Ursula Archer - Five

At least he seemed to be alone now. He held his breath, listening in case he could still hear breathing in the room. He heard something, but it might have been the wind. A gentle, quiet breeze between the leaves.

Gradually, he began to realise that the darkness wasn’t necessarily synonymous with night. Something had been bound tightly around his head and eyes.

The noose around his neck was gone, and he was sitting now, but the pain in his throat was still unbearable. He tried not to swallow, but that only made it more difficult. His salivary glands worked as though his very awareness of their existence was spurring them on to hyperactivity.

It hurt so much.

He whimpered involuntarily. Thought about the policewoman with the blonde hair who had given him a chance. Wished fervently, with all the energy he had left, that he could turn back time.

There. A noise. He raised his head and struggled to suppress a sob. Tried to speak, but his voice was only a rasp and trembled so much that hardly a word he said was decipherable. At the third attempt, he managed to get a whole sentence out.

‘Will you… let me go?’

He didn’t get an answer. Maybe he was mistaken; maybe he was alone after all and his mind was just playing tricks with him. That would be good. Better than the alternative.

It was only when he heard the cough that he realised his senses were still functioning. He struggled against the ties that bound him. ‘Please, let me go, I’ve told you everything.’

A hand on his head, almost a caress. And then the voice.

‘That doesn’t change the fact that I still don’t know enough.’

The morning was sunny and bright, announcing its arrival through the broad slats of the half-shut Venetian blinds. Beatrice awoke gradually for a change, drifting slowly and languidly at the surface of her consciousness.

The shirt she was wearing smelt of unfamiliar washing powder. Because… she wasn’t at home, but in Florin’s spare room. She sat up, feeling as though she had slept too late, but her watch said it was only half-past six. Her next glance was directed at her mobile, and even though she was sure an incoming message would have woken her, she still checked to be sure. Nothing.

Tiptoeing on bare feet, she made her way out to the bathroom. Florin was standing at the hob frying eggs, his hair still wet. ‘I’ve put towels on the stool next to the shower, and you’ll find everything else by the sink,’ he called.

While she was brushing her teeth, Beatrice wondered why she felt much fresher than she usually did at this time of the morning. And younger. It reminded her of her days as a student, of staying overnight in unfamiliar flatshares after long parties, of—

Pushing the thoughts away, she rinsed out her mouth, got under the shower and started to plan the day ahead. Their main goal was to find the key figure.

‘We worked on it all night.’ Drasche shot Beatrice a look which implied that she was personally responsible for that fact. ‘The apartment wasn’t the scene of the crime, that much is clear.’

‘Did you find fingerprints? The letters on the TV screen were most likely left by the killer.’

‘Who wore gloves, yet again.’ He raised his coffee cup to his lips, took a slurp and pulled a face. ‘All of the prints we’ve evaluated so far are the victim’s. For which, as luck would have it, we have a variety of fingers at our disposal for comparison.’ He laughed. ‘The car hasn’t been much help either. There are some hairs, presumably belonging to Beil’s wife. Unless the perpetrator has long blonde hair – shit!’ In the process of gesticulating wildly to depict the hair length, Drasche had spilt coffee all over his shirt. ‘So, did you two at least manage to get home at a reasonable hour in the end?’

Beatrice felt herself go red. Of course Drasche didn’t know anything about her sleepover – innocent sleepover – at Florin’s. Each of them had driven to work in their own cars. But she still felt as though she’d been caught in the act.

‘There’s no need to look so offended. I know you two work hard too.’

Offended . Smiling, Beatrice shook her head. Drasche was in exactly the right job with the forensics. He wouldn’t have been suited as a psychologist.

As soon as she was out of the room, the first person she saw – appropriately, given that last thought – was Kossar, waiting in front of the door to her office. She sighed and ushered him in.

‘I had a very interesting evening,’ he began. ‘Where’s Wenninger? I think this will interest him too. In fact, I’m sure it will.’

‘Florin’s with Hoffmann. I’m sure he’ll be here soon though, so let’s make a start. Do you want a coffee?’

He did. While Beatrice busied herself with the machine, he sauntered around the room, inspecting everything closely as though he was thinking of buying it.

It was only when she sat down that he too pulled up a chair. ‘I haven’t created a definitive perpetrator profile yet, of course,’ he said. ‘I’ll need to study as many similar cases as I can from the files before I can make a substantiated testimony. But I have managed to establish some first impressions, and in my opinion they should stand up to inspection.’ He looked at Beatrice expectantly.

‘And?’ she asked, a little confused. ‘Please go on.’

‘Okay. We can assume that we’re dealing with a perpetrator who is planning his actions, rather than acting in an uncontrolled way. He’s not just killing his victims, but also satisfying other needs, one of which particularly jumps out at me: that he wants to be in contact with us. He sends his messages via the murdered victims – the tattooed coordinates with Nora Papenberg, the notes in the caches, and not least the body parts. He forces us to listen to him, and to engage with what he sends us.’

That was nothing new. ‘So you think his main motive is a desire for attention?’

‘Without a doubt. He also wants to pit himself against us, to prove himself; that comes across very clearly in his messages.’

‘But it’s also very clear that he doesn’t take us seriously. Why would he want to pit himself against someone who he regards to be incapable?’

Kossar straightened his glasses. ‘Well, have you ever been to a boxing match? Before it starts, the opponents often shout abuse at each other, provoking one another. By doing so, they motivate themselves and try to make the other man angry, because then he might make mistakes.’ He sipped at his coffee. ‘I suspect the perpetrator exhibits strong narcissistic tendencies. He enjoys picturing the police trying to fathom the pieces of the puzzle he’s throwing at their feet. I’m sure he’d love to be here in person, watching us come up with theories and pulling our hair out in frustration because none of it makes any sense.’

Florin had arrived in the middle of the last sentence. ‘Is that what you think?’ he asked. ‘Does none of the information in the files make any sense to you?’

‘No, on the contrary. But at the moment the information we have mainly draws attention to individual aspects of the perpetrator’s psyche.’

‘Like what, for example?’

Kossar stared thoughtfully at his hands. ‘Normally, when a person is acting like this I would assume he picks his victims at random, studies them for a while and then rips them from their lives. Like God, you see? He watches how his chosen ones contend with their daily lives, drive their cars, care for their families, knowing that he’s going to put an end to it all, at a time and in a way that suits him. Like a sadistic child watching an anthill and then plunging a burning match into it.’

Kossar lifted a finger. For a moment, he resembled a pompous old headmaster giving a lecture. ‘But unlike most perpetrators who act like that, this one is making a connection between the victims. He leads us from one to the next: Nora Papenberg was the signpost to Herbert Liebscher’s body parts. Those, in turn, led us to Christoph Beil and on to Bernd Sigart. Now Beil has disappeared, and you—’ he looked at Beatrice – ‘have a feeling that he knew Nora Papenberg but kept quiet about it.’