‘So she had targeted the nurse, rather than just grabbing an opportunity to escape?’ asked Dirk Hechtner.
‘Probably months in advance.’
Fabel spent the rest of the briefing going through what they had in the way of statements and the initial forensic evidence. He then allocated investigative tasks to each team member. After he had wound the meeting up, Werner loitered until the others were gone.
‘Let’s have it, Werner,’ said Fabel, gathering up his papers. ‘What’s on your mind?’
‘Anna told me about your chat.’
‘My God, it didn’t take her long to find a shoulder to cry on.’
‘It’s not like that, Jan. I asked her how it had gone. She’s in shock, I think. So am I, truth be told.’
‘You think I’m making a mistake?’ Fabel asked.
‘I think you would have handled it differently if Anna had been a man, to be frank, Jan.’
‘Not that again, Werner. I don’t let gender influence how I deal with my officers.’
‘Well, whatever the reason, I think you should give Anna another chance. She’s put her neck on the line more than once for the sake of catching a killer.’
‘But don’t you see that’s the point? Anna has put her neck on the line. She nearly got herself killed twice doing exactly that. This isn’t the Wild West, Werner. I mean, I thought you would understand. If anything it’s you that’s kept me from screwing up because you always make sure we follow procedure. There have been times when Anna has all but rendered evidence inadmissible because she hasn’t followed the State Prosecutor’s guidelines.’
Werner sighed and rubbed a shovel of a hand over the grey stubble on his scalp. Fabel always thought Werner looked like a retired boxer or hardened sailor: his broken nose, picked up early in his career as a street policeman, his Hamburg Low-German way of speaking combined with his faintly scruffy way of dressing and his powerful build made him look like someone who was probably inclined to use muscle rather than brain. But no one had the eye for detail that Werner had. A tiny discrepancy in someone’s statement, some event that didn’t quite fit into the chronology of a crime, a forgotten scrap of evidence that changed the whole picture: these were the things that Werner caught when everyone else, including Fabel, had missed them. The truth was that Fabel relied heavily on Werner’s counsel, and it troubled him that his friend thought he was making a mistake over Anna.
‘Listen,’ said Werner, ‘I know you’ve been looking for a replacement for Maria Klee to partner me with. Team me up with Anna in the meantime. You could put Henk together with Dirk for a while. I think Anna and I could work well together. A good balance. Give it a go for a month or two. Then, if you still think she should go, fair enough.’
‘Have you talked to her about this idea of yours?’ Fabel asked suspiciously.
‘No. I promise. It’s just that she’s desperate to stay in the Commission, Jan. And Anna really would be a loss to the team. Another loss. She’s a good officer, Jan. She just needs to be brought into line. Let me have a crack at it.’
‘Okay, let me think about it,’ said Fabel.
5
‘Hard day?’
‘I thought you were asleep,’ said Fabel to the shadow in the bed.
‘I was. I asked if you’d had a hard day…’
‘The usual. Murder. Mayhem. Paperwork. You?’
‘The usual. I heard you have another celebrity murder on your hands. Are you sure you’re not doing them yourself, just to advance your career?’
‘Our career. I can see I’m going to have to bring you into this one,’ said Fabel. ‘That’s the deaclass="underline" I’ll keep killing them to keep us both in work.’ He slid between the sheets. They were cool and clean on his skin. ‘By the way, have you seen my MP3 player lying around?’
‘No. You’ve already asked me. How did it go with Renate?’
Fabel sighed. ‘How does it ever go with Renate? She was as bitter as hell, as always. I don’t know how the hell she has managed to turn the whole situation around so that she’s the injured party. It was Behrens who dumped her. Not me.’
‘It’s a woman thing.’ Susanne still had her back to him. ‘If you can’t find the man to blame, find a man to blame. I hold you responsible for Hans Zimmerman not choosing me as his partner for our kindergarten parade.’
‘I knew there was something,’ said Fabel. ‘Anyway, Gabi is thinking about joining the police. Renate blames me and wants me to talk her out of it.’
