back to police headquarters, Max said, “We’ve got to find the other clique members as fast as we can. Either Vogler’s giving us the runaround, or . . .”
Lina knew what he meant. Was Vogler aware that he had been the
rape victim, or was he really convinced that he had only witnessed it over the phone?
Back in the office, Lina surveyed her desk that was cluttered with
notepads, printed forms, flyers, and random notes until her gaze rested on a piece of blue paper. That wasn’t hers; she was sure of that. She grabbed the slip of paper, read the few lines written on it, and frowned.
That’s how Max found her when he entered the room surrounded by a
whiff of peppermint.
“Here’s your coffee . . . What’s the matter?” he asked.
She handed him the blue slip without saying anything. “In re:
Industrial espionage Birkner. A certain Holger Thies is registered as general manager in twelve of the twenty consultation firms used by
Markman Solutions. I hope that helps you. Greetings from the second
floor, Marita Schön.”
It was evening by then, but Hanno and Sebastian were still busy try-
ing to get hold of witnesses from the past. Alex had to locate current friends and acquaintances of Daniel Vogler, but he announced that you can’t squeeze blood from a stone. Vogler had only saved five numbers in his phone: his grandmother’s, Franziska Leyhausen’s, a car repair shop’s, a Gregor Triantaphilidis’s—a general practitioner, as it turned out—and the direct number of Professor Thelmann at the university.
Hanno and Sebastian were a bit luckier. They had found three for-
mer schoolmates of Daniel Vogler and Philip Birkner. They confirmed
that Vogler had been harassed by the clique of Julia Munz and Philip Birkner. One woman had added, however, that Daniel hadn’t been the
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only one suffering their taunts. She said, “He didn’t even leave his own brother alone, this Philip. He was a real creep.” The clique itself seemed to have disappeared.
“We got an address in Hessen for Christian Bischoff, but no luck
reaching him so far,” Hanno said. “He’s receiving long-term unemployment benefits, and I asked our people down there to look for him and question him. With regards to Miriam Haase, we know that she went
to study in the United States, and that’s the end of it. Her parents still live in Hamburg, but the last time they heard from her was ten years ago. She had just joined some fundamentalist sect or other.” He looked through his notes. “Maike Haubach has several priors, mostly small
property crimes. She’s a drug addict and lives in Berlin. No current address is on record.”
They all looked at each other after this enumeration. “The revenge
of fate,” Alex suggested. “Everyone who took part in the rape failed at life.”
“Or they’re dead, like Julia Munz and Philip Birkner,” Sebastian
added.
“In which case someone lent fate a hand.”
Hanno silently scanned the ever-increasing list of witnesses, lifted his head, and looked around. “It looks as if we have the killer, but we have practically no evidence against him as long as we’re still waiting for the DNA results.” He stroked his chin. “Max, what’s going on with that Niels Hinrichsen? He’s a possible witness of the crime, isn’t he?”
Max nodded slowly. “True. He could have seen the killer when he
came back from the brook with the Aaron’s rod.”
“Is he still unfit to be questioned?”
“As far as I know,” Max replied. “But I’ll look into it.”
Hanno sighed. “Who knows what the hell he’ll tell us once he
opens his mouth again. Maybe it’ll just be the same nonsense about
knights with swords.”
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Chapter 17
Cackling laughter could be heard through an open door. Two rooms
down the hall, Max heard a woman call for help. She seemed to have
carried on in a monotonous singsong for hours, maybe days. “Help,
help, help.” He took a deep breath, but faced with such accumulation of sorrow, even he found it difficult to stay serene. He looked at the young woman next to him, who was guiding him quickly through
the hallway of the closed psychiatry ward of the university hospital in Eppendorf.
“Herr Hinrichsen’s neighbor is already here,” the nurse explained
and stopped in front of a closed door. She knocked, pushed down the
handle, and let Max enter ahead of her.
Niels Hinrichsen sat at the edge of the bed, freshly washed and
wearing the clean clothes Max had brought him three days before. The wound on his temple was hidden under a small bandage and he was
beaming. He had put both hands under his thighs and he dangled his