Germans. Jens Jespersen had been a police officer for twenty-three years. His father had been a police officer before him. And his grandfather before him. It was a tradition he was immensely proud of. And in that tradition lay the roots of his dislike of Germans. But now was not the time to think of such things.
A female voice asked him something in German. Jespersen looked up: the woman was in her thirties with light blonde hair, pale skin over high cheekbones and bright blue eyes.
‘I’m sorry?’ he said in English.
‘May I sit here?’ she repeated in English.
He nodded, moving his coat to allow her to sit. She was about to say something when Jespersen’s cellphone rang. He answered it without excusing himself.
‘Herr Jespersen? This is Principal Chief Commissar Fabel, Polizei Hamburg Murder Commission. I got your message. I’m sorry I couldn’t get back to you earlier but I was kind of tied up with something. We’ve just had a major case kick off — I’m sure you know the drill. Anyway, I believe you would like to arrange a meeting.’
Jespersen, whose English was excellent, was surprised to hear the German speak in perfect and, to Jespersen’s ears, unaccented English.
‘Yes, Herr Fabel. I have a few things to check out so I’ll be in Hamburg for a few days, but I’d like to talk to you as soon as possible. Would you be able to see me tomorrow?’
‘Tomorrow might be difficult. Like I say, we’ve just launched a major inquiry. Give me a moment…’ There was a short silence. ‘How about four-thirty at the Presidium?’
‘I’ll be there,’ said Jespersen.
‘I hope you don’t mind me asking, Herr Jespersen, but when you say you have a few things to check out, does that mean you are conducting part of an investigation here in Hamburg?’
‘I see what you’re getting at…’ Jespersen managed to get just the right element of irritation into his voice. ‘If I were conducting an investigation, I would have gone through the appropriate channels. No, Mr Fabel, your toes are not being trodden on. I’ll see you tomorrow at four-thirty.’ He snapped his cellphone shut. Bloody Germans: was there one who wasn’t a born bureaucrat?
‘Are you English?’ the woman sitting next to him asked after he had pocketed his phone.
‘No.’ He smiled wearily, not really trying to conceal his disappointment at having to make small talk. ‘I’m Danish.’
‘No! I’m half Danish,’ she said fluently and enthusiastically in his native tongue, but with a heavy German accent. ‘My mother is from Faborg — you know, on Fyn — but I was brought up here. My father is from Hamburg.’
‘You don’t say,’ Jespersen said. The woman was clearly delighted at the happenstance that she should sit next to a Dane; Jespersen despaired at it. He liked to have time to think things through. But, there again, she was an attractive woman.
‘Are you here on holiday?’ she asked.
‘No. Business,’ said Jespersen. He looked at the young woman more closely. She certainly had the colouring of a Dane. Something about her reminded him of Karin. Her almost white blonde hair had been gathered up by a band but protested in a torrent of kinks and curls. Jespersen smiled, this time not wearily.
She really was very attractive.
7
Carstens Kaminski called Fabel at his office in the Presidium first thing.
‘We’ve got someone you should talk to,’ he explained. ‘It’s probably nothing, but I think you should hear what he has to say.’
‘In custody?’
‘No. A witness. Of sorts.’
‘I’ll come over,’ said Fabel.
‘No, it’s okay. I’ll send him over to the Presidium. He’ll be there in twenty minutes.’
Even after all of these years, after all of the things he had seen, Fabel still found it difficult to understand why some people got involved in the things they did. Despite his experience, Fabel still sometimes found himself fooled by people’s appearances. Jurgen Mann, who now sat opposite Fabel in the interview room, did not look like someone who should have inside information on hookers. Mann was thirty-five years old, tall and slim, dressed trendily but tastefully in a grey jacket and trousers and a black sweater. He had a wide, strong jaw forested with the kind of designer stubble that actually took a lot of maintenance to look so casual. Like the grey-haired man Fabel had seen ducking into Herbertstrasse, the fact that someone so outwardly normal, so unexpected, could be a regular user of street prostitutes depressed him.
Because of the ‘sensitivity’ of the interview, Fabel conducted it alone.
‘What is it you do?’ asked Fabel. ‘For a living, I mean?’
‘I’m a designer. Packaging, signage, that kind of thing.’
That would explain the stubble, thought Fabel. ‘Are you married?’
‘Yes. I don’t see-’
‘Children?’ Fabel cut Mann off.
‘One. An eight-year-old. Girl.’
‘And you visit the Reeperbahn regularly?’
‘Now and again. Listen, do you want to hear what I’ve got to say or not?’ Mann asked defiantly.
‘I need to know how you came by such information. I need to know about you. How often is “now and again”?’
‘Once every couple of weeks or so, I’d say. Sometimes more, sometimes less.’
‘And is it always street prostitutes you use?’
‘Yes.’
Fabel regarded the young man. He thought of his wife and eight-year-old daughter. ‘And this prostitute you told Herr Kaminski about: do you use her frequently?’
‘No. It was just the once. And I didn’t get to… well, there was no contact.’
‘Have you seen her before?’
‘No. That was the first time. And she approached me. Just sort of came out of the shadows and asked if I wanted to go with her. She told me how much and it was cheaper than usual, so I said yes.’
‘Then what happened?’
‘Like I told them at Davidwache, she led me into this courtyard. It looked like she planned that we do it there but I said I wanted to go to her room. It was then that she pulled the knife. She had me cornered and said that if I didn’t hand over my wallet she would cut me up the same way as she had sliced up that English singer.’
‘You believed her?’
‘If you had seen her eyes… I knew if I didn’t do what she said — and maybe even if I did — she would have a go at me with the knife.’
‘What kind of knife was it?’
‘I don’t know. A bloody big one. Maybe a filleting knife or something. Like a butcher knife but thinner.’
‘And you gave her your wallet?’
‘Yes. I threw it to her and when she caught it, I shoved her as hard as I could and ran for it.’
‘And this happened last night?’
‘Yes. I knew what she was talking about because I saw this thing on the news about the Angel being back.’
‘Yet you still went to the Kiez and wandered into an empty courtyard with a prostitute.’