Friday, November 21, 2008
At a quarter past six Bodenstein was torn out of a deep sleep by the ringing of his cell phone. In a daze he groped for the light switch until he remembered that he wasn’t at home in his own bed. He had slept poorly and had crazy dreams. The mattress was too soft, the comforter too warm, so that he had alternated between sweating and freezing. His cell kept on ringing obstinately, stopped, and then began ringing again. Bodenstein rolled out of bed, felt around in the dark with no point of reference in the strange room and cursed when he stubbed his big toe on a table leg. Finally he found the light switch next to the door and then located his cell phone in the inside pocket of his jacket, which he had thrown over the chair last night.
A forest ranger had found a male corpse in a car at a forest parking lot below the Eichkopf mountain between Ruppertshain and K?nigstein. The evidence techs were already on their way. Could he drive out and stop by to take a brief look? Of course he would—what choice did he have? His face contorted in pain, he hobbled back to the bed and sat down on the edge. The events of the other day seemed like a bad dream. For almost an hour he had driven around until he almost by accident happened to pass the turnoff to his family’s estate. Neither his father nor mother had asked him any questions when he showed up at the front door shortly before midnight and asked to stay for the night. His mother had made up a bed for him in one of the guest rooms on the top floor but hadn’t pressed him for an explanation. She certainly must have seen from his face that he hadn’t dropped by for fun. He was grateful for her discretion. There was no way he could have talked about Cosima and that guy.
With a sigh he got up, fished out his toiletry bag from his suitcase, and went across the hall to the bathroom. It was tiny and ice cold and reminded him unpleasantly of his childhood and youth, which had been devoid of any luxury. His parents had scrimped where they could, because money was always tight. Over there in the castle, where he had grown up, in the winter months only two rooms were heated; all the other rooms were only “lukewarm,” as his mother used to call the barely 64-degree room temperature. Bodenstein sniffed at his T-shirt and wrinkled his nose. He couldn’t avoid taking a shower. He thought nostalgically of the heated floors in his house, of the soft towels smelling of fabric softener. He showered in record time, drying himself with a rough, tattered hand towel, and then shaved with trembling fingers in the pale fluorescent light of the mirrored cabinet. Downstairs in the kitchen he encountered his father, who was drinking coffee at the scratched wooden table and reading the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.
“Good morning.” He looked up and gave his son a friendly nod. “Coffee for you too?”
“Good morning. Yes, please.” Bodenstein sat down. His father stood up, got a cup from the cupboard and poured his coffee. His father would never dream of asking him why he’d showed up in the middle of the night and slept in one of the guest rooms. His parents had always been frugal with words as well. And Oliver felt no desire to discuss his marital problems at a quarter to seven in the morning. So father and son drank their coffee in silent harmony. For as far back as he could remember they had always used the Meissen porcelain for all of their meals—out of thrift. The china service was a family heirloom, and there was no reason not to use it or to acquire a different set of dishes. It would have been of inestimable value except that almost every piece had been repaired multiple times over the years. Even Oliver’s coffee cup had a crack and the handle had been glued back on. Finally he got up, put his cup in the sink, and said thank you. His father nodded and turned again to his newspaper, which he had politely put aside.
“Take a house key with you,” he said in passing. “There’s one on a red key ring hanging on the board next to the door.”
“Thanks.” Oliver took the key. “See you later.”
His father obviously assumed that he would be back in the evening.
* * *
Headlights and flashing blue lights brightened the dark November morning as Bodenstein turned in at the forest parking lot directly beyond the Nepomuk curve. He parked his car next to the patrol car and set off down the path. The autumn smell of damp earth and decaying foliage penetrated his nostrils, and he recalled fragments of a Rainer Maria Rilke poem, one of the few he knew by heart. Who is now alone will remain so for long, wandering restlessly among the avenues when the leaves are turning. The feeling of loneliness pounced on him like a mad dog, and he had to force himself with all his might to go on, to do his job, although he would have preferred to creep away somewhere.
“Morning,” he said to Christian Kr?ger, leader of the evidence team, who was unpacking his camera. “What’s going on up there?”
