, their boss nodded.
‘Anyone who attempts to get close to her will be checked out by our guys. I’ve spoken to her parents and her doctor, and we’re getting full support from both sides. Unfortunately there’s no information that could be of use to us – no one knows what caused Melanie’s breakdown.’ He took the glass of water Stefan handed to him and sipped at it. ‘Apparently she was always quite difficult growing up, with a tendency for depressive moods.’
Beatrice had read through the parents’ statement before their meeting. They were at their wits’ end. They described Melanie as a silent, withdrawn girl, who had hidden herself away with her flute from a young age. She was eight when she first went to a psychotherapist, because she’d stopped eating after two girls from her class had come up with the idea of nicknaming her the ‘Italian Hippo’.
What might have prompted other children to run in tears to their teacher or parents, or to kick the bullies in the shin, left Melanie reeling for weeks on end. She insisted that a change of schools be the condition for her agreeing to eat again. Her parents gave in and registered her at a private school which specialised in music. A few years followed in which they believed she had ‘grown out of’ the problem, as her mother put it. But when puberty set in, Melanie began to suffer from extreme mood swings that led to renewed anorexic and bulimic episodes. Her parents were convinced that, had it not been for the flute, she would probably have died. Once again it led to psycho therapeutic intervention, and a three-week hospitalisation during the summer holidays.
Six years ago, at the age of eighteen, Melanie had passed the entrance exam for the Mozarteum. She moved into a tiny studio apartment near the Salzach river, dreamt of a career as a soloist and fell in love with a fellow student who, although he didn’t return her feelings, let her down very gently and became a close friend. He introduced her to a group of students who went on hikes, to cafés or the cinema in the evenings, and who also studied together for music theory exams. For a while, Melanie even lived with two of the girls from the group in a student flat share.