‘Will you?’
‘No. Not talk her out of it. Give her an informed picture, yes. Talk her out of it, no.’
‘We’ll talk about it tomorrow.’ Susanne’s voice was thick with sleep, but Fabel slid close to her, put his arms around her, cupped her breast in his hand.
‘I’d like to make up for the kindergarten parade…’ he said.
6
Jespersen had been relieved that the seat next to him on the plane was unoccupied. Jespersen liked to use travel time to sort things out in his head: to review, to do a bit of broader thinking. The Scandinavian Airlines flight to Hamburg’s Fuhlsbuttel Airport from Copenhagen had only taken a little over fifty minutes but, during that time, Jens Jespersen had been able to study the information he had obtained through Europol on Erster Kriminalhauptkommissar Jan Fabel.
Most of the information related to the consultative role Fabel was adopting for cases outside the Polizei Hamburg’s jurisdiction. He was being touted by Europol as a major expert in complex murder investigations. The ‘go-to guy’ as the Americans would call him. Jespersen didn’t like Americans much. He liked Germans less.
As the seat-belt lights came on and Jespersen put the file back in his case, he reluctantly admitted to himself that the German was probably the best person to talk to. Talk to about what? It suddenly struck Jespersen that he had come a long way to meet with the German and he didn’t really have that much to discuss. All he had was a remark made by a drug trafficker during a sting operation; a couple of potentially connected events that may be nothing more than so many coincidences; and a legend: a vague and most likely exaggerated spook-story from the dark ages of the Cold War.
After touchdown at Hamburg Fuhlsbuttel, Jespersen called the Politigard headquarters in Copenhagen and was put through to his office. He spoke to Harald Tolstrup, his deputy. Tolstrup confirmed that Jespersen was booked into a hotel on the Alter Wall, in Hamburg’s city centre. Tolstrup also said that Jespersen’s boss, Politidirektor Vestergaard, wanted to speak with him as soon as possible and hadn’t sounded happy. After Jespersen hung up from his call to the Politigard, he phoned the Hamburg Police Presidium and asked in English to speak to Jan Fabel. He was told that Fabel was in a meeting: Jespersen gave his cellphone number and asked that Fabel call him back.
After Jespersen checked into the hotel he took a walk around the city centre. It was cold but bright and he looked up at the pale blue of the sky. It was the same sky as in Copenhagen. As in Stockholm or Oslo. Hamburg’s light was a Nordic light and Jespersen found it strange to be in a foreign country amongst people he disliked and yet to see the same sky, the same light, the same architecture, the same faces in the street. He knew that the illusion would have been dispelled if he had travelled even a little further south. But here, in Hamburg, and totally despite himself, Jespersen felt at home. He walked along Grosse Bleichen and found himself in front of an impressive red-brick building which announced itself with a plaque as the Hanseviertel. Jespersen went in, partly motivated by curiosity: he had come across the word ‘Hanseviertel’ once before, when he had visited Bergen in Norway. Bergen had been part of the Hanseatic League and there had been a part of the city where German traders had settled in the Middle Ages called Tyskebryggen, the German Wharf: Bergen’s own Hanseviertel. This Hanseviertel in Hamburg, however, was something completely different: behind the red brick lay connecting avenues and galleries of shops, all now covered over by glass. It looked like the ideal place to get some lunch and, while he was at it, he would pick up a small gift for his twelve-year-old niece. Everywhere he went he would find some small soft toy for Mette, his younger brother’s daughter. She was beginning to pretend she was too old for such nonsense, but he could tell she liked it. He found a small shop in the arcade selling gifts that were a little more upmarket and unusual than the usual tourist stuff. He bought a small stuffed bear for Mette: it was dressed in a blue jacket with ‘Hamburg’ embroidered on the back and was wearing a Prinz Heinrich fisherman’s hat. Jespersen found a pleasant-looking cafe and ordered a light lunch. He sat eating slowly and watching Germans go by.