driver on the windowsill and a crumpled plastic bag in a corner. A little girl must have once lived in the next room. Hundreds of replicas of
Princess Lillifee laughed from the walls and the floor was soft, plush, and pink. This room, too, was empty.
When Max and Lina were back in the gloomy, narrow hall, they
heard groaning. It could also have been a mixture of snoring, cough-
ing, and yawning. Lina cautiously pushed down the door handle of the room the sound had come from. A mattress was on the floor under the
window and on it, under a thin wool blanket, one could see the con-
tours of a body. The head with shaggy hair and a beard that had long outgrown a fashionable designer stubble was turned slightly toward the door. The man lay on his back, had one hand over his eyes, and was
breathing through his half-open mouth.
“Herr Jensen?” she said quietly.
His nose twitched. He scratched it as if he was about to sneeze. He
moaned quietly.
“Herr Jensen?” Lina repeated, slightly louder.
Startled, the man flung his hand from his eyes, raised his head, and squinted at Lina. It was difficult to guess his age—somewhere between thirty and fifty. Spittle had accumulated in the corner of his mouth.
Max followed Lina into the room, which once must have been the
master bedroom. One could still see the marks of a wardrobe and of a large bed on the carpet. The window was closed, and the room reeked
of an unwashed body and booze.
“Herr Jensen, I’m Max Berg from Major Crimes, Hamburg. This
is my colleague, Lina Svenson.”
The man stared at them without saying anything.
“The door was ajar and you didn’t react when we rang the bell.”
Max addressed him patiently, but the man still didn’t move.
53
Maria C. Poets
“We have a few questions we’d like to ask you. Would you mind
getting up and coming downstairs with us?”
Frank Jensen frowned, still seemingly confused about the presence
of two strangers in his bedroom. He gazed from Max to Lina and then
from her head to her feet.
“I’ll wait downstairs,” she said and left the room.
Shortly afterward, the old wooden floorboards were creaking above
her, and she heard low mumbling and swearing and then loud rum-
bling when Frank Jensen stumbled down the staircase. Max followed
him silently.
Frank Jensen shuffled into the kitchen, paying no attention to his
visitors. His jeans almost slipped down his hips and were in dire need of washing. The T-shirt looked as if it had been pulled out of a dona-tion basket. Lina could smell yesterday’s drink on him and knew that he hadn’t taken a shower for quite some time.
Jensen claimed the only stool in the kitchen, forcing Lina and Max
to stand. Still silent, Jensen fumbled around on the table until he found a pack of cigarettes. His hands were trembling when he lit one. It was sticky in the room and Max, without asking, went to the kitchen window and flung it open. Jensen didn’t even lift his head.
“Herr Jensen, we’re investigating a murder that happened the night
before last,” Max said. There was no reaction. Jensen was balancing on his stool, swaying a little. “You know Philip Birkner, don’t you?” Jensen finally raised his head and looked at Max, who said, “He was murdered some time late Thursday night or early Friday morning.”
Jensen burped and then had hiccups that made his belly shake. It
took a while for Lina to notice that it wasn’t hiccups—the man was
laughing. Eventually he inhaled deeply and said, “Good riddance.”
Lina and Max looked at each other.
“Herr Jensen, I have to ask you where you were Thursday night
between eleven and three.”
54
Dead Woods
Jensen burped again. Then he frowned as if he were thinking hard.
“Here,” he said. His voice sounded washed up, as if he had woken up
just as drunk as he was when he fell asleep. “In some dive first, and then here.”
“In which bar?” Max asked patiently.
“Dunno. Was hopping around,” Jensen replied with another
frown. “At the Almira, I think. And at Azaley and at the Tropicana. Or in that joint, what’s the name, in that street, the one near the market.
Oh, man.” He wiped his face.
“Were you alone?” Max asked.
The man nodded. “In the Almira I met Dirk, or is it Dieter?
No, he’s called Dirk. I’ve seen him there a few times. Or was it at the Tropicana?” He hiccupped again and then started to nod and seemed
unable to stop nodding. “Philip, that son of a bitch,” he finally said in a halting voice. “He’s the one responsible for all this.” He