Craig Russell - The Valkyrie Song

The preliminary forensics survey of Sparwald’s house had, as expected, surrendered nothing much. Fabel was surprised, however, at just how much Astrid Bremer had been able to read from such meagre trace evidence. She was still at Poppenbuttel when she phoned him at his office in the Presidium.

‘I’ve had the body removed and we’ll get the autopsy report, obviously. But my guess is that the victim was dead before he hit the floor. The killer put another bullet in him, firing along the victim’s already supine body and causing an entry wound under his chin. Very professional job. The last shot was probably insurance. Professional meticulousness.’

‘There was a similar murder outside Oslo,’ said Fabel. ‘Exactly the same modus.’

‘My guess is that the victim didn’t let the killer into the house. There was a book beside him on the floor. No prints other than his own and it’s obvious he dropped it when he was shot. And I found powder traces on the wall by the lounge door and on the edge of the door itself. Again no prints on the door handle or anywhere else that I could see. I’m guessing that the killer opened the lounge door, stepped in and fired before the victim had time to respond. The killer didn’t need to go any further into the room, so she retraced her steps back along the hall to the front door. It was a hunch, but I was right: there is no evidence of the door having been forced, but there is some fresh scratching around the lock. She picked it.’

‘But nothing we can get DNA from? Or any trace of any kind?’ Fabel failed to conceal his frustration.

‘A faint partial bootprint in the hall, bearing traces of soil from the garden, but that could have been anyone’s and made at any time. And, anyway, it’s not big enough to give us a match.’

‘Great,’ said Fabel.

‘Sorry. I did my best,’ said Astrid and, even over the phone, Fabel could tell that she meant it. ‘I went over everything three times. Tried all the tricks. There just wasn’t anything to find.’

‘It’s not your fault. Holger told me that if anyone could get something, you could. He also said you’re the best he’s worked with for cold scenes.’

‘Thanks,’ Astrid said. ‘But whoever killed Sparwald is better.’

After he’d hung up Fabel made his way into the main Murder Commission meeting room. Werner, Anna, Henk and Dirk were waiting for him. He had also invited Karin Vestergaard to join them, but she had phoned in to say she’d be a few minutes late.

‘You know,’ said Werner, ‘if we’re looking for a Valkyrie, we couldn’t go far wrong looking at the Danish ice maiden. She’s a cold one all right.’

‘She’s a good cop, from what I can see,’ said Fabel.

‘Listen,’ said Anna, ‘while we’re on the subject of people we should be thinking about… I’m not being funny, but there are two women we should maybe take a long hard look at. Martina Schilmann and Petra Meissner.’

‘Why Martina?’ Fabel searched Anna’s face for meaning. ‘She’s ex-Polizei Hamburg, for God’s sake.’

‘She was also involved with Westland and was there at the scene. Let’s face it, we’ve only got her word that she was at the opposite end of Herbertstrasse all the time she said she was. And she was brought up in the GDR, as was Petra Meissner. Both fall within the age range we have for the Valkyrie.’

‘What?’ said Fabel dismissively. ‘So now we’re going to suspect all women from East Germany? We’d better bring in Chancellor Merkel, then. She was brought up in Brandenburg, after all.’ Fabel sarcastically put on an expression of enlightenment. ‘And she was in the Free German Youth!’

‘Seriously, Chef,’ pressed Anna. ‘We can’t ignore the fact that two women involved with Jake Westland spent their youth in the GDR.’

‘But Martina’s background will have been thoroughly checked out before she was allowed to join the Polizei Hamburg. And I would say that Petra Meissner’s public profile is far too visible for her to operate as a professional killer.’

‘Maybe so,’ said Anna. ‘But if Martina Schilmann is the Valkyrie, then her backstory in the GDR would be as solid as it could be…’

‘Okay, check it out.’ Fabel turned to Hechtner. ‘Dirk, were you able to get any more on who “Olaf” might be — the name in Jespersen’s notebook?’

‘Nope, sorry, Chef. From the little we’ve been able to piece together, there’s nothing to suggest Drescher ever used “Olaf” as a pseudonym. No Olafs that we can see connected to Goran Vuja i c, Jake Westland or Armin Lensch either. We’re still looking into any Olaf that Ralf Sparwald might have known.’

‘It could be incidental,’ said Fabel. ‘Maybe nothing to it all.’

Fabel waited until Vestergaard arrived and the rest of the team had assembled in the Incident Room.

‘Okay. We’ve got a break,’ he said addressing the whole team. ‘Thanks to Anna, we’ve cracked the code behind Drescher’s messages to the Valkyrie. All the messages have been simple time-and-place set-ups for meetings. It’s an example of institutional thinking. They formed their working system in a time before reunification, using the methods of the Cold War. I’m guessing that Drescher was uncomfortable with new technology, otherwise they could have used the Internet or anonymous email accounts. Having said that, there’s no evidence that they didn’t use these means in addition to the magazine announcements.’

‘Why do it at all?’ asked Werner. ‘After all, they could have simply phoned each other. No one knew who Drescher was and she could have had an untraceable cellphone.’

‘Like I said, institutional thinking. Drescher was in the same city as the Valkyrie, but their entire relationship had been created to operate at long distances, with the Valkyrie working on her own most of the time. When they set up in Hamburg, post-Reunification, they kept their old way of working. Inflexibility, I suppose.’

As he spoke, Fabel noticed that Astrid Bremer, the deputy head of the forensics team, had come into the Incident Room and was standing at the back.

‘Anyway,’ continued Fabel, ‘we’ve managed to get the cooperation of Muliebritas magazine. They’re going to hold us a space in the next issue. It’s due out next week, so we’ve had to work fast to get our wording right. There doesn’t seem to be any regular meeting place. The only common element is that it seems to always be in an open space, presumably so she can check it out as she approaches him, but with enough people around for them to be inconspicuous. As far as we can see, all meetings have been in Altona or Hamburg city centre.’

‘What about the Rathausplatz in front of the City Chambers?’ asked Anna. ‘We could put someone on each corner and on the U-Bahn entrance.’

‘I suspect that would be a little too public for the Valkyrie. Drescher always picked quieter venues. People milling about but not crowds. The other thing is we want to limit the risk to the public if things go pear-shaped.’

‘What if we used the Altona Balkon?’ asked Werner.

‘Drescher used it once before, as far as we can see. The last meeting, in fact.’

‘What about the Alsterpark next to where you used to live, Chef?’ said Anna. ‘On the shores of the Outer Alster? It would be reasonably easy to secure but quite difficult for the Valkyrie to spot us.’

Fabel thought for a moment. ‘That sounds good. Anybody have any objections?’

There were none.

‘Okay,’ said Fabel to Werner. ‘Let’s get this encrypted and spread across three announcements, the way Drescher did: “Alsterpark at Fahrdamm. Eleven-thirty, Wednesday”. That gives us a week to get it all set up. In the meantime, I’m going to do a bit of digging into Goran Vuja i c ’s history. It was his untimely demise that brought Jens Jespersen to Hamburg.’ He turned to Vestergaard and spoke in English. ‘I’d like you to come along with me, if that’s okay. I’d also like us both to go and visit Gina Bronsted. The NeuHansa Group keeps cropping up in all of this.’