“The news must have spread over the police band,” said Kr?ger, shaking his head with a grin. “They’re like little kids!”
“News of what?” Bodenstein still didn’t understand and wondered at the crowd of people. In spite of the early hour, five police vehicles stood in the gravel parking lot, and a sixth was just turning in from the road. Bodenstein could already hear the murmur of voices from a long way off. All the officers, uniformed or in the white overalls of evidence techs, were talking excitedly.
“It’s a Ferrari,” one of the highway cops told him, eyes shining. “A 599 GTB Fiorano. I’ve only seen one once, at the International Auto Show in Frankfurt.”
Bodenstein made his way through the crowd. There it was. At the very end of the lot gleamed a bright red Ferrari in the floodlight, reverently surrounded by about fifteen police officers, who were more interested in the cubic capacity of the engine, horsepower, tires, rims, torque, and acceleration of the noble sports car than in the dead man in the driver’s seat. A hose stretched from one of the arm-thick, chromed exhaust pipes to the window, which had been carefully sealed on the inside with silver duct tape.
“That thing costs two hundred and fifty thousand euros,” one of the younger officers said. “Crazy, don’t you think?”
“The value probably dropped a bit overnight,” said Bodenstein dryly.
“How so?”
“Maybe you didn’t notice, but there’s a dead body in the driver’s seat.” Bodenstein wasn’t one of those men who flipped out at the sight of a red sports car. “Did anyone run the plates?”
“Yes,” said a young female officer in the back of the crowd, who obviously didn’t share the enthusiasm of her male colleagues. “The vehicle is registered to a bank in Frankfurt.”
“Hmm.” Bodenstein watched while Kr?ger shot his photos. Then he and a colleague opened the driver’s side door.
“The economic crisis claims its first victim,” somebody joked. Then a new discussion started about how much money you’d have to earn per month to be able to pay the lease on a Ferrari Fiorano. Bodenstein saw another patrol car roll into the parking lot, followed by two plainclothes cars.
“Cordon off a large area of the parking lot,” he instructed the young female officer. “And please get rid of anyone who doesn’t have a reason for being here.”
The young woman nodded and energetically strode off to carry out her assignment. A few minutes later the parking lot was sealed off. Bodenstein squatted down next to the open driver’s side door and examined the body. The blond man was still young, probably in his mid-thirties. He wore a suit and tie and had an expensive watch on his wrist. His head was tilted to one side, and at first glance he looked like he was asleep.
“Morning, Bodenstein,” said a familiar voice behind him, prompting him to look back over his shoulder.
“Hello, Dr. Kirchhoff.” He got up and nodded to the medical examiner.
“Isn’t Pia here?”
“No, today I’m on my own,” Bodenstein replied. “Do you miss her?”
Dr. Kirchhoff put on a weary smile but didn’t comment. For once he didn’t seem in the mood for sarcastic remarks. Behind the lenses of his glasses his eyes were red-rimmed. He looked like he hadn’t gotten much sleep last night either. Bodenstein made room for the ME and went over to Kr?ger, who was inspecting the briefcase that they’d found lying on the passenger seat of the Ferrari.
“Well?” he asked. Kr?ger handed him the dead man’s briefcase. Bodenstein took out the ID and stared at it. He read the name a second time. Could it be a coincidence?
* * *
The head doctor of the psychiatric ward had informed Kirchhoff about Thies Terlinden’s condition in as much detail as her oath of confidentiality allowed. Now Pia was even more curious to see the man. She knew that she shouldn’t expect too much. The doctor had said that Thies probably wouldn’t answer her questions at all. For quite a while Pia observed the patient through the window in the door. Thies Terlinden was an extremely good-looking young man with thick blond hair and a sensitive mouth. It was impossible to tell by looking at him what sort of demons he struggled with. Only his paintings revealed something of his internal torments. He was sitting at a table in a bright, cheery room, all of his attention focused on what he was drawing. Although he had calmed down under the influence of the medications, he wasn’t allowed any sharp implements such as pencils or paintbrushes, so he had to settle for crayons, which didn’t seem to bother him. He didn’t look up when Pia entered the room, accompanied by the doctor and an orderly. The doctor introduced Pia and explained to him why she was here, saying that she wanted to talk with him. Thies bent farther over his picture, then leaned back abruptly and set the crayon on the table. The colorful crayons weren’t lying helter-skelter; he had lined them up precisely like soldiers at roll call. Pia sat down on a chair across from him.
“I didn’t do anything to Amelie,” he said in a strange, monotone voice before Pia could say a word. “I swear. I didn’t do anything, do anything.”
“Nobody is saying that you did,” Pia replied in a friendly voice.
Thies’s hands were fluttering uncontrollably, and he was rocking his upper body back and forth. His gaze was fixed on the picture lying before him.
“You like Amelie a lot, and she visited you often, isn’t that right?”
He nodded vehemently.
“I took care of her. Took care of her.”
Pia exchanged a glance with the doctor, who had sat down a short distance away. Thies again grabbed a crayon, bent over the picture, and continued drawing. There was silence in the room. Pia thought about what question to ask next. The doctor had advised her to speak normally to Thies, not as if to a child. But that turned out not to be so easy.
“When did you see Amelie the last time?”
He didn’t react, but kept drawing as if possessed, changing to a different crayon.
“What did you and Amelie talk about?”
This was completely different from a normal interview. Thies’s face revealed nothing; his expression was as rigid as a marble statue. He didn’t answer any questions, so Pia asked him no more. The minutes went by. Time meant nothing to autistic patients, the doctor had explained to Pia. They lived in their own world. Patience was required. But at eleven o’clock the funeral for Laura Wagner was being held at the cemetery in Altenhain, and she wanted to meet Bodenstein there. When she got up, disappointed, and was about to leave, Thies suddenly spoke.
“I saw her that evening, from the eagle’s nest.” He spoke in clear and distinct sentences that were grammatical and correct. Only the melody of the sentences was lacking, a result of his robotic delivery. “She was standing in the barnyard near the barn. I wanted to call out to her, but then … the man came. They talked and laughed and went into the barn so nobody could see what they were doing. But I saw it.”
Pia cast a bewildered look at the doctor, who merely shrugged, uncomprehending. Barn? Eagle’s nest? And what man had Thies seen?
“I can’t talk about it,” he went on, “or else they’ll put me in a home. And I’ll have to stay there till I die.”
Suddenly he raised his head and looked at her with bright blue eyes, as desperate as a figure in the paintings in Dr. Lauterbach’s office.
“I can’t talk about it,” he repeated. “Can’t talk about it. Or they’ll put me in a home.” He pushed the picture he had drawn over to Pia. “Can’t talk. Can’t talk.”
She looked at the picture and gave a shudder. A girl with long dark hair. A man running away. Another man bashing in the head of the dark-haired girl with a cross.
“That isn’t Amelie, is it?” Pia asked softly.
“Can’t talk,” he whispered hoarsely. “Can’t talk. Only draw.”
Pia’s heart beat faster as she grasped what Thies was trying to tell her. Somebody had forbidden him to talk about what he had seen. He wasn’t talking about Amelie. And the picture didn’t show Amelie either, but Stefanie Schneeberger and her murderer.
Thies had turned away from her again, grabbed a crayon, and was raptly drawing a new picture. It seemed as though he had withdrawn completely now. His features were still tense, but he had stopped rocking back and forth. Slowly Pia realized what this young man had been through in recent years. Someone had put pressure on him and threatened him so that he wouldn’t tell anyone what he had seen eleven years ago. But who had done that? Suddenly she also realized what danger Thies Terlinden was in if that person found out what he had just told the police. To protect him she had to pretend, even to the doctor, that it was completely irrelevant.
“Oh well,” she said. “Thanks a lot, at any rate.” She got up, and the doctor and orderly did too.
“Snow White must die. That’s what they said,” Thies announced all of a sudden. “But nobody can do anything to her anymore. I’m watching out for her.”
