He shrugged. Apparently he had not asked. He really wasn’t in top form.
“Leo Andresen said he’d check it out. He remembers the accident well, even though he didn’t work with the people involved. He worked with high voltage, I think he said, which was based elsewhere. That plant is huge.”
“Then we’ll have to keep our fingers crossed that he finds someone who knows a bit more.”
Carl pushed the documents he had been looking at in front of Assad.
“These are two account statements, and don’t ask me how I got ahold of them.”
He drew circles around various figures around the turn of each month on both statements. “Look here, and there, and there.”
Carl tapped on a few of the circles. “These are Rigmor Zimmermann’s withdrawals since January 1st. As you can see, there are large cash withdrawals at the end of every month. And then look here.”
He pointed at a couple of figures on the other statement.
“This is the daughter’s account. Funnily enough, in the same period a slightly smaller amount is deposited in her account just after the start of the month. So Birgit Zimmermann probably had her hands on her mother’s money before depositing it in her account, from where she had set up direct debit payments to take care of her and Denise’s rent, utilities, and so on. At least that’s what the figures seem to suggest.”
Assad’s eyes lit up. “Score,” he said quietly.
Carl nodded. “Exactly. And what does this tell us? I wonder if Rigmor Zimmermann was supporting her daughter and granddaughter long-term.”
“And she obviously didn’t this month because she was killed on April 26th.” Assad had the same calm look in his eyes as when he stood up from his prayer rug. He counted on his fingers as he tallied up the facts.
“One. According to Birgit Zimmermann, her mother was carrying the money when she visited her on April 26th.
“Two. The money hasn’t been deposited in Birgit’s account, and therefore a lot of bills haven’t been paid for May.
“Three. It seems reasonable to conclude that the daughter didn’t receive the money the day Rigmor Zimmermann was killed.
“Four. Something happened that day that made Rigmor Zimmermann decide not to give her daughter the money like she normally did.
“Five. We don’t know why!”
“I completely agree, Assad. And six: Does this help us in any way given that we don’t know anything about the relationship between Rigmor and Birgit Zimmermann?
“Of course, we’ll have to confront Birgit with the facts, but I also think you need to investigate further into her mother’s background. Who was Rigmor Zimmermann? Was she supporting her daughter because she expected something in return? And did she hold back the money on April 26th because she didn’t get what she wanted? Was it a form of blackmail? Or was it a question of simply changing procedure?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why would you give someone cash in that way? I’m thinking it might be because the receiver wouldn’t necessarily have to pay tax on the amount. But what if Rigmor Zimmermann got cold feet? That she suddenly realized that the connection we have just made was one the tax authorities could just as easily make. And what if she didn’t dare take that risk anymore? Maybe she thought she shouldn’t be the one to pay for the daughter and granddaughter’s social fraud.”
“Could that have happened?”
“Maybe if the amount was big enough. But no, I don’t think that was likely. But she might have thought it was. It’s also a possibility that Rigmor Zimmermann intended to pay the money into her daughter’s account directly from then on. Perhaps she knew about her daughter’s alcohol problem and didn’t want to risk the money being used in the wrong way.”
“But couldn’t Birgit Zimmermann just have withdrawn the money and spent it on booze afterward?” asked Assad.
Of course he was right. There were a lot of aspects to this otherwise simple calculation.
“In any case, the mother had enough money to support her daughter and granddaughter, I can see.” Assad pointed at the main balance. There was more than six million.
Carl nodded. That alone was motive enough to wish her dead.
“Do we suspect Birgit Zimmermann, Carl?”
“I don’t know, Assad. Check the background of these three Zimmermann women. Find out as much as you can, Assad, and give me the number of that guy from the steel plant. I’ll go and visit him.”
“His name is Leo M. Andresen and he used to be the union rep and head of one of the sections at the plant, Carl. So be nice.”
That was some insinuation. Wasn’t he always nice to people?
—
Although he was retired, the former union representative Leo M. Andresen had a youthful voice and an even younger-sounding vocabulary, which made it difficult to determine his age over the phone.
“Let’s just meet up here when I’ve found someone who’s a bit more down with the current setup, Carl M?rck. There are enough of us old steel boys to create an army. Anyway, if I find someone, we’ll take a quick round of the plant and check out where the guy kicked the bucket.”
“Er, thank you! So the site of the accident still exists? I was under the impression that there had been a lot of changes at the plant?”
He laughed. “Yeah, W15 has been expanded in every imaginable way—you’re not wrong there. The slabs come straight from Russia now that we no longer mound them ourselves, so there isn’t the same need for space as there used to be. But the part of the section where Arne Knudsen met his end looks more or less the same.”
“So you get the finished product from Russia?”
“Not quite. We import the steel slabs from Russia and roll them into plates.”
“I see, so that’s the only thing they do at the plant now?”
“Yeah, I wouldn’t say ‘only’; there’s more to it than that. They receive the steel from Russia in big slabs and heat them up to around twelve hundred degrees Celsius, then roll them into plates of different sizes and only to order.”
Carl had more questions, but then someone in the background shouted, “Leo, coffee’s ready!” and the man said good-bye.
A perfect example of how a pensioner’s day could drastically change from one second to the next.
27
Thursday, May 26th, 2016
Michelle sat on the edge of the sofa with her head in her hands. It was all just so horrible that she had been crying most of the night. As soon as they had come home, she had done everything she could to make them understand how serious the situation was. That they had committed armed robbery and then shot a girl.
That it had already been reported on the radio.