The Valkyrie Song

2

Anna Wolff had spent three nights retracing the drunken footsteps of Armin Lensch. She had also spent the time thinking about the situation she had got herself into. She had been involved in seventeen murder cases since Fabel had selected her for his team. Seventeen different killings for motives as banal as drunken rage or sexual jealousy.

And a few, like these latest ones, had been for motives so twisted and abstract that she knew that no matter how long she served in the Murder Commission, she would never get the measure of the minds behind them. Fabel did, though. It was in itself a creepy thought: that he understood these people. Maybe he was right after all: maybe she wasn’t suited to being a Murder Commission officer.

Anna still couldn’t wrap her mind around the fact that the guy she’d kneed in the groin was now dead. For some abstract reason she couldn’t understand, she felt she had contributed to his death. Maybe it wasn’t that abstract. From what she could gather from his friends, they had teased him about his encounter with her and he had gone off on his own into the night. And then someone had murdered him. The final element in a sequence of events that she could have been said to have set in motion.

It was too close for comfort.

‘Where do you want to go now, Commissar?’ Theo asked her. She turned to him. Theo Wangler was the Davidwache uniform who had been assigned to accompany her as she did the rounds of the bars and clubs. And the uniform hung well on him: Wangler was two metres tall and obviously worked out. Weights, Anna reckoned. He had a broad, strong jaw and when he had taken his hat off to brush back his hair with his fingers she had noticed it was thick, dark and wavy. People as good-looking as he was were usually assholes. She had decided in that instant of first meeting that she disliked him, but would not rule out a bit of a tumble with him. As it turned out, her first impressions had been wrong: Wangler was a quiet type, almost shy. But as they had gone from one bar to the other, she had seen he had a quiet assertiveness about him that kept the unruly in their place yet was unaggressive enough for him to be able to talk reason into all but the most drunk or the most cop-hating. It was, she realised, an ideal temperament for a police officer. A temperament she knew she didn’t possess. Anna decided to dislike Wangler all over again.

The Reeperbahn was long and wide and straight, ideal for weaving the reep, as rope was called in Low German, from which the former ropewalk street had got its name. By day it looked dreary and tawdry, by night it became one of the most illuminated streets in Germany. But, as they made their way along the Reeperbahn, there was something about its ten-thirty neon sparkle that was deeply depressing. A forced, manic jollity. Anna and Wangler had visited one sleazy bar after another, getting nothing from the bar staff. They had done most of their talking to the security men on the doors of the clubs and bars, most of whom, like the bartenders and hostesses, greeted Wangler with a warm handshake or at least a nod of acknowledgement.

‘I’ve worked here for four years,’ explained Wangler, as they made their way along the sinful mile, passing a sex shop with a window full of improbably proportioned sex aids. ‘You get to know people.’

‘Do you like working this beat?’ asked Anna.

‘It’s okay… people have the wrong idea about the Kiez. An old idea, I suppose. Even Superintendent Kaminski. He was on the beat here in the old days and I sometimes think he’s of the opinion that it’s all going to the dogs because the brothels are shutting up shop and the trendy bars, musical theatres and luxury flats are moving in. There’s even an advertising agency setting up its offices here.’

‘That’s all good, isn’t it?’

‘Well, there’s the other side to it. The Reeperbahn used to sell cheap sex. Now it sells cheap booze. The Kiez has become infected with the British Disease — binge drinking, particularly in the clubs. It’s changed the kind of street crime we deal with. Less thievery, more violence.’

‘Isn’t the ban working?’ Anna referred to the recent injunction against the carrying of any weapons in the Reeperbahn and the Kiez. A designated weapon-free zone had been set up, with yellow signs standing at the perimeter.

‘A little. But your Angel seems to be contravening it…’

Anna laughed. They broke off their conversation as they came to the doorway of another club. Two bull-necked Neanderthals stood with their hands folded in front of them in the traditional stance of security staff.

‘Why do they always stand like that?’ Anna asked Wangler. ‘You know, as if they’re protecting their balls?’

‘Maybe they’ve heard about you…’ Wangler laughed.

‘You know about that?’

‘Everybody knows about that.’ Wangler turned to the first doorman. ‘Hi, Heiner.’

‘Hi, Theo.’ The huge doorman spoke with a remarkably soft voice. A little high-pitched. ‘How’s it going?’

‘The usual. Listen, Heiner, this is Criminal Commissar Wolff of the Murder Commission. She’d like to ask you a couple of questions.’

‘She can ask me anything, any time…’ The doorman smiled at Anna. His mate joined in but Anna reckoned it was a reflex action. The other doorman did not look sufficiently evolved to be capable of independent thought. Anna returned the smile with a weary one of her own. She handed the doorman a photograph of Armin Lensch.

‘I don’t suppose you’ve seen this guy?’ asked Anna.

The doorman glanced at the photograph. He shrugged colossal shoulders and handed it back to Anna. Then he checked himself. ‘Wait a minute. Let me see it again…’ Anna handed the photograph back to him. ‘Yeah… yeah, I seen him. I seen him on Friday… no, Saturday night. Over there.’ He pointed across the wide roadway. ‘I seen him get into a taxi.’

‘You remember everyone you see getting into a taxi?’ asked Anna.

‘No. But I remember this guy because I didn’t think it was a taxi. Or a taxi on duty, anyway. It looked dodgy.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, it was the right model — a Merc E-class, and it was the right colour, ivory-beige — but it didn’t have a roof sign. The reason I paid attention was ’cause I noticed the car came up from behind him. I don’t think he realised it wasn’t a taxi. You’ve got to watch for shit like that — you know, pervs pretending to be taxi drivers and picking up girls and stuff. Or drunken guys being picked up and rolled for their cash. It don’t happen much because nobody’s got a car the same colour as a taxi.’

‘And you would identify this man as the one who got into the taxi? Or fake taxi?’ Anna tapped the photograph.

‘Yeah, he was in here earlier in the night with a bunch of other guys. Mouthy little prick. I recognised him when I saw him over the road.’

‘You said you watch out for guys being rolled — why didn’t you report seeing him get into the car or do something to stop it?’ asked Wangler.

‘It could have been a genuine taxi. Whether it was or not, I didn’t think at the time that he was in danger.’

‘Why?’ asked Anna.

‘Well.’ Heiner the Neanderthal shrugged his massive shoulders. ‘I reckoned he was safe. With it being a woman driver and all…’