* * *
The fog and drizzle kept no one in Altenhain from accompanying the mortal remains of Laura Wagner on her last journey. The parking lot in front of the Black Horse couldn’t hold all the cars. Pia simply parked up the street, climbed out of the car, and walked briskly toward the tolling bells of the church, where Oliver was waiting for her on the covered porch.
“Thies saw everything that happened in 1997,” she blurted out the news. “He did paint pictures, just as Amelie told Tobias. Somebody put pressure on him, telling him that he’d be sent to a home if he ever told anyone what he saw.”
“What did he say about Amelie?” Bodenstein was impatient, a sign that he too had found out something important.
“Nothing. Only that he didn’t do anything to her. But he spoke about Stefanie and even drew a picture.”
Pia fished the folded paper out of her purse and handed it to Oliver.
He glanced at it and frowned, then pointed at the cross. “That’s the tire iron. The murder weapon.”
Pia nodded excitedly. “Who could have threatened him? His father?”
“Maybe. He probably wouldn’t have wanted his own son to get mixed up in such a crime.”
“But Thies didn’t do anything,” Pia countered. “He was only a witness.”
“I’m not talking about Thies,” Oliver shot back. The bell stopped tolling. “This morning I was called to a suicide. A man took his life in a car in the parking lot by the Nepomuk curve. And the man was Thies’s brother, Lars Terlinden.”
“What?” Pia was shocked.
“That’s right.” Oliver nodded. “What if Lars killed Stefanie and his brother saw it?”
“Lars Terlinden went to study in England right after the girls disappeared.” Pia tried to recall the chronology of events in September 1997. The name of Thies’s brother had never come up in the old files.
“Maybe that was how Claudius Terlinden kept his son out of the investigation. And then he threatened his other son so that he would keep his mouth shut,” Oliver proposed.
“But what did Thies mean when he said that nobody could do anything to Snow White anymore because he would take care of her?”
Oliver shrugged. They didn’t seem any closer to resolving the case. In fact it was getting more and more complicated. They walked around the church to the cemetery. The funeral party had gathered under umbrellas, crowding around the open grave. At that moment the white coffin, with a bouquet of white carnations on top, was being lowered. The men from the funeral parlor withdrew, and the pastor began to speak.
Manfred Wagner had obtained a release from custody to attend the funeral for his eldest daughter. With a stony face he stood in the front row beside his wife and two teenagers. The two warders who had accompanied him waited a short distance away. A young woman wearing stiletto heels hurried past Bodenstein and Kirchhoff without looking at them. She had done up her gleaming blond hair in a simple knot, and she wore a tight black suit and big sunglasses despite the gloomy weather.
“Nadia von Bredow,” Pia explained to her boss. “She’s from Altenhain and was a friend of Laura Wagner’s.”
“Ah, yes.” Oliver was lost in thought. “By the way, I just heard from Dr. Engel that she’s worried about Gregor Lauterbach. Cultural minister or not, he rode back home with Terlinden on the Saturday when Amelie disappeared.”
Pia’s cell began to ring. She quickly took it out and hurried around the corner of the church before she attracted any dirty looks.
“Pia, it’s me,” Ostermann said. “You told me the other day that interview transcripts were missing from the old file.”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Listen to this. I don’t like telling you this, but it occurred to me that Andreas was pretty interested in those files. He stayed late one evening when I was sick at home, and I…”
The rest of his sentence was drowned out by a sudden howl from the siren on the roof of the Black Horse. Pia covered her other ear and asked her colleague to talk louder. Three men left the funeral party when the siren sounded and rushed past Pia toward the parking lot.
“… I’m wondering … prescription … but was in our office…” was all she could make out. “… no idea … ask him … is it?”
“Can’t hear you because of the siren.” Pia was straining to hear. “There’s a fire somewhere. Okay, give it to me again. What about Andreas?”
Ostermann repeated what he’d said before. Pia listened in disbelief.
“That would be absolutely amazing,” she said. “Thanks. We’ll see you later.”
She put away her phone and walked back to Bodenstein, lost in thought.
